Why can we not control our body?

[Love]

I would like to get different views as to why the body does not seem to be in our control even though for hundreds of years Indians have followed the path of spirituality by giving up the worldly life in favour of the spiritual one? If spirituality would have cured us we would not have seen the manu social evils that we see in India in its present form. Also, why have we then deviated all of a sudden from the path of spirituality that we were so devotedly following?

[shvu]

 

'why have we then deviated all of a sudden from the path of spirituality that we were so devotedly following?'

 

I think your perception is that India was once very spiritual and now is has deteriorated. That is not correct. India was always like this and was never better. As it is now, even in the olden days it was rarely that a person renounced worldy life to take on a spiritual one.

 

I think that also answers your other questions.

 

Cheers

 

 

[Love]

PLease correct me if I am wrong. I thought all sages, Buddha, Mahavira, and many others (the concept of vanaprastha) renounced worldly life when they went on the spiritual path as worldly ties were considered a hinderance to the journey on the spiritual path. I am quite sure spirituality was not recommended for people who wished to live the mudane life. It was culture that kept them from straying in the world of physical desires and senses.

When I said that we deviated from the path of spirituality I meant just arounf 2000 years. If we go back to the times when Mahabharata is written, it is quite explicit that worldy life was not looked down upon. In fact, Pandavas fought for their kingdom because it was not dharma to stand up to injustice being meted out to them. Besides, Krishna also all his life devoted to the worldy matters (as that was what the re-incarnation was about - cleaning up the adharma from earth). It is only sometime before the onslaught of the Muslim invaders that we started turning towards spiritual life as opposed to worldy life and even started condemning the worldly life. I even go further to say that it is nature that filled the vacuum which was created in India by the removal of energies in us that desired to be a part of the worldly life, that such despicable enegies filled India in the form of Muslims and took over the worldy life from the Hindus. We must have been confused only as there were around 70000 Jain munis, who in the name of their dharma of ahimsa, took jal samadhi when one of the early Muslim invaders captured 70000 women from Brahmnabad and took them to Arab. Why did these Jain munis forget that their duty was to follow ahimsa but at the same time bearing suffering at the hand of injustice is also adharma and not ahimsa.

Lastly, if we were always the same, does it imply we have not got better. I mean where is the point of a civilisation if it does not improve upon itself not only in scientific manners but also as a culture and individuals. Why have we not been able to control our bodies better? The question remains the same.

Cheers

[shvu]

Hi,

 

Your logic of Jainism is correct.

 

While the Hindu philosophy was based on duty, Jainism and Buddhism were based on Non-violence. Their philosophy was something identical to 'if someone slaps you, show the other cheek'. According to such a philosophy, if someone invades my kingdom, I should actually welcome them and surrender myself. The concept of duty, responsibility etc were not addressed in these philosophies, unlike Hinduism. That perhaps was a major flaw resulting in a weak attitude towards oppression.

 

Coming to Indians bending to Invaders, my opinion is that Indians are weak in general. We seem to lack that forcefulness found in westerners or even the Middle-eastern countries. I have always wondered if Vegetarian food has something to with this, or more simply the climate. Or maybe it is genetic. I have no idea.

 

'if we were always the same, does it imply we have not got better. I mean where is the point of a civilisation if it does not improve upon itself not only in scientific manners but also as a culture and individuals.'

 

Wrt Spirituality, India remains the same as before, in my opinion. Spirituality in India has neither decreased nor increased.There are some people who have an impression that India had a glorious spiritual past and has deteriorated now. I was pointing out that it is false. However materially, we have got a lot better on the social and economic front . We are gradually breaking away from our age old fatalistic attitude. Thanks to all the western influence.

