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India -- A peaceful and peace-loving society? Free Speech Host 2/10/2001 Or do we believe our own propaganda? Anita Pratap argues that violence and savagery lurks in our society from the time of conception to death. And that communism, by denouncing God, has destroyed humanity. |
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nikhil 2/10/2001 ( 1 of 93 ) yes i agree with anit pratap to some extent that humanity has been destroyed.but it is there deep within the human heart and it is just that the the greed and revenge attitude has taken control of human hearts and minds. they unable to make decisions and always try to be selfish. The money has become the symbol for prosperity.People are losing faith in god.especially the young generation is pre occupied with the western culture.no one is interested in indian culture. they think india is a poor country and they owe nothing to this country. BUT STILL THE LOVE IS THERE HIDDEN WITHIN AS COMPARED TO OTHER NATIONS. |
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ajay 2/10/2001 ( 2 of 93 ) i agree with nikhil. But what do u really mean that the love is there within? who are we keeping this love for? and why to compare with other nations? can you pry into their within as well? |
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coolbuddha 2/10/2001 ( 3 of 93 ) Anita Pratap has maded a case against the notion of mythologizing (to use a creative license)very akin to the notion of a "national" identity. Isn't the idea of Indian nation a nationalist myth started by the british and continued in the minds of the middle class in India? We continue bandying words like "nation," "Indian," and "greed" with no clue/homework or even a socilogical/anthropological basis for this construction except the ones we want to believe. This generalization and stereotyping of a common identity in itself is the biggest malady of our times-off course the culture police has now taken over the government. If as a "nation" that includes me and you and everbody else we are "relatively" peaceful as you claim-imagine what would happen if those bajrang dal/shiv sena and a multitude of other (no longer fringe groups) were allowed to carry firearms. From another perspective, a nation who blantantly ignores human/social/infrastructural/gender/economic development at the cost of pandering to middle class fantasies of nationhood - a violent society is a natural outcome leaving the middle class in their perpetual state of delusional "peace" loving nationhood. Anita Pratap is only repeating/highlighting a hormonal adjustment that we perhaps need to make and move away from this excessive testostoronal discahrges. And for those who define an "indian culture," go back and read critical history again-and ask yourself- whose history is this, and whose filter or prism are we seeing it through. I think we would be better informed if people were actual readers of history. An example - Ashoka is called the great yet for some 36 yrs of his existense he rapes, pillages, murders- does everything under the sun- yet we call him the great because after all those deaths he becomes peaceful. Would you endorse hitler with the same term? And look how far back this trend can be traced? |
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coolbuddha 2/10/2001 ( 4 of 93 ) oh and excuse my typos thanks |
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Gayathri 2/10/2001 ( 5 of 93 ) As a fellow keralite, I cannot agree more with Anitha Prathap. She is right. We are in this mess because we have stopped believing in God. But God is back as outlook said on its cover some days back. I think we are hemmed in by our secularism. The other day I watched the Bush inaugration addres and was struck by the no of times he invoked God, Christianity and so on. EVen the motto of USA is "In God We Trust". Can you imahgine it in India? Can we imagine Vajpayee talking about Ram, Hinsuism and his cultural background the way Bush feels free to harp on Christian values. No! WHy is it so? Because the media would lynch him calling him a religious zealot. The reason America is so advanced is because it believes in God, in good and bad. We are just busy fighting over whose God it is.And we kill in thename of god. |
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ajay 2/10/2001 ( 6 of 93 ) Gayathri, have you ever thought that why we the Indians don’t believe in God as staunchly as the Muslims or Christians or Jews do? Well maybe its because the idea of God in Hinduism is wrong.. How can you believe firmly in a god that can’t even wink its own eye and is made of stone and wood? How can you really have faith in a god who has stories about him going around doing things that are uncivilized by all manners of conduct! Think about it! May be if the concept of god was a bit rational and logical Indians/hindus would have adhered to it more closely. But even in the western world people have stopped believing in God. Well I don’t want to quote tons of data as a proof for that. And look what it has brought to them, nothing but violence. The crime rate in America is the highest in the world. That is why the conversion rate from the religion to materialism is so fast spreading in the world. In order to be peaceful in the society you first have to make peace within yourself, and for that matter spirituality counts a great deal. But how can you be peaceful within yourself when you find that there are more than 330 million gods in hindu religion and many at most of the times are at the loggerheads with each other. (acc to the stories attributed to them) May be if we give tolerance a real chance it might bring real peace in the country. I say this because all the Indian politicians uphill now have abused this idea of secularism as a facade for their own vested interests. Only Mahatma Gandhi in my view was a truly compromising and accommodating leader, and he was the real arbiter of peace and harmony not only between different religious groups in the prepartition India but also between the different castes within the hindu religion itself. But what does the Gandhi's India get after more than fifty years of survival? Chaos.. As now the very forces, which opposed him, are in power and are the perpetrators and executors of his murder. What a loss. Unless and until we find out where we went wrong and correct that blunder, history will not forgive us, and there will be no peace. |
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Hindu 2/10/2001 ( 7 of 93 ) Om Shatih! It's very heartening indeed to read Anita Pratap write about the need to remember our God. When we remember God we shall not have the time to fight and will obtain sat chit and anand. |
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rav666 2/10/2001 ( 8 of 93 ) sat, chit and anand????? I initially read it as sit, shit and (u'll be) 'fit' :-) No offense, just a PJ..... |
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rav666 2/10/2001 ( 9 of 93 ) Or is it 'sit, shit and u'll fit'???? (this caption may fit those who use trousers of 32" waist-size when they ought to use 34". Are we as a nation unnecessarily tormenting ourselves and losing 'peace'??) |
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kvbvarma 2/10/2001 ( 10 of 93 ) Dear readers, It's quite funny for all of us to read columns from columnists like "Anita Pratap" who would generally hype the happenings in our country (i agree that by and large they are true)and hold the attention by raking issues like god. Anita, If u were to read this column i hope that u would agree that the social evils have come down in India when u compare them with the past 50 years. The society can't change with articles on glossy papers and Cathode ray tubes. Give them some time dear.... kvbvarma@usa.net |
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Gayathri 2/10/2001 ( 11 of 93 ) Ajay, What do you know about hinduism and the idea of God? Thomas Babington Macauly would be a man fulfilled if he were alive. You speak so knowingly about issues you display the most pathetic ignorance about. Hinduism is not a religion. "Hindus" - whatever that term means, are not a religious group. It includes all sorts - from time immemorials - even the dharamshastras talk about nastiks, non-believers, and agnostics and atheists. The "Hindu" mind (the word is used more as broad term for inhabitants of this side of Indus) is not unquestioning and dogma-bound. "God" is an artificial civilisational construct and only displays the gullibility of people. My agreement with Anitha Pratap is on more nuanced than I have time to expound here, but I do wish to place on record my disagreement with almost everything said by you in your post above. |
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Vijayan 2/10/2001 ( 12 of 93 ) Mr. Ajay has asked: >>How can you really have faith in a >>god who has stories about him going >>around doing things that are >>uncivilized by all manners of conduct! Think about it! Which uncivilized things do the Hindu gods go about doing? >>May be if the concept of god was a >>bit rational and logical >>Indians/hindus would have adhered to >>it more closely. cONCEPT OF gOD IS RATIONAL IN WHICH RELIGION? |
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ajay 2/10/2001 ( 13 of 93 ) Gayathri, You have raised certian questions that can come in an intelligent mind only. The fact that "Hinduism" is not a religious group is not true. hinduism the term is used for all the pagan religions that are there in the "Hindustan". The WORD GIVEN TO THE PEOPLE LIVING IN THE INDUS VALLEY IS NOT HINDU BUT IT IS "HINDI". You cant question me about how much i know about Hinduism because its out of context here. Further more i dont want to qoute upanishads, smritis, vedas and puranas. I just want to qoute Jawaher Lal Nehru here who said in his book "The Discovery Of India has said: JAWAHARLAL NEHRU said in his "THE DISCOVERY OF INDIA" (Page 37): "HINDUISM as a faith is vague, amorphous, many sided, all things to all men. It is hardly possible to define it, or indeed to say definitely whether it is a religion or not, in the usual sense of the word. In its present form, and even in the past, it embraces many beliefs and practices, from the highest to the lowest, often opposed to or contradicting each other." What does it tell you? Its very clear that Hinduism is nothing but a bunch of superstitious rituals and practices. I dont want to go into the detail of each and every practice and then prove that it is superstitious. Suffice it to say here that, any one who has closely observed Hinduism with rational thought and mind will give more or less the same statement that Jawaher Lal Nehru has given. You said that >>>"God" is an artificial >>>civilisational construct and only >>>displays the gullibility of people. Well its only your personal view and to tell you how wrong you are just look at yourself and think.... How beautifully organised and synchronised your body is.. Each organ is a marvel in its very own right.. Could this be possible because of an accident in the universe???? No.. Because accidents bring chaos, not peace. accidents bring disturbance not organisation.. So there is some force out there that has thought about our physical arrangement and then made us like what we are!! That is perfect... Have you evr thought about your hands for example. could you have benefitted if you had an extra hand hanging by the side of your bidy? Are you suffering because you have too many or too less fingers and hands? I dont think that you do. So its perfect. Look at the beauty of the universe and its vast expanse, and think could this all beautifull and great things be there just by a stroke of luck? The answer is again no. Why because its simply impossible. A beautiful house with its well built rooms cant possibly be constructed by an accident. Somebody has to create it. Similarly this universe has a creator as well. And that creator is "GOD" As far as your disagreement is concerned then its your right to do so. But please exercise your right with the backing of reasoning and logic. |
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ajay 2/10/2001 ( 14 of 93 ) As far as Mr Vijayan is concerned then i must say that many of your questions have been answered in my reply to Miss Gayathri. As far as your questions about the Hindu gods doing uncivilised things then do u want me to give examples here? Or are you literate enough to find that out yourself? |
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Aslam 2/10/2001 ( 15 of 93 ) ajay 2/19/2001 6:56:02 PM "A beautiful house with its well built rooms cant possibly be constructed by an accident. Somebody has to create it. Similarly this universe has a creator as well. And that creator is "GOD" " Haven't you heard of evolution? |
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docopeh 2/10/2001 ( 16 of 93 ) Which society is peace loving? Every society has its share of soldiers, policemen, spies and informers... to protect wealth of the filthy rich. Those who donot have wealth are taxed to the brim to finance this protection racket. Of course, these tax collections are made in the name of national interest! Actually public pays to protect private wealth of a handful. |
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Aslam 2/10/2001 ( 17 of 93 ) All that is very fine. That is like Indira Gandhi saying that corruption is a global problem. The pint was whether Indians arem't a bit too self-congratulatory about being allegedly a peaceful nation. I think Anitha Prathap has done a good job of puncturing that myth. |
