Mother Teresa – Hollowed be thy name

Mohan Bhagavat, the RSS supremo while speaking in a conference made a reference to Mother Teresa (now Saint Teresa after the beatification). He said mother Teresa’s supposed service to the poor; the destitute was not without any motive. Her motive was conversion to ‘one true faith’. That was enough to ruffle many secular feathers. Many seculars, liberals came in unison against Bhagavat for commenting against a ‘noble’ soul. Many well-meaning people who are fed with the hallowed imagery of Teresa and of the missionary of charity came against Bhagavat strongly. [I remember studying a chapter on Mother Teresa in my middle school titled ‘Nirmala Hrudaya’ which translates into ‘Noble or Pure Heart’] Among others, the statement of Bhagavat did one good thing – It initiated a debate and more people got to know the real truth behind the supposed saint. But, did Bhagavat say anything wrong? Was he off the mark? When you try to investigate, you know the answer is no.

You may have your own misgivings on the RSS on various issues. But its service across the nation without motive can be seldom faulted. But can you say the same with respect to the Christian Missionaries? Not for a second, not once in a millennium. Charity is one of the important tools for proselytizing. They are pretty much open about it. Recently, the pope made the point amply clear. If the experience with the aftermath of the Tsunami disaster in South India is anything to go by, conversion is the pre-condition to get any kind of help from the missionaries. How low can these missionary hawks plumb? Nevermind. Now, coming to the issue on hand – Did Mother Teresa do the same? Yes, she did. It’s all well-documented by the first-hand accounts. It’s just that the Indian media is too lethargic and dishonest to dig out the truth.

Mother Teresa was a fundamentalist Christian. Like any fundamentalist of any religion, she minced no words about it and was pretty straightforward on the issue. In many of the interviews she stated her position as such. In one of her interviews, she was quoted saying "We are not nurses, we are not doctors, we are not teachers, we are not social workers. We are religious, we are religious, we are religious". She was against the use of contraception, against abortion and in fact in her Nobel Prize ceremony she proclaimed the greatest threat to world peace was abortion! Viola! Everyone was struggling to figure out the factor which was detrimental to world peace – This lady had an answer – abortion. Abrahamic religions especially Christianity exalts suffering as virtue. It springs from a fundamentalist belief – Man is a sinner. God sent his only son Jesus to earth to save us from sin and he suffered enormous pains in the process – all for us. So, if anyone is suffering, he is being closer to Jesus. This is one of the many other beliefs which shaped Mother Teresa’s psyche.

Money was never an issue for missionaries for charity as its PR machinery was very strong and millions of dollars kept pouring in. But, testimonies allude to the worst living conditions of the patients that were living there. Proper medication was not given even to the patients who were suffering from chronic diseases like cancer where pain was immense. Basic painkiller like morphine was also not given to many. When questioned, all was pushed under the carpet saying ‘love’ will substitute for all including necessary medications. It was a living hell. Christopher Hitchens called her ‘Hell’s angel’. Baptism was performed for the dying without anyone’s consent – as the process was altruistic because the motive was to ‘save’ the soul from eternal damnation.

No discussion on Mother Teresa would conclude without mentioning Christopher Hitchens’ name. He wrote a complete book on her with a provocative title – The missionary position. He along with Tariq Ali made a documentary for channel 4 – Hell’s Angel. Even before Hitchens, Dr. Aroup Chatterjee wrote a book on her - Mother Teresa: The Final Verdict, which challenged the popular perception of Teresa which we all had. In these works lists all the misdemeanors of Mother Teresa and her institution - misappropriation of money given for charity, hobnobbing with the worst of criminals and dictators and so on. Hitchens called her 'fraud, fanatic and a fundamentalist'.These are all very well documented. But the pusillanimous liberal media never dared a debate on it.

The fallen façade of the media – again!

Indian media as a rule treats the issues related to Christianity and Islam with kid gloves. This issue was no different. Forget getting deeper into the issue, the media did not have the guts to even take up the issue for the debate. Bhagavat had disturbed the hornet’s nest. Media treated Bhagavat like a man who had committed blasphemy for insulting their holy god. An honest or a neutral media would have ensured a debate in which there was a say for all the parties involved. But, that never happened. Only social media, blogs and a few online portals discussed the matter in depth. This is one of the outcomes of deification of any person. He becomes insulated from any criticisms or questions. The very act of questioning becomes a kind of blasphemous act. The way some media guys behaved as if it’s a crime to even question a revered figure like Teresa testifies the point. This just proves they lack two important qualities that are required for journalism – Intellectual rigor and honesty.

Mother Teresa was beatified in 2003. Beatification is the third step in the four-step canonization process. The main condition for a person to be beatified is that the person should have performed some miracles in others’ life which they should testify. This looks like classic case of superstition and sham. But as it is practiced by Christians, this will go unquestioned in most intellectual circles. The same media which doesn’t question this goes hammer and tongs whenever the issue is of Hindus. They question the authenticity of the Makar Jyoti in Sabarimala, they question the authenticity of Hindu gurus, and they question the rationale behind Hindu beliefs. Fair enough – As long as they question other faiths with same tenacity. That, they would never do. All in all, this entire incident was yet another naked display of pusillanimity and double-standards of our liberals and seculars.

