The escape clause?

Fair dues warning: This is a spiritual post. Please leave if you are easily offended. 

Krishna demolishing Kansa

I heard a talk from a Hindu scholar recently. He was narrating the story of Krishna and the troubling times he was born into. Rather, the Protector of the Universe, Vishnu, manifested himself as Krishna to maintain law and order. Too many influential people were abusing their positions to create chaos, which needed to be curbed.

Krishna's immediate duty was to defeat Kansa, his uncle, a demonic King. Trouble started when Kansa married off his sister, Devaki, to Vasudeva. Deep inside, Kansa intended to usurp Vasudeva's land. At the wedding, a prophecy was heard that Devaki's eighth child would be the reason for Kansa's defeat. Kansa imprisoned the couple, and Devaki's seven children were all killed at birth. Why all the other births, too, not just the eighth? Somebody alerted Kansa that the seven siblings could rally behind the eighth to attack him.

When the eighth child was finally born on an auspicious star on a wet rainy night, the hypnotic illusion of Vishnu came into full force. With sleeping guards and extremely lax security, a child was born, taken out of prison, transported across River Ganga, swapped with another baby, a baby girl, born at the same time, and returned to Devaki's cell. The baby girl cried only when it arrived at its destination, alerting the guards. The palace was alerted, but by the time Kansa laid his hands on the baby, he knew he had been duped. Was the prophecy wrong? The eighth born turned out to be a girl! Kansa tried to smash the baby on the wall. Surprise, surprise. The baby girl turned out to be Goddess Kaali, who announced that Kansa’s assassin was safe on the other side of the river and that his days were numbered.

Kansa spent the rest of his days thinking of Krishna, turning every corner and looking for his assailant. Long story short, Kansa sent so many adversaries to finish off young Krishna, but in vain. When Kansa was finally killed, it is said he attained moksha (released from the curse of rebirth) because Krishna was always on his mind, thinking of Krishna day and night.

Ravana

The same thing is said to have happened to Ravana. After kidnapping Sita, keeping her captive, and wooing her, he was shocked when Hanuman arrived in his supposedly safe cocoon. Hanuman created a ruckus by burning Lanka. It was a warning to Ravana that the end was nay. Rama was coming sooner than he thought. Just like Kansa, Ravana went into alert mode. 

Despite being the sorcerer and the erudite person he was, the fear of Rama and the accompanying Vanara army sank in. Ravana shuddered. What carnage could the rest do if one representative could do such damage? Every minute that followed, he was compelled to think of Rama and only Rama. Again, Ravana was defeated but also attained moksha because Rama was always at the tip of his tongue and immersed deep in his thoughts. 

My feeble mind does not comprehend all these. These great tyrants, despite all their evil deeds, the pain and suffering they inflicted upon others, and the trail of destruction left behind, escaped the dreaded curse of reincarnation because they went on thinking and chanting the Lord's name. It is a rather lazy way of cutting the queue, surpassing all others who went the problematic way of collecting brownie points and spiralling through birth after birth to attain salvation. In my mind, katas (sermons) like these are the crossroads where itihasa (history), tattva (philosophy) and sciences morph into myths. The scriptures tell about Rama and Krishna's dates of birth indirectly through constellation positions, permitting accurate dating of certain events. This information can be fed through astronomical apps to verify the presence of such a constellation. Astronomical calculations had verified it to be correct. Their births probably happened. That is science. But I am not so sure about others. My blinkers are still on, and I may not be ready to receive the essence of the nectar of the Lord's divine wisdom. But I persevere...

(P.S. I had been under the impression that the law of karma works like Newton's Third Law of Motion. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. You reap what you sow. Perhaps this escape route to erase one's sins is reactionary to what the Catholic Church was preaching at that time in India. A sincere confession under the name of the Lord cleans the slate. Fearing losing their congregation to the order side where something else is offered to the Law of Karma, the stakeholders may have relented. Instead of uttering ‘Hail Mary’ thrice and absolving your sins, they offered the chanting of ‘Hari Krishna Hari Rama’ indefinitely.)

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Time to ponder!

Kahlil Gibran's Little Book of Secrets, 2019
Kahlil Gibran, Neil Douglas-Klotz (Editor)

(first published 1932)

That is it. There is no secret. Like every seed we sprout, each extracting our own energies, in different shapes, forms and sizes, build our leaves and flowers, but have to face the sun to get our nourishments. We may take different routes like that, but lest we forget, all roads lead to Rome.

Secrets? There are none. The answers are all within us. The problem is that the more answers we seek, the more questions pop up.

Khalil Gibran, a Lebanese Christian from the Eastern Christian Church, landed in the USA after spending a fair amount of formative years in Lebanon. Exposed to either side of the hemisphere, his outlook on life is quite profound. Here is an example of his thoughts and invitation to think.