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Bubka 2/10/2001 ( 18 of 93 ) Yeah we have all heard of evolution. i wonder what Mr Aslam will become next? a monkey? Hmm that wouldnt be interesting coz his present status is no different. So Mr Aslam you beleive in evo? If so why you havent transformed into something else by now? Do you have an answer to that? Furthermore evolution theory is just a THEORY!!! If you are literate enough to know the difference between theory and LAW you wouldnt have asked such a stupid question from Mr ajay. By the way Mr ajay, you have done a good job of explaining the issue at hand. Keep it up. You seem to be a sane voice in this jungle of insanity. |
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Aslam 2/10/2001 ( 19 of 93 ) >>So Mr Aslam you beleive in evo? >>If so why you havent transformed into >>something else by now? >>Do you have an answer to that? If you knew anything about evolution, you wouldn't have asked something as basic. May I suggest a few good books? Or perhaps a few websites that might proved educative and edifying? Or have the creationsits succeeded beyond any measure in dubbing evolution as just a theory? Grow up, bub, wake up and smell the coffee. |
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rav666 2/10/2001 ( 20 of 93 ) My problem with Anitha's article is her safe assumption that the fear of God will work wonders in terms restraining people from violent methods and the absense of that fear is the culprit. How many lives have been lost in the name of religion? Every religion (or in other words, institution of worship) has in some way or other preached violence as a means of reaching the desired end. Lord Krishna preached violence to Arjun in the Mahabharata war - Vatican waged Crusades and forced conversions (and its modern-day equivalents carpet-bomb Iraq, while holding the Bible on the other hand) - there are different forms of Jihadis around the world swearing by Allah and out to disrupt world peace - Sri Lankan Buddhists - Sikh fundamentalists - gimme one example of a God-fearing fundamentalist who has made this world a better place to live. We do not need the fear of God - we need education, to be a less violent society. |
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Aslam 2/10/2001 ( 21 of 93 ) People sometimes try to score debating points by saying, "Evolution is only a theory." That is correct, but it’s important to understand what that means. It is also only a theory that the world goes round the Sun—it’s just a theory for which there is an immense amount of evidence. There are many scientific theories that are in doubt. Even within evolution, there is some room for controversy. But that we are cousins of apes and jackals and starfish, let’s say, that is a fact in the ordinary sense of the word. |
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Aslam 2/10/2001 ( 22 of 93 ) I agree with you rav666. In practice, no civilized person uses Scripture as ultimate authority for moral reasoning. Instead, we pick and choose the nice bits of Scripture (like the Sermon on the Mount or the nice pieties in the Koran) and blithely ignore the nasty bits (like the obligation to stone adulteresses, execute apostates, and punish the grandchildren of offenders or in the case of Manu, pouring hot oil in the ears of the low caste). The God of the Old Testament or the Koran himself, or some Hindu reincarnation with his pitilessly vengeful jealousy, his racism, sexism, and terrifying bloodlust, will not be adopted as a literal role model by anybody you or I would wish to know, I am sure. Anita Pratap sounds like a closet creationist to me. |
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ajay 2/10/2001 ( 23 of 93 ) Well Mr Aslam, i am really bewildered by reading your post that says, and i qoute: >People sometimes try to score debating >points by saying, "Evolution is only a >theory." That is correct, but it’s >important to understand what that >means. It is also only a theory that >the world goes round the Sun" Well I want to tell you that its not a theory that the EARTH moves around the SUN, its the "LAW" period. i dont think that you really understood whats the different between a theory and a LAW. if a theory has proof it becomes a law, If there is no proof then it remains a theory. i think i read about the differences between theory and law when i was in class eight (long time ago, time really flies). Evolution theory is still a theory because it has no proof uptill now. if you keep yourself well-informed about the latest scientific developments in the world then you would have known that the theory of evolution has largely been refuted by the scientists as they have been unable to create the DNA of a living being through artificial methods using the same environment that Mr Darwin has expressed in his theory of Evolution (you know the sulfer pond and extremes of temperature and carbon dioxide, that kind of stuff). Therefore it has largely been concluded ( I read it in the world renowned journal of science called " NATURE") that HUMAN DNA IS EXTRA-TERESTRIAL AS IT COULDNT HAVE COME TO EXISTANCE ALL BY ITSELF KEEPING IN VIEW THE PROPOSED ENVIORONMENTAL CONDITIONS PREVAILING ON THE PLANET EARTH AT THE TIME HUMANS APPEARED ON THE SCENE. I am currently looking for the refferences of this article (you know it appeared I think four or five years ago). I am searching the nature's web data bases and will provide you with the complete details of the study soon (provided that nature people give it to me free of cost). Well as far as the talk about being the cousins of apes ang jackals is concerned then personally i would be offended if some one would say that to me. If Mr Aslam you are not offended then its your personal matter. A note to Bubka:- Thanx for encouraging me. I really appreciate that but i dont think that you should call other people insane, because INSANITY is nothing but the absence of SANITY, but tables can always be turned. The point is never to lose hope. thanx for taking your time to read this. |
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Aslam 2/10/2001 ( 24 of 93 ) From the talks.origins archive FAQ: "Evolution is only a theory; it hasn't been proved." First, we should clarify what "evolution" means. Like so many other words, it has more than one meaning. Its strict biological definition is "a change in allele frequencies over time." By that definition, evolution is an indisputable fact. Most people seem to associate the word "evolution" mainly with common descent, the theory that all life arose from one common ancestor. Many people believe that there is enough evidence to call this a fact, too. However, common descent is still not the theory of evolution, but just a fraction of it (and a part of several quite different theories as well). The theory of evolution not only says that life evolved, it also includes mechanisms, like mutations, natural selection, and genetic drift, which go a long way towards explaining how life evolved. Calling the theory of evolution "only a theory" is, strictly speaking, true, but the idea it tries to convey is completely wrong. The argument rests on a confusion between what "theory" means in informal usage and in a scientific context. A theory, in the scientific sense, is "a coherent group of general propositions used as principles of explanation for a class of phenomena" [Random House American College Dictionary]. The term does not imply tentativeness or lack of certainty. Generally speaking, scientific theories differ from scientific laws only in that laws can be expressed more tersely. Being a theory implies self-consistency, agreement with observations, and usefulness. (Creationism fails to be a theory mainly because of the last point; it makes few or no specific claims about what we would expect to find, so it can't be used for anything. When it does make falsifiable predictions, they prove to be false.) Lack of proof isn't a weakness, either. On the contrary, claiming infallibility for one's conclusions is a sign of hubris. Nothing in the real world has ever been rigorously proved, or ever will be. Proof, in the mathematical sense, is possible only if you have the luxury of defining the universe you're operating in. In the real world, we must deal with levels of certainty based on observed evidence. The more and better evidence we have for something, the more certainty we assign to it; when there is enough evidence, we label the something a fact, even though it still isn't 100% certain. What evolution has is what any good scientific claim has--evidence, and lots of it. Evolution is supported by a wide range of observations throughout the fields of genetics, anatomy, ecology, animal behavior, paleontology, and others. If you wish to challenge the theory of evolution, you must address that evidence. You must show that the evidence is either wrong or irrelevant or that it fits another theory better. Of course, to do this, you must know both the theory and the evidence. talk.origins.archives |
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Aslam 2/10/2001 ( 25 of 93 ) Ajay, If you really want to see the evidence for or against evolution, I'd highly recommend a reading of Richard Dawkins. Just do a search and you'd have far more conclusive refutation of God than anything I could try and do here. I could also recommend his books, but just looking up the web might be a good start. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 26 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava Agree with raav saahib... :), Anita ben, or devi anita is wrong in her presumption that a lie like god has kept these stupid societies intact... jhooT meiN sirf dukh hey devi... kHuda jhooT hey... sach khuda hey... ;)... It is said that when Buddha was first Enlightened he was asked, "Are you a God?" "No," he replied. "Are you a saint?" "No." "Then what are you?" And he answered, "I am awake." ******** If I were not an atheist I think I would have to be a Catholic because if it wasn't the forces of natural selection that designed fish, it must have been an Italian." -- Douglas Adams, "Riding the Rays" "The MIT Science Fiction society keeps a Bible in their comprehensive collection, as an anthology filed (by editor's last name) under 'G'." -- David Mix Barrington "If Jesus had been killed 20 years ago, Catholic school children would be wearing little electric chairs around their necks instead of crosses." -- Lenny Bruce "Christ died for our sins. Dare we make his martydom meaningless by not committing them?" -- Jules Feiffer "Life in Lubbock, Texas, taught me two things: One is that God loves you and you're going to burn in hell. The other is that sex is the most awful, filthy thing on earth and you should save it for someone you love." -- Butch Hancock "What do atheists scream when they come?" -- Bill Hicks Question: "Mr. Haldane, what can you tell about the Creator from your study of biology?" Answer: "The Creator, if He exists, has a special preference for beetles." -- J. B. S. Haldane, 1892-1964, Report of lecture, 7 April 1951 in Journal of the British Interplanetary Society (1951) vol. 10, p. 156 "There once was a time when all people believed in God and the church ruled. This time was called the Dark Ages." -- Richard Lederer, Anguished English "If Jesus was a Jew, why did he have a Spanish name?" -- Bill Maher on "Politically Incorrect" "The chief contribution of Protestantism to human thought is its massive proof that God is a bore." -- H. L. Mencken's Notebooks, no. 309 (1956), quoted from The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations "God is real, unless declared Integer". "Why does the Vatican have lightning rods?" "Christian Fundamentalism: The doctrine that there is an aboslutely powerful, infinitely knowledgeable, universe spanning entity that is deeply and personally concerned about my sex life." "'God is as real as I am' the old man said. I was relieved since I knew Santa wouldn't lie to me ... " "And Jesus said unto them, 'And whom do you say that I am?' They replied, 'You are the eschatological manifestation of the ground of our being, the ontological foundation of the context of our very selfhood revealed.' And Jesus replied, 'What?'" more later... |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 27 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava The world holds two classes of men -- intelligent men without religion, and religious men without intelligence." -- Abu'l-Ala-Al-Ma'arri, 973-1057, Syrian poet "If Atheism is a religion, then health is a disease!" -- Clark Adams "Pray: To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy." -- Ambrose Bierce "Religions are conclusions for which the facts of nature supply no major premises." -- Ambrose Bierce, "Collected Works" (1912) "Missionaries are perfect nuisances and leave every place worse than they found it." -- Charles Dickens "Intellectually, religious emotions are not creative but conservative. They attach themselves readily to the current view of the world and consecrate it." -- John Dewey "Beyond the grave they will find nothing but death. But we shall keep the secret, and for their happiness we shall allure them with the reward of heaven and eternity." -- Fyodor Dostoyevski, The Brothers Karamazov, remark of the Grand Inquisitor "If there is a God, atheism must strike Him as less of an insult than religion." -- Edmond and Jules de Goncourt "Belief in gods and belief in ghosts is identical. God is taken as a more respectable word than ghost, but it means no more." -- E. Haldeman-Julius, "The Meaning Of Atheism" "Businesses may come and go, but religion will last forever, for in no other endeavor does the consumer blame himself for product failure." -- Harvard Lampoon, "Doon" (paraphrase) "History has the relation to truth that theology has to religion -- i.e. none to speak of." -- Robert Heinlein (Lazarus Long) "Organized religion is like organized crime; it preys on peoples' weakness, generates huge profits for its operators, and is almost impossible to eradicate." -- Mike Hermann "Theology is but the ignorance of natural causes reduced to a system." -- Baron Paul Henri T. d'Holbach "John Wesley said that if you give up the