RELIGIOUS FANATICISM — PART 6
  RELIGION AND WARS

Bringing the marriage party of sin, Babar has invaded from Kabul,
demanding our land as his wedding gift, O Lalo. Modesty and
righteousness both have vanished, and falsehood struts around
like a leader, O Lalo. The Qazis and the Brahmins (i.e., clergy)
have lost their roles... (sggs 722).
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"God is Love" is the experience of all Prophets and Spiritual Beings. The true scriptural texts containing their teachings also gush this declaration. Thus they tell us that the true Wisdom is the Love of the All-pervading Self; and that the Love of the Self is to Love all. Yet, the human society is war and killing-ridden. What a paradox! Genuine religions, true scriptures, and the real teachings of the Men of Light do not support hatred, wars and violence. Also, they strongly condemn immorality and greedy exploitation of others that have been carried on in the name of religion and God.

False ego is always at war. Hence, wars are the direct manifestation of human greed, selfishness, etc. Therefore, the fault lies with the greedy and selfish people, not with the Prophets or the true spirit of religions and their scriptures. And the greed and selfishness is the progeny of man's ignorance of his Essential Nature, and his confusion about the real purpose of life. The Men of Light come to this world to help us eradicate our ignorance and confusion, not to teach us warring and killing in hate and greed. "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?", asks Christ.

In addition to teaching false doctrines and absurd and frightening concepts about God, many religions and their clergy have betrayed their Prophets, their scriptural texts and God by their actions. To put it otherwise, what the clergy and their establishments have done in the past, and have continued to do in our time, is the opposite of what the God of the scriptures requires and the opposite of what the Prophets (Buddha, Mahavir, Jesus, Muhammad, Nanak, Kabeer, Zarathustra, etc.) taught us.

Nowadays, dishonest politicians, kings, rulers, leaders, etc., in collaboration with wily clergy play with religion and use it as a cover for personal gains. As a result, the world is tasting today more violence, more hatred, more communalism, more danger, more animosity, more conflicts and more wars. Politics without pure religion is nothing but corruption. Prophets taught their followers not to meddle in world's such corrupt political affairs nor to get involved in its wars. They also taught them to be peace-loving, to be law-abiding, to be truthful and righteous, to be kind and generous, to be restrained and peaceful, to be full of selfless love for their fellow humans free from any prejudices, even willing to sacrifice their own lives rather than take the lives of others.

Indeed, the Spiritual giants taught that the selfless Love for other humans would be the mark that would identify true religious persons from pretenders — true Sikhs from false Sikhs, true Christians from false Christians, true Muslims from false Muslims, true Hindu from false Hindus, true Buddhist from false Buddhist, and so on. Only love can conquer hatred and see God Within and without. In truth, selfless love across all barriers constitutes religion.

Yet, century after century, the clergy of many world religions have meddled in the world's political affairs and have supported the wars of their nations. They have also supported the opposing sides in wars within their own religion. For example, in the two world wars of the last century the clergy of Christendom not only supported the opposing sides within Christendom, each side prayed for victory and members of one religion from one country were killing members of that same religion from another country. Jesus was adamantly opposed to war. Still, during the religious history of Europe and middle-east, Christian "Crusaders" and Muslims alike killed each other along with countless innocent people, and destroyed sacred places of worship (churches, mosques, synagogues, etc.); all in the name of religion and God!

In India, history reports that Muslim emperor Aurangzeb would not take his morning breakfast until he had either forcefully converted thousands of people of other religions ("Savaa Mann Janeyu") into Islam or killed those who resisted the conversion; all in the name of his religion and God! He beheaded Guru Teg Bahadur, and waged war against Guru Gobind Singh. Such heinous acts of Aurangzeb were fully supported by the Muslim clergy. History of every country is full of such horror stories. Thus, while the clergy and their followers have claimed to be religious, they have contradicted the teachings of their Prophets. In truth, according to the scriptural teachings, it's unholy to instigate or start war; although, as we know, some wars are inevitable.

For centuries the Christian and Muslim clergy collaborated with their respective political powers when they conquered, enslaved, plundered, looted and humiliated other people. They were in the forefront of the persecuting, torturing, and killing of those who disagreed with them. For instance, during the age of imperialism or colonialism, that was the case for centuries in Asia, Africa and other parts of the world. During the Inquisition, which lasted for many centuries, fiendish practices, such as torture and murder, were authorized and carried out against decent, innocent people by the clergy and their lackey who claimed to be Christian. It is reported that they even tried to stamp out the Bible so that the common people could not read it. In Islam, Seas and Sunnis cannot see eye to eye. The same is true with all other organized world religions as well.

