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Monday, December 19, 2011

The Agnostic's Faith

Meaningfulness of life rests upon not our rationalities, but on some fundamental faith. I am firm that you need faith to find this life worth living.

I too have a faith. My faith is: I am good person.

People who love me know what I mean. People who hate me may think of it as the resounding substantiation of the hunch they have that I am probably an egotistic bastard. I think they are all right. Life's all about myself.

I believe that it's possible to approach a point where this fact is beyond doubt: for others (probably easier to achieve), and for myself (most difficult). Like all other faiths, my faith can't be proved or disproved. Like other un-enlightened creatures of different faiths, I too often waver on my faith, commit sacrileges, and then get back. Like other faith-fuls, what I never do is question my faith. Because, I don't find a way otherwise which would let me live with zeal and energy, and not get reduced to a passive vegetable waiting to be decayed or devoured. Believing in the beauty of life appears to me the only way of making life beautiful. Life may be an accident. But, whether it's going to be a beautiful accident or an ugly one is a choice. And this choice rests on one's faith, because rational thoughts can't resolve this issue.

My faith has another corollary: Everyone is a good person.

I feel, the urge to live is inseparably tied with the urge to be good. Because, being good is the only way you support the idea of life being a beautiful thing. Doing something ugly is an act of sacrilege to the faith of a beautiful life. It's hard to believe that murderers, rapists, corrupt people, ... they are all creatures of the same faith. But, I firmly believe, they too are creatures of the same faith. They too are seeking to make life beautiful. Just that their notion of beauty is in terrible conflict with their environment. Conflict and disharmony is the measure of ugliness.

Yes, life's all about myself. But the I exists in the context of a universe. Discord with the context affects the harmony within. Hence, the state in which the state of perfect goodness reveals itself in a stable glow only happens when the being is in perfect harmony along with the entire universe. This happens only if there's harmony everywhere. This happens when the barriers between the system and environment break down. This happens when the I consumes the universe, or the universe consumes the I. Whichever way. Shouldn't matter.

Probably, I sound similar to advaitists. May be. I don't give my faith any name for the moment.

Related posts:
The Spiritual Way of Life

6 comments:

Pritesh Dagur said...

Any faith is as good as any other, provided it doesn't create discord with the Universe! Wonderful post. I think I fall in the same category too, my faith being: I can and I will :) [Be good, Be happy, Be helpful etc.]

Madhurima said...

Lovely post Sujit. faith is such a personal thing. I believe it is about being good to people and the blessings that we count, nothing ritualistic about it.

Shiva said...

Nice post. My apologies for talking fluid dynamics , but your faith is like isotropic homogeneous turbulent flow, it may have variance about the mean but the mean has always been steady.:-) . Talking of advaita, the diffference between us humans and other creatures according to advaita like monkeys is the way we look at ourselves. When we look at a mirror, we see our own reflection (called Pratibimba).It is not only a reflection of our external appearance but also our inner conscious. What would happen when a monkey sees a mirror?

Anonymous said...

Gurujee, Ashram kab shuroo kar rahe ho. Hamen bhi apne sharan mein le lijeye!!!

SKS

Pramod said...

ಅವನ ಕಣ್ಗಿವನ ಬಾಳ್ಕುಣಿದಾಟಗಳು ತಪ್ಪು |
ಇವನ ಕಣ್ಗವನಿರವುನೋಟಗಳು ಬೆಪ್ಪು ||
ಅವನವನಿಗವನವನ ಹುಚ್ಚಾಟದಲಿ ನಚ್ಚು |
ಶಿವನಿಗೆಲ್ಲವು ಮೆಚ್ಚು - ಮರುಳ ಮುನಿಯ ||
- D.V.Gundappa

For that guy's eyes this guy's game in life is wrong. For this guy that guy's views are dumb. For himself and every one his mad games are favorite and true. For Shiva everything is favorite and right.

Translation is dumb. It is not possible either. I cannot convert apple to orange.

Sujit Kumar Chakrabarti said...

Well quoted Pramod!