witchcraft, you must give up the Bible. He is right. The choice is easy for me." -- Rupert Hughes "The Christian religion not only was at first attended with miracles, but even at this day cannot be believed by any reasonable person without one." -- David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, 1748 "Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous." -- David Hume, Treatise of Human Nature (1739) "You never see animals going through the absurd and often horrible fooleries of magic and religion. Only man behaves with such gratuitous folly. It is the price he has to pay for being intelligent but not, as yet, quite intelligent enough." -- Aldous Huxley "...your belief in God is merely an escape from your monotonous, stupid and cruel life." -- Krishnamurti |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 28 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava "It is possible to pay another man's debts on his behalf, but it is not possible to make a guilty man innocent by suffering in his place." -- Carl Lofmark, What is the Bible? "Christians say that--without exception--their God answers all of their prayers; it's just that He sometimes says 'yes' and other times 'no', 'maybe', or 'wait'. Of course the same could be said of the rain-god, 'Bob'." -- Rev. Donald Morgan "Where it is a duty to worship the sun it is pretty sure to be a crime to examine the laws of heat." -- John Morley "Few nations have been so poor as to have but one god. Gods were made so easily, and the raw material cost so little, that generally the god market was fairly glutted, and heaven crammed with these phantoms." -- Robert G. Ingersoll, "The Gods", 1872 "Take from the church the miraculous, the supernatural, the incomprehensible, the unreasonable, the impossible, the unknowable, the absurd, and nothing but a vacuum remains." -- Robert G. Ingersoll, Ingersoll's Works, Vol. 1, p. 285 This crime called blasphemy was invented by priests for the purpose of defending doctrines not able to take care of themselves." -- Robert G. Ingersoll "The notion that faith in Christ is to be rewarded by an eternity of bliss, while a dependence upon reason, observation, and experience merits everlasting pain, is too absurd for refutation, and can be relieved only by that unhappy mixture of insanity and ignorance called 'faith.'" -- Robert G. Ingersoll "Faith is often the boast of the man who is too lazy to investigate." -- F. M. Knowles "We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart." -- H. L. Mencken, quoted from 'Not Church' "The cosmos is a gigantic fly wheel making 10,000 revolutions a minute. Man is a sick fly taking a dizzy ride on it. Religion is the theory that the wheel was designed and set spinning to give him the ride." -- H. L. Mencken, quoted from 'Not Church' "Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction." -- Blaise Pascal, 1623-1662, "Pense'es" #894. "To make sure that my blasphemy is thoroughly expressed, I hereby state my opinion that the notion of a god is a basic superstition, that there is no evidence for the existence of any god(s), that devils, demons, angels and saints are myths, that there is no life after death, heaven nor hell, that the Pope is a dangerous, bigoted, medieval dinosaur, and that the Holy Ghost is a comic-book character worthy of laughter and derision." -- James Randi, "Challenge" "We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes." -- Gene Roddenberry "It is an interesting and demonstrable fact, that all children are atheists and were religion not inculcated into their minds, they would remain so." -- Ernestine Rose "Blasphemy laws should be abolished. It would be a strange God indeed, that required protection by the judicial system." -- Salman Rushdie |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 29 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava Everything is deeply related with everything else that happens. The event of terrorism is certainly related with what is happening in the society. The society is falling apart. Its old order, discipline, morality, religion, everything has been found to be wrongly based. It has lost its power over people's conscience. Terrorism simply symbolizes that to destroy human beings does not matter, that there is nothing in human beings which is indestructible, that it is all matter -- and you cannot kill matter, you can only change its form. Once man is taken to be only a combination of matter, and no place is given for a spiritual being inside him, then to kill becomes just play. The nations are irrelevant because of nuclear weapons. If the whole world can be destroyed together within minutes the alternative can only be that the whole world should be together. Now it cannot remain divided; its division is dangerous, because division can become war any moment. The division cannot be tolerated. Only one war is enough to destroy everything, and there is not much time left for man to understand that we should create a world where the very possibility of war does not exist. Terrorism has many undercurrents. One is that because of nuclear weapons, the nations are pouring their energy into that field, thinking that the old weapons are out of date. They are out of date, but individuals can start using them. And you cannot use nuclear weapons against individuals -- that would be simply stupid. One individual terrorist throws a bomb -- it does not justify that a nuclear missile should be sent. What I want to emphasize is that the nuclear weapon has given individual people a certain freedom to use old weapons, a freedom which was not possible in the old days because the governments were also using the same weapons. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 30 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava Now the governments are concentrated on destroying the old weapons, throwing them in the ocean, selling them to countries which are poor and cannot afford nuclear weapons. And all those terrorists are coming from these poor countries, with the same weapons that have been sold to their countries. And they have a strange protection: you cannot use nuclear weapons against them, you cannot throw atom bombs at them. They can throw bombs at you and you are suddenly impotent. You have a vast amount of atomic bombs, nuclear bombs in your hands -- but sometimes where a needle is useful, a sword may not be of any use. You may have the sword; that does not mean that you are necessarily in a superior position to the man who has a needle, because there are purposes in which only the needle will work -- the sword will not be of any use. Those small weapons from the old times were piling up, and the big powers had to dispose of them -- either drown them in the ocean.... That meant so much money, so much manpower, so much energy had gone to waste; economically it was disastrous. But just to go on piling them up was also economically impossible. How many weapons can you gather? There is a limit. And when you get a new way of killing people more efficiently, then the old simply has to be got rid of. It was thought that it would be better to sell them to poor countries. Poor countries cannot create nuclear weapons -- it costs too much. And these weapons were coming cheap -- as help; they accepted it, but these weapons cannot be used in a war. In a war these weapons are already useless. But nobody has seen the possibility that these weapons can be used individually, and a new phenomenon -- terrorism -- can come out of it. Now, a terrorist has a strange power, even over the greatest powers. He can throw bombs at the White House without any fear, because what you have is too big and you cannot throw it at him. And these are the weapons sold by you! But the phenomenon was not conceived of, because human psychology is not understood. My understanding is that the way he has lived, man needs every ten to twelve years -- a war. He accumulates so much anger, so much rage, so much violence, that nothing short of a war will give him release. So, war after war, there is a gap of only ten to fifteen years. That gap is a kind of relaxation. But again you start accumulating, because the same psychology is working -- the same jealousy, the same violence. And man is basically a hunter; he is not by nature vegetarian. First he became a hunter, and for thousands of years he was just a meat-eater, and cannibalism was prevalent everywhere. To eat human beings caught from the opposing tribe you were fighting with was perfectly ethical. All that is carried in the unconscious of humanity. Religions have imposed things on man very superficially; his unconscious is not in agreement. Every man is living in a disagreement with himself. So whenever he can find a chance -- for a beautiful cause; freedom, democracy, socialism -- any beautiful word can become an umbrella to hide his ugly unconscious, which simply wants to destroy and enjoys destruction. Now the world war has become almost impossible; otherwise there would have been no terrorism. Enough time has passed since the second world war; the third world war should have happened nearabout 1960. It has not happened. This has been the routine for the whole of history, and man is programmed for it. It has been observed by psychologists that in wartime people are more happy than in peacetime. In wartime their life has a thrill; in peacetime they look bored. In wartime, early in the morning they are searching for the newspaper, listening to the radio. Things may be happening far away, but they are excited. Something in them feels an affinity. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 31 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava cont., #3 A war that should have happened somewhere between 1955 and 1960 has not happened, and man is burdened with the desire to kill, with the desire to destroy. It is just that he wants good names for it. Terrorism is going to become bigger and bigger. Because the third world war is almost impossible. And the stupid politicians have no other alternative. Terrorism simply means that what was being done on a social scale now has to be done individually. It will grow. It can only be prevented if we change the very base of human understanding -- which is a Himalayan task; more so because these same people whom you want to change will fight you; they won't allow you to change them easily. In fact they love bloodshed; they don't have the courage to say so. It will happen in the airplanes, it will happen in the buses. It will start happening in the cars. It will start happening to strangers. Somebody will suddenly come and shoot you -- not that you have done anything to him, but just, the hunter is back. The hunter was satisfied in the war. Now the war has stopped and perhaps there is no possibility for it. The hunter is back; now we cannot fight collectively. Each individual has to do something to release his own steam. Things are interconnected. The first thing that has to be changed is that man should be made more rejoicing -- which all the religions have killed. The real criminals are not caught. These are the victims, the terrorists and other criminals. It is all the religions who are the real criminals, because they have destroyed all possibilities of rejoicing. They have destroyed the possibility of enjoying small things of life; they have condemned everything that nature provides you to make you happy, to make you feel excited, feel pleasant. They have taken everything away; and if they have not been able to take a few things away because they are so ingrained in your biology -- like sex -- they have at least been able to poison them. Friedrich Nietzsche, according to me, is one of the greatest seers of the Western world; his eyes really go penetrating to the very root of a problem. But because others could not see it -- their eyes were not so penetrating, nor was their intelligence so sharp -- the man lived alone, abandoned, isolated, unloved, unrespected. He says in one of his statements that man has been taught by religions to condemn sex, to renounce sex. Religion has not been able to manage it; and man has tried hard but has failed, because it is so deeply rooted in his biology -- it constitutes his whole body. He is born out of sex -- how can he get rid of it except by committing suicide? So man has tried, and religions have helped him to get rid of it -- thousands of disciplines and strategies have been used. The total result is that sex is there, but poisoned. That word poisoned is a tremendous insight. Religions have not been able to take it away, but they have been certainly successful in poisoning it. And the same is the situation about other things: religions are condemning your living in comfort. Now, a man who is living in comfort and luxury cannot become a terrorist. Religions have condemned riches, praised poverty; now, a man who is rich cannot be a terrorist. Only the "blessed ones" who are poor can be terrorists -- because they have nothing to lose, and they are boiling up against the whole of society because others have things they don't have. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 32 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava conclding part Religions have been trying to console them. But then came communism -- a materialist religion -- which provoked people and said to them, "Your old religions are all opium to the people, and it is not because of your evil actions in this life or in past lives that you are suffering poverty. It is because of the evil exploitation of the bourgeois, the super-rich that you are suffering." The last sentence in Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto is: Proletariats of the whole world unite; you have nothing to lose and you have the whole world to gain. "You are already poor, hungry, naked -- so what can you lose? Your death will not make you more miserable than your life is making you. So why not take a chance and destroy those people who have taken everything away from you. And take those things back, distribute them." What religions have somehow been consoling people with -- although it was wrong and it was cunning and it was a lie, but it kept people in a state of being half asleep -- communism suddenly made them aware of. That means this world is now never going to be peaceful if we don't withdraw all the rotten ideas that have been implanted in man. The first are the religions -- their values should be removed so that man can smile again, can laugh again, can rejoice again, can be natural again. Second, what communism is saying has to be put clearly before the people -- that it is psychologically wrong. You are falling from one trap into another. No two men are equal; hence the idea of equality is nonsense. And if you decide to be equal then you have to accept a dictatorship of the proletariat. That means you have to lose your freedom. First the church took away your freedom, the God took away your freedom. Now communism replaces your church, and it will take away your freedom. And without freedom you cannot rejoice. You live in fear, not in joy. If we can clean the basement of the human mind's unconscious... and that's what my work is. It can be cleaned away. The terrorism is not in the bombs, in your hands; the terrorism is in your unconscious. Otherwise, this state of affairs is going to grow more bitter. And it seems all kinds of blind people have bombs in their hands and are throwing them at random. The third world war would have released people for ten or, fifteen years. But the third world war cannot happen because if it happens it won't relieve people, it will only destroy people. So individual violence will increase -- it is increasing. And all your governments and all your religions will go on perpetuating the old strategies without understanding the new situation. The new situation is that every human being needs to go through therapies, needs to understand his unconscious intentions, needs to go through meditations so that he can calm down, become cool -- and look towards the world with a new perspective, of silence. |
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Aslam 2/10/2001 ( 33 of 93 ) Tathagat- man, wow i'm impressed by your cut and paste abilities. now if only you could right so coherently yourself. i'd spend all day just reading you. |
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ajay 2/10/2001 ( 34 of 93 ) Tathagat- If you only had a mind of your own.... you would have done well. Mr Aslam, i will be replying to your arguments in detail pretty soon. ( have to buy more time from the isp). till then ciao. |
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knower 2/10/2001 ( 35 of 93 ) Take a look around you from where you sit. You will notice that everything in the room is made: the walls, the upholstery, the ceiling, the chair where you sit, the book you hold in your hand, the glass on the table and countless other details. None of them happen to exist in your room of their own accord. Even the simple loops of the car- pet were made by someone: they did not appear spontaneously or by chance. A person who is about to read a book knows that it has been written by an author for a specific reason. It would not even occur to him that this book might have come into being by chance. In the same manner, a per- son who sees a sculpture has no doubt whatsoever that it was made by a sculptor. And not just works of art: even a few bricks resting on top of one another make one think that they must have been brought to rest just so by someone within a certain plan. Therefore, everywhere where there is an order Ð either small or big Ð a founder and protector of this order must also exist. If, one day, somebody came forward and said that raw iron and coal came together to form steel by chance, which in turn constructed the Eiffel Tower again by chance, would not he and those who believed him be regarded as insane? The claim of the theory of evolution, the unique method of denying the existence of Allah, is no different than this. According to the theory, inorganic molecules formed amino acids by chance, amino acids formed proteins by chance, and finally proteins formed living creatures again by chance. However, the probability of a living creature being formed by coincidence is less than the probability of the Eiffel Tower being formed in the same manner, because even the simplest human cell is more sophis- ticated than any man-made structure in the world. How is it possible to think that the balance in the world came about by coincidence when the extraordinary harmony of nature is observable even with the naked eye? It is the most unreasonable claim to say that the universe, each point of which suggests the existence of its Creator, has come into being on its own. Therefore, there should be an owner of the balance visible every- where from our body to the farthest corners of the inconceivably vast uni- verse. So, who is this Creator that ordained everything so subtly and cre- ated all? He cannot be any material being present within the universe, because His must be a will that existed before the universe and created the universe thereupon. The Almighty Creator is One Whom everything finds existence, yet Whose existence is without any beginning or end. Religion teaches us the identity of our Creator Whose existence we discover with our reason. Through what He has revealed to us as religion, we know that He is Allah, the Compassionate and the Merciful, Who cre- ated the heavens and the earth from nothing. |
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knower 2/10/2001 ( 36 of 93 ) Although most people have the capability to grasp this fact, they spend their lives unaware of it. When they look at a landscape painting, they wonder who its painter is. Later, they praise the artist at length for his beautiful work of art. Despite the fact that they face numerous originals of that painting the moment they turn around, they still disregard the exis- tence of Allah, Who is the only owner of all these beauties. In truth, not even a lengthy research is needed to understand the existence of Allah. Even if one had to live in a room from the time he was born, countless pieces of evidence in this room alone would be enough for him to grasp the existence of Allah. The human body so overflows with evidence that it could not be con- tained in many multi-volumed encyclopaedias. Even giving a few minutes of conscientious thought to it all is enough to understand the existence of Allah. The present order is protected by Allah and maintained by Him. The human body is not the only food for thought. Life abides in every square millimetre of the earth, be it observable by men or not. The world overflows with many living beings, from unicellular organisms to plants, from insects to sea animals, and from birds to human beings. If you take a handful of soil and look at it, even therein you can discover manifold liv- ing creatures with diverse characteristics. The same is true also for the air you breathe. Even on your skin, there are many living creatures whose names are unknown to you. In the intestines of all living beings are mil- lions of bacteria or unicellular organisms that help digestion. The animal population in the world is many times greater than the human population. When we also consider the plant world, we see that there is not a single spot on the earth where there is no life. All of these creatures that are spread over an area of millions of square kilometres have different body systems, different lives and different contributions to the ecological bal- ance. It is preposterous to claim that all these have come into existence by chance with no aim or purpose. No living being has come to exist through its own accord or effort. No coincidental happening can ever result in such complicated systems. All of this evidence leads us to the conclusion that the universe works with a certain “consciousness”. What, then, is the source of this conscious- ness? Surely it is neither the living nor the non-living beings in it. Nor can they be the ones that maintain the harmony and preserve the order. The existence and glory of Allah reveals itself in countless proofs in the uni- verse. In fact, there is not even a single man on the earth who will not accept this evident reality from the heart. Yet they still deny it “in iniquity and arrogance though their souls are convinced thereof” as stated in the Qur'an. (Surat an-Naml, 14). |
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anujxxx 2/10/2001 ( 37 of 93 ) To coolbuddha Ashoka didnot rapes anybody. I request you to state only facts and your thoughts and ideas should not come here. |
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nazgul 2/10/2001 ( 38 of 93 ) our society has become extinct. we have, since the concept of satyagraha not added anything of value to society. now as we have a glorious past with a retrograding future, the maturity of the common roadside individual has plummeted. the future holds no new philosophy to experiment and the philosophy of the past has been termed as culture and archived. GOD BLESS INDIA |
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rav666 2/10/2001 ( 39 of 93 ) Knower, even though i'm tempted to dismiss your posts, I like the following lines: All of these creatures that are spread over an area of millions of square kilometres have different body systems, different lives and different contributions to the ecological balance. It is preposterous to claim that all these have come into existence by chance with no aim or purpose. No living being has come to exist through its own accord or effort. No coincidental happening can ever result in such complicated systems. Without getting into an Allah Vs Ram debate, is it possible to have a debate here on 'Evolution Vs Creation'??? Maybe we need to create a separate thread for that, but i'd like to know what Aslam, Prem and Tatha would like to say for the abv argument. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 40 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava ... here is K, krishnamurti that is... its handy, i gotta rush... rat :) race.... i will try to shed some light on it ;), happy reading mates... cheers! "There is the army, within its own walls of self interest; and the businessman enclosed within steel and glass; and the housewife pottering about the house waiting for her husband and her children. There is the museum keeper, and the orchestra conductor, each living within a fragment of life, each fragment becoming extra ordinarily important, unrelated in contradiction to other fragments, having its own honors, its own social dignity, its own prophets. The religious fragment is unrelated to the factory, and factory to the artist; the general is unrelated to the soldiers, as the priest to the layman. Society is made up of these fragments, and the do-gooder and reformer are trying to patch up the broken pieces. But through these sepretive, broken, specialized parts, the human being carries on with his anxieties, guilt and apprehensions. in that we are all related, not in our specialized fields. In the common greed, hate and aggression, human beings are related and this violence builds the culture, the society in which we live. It is the mind and the heart that divide god and hate, love and violence - and in this duality the whole culture of man expands and contracts. The unity of man does not lie in any of the structures which the human mind has invented. Cooperation is not the nature of the intellect. Between love and hate can be no unity, and yet it is what the mind always trying to find and establish. Unity lies totally outside this field, and thought can not reach it. thought has constructed this culture of aggression, competition and war, and yet this very thought is groping after order and peace. But thought will never find order and peace, do what it will. Thought must be silent for the love to be." o'course we cannot follow the established order, but we are caught in it. What is our relationship with the older generation and their activity? "Mere revolt is not the answer, is it? Revolt is a reaction, a response which will bring about its own conditioning. Every generation is conditioned by the past generation, and mererly to rebel against the conditioning does not free the mind which has been conditioned. Any form of obedience is also a resistance which brings about violence. Violence among the students, or the riots in the cities, or war, whether far removed from urself or within urself, will in no way bring clarity. But how we are to act within the society to which we belong? If u act as a reformer than u are patching up society, which is always degenerating, and so sustaining a system which has produced wars, divisions and seperativeness. The reformer, really, is a danger to the fundamental change of man. U have to be an outsider to all communities, to all religions and to the morality of society, otherwise U will be caught in the same old pattern, perhaps somewhat modified. You are an outsider only when you cease to be envious and vicious, cease to worship success or its power motive. To be psychologically an outsider is possible only when u understand urselfwho are part of the environment, part of the social structure which u urself have built - u being the many yous of many thousand years, the many, many generations that have produced the present. In understanding urself as a human being u will find ur relationship with the older passing generations." |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 41 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava But how can one be free of the heavy conditioning as a Catholic? it is so deeply ingrained in us, deeply buried in the unconscious. "Whether one is Catholic, or a Muslim, or Hindu, or a communist, the propaganda of a