The festival is here!

10 days of tumult and pandemonium is here. Ganesh Chaturthi. Celebrated gloriously at a cost of environment. Bored because of an off day amidst week days, I was truly jobless & spent all day stuck to bed.


With continuous prompting of my mom, I went out in the evening to breath in some fresh air. The city is now well decorated, flashing with glittering lights and plaster finished idols, standing majestically as the epitomes of Hinduism & its popularity in the country.


I was wondering how much would it cost to erect thousands of such idols, so much of gala for 10 whole days and finally immerse the 10 days of celebrated investment in waters. I even wondered how many reforms or ideas can be efficiently implemented with that amount. A lot of 'em right? How many home(pe)less can be fed with clothing, food and shelter?


Not any of these thoughts come into our minds as we keep ourselves super busy & engaged decorating the idols with countless, grand garlands in the name of devotion.



A sweet offering to God is usually auctioned at the end of the gala & it gets sold off for whooping prices, say INR 300,000, if not 600,000. Where does this archaic behaviour take us? To a pretentious state of satisfaction? To a fake shore of accomplishment?



If He exists, He must exist in hearts, thoughts and actions. Not necessarily in idols & celebrations.

Serving mankind is serving God.

What Makes Hinduism Unique and Great?

Hinduism stands tall among the league of religions.

How & why?

There are many answers.

The greatness of Hinduism can be summarized in few words.

"Freedom of Thoughts and Actions."

1.Hinduism is a way of life, a culture and not an organized religion like Islam or Christianity.

2.There is no POPE or hierarchy in Hinduism. Only thing Hinduism have a lot of scriptures.

3. Hinduism is a Culture and all the eastern religions like Buddhism, to some extend Jainism, Sikhism came from Hinduism. Judaism is also a culture/religion from which organized religions like Islam and Christianity came.

4.Hinduism never ever had a “spring cleaning” like all other religions do. What ever any one wrote for the last thousands of years are still there for people to study and discuss. That is the reason why we have a very large number of scriptures. That is also the reason we do not have a so called Bible. For all us all scriptures are equally important even though many consider Bhagavad Gita to be the Hindu Bible.

5. No body is killed or crucified since he or she challenged Vedas or any other scriptures. In fact, Hindus worship Lord Buddha who challenged authority of Vedas and Hindu form of worship.

6. Hinduism never state it has monopoly on truth or God. According to Hinduism, God & truth are universal.

7.Rig Veda states: 'ekam sat viprah bahudaa vadanti' …meaning Truth or God is one but learned men describe it in many ways.

8.Hindu scriptures state, “Sathya meva Jayathe” meaning “Truth alone triumps, never falsehood.”

So Hindu scriptures allow FREE FLOW OF THOUGHTS & ACTIONS.

9.Hindu authors knew that by allowing absolute freedom of expression of thoughts and actions, every one will finally end up attaining truth.

10.They preached, "Ignorance is the root cause of all evils and knowledge eradicates ignorance.' We do NOT sin, we only make mistakes due to lack of knowledge of right and wrong. Hinduism does not believe in ORIGINAL SIN like Christians do.

11. Not even one Hindu scripture states only by becoming a Hindu, one can attain salvation.

12.Instead Hindu scriptures state, “Salvation or self-realization is open to all, irrespective whether a person Hindu or not.

13. Even an agnostic and atheist can attain salvation.

14. Nobody is denied salvation in Hinduism. The best among us will attain with one life. The worst among us will attain through many lives.

15.Salvation or self-realization is the process by which one is attaining the true knowledge that he is the immortal soul Atman within and giving up the false knowledge that one is the perishable material body.

16. Hinduism never forcefully convert others to Hinduism like other religions do. Hinduism as a culture and it does not force any one to become a Hindu.

17.Those who convert to Hinduism are doing that since they fell in love with Hinduism.

18. Hinduism believes in one and only God Brahman which expresses itself in trillions of forms.

19.Hindus believe in a one, all-pervasive Supreme Being who is both immanent and transcendent, both Creator and Un manifested Reality.

20.According to Hindu scriptures you can worship that God which has NO name or form [nama-roopa] in any form & with any name.


21.You can worship that God calling it Jesus or Allah or Brahman or Krishna or Buddha or anything else you wish. In all worships, finally worshiper ends with a God which is spirit, which has no name or form.

22. Even atheists can proudly proclaim they are Hindus.

23. In fact the Charvaka philosophy or Nastika philosophy, (existed during the Vedic period) founded by Charvaka rejected the existence of God and considered religion as an aberration. Nobody killed Charvaka. He died a natural death.

24. Hindus do NOT worship idols.. Hindus use idols like everyone else to concentrate on a God who has no name or form.

25.All worships in all religions start with God with a name and form. As the devotee matures in devotion, devotee start sees a God without any form at all.

26. Hindus believe that the universe undergoes endless cycles of creation, preservation and dissolution. This belief is in parallel with the modern big bang theory.

27. Voltaire in Essay on Tolerance wrote::

"I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death, your right to say it."

Hinduism is the symbol of what Voltaire wrote.

Rig Veda wrote:
Vasudhaiba Kutumbakam
(the world is a family)

Rig Veda also wrote:
"Ano Bhadra Krittavo Yantu Vishwatah" -
Let noble thoughts come to us from every side.

PROUD TO BE A HINDU :)

Tale of my Ancestors

well, this post maybe a bit boring for those who have no clue about our lost "lineage" :P . This was my attempt to trace my roots back. First i come from an orthodox brahmin community whose gotra is HARITHASA. Gotra is a sanskrit term which broadly refers to people who are descendants in an unbroken male line from a common male ancestor.
 

                         Harit/Harita was an ancient and great prince of the Suryavansha dynasty, best known because he is the ancestor of my Brahmin lineage, Harithasa gotra. Brahmins like me trace our origins our lineage to harita ;) :D This is unusual as most Brahmins are descended from ancient sages, whereas the Brahmins of Haritsa Gotra are descended from kshatriyas trained by the Brahmin Angirasa. This created, according to the Linga Purana, 'Brahmins' with the properties of Kshatriyas. to put it in a simple way, i am a brahmin who is a kshatriya by blood :D may be i can attribute my "never say die" attitude to this relation. ;) I am proud of the fact that the same lineage i was born with, i share it with Lord Rama and Buddha.

                        For the past 20 years i was lost in iniquity and even regretted being a brahmin, but after reading epics i preferred to come out of shadows and lead a life based on the ethics of my religion and try to surpass my predecessors in my own way. ;) :D

signing off!

the warrior priest :P