Case against monotheism – A fountainhead of multitudes of ills

The common understanding of monotheism is that it’s a system of belief in one god. Well, that’s only partially correct. It’s a belief in one TRUE god is the complete truth. The emphasis on all three words makes sense – ‘ONE’ ‘TRUE’ ‘GOD’. It’s important that the god to the one – as he brooks no partnership of any kind, also he has to be true because the creed fears impostors and also he is THE GOD. This is the image of god that most of the dominant monotheistic faiths viz Islam, Judaism, Christianity etc profess.

As I mentioned in the very beginning, monotheism doesn’t only mean belief in one god but it also means intense hatred to any other gods. So, hatred is something inherent to the creed of monotheism. The prevalence of the spooky, imaginary creature, the bogeyman called the ‘satan’ and his eternal conflict with the god speaks about the never ending need of the monotheistic creed to hate something to keep the things going.

Monotheism rests on a set of belief system where most of them happen to be out and out irrational. For example, Christianity rests on ‘sin’, virgin birth of Christ; Islam rests on the revelation of Allah to Muhammad, Muhammad travelling with Gabriel to heaven on a horse and receiving revelations from Allah over a period of time. Monotheistic creeds are usually revealed creed. So, the votaries of the creed have to believe in each and every word of their canonical texts. 

Since the focus of this post is on the ills of monotheism, I’ll only stick to it. To begin with, monotheism hacks at the very roots of the most fundamental of human aspirations – Knowing oneself. That thirst of knowing the source of existence is inherent in every human being. Religions (Sic.) with open architecture provide the necessary means for the followers to find the answer. But, with monotheistic creeds one has to quench their thirst for knowledge by the ‘holy’ texts. Anything else amounts to blasphemy. An example of one Mansur Al-Hallaj should explain this or for that matter the burning the ‘witches’ at stake in Europe during the medieval times is a direct influence of blasphemy which in turn influenced by the fundamental tenet of monotheism. We would have seen a great number of seers in Muslim and Christian world if not for ossified monotheism.

As mentioned earlier, the holy texts of monotheism like Quran, bible are canonical i.e. they can’t be edited, deleted or added with. The followers believe the texts are the very words of god and hence, infallible. This belief removes all the possible doubts any reasonable mind possess for good or for worse, usually the latter. This is the main reason that mass killing, arson, rape and other atrocities in the name of religion get passed off as if there are nothing because all of them have divine sanction. Ask any Mujahiddin of ISIS or Boko Haram why he is doing what he is doing. He’ll show you perfect ayat and surah of Quran which completely condones and mandates his action. The so-called terrorists are straightforward and honest. They don’t hide their motives and their inspirations for their actions. It’s only the liberal-intellectuals who provide the smokescreen for the action and motive of terrorists who are confused.  

There is no ideology which has brought the amount of human suffering as the monotheistic ideology has brought. The closest ideology that comes in inflicting the magnitude of human bloodshed to monotheistic ideology is the ideology of communism. While communism is just around two centuries in existence whereas, monotheism is over a millennium in existence and hence the wreckage is naturally more. 

Monotheism has shunted the human growth – both at personal level and societal level. It is incompatible with science. Europe started walking in the path of progress when it cut loose of the Church and fundamental Christianity. The day it was in the stranglehold of church is aptly referred to as ‘the dark ages’. The eastern religions (Sic.) like Buddhism and Hinduism on the other hand, never had such issues ever. They were perfectly compatible with science and there was little difference between scientists and what we traditionally referred to as rishis. Monotheistic creed has been evil and destructive since its inception, it continues to this day and it will continue till its last breath. If there is indeed a god and he is just, I don’t think he can be kind to the founders of any monotheistic creeds.

Book Review - The End of Faith

Introduction:

End of faith is a book by Sam Harris. Going by the title, I had assumed it to be a treatise on atheism like- say- The God Delusion of Richard Dawkins. But to my surprise it didn’t turn out to be one. But instead it was a work which diagnosed the phenomenon called faith (or belief) and its various manifestations from various dimensions and its impact on the world. Having proficiency in neurology and allied sciences, Sam Harris does a good job in it.

Synopsis:

First of all, the concept of belief is examined with all its psychological clutches that hold us.

“A BELIEF is a lever that, once pulled, moves almost everything else in a person's life. Are you a scientist? A liberal? A racist? These are merely species of belief in action. Your beliefs define your vision of the world; they dictate your behavior; they determine your emotional responses to other human beings.”

Then the focus shifts from belief to the next obvious territory: the territory of religion. Sam Harris warns about the religious bigotry and its effects.

“It seems that if our species ever eradicates itself through war, it will not be because it was written in the stars but because it was written in our books”

The primary focus is on the Abrahamic religions which have a common root: Judaism, Christianity and Islam. All three have many similarities and all have exclusive truth claims. Sam Harris goes to the roots of ‘holy’ scriptures of these religions and examines them. He rebukes the truth monopolies the religions claim to have.

“The idea that any one of our religions represents the infallible word of the One True God requires an encyclopedic ignorance of history, mythology, and art even to be entertained—as the beliefs, rituals, and iconography of each of our religions attests to centuries of cross- pollination among them.”

While examining these original texts (Old Testament, New Testament, Koran, Sunnah etc), he shows how they are inherently intolerant and inspires violence against the non-believers. The episodes of medieval Christianity: the never ending witch-hunts, inquisition, burning heretics at the stake make for a nauseating reading and makes one wonder how much blood have spilled for the sake of belief.

