Supermarket philosophy

[sporkubus]

Dear all,

 

I came to this forum a few months ago excited to see a true Hindu discussion board with lots of differing opinions and exciting debates going on. It only took me a short time to become saddened by the tone of many of the posts, especially the "my God is real and yours is not" ones. My faith was even shaken a little to watch people argue over things that I had imagined Hinduism was free of.

 

Today I was in a grocery store in my town with my aunt and niece. All of the sudden my little niece of only four years ran up to me in tears. I hugged her and asked "What's wrong?" and she told me "Mommy is missing!" So I told her "Don't worry, we'll find auntie." She looked at me like I was crazy and started crying even louder, "I DON'T WANT AUNTIE, I WANT MOMMY!" So I hugged her again and said "That's right, let's go find mommy." A minute later we found her and I called her "Auntie" and once again my little niece started crying "That's not AUNTIE, it's MOMMY!"

 

For me, believe it or not, this was an extremely profound experience, because it put everything that is argued about on this forum into perspective. A human being is really such a massive thing - made up of a thousand different parts, an entire physical, mental, and emotional past - a brain, a body, and a soul. No matter how hard we try, there is no way any of us could ever completely and totally understand another person in every aspect of their life. We can hardly understand ourselves in this form, so how could we presume to know another person perfectly?

 

We know other people through our relationships to them. This is both a limiting and liberating feature. Although we consciously know our mother is also the wife and lover of our father, the sister of our aunts and uncles, the daughter of her parents, a friend to her best friend, we still think of her as "mother" and whatever else she is in our lives. Can you imagine trying to accept your mother, right this moment, as your lover, and toss away all of your pre-conceived notions of her as mother? Yuck! I definitely couldn't. Are we wrong, then, for accepting our mother as our mother and not as our lover? Is either wrong? Are we wrong for not knowing our mother completely, from the inside out, and altering our behavior toward her accordingly?

 

The archetypes of the gods - Shiva, Brahma, Vishnu, Kali, Durga, the Father of Christianity and Allah of the Muslims - are real people, in the same way as my "mother" is a real person. However, God is no more just Shiva or Vishnu as my mother is just a "mother." If people are so vast and complex that we could not even come close to understanding one person entirely in a lifetime, presuming to know God completely, from the inside out, is a zillion times more ridiculous. If my mother does not become offended when I call her "mother", then certainly God would not become offended that I call Him Shiva. I would not pretend to know my mother the same way her sister does, or my father does, except that we both love her. I think this is the most important aspect of that relationship, love. I think the same also applies to religion. Whether I know God as my brother, my father, or my mother - as the Destroyer, the Creator, or the Preserver - all that matters is my devotion or love for Him in that relationship.

 

In the end, God is no more just Shiva than my mother is just Mother, but I will continue to call her that without shame, and the same goes for Shiva.

[Guest guest]

unforunately i have been saying the same thing. there are so many people here fighting about which religion is right and which god to worship, and what people are better and what race is the best. its so useless and stupid.

 

god is one no matter how many different names we have for him. that doesnt make any of the names wrong. respect eachothers beliefs. people have a god given birthright to live their lives as they choose to. if they want to call vishnu 'allah', then let them. only criticize if they do something immorral. not because they do things you dont.

[maadhav]

<< so how could we presume to know another person perfectly? >>

 

vedic answer:

by becoming perfect ourselves. besides, the ultimte life goal is to know god and be with him/her. the vedic literature provided many ways of knowing the self, the people, and god.

 

we know by direct experience also.

e.g we know islam by 1000 years of our direct experience with it. and so we do not like it in the vedic land.

 

[sporkubus]

this is true... but I am speaking about us as limited, non-Realized human beings. When we know God completely, we lose all barriers and distinctions, so of course we would no longer have need of such relationships. Until then...

[sporkubus]

do not forget the negative experience so many Westerners have had with Hinduism - Sai Baba and numerous other "gurus," the New Age movement, and the picture so many have of ignorant farmers worshipping their cows and drinking their urine. I'm not saying Islam is perfect or even good, but you should perhaps not throw stones from a glass house.

[Guest guest]

 

This is the age when there are very few real sadhus or satvik people.It is one of the signs of Kali that frauds wearing red cloth pretend to be sadhus everywhere.

 

Hindusim is not an evil ideology. Islam is an evil ideology who very basis is intolerance and annihilation of non-believers and ultimately it will self-annihilate itself. Chistianity has evolved and now a much refined version otherwise medieval period is very violent.

