Jesus goes to Hollywood

News Item: “Hollywood is to fill in the Bible’s “missing years” with a story about Jesus as a wandering mystic who travelled across India, living in Buddhist monasteries and speaking out against the iniquities of the country’s caste system.”

Like Mr. Joseph Smith of upstate New York who received the Book of Mormons in a vision, Mr. Levi Dowling of Ohio claimed to have received (also in the 19^th century)  the “Aquarian Age Gospel” which was alleged to have been imprinted on  tiny plates “smaller than atoms.” If you can believe this, you should be able to believe the rest of this fantasy which, like the Bhavishya Purana, is taken to be the gospel truth by countless credulous souls, both Hindu and Christian,  down to this day.If we think God speaks only Sanskrit, Hebrew, and Arabic, that too would be off the mark. To Smith and Dowling, for example, He spoke in good American English.

I first heard about this gospel in a lecture I attended some fifteen years ago at a Divinity School. I became interested and read through this inspired fable. I looked for internal discrepancies in it. Sure enough, there are several loop-holes in this hoax or delusion, the most staggering of which is that Jesus was a pupil at the temple of Jagannath where he took a course on the Vedas. This is like saying that Shankara of the 7th century  had been a graduate of Harvard. Anyone with even extended historical imagination knows that this temple wasn’t there before the 10^th century CE.

One of  the people Jesus met in Puri  was Professor Lamaas Brama who asked the  would-be prophet for his definition of Truth. Young Jesus’ profound answer began with the statement: “Truth is the only thing that never changes.”  [This would imply that human stupidity is Truth.] But he also said a few things that should make any advaitin happy, such as: “In all the world there are two things; the one is truth; the other is falsehood; and truth is that which is, and falsehood that which seems to be.” Jesus also gave Lamaas the Upanishadic wisdom that “God and man are one.”

And here is the version in which, as per this gospel,  Jesus is reported to have heard a graphically colored version of the Purusha Suktam:

“Now, from the mouth of Parabrahm the first man came; and he was white, was like the Brahm himself; a brahman he was called. And he was high and lifted up; above all want he stood; he had no need of toil. And he was called the priest of Brahm, the holy one to act for Brahm in all affairs of earth.  The second man was red, and from the hand of Parabrahm he came; and he was called shatriya.  And he was made to be the king, the ruler and the warrior, whose highest ordained duty was protection of the priest. And from the inner parts of Parabrahm the third man came; and he was called a visya.  He was a yellow man, and his it was to till the soil, and keep the flocks and herds.  And from the feet of Parabrahm the fourth man came; and he was black; and he was called the sudras, one of low estate.  The sudras is the servant of the race of men; he has no rights that others need respect; he may not hear the Vedas read, and it means death to him to look into the face of priest, or king, and naught but death can free him from his state of servitude.”

This abomination of the PS is not even funny! 

Yes, the book says that Jesus (like many of us, though not all, in the 21st century) said that it was not fair for God to have created men in this way. He was chased out of the Jagannath temple for saying this (as some Non-Hindus are even in our own times). Jesus now went to the Shudras to whom he preached saying, for example, “The sudras shall be free as priest; the farmer shall walk hand in hand with king; for all the world will own the brotherhood of man.”

What a dramatic impact this would have when shown on the big screen in Technicolor!

Jesus and (by now his friend) Lamaas went on to Varanasi where Jesus studied medicine (art of healing) under Professor Udraka. Well, of course, like any spiritual tourist of the day, he went to Varanasi and Tibet, and perhaps foreseeing the emergence of Pakistan, he also made a stop in Lahore before heading back home to give his scheduled lecture on the mount. He seems to have missed Madurai and Kanchipuram, though, which is too bad.

In case you are wondering what brought the would-be Savior to India, well, we are told in dead seriousness that Jesus took the trip  at the invitation of King Ravanna of Orissa who visited the prophet in his home town in Israel with “a band of Brahmic priests.” Competing with Hindu creativity in making up etymologies,  Dowling tells us that Abraham is just an anagram of Brahma, more or less. [I have seen Hindus elated by this observation.]

