Επιμέλεια: Εύα Πετροπούλου Λιανού
“We are God-loving, but man-hating people, who make huge donations to religious shrines from the wealth we have robbed from our neighbours.” – Anand
As human beings, we might stand convinced that with the inventions of science, we are leading a wonderful life, full of so many comforts, and joys which were never available to our yesterparts. [a newly coined word which combines yesterday and counterparts: yester + parts]. If it were so, why are we so uncertain about human happiness? Happiness is the fantasy land, we all are in hot pursuit of. But, it seems to be an elusive dream of mankind. Instead of being happy, it appears we have lost the direction of our quest. If you look at it even without being critical, you will find to your chagrin that happiness is not the destination of mankind. All that we have done is the reverse of happiness. How to kill, how many to kill, how much we can destroy. The commodity that sells in the world market on high stakes is not happiness, but the paraphernalia of war, death and destruction. Are we really the wise race of men, who started with knowledge? We had better started with innocence. We would have been better off. But it was not to be so. Isn’t it strange we have been creating so many things for our joy, ye what is the final result of all our efforts all these centuries? We have seen great wars: Ramayana, Mahabharata, Troy, World Wars, Hiroshima Nagasaki, .. and now, we are face to face with a world on the boil. We are highly deficient in the arts of living. There is no industry which produces Love. No Group of Industries for production of Faith and Trust. Where is the company which mass produces Honesty? Have we built temples which breathe in Compassion, Understanding and Shared Living?
THE ETHICAL HOLLOW:
We are hollow at the centre of existence. This world which looks so beautiful, so various, and so romantic, and sometimes so dangerous also, is without a moral centre. Joys are shadowed by sorrows. And success has an inbuilt weakness, because it has ensured the failure of so many. Human life would have been a happy lot, if those who worked for their own wellbeing, had taken the trouble of learning a few lessons in cosmic brotherhood. Our success has a simple logic: make your neighbour poor if you want to turn rich. It is an individualistic dream which is toxic and malignant. It is neither growth, nor prosperity. It is extortion, it is exploitation of the man lesser in wits. If you use your education and learning to strip your neighbours of their assets, physical and mental, you are not a human being, but a member of a murderous gang of dacoits who operate in the broad day light of rules and regulations, having no sense of good and evil. Such men are greatest insult to the Prophets whom they profess to follow.
Pardon, and who are our neighbours? Animals, birds, rivers, mountains – see how we have reduced them to misery. The poverty that we have inflicted on the nature’s beings has torn a hole in the centre of our existence. We find an ethical hollow. Our moral centre is missing. We are accumulating wealth, and stacking it in banks. What is this money doing in the banks? We are God-loving, but man-hating people, who make huge donations to religious shrines from the wealth we have robbed from our neighbours. Is the money we deposit with gods being recycled for the benefit of society, or a few masters are playing with our trust? We made schools and colleges. Where is the moral centre of these institutions? Can wealth-creation be an answer to all our needs and necessities?
MEN AS PERFORMERS:
Men may contradict themselves, or one another, but it is not easy to contradict gods, who have superior plans for mankind. Just as the quality of a singer’s performance is entirely dependent on the tens of people who are managing the musical instruments, [add here other uncertainties like: if the net stops working and lights disappear], we too are dependent and interconnected with a hundred agencies, human and divine, to perform to the best of our abilities. Now, whatever we are performing, we are least bothered that it should be best, because we take life absolutely seriouslessly. We know it full well that a moment once passed, will not return. Still we let the moments flip by, thinking that we will do better next time. Does the next time come? All this underlines our casual attitude towards life, our own and in general, and this tells upon our performance levels too.
