The last thing you would like to hear is religion but just too difficult to avoid it. There are just too many religious people around. Nothing against them, just pointing out a fact.
Coming back to the topic I had a religious ceremony at home today and I was wondering why these ceremonies have so much of useless activities associated with them. Offer water 3 times, milk 2 times, fire 7 times. What if those numbers were something different. Will God get offended? Dunno but anyway do as the wise man say. I always wonder how human beings have evolved a system of doing these useless activities and also creating specialized roles on people whose only job in life is to do these useless things with consistency. There is even some respect associated to this gross lack of creativity and innovation. I am sure we could have evolved to a more comfortable existance if religion was not a part of the deal. Wish you had a undo button for the universe and mankind but if life was as simple as computers, it would not last for so many years 🙂
Next time you are doing any religious ceremony just watch every step and think why you did it….
BTW I am not against religion, it is a good design with bad implementation.
Hang around….
My religion used to be vi some days ago ! But thanx0r to this baba by name Hmansing – my religion is now emacs !
some religions never differ but do matter !
Even I wonder why I did that ritual / ceremony ! 😉
-nerdy
Man created God. And for good reason. Ceremonies are a way of making tangible what would otherwise require a lot time and will power.
Having said that, let me also say that I am religous, but not overly so. What I feel wrong with religion is that it is being used as a means of manipulating others, and sometimes one’s own self; that it has been pulled out of its natural place which is within the self.
Hello! I’m your neighbour sitting right across HMan’s desk 😉
Religion must have also been science at some point of time. Whatever they could reason out took to the form of ‘rituals’ (ex: adding ghee/butter to the fire… must have become obvious to the brainier of the guys while those who couldn’t figure out why made it a blind practice) and whatever they couldn’t reason out became ‘God’ (ex: rainbows, thunders and lightnings). The bad thing about most religions is that they don’t have a provision to let themselves evolve. Hinduism would not be a lot different from what it is today 20 years later, would it? But science would be quite different 🙂
Science is a religion too… a religion which is trying to reason out things that aren’t already explained, except that it has a nice decentralised design to it. There is no god men. There is nothing blind and evrybody has the right to question.
A lot of the rituals have a sometimes fascinating explanation behind them. A lot of them are out of date, but I’ve often found the thinking behind all of them to be interesting in the very least. Unfortunately, Hinduism as a religion doesn’t do enough to educate its followers about what’s going on. The biggest barrier perhaps is that the language all of the religion uses isn’t used or understood by most people anymore. While we can lament that a lot of this stuff is outdated, it is very interesting that in one way or another we’ve succeeded in preserving something so ancient.
BTW I am not against religion, it is a good design with bad implementation.
But the design is empty.
My 2 paise:
I agree God would not get offended if we offered water seven times, and fire thrice (or whatever the number is). However, if you ever bother to ask any resonably learned priest about these numbers, he would certainly have some justification ready for it (may be seven times for each day in a week, just a wild guess). We see such things everywhere around us, not only religion. I also wonder why the government offices (most of them) start at 10, and close at 5. It could have well been 9 to 6 or 8 to 4. Or why should a normal working day be for 8 hours only? Would we have been more tired if the normal working hour was 9 hours a day, or the world be less balanced if a standard work day constitued 7 hours.
Vinay Rai
Hi,
Am too late for a comment, but it’s one of my favorite topics.
Hindi mein chalu hota hoon ab 🙂
“Papa kehtey hain sabsey lacheela dharam hai apna, saari umar mandir nahi jayega toh bhi hindu hi rahega, kisi se jangal mein bhi shaadi karega, bina pandit ke toh bhi hindu rahega “Gandharva vivah”, 2 ya 4 shaadi karega toh bhi hindu rahega “yaad hai Dashrath ki char raniyan thi”, khud to bhagwan samjhega toh bhi hindu rahega “Aham Brahmasmi [i am the divine flame]” – yeh toh hui hindu honey ki baat , yaad ho toh Pakistan ko basaney waley Jinnah ne kabhi Namaaz nahi padhi aur bana diya ek muslim rashtra, if you are born to a muslim and still come to a Mandir there’s no problem aur agar kisi ko hai toh mein use shastra padha sakta hoon.
Toh dharam hai, “Sach” yaani Truth ka ek representation, har dharam mein, upar aur neechey se rule lagaatey hain woh log jo use define ya paribhashit karney ka theka letey hain jaise Pandit ji aur Maulvi ji.
ek aur case dekhiye, aajkal hinduon mein sab gharon mein auratein aajkal parda kareti hain, ab jara saari Mahabharat padh daliye aur dekhiye kya Draupadi parda karti thi.
Kunti – bin byahi maa thi ?
Pandit ji – dusht balak, karna surya ka putra tha, woh daivi yojna thi.
chaudhary – Dekh tau – aisi yojna toh meri bhi bahut si hain – aur devta se neechey kaun hai – aadmi ka vyavahaar devtaon ko dekhkar hi decide hota hai.
Sabit ye karna chahta hoon ki Dharam hai “Sach” ka ek representation – jo hamarey poorvajon ne karna chaha – kabhi Jesus bankar toh kabhi Ram bankar- toh kabhi Husain bankar – to kabhi Gnadhi bankar – Dharm bahut sukshma bhi hai aur bahut simple bhi – uski poori samajh ki vyakhya ek insaan na hi karey toh achcha – behtar hai apney thodey gyaan se ek baat samajh le – ki ‘Sach’ se badhkar koi dharm nahi – insaan sab barabar – aur jab sab barabar toh kya hindu aur kya muslim.
“Tauheed [Ekta] ke maat[Pitcher] mein rang de laal re rangrejvaa [The color artist” – Oh! great God – color our pitcher of unity bright with red color.
Brij
Brij Bhai,
Bahut hi goodh aur gahan vichar hain aapke. Dharm ko sahi se samajhne wale bahut hi kam matra main hain aur unki sankhya prati din kam hoti ja rahi hai.
Na Shiwale Na Kalisa Na Haram Jhoothe hain
Bas yahi sach hai ki tum jhoothe ho hum jhoothe hain
Birla
It’s all about perception!
like- the way you click once on an icon to select it.. and twice to open it..