If some of us feel that it is spiritually absurd, religiously offensive, and historically outrageous to come up with a pseudo-document like this (the only excuse could be an extreme case of hallucinatory raving),  we must realize that most prophets and spiritual visionaries are basically honest people. First order prophets found religions, and second order prophets extend established religions to newer heights or generate new sects. Dowling was (a not too successful) second order prophet, But now, thanks to Hollywood, this now ignored gospel-composer may be in for a fame-boost. It is recorded that he was a child-preacher who had visions before he could think clearly, which he perhaps never did anyway.

The man surely deserves a place in the archives of religious curios, but I think it is irresponsible for Hollywood entertainers to turn this travesty into a film. It is likely to delude millions of naïve movie-goers (both Christian and Hindu) into believing that this canard is in fact part of the already dubious Jesus history.

But then, we have entered an age in which history and pseudo-history have merged with politics and religion and become one unrecognizable mess of a hot-mix in which one cannot separate  peanuts from  splitp-peas and  rice crispy from salt and pepper. 

We can only exclaim helplessly, amen! or aameen! or tataastu! or so be it! depending on our linguistic preference. 

On Jokes and Laughter

Why do jokes make us laugh? The human mind rejoices when it perceives a great truth. Religious ecstasy and the eureka of scientists are instances of this. For true religious experience is the recognition of a profound truth about the essence of our being, and a scientific discovery is the unveiling of a profound truth about the world around us. The human mind is amused when it recognizes a small truth.

The laughter at a joke is an expression of that amusement, for ultimately every (good) joke exposes some little truth or other about  humanity, inanimate nature, ideas, words, or whatever.   Laughter is an expression of mild ecstasy.

If great truths are like the nutritional essence of what we eat, small truths are like the sweeteners and spices that enhance the taste of the food.

Likewise, if religion and science raise us to lofty heights, jokes and humor add spice to living.

Gratitude

We receive

Knowledge and understanding from Science, 

Insight and vision from poetry,

Joy and ecstasy from music,

Love and warmth from relationships,

Laughter and mirth from humor.

Many also get

Inner peace and spiritual fulfillment from religion.

We become aware of all this because we are conscious beings.

We are blessed with a little of all this

During a slice of temporal eternity

In the patch of space wherein we live and die.

For all this,

I am grateful to the Unfathomable Mystery to whose presence

Evolution and cultural upbringing have made me sensitive.

Thanksgiving Day 2007

Each and every breathing day when the body finds nourishment, the mind still thinks, and there is at least one person who cares for us we have much to be thankful for.

But today, as an American, I am thankful, not for turkey slices and cranberry sauce, but  for the freedom to express my thoughts without fear of persecution, to believe and to disbelieve as my reason and conscience dictate, and for a system of government that allows for periodic change of people in power, even if it does not always present us with candidates worthy of our hearty vote in their favor.

November 22, 2007

Nero is not fiddling, but making ugly noises

Among the frightening news reports that fill our newspapers in our times, I came across one (on October 21) with the following lines: “A catastrophic reduction in the flow of the Colorado River — which mostly consists of snowmelt from the Rocky Mountains — has always served as a kind of thought experiment for water engineers, a risk situation from the outer edge of their practical imaginations. Some 30 million people depend on that water. A greatly reduced river would wreak chaos in seven states: Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada and California.”  

This is but one example of the ominous unimaginable water scarcity that, according to experts, is almost inevitable all over the world in the next few decades during which, ironically, there will also be an overabundance of sea-water that would wipe away many coastal regions.The predicted catastrophes, so say many who seem to know, are in the foreseeable future when many of today’s children will be in the peak years of life.

In this projected scenario we (ordinary citizens) have no alternative but to do our little to diminish the individual environmental disturbance that each one of us is causing at various levels of intensity, and go about our business and human relationships, while trusting political leaders, planners, and engineers to do the best they can to avert the evitable, and minimize the impact of the inevitable.