Then his gaze turns towards east. He observes, in the east, non-sectarian spiritual traditions have developed which never developed in the west in a full scale and ponders on the reason. In his own words: 

“If there is an equally arresting image that accounts for why nondualistic, empirical mysticism seems to have arisen only in Asia, I have yet to find it. But I suspect that the culprit has been the Christian, Jewish,and Muslim emphasis on faith itself. Faith is rather like a rhinoceros, in fact: it won't do much in the way of real work for you, and yet at close quarters it will make spectacular claims upon your attention.”

He then dwells on the issue of conscious mind, the functioning and the intricacies and all the exhortations of western philosophers like Descartes, Pascal, and Sartre et al. Then he makes an arresting conclusion:

“ Nevertheless, when the great philosopher mystics of the East are weighed against the patriarchs of the Western philosophical and theological traditions, the difference is unmistakable: Buddha, Shankara, Padmasambhava, Nagarjuna, Longchenpa, and countless others down to the present have no equivalents in the West. In spiritual terms, we appear to have been standing on the shoulders of dwarfs.”

Then the focus is shifted to Buddhism and the long tradition of Buddhists to focus on the mind and its functioning. He posits Buddhism in the high pedestal among religions which is rational and most of the claims can be empirically verified. He mocks the difference in understanding of the universe and its functioning between Eastern and western tradition thus:

“It is no exaggeration to say that meetings between the Dalai Lama and Christian ecclesiastics to mutually honor their religious traditions are like meetings between physicists from Cambridge and the Bushmen of the Kalahari to mutually honor their respective understandings of the physical universe.”

He makes a very important distinction which most miss: The difference between mysticism and religious tradition. To paraphrase him –

“MYSTICISM is a rational enterprise. Religion is not. The mystic has recognized something about the nature of consciousness prior to thought, and this recognition is susceptible to rational discussion .The mystic has reasons for what he believes, and these reasons are empirical. The roiling mystery of the world can be analyzed with concepts (this is science), or it can be experienced free of concepts (this is mysticism). Religion is nothing more than bad concepts held in place of good ones for all time. It is the denial—at once full of hope and full of fear—of the vastitude of human ignorance.”  

He nails the coffin called faith thus :

“Faith is simply the license they give themselves to keep believing when reasons fail When rational inquiry supports the creed it is championed; when it poses a threat, it is derided; sometimes in the same sentence. Faith is the mortar that fills the cracks in the evidence and the gaps in the logic, and thus it is faith that keeps the whole terrible edifice of religious certainty still looming dangerously over our world.”

Conclusion:

This is one of the few books written in the spirit of free enquiry. Usually the books which take critical position on religion take the side of atheism, and eventually end up advocating it. But this book is an exception. While looking the faith, religion and the dangers which loom from it, it also looks at the possibility of expansion of human consciousness through non-sectarian spiritual traditions and methods. It’s a strong, scholarly work rooted in reason, science and rationality.

The Land Jihad

I assume you all have heard of the term ‘love jihad’. If you haven’t, just googling it will throw out thousands of results. It is a phenomenon that is rampant in several areas of coastal regions of Karnataka and also in many parts of Kerala. When I heard it for the first time, I thought it was some kind of a crackpot conspiracy theory but later instances proved otherwise. But did you know there is something called as ‘land jihad’?

Let me first interpret the word ‘jihad’ in the present context. Jihad in simple terms means a religious warfare for the cause of Islam. Though the means remain violent most of the times, a few times it can be non-violent also. This land jihad falls into the latter category. But the cause or the end remains intact: The cause of religion.

Land as an investment avenue

There are many investment avenues that can be used to leverage your capital amount of investment. The basic lessons of investment say that over a long duration of investment horizon only two investment avenues are profitable more than any other types of investment: The first one is investment in stock market and the other one is investment on land. Both these investments, in a way are an investment on the economy of the nation. So, especially when the economy is booming, the stated investments can give you very high dividends. As India is a booming economy, the importance of investment in these two avenues can’t be stated more. Here, the focus is on land so let me stick to it.

Land Jihad by ‘Religion of peace’ – With Kerala as an example

Islamists make no bones about their intention to make this nation Islamic. The way things are shaping up in the nation and the kind of support they are getting from all the quarters both openly and covertly, perhaps they will eventually be successful. Among many ways of capturing the nation, ownership of the land is one of the main ways. Just remind yourself how the church captured and controlled the African continent by owning most of the land.

It’s a common knowledge that Muslims like to be amongst themselves. That’s the reasons you find ‘Muslim ghettos’ even in some of the well-developed countries of Europe. I’m not trying to implicate anything wrong per se. But given the ‘Muslim only’ mindset, it is difficult to deal with them in many cases. For instance, it is almost impossible to find a house to buy in a completely Muslim-dominated area if you are a non-Muslim. This is just a small example of demographic seize. [The media especially the loathsome likes of NDTV, The Hindu et al. wants us to believe exactly the opposite where Muslims are portrayed as helpless victims]But contrary to this, the Hindu land-owners by and large sell off their lands to a good price without thinking any of the other larger consequences. The ghettoization is a dangerous trend, very well captured in this well-researched article.