 

Hinduism is passing through Kaliyuga syndrome...where there are more frauds than real sadhus...one should be careful from red cloth wearing sadhus as it is written

 

Vedic religion true religion of India is a Universal religion...Hindusim of present day is a corrupted version due to invasion/colonization/other kaliyuga effects.

 

 

 

 

[maadhav]

<< and the picture so many have of ignorant farmers worshipping their cows and drinking their urine. >>

 

in the vedic times the cows used to eat clean and organic grass. consequently cow urine and dung were not harmful to life. additionally, the vedas says cow unrine is pavitra (antiseptic/clean). therefore the hindus used to drink it a bit (not glassfuls) to purify themselves. this is faith.

 

no hindu has gotten sick doing this, and many actually have gained health by doing it. this faith is a lot better than a ny faith that says "go invade other countries and convert by force or kill them and smash their temples."

 

no hindu should be ashamed of drinking cow urine if the cow eats healthy food, lives naturally and is healthy. we should not care what the world thinks about us. we have our vedas to live by. remember that we never force anyone (even our own hindus) to drink that. in contrast, islamits hae their police to enforce koran even on the muslim.

 

<< I'm not saying Islam is perfect or even good, but you should perhaps not throw stones from a glass house. >>

 

to islam, we hindus need to throw missiles, not stones.

this forum is not for praising 2000 year old ememy ideology of hinduism. this is hindu forum.

 

[Guest guest]

*******do not forget the negative experience so many Westerners have had with Hinduism - Sai Baba and numerous other "gurus," the New Age movement,**********

 

atleast hindu gurus do not convert and force their ideologies, pay money, convert fradulently, throw dirt on the church god, or gods of other religions. If one is not happy with a guru, hinduism offers the freedom of searching for god and realising him even without a guru.

 

******and the picture so many have of ignorant farmers worshipping their cows and drinking their urine******

And hindus do not eat the body of a dead cow. And cow's urine has got some medicinal properties ( I mean the cow that lives on eating grass, hay etc and not cinema posters).

Farmers worshipping the cow is because, it is a source of livelihood, and since god is the one that gives and sustains life, and cow also does the same thing, it is worshipped as a goddess.

[krishnadasa]

I agree with that!!!

 

Hari hari bol

 

[maadhav]

all glory to our gurus and krisha, and sri madvhacharya.

please keep on spreading the message.

 

[Subham]

Hari OM:

 

it is good that you are thinking and able to come to good conclusions, but are missing subtle points.

 

if that child, accusses you of blasphemy, for calling her Mommy as Aunty, and tries to behead you, what will you do, will be smiling or running away for life?

[happy102785]

Sporkubus,

 

I too came upon this site with the hope that a real discussion on the many aspects of Hinduism would be happening, and was angered and saddened to see the inane, fundamentalists responses populating the forum.

 

But reading your post has shown me that there does exist hope that Hinduism in its true sense of the word is not become overriden with the zealousness of these neo-Nazi-types on these forums. It's disappointing to see fundamentalists ruling the Hindu faith, but such has become the case in many places the world over, including this forum it seems.

 

I wholeheartedly thank you for bringing a sense of sanity into these discussions.

 

Keep writing.

[Guest guest]

I have made various postings on this website stating just this point. I don't understand why some people cannot accept the basic principles of a religion. There is one God but God has so many elements that have different names. Hinduism is the only surviving religion that recognises and celebrates all the functions God has whilst stressing that God is one. We embrace both the maternal and paternal functions of God. Pictorial representations such as murtis are not the only place that God is confined to. They are more a focus point for worship. God is omnipresent.

This is what the scriptures say and it is not a hard concept to understand.

I would like to add that I urge those that are discontented with any posting to please refrain from aggression and name calling. We are all brothers and sisters trying to understand, learn and celebrate our religion and way of life together and united. If you cannot accept someone's point of view, try to be more persuasive yourself but do not demean them.

United we stand, divided we fall and the sooner we realise this the longer we will be able to preserve the religion our ancestors fought so hard to keep alive!!

p.s. I’m a 22 yr old young woman living in the UK. I'm proud of the way my parents have brought me up but it upsets me when people of my parent's age are fighting about which God is the strongest instead of encouraging more youngsters to participate in discussion.