But what is sad and incredible to contemplate is that in this backdrop so many people are deeply engaged in intercultural squabbles, deafening debates on God and Religion, recriminatory ideological combats, tall claims of religious uniqueness, mindless convictions of sectarian and racial inferiority, pride in national histories, incessant intergroup hate, and the like.

Is this because the imminence of catastrophic global ecological disasters is so little understood and internalized, or because our passion for group elation and sensations of sectarian superiority far exceed our instinct for survival, I wonder. 

 You may enjoy visiting: http://www.metanexus.net/Institute/

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On Watson’s Comments

News item: “On 17 October 2007 one of the world’s most eminent scientists was embroiled in an extraordinary row last night after he claimed that black people were less intelligent than white people and the idea that ‘equal powers of reason’ were shared across racial groups was a delusion.” 

We live in an extraordinarily confused and insecure age. A long-range effect of colonialism, cultural hegemony, free-trade, globalization, color-blind immigration, and multiculturalism is that deep in the hearts of countless people in every race, religion, region, and nation, of every language, culture, and group, there lurks a fear to the effect that what they have considered to be theirs for many generations is now under threat of dilution or destruction, or will soon be taken over by others of alien vintage. Added to this is the great discomfort at the thought of the weakening and eventual dissolution of the most dearly held religious beliefs that have given comfort, security, and stability during countless generations. The fear and discomfort find expression in a hundred ways.

One mode of reaction to this predicament is to decry, degrade, or demean others (real or imaginary enemies and institutions) in explicit or implicit ways. Often this is done in the language of   religion, nation, or science so as to clothe the irrational (though in some instances understandable) fear in a framework of authority, collective self-interest, or empirical evidence.

The recent statements of James Watson sound shocking and are certainly unbecoming of a responsible scientist. But this is only one example of the manifestations of fears and cultural discomfort. It is important to realize that it has received considerable recognition mainly because it was in English (a widely read language), and by an individual of considerable scientific reputation. Echoes of such views are expressed in direct or convoluted ways by thinkers and leaders in many other groups as well, and spilled out routinely in listserves which, with all their benefits, have also become powerful global networks for the dissemination of hate, misinformation, and pseudoscience. If a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, when it is coated with hateful passions and diffused, it becomes toxic.

Awakened thinkers in enlightened societies recognize the untenability, anachronism, and potential danger in racist, xenophobic, sexist, and other distorted convictions that were public and widespread in ages past, and they challenge and condemn the propagandists of pernicious and prejudiced views, even while giving them to right to speak out their minds. It is too early say how far or for how long they will be successful in shielding the world from the resurgence of culturally stifling and harmful thoughts all over the world.  

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On September 11, 2001

 [Written on September 11, 2002]

It happened a year ago, in the morning of 11 September 2001: an episode that lasted for a couple of hours and changed the heartbeat of history. It was as if an asteroid had landed somewhere on our planet, a mindless, mammoth, unannounced intrusion that disrupted everything around and much beyond, causing death and destruction of inordinate proportions. Except that this was hatched in the minds of men, with passion and deliberation, for revenge and with prayers to their religion which had once been a fount of learning and science, of philosophy and poetry, but which has been pitifully sterile in creative science or world-enriching ideas during the past few centuries, and (as they saw it) treated with scant respect by a more successful and productive civilization. They stood tall and strong: those majestic Manhattan Towers, symbols of a nation in many ways, clearly visible from the Statue of Liberty that is holding high the torch of freedom. Those arch-haters did not have the heart to level Lady Liberty to the ground with the planes they had high-jacked with cowardly brutality. Or perhaps they calculated that wouldn’t kill as many human beings.But the structures they struck were towering over the surroundings like the nation does in the world, much to the annoyance of billions. The buildings symbolized America: grand in scale, strong like America’s might. They were brimming with business like America’s market-places, buzzing with economic activity, facilitating finance, providing jobs for a multitude, harboring people from all over the world. In the buildings were citizens of more than sixty nations, belonging to every race and creed. There were blacks and whites and browns working there, Hispanics and Greeks, Sikhs and Arabs too.

