sad reflection on the Enlightenment

Report: “The government (of Malaysia) maintained that views held by “deviant” groups endangered national security. According to the Jakim Web site, 56 deviant teachings were identified and prohibited to Muslims as of year’s end.” 

Of the many ironies that sprinkle humanity’s history one is that the spirit of religious Enlightenment carries within it seeds of its own destruction. That spirit allows one to criticize religious doctrines,  welcomes religious tolerance and grants freedom to worship the way one chooses.

In modern nations which adopt this as a guiding principle, the time-honored religion of the land subjects itself to reasoned analysis and exposure of all that is irrational, absurd, and intolerable in its religious system which is thus made vulnerable, in addition to missionary intrusions from the outside.

Sooner or later, with the spread of knowledge, information, and education, belief in the traditional religion of the people will gradually diminish and eventually disappear while powerful missionary activities will swallow the more disgruntled members of the local religion.On the other hand, nations which firmly close their doors to other religions, and ruthlessly persecute those who try to impose an alien faith (convert) or question the framework of the national religion shield the state religion from transformation, corruption and disappearance. From this perspective, a hundred years from now Christianity would have disappeared from Europe, but Islam would be strong and sturdy in Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Pakistan, Malaysia, Iran, and other theocracies. Even Hinduism, because India is an enlightened democracy, is exposed to external lethal religious viruses.

What one could expect from globalized information spread is that Islam would become less harsh in its treatment of women and persecution of Muslim dissenters, but would still be safe and sturdy, even become more open and civilized within its walls, while propagating itself freely in nations where the light of freedom shines.

We think of martyrs as individuals who die for the principles they strongly believe in and will never give up. But cultures and civilizations can also become martyrs. Enlightened societies have exposed themselves to external onslaughts with the potential for destroying the very framework that allowed them in to begin with.

So what can we do? Nothing, or very little, really, except to sadly reflect on this irony in history, and to hope that the guardians of enlightenment will be vigilant and will succeed in not allowing the agents of darkness to infect  all societies.

On the Degeneration of the Left

Like every positive movement and innovation in human history, leftist ideology has also degenrated leftist movements into mindless anti-one’s-own-cultre-and-nation attitudes. This is a sad phenomenon occurring in many countries, but especially in India and in the United States.
Nationalism served a useful purpose at one time. It is what united the people of India (and other former European colonies) in their fight against the colonizing powers. It also served to unify a people and make them feel good about their culture, heritage, and history. However, in the 1930s it degenerated in Germany and Italy into chauvinistic and malicious racism and oppressive fascism,
Likewise, leftist movements have many positive elements in the goals: They strive for social justice, for the eradication of racism and casteism, and for many other enlightened values. But they often degenerate into blindness for what is good in one’s own society and nation, and engaging in incessant criticism and virulent condemnation of one’s own culture, nation and religion, while downplaying whatever may be wrong in alien systems and  indulging in exaggerated extolling of the virtues of
alien systems.
The Left is often a response to religious fundamentalism and extremist conservatism, but by its own extremist positions it also provokes fundamentalism and conservatism.
This degeneration of the Left has been occurring in India as well
as in the West. Leftist minorities in India as well as in the West generally applaud the Left because it is favorable to them.

Reactions to a boycott

News item: “Britain’s largest faculty union has proposed a boycitt of Israeli academics and their institutions.”
There have been many emotional reactions to this from the supporters and opponents of this move, transforming the debate into one about Israel’s right to exist as a state.
When a topic as emotional as the Isralei-Palestinian issue comes up, academic objectivity and calmness melt away, and we see the ugly heads of the rage and acrimony pop us, stifling all hopes for peace and understanding.
Personally, I am not in favor of any academic group boycotting any other, because it smacks of collective punishment and contempt: an attitude that is utterly unjustified vis-a-vis scholars.
I am quite sure there are many Jewish academics who don’t support the policies of their government, and the same may be true of scholars on the opposite side also.
It is one thing to pass resolutions condemning the policies of a government, and a quite different matter to boycott fellow academics in another country.
I have all sympathies for the marginalized Palestinians, and also for a cornered Israel which is despised by millions in neighboring countries, facing constant threats of annnihilation.
I wish academics from every country in the world would join hands and strive to bring about a compassionate and realistically just solution to this complex and terrible problem that has victimized millions of innocent people over the past few decades, instead of stirring up more hatred and anger between otherwise balanced thinkers.

