The Omnipresent
So finally I've begun writing about the greatest story ever told: the Human History. And I don't intend to begin by talking dryly about Harappans or Mesopotamians here. I want to start by using the three words found at the start of the world's most read text: "In the beginning". And I want to start by talking about History's greatest hero and most revered being: God (and He's still going strong, by the way).
So, in the beginning, we had God who created everything around us. Or so the Holy books say. Throughout history, if there's anyone who has most impacted our lives without actually having ever been seen, it is God. From our very birth onwards, what we eat, what we wear, how we see the world around us is dictated by our religions. And all this is done to ensure that our guy in the sky doesn't get mad on us. He is in everyone, in everything and he is all-knowing. He is perfect, the purest and without his wish, not even a leaf can move. But you can't see him. It is mainly a matter of faith.
In the play by Samuel Beckett, 'Waiting for Godot', this frustration for uncertainty has been depicted by two vagabonds who are waiting for a guy named Godot who never actually comes.
Now this is not a question of whether God is or isn't. It is just that this is the only figure in human history that has made the most impact without having ever been seen.
There have been prophets. Messengers of God: Muhammad and Christ being the most famous among them. People who came, preached His message and left millions to come for generations to follow that unseen almighty being.
Some may question a discussion on God when talking about history. But I think that it would be dishonest not to mention him right at the start. Ask a Muslim who prays five times a day