The premeditated murder of several thousand innocent individuals and the infliction of painful bereavement on thousands more should have been abhorrent to every decent and civilized person, and yet it was a matter for rejoicing, public and private, to millions who have been harboring venomous hate, for reasons justified and unjustified, for the giant of a nation called the United States.

Aside from the anguish and incalculable material loss, that eruption of inhumanity triggered many responses, including a public declaration of war against terrorism and the fiery destruction of individuals who were planning and plotting more such mischief, hiding in the dark dens of Afghanistan. In the process, the medieval Taliban regime was deposed in that unfortunate country. Its leaders – including the mastermind behind 9/11 – promptly went underground, and still remain there: alive or not is anybody’s guess.

Scholars began to analyze the roots of the ruthless savagery, and commentaries filled editorial pages. A sense of panic gripped countless people. Non-Muslims tried to understand what Islam was all about. Most of all, all realized that the world will never again be the same for the secure minority who live in relative comfort and freedom within the borders of the United States. Safety and civil rights began to take on different meanings here: those very features had facilitated the perpetration of the awful atrocity.

Even after a full year, the tremors haven’t subsided: it may take decades for this. Sadly, we are at the brink of another ominous war. The time hasn’t yet come for people of all faiths and races to join hands in gestures of friendship and mutual respect, and to seek peace and understanding, no matter what the price. But we must remember that hate is a cancer that eats away both source and target, and the price of uncontrollable anger and revenge can be very high too.

Freewill and Divine Omniscience

The question, “If God is omniscient, then how can there be freewill?” is an ancient theological paradox. For freewill implies that the next move by a conscious entity is as yet undetermined, and could be one of many possibilities, depending on the FREE exercise of judgment by that entity. If this “capacity for free exercise of judgment prior to an action” (which is what free-will is) has been given to the human being by God, then God cannot and should not know what the actions of humans would be prior to their performance, especially if God is to judge and reward/punish human beings on the basis of their actions based on their own free will. If God is thus aware, how can God be considered omniscient?
This paradox arises from not recognizing what I have called elsewhere the hypercomplex level of reality. At the hypercomplex level, events occur, not simply by the operation of the usual physical forces, but also from thought processes. Thus, whereas the motion of a projectile is governed solely by physical forces, the initial magnitude and direction of motion of a football is determined by a decision on the part of the ball player. Events of this kind occur only in the hypercomplex level at which thought/decisions come into play. As a result, events at this level are utterly unpredictable.
The omniscience of God refers to knowledge and phenomena at the usual physical (classical and quantum) levels, but not at the hypercomplex level: Not because God is ignorant, but because God chose to create a hypercomplex level with such a property, perhaps because it is very interesting and has great potential for continuous creativity.

Why Do We Focus On Our Negative Sides?

A friend of mine wondered: <I am always struck by how poorly developed our theories of human empathy and altruism are compared, for example, with theories of human aggression.> This does not surprise me at all. If we were to judge humanity (including Americans) by what we read in news head-lines and what we watch on CNN, it is difficult not to form a very low opinion of humankind (and Americans), ourselves excluded of course.This overall impression is reinforced by history books which glorify wars and victories, narrate conquests  and colonies, and keep reminding us of the slave trade and casteism, the Crusades and the Inquisition, both Spanish and Roman.  Then there is the theological view to the effect that we have been sinners from Day One, just preparing for Day Omega when we will be judged for all our evil thoughts, nasty words, and awful misbehavior; and the idea that we are constantly accumulating bad karma and will be shoved back to earth to go through more suffering. In this framework, the focus of attention of scientists is naturally on the negative side of humanity.If our media and minds were replete with the actions and achievements of great philosophers and poets, scientists and saints, musicians and mathematicians, architects and artists, then psychologists would probably wondering what makes humans so special and great and creative and good, and all the rest of it.It is a piece of ancient wisdom that we are somewhere between angels (in the mythic sense of the word) and beasts (in the pre-scientific connotation of the word). I rather think that we are a blessed blend of the two, with the strange feature of manifesting one capacity rather than the other, depending on what the circumstance warrants or prompts. Most of the time, we are just neutral, carrying on the chores and challenges of normal existence.