Kerala, former ‘God’s own country’: It is no longer cool to refer Kerala as god’s own country anymore. God disowned that state long back if ever he owned it in the first place. It is heading up steadily to become another Kashmir. Defense analysts say the kinds of events that Kerala is witnessing now is strikingly similar to the events that Kashmir witnessed a few years before things went out of control. Let me add some factual spice to it: Muslim fundamentalists have declared to make Kerala an Islamic state in a few decades. The avowed promise was really serious that the chief minister of Kerala had to concur they actually vowed so. This small article actually outlines briefly how land Jihad is taking shape in Kerala.   

As the above article briefly explains, Muslims in many dealings are willing to pay price which is higher than market value. Unsuspecting Hindus by the lure of higher price just sell off their lands for a higher price. As with many cases, Hindus are caught off guard here. There is nothing objectionable-legally-as everything is done in accordance with laws. This trend of land Jihad started in the Muslim-dominated district of Malappuram then it did spread to other cities like Kasargod. One of my friends who happens to be a resident of Kasargod gave me first-hand account of all these. In his own words – “Kerala is turning out to be a hotbed of Islamic Fundamentalism. A powerful land mafia is behind all to usurp the lands from Hindus with intimidation & terror so as to create a strong Muslim land bank. Unemployed Muslim youth are reared with cash, motor bikes, mobile phones to foment tension in Hindu pockets thereby create panic to sell off their lands. Gulf money + Forged money is deployed for the purpose. Being a part of the central cabinet & a partner in the state ruling front, they have the necessary protection from all quarters. To top it all, the Hindus are divided into umpteen numbers of parties”.

This is just a glimpse of what RoP guys have done in recent years in one particular state. Let's look at the RoL (Religion of Love) guys now. They are far better networked, far wealthier than any cult group you can think of.

Land Jihad by ‘Religion of Love’

Let me ask you a question to start with. Who is the largest landowner of India? Any guesses? I think this is fairly simple. Yes, the Government of India (GoI). But let me ask you a tough one. Who is the second largest landowner of India? You perhaps don’t know because it’s a tough guess. Indian Church is the second largest landowner of India. Surprised? May be you are.

Globally, the church is third largest landowner 

Christians constitute about 3% of Indian population (according to 2001 census) and the church is the largest non-government landowner in India. Talk about disproportionate asset allocation! While at present the Christian population could be anywhere between 5-6% of the total population, it is still a case of disproportion. (Although some evangelical websites like this places the percentage to as high as preposterous 25%! )

But what’s wrong in owning any amount of real estate in legal terms you may ask. Fair question! If it were to be all legal, then the question would have been only about the moral and strategic choices and implications. But the case is not so. How did the church acquire so much land in the first place? It is through the land grants since the days of the British. It’s like an inheritance of the colonial period. But the sad part is that even after the independence, there was never an effort to legitimately redistribute this.

This article could be a primer for the issue under discussion. One more disturbing fact about this issue is that it is not discussed as it should have been. You can see a very few intellectuals like Rajiv Malhotra raising this topic often and we can never expect our mainstream media to discuss these issues which have far reaching consequences. This is because most of the Indian media is controlled from outside India, mostly by church and also because the excessive fetish and allegiance it has towards the twisted idea of secularism.

The church’s nefarious designs for India to make it a Christian nation can be seldom disputed. Why should we fear the church’s hegemony on land ownership? Anyone posing such naïve questions should care to study the kind of divisive role the church played in the continent of Africa. Why go even there? Just watch our own back yards of some the north-eastern states of Nagaland, Tripura, etc. You can better understand the church and its design. It always wants to create state within the state. The kind of role it has played in the North East India is an unshakeable testimony to the fact.

Last Tidbit : If the issue is not debated with all seriousness it demands, if the trend is left unchecked, I think we will be laying a strong foundation towards making India a Chrislamic  Republic and that can be unarguably the greatest disaster to befall on us.

Book Review - Breaking India

Before starting anything, sample this : 2 authors, 5 years of research, 476 pages of data and analysis, bibliography of 61 pages, references to innumerable websites, books,and articles. Even this doesn't say how serious and important is this work -> Breaking India - Western Interventions in Dravidian and Dalit Faultlines. Authored by Rajiv Malhotra and Aravindan Neelakandan this work talks about various kinds of threats that are systematically unleashed by various coordinated forces on India and its religion. Before reading anything further, go to this official website to know more. 

The map shown is what the authors warn about in the book.

Introduction: 

There are global forces which don't like the idea of integrated India and constantly try to balkanize India so that balkanized India serves to fulfill their ultimate ends. Rajiv Malhotra calls these forces centrifugal forces. There are some interests which want to see India as one united country and these Malhotra calls as centripetal forces. Needless to say, centrifugal force that India is subjected to is far more stronger than the centripetal force which tries to unite India.

What are the centrifugal forces that want India to be divided and sub-divided? Though there are innumerable forces, institutions, individuals, all invariably fall into these three category -

1) Islamic radicalism linked with Pakistan
2) Maoists and Marxist radicals supported by China via intermediaries such as Nepal
3) Dravidian and Dalit identity separatism being fostered by the west in the name of human rights.

As the authors say in the introduction, this book focuses on the third issue -
the role of U.S. and European churches, academics, think-tanks, foundations, government and human rights groups in fostering separation of the identities of Dravidian and Dalit communities from the rest of India.

Synopsis:

The range of topics, institutions, individuals that are covered are huge that just for convenience, I have divided the issues raised by this book into these sub-headings (no way it's comprehensive)

1) Creation of identities, faultlines 

India is a diverse nation comprising of various cultures, languages, identities. But despite so many variations, there is something that creates pan-Indian identity. But the centrifugal forces (several churches, NGOs, individuals) are desperately trying to sever this pan-Indian identity and create several limited identities in its place.

