Twitter

Monday

Am I getting agnostic?

Disclaimer - This should give a clarity on my spiritual stance. I've collected information from peer-reviewed sources and peers themselves. I am God fearing and also believe in the duality of nature. My outlook on life is a cognizance of all this part-belief, part-reverence data.
My religion - I am a great fan of Sanathana Dharma. It is my hereditary religion. I fell in love with it once I was able to comprehend the fact that it is an intelligent religion to begin with.It gives ample scope of self-realization. Naturally, it worries me when friends take to the sensationalism and hype rather than the essence of the religion. It does not cater to idol worship. Yet, the hottest topics associated with the religion today center around authenticity of birth-places, recorded Godly activities; so on and so forth. I yearn for company that sees my religion the way I see it.
God(s) - My findings tell me that the oldest known scripture is what we collectively call 'The Vedas'. I've accepted the fact that not everyone can understand the Vedas let alone follow its preaching. (The precise reason why there has only been one Aaadhi Shankaracharya!). The next available texts seem to be the Ramayana and the Mahabharatha. I believe that these were written after the Vedas and were aimed at mass education. The idea was to introduce characters as incarnations of the Supermen being and stories that helped convey the Vedic core. Where the Vedas were elemental, the epics were narrative and gave human form to various theories propounded in the Veda. People were able to identify God once a human form was provided. In "A tiger for Malgudi", R.K.Narayan beautifully symbolizes God to be a ferocious 50 foot tiger with multiple heads and many limbs. Of course, the narrator of the tale was a tiger. The Ramayana is character driven - wholly based on Rama and introduced the concept of idol worship - idols symbolizing moral goals. The Mahabharatha was more ambitious and could have easily been Krishna-centric. There was a lot more to convey and eventually the canvas was too big for one character. The longevity of these epics are amazing. Any story born out of human consciousness will find its origin in the Mahabharatha. The Gita is the moral arm of this multi-layered magnum opus. The Puranas were later derived from these scriptures to justify different needs. I've been able to draw a lot of parallels between tales in the Mahabharatha and tales in the Greek epics by Homer. A good story is always adapted.
Prayer - Choose a clean place devoid of distractions. Strive for inner peace. Resolve to help others. Start your day with a smile. - This is the translation I got for a sloka that I've known all my life.  I never chant this Sloka anymore until I feel that I can justify its message. It has also given me the arrogance to laugh at someone who says he chants this sloka a hundred times every second Friday using a certain flower, facing a certain direction and in general resolving to help himself or herself to the 'loukik' pleasures of life. Nobody does charity anymore. Yet, that is the singular characteristic of the religion.
Hope - Licensing the fore-mentioned arrogance, I hope everyone will stop glorifying the religion - as opposed to learning it and living it.

1 comment:

  1. Anonymous8:53 PM

    This was definitely not mumbling :) I like your stance.
    -Smitha

    ReplyDelete