hundred, two hundred, or five thousand years is part of this verbal structure of images, which goes to make up ur consciousness. We are conditioned by what we eat, by the economic pressures, by the culture n society in which we live. We r that culture, we ARE that society. Merely to revolt against it is to revolt against ourselves. If u rebel against urself, not knowing what u r, ur rebellion is utterly wasted. But to be aware, without condemnation, of what u r such awareness brings about action which is entirely different from the action of a reformer or a revolutionary." But, sir, our unconscious is the collective racial heritage and according to the analyst this must be understood. "I don't see why u give so much importance to the unconscious. It is trivial and shoddy as the conscious mind, and giving it such importance only strengthens it. IF U SEE ITS TRUE WORTH IT DROPS AWAY AS A LEAF IN THE AUTUMN. We think cretins things r important to keep and that others can be thrown away. War does produces certain peripheral improvements, but WAR ITSELF IS THE GREATEST DISASTER FOR MAN. Intellect will in no way solve our human problem. Thought has tried in many many ways to overcome and go beyond our agonies and anxieties. Thought has built the church, the savior, the guru; thought has invented nationalities; thought has divided the people in the nation into different communities, classes, at war with each other. Thought has seperated man from man, and having brought anarchy n great sorrow, it than proceeds to invent a structure to bring people together. Whatever thought does must inevitably breeds danger and anxiety. To call oneself an Italian, or an Indian or an American is surely insanity, and it is the work of thought. But love is the answer to all this, isn't it? "Again u r off! are u free from envy, ambition, or are u merely using that word love to which thought has given a meaning? If thought has given a meaning to it, than it is not love. The word love is not the love - no matter what u mean by that word. Thought is the past, the memory, the experience, the knowledge from which the response to every challenge comes. So this response is always inadequate, and hence there is conflict. For thought is always old; thought can never be new. Modern art is the response of the thought, the intellect, and though it pretends to be new it is really as old, though not as beautiful, as the hills. It is the whole structure built by thought - as love, as god, as culture, as the ideology of the polit buro - which has to be totally denied for the new to be. The new can not be fit into the old pattern. U r really afraid to deny the old pattern completely." Yes, Sir, we r afraid, for if we deny it what is there left? With what do we replace it? K: This question is the outcome of thought which sees the danger and so is afraid and wants to be assured that it will find something to replace the old. So again u r caught in the net of thought. But if factually, not verbally, or intellectually, u deny this whole house of thought, then u might perhaps find the new way of living, seeing, acting. Negation is the most positive action. To negate the false, not knowing what is true, to negate the apparent truth in the false, and to negate the false as false, is the instant action of a mind that is free from thought. To see this flower with the image that thought has built about it is entirely different from seeing it without that image. The relationship between the observer and the flower is the image which the observer has about the observed. and in this there is great distance between them. When there is no image the time interval ceases. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 42 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava Western Philosophical Concepts of God ANCIENT AND EARLY MEDIEVAL. Plato viewed as the highest of all things the good that was above all being and all knowledge, identified it with the divine nous, and attempted to raise the human spirit into the realm of ideas, into a likeness with the Godhead; which taught men to rise to the highest by a process of abstraction disregarding particulars and grasping at universals, and conceived the good of which it spoke not in a strictly ethical sense, but as, after all, the most utterly abstract and indefinable, entirely eluding all attempts at positive description. Neoplatonism went the furthest in this conception of the divine transcendence; God, the absolute One, was, according to Plotinus, elevated not only above all being, but also above all reason and rational activity. He did not, however, attempt to attain to this abstract highest good by reasoning or logical abstraction, but by an immediate contact between God and the soul in a state of ecstasy. This tendency was shared by a school of thought within Judaism itself, whose influence upon Christian theology was considerable. The more Jewish speculation, as was the case especially at Alexandria, rose above an anthropomorphic idea of God to a spiritual conception, the more abstract the latter became. In this connection Platonism was the principal one of the Greek philosophical systems toward w c this Jewish theology maintained a receptive attitude. According to Philo, God is to on, " that which is " par excellence, and this being is rather the most universal of all than the supreme good with which Plato identified the divine; all that can be said is that God is, without defining the nature of his being. Between God and the world a middle place is attributed by Philo to the Logos (in the sense of ratio, not at all in the Johannine sense), as the principle of diversity and the summary of the ideas and powers operating the world. When the Gnostics attempted to construct a great system of higher knowledge from a Christian standpoint, through assimilating various Greek and Oriental elements, and worked the facts of the Christian revelation into their fantastic speculation on general metaphysical and cosmic problems, this abstract Godhead became an obscure background for their system; according to the Valentinian doctrine, it was the primal beginning of all things, with eternal silence (sige) for a companion. In the development of the Church's doctrine with Justin and the succeeding apologists, and still more with the Alexandrian school, the transcendental nature of God was emphasized, while the Scriptures and the 'religious |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 43 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava conscience of Christendom still permitted the contemplation of him as a personal and loving Spirit. Theology did not at first proceed to a systematic and logical explanation of the idea of God with reference to these different aspects. Where philosophical and strictly scientific thought was active, as with the Alexandrians, the element of negation and abstraction got the upper hand. God is, especially with Origen, the simple Being with attributes, exalted above nous and ousia, and at the same time the Father, eternally begetting the Logos and touching the world through the Logos. In opposition to this developed a Judaistic and popular conception of God which leaned to the, anthropomorphic, and also a view like Tertuilian's' which, under the influence of Stoic philosophy, felt obliged to connect with all realities, and thus also with God, the idea of a tangible substance. In this direction Dionysius the Areopagite finally proceeded to a really Neoplatonist theology, with an inexpressible God who is above all categories, both positive and negative, and thus is neither Being nor Not-being; who permits that which is to emanate from himself in a descending scale coming down to things perceived by the senses, but is unable to reveal his eternal truth in this emanation. With this doctrine is conconnected, after the Neoplatonist model, an inner union with God, an ecstatic elevation of the soul which resigns itself to the process into the obscure depth of the Godhead. The ethical conception of God and redemption thus gives place to a physical one, just as the emanation of all things from God was described as a physical process; and as soon as speculation attempts to descend from the hidden God to finite and personal life, this physical view connects itself with the abstract metaphysical. In the West there was long a lack of scientific and speculative discussion of the idea of God. Augustine, the most significant name in Western theology, sets forth the conception of God as a self-conscious personal being which fitted in with his doctrine of the Trinity; but as his own development had led him through Platonism, the influence of that philosophy is found in the idea of God which he developed systematically and handed down. He conceives God as the unity of ideas, of abstract perfections, of the normal types of being, thinking, and acting; as simple essential in which will, knowledge, and being are one and the same. The fundamentally determinant factor in the conception of God by the Augustinian theology is thus pure being in general. LATER MEDIEVAL. Scotus Erigena, who gave Dionysius the Areopagite to Western theology, though Augustine was not without influence upon him, fully accepted the notion of God as the absolute Inconceivable, above all affirmation and Erigena. all negation, distinguishing from him a world to which divine ideas and primal forms belong. He emphasizes the other side of this view-that true existence belongs to God alone, so that, in so far as anything exists in the universe, God is the essence of it; a practical pantheism, in spite of his attempting to enforce a creative activity on the part of God. The influence of this pantheistic view on medieval theology was a limited one; Amalric of Bena , with his proposition that God was all things, was its main disciple. In accordance with its fundamental character, scholasticism attempted to reduce the idea of God into the categories which related to the laws of thought, to being, in general, and to the world. It began by adapting the Aristotelian terms to its own purposes. God, or absolute being, was to Aristotle the primum mobile, regarded thus from the standpoint of causation and not of mere being, and also a thinking subject. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 44 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava NINETEENTH-CENTURY DEVELOPMENTS. But since all thinking is to condition, and to condition the unconditioned is self-contradictory, God is both unknown and unknowable. Following in the same path H. L. Alansel (Limits of Religious Thought, London, 1867) found here the secret by which to maintain the mysteries of the faith of the church in the Trinity, the incarnation, the atonement, and other beliefs. Revelation was therefore required to supplement men's ignorance and to communicate what-human intelligence was unable to discover. Hence the dogmas concerning God which had been found repugnant or opaque to reason were philosophically reinstated and became once more authoritative for faith. In his System of Synthetic Philosophy Herbert Spencer (First Principles, London, 1860-62) maintains on the one hand an ultimate reality which is the postulate of theism, the absolute datum of consciousness, and on the other hand by reason of the limitations of knowledge a total human incapacity to assign any attributes to this utterly inscrutable power. In accordance with his doctrine of evolution he holds that this ultimate reality is an infinite and eternal energy from which all things proceed, the same which wells up in the human consciousness. He is neither materialistic nor atheistic. This reality is not personal according to the human type, but may be super-personal. Religion is the feeling of awe in relation to this inscrutable and mysterious power. With an aim not unlike that of Herbert Spencer, Matthew Arnold sought to reconcile the conflicting claims of religion, agnosticism, evolution, and history, by substituting for the traditional personal God the " Power not ourselves that makes for righteousness." Side by side with this movement appeared another led by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, based upon a spiritual philosophy, which found in the moral nature a revelation of God (Aids to Reflexion, London, 1825). This has borne fruit in many directions: in the great poets, Wordsworth, Tennyson, Browning; in preachers like Cardinal Newman, Dean Stanley, John Tulloch, Frederick William Robertson, and Charles Kingsley; in philosophical writers, as John Frederic Denison Maurice and James Martineau. The idea of God is taken out of dogma and the category of the schools and set in relation to life, the quickening source of ideals and of all individual and social advance. Religious thought in America has fully shared in these later tendencies in Great Britain, as may be seen by reference to John Fiske, Idea of God (Boston, 1886), unfolding the implications of Spencer's thought, and, reflecting the spirit of Coleridge, William Ellery Channing, Works (6 vols., Boston, 1848), W. G. T. Stead, " Introductory Essay " to Coleridge's Works (New York, 1884), and Horace Bushnell, Nature and the Supernatural, and Sermons (in Centenary edition of his Works, New York, 1903). An idea of God based on idealism, represented in Great Britain by John Caird, Philosophy of Religion (London, 1881), Edward Caird, The Evolution of Religion (ib. 1893), in Canada by John Watson, God's Message to the Human Soul (New York, 1907), has received impressive statement by Josiah Royce, The Conception of God (ib., 1897), and The World and the Individual (2 vols., 1899-1901). God is a being who possesses all logical possible knowledge, insight, wisdom. This includes omnipotence, self-consciousness, self-possession, goodness, perfection, peace. Thus this being possesses absolute thought and absolute experience, both completely organized. The absolute experience is related to human experience as an organic whole to its integral fragments. This idea of God which centers in omniscience does not intend to obscure either the ethical qualities or the proper personality of the absolute. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 45 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava "Currently there exist two theories of consciousness. One theory holds that consciousness is a universal quality adapted by each species to its specific needs. A second theory, based on the contents of consciousness, concludes that consciousness is species specific. The consciousness of each species developed by evolution is aware of and monitors the specific stimuli in its environment needed for its survival...Consciousness of any sort would have enormous survival value, and undoubtedly evolution has supported the ability to think wherever the opportunity arises. But reflective consciousness would enable any species to jump light-years ahead in its ability to respond to, and then to manipulate, its environment. It would be a strange anomaly if evolution has not developed such a survival quality along varied limbs of the evolutionary tree." Excerpts from: John Alcock "Consciousness-Raising III" Natural History (September, 1992) "Telefinality orients the march of evolution as a whole and has acted, ever since the appearance of life on earth, as a distant directing force tending to develop a being endowed with a conscience, a spiritually and morally perfect being. To attain its goal, this force acts on the laws of the inorganized world in such a way that the normal play of the second law of thermodynamics is always deflected in the same direction, a direction forbidden to inert matter and leading to ever greater dissymmetries, ever more "improbable" states." biolologist Lecomte du Notiy, Human Destiny "Humberto Maturana's theory of consciousness differs fundamentally from most others because of its emphasis on language and communication. From the perspective of the Santiago theory, the currently fashionable attempts to explain human consciousness in terms of quantum effects in the brain or other neurophysiological processes are all bound to fail. Self-awareness and the unfolding of our inner world of concepts and ideas are not only inaccessible to explanations in terms of physics and chemistry; they cannot even be understood through the biology or psychology of a single orgranism. According to Maturana, we can understand human consciousness only through language and the whole social context in which it is imbedded. At its Latin root (con-scire ("knowing together") - might indicate, consciousness is essentially a social phenomenon." Fritjof Capra, The Web of Life, page 291 "The deal with scientists was a prior inability to equate the alleged supernatural manisfestations to their then-believed limitations of the laws of physics. Now, due to the discovery of quantum expansion, they're no longer left scratching their heads". Mary Summer Rain, Fireside |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 46 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava "Life is possibilities." Theoretical Physicist Bob Laughlin "Reality is the real business of physics." Albert Einstein "Mind is not a thing but a process - the process of cognition, which is identified with the process of life. The brain is a specific structure through which this process operates. The relationship between mind and brain, therefore, is one between process and structure...The new concept of cognition, the process of knowing...involves perception, emotion, and action - the entire process of life. In the human realm cognition also includes language, conceptual thinking, and all the other attributes of human consciousness. The Santiago theory (Maturana and Varela) indentifies cognition, the process of knowing, with the process of life. The brain is not necessary for mind to exist. Mind and matter no longer appear to belong to two separate categories but are seen as representing merely different aspects, or dimensions, of the same phenomenon of life." Fritjoj Capra, The Web of Life, pg 175 "Consciousness evidences the life of the spirit. It is mind that is not dependent on a mechanized brain for its existence...Consciousness is mind, not brain matter... Consciousness is energy, able to function as an intelligent force that carries the potentiality of boundless, unrestricted movement." Mary Summer Rain, Fireside "I had become aware that living systems theory provides a critical key for understanding what makes traditional "animate" systems come alive (cells, organs, people) and by extension "ideas themselves". I had stumbled upon the logic of a potentially universal living memory process that all systems at all levels, from the miniscule to the monumental, engage in a process essential to their very being. The process involves the natural integration and dynamic storage of information over time, and therefore it is, by definition "evoloving" as well as "alive". Is everything really eternal, alive, and evoloving? Is nature a creative-unfolding process rather than a purely random process? Is the hypothesis that ideas are alive, and that ideas continue after death, really required by the theory? Do some of the seemingly inconceivable stories attributed to phychics and mediums have a foundation in contemporary science? Do all cells really have memory? Is energy itself alive and evolving? If there is a God, is God alive? Is He, She, It, Them, in a deep way, evolving?" Gary E.R. Schwartz, Ph.D., The Living Energy Universe "At the core of consciousness is the ever-present experience, "I am life which wills to live, in the midst of life which wills to live...I am a self in the midst of selves, a will-to-live in the midst of an infinate number of other wills-to-live." Albert Schweitzer's "Reverence for Life" "..to say that God existed before time is to say he existed before consciousness which, again, is quite possible. So we arrive at a theological statement that cannot be proved or disproved; that God alone existed, and therefore (providing he is consicous), time existed only in the consciousness of God." James L Christian, Philosphy, An Introduction to the Art of Wondering, page 509 "It is the Divine Consciousness that binds all life together upon the fine strands of the Great Web of Life. That Consciousness is everywhere. That Consciousness is Life. It is the very breath that sustains us. The Divine is not relegated to here or to there. The Divine is not up, not down. The Divine is within the pulsating DNA of the All." Mary Summer Rain, Beyond Earthway, page 18 |
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rav666 2/10/2001 ( 47 of 93 ) Well, i wasn't exactly looking for a 'cut n paste' job - i was expecting opinions, thoughts that counter/agree with the arguement that such a complex system that is the universe couldn't have come into existence by chance. |
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knower 2/10/2001 ( 48 of 93 ) Yes Mr Rav666, This complex universe didnt come to existence by chance. If one is to believe that this universe came to being by chance then one should also be prepared to believe that this computer has also come to existence by chance. If one extends this a bit further and apply it to all the things in the world then it will kill the whole process of research, study, discovery and development as we would be satisfied with what is there by just thinking that its all by chance!!!!! So this so called scientific theory about evolution of life is against all the basic rules and regulations of science itself. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 49 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava This Buddha was carved in the once Buddhist country of Afghanistan. It shares common characteristics with Buddhas from many other countries. During the first centuries after Siddhartha died, no images of Buddha were created, partly because he did not want his followers to concern themselves with his existence after death. The first figures appeared in the second century A.D. in northern India and rapidly spread throughout Asia. Each culture depicts Buddha a little differently. Explore this Buddha and others by clicking on any of the buttons above. for more... BuddhaLand Admin feel free to shift this post to appropriate place... if the scene get hot on Buddha |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 50 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava a salute to all the anitas and all their prataaps... Jo ik dard hey saansoN meiN Nida Faazli Likho ki cheel ke panjoN meiN SaaNp ka sir hey Likho ki saaNp ka phun chipkalli ke ooper hey Likho ki muNh meiN ussi chipkalli key jheengur hey Likho ki cheNvta, jheengur ki das-tras meiN hey Likho ki jo bhi yaNhaN hey kissi kafas (qaid, prison) meiN hey Likho ke koyi buraa hey na koyi achchaa hey Likho ki rang he jo bhi nazar meiN kachchaa hey Jo eik dard hey saaNsoN meiN Wohi sachchaa hey Ye ik dard hi sangharsh bhi hey, kHwaab bhi hey Likho ki yehi andheroN ka mahtaab bhi hey! |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 51 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava The new man will not be Hindu, will not be Mohammedan, will not be Christian, will not be communist. The new man will not know all these "isms." The new man will simply be an opening, a window to reality. He will allow reality as it is. He will not project his own mind upon it. He will not use reality as a screen. His eyes will be available; they will not be full of ideas. The old man lived out of fear - even his God was nothing but a creation out of fear. His temples, mosques, gurudwaras, churches - they were all out of fear. He was trembling, he was afraid. The new man will live out of love, not out of fear, because fear serves death, love serves life. And if you live out of fear you will never know what life is, you will only know death again and again. And remember, the person who lives out of fear creates all kinds of situations in which he has to feel more and more fear. Your fear creates situations, just as your love creates situations. If you love, you will find so many occasions to be loving. If you are afraid, you will find so many occasions to be afraid. |
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nishant 2/10/2001 ( 52 of 93 ) No............A cawardise society which tries to hide its weekness by False idol of Peace and Harmony |
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ketkar 2/10/2001 ( 53 of 93 ) of course not we r all a bunch of hypocrite lunatics. peaceful us,what a joke we kill each other in the name of religion, caste ,class, political parties and god knows what. we r dirt poor, illeterate and ignorant and instaed of working on this what we do is kill each other at the flimsiest excuse. that woman anita is right . |
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sss 2/10/2001 ( 54 of 93 ) India is made of Indians.If you are crooked,corrupt,devious opportunities galore in India.India was once a land of buddha,saints but today no peace even for majority of buddha,saints in India.Indians (majority) love,sweet gossip,slime,politics,back stabbing,money,and open sex in a covered way.They love religion in words,not deeds.Even outside India,only Indians will make life tough for a Indian who climbs up and they love to gossip,stab at back(and you will meet them everyhwhere and cannot escape them).Indian Religious people are most dangerous today.Love is packaged as sex locally.It is true Indians love there friends,relatives female members a lot.And the best loving devious/crooked brains are in India,and you will not even come to know that they have corrupted,looted,destroyed you.Even after death they carry there habits along and will not let good Indians live in peace(they haunt them and are jealous even of goodness/peace of someone).If a Indian sees other Indians success,why does he get so jealous ,but to rich,powerful they salute.But all good rich Indians also they loot,so very tough to be rich/good human in India.Silent riots of politics,sex,destruction,money games,corruption,back stabbing goes on again & again.Where is peace/love?And well lot of mahatama gandhis even in common people.Why does god send mahatama gandhis,commodus of gladiator to sell love/peace to Indians .And majority follow them and commit silent riots,where good(of any religion/class) is only loser even today. |
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sss 2/10/2001 ( 55 of 93 ) Every society (read somewhere) 7-10% bad,5-7% good,rest in between i.e they become good/bad by who is in power/circumstances (i.e lead by them or what is in fashion) and are practical to survive , for if you go against people in power ,tough to survive and definition of power changes over time.In India where is real power with rulers/or some where else,who knows? But majority people are what people at top in govt.,business,religion etc do.So we are peaceful/loving society by majority.Minorities can have different views.Also a society development/state is by people in power.Views are different according to circumstances/type of people met.But overall peace loving for majority get peace/love in India by Indians. |
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sss 2/10/2001 ( 56 of 93 ) Violence and savagery is in all societies in all culture from times history is written.Sometimes we give reason to religion conflict,nations conflict,good/bad conflict.I read on a web site which blames India's problems to musilm,british invadors and hindu's are united.Now that India made tryst with destiny 50 years back and hindu govt. there,peace there,hindu united,and all religions united why cannot we make heaven in India? Why are there darker forces like misery,torture,various crimes,corruption,slavery,insecurity(poverty will be there for everyone cannot be rich but can be prosperous.secure),murder ,lootingetc.This applies for world.Any society if has peace/provides basic needs to all citizens will be happy.This applies to world.From 50 yrs,we have added 60 crores and state of nation is what everyone can see.What holds world / India to become Ram Rajya (like put in may be fiction "Ramayana") when humans are united and peaceful.Why so much suffering/misery/torture even now? Can humans be united or some other reason/hindrances to perfect, peaceful,prosperous,happy,secure nations/people in world.Or like till recent times wars were common,now we have silent wars and world can never have peace.Some hidden reasons.Ask your GOD. |