2) Creation of race theories, their large implications in forming identities

Race theories were the products of colonial constructs of 18th century and are outdated. Still, to this day they are regurgitated to divide and sub-divide India. The creation of Aryan theory is well known and we know how the British used it to justify their dominion. The church and the colonialists have used Biblical myth of Ham to justify both racism and colonialism.

The authors warn of the outcome of creation and manipulations of race identities (master race, slave race having strong parallels with Aryan and Dravidian race theories) citing the examples of Sri Lanka and Rwanda. These two countries witnessed the worst civil wars of history killing thousands of people. 

3) Dravidian and Dalit faultlines

There are consistent efforts to portray Dravidian identity as an unique identity and different from pan-Indian identity. Same goes with the Dalit identity. Every effort is made to keep them apart from mainstream Hinduism and pan-Indian identity. Once the identities are separated from the pan-Indian identity, it can be used to map it to Christianity. So, many high profile churches are involved in this because it ultimately helps in proselytizing.

4) Dravidian Christianity, digesting Hinduism 

Attempts have been made to portray history of Christianity in India as an ancient one starting from the myth of St.Thomas. Just to give you a glimpse of some crackpot theories, sample these:

1.    India is a Dravidian Christian nation.
2.    Veda Vyasa is a Christian missionary.
3.    Shakti is the holy ghost in the christian trinity.
4.    Famed 6 Darshanas, Purva mimansa et al.have christian origin.
5.    Hinduism and Sanskrit were formed in 2nd century A.D.     

Did you say "Are you freaking kidding me?" but yes,these are the kinds of spurious theories which are passing of as scholarship. Basic contention is this: Anything good in Hinduism should be of Christian origin. First they tell Hinduism and Christianity are similar. Then they say Christianity as the pristine,the only truth and there is no salvation without Christ. All these so-called academic exercises are done only to aid conversion.

5) India and Hindu bashing industry of the west

India and Hindu bashing industry of the west is highly lucrative. There are many institutions which are dedicated to do this job. Of course they do it in the name of 'human rights', 'empowerment', 'protection of minorities' etc. There is a huge nexus of this India-bashing industry which uses every possible incident in India in the international circle to portray India and Hinduism in a bad light. These are high paying roles which promises reputation, money, foreign trips etc.

6) Church interests and U.S. direct involvement  

Church has severe interests in India and for its evangelical plans, it has mapped India to be inside the 10/40 window. India falls under the region where church has planned aggressive evangelism. The other major regions which fall under this region are China, Arab countries where proselytizing is outlawed or heavily restricted. So, India becomes the natural target.

To fulfill the mission of 'reaching out to the unreached masses' which is an euphemism for conversion, the church can go to any extent. For instance the Church and Maoists have come together in North-East India to break away from India.

The right-wing politics and lobbying is very strong in the U.S such that they eventually influence the policies of the U.S which can have many far reaching effects on India.

7)  Pan-Islam, China and the west

These are three civilizations which are working for the world's domination. They fight amongst themselves owing to difference in ideology. But when it comes to India, they all come together because they have a common enemy: India and its culture. All these forces have made India an ideological battleground. Truth be told, they have nothing to lose but everything to gain. The increase of Jihadi network in Kerala, the Naxalism in some states, Maoism in the north-east India and the huge infrastructure and networks these forces have created bear testimony to the fact that they are getting more stronger by the day.  


The Ultimatum :

This book should be studied by all who want to see India as one united country. The book is not trying to churn out some conspiracy theories but instead relies on hard,well-documented facts. So, the importance of the book can't be overstated. This book is important in many levels like: strategic,security, policy making etc.

Once you finish the book, you might get a feeling that India is a piece of meat lying on the ground waiting to be devoured by the vultures flying in the sky. The vultures which represent the centrifugal forces are far more equipped, organized, networked than the centripetal forces. The message and gentle warning that the book gives,if simplified could be:'be vigilant,organize,strategize or perish'

The three world conquerors, their doctrines

As Koenraad Elst & a few others clearly observed, there are three world conquerors that have ambitions which will be satisfied only when the world becomes theirs. The three world conquerors are Communism, Christianity and Islam. Though their ideologies and modus operandi may differ, they travel towards the same goal: total world conquest; and they will not rest until their stated goal is reached. Although one can discount the effect of communism over the world compared to the other two owing to the collapse of Soviet Union and failed states which had embraced communist ideology, it still has not died totally. Certain offshoots of communism still persist strongly especially in India. Their history and effects are too elaborate to be discussed in a book let alone a blogpost. I try to touch them at least superficially.

Communism

Though the idea of communism can’t be traced back to one particular era or one particular individual, communism found concrete shape from the theories of Marx and Engels. Though the words socialism and communism are used interchangeably, there is a difference between socialism and communism. Socialism is just a transitional phase on the road to communism. The aim of communism is to create a class-less society which is based on common ownership. Communism theory says every society has to pass through five stages of development: class-less primitive society, feudalism, capitalism, socialism and communism.[1]

No nation, no master, no class: This is the stated goal of communists. There will be no classes at the culmination of communism. The power is equally distributed among the masses; so there is no master. The entire world would have embraced the idea. So, there are no divisions among the nations. Communists defined peace as the lack of opposition; thus peace could only be attained once everyone had surrendered and fallen under the control of the World-Wide Communist State. Everyone will consume according to their needs not for their greed. This is the ideal propounded by Marx.[2] Sounds pretty good! But, it’s utopian, and hence impractical.

