Somewhere in middle of chaos, out of nowhere, two persons
who knew each other quite well started the conversation about God. Both Gautam
and Ashok were agnostics but Gautam believed that God is there but was not sure
of it. On the other hand, Ashok believed that God is not there but again had
his doubts. Gautam had read some of the Indian scriptures and Ashok had read
many evolutionary theories. Both however, did not completely believe what they
read. They were still doubtful, still had questions and still analysed
situations around them to conclude the existence of God. So two people, both
not sure about existence of God starts talking with each other and let us see
how the dialogue goes.....
Gautam: Hey Ashok, why do you say that nature is everything,
God does not exist and humans should follow nature. I was reading an article
somewhere arguing who should be the inspiration of human society, the nature or
the God. The author was arguing that Nature teaches us that strong kills weak,
tiger kills deer etc. which we can call the animal society. However, as humans,
one should think beyond the animal society and should get inspired from God
where Love exits. Humans should and can make their society filled with love and
cooperation.
Ashok: Man is also an animal Gautam and when the resources
will be less, automatically men who cooperate with each other in today's era
will fight each other for resources and will kill each other. We still do not
see lack of water, fresh air and agriculture land around us. In African
countries, histroy tells us that tribes vanished fighting for limited
resources.
Gautam: I guess you are right. Don't you ever believe that
God is there and will protect us from such catastrophy. It sounds scary.
Ashok: Yes it is scary but that's what it is. You know very
well that I am doubtful about God's existence.
Gautam: Yes, sometimes even I doubt His existence. Why He
created this world? If He is there, why innocent people including infants get killed?
Why Satanism exists at all? Why we can not see Him? Questions like this perplex
me. Indian scriptures try to answer these questions but they do not sound very
convincing. But tell me one thing; India has history of around 20-25000 years.
Why no one challenged God's existence?
Ashok: I think people must have challenged but the majority
must have dominated.
Gautam: Yes, I think Buddha tried to find God but could not
find him but was surely enlightened by deep meditation. He was agnostic, wasn't
he? Jainism however, goes on the lines of atheism. They do not believe in God,
but believed in meditation.
Ashok: You mean both propounded to achieve the state of tranquillity.
Gautam: I am not sure, if tranquillity is the right word.
Ashok: Fine, tell me more about meditation.
Gautam: Well, we hear about meditation right from the start
of Hindu philosophy. Vedas taught humans about it. They also taught humans that
God created the nature and jeevatma
(including humans) and we can reach Him by meditating i.e. attain Moksh. Later on, one school of thought
came that we ourselves are God, we just have to realize this fact by
meditation. The world we see around us is Maya,
an illusion. These sects of people were called Vedantis. Later on Buddhism and Jainism also continued stressing on
meditation but had different thoughts on existence of God. Now it comes to my
mind that may be nobody saw God but all these years great saints through
meditation reached a different state of mind which some of them called God and
some called attaining Moksh.
Ashok: Yes, I think you are right. I have been a
pharmacology student and have experienced effects of some neural drugs on my
body. Boy, I have done every kind of intoxication, which makes me feel that
teasing with mind can take you to higher state but we can’t call it God, can
we? It is possible that saints concentrated their mind so much that they
reached some sort of higher state which today's scientists are not sure of, but
I doubt whether we can call it God.
Gautam: Yes, it might be possible. I have read that after
enlightment, people are in such joyous state that nothing around them, good or
bad, can affect their joyous state. Also, I remember Sri Aurobindo's philosophy
now. He believed that what we see around us are normal human beings and humans
will evolve into super humans through meditation. Krishna, he said was such a
super human. May be every human being, saints who got enlightened became a
super human. By enlightment, I mean that they attained such state of mind that
nothing around them disturbed their joyous mental state. In Geeta, such state of equanimity has been
termed as Nirwana.
Ashok: Yes, I think you can relate this to today’s scientists
and mathematicians as well who are too involved in their work. They sometimes
reach different mental state due to their concentration and devotion towards
their work. And I have heard classical music singers also reach such higher
state of mind while singing.
Gautam: Not to forget, the sufi saints like Bulleshah and
saints like Kabir and Tukaram who reached higher state of mind through complete
devotion and love for God. I think I can relate this observation to scripture
knowledge.
Ashok: Like what?
Gautam: In Geeta, for e.g. three ways have been defined to
reach God, which now we can assume this to be the higher state of mind. Gyan
yoga, Karma Yoga and Bhakti Yoga. Gyaan Yoga involves deep meditation, Karma
Yoga involves doing one's duties without thinking about consequences and Bhakti
Yoga involves complete devotion and love towards God. We have discussed
examples of followers of each of these disciplines. I think things are getting
in line now.
Ashok: Indeed! And I think in Karma Yoga, doing duties
without consequences must have been stressed to remove any fear of failure so
that mind can concentrate better on work.
Gautam: Yes, you are right. So we can conclude that there is
some higher state of mind which has been attained by meditating saints,
scientists and devotional saints. But (smiling), mystery of God continues my
friend.
Ashok: It always will (smiling)! I personally believe that
the concept of God must have come to de-stress people that there is somebody
there to protect us, we need not worry.
Gautam: I don't know that but I know this for sure,
sometimes it feels very relaxing to know that somebody up there is watching us
and protecting us.