On the resolution in the U.S. Congress (July 2007)

Irrespective of the motives of this resolution – which could well have been benign – it seems to me that it is ill-conceived, irrelevant, inappropriate, suspect, and even unfair in its assessment, and may be counterproductive.
The resolution is ill-conceived because it speaks about a topic on which the signatories have little experience. Some of the preliminaries are questionable and inflammatory, such as that Dalit women It displays total ignorance of the fact that many Hindus in India as well as abroad are making genuine efforts to erase caste inequities, not unlike white Americans who served the cause of civil rights for African Americans a few decades ago.
It is irrelevant in that it speaks to and about a country where there is no law sanctioning a social malpractice which is slowly being erased anyway. The problem is humungous.
It is inappropriate in that it is interfering in the internal problem of another sovereign country with threats: One does not instigate social changes in a foreign nation by threatening to restrict aid if the mandated injunctions are not followed.
It is unfair in that the U.S. engages in trade and aid with many nations where human rights and religious freedom are grossly violated.
It is suspect because there is reason to believe that its sponsors are inspired more by Christian evangelical goals than by genuine compassion for the marginalized.
It may be counterproductive because not only will this resolution not resolve overnight a situation that has existed for generations and is slowly changing now independently of external rebukes; but it is likely to sour rather than help U.S.-India relations.
None of this is to say that I don’t sympathize with honest efforts to eradicate racism, casteism, and pernicious prejudice which afflicts many people and societies.

New President of India; the price of Democracy

It is official: India will now have a new president. For the first time, some sixty years after the nation came into being, the Indian Republic will have a woman president in Pratibha Patil. India deserves to be congratulated for yet another step forward. Indeed, it is as important to have a woman president as it is to have a minority (Muslim) one or someone from a marginalized group (a so-called Untouchable). India has had such presidents before.
Sadly, the choice of this president was not made under happy circumstances. In the past few weeks, soon after her name was announced as a possible candidate for president of the world’s largest democracy, a spate of ugly revelations were made about scandals and criminal activities in which some of her family members were involved. And then it was clamored that she had an for affinity to astrology and other old-world beliefs, and that she was more Hindu than secular in some negative ways. Never before were such harsh and taunting things written and said about a candidate for president of the Indian nation. There were protests and calls for her to resign. But she did not. Looking very much a traditional Hindu woman, head covered with part of her sari and forehead adorned with a traditional tilak, this one-time lawyer remained indifferent to the comments and criticisms relating to her. Her nomination by the Congress Party was not swayed, much to the dismay of the extreme left, of Muslims, and of those sectors of the educated classes that have been scientifically educated. Whether one likes it or not – and some of their arguments were quite sound and reasonable – , her views and beliefs on extra-terrestrial and supernatural things resonate fully with the vast majority of the people of India to this day.
The fact is, Ms Patil has been duly elected. The way democracy works, there are rules by which political leaders come to power. People have every right to support the candidates of the choice, and attack as harshly as they wish the rival ones. But once the process has borne result, all citizens and political candidates will have to concede the results of a duly conducted election, congratulate the winner, and move on.
So, even if the choice of Mrs. Patil as President of Modern India was wrong in the view of many, they are morally and legally obliged to accept the new president. The one good thing about democracy is that even the most hated or the least respected winner in an election will have to step down after a pre-determined length of time. This is also the reason why dictators detest democracy.
It must be remembered that the President’s role is largely ceremonial as per the India Constitution.
What must be stressed is the fact that a woman will be gracing that position for the next five years in India. This is a matter about which all people with Indian connection can be legitimately happy. Its symbolic significance is enormous, and is bound to inspire millions of little girls and grown women in India.
Congratulations to Mrs. Pratipbha Patil and to India are in order.