When the Gods are Rendered Helpless
Once a rat gnawed its way into a wicker basket in which a snake was kept in captivity. The starving snake was very weak. When the rodent entered the basket, the snake ate it up, and strengthened, managed to crawl out of the basket through the hole made by the rat. The rodent's entry into the basket served as an indispensable cause for the snake's liberation from captivity, says ancient poet Bhartruhari. These two actions performed by two apparently unconnected agents are dependent on each other on a broader scheme: the rodent had to make a hole for the liberation of the snake and it had to be eaten up in order to strengthen the starving snake. Providence, the poet explains, operates in a manner that the agents taking part in the whole operation may or may not be aware of what lies in store for them. Before one begins to infer that Bhartruhari iS a fatalist, he stretches his argument further. He understands Providence to be a by product, an effect, and so is different from that of a traditional fatalist. What we call Fate, he explains in the Niti Shatak, is nothing but the combined effect of the efforts undertaken by the individual doer during her long chain of births. A person endowed with free will can choose to act rightly or wrongly. If you choose to act wrongly, you shape your malignant Providence that could visit you in this life or in the lives to come, as external hazards, enemies, inherent weaknesses and ignorance, for instance. If you choose to act rightly, you shape your benign Providence that will manifest itself in the form of a noble disposition, unexpected good fortune, genial attitude to life, and so on, which will deliver you from difficult situations. In fact, even your careless actions will turn out for the ultimate good. Such is the power of benign Providence. According to Bhartruhari, the gods are powerless to alter their supplicants' Providence for better or for worse. He wrote: "We earthlings offer our obeisance to the gods. But the gods themselves are under the tutelage of Providence who Himself is totally incapable of bestowing blessings on His supplicants, because He is bound by the efforts of the individual, that is to say. by the Law of Action. The power of Providence to fulfil our desires is restricted by what people deserve to get on the strength of their good or bad efforts". Instead of genuflecting to supernatural beings to improve their present condition, people should try to improve themselves qualitatively by choosing the right course of action, by desisting from doing evil. Their good actions will make them happy, and their bad actions will cause miseries to them sooner or later. Since fate is an effect of human efforts, each person is the maker of her own fate. According to Bhartruhari, a person is good in so far as she loves and helps her fellow human beings for altruism is the highest virtue. By yielding to temptation and being self-centred, one only drifts towards evil. To bring about a qualitative change, you have to cultivate a healthy attitude of your separateness from of your separateness from earthly transactions and sense-motivated temptations. This attitude is called vairagya or dispassion. This can be achieved without getting estranged from the human world; it is a continuous and inner awareness of one's separateness from the grossly physical. This generates a healthy disinterestedness in what you do and helps in coping with the vicissitudes of life.
DISCLAIMER:
The views expressed in the Article above are Dharanidhar Sahu kashmiribhatta.in is not in any way responsible for the opinions expressed in the above article. The article belongs to its respective owner or owners and this site does not claim any right over it.
Courtesy: Dharanidhar Sahu Speaking Tree,Times of India
When the Gods are Rendered Helpless
Once a rat gnawed its way into a wicker basket in which a snake was kept in captivity. The starving snake was very weak. When the rodent entered the basket, the snake ate it up, and strengthened, managed to crawl out of the basket through the hole made by the rat. The rodent's entry into the basket served as an indispensable cause for the snake's liberation from captivity, says ancient poet Bhartruhari. These two actions performed by two apparently unconnected agents are dependent on each other on a broader scheme: the rodent had to make a hole for the liberation of the snake and it had to be eaten up in order to strengthen the starving snake. Providence, the poet explains, operates in a manner that the agents taking part in the whole operation may or may not be aware of what lies in store for them. Before one begins to infer that Bhartruhari iS a fatalist, he stretches his argument further. He understands Providence to be a by product, an effect, and so is different from that of a traditional fatalist. What we call Fate, he explains in the Niti Shatak, is nothing but the combined effect of the efforts undertaken by the individual doer during her long chain of births. A person endowed with free will can choose to act rightly or wrongly. If you choose to act wrongly, you shape your malignant Providence that could visit you in this life or in the lives to come, as external hazards, enemies, inherent weaknesses and ignorance, for instance. If you choose to act rightly, you shape your benign Providence that will manifest itself in the form of a noble disposition, unexpected good fortune, genial attitude to life, and so on, which will deliver you from difficult situations. In fact, even your careless actions will turn out for the ultimate good. Such is the power of benign Providence. According to Bhartruhari, the gods are powerless to alter their supplicants' Providence for better or for worse. He wrote: "We earthlings offer our obeisance to the gods. But the gods themselves are under the tutelage of Providence who Himself is totally incapable of bestowing blessings on His supplicants, because He is bound by the efforts of the individual, that is to say. by the Law of Action. The power of Providence to fulfil our desires is restricted by what people deserve to get on the strength of their good or bad efforts". Instead of genuflecting to supernatural beings to improve their present condition, people should try to improve themselves qualitatively by choosing the right course of action, by desisting from doing evil. Their good actions will make them happy, and their bad actions will cause miseries to them sooner or later. Since fate is an effect of human efforts, each person is the maker of her own fate. According to Bhartruhari, a person is good in so far as she loves and helps her fellow human beings for altruism is the highest virtue. By yielding to temptation and being self-centred, one only drifts towards evil. To bring about a qualitative change, you have to cultivate a healthy attitude of your separateness from of your separateness from earthly transactions and sense-motivated temptations. This attitude is called vairagya or dispassion. This can be achieved without getting estranged from the human world; it is a continuous and inner awareness of one's separateness from the grossly physical. This generates a healthy disinterestedness in what you do and helps in coping with the vicissitudes of life.
DISCLAIMER:
The views expressed in the Article above are Dharanidhar Sahu kashmiribhatta.in is not in any way responsible for the opinions expressed in the above article. The article belongs to its respective owner or owners and this site does not claim any right over it.
Courtesy: Dharanidhar Sahu Speaking Tree,Times of India