Tirupathi darshan - the doubt
All I had was skepticism – skepticism not at the existence of God, but skepticism that a particular idol at a particular place at a particular time could be considered more “Godly” than others. And that skepticism still remains. Can this at all be true? Can there be an iota of truth in this? The very concept of “VIP Darshan” – the fact that the more money you pay the easier it is for you to seek and find God – yes, God, not an idol – seems so utterly ridiculous, so perverted!!!!! It seems to be just a case of Man’s already bloated ego reaching new heights – new heights of egoticism. Puny, powerless mortals that we are, we simply refuse to accept it; we are blinded by our ever-increasing paranoia for power, our undying love of ourselves, our unparalleled selfishness. And we choose, in fact love, to remain blind. Worthless creatures that we are, we believe – rather force ourselves to believe – that we can buy everything – even God’s graces – with that worthless immaterial material wealth – money. Is that what He would like us to do? Is that why He created us? Just because some of us are lucky enough to be “more equal” than others in terms of the materialistic pleasures of life, do we deserve God’s graces more than others? People seem to measure their own piousness and the graces they will receive from God by the amount of money they put in the “hundi” or by the number of times they put their palms together in front of the idol. Why do they do it? Do they do it because of their true love for their fellow human beings and for God? Or do they have a small voice telling them in the back f their minds that the money they put in front of God will come back to them manifold? Maybe it is the latter…. But is it???? Wont that money be better spent by helping the less fortunate – the teeming masses who are deprived of their basic rights of food, water, clothing, shelter, medicines and education? As far as my very limited experiences go, the same people who donate money to the hundi will also help the poor; so what is it that inspires them to put money in front of “God” as well? I am torn with doubt; I am still looking for an answer.
posted by Ranajoy Sanyal at 11:55 AM
5 Comments:
Firstly, Congrats for your first post. Feel proud to be the first guy sending my comments on this blog.
Empathize your feeling bud. I myself had these doubts. It is easy to have these thoughts whenever one looks at organized religions a little more carefully. I am also throughly disguested by looking at these VIP darshans. I found my share of disgust more from my own religion when i see sycophancy, petty politics, rituals for the sake of rituals, etc. Having said all this, i must say if we look a little deeper, these ills have crept into what have been pure spiritual movements. As the time passed by, these movements needed a strong organizational structure for them to stand the test of time. But the problem with organization or over-organization was with time, the organization with its petty rituals and motions became an over-powering idea in itself. The original fire which hallmarked the spiritual movement itself is pushed to the sidelines.
I find that these enquiries, these confusions to be very conducive to my own growth.
Keep Blogging..:-D
Ranajoy..Ranajoy! You seem to be too angry:).
I was one of the guys who was totally put off by the VIP Darshan at Tirupati and infact the only prayer I had that day to the Lord was to forgive me for "getting ahead" in such an ugly way and promising to come back the normal way. This is a bane of this country I feel sometimes, nothing much we can do about it.
Coming to your other point, everyone has the right to decide what they will spend their money for. I think it is infinitely more logical to think about what things I can change rather than think about what all things are bad right now.What say??
And welcome to Blogger's world, happy blogging:).
Hey Juju....Great post to begin with...
Pretty much agree with what you have to say...The very purpose of places of worship is getting defeated, thanks to the whole system of changes in the society...Many places of worship no longer serve the purpose they intend to...Hav become jus mass gathering spots churning out a good fortune for the trustees...
But there are beautiful places of worship in Tamil Nadu that still serve the purpose they were built for...U shud visit them sometime...
Keep blogging sir..A nice way to store ur foot ptints which u can turn back and look some day.
Thats a social evil that has crept into Hindu society. The God just looks for true love - krishna loves taking food from Vidhura rather than Duryodhana,Shiva asks nandhi to move away for Nandhanar - a out caste to have his darshan, Vishnu bleeds when the caste brahmins strike thirupanalwar, a outcaste with stones when he enters the temple. Krishna throngs from his seat to the street seeing Sudama, his friend in rags came to visit him. Need more examples? This is age of Kali and we are bound to face more such things.
- Ramanujadasan
But whatever may be - the money Hindus put in temples are going to government. And the government spends it happily for its vote bank politics sending Muslims to Haj as they are toooo poor to go - inspite of all the Mosques are in the hands of Muslims themselves.
And all Hindus are so rich that though the entire money goes to govt, they care a least for Hindus.
In a secular country why the heck funds to a particular community for their religioous obligations?
any way YSR is coming with plans for Christians as well. So secularism rocks. though diverging from topic, the essence is the money put in temples by foolish hindus are ultimately not reaching the benifits of general poor forget the hindus. But for vote bank politics.
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