“The soul of religion is one, but it is encased in a multitude of forms.”
–Mahatma Gandhi
Kabir – The couplet
??? ????? ????, ?? ?? ??? ???? |
?????? ?? ?? ??? ???, ??? ??? ???? ||
transliterated:
Pachha pachhi ke karane, sab jag raha bhulan |
Nirpachh ho ke hari bhaje, soi sant sujan ||
Translation:
Divied into groups with differing agendas, humanity has lost sense of direction|
He who prays to God, impervios to religion, is the true Believer, the Teacher ||
My understanding:
Religion, over the ages, has been transformed from the path to inner peace to a doctrine meant to control groups.
When a follower disagrees, he searches (as we do with all our arguments, debates and disagreements) for other like-minded individuals. IF there are enough, this is the new group, and sometimes becomes “new religion”.
What we need is less talk, and more introspection. All of humanity is essentially good and kind. Groups, doctrine and dogma take us away from this inner truism and make us behave in ways we (sometimes intensely) disagree with, just to ‘keep up with the Joneses’.
If we were to return to basics, the sun, while still just as warm and bright, would look truly brilliant, and the birdsong around us would be heard as the true song of real freedom that it really is.
Well-meaning individuals trying to solve specific problems created all borders, religion, politics and beaurocracy. We forgot the problems, but hung on to the resultant processes as the Absolute Truth.
We need to go back into the mists of time, re-discover the problem, and document it along with the solution – it is only then that we will realize the childishness of our excesses.
Religion is not the God we pray to, or the faith we profess to follow. Spend time in introspection, and we will all learn to love all around us. That is true religion.
Agree?