 

[sporkubus]

I apologize if my post about Islam sounded more angry and accusatory than it was meant to. I am not ignorant of the violent nature of Islam and its many other negative aspects, nor was I attempting to refute such negativity through my post. What upsets me about the discussions of Islam on this forum is that this is a forum about Hinduism, and it seems 80% of the posts are Vishnu vs. Shiva and the other 20% are "Islam has to go" posts. This, to me, is ultra-ironic: that Hindus themselves are re-enacting the war between Sunnis and Shi'ites right here, while criticizing the violent pig-headedness of their Muslim neighbors.

 

I just think it would be a good idea for us all to take a moment and analyze the negative aspects of our own tradition, rather than playing the shout-down game: "My tradition has problems, but I'm not even going to think about them because yours are much much worse."

[Subham]

Hari OM:

 

it is true that there are many differences in Hinduism itself, and the existence of difference is an universal fact, people who try to destroy the differences actually create more differences.

 

As far as my knowledge, Shivites and Vishnavities don't try to behead each other or the rest of mankind.

 

Islam like most of the other religions "Think" that:

 

- It is superior and others are inferior

 

- They are the "chosen" people of God.

 

i don't find any issue here.

 

The second concept is "Jihad" and there are three interpretations:

 

-The spiritual Jihad

 

-The defensive Jihad (To defend the Religion and the community)

 

-The offensive Jihad (To use violence for the spread of Religion)

 

The first one is noble, but has very few adhrents (~8% of muslims adher to it)

 

The second one is not so noble, but 90% of muslims adher to it, this is ok and agreeable and is similar to found in most other religions (at least in older times)

 

The third one is outright criminal, only 2% of muslims adher to that.

 

The main problem now is there is a gray area between the Second and third one and lot of people are jumping into that and making it very dangerous.

 

For example the attack on WTC, USA is considered as offensive Jihad by many people, but few try to classify it as defensive Jihad (since USA is helping Israel to occupy Palestine and hence affecting their Ummah-coumminty)

 

The big problem here is any action can be both classified as Offensive or defensive Jihad, it would confuse both Muslims and non-Muslims alike and creates terror. This is the issue we are trying to address.

 

Other than that, i have no problem with their other beliefs (Hajj, Ramzan, charity...) their dress codes, polygamy, seperate marriage and civil laws,etc., (even though they may create economic hardship to them and others)

 

Now you justify your comparison of the negative aspects of our own tradition with the above issues.

[Guest guest]

This post to the first post.

 

Nicely put and you have explained it nicely and articulately. Yes, it is sad and difficult to see people hold their own and not compromise. Where is the tolerance that one should have the Gita talks about?

 

Just yesterday, i was reading Srila Prabhuapda's book and he says that an Uttama Adhikari(first class devotee) is characterized by how he sees everybody else as the devotee of God but him. The key word here is everybody which means all moving and non-moving entities that exist on this planet are devotees and he thinks he is not a devotee and that he is useless. This is how one can say if one is a first class devotee or not. But, unfortunately nowdays it is very rare to see these personalities.

 

Now, you were comparing 'mother' as a metophor to see God. See that is the problem. You know who your 'mother' is so you can call her mother and interact with her. But, do you know who really God is?

 

I think your mother will be offended if you go and call someone else as 'mother' and identify her as 'mother'. What i am saying is, you cannot call another person as your 'mother', yes in a polite way we address other woman as mother, but iam saying like you cannot treat other women as your real mother and in that sense call her mother. So, you can only live and treat your real mother as mother with love and affection. This does not apply for other women. But this is possible only if you know who your real mother is but unfortunately people in general deluded who real God is. That is the problem.

 

I would dare to say that it is not correct to call any other God as God just as it is not correct to call any other women as your real mother. So instead of trying to genralize i think it is our prime duty to searh for that God and not just assume God out of mere sentiment or heresay.

 

It is your duty to read and analyse the scriptures with an open mind and study sincerely just like any book and understand who really God is. Yes, people fight, that is a given in this day and age and we have to be tolerant to everybody and that is part of developing oursleves into better people. But, trying to give God who is as real as your mother and who is as individualistic as your mother a homogenous outlook, to me, is not the right way.

 

So study the scriptures written by authentic sources and analyse for yourself and am sure it will be a ride and experience in itself. In other words, iam trying to tell that to understand who really is God and how really is God is not an easy task and just because it is not easy doesnt give us the right to ignore the duty of knowing who is God.

 

Only if you know who really is God can you serve Him.

 

anand