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kamal 2/10/2001 ( 57 of 93 ) Yes, india is a peace loving society. Some times they donot have choices. Majority are hindus. Hindu religious leaders teaches peace and love. whereus other religious leaders like muslim and sikh, they teach war too. since our religious leaders did not teach war, we are coward. since we are coward, we are peace loving society. |
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Prem 2/10/2001 ( 58 of 93 ) Prem Naam Hai Mera, Not Chopra. Wow, wah, wah -- Kamal (i.e. BJP ke symbolic phool, or should we say, fool?)! Kyaa deductive logicwa lagayen hain. Woh Stri Krishna ko bhul gaye? mathura wale butter-thief? Yaan, Mahabharat? Yaan Ramayana meiN Raam's various acts of violence? Yaan, more recently, the "brave" Bajrang Dal and Shiv Sainiks? Cowards they are, these bunch of new self-appointed and proclaimed "saviours" of Hinduism (who in reality are its worst enemies) but didn't you read elementary psy. bud? Cowardice leads to violence. It's fear which leads to violence. And it's true that some of the "majority" community of ours do suffer from an immense "minority complex" Hence the fear. The real trouble is that the repressed and oppressed over the millennia have got political power and these uchh jati log do not know what to do. Add to that their limited brains and even worse illiteracy. So there you are. But, hey, what you doing here at Outlook? Wouldn't India Today and Prabhu Chawla and Swapan Dasgupta types be more your scene, eh? |
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reason 2/10/2001 ( 59 of 93 ) considering that we are a union of states that were different in many ways, it's a miracle that we've come this far without degenrating into a civil war. i don't believe that violence is created by a religion. it's inherent in all of us, it's just that we seek different ways to channel that anger & justify it, religion being the easiest excuse of all. you can forget all your miseries and problems when you listen to rhetoric that a particular religion was the root for all your problems. if you don't believe it to be tru, read the history on the rise of nazism and you've your answer. xenophobia is the best way for our politicians to keep us in their control. if we're busy killing followers of another religion where do we have the time or the interest in keep a check on our fine & upstanding politicians who are making money in blood. communism has not destroyed humanity. it's just another excuse to justify our problems & errors. mankind has destroyed humanity and until we realise it ourself, and stop blaming others we're doomed to be as we are. |
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Tathagat 2/10/2001 ( 60 of 93 ) appa DeepO bhava This song of ours will wind its music around us, our children, like the fond arms of love. The song of ours will touch our foreheads like a kiss of blessing. When we are alone, it will sit by our side and whisper in our ears, when we are in the crowd it will fence us about with aloofness. Our song will be like a pair of wings to our dreams, it will transport our heart to the verge of the unknown. It will be like the faithful star overhead when dark night is over our road. Our song will sit in the pupils of our eyes, and will carry our sight into the heart of things. And when our voices are silenced in death, Our song will speak in our living hearts. -tathagat Tagore sang it like this... :) This song of mine will wind its music around you, my child, like the fond arms of love. The song of mine will touch your forehead like a kiss of blessing. When you are alone it will sit by your side and whisper in your ear, when you are in the crowd it will fence you about with aloofness. My song will be like a pair of wings to your dreams, it will transport your heart to the verge of the unknown. It will be like the faithful star overhead when dark night is over your road. My song will sit in the pupils of your eyes, and will carry your sight into the heart of things. And when my voice is silenced in death, my song will speak in your living heart. |
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khan 2/10/2001 ( 61 of 93 ) Instead of discussing and labeling whether India is peace loving or not, I think we need to discuss how to eradicate this stigma attatched to India. Ofcourse in last few years the world has seen blatant violations of human/religious rights in India. Babri Masjid, Graham Staines, Bal Thackeray, Bajrang Dal, the continuing violence in Kashmir, cross border terrorism, under-world dons all are tearing apart our nation. Its time we discussed better methods to live amicably among our diversity (which we have inadvertantly done for centuries, to a less extent since independance, but not for the last few years). |
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surya 2/10/2001 ( 62 of 93 ) Humans are same everywhere.In India,a population of 100 cr(official) fighting for opportunities for survival,growth with no safety net from govt makes life pretty insecure.Violence,same crimes are lot even in developed world.Maybe crimes everywhere.But in India multi religions/caste/community leads to lot of peculiar confusion/problems. |
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khan 2/10/2001 ( 63 of 93 ) Crime is everywhere, even in developed countries. US has higher crime rate than India. Agreed. (period). But in India, we are talking about organised hate crimes and flaring of religious and communal passions becoming the rule of the day. If there were one or two stray incidents, then we can ignore them as random events. But in reality there has been organised and systematic hate crimes and hate mongers had been making their evil designs public. Nobody questions them. We are talking about Babri Masjid Demolition, Bombay riots, and scrapping of Sree Krishna Commission on Bombay Riots, Killing of the elderly missionary Graham Staines, and Home Minister shielding the killers, even before the investigation is completed. We are talking about attacks on churches, desecration of Mosques, public burning of the holy book of Islam, Quran. Organised attacks on Dalits and other minorities. Leave alone the re-interpretation of Indian history on the lines of Hindu racist and supremacist theories, and revamping of the educational system to indoctrinate the yound children with hindu fundamentalist ideologies. What is worst is those political parties that have been instrumental in flaring up religious passions that led to these crimes, or had been directly involved in some of them are now ruling the country. Like the famous urdu couplet goes, "Barbaad Gulistan Karne Ko Ek Shaakh pe ullu kaafi hai Har Shaakh pe ullu baitha ho Anjaame Gulistan kya hoga" (A fool is sufficient to destroy an entire garden, if there is a fool on a branch of every tree, what will be the condition of the garden). |
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rav666 2/10/2001 ( 64 of 93 ) Hi Khan, I think it's time to call your bluff. Talking of religion-centic politics, Muslim League was the first religion based party and you dont seem to make any noise about it. And talking of violence, I dunno how you could skip Bombay blasts (orchestrated by Memon brothers and D-gang with the blessings of ISI), church burning incidents (by a muslim fanatic group called Deendar Anjuman) the massacre of Kashmiri Pandits / sikhs and Amarnath pilgrims every year, anti-Gadar / anti-Quran-burning incidents, and sundry blasts occuring somewhere or other on Dec 6th every year. Are these not violence, or do you have a different name for them (like 'jihad' or whatever)? And regarding our amicable living for centuries, I hope you are not talking about the kind under the rule of Aurangazeb and his ilk, when we had wonderful policies like Jaziya etc. Another question arousing my curiosity - when the church-burning incidents were traced back to Deendar Anjuman, the Christian lobbies and their guardian angels in the media (who were making a hue and cry until then) fell surprisingly silent. I guess that's because their minority-complex was not not being fed anymore - I can't think of any other explanation. |
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khan 2/10/2001 ( 65 of 93 ) rav666, Unlike Bajrang Dal and other saffron brigade activits, the Deendar Anjuman was banned and all its learders were arrested and are being tried in court, although it is not established whether they were really involved in the incidents you are suggesting. I hope you see the difference. When foolish muslims or christians do wrong, they are severely dealth with, but when saffron brigade is involved they go scot free. Moreover they are even encouraged by the Home minister, Prime Minister, and the remote-control Minister. The whole Memon family and their relatives and their neighbours and their bussiness assosciates are all harrassed by the authorities. But those saffron-sena involved in Bombay riots have gone scott free. And those involved in Babri Masjid demolition are now ruling the country. I hope you will agree that after the Babri Masjid incident a lot of knee-jerk militant organisation were created all over the country. Instead of arguing about these, it would be better if we dwell on the reason why this happened. As far as ISI is concerned why do you blame Indian muslims for that. I think it is the duty of the Indian forces to stop ISI from entering its soil. It seems for every thing that goes bad in India, the saffron brigade will link it to Indian muslims, even the Plague in Surat and the Earthquake in Gujarat. How about the recent floods in Orissa? |
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kamal 2/10/2001 ( 66 of 93 ) To make India peaceful society, Government should induce the public to think about economic growth rather than this religious fight. people should spent more time for economic growth rather this religious fundamentalism. To avoid religion based riots, people should remove their religious marks. So that no one can find out who belongs to which religion. This is very very important. |
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666 2/10/2001 ( 67 of 93 ) Khan, It is a fact that while 45+% muslims chose to depart from Hindustan and formed the relegious fanatic state called pakistan. It was Hindus by the virtue of which India remained secular. The fact remains. Across the world, people of different non-muslim majority relegions are facing the problem of terrisom mostly state sponsored, cross border in the name of jehad. Because of the "5% internal fanatic terrorist minded muslims" all our remaining 50%+ muslims tend to be blamed. 45% are outright enemies. (pakistanis) 50% seem to be okay. Indian part of muslims. 5% are dangerous than the first category. Lets strive to eleminate these dangerous category. Let's not break the same dish in which we eat. |
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Eminem 2/10/2001 ( 68 of 93 ) Khan has put up a spirited and well reasoned defence and there is certainly some merit in his arguments. A bungling communal government has found a convenient whipping boy in the ISI and the weak impoverished Muslim minority struggling to eke out a living and could not care less who is in government for successive governments have let them down. The speed with which the home minister rushes to justify the Sangh Parivar and the Prime Minister grovels at the RSS feet of the RSS (which he grew up with) suggests an unprecedented sway for any communal organisation on the government. I cannot recollect any examples of a similar magnitude of sway ANY OTHER COMMUNAL ORGANISATION HELD ON THE GOVERNMENT IN INDEPENDENT INDIA. Any one suggesting the contrary may please give similar examples. Incidentally this may sound strange BUT IS TRUE the RSS is as much ANTI HINDU SOCIETY as any fundamentalist Muslim Organisation...AND THEY CLAIM TO BE THE SPOKESGROUP FOR THE HINDUS ! Who refrained from participating in the freedom movement ? The Seva Dal ? Who accused the Hindus of being Cowards ? The Muslim League ??? Who accused the Hindus of lacking in Discipline ? The Akali Dal ?? Who objected to the codifcation of Hindu law ? The Pseudo secularist ? Who is trying to protect the priviliges of a Brahiminical order ? The Parsi Sena ? Who is objecting most to Deepa Mehtas water but doing precious little to work for the emanicpation of women ? Who is glorifying Sati ? The Catholic Sabha The questions can go on. (cont'd).... |