Clergy, religious leaders and religious regimes make people blindly believe that the whole truth is stated only in the scriptures of their own religion, and if anything is not stated in those scriptures of their own religion, then, it cannot be true. This is why their is so much hatred towards other religions and other scriptures; for people think that other religions and their scriptural texts are false, hence, must be destroyed. They name their blind religious zeal as "Jihad", "Crusade", "Dharam Yudh" or "Holy War"; and perpetrate untold sufferings and cruelty on humanity in the name of religion and God.

Such stubborn fanatics suffering from the mental ailment of duality, create frightening concepts such as a separate God of Muslims, a separate God of Christian, a separate God of Sikhs, a separate God of Hindus, and so on. To them a Sikh soul is different than a Christian soul or a Hindu soul or a Muslim soul, and vice versa. Thus, they sow the seeds of hatred, animosity, and dissatisfaction in the human society. As a result, the world history is soaked with wars, holocaust and innocent blood; all in the name of religion and God. In this fallen condition, ignorant fools commit sins through their Mann (mind or thought), Bachan (speech or word), and Karam (body or deeds).

No, this is not God-centered activity. Such demoniac work is indicative of being false religionist, which has nothing to do with God and Spirituality. However, the failure of the clergy of the world religions does not mean the failure of the Spiritual Masters and the scriptural texts. Rather, it shows why wickedness, corruption, fraud, hatred, differences, fanaticism, danger, tension, animosity, vengeance pain and suffering exist throughout the earth!

A spiritually ignorant person is cruel by nature; for materialistic living and cruelty go hand-in-hand. Since such person is essentially selfish and spiritually ignorant, his life is dominated by his strong bondage to material consciousness, far away from spiritual discipline (Aatam-Maarag). This is why a materialistic person, a materialistic society or a materialistic nation is always seen engaged in inventing something for the sense gratification. In their view, such materialistic advancement is considered to be the advancement of the human civilization, but the result is more and more violence and cruelty towards other beings; animals and human alike.

The reason people behave in such destructive manners is that they do not see One God in all beings. Under the spell of false ego or ignorance, they have no sense of Oneness. Consequently, such people always find themselves engaged in activities that brings the human society harm. Scriptures consider such people enemies of the goodness in the world, because they are always engaged in inventing or creating something that is conducive to only destruction.

What went wrong? The scriptural texts of the world religions indicate that it was not God's purpose for people to suffer or be fearful. We suffer when we no longer do God's Will (Hukam, Eternal Law, Bhaanaa, Command or Divine-doing). It's that simple. We humans have the ability to choose. We also have the ability to discriminate between good and bad or true and false or right and wrong. Thus, we are not made like machines or robots. Also, we are not made like animals either, who are guided mainly by their instinct. Therefore, while we humans have this wonderful gift of free choice, we must accept the consequences of our choice of action.

Those wedded to love, peace, joy, harmony, righteousness and piety (Gurmukhs) never show their hatred even against bad and wicked forces, nor curse them. They feel that if they conduct themselves in a godly manner and do what is right, God's Grace from Within will guide them. To the contrary, material beings (Manmukhs) infected with divided consciousness (false ego) remain wedded to greed, selfishness, hatred and violence. In such corrupt mentality, people have the tendency to consider one's own adopted religion superior and thereby insist that others should join and follow it. This is the cause for most of the wars fought in the name of religion and God.

A truly religious person refrains saying something bad to another person that he wouldn't want someone else to say to him. Thus, those who have understood the True Religion will not attack beliefs of others because they realize how much it would hurt if someone else did the same to them! They would never rejoice in another person's suffering; for they always look to their Spiritual Wisdom to find ways to help others overcome their problems. Such persons become a loving "Spiritual Warrior" or "Spiritual Hero"!

God is said to be the fountainhead of selfless Love, mercy and compassion. The Men of Light and the scriptures urge us to awaken these Divine attributes Within if we intend to realize God's Presence, "here" and "now". Eradication of greed and selfishness from Within is must for one to experience these Divine Virtues; for greed and selfishness give rise to hatred, wars, conflicts, violence and disharmony.

— T. Singh
www.gurbani.org

Updated on Thursday, April 26, 2012 6:47 PM (PST)

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