The main aim of the communists is to seize power of the state. They never sway away from their stated goal. They plan meticulously and execute the plans with mathematical certainty. The utopian world that’s envisaged by communism has beckoned many intellectuals to embrace the ideology. So, even today most of the people who are branded as intellectuals have a tilt towards leftist ideology. Especially in India, most of the intellectual sphere is ruled by communists.

If people voluntarily take up the idea of communism, it may create a beautiful world. If it is enforced, it is nothing short of tyranny. So, naturally the states which are under the rule of communism are totalitarian. Even today, most of the human rights violations all over the world are reported from either communist countries or Islamic countries.

As far as India is concerned, communists have hijacked the intellectual, public discourse. They hold key positions so that they can twist and turn the institutions of national importance according to their whims and fancies. All the terrorist organizations like Maoists, Naxals or ULFA are all inspired from the grand idea of communism. With the fall of Soviet Union, communism has got a death blow. But still, it hasn’t perished.

Islam

The youngest of the Semitic religions, Islam was founded in 7th century in Arabia. Like Judaism and Christianity, it is also a revealed religion. In all the revealed religions, it is mandatory to believe in god as well as in his prophet to be able to get any rewards. Prophet Muhammad claimed that he was the prophet chosen by the god Allah for the benefit of the entire humanity and he received the messages of Allah through Angel Gabriel. He put himself in the line of Abraham, Jesus, Moses and the likes. But Muhammad abrogated all the previous prophets including Jesus and claimed he was the last prophet send by god for the benefit of humanity. A close study of life of Muhammad shows us how he intelligently maneuvered ignorant Arabs and built an empire of Islam.

Islam is more of a set of beliefs and political ideology masquerading as religion than a religion in the real sense. A close look at Quran and Hadith reveals the true nature of Islam. The intention is to conquer the whole world. It is similar to communism in its intention but it is with god-attached. For all the heinous acts that Muslims commit all over the world in the name of Islam there is sanction from the god. So, moral dilemmas seldom arise in them. Islam divides the whole world into Dar-al-harb(Land of war) and Dar-al-salaam (Land of peace).[3] Dar-al-harb is the place where Islam is not the official religion. So, war should never stop in those places until and unless it is completely converted to Islam. Then alone it becomes land of peace, Dar-al-salaam. And it is the duty of every Muslim to take part in this ‘holy’ mission in some way or the other. The concept of Jihad is central to the Islamic doctrine and is considered to be the most sacred.

Islam, the imperialism: The imperial nature of Islam is such that all the converts have to change their lives to fit into the Islamic mould. It places the idea of Arab, Arabic culture (Islamic culture) and Arabic language as superior to all the rest and expects all the followers to emulate.[3] It is so much of an exclusivist ideology that it intends to completely obliterate the rest. So, when the countries were conquered and converted by Islamists, their ancient culture and history are stamped out of their lives. So, they never merely conquered a country but destroyed its history and civilizations. For instance: Iran and Egypt had great civilizations going back thousands of years, but they have been totally wiped out. This is what’s happened to Afghanistan in recent times and also what the Jihadists are trying to do to Kashmir.[4]

Indian context: India being the biggest land of polytheists became their targets in as early as 10th century. It is sanctioned in Quran to destroy the places of worship of other religions and to build mosques in their places. It was faithfully implemented in India as well. Millions of people were killed, converted and temples were destroyed. Of course, our ‘eminent’ historians invent economic reasons for this plundering of temples. Although economic reasons were a part of it, the biggest reason was religious one. Nalanda, Vaishali, Sarnath, Vikramashila, Takshashila, and many more centers of learning which attracted students from all over the world were mercilessly destroyed by the Islamic bigots. But amidst all these we have to acknowledge among all the nations and civilizations that Islamists have attacked, India alone remains unconquered till date. So, they consider India as an unfinished chapter in their global Jihad expeditions.

A commentator writing by the pen name KaffirPagan wrote about the entire history of conquest of Islam in India so succinctly and beautifully in the website Jihadwatch.com of Robert Spenser.