A clergyman who preaches the dangers of sin and the need to follow the spiritual path meets a dying man during his travels. He was about to help him but was warned by the man about saving him. For he was Satan. Nursing him back to health would mean saving Satan. On the other hand, what work is there for the preacher if Satan stops his evil? The preacher would be out of a job. What evangelism is there any more? There is no Satan to spew his venom. In a way, both depend on each other to prosper. Without sin, there is no need for salvation. Without the poor, there is no one for the rich to flaunt. Without the slave staying dumb, the master cannot continue squeezing the noose on the poor.

Another point to ponder...

"Maybe a funeral among human beings is a wedding feast among the angels." Whilst man mourns the loss of one of his kind, the angels have a new member. Akin to the birth, the ushers smile when the entree (baby) cries. At death, the exiting member is happily relieved of his worldly pain, but the mourners wail in pain, unable to bear the separation.

N.B.

Kahlil Gibran (Arabic: جبران خليل جبران ) was a Lebanese-American artist, poet, and writer.
Born in the town of Bsharri in modern-day Lebanon (then part of Ottoman Mount Lebanon), as a young man, he emigrated with his family to the United States, where he studied art and began his literary career. In the Arab world, Gibran is regarded as a literary and political rebel. His romantic style was at the heart of a renaissance in modern Arabic literature, especially prose poetry, breaking away from the classical school. In Lebanon, he is still celebrated as a literary hero.
He is chiefly known in the English-speaking world for his 1923 book The Prophet, an early example of inspirational fiction, including a series of philosophical essays written in poetic English prose. The book sold well despite a cool critical reception, gaining popularity in the 1930s and again, especially in the 1960s counterculture.
Gibran is the third best-selling poet of all time, behind Shakespeare and Lao-Tzu.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

The modern theologians

Credit: New York Times

Is it just me or is it plain for all to see? I feel that the economists are the new leaders of the modern world. They seem to portray the image that they have a crystal ball in front of them and they are well aware how our society is heading. They talk as if they hold the steering and have total control of the rudder to manoeuvre the human race in the right direction. Their destination is the abode of the money God and its path is paved with gold. The lure of it seems so lucrative in a world where God is dead, and we killed him for something so fulfilling.

These economists, the new theologians, speak in meaningless jargons like 'quantitative easing', 'ROIs', 'paper loss' and 'bull run' which are just rhetorics to pacify concerned laypersons.

Funny a few centuries ago, we may remember of yet another brand of leaders who used to talk in doublespeak invoking fascinating fables and inspiring words like 'Grace', 'original sin' and a promise of an eternally peaceful place so beautiful that beats everything on Earth.

In both cases, the followers are left confused, not comprehending whether such a place actually exists, the Xanadu or the Shangrila! Some are left wounded, burnt or confused while the leaders laugh all the way in the cover of the night, under the cloak of wizardry, chuckling all the way to their own havens!

The modus operandi is the same. When money replaced ethereal God as the most important thing, so did the gatekeepers. They just wear different costumes and chant different mantras. Economists and bankers are the new theologians.

And no religion too

Courtesy: iyermatter.wordpress.com

I have a friend whose ancestors hail from the land of the Kamasutra. Even though born and bred here, he has not quite severed his umbilical attachment to his roots. His roots are still deeply rooted there. His religious conviction handed down by his ancestors are quite strong and has no qualms displaying his beliefs. He makes frequent pilgrimage trips there and is quite in tune with the latest flavour of the month of the sub-continent.

He once told me of a relative holding quite a high post in the Indian Air Force. Like my Brahmin friend, this guy was steadfast in continuing his Vedic practices through rituals, prayers, regalia to display of proof of his theological conviction on his forehead, vermilion, ash, sandalwood paste and all.

But once he dons his uniform and leaves his abode, he makes it a point to take a glance himself at the mirror to erase all traces of his religious beliefs. He, being a servant of the state, had to display a secular image serving all his brothers and sisters irrespective of their beliefs. He did not want his external appearance be an excuse for his actions to be construed as bias towards or against one section of society. What more, in a society whereby the days, everything is viewed in a rose-tinted lens of religion. Even if his move was in accordance to standard operating protocol, his avatar could be an excuse for favouritism!

It has come to this. There was a time when the public viewed a person of faith as a stable individual who would execute his duties with just. He is assumed to perform with a divine force as the witness without fear or favour. That was a different era in a galaxy far far away. Now, it is a question of my God is 'better than yours'! Anything and everything can be penalised and a mountain can be created out of a molehill, dying to be broadcasted to be sensationalised devoid of merits. The place a man of faith held has been hijacked by bad publicity. A group of fame-seeking and attention yearning leaders have no shame in uttering ridiculous statements for their time in the spotlight, just to be in the limelight.

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