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Eminem 2/10/2001 ( 69 of 93 ) (COnt'd) Am pointing THE FACT THAT THE RSS IS NOT AN ANGEL IN DISGUISE ONLY TO MAKE A LARGER POINT THAT OTHER COMMUNAL PARTIES LIKE THE MUSLIM LEAGUE THE AKALI DAL AND ALSO THE COMMUNIST PARTIES are FAR FROM BLAMELESS in this violence ridden society ON THE CONTRARY , THE TRUTH IS THAT IN THIS DEGENERATED SOCIETY EACH OF THESE GROUPS DRAW A JUSTIFICATION FOR THEIR EXISTENCE AND THEIR SUSTENANCE FROM THE OTHER AND WILL THEN BE QUITE HAPPY TO APPORTION BLAME TO THE OTHER. AS IS EVIDENT IN FREE SPEECH FOR MOST OF THE COMMUNAL ORGANISATIONS OF THE DAY AND THE COMMUNISTS THE MEANS CAN BE JUSTIFIED SO LONG AS IT ACHIEVES THEIR ENDS HENCE VIOLENCE, SAVAGERY AND VANDALISM HAVE FOUND LEGITIMACY IN THE PROCESS !!!! VIOLENCE, SAVAGERY, VANDALISM have gained currency and is lurking below the surface in a society where HATRED of the neighbour WE vs THEM, minority bashing, jehad are all acceptable practices . THEY HAVE PROBABLY reached their culmination with the most no. of offenders of the law finding themselves as ministers in a central government charged with upholding the law and the constitution. Communism by denouncing God and denying the soul has indeed caused serious damage but what about the religions and claimants in the name of religion that call for jehad, fatwas, Kar sevas and vandalism ? To kamals point 'to avoid religion based riots' people should remove their religious marks. The Jews and Muslims practice circumcision for them to be recognised at the gates of Paradise. Ask the Sena activists in Mumbai and they will tell you that they have used these signs with telling effect to pick their victims. How many of these have been arrested and jailed ?? to 666 point on percentage of unfaithful muslims . I do not know where he got these figures from. The question is who determines who form the unfaithful and the apprporiate punishment for them ? Here in lies the seeds of mistrust and strife. This is precisely the point made by the free speech host. |
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gandalf 2/10/2001 ( 70 of 93 ) khan: the orissa floods were not (thanksfully) blamed on Muslims. they were the fault of Christian missionaries. :-) 666, India did not (remain) secular because of the hindhus. IT did so because of the farsightedness fo leaders both Hindhu, Muslim and Buddhist. We were lucky to have better leaders at that time. Today we dont have them so the inexorable slide. Majority of junta in most communities are easily swayed. |
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gandalf 2/10/2001 ( 71 of 93 ) Eminem: Though I completely agree with you that fundementalist groups draw justification from each other, I am not sure that its just the groups to blame. The most powerful group is the common person like you and me. It now sole rest on us to take a more active role in public debates, question our own biases and prejudices and speak out for what we belive is right yet respecting other groups. We have to do something to make this society better (though I am not sure what) Blaming others however valid.. is not helping. |
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gandalf 2/10/2001 ( 72 of 93 ) 666, India is not secular because of Hindhus. Its because of a few farsighted men and women - hindus, Xtians, Muslims, Sikh etc.. not to forget Ambedkar the Buddhist. I think Eminem has shown that the emporer has no cloths. The issue is not really facist, fundementalist or even misguided groups like RSS, SIMI. Its we the middle class who are not applying humanity, applying reason and digging deeper for answers. We have a responsibility to opur society first. Thats is to ensure that understand what we belive in and are epitomes of independent thought. Not ideologica parrots |
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Karapall 2/10/2001 ( 73 of 93 ) gandalf: "Its we the middle class who are not applying humanity, applying reason and digging deeper for answers. We have a responsibility to opur society first. Thats is to ensure that understand what we belive in and are epitomes of independent thought. " Right, and after the middle class has chewed its intellectual cud and found all the answers, they can walk by to the local politician who will implement it in a trice. Jeez, wonder why nobody else had such brilliant ideas before... |
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Karapall 2/10/2001 ( 74 of 93 ) eminem, good post, pal. Especially your point about the hindu fundies justifying their existence because of rampant islamic fundamentalism and communalism in India. Islamic communalists must be placed on a tight leash before we see a decline in support for hindu fundies. |
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Karapall 2/10/2001 ( 75 of 93 ) gandalf, seriously, the middle class does not control the votes. Rural Indians actually appreciate Indian democracy more than the urban Indians, and it is they who decide who gets elected and who does not. And it is precisely these same people who can be easily misguided. Middle class Indians might have all the money but they have zero political clout at election time. |
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Karapall 2/10/2001 ( 76 of 93 ) gandalf, seriously, the middle class does not control the votes. Rural Indians actually appreciate Indian democracy more than the urban Indians, and it is they who decide who gets elected and who does not. And it is precisely these same people who can be easily misguided. Middle class Indians might have all the money but they have zero political clout at election time. |
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jbindra 2/10/2001 ( 77 of 93 ) We shall overcome. The rabid Karapall barks yet again : good post, pal. Especially your point about the hindu fundies justifying their existence because of rampant islamic fundamentalism and communalism in India. Islamic communalists must be placed on a tight leash before we see a decline in support for hindu fundies Why one before the other ? Care to explain O' Learned One ? All fundamentalists and their supporters must be crushed, together and without prejudice. It is the liberals who always encourage development in any society and that is the only way for India to prosper too. We must promote a liberal mindset that only takes the basic moral values from each religion and debunks the hardline and divisive preachings. btw : Eminem - Good job ! =D |
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Karapall 2/10/2001 ( 78 of 93 ) jbindra: "It is the liberals who always encourage development in any society and that is the only way for India to prosper too. " I am sure your simple mind swallowed this little bit of myth. Development results from the creation of solid policies that correctly address various loopholes and problems in any given sector. Political ideology of the people or parties developing or implementing such policies is usually secondary and mostly irrelevant. Government policies are crafted by the civil service which works on various policies slowly and steadily, no matter who is currently in power. The current economic policies of the govt. are the same as those instituted by Manmohan Singh because the civil servants have the job of keeping these reforms moving forward even after the congress lost power. For example, Nixon was the one who actually instituted a lot of civil rights reforms in the US; I am sure your simple mind was not aware of such facts. Next time, read up on world history and Indian history before you claim to be an expert on those fields. You truly are a decrepit, senile old fool who has possibly reached the same stage of life as the famous decrepit senile motherfucker Khuswant Singh -- his latest anti-war article speaks volumes about this man's need for a straighjacket and a golden shower from a lot of Indians who have lost their lives to pakis in the past decades. |
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sangeeta 2/10/2001 ( 79 of 93 ) Time for a new national flag The flag of a country is a proud symbol of its ethos, the principles it professes AND practices. Perhaps, its time to change the Indian flag – remove the white and green stripes, which children are taught in school stand for peace and prosperity, and have just the colour saffron to stand for what we, individually and as a nation, practice on a daily basis. No country ever achieved any peace and much less prosperity by being constantly in a state of about to topple into war or dousing (and arousing) the flames of communal conflict. Instead of schools and hospitals, we build bombs. Instead of maintaining a secular democracy that has been our just pride for five decades, we ring out threats to our friends and neighbours who worship another god. We have no need for the green and white any more. The saffron however will be our safety net. We won’t care if we die – either because we did not eat enough food, did not get the right medicines, could not read basic instructions or because we were just wiped out by some nuclear weaponry – we, the Hindus, will be reincarnated. We won’t care if ‘they’ die when we kill them. It is said in the Gita, no one kills and no one gets killed. The Upanishads, the Gita and all other repositories of the perennial philosophy will need some updating, however. In them is said that ‘dharma’ is ‘that which upholds’. They got it wrong. ‘Dharma’ is that which eats away at the basis of a prosperous social life of peaceful co-existence. I am a Hindu so I am incriminated with those who lit the fires in Gujarat, who remain silent in the face of the numerous jingoistic irrationalities shouted by the BJP and its shot-callers, the Bajrang Dal and the VHP, who allow unreason to become reasonable, who do not question the illogic of hatred and intolerance. We are now a nation of monkeys ‘seeing no evil, hearing no evil, saying no evil’? If something is not heard, seen or talked about – well then, it does not exist. Out with the green and white and in with the saffron – a symbol of our individual and collective hypocrisy and cowardice. |
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maha 2/10/2001 ( 80 of 93 ) sangeeta, If India did not build bomb, it will not have any land to build schools and hospitals (did you get what I mean?). Same goes to your other points. |
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luvvmann 2/10/2001 ( 81 of 93 ) sangeeta, do not show your ignorance and gandhian knowledge. please fuck off. |
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jbindra 2/10/2001 ( 82 of 93 ) We shall overcome. Luvvman : Patience. This is no way to treat a woman. Especially if you lust for a fellatio so greatly. But then when did non-heterosexuals know how women need to be treated. |
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luvvmann 2/10/2001 ( 83 of 93 ) jbindra, i have fucked all kinds of women in this world. white, black, indian, chinese. i don't want to fuck a seditious bitch no matter what race. did you visit lahore today to suck your favorite mullahs dick benchot. |
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jbindra 2/10/2001 ( 84 of 93 ) We shall overcome. Luvvman : You carrier of veneral diseases. I am sure your female companion, not a human offcourse, had some one put up that topic about martial rape and HIV. Did you remember to ask someone to kick yor balls today ? Visit Lahore and ask a mullah, he will do great wonders for you. |
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Karapall 2/10/2001 ( 85 of 93 ) jbindra: "Patience. This is no way to treat a woman. " Hear, hear. It is essential that we all learn the finer points of etiquette and manners from paki-loving Khalisthani terrorist sympathizers like jbindra, who represent all that is good and wholesome on this good earth. |
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Karapall 2/10/2001 ( 86 of 93 ) jbindra: Please explain the concept of a "martial rape"...inquiring minds would like to know. |
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gandalf 2/10/2001 ( 87 of 93 ) You guys are sick. Sangeetha.. very well said.. Your post would acieve pore that most.. making a few people think. Very well said. maha or whatever..we old not have land to build hospitals if we did not build a bomb".. seriously how stupid can one get. This is too depressing to even try and explain to you. Please shut up, perform some some karva chauth. Or do you have access to the comp because you are confined in a room? |
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gandalf 2/10/2001 ( 88 of 93 ) Sorry for the bloomer ".. very well said.. Your post would achieve more that most.. making a few ... |
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gandalf 2/10/2001 ( 89 of 93 ) Karapall jbindra: Please explain the concept of a "martial rape"...inquiring minds would like to know." .. Thats what happens when your wife says she is visiting the doc, or going to the mall. An impotent fool like you luckily will not be able to rape so .. dont bother your numbskull with big confusing words |
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Karapall 2/10/2001 ( 90 of 93 ) gandalf: "An impotent fool like you luckily will not be able to rape..." Your authoritative tone indicates clearly that you have the benefit of a lot of experience when it comes to rape. Pardon me if I am not too impressed. |
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GAYATHRI 2/10/2001 ( 91 of 93 ) www.cry.org/you/youcando.htm Dear Gandalf Reg.Marital Rape. Guess what? its not "Thats what happens when your wife says she is visiting the doc, or going to the mall". It may seem a funny thing to say but its not funny especially for the raped woman. I am sure you dont want to hurt other's feelings. So please do think twice before writing things along those lines. This is a sincere request which of course you can choose to ignore. Other inquiring minds can read the discussion for more details. have a nice day |
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gandalf 2/10/2001 ( 92 of 93 ) Gayatri .. Point taken and unconditional apology to you and anyone else offended. |
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GAYATHRI 2/10/2001 ( 93 of 93 ) www.cry.org/you/youcando.htm I hadnt expected the apology. I had written only because i believed that it was unintentional attitude on your part. You might be aware that i am trying to inform my friends but the serious nature of marital rape and hiv transmission in another discussion. Your message therefore was deeply discouraging. I hadnt expected the apology, but its nice to know that the point had been made. Thanks. Have a nice day. |
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