Sha?sana?t ta?raye yastu sha?stra parikiirtiitah.
“That which leads to liberation through discipline is called ‘scripture’.”
Common people usually live their lives according to absolute knowledge and become noble and great. That is why we see people like Kabir and Ramakrishna, who even without formal schooling, were highly regarded by tens of thousands of people. In fact, it is doubtful whether learned scholars could bring about even a small fraction of the spiritual progress these great people brought to society.
Sha?sana?t ta?raye yastu sha?stra parikiirtiitah.
“That which leads to liberation through discipline is called ‘scripture’.”
Common people usually live their lives according to absolute knowledge and become noble and great. That is why we see people like Kabir and Ramakrishna, who even without formal schooling, were highly regarded by tens of thousands of people. In fact, it is doubtful whether learned scholars could bring about even a small fraction of the spiritual progress these great people brought to society.
The amount of social welfare achieved by the rule of administration is very insignificant. The rule of administration is no rule. It does not provide any inspiration for the desire to work, but rather it injects a fear psychosis in the mind. Such administrators do not command the confidence of the people. Once they are removed from power they lose their social prestige.
But social progress is achieved to some extent through relative knowledge, but here also there is a great possibility of conflict between relative knowledge and absolute knowledge. Relative knowledge often encourages divisive ideas and the propagation of narrow sentiments such as casteism, nationalism, communalism, provincialism, etc., by extolling the greatness of caste, community, creed, colour, etc. It often tends to suppress other castes, communities, creeds, etc., or wants to annihilate them completely. On the other hand, absolute knowledge teaches human beings that the Dharma of all humans is one and the same. The Supreme Entity is the Universal Father. All the human beings of the world are brothers and sisters. All are equal – no one is low, no one is high.
Relative knowledge, by concocting certain false arguments, may prove that God does not exist, that He is a mere figment of human imagination. A weak mind may accept these arguments, but the heart can never do so. Whenever there is a conflict between the brain and the heart, intelligent people should respond to the call of the heart. The books in Ananda Marga philosophy are all absolute knowledge. The proper mark of identity of absolute knowledge is that it must be universal, rational and psychological. Certain instances of absolute knowledge are as follows – the goal of human life is the attainment of Brahma; human beings are the progeny of Parama Purus?a; this universe is created by the macrocosmic conation; matter is the crudified form of the universal mind; by dint of sa?dhana? or spiritual practices human beings gradually become divine; whoever is born will have to die one day; liberation is the birth right of all living beings; human society is one and indivisible; diversity is the law of nature; no two entities in this universe are uniform.
How far is relative knowledge acceptable to human society? As long as there is no conflict between absolute knowledge and relative knowledge, relative knowledge may be tolerated, but the moment relative knowledge does more harm than good to society, it should not be allowed to work in society, because by taking advantage of relative knowledge opportunists get the scope to exploit the psychological weakness of human beings. For example, the concept of selfless action in the Giita and the theory of the migration of souls have been interpreted in such an unscientific way that the society is greatly harmed. The boot-licking Vipras of the capitalist trick the hungry Shu?dras or workers into believing that poverty is a result of their previous misdeeds. Hence they will have to be prepared to wait until their next life before receiving the inexorable decree of fate. This makes a group of people passive fatalists. On the other hand, it paves the way for the ruthless exploitation of the capitalists. Once a reputed professor of Calcutta made a statement which became popular amongst Indian students that the beef-eating race enjoys independent political life. Many enthusiastic students were misguided by that. Today in the communist countries of the world thousands of people are being killed in the name of communism. So the value of relative knowledge should be assessed in the light of universal humanism. If relative knowledge promotes universal humanism, it will be tolerated by the society, but once it goes against the spirit of universal humanism, it will forfeit the right to exist.
25 February 1970, Ranchi Ja?grti
