Civilisation does not equate to civility!

Civilisation does not assure civility!

So, what is it that makes someone great? Is he the one who has conquered all his animalistic desires and knows that his real needs are beyond the realm of physicality and materialism? This man seeks knowledge and is satisfied when the lock of the meaning of life and the hidden secret of the Universe is unlocked. Such a man is fiction. Nietzsche described him as Übermensch. Hindus referred to him as Rama or Krishna, the revised 2.0 version of a complex man. 

Javanese Trishul

Another version of understanding how life works is to look at Hinduism's representation of the Universe - Trimurti, the Trinity - Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva and their consorts. Brahma, the creator, has to work in tandem with his consort, Saraswati. Saraswati is the Goddess of education and creativity. The take-home message here is that to create anything; one needs to have enough knowledge and creativity.

Once the creation is done, life does not just go on unabashed. It has to be preserved and preserved well. To maintain this creation and look after it, one needs the brains, plus the resources for that. For this comes Vishnu, the divinity assigned for this purpose, who operates with his consort, Laxmi, the Goddess of wealth and prosperity. The point here is that to conserve any creation; we need affluence. Wealth is required to ensure the continuity of anything that we create. Maintenance takes money. And money begets money.

At the same time, to guard any property, one should have to power to destroy evil and negative forces. Human instinct is to usurp and squander. He will sleep until his material possession is more than his neighbour's. The guardian for this is Shiva, the dissolver (destroyer). Goddess Sakti or her manifestations Parvati or Kaali, the most ferocious form of divinity, is there to assist him in his task. To maintain the status quo and to keep one's possessions intact, he needs to have the power to destroy. Power is mandatory to stay in charge. Unstoppable rage is pointless. Shiva, by being the brake to unbridled violence, acts against the killing machine of Sakti.

One cannot go on destroying everything in sight forever like what the jihadists are doing. Nothing would be left to protect or protect for. Hence, the creation, preservation and destruction cycle needs to be repeated.

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