Of Religion, Spirituality and Godman !
The first thing I do in the morning is to get that day’s newspaper and head directly to the loo. Around a week back or so there was this four-page supplement along with The Hindu dedicated to satya sai baba on His birthday. That left me wondering about this self proclaimed God. Does he really deserves a full four pages of coverage in a news paper none other than the stature of The Hindu, which surely is class apart from the ilk of TOIs and DCs. That led me to some search on net about sai baba and others of same genre. And came across quite a good amount of controversy about him.
This post is not about if this guy is right or wrong. Rather I think I put forward my point of view on matters related to this. I wont argue if there is God or not and any such non conclusive debate issues. This will be about why they believe in them.
I think every human being is a seeker in some way or other. Some how every body wants to understand oneself and ones relation with everybody else in the larger scheme of nature. And in this endeavor some seek help of some external teacher and other resort to some kind of rational thinking and analysis to reach to a logical conclusion and still there are some who don’t want to head in any direction. I myself fall in second category. They say education helps you to become rational and logical but I don’t think education has anything to do with the belief and faith, otherwise how do you explain the premier of Indian state being a devotee of some self proclaimed God. Even some of my professionally educated friends consider him God and are part of that educated middle class from which most of the follower of sai baba comes. So I don’t think education has anything to do with belief even if that is blind faith. I am not here to ridicule or mock their feelings , but I want to understand the psychology behind the same.
My take on the issue is , as I mentioned earlier that perhaps its human quest to achieve self awakening and self realization , and in that if one still have some unanswered questions then they seek some external help in the form of God or Godman or some religious guru. And once they feel that this particular association can help them in understanding the larger scheme and their relation with the same , they tend to form a kind of bonding and with that generates a faith , a belief in them . And once you start believing in some thing at times you may overlook reasoning. But what the heck as long as your association or lack of it , brings happiness , understanding and satisfaction in your life nothing else matters.
A passing thought. Isn’t their faith in God and God’s will act as shock absorber in many cases, when in a person in a particular situation considers that as the will of God and accepts the same however drastic the situation may be. This certainly helps in moving forward. But for me and other lesser mortal and non believer, if I can term it that way ,like me who does not seek any thing external to ourselves to understand one self and our relation with the larger scheme in nature are doing equally good , if not better.
In the end beliefe or the lack of it remains the same. Faith does not listens to reason.
Stay Hungry,Stay foolish.
This post is not about if this guy is right or wrong. Rather I think I put forward my point of view on matters related to this. I wont argue if there is God or not and any such non conclusive debate issues. This will be about why they believe in them.
I think every human being is a seeker in some way or other. Some how every body wants to understand oneself and ones relation with everybody else in the larger scheme of nature. And in this endeavor some seek help of some external teacher and other resort to some kind of rational thinking and analysis to reach to a logical conclusion and still there are some who don’t want to head in any direction. I myself fall in second category. They say education helps you to become rational and logical but I don’t think education has anything to do with the belief and faith, otherwise how do you explain the premier of Indian state being a devotee of some self proclaimed God. Even some of my professionally educated friends consider him God and are part of that educated middle class from which most of the follower of sai baba comes. So I don’t think education has anything to do with belief even if that is blind faith. I am not here to ridicule or mock their feelings , but I want to understand the psychology behind the same.
My take on the issue is , as I mentioned earlier that perhaps its human quest to achieve self awakening and self realization , and in that if one still have some unanswered questions then they seek some external help in the form of God or Godman or some religious guru. And once they feel that this particular association can help them in understanding the larger scheme and their relation with the same , they tend to form a kind of bonding and with that generates a faith , a belief in them . And once you start believing in some thing at times you may overlook reasoning. But what the heck as long as your association or lack of it , brings happiness , understanding and satisfaction in your life nothing else matters.
A passing thought. Isn’t their faith in God and God’s will act as shock absorber in many cases, when in a person in a particular situation considers that as the will of God and accepts the same however drastic the situation may be. This certainly helps in moving forward. But for me and other lesser mortal and non believer, if I can term it that way ,like me who does not seek any thing external to ourselves to understand one self and our relation with the larger scheme in nature are doing equally good , if not better.
In the end beliefe or the lack of it remains the same. Faith does not listens to reason.
Stay Hungry,Stay foolish.
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