"It has been coming at us for 1400 years in Islamic tides that have ebbed and flowed. And our boundaries are still receding.
Christian Byzantium- Syria, Jordan, Turkey have been lost to the enemy camp. Also, North Africa has been lost by Christendom.
Similarly Hindus have lost Pakistan, Afghanistan, Indonesia and Malaysia. Buddhists lost all of Central Asia (The Central Asian republics- the Stans). Persian Zoroastrians lost their entire possession- Iran.
At least we still have India and Europe proper. But do we? The Muslims in both places continue to multiply disproportionately and encroach more ground.India had a beautiful civilization before the newly converted Turkish, Persian hoards goaded on by their Arab masters with promises of booty and women of Hindustan completely wrecked India. They raped India again, again and again for centuries.
According to the words of Islamic court chroniclers that often accompanied the Muslim warlords-- "Hindu civilization was wrecked, ground to dust, the inhabitants of Hindoostan became like atoms scattered..." This theme of wanton and cruel pillage reoccurs again and again and again from 800 AD till 1700 AD. It is a telling story of how civilization can be overwhelmed by barbarians hovering on its borders.
The Muslim barbarians appropriated not only India's riches, but also its accumulated knowledge for themselves.And no, the modern number system, the decimal, the concept of zero, arithmetic, algebra, trigonometry, geometry, chess, astronomy, medicine, speculative philosophy, metaphysics were not "invented" by Arabs. They were stolen from India and claimed for the Ummah. Ditto- Greek and Roman philosophies.
But at least the Europeans were aware of their own heritage and reclaimed it back. Why? Because Europe was not fully conquered, only partially ravaged till Anatolia, Iberia and the Balkans. The rest of Europe was relatively free from the scourge of Islam.But India? Not so fortunate. The entire land which was India (which consists of present day Pakistan, Afghanistan) was enslaved by the Mohammedans and that too for 800 years! The land that gave birth to the most "progressive, creative and imaginative civilization known to man," according to the words of a Western scholar, was not only physically, but also mentally yoked to Islamic slavery for 8 millenniums. No wonder that Indians are neither aware of the achievements of their ancestors, nor are proud of their heritage.
It is the same India that had the biggest universities of the world of its time like Nalanda (Bihar, India) and Taxila (present day Rawalpindi-Pakistan) where students from all over the world: China, Greece, Persia traveled to learn sciences, speculative metaphysics, philosophy, economics, mathematics. Some have said that noted Greeks like Archimedes himself came to India to study geometry. India was also been China's teacher for centuries, and in the words of a Chinese general-- "India has conquered China for a millennium without sending a single soldier over the Himalayas." This empire of ideas, of learning, of knowledge was reduced to the pitiful state of today because of a long and dark intervening period of Islamic plunder.
But the Hindus never gave in, nor gave up. They retreated into the forests and into the inaccessible Himalayan Mountains with whatever memories of their civilization they could salvage. The Hindu population in the middle ages decreased by 80 million! Many were slaughtered, many died of hunger and disease when transported over the Hindu Kush mountains (literally means "killer of Hindus") to be sold as slaves in the bazaars of Central Asia and Baghdad, many died of famine when the entire socio-economic structure of the land was shattered.
But I am mighty glad that despite all the unimaginable sufferings the collective will of our ancestors didn't sink and they did not join the enemy ranks. I am mighty glad the unassailable sword of Islam the overpowered the Persians, Byzantines, North Africans and Central Asia Turks was blunted in India.
Otherwise, today I too would be the nemesis of civilization, I too would be calling for the triumph of Islam, I too would be the enemy like the converted Albanians, Persians, Syrians and Turks."

If someone daydreams about the end of Islamic terrorism, they have to remember that Islam is fundamentally unchangeable. In the words of Geert Wilders, a controversial politician from Netherlands (controversial because of his open criticism of Islam) "There might be moderate Muslims, but there is no moderate Islam. Islam will never change, because it is built on two rocks that are forever, two fundamental beliefs that will never change, and will never alter. First, there is the Quran, Allah's personal word, uncreated, forever, with orders that need to be fulfilled regardless of place or time. And second, there is al-insal al-kamil, the perfect man, Muhammad the role model, whose deeds are to be imitated by all Muslims. And since Muhammad was a warlord and a conqueror we know what to expect. Islam means submission, so there cannot be any mistake about its goal. That's a given. It's a fact"!

Christianity

Compared to the previous two, Christians operate in a softer but a very organized manner. Christians have prophet in the form of Jesus and they believe him to be the chosen one of god among all men & was sent to earth to elevate humanity. The principal founders of Christianity include Peter, James, Matthew and John who were all the disciples of Jesus. As with any other Semitic religion, Christianity is an exclusive path.

Christians sincerely believe Jesus to be the son of god and salvation can be attained only by following him. The ones that don’t follow him are doomed. So, to ‘save’ the souls from the doom, they do religious conversions. They do it zealously and they think it as a pious work. Perhaps the proverbial ‘missionary zeal’ originated from the Christian missionaries.

Theologically, Christianity had a tendency towards intolerance, but had to adopt the policy of "live and let live" because in its formative period, it was but one of the numerous sects in the pluralist Roman Empire.[5] But much unlike Islam, it seldom directly plunders civilizations but attacks very core of civilizations and over a period of time it uproots them. Christianity has contribution in destroying Inca, Mayan civilizations. The unassailable Roman Empire could not stand the incoming wave of Christianity. Though there were many reasons for the downfall of Roman Empire, Christianity was a main factor.[6] Many indigenous African cultures were destroyed when a large part of Africa was converted to Christianity. There is an African proverb which captures the pulse of that point “"When the white man first came to this land, we had the land and they had the bible. They taught us to pray with our eyes closed. When we opened them again, we had the bible and the white man had the land."”

India, a natural target: when the European invaders like Portuguese, Dutch, and British came to India, they all came with missionaries to ‘save’ millions of souls. India was the largest pagan-land and naturally attracted all the missionaries who were interested in saving souls and planting crosses everywhere they could.

Even to this day, India remains the best destination, an attractive location for ‘soul-harvesting’. The reason being a large part of non-Christian population resides in the lands of India, China and all the Islamic republics. In all the Islamic countries and communist China, the missionary activities and hence the religious conversions are completely banned. So, thus India became a natural destination and target for the soul harvesters. And they have successfully harvested many souls in North-Eastern parts of India, tribal areas, Southern states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

They are doing a few things covertly, a few things unabashedly. The Joshua Project,a mega-plan they have made for soul-harvesting is really telling of their evangelical activities. They have made a detailed plan for soul-harvesting across the world. They have segregated people by their religion, language, ethnicity and various other parameters.They have separate plans for each segment of people. The whole exercise looks like a huge project of some multi-national company.The project is global, well-networked, well-funded. Needless to say, the main targets in India would be tribals and backward castes.This is just a tip of the iceberg.