 

Cheers

[Love]

Hiya,

 

I was trying to imply something by the story of the Jain munis. Jain munis were perhaps justified in taking ‘jal-samadhi’, as the ruler of the land could not protect the people and they by their dharma could not prevent it. However, it was my personal view, which believes that the Jain munis should have rather given their lives fighting the barbaric act. None-the-less, if we look at this story, we find there was a time when Indians knew when they had to pick up weapons and even lay down their lives to protect dharma. Mahabharata is all about this. Yet, we reached a stage of confusion when we did not know what needed to be done in order to live in this world. I am not implying that we should have learnt to be cunning to survive. In fact, Indians were in a stage of great experimentation where they were trying to build a just society (as opposed to the rest of the world still being comparatively barbaric) and had gone deep onto the spiritual path when the Muslims invaded. And then, they did acts that were unheard of at that time – killing the children, destroying places of worship, ravaging women, etc – and this was what just made the Indians reach a sort of somatic-coma. They could not believe their eyes that man could be so cruel. This is where we faltered. Why is it that we faltered here and since then, have been stuck at this stage of somatic-growth? And so, my question is that why have we not been able to root out the problems that plague our physical existence – our somatic-selves even though we have striven for centuries to search for Truth? Does it not suggest that we had taken a wrong approach somewhere in the past?

 

It is also not true that Indians are generally weak. Yes, if we look at modern India, we seem to be much less endowed physically as opposed to Westerners. However, I don’t believe this was the case always. After all, people from Mahabharata fought with courage, had even characters like Karna who could give up their ultimate weapon even when they knew it would mean death for them. The fact is that in our every walk of life we had a certain dharma, which governed us. If you would not take Mahabharata as a true depiction of those times but as a story, then allow me to tell you of a king called Kharvela. He lived in the times when Greeks were invading India. He was born after Alexander had died and there used to be a Greek ambassador, I think called Seleucus (or something like that). He drove the Greek army out of India three times while he ruled! And every time he went as far out as Afghanistan to drive them away from India. It is after this time that we do not find Greeks invading India. So, as far as courage goes, I am sure we had plenty of that in the older times. And by the way, Kharvela was a Jain king.

 

Thanks to Western influence, we are learning to become pragmatic and forgetting that living life by a certain dharma resulted in the automatic walk on the path that lead to Truth. We have become more like the shifting sands of the desert who will not stop at anything. We are a stunted race today, as our nervic personality has been confused and all mangled up by centuries of slavery. And that is why most of the Indians think that we have a great thanks we owe to the Westerners for teaching us culture. One thing that we should be grateful for though is that the British helped India out of the slavery under Muslims where their art and culture was being destroyed outright. One cannot even count the number of temples that were destroyed under the Mughal rule. If you would believe me then know it that culture has not touched greater heights than it did in ancient India. The simple example would be if you look at the ancient science, where by Aryabhatta, Varahimira, and many others had already known that Earth revolved round the Sun and were not prosecuted for it. In the West, however, in the early 14 or 15 century when this fact became evident that Earth revolved round the Sun, Copernicus was executed for it and killed for his discovery. The reason was that in the West life was controlled by religion and whatever was written in Bible was the only correct picture of the world. No wonder that they eventually had a revolution to break away science from the clutches of religion. However, we do not know of such stories in India. The reason was that life was governed by culture and there was no code-of-conduct book that governed our lives. Culture had been developed in a manner where democracy flourished in a manner so that people had a right to say anything as long as they said it for the protection or upholding of the Truth. It was not like a democracy of modern times where everyone has a right to say anything they please just because it is their basic right!

 

Lastly, if we have a fatalistic attitude today it is because we are confused. We were not so in the past. We were very much a race that was alive and kicking – brimming with art, dance, culture. We have reached this stage today because we went on the purely spiritual path forgetting that we still live in this world and we need to develop our somatic faculties in order to make this world a better place. By devaluing our body and ascribing highest value to spirituality only we confused our inner levels of existence where the somatic light that was so carefully planted in our nerves by the ancient sages and developed over years has been forgotten. That is also the reason you find that Indians are much weaker compared to any other race in the world. We have to learn to respect our bodily existence as much as we love our spirituality and then you will find Indians growing in the somatic level also. But in order to do that we will need to command our spiritual-self, the psychological-self, the intellectual-self and the scientific-self to stop imposing their knowledge on our body and let somatic-light govern the bodily realms. Then we will find our bodies as a race being invigorated and fortified in a way we have never felt for centuries. That is the only way for India to become anything, if at all and also show a path to the world that will herald a cultural-revolution. West never had this somatic knowledge and so they grew their civilization in a fashion where their scientific-selves have been imposed on the body. I lament for India because we had the privilege of knowing this path and some misfortune made us forget it.

 

[animesh]

Hi Love,

If I read the stories in puranas, I feel that Indians used to do many things which were considered to be great deeds but, in my opinion, should not have been done as doing those things was tantamount to giving advangate to enemies. Example: When somebody asks for something, give him. You will find numerous examples in which somebody gave donated something knowing fully well that the person who was asking for favour had an ulterior motive. It might be considered as great deed but I don't think it is at all practical.

[shvu]

Hi,

 

'Mahabharata is all about this.'

 

I would have to disagree. The Mahabharata is a story, fiction in all possibility. Even if for a moment we consider it a true occurence, it was Indian kings fighting amongst themselves driven by greed for Land and power. Nothing marvellous about that.

 

'...our somatic-selves even though we have striven for centuries to search for Truth? Does it not suggest that we had taken a wrong approach somewhere in the past?'

 

When you say 'we', it is likely to be misleading. The person who is in quest of the truth has no concern about Kingdoms and vice-versa. They have nothing to with each other. So there is no question of a wrong approach here. The Indian kings did battle with foreigners when they invaded India. Unfortunately for us, the Invaders were stronger and they won.

 

'So, as far as courage goes, I am sure we had plenty of that in the older times.'

 

Courage and strength are different again. Even recent kings like Tipu Sultan et al., were courageous enough to battle the British with their meagre resources and gave up their lives.

 

'We are a stunted race today, as our nervic personality has been confused and all mangled up by centuries of slavery.'

 

Well said.

 

'One cannot even count the number of temples that were destroyed under the Mughal rule.'

 

Yes, but with all that Hinduism still survived and that is amazing. However the early Muslim invaders destroyed thousands of Buddhist monasteries in North India, which resulted in the death of Buddhism in India.

 

'If you would believe me then know it that culture has not touched greater heights than it did in ancient India. The simple example would be if you look at the ancient science, where by Aryabhatta, Varahimira, and many others had already known that Earth revolved round the Sun and were not prosecuted for it.'

 

Can you provide me with references about Aryabhatta knowing that the solar system was Helio-centric? I really doubt they knew that.

 

Anyway, that piece of knowedge does not help man live a better life. How was Indian life then? If there were no rains, the farmer had to starve. And since farming was the chief occupation, you can guess how life must have been in those times. Can you provide some details about a better culture in India in the past?

 

'We have reached this stage today because we went on the purely spiritual path...'

 

I have to diagree here. No such thing ever happened in India at any time. Indians were just like they are today. They were never highy evolved people at any point of time. A handful of Sages living in forests do not qualify. Let us talk about the majority who lived in towns and villages and had nothing to do with Spirituality.

 

'I lament for India because we had the privilege of knowing this path and some misfortune made us forget it.'

 

You don't have to lament because India was never glorious as some people have wrongly projected. People like Vivekananda, finding that there was nothing worth talking about modern India, resorted to describing the glory of ancient India, which was not glorious at all. India today is better than it ever was, and will hopefully get better.

 

Cheers

[animesh]

Hi Shvu,

You have mentioned that it is amazing that even though many temples were destroyed during Mughal rule, hinduism has still survived. That really indicates that there is something good about hinduism.

If there is any religion which teaches people love and respect for each other and, at the same time, allows them to live a happy life, then it is bound to survive. There have been instances when many brahmans misinterpreted scriptures and spreaded many bad practices in society. But at the same time, there have been very good people (most of them again brahman), who instilled good habits in people. Fortunately, many of the earlier bad practices have been over or have reduced, but still some are left. Hopefully, they will also be over.