Skip to main content

Does God exist?

Why do people believe in God?

Is being religious tantamount to believing in God?

Does God exist?

These are few questions which have kept many philosophers and thinkers busy since ages, and often at loggerheads with each other and with the society. I am no philosopher, nor a great thinker. But yes, these questions do arise in my mind, and too often especially when I see the countless customs and traditions, which often overlap with some superstitions, when I am told to perform rituals or puja, when I am criticized for being an atheist as I am unwilling to indulge in sycophancies to please gods for favors and often here and there. I am not an atheist. But I am not a great believer either. Actually I am a terribly confused person.

I am not sure why do people believe blindly in an all powerful supreme being without questioning, and accepting (or pretending to!) everything that comes their way – good or bad as the will of god. Maybe it is just because it is convenient to do so. It often becomes a lot convenient to pass the hard time with blindly accepting them, rather face it. Also, more often than not, it frees them from taking responsibilities and gives them someone to blame with things not going that way and accepting everything as will of god. With so much suffering and injustice all around it may be too comfortable to say them to be will of god, and ASSUME that justice will be done sooner or later. This may not be true, but it is definitely an assumption which would make most of us a bit more comfortable, rather than facing the fact that we are helpless or we would rather not take responsibility.

But the question is that is god really all that great? One of the main arguments against is that if it is true, then why is there so much suffering all around? Why is there so much inequality? If god is all powerful why doesn’t he do anything to stop it, or why does he allow all these to happen? Why does he live like king (in many cases it is true), while much of the mankind is still poor.

Many religious interpretations ask us to serve god selflessly. Though much of us serve him mostly out of fear of going to hell, or in a hope to get a undue favor, or to have a better life after death. Most of these motives are selfish. Why does god need so much sycophancy to be pleased and so many dos and don’ts (some of which may not be related to morality at all).

Often the problem may lie with interpretation of religion, especially by religious leaders. Most people in this world have been killed in the name of religion than anything else in history. Also a lot of superstitions are promoted by claiming it to be ultimately sourced from god. And so are many of the caveats. For example I once sat in a Satyanarayan puja (often these pujas are showoffs than real feelings) . In it was mentioned repeatedly the consequences of not performing that puja. More than a puja, it seemed like a threat to perform puja!

God is said to be all powerful. Still there exists concept of heaven and hell. If you serve lord well, remember him endlessly (maybe, investing time for primary education would be a better idea), serve Brahmins well (is god a believer in caste system?), or do good deeds and are moral, you will end up in heaven, else in hell. However, god being all powerful controls everything. So, are the ones going to hell paying price of the mistakes made by god? Probably yes, if we consider most of the religious beliefs.

Maybe someone would argue that I’ll be condemned to hell after writing all these, but if god is really that great (if he exists!), he would definitely understand my cynicism and respect my doubts and opinions.

(These may just be few of the points in my mind that I can remember. Such opinions were in my mind since quite long, more in last few days. However, I couldn’t write them. But today, I read an article by Bhagat Singh - http://www.boloji.com/spirituality/051.htm

and its contents were somewhat similar to what I believe, and this became one of the main drivers for this being written)

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Shop @ Amazon

Popular posts from this blog

Respect the sentiments

How often do we hear the above mentioned words? Especially in situations when there are chances of someone not taking anything well, or a comment not going down well with audience; in the situations when one needs to be politically correct and socially correct and be seen as morally upright. But if we remove the facade of the mushy gushy all-OK things, we can look into sort of ugly interiors of what respecting the sentiments mean ... and what it hides. Some of these reasons for expecting someone to respect the sentiments can be - 1. Person/ groups whose sentiments need to be respected are not open minded enough to hear a counter point of view, and my not be capable of any rational thoughts in that matter 2. There is something undesirable, or something ugly, or even something cancerous that needs to be hidden. 3. The truth might be extremely uncomfortable one, and ignorance might be a better option. 4. Deviation from the accepted norms is not desired. Reason - It has never been done so ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Fully loaded with ... @ b-school

First half of the first term @ b-school and I am fully loaded with Balance sheet that don't balance Accounting equation which had debited my brain with frustation Supplies that aren''t demanded Accounts which I can't count Some useless statistics with highly any marginal utility Information technologies that hardly carry any information Acts of associaation that dissociates my brain The hairs that are depreciated from my head by means of scratching Probablities, to understand which is improbable A grouped data set of competants in which I am an outright outlier in the negative direction Motivation theories that leave me demotivated Leadership theories, which I try to follow Theories of satisfaction that leaves me dissatisfied Assignments that I wish had never beeen assigned to me Researches, which I don't want to search even once Communication, whose message I couldn't grasp All paths leading to the so called "dream jobs", which we don't have any ...
3 comments
Read more

On koolness, Phonyness, Holden Caulfields etc. and all

This is one more post with nothing in particular. It was just that I was feeling like writing something crappy as no one was listening to me. I was watching a movie, not studying, was in a mood to do nothing in particular, getting bored and all that stuff. Actually I was browsing through people’s Orkut profiles. They have written such a nice bunch of krap. I mean all sounded so unreal, so phony. I mean, every second guy is a cool guy. That I must have seen million times by now. This all scares hell out of me. I mean I don’t say that I am someone great or someone like Howard Roark or John Galt, nor I can be. I don’t have such great ideals or morality or any such krappy stuff. But it all sounds so unreal and millions tonnes of aaattitude and exhaggerations thrown in. Dude … they are so arrogant. I mean, they are such idiots that they think that only they are the only human beings on earth, and others are just crappy combination of cranky bones and muscles. And all those artificial and c...
Post a Comment
Read more

Financial tips for a 25 year old

Originally published at  BeingfinWise __ If you are 25 year old, there is a good likelihood that you would have started working or are likely to start soon. And hopefully start(ed) managing your own finances. So, what do you do next? The good news is that having a profession can soon lead to cash flows which perhaps wouldn't have seen in your student days. And that can be empowering in many ways. The bad news is that, if you are reckless with spending money, it can soon lead to a downward financial spiral. Managing your finances well can be a good first step towards a healthy financial life. And it starts with small steps.
Post a Comment
Read more

Rich, yet bankrupt

Originally published on BeingFinWise __ Tennis legend Boris Becker is in news - for wrong reasons. He is having auction off his trophies to pay off his debts . Even then, the debt will not be fully repaid. To think of it, he was the youngest Grand Slam champion & considered one of the greats in tennis. He won Wimbledon when he was just 17! At that level, tennis does pay a huge amount of money! So we can safely assume, that he would have had no dearth of money. Boris Becker is not the only celebrity to be rich, yet bankrupt. There are ample examples. For example, Michael Jackson died, he was in huge amount of debt.
Post a Comment
Read more