In November 1999, the then Pope John Paul II visited India and he did not hide any intentions when he made the statement “Just as in the first millennium the Cross was planted on the soil of Europe, and in the second on that of the Americas and Africa, we can pray that in the Third Christian Millennium a great harvest of faith will be reaped in this vast and vital continent” He was referring to Asia. With china out of equation, the only largest remaining country is India.

Conclusion: Even if the rest of the groups except these three get obliterated from the face of the earth, these three conquerors would still fight among themselves for supremacy. (For instance, Muslims are persecuted in communist china; communists were persecuted in Iran; historical crusades between Muslims and Christians.) As far as India is considered, all three are very much present in India. Though each one is the nemesis of the other, the common animosity towards Hinduism brings them all together. All are fervently pursuing their respective missions, and have damaged the civilization significantly but I still believe India’s soul is intact.

References

1) Marx and Engels, The German ideology

2) Karl Marx, The communist manifesto

3) Anwar Shaikh, Islam-The Arab imperialism

4) Navaratna Rajaram, An article by name Tortured souls create twisted history

5) Koenraad Elst, Negationism in India

6) Edward Gibbon, The history of the decline and fall of the Roman Empire

A small critique on religions !

Muni Tarun sagar once said that the house should be destroyed after a hundred years of its construction and then should be rebuilt. In the same way, religions should be destroyed after one thousand years. Because of a long duration of time, many junks might have made their way to the religion. So, it would be near impossibility to set all the things right. The actual meaning and intention of the religion would have lost long ago. So, the process of cleaning the unwanted aspects should always be on.



Any religion should be open to criticism. Because that’s the main thing which helps to look deep about certain aspects and clean them if needed and also helps in reaffirming the faith in the good aspects of the religion. But a few religions consider themselves to be perfect and beyond evaluation or criticism. Worse than that, they intimidate the people who criticize it and create a kind of phobia.

Hinduism which is perhaps the oldest religion of the world has faced the same. Owing to the long-presence of it, it picked up junk and some aspects of it became intolerable. Though it had some very beautiful things that no other religions had, the junk had piled up so much that it began to mask the great aspects of the religion. So, the reformers came for the rescue. They could see the problem. Many of them criticized and brought many reforms. But due to its enormity and vastness, still many junks has remained. But, one appreciable fact is that Hinduism is open to criticism. No acts were considered as blasphemous acts even though many acts were nothing less.

Christianity also gives a fair amount of freedom in criticizing the religion and for the reforms. But as Christianity is a highly organized religion, it is not as easy as Hinduism to criticize and evaluate. Organization of religion has its own weaknesses and strength. But, with its limitations, Christianity has come a long way and it has given scope for criticism and evaluation.

But the religion which hasn’t opened up at all is the religion of Islam. The very word Islam means ‘to surrender’. It’s a beautiful thing to surrender to something. Unless you are truly humble, it is impossible to surrender to something completely. But as mentioned before, no religion is perfect. Every religion has its own piece of scrap which has to be cleaned up from time to time. If the scraps are not cleaned, the scraps become more and cover the entire religion and the religion appears as a joke.

Islam has hardly gone through reforms over the years. It is as medieval as it was in the 7th century. There is not much difference between Aurangazeb and Osama Bin Laden. Both might belong to completely different eras but the point to be noted is that both were motivated by the same ideology. Obviously, there should be something wrong in some part of the religion. If someone questions that, instead of brooding over the reasons, the very act of questioning is considered blasphemous and the person who questions it is persecuted or worse, killed. So, none dares to question and all want to be politically correct.

Subramaniam Swamy (President of Janatha Party and former minister) had written an article about Islamic terror and the ways to wipe it. Though there were some extreme points in it, he had raised some valid issues. I had posted the article on my Facebook profile. Irfan, one of my college mates in my post graduation got offended by the article and he began to throw some personal slurs at me and also started his line of defense defending his religion and tried to portray his religion as the religion of peace(had he said piece, I would have readily agreed!). The person was so blind that he was not even ready to acknowledge the well-established fact of the Islamic terror. Then Naveen, one of my college mates in my graduation joined this guy and they continued to defend their argument.

Then the rhetoric began: ‘Terrorism has no religions’, ‘You can’t attribute terrorism to one single religion’, ‘Terrorism has a socio-economic-political cause than religious ones’. It was a typical Indian situation: One guy from the minority, to defend him a pseudo-secular intellectual and one hopeless moron against them. My hope to drive home some points to them remained hope till the end because one person had mortgaged his intelligence to his religion and the other one to some ideology and pseudo-secularism. So, the arguments yielded no results. But, the next morning I was surprised to see that my name was promptly removed from his friend’s list. I was bewildered at the level of narrow-mindedness!!

To do a cover-up job for a problem is not the way to encounter a problem at all. To solve any problem, one has to acknowledge the existence of the problem first. If someone is the denial mode and act as if the problem doesn’t exist, the existence of the problem is undeterred and it can only exacerbate over a period of time.