THE ORIGINAL INTELLIGENCE
A human body retains its original intelligence, its innocence, to say, and cannot be made to deviate from it. If you cannot eat more, you cannot eat more. If you cannot drink more, you cannot drink more. If you are tired, you need rest. If you don’t go to sleep, the next day is gone. In other words, our bodies have essential wisdom, and it is not easy to make them deviate from it. But, our minds don’t believe in original intelligence. They go on acquiring more and more knowledge, [now call it intelligence], which finally serves to cause emotional constipation. Disturbing the body of its natural functions. In the same way, when we try to hoard more wealth in the vaults of our banks, it too is an unethical act, which violates the essential order ordained by gods; we are dodging limits set by cosmic forces, and in this way, usurp what has been meant for others. If body cannot absorb more than its mite, should we amass wealth on which millions could survive? And does it not lead to the undernourishment of millions of people whom we have assigned to poverty? When we indulge in such an activity, mentally, does it not impact the society? Physically, and bodily, we may look fine, well-dressed, and well-spoken too, having learnt the arts of articulation, but are we not mental cyborgs? Psychic monsters? We are sick in mind, sick in our psyche, and sick in our souls. We are part of a running stream of malignant waters, which like a nullah of dirty waters, passes in between a city carrying dirt, emitting foul smell.
DEATH BY STARVATION
Have you ever seen any animal, or bird, dying of starvation which is a very common spectacle in the human world? We forget that Gods have created enough wealth in nature so that not a single animal goes to sleep hungry. [If there are cases of animals dying of starvation, it is possible only when they are slaving for man]. In the same way, if men also try just to satisfy the natural hunger and do not hoard beyond their need, – like the body cannot store more food than it needs, nor it takes more water than it can digest – if the wealth of the world is given to every man according to his basic requirement, I have no doubt there will not be even one person in the entire world going to bed without food. Nor it will force men like Jean Valjean to lose their humanity in jails for stealing a piece of bread for his starving family. [Les Miserables by Victor Hugo]. Men are not tired of work when it pays, they revolt when their work does not pay them equal to their needs. The presence of a hundred ants suggests there is some pick of jaggery. And if you see thousands of people suffering from poverty, disease, and moral sickness, there is some brutal force in its hellish glory, some tyrannical industrialist, some politician, some conman, who has aggregated the wealth, charm, beauty of these innocent people, and reduced them to distracted images of humanity.
SUBSISTENCE AND THE DANGER ZONE OF THOUGHT
We have divested humans of their rights. Not only the right to survive, but also to think beyond the base-model facilities available to men. Food, shelter and a roof – this is the base model of life. Even these are not available to millions. Value based living is the second step. In other words, the first step is survival. And then, comes the idea of supplementing it with values. Good or bad enter our vocabulary after the subsistent needs are fulfilled. Animals live at the subsistence level. There is no question of entertainment, free time libraries, discussions and poetry seminars for them. For them, birds sing on the trees. These are their poetry sessions. Otherwise, survival is the main issue. And this is the case with most of the humans now. Subsistence and Survival. Ethics, goodness, justice, fair play, honesty these are attributes of the people who are living a good life. Yes, evil comes naturally to all.
Millions of men are in the denial mode. Men who command the resources of this earth ensure that more and more people fall below the poverty line, so that they spend most of their time fighting penury, or working for their survival. Beyond this, is the danger zone of thought. And every wise government and the billionaire brotherhood resists such privileges to the ordinary people who can be likened to planes which spend themselves while trying to negotiate the pitch, and never sae the breath of the skies.
Author: Dr. Jernail Singh Anand is Founder President of The International Academy of Ethics, a think-tank of Poets, Philosophers, Thinkers, Scientists and Social Scientists. He is Professor Emeritus with the European Institute of the Roma Studies, Belgrade and Honorary Member of the Serbian Writers Association. Dr. Anand has authored 150 books which include 9 epics which are considered world classics. He has innovated the theory of Bio-text in critical theory. The Univ. of Neyshabur, Iran has conducted a Research Project on his Poetry comparing it with Iranian Poets, under Dr. Roghayeh Farsi. His works have been translated into 20 world languages.
Contact: [email protected]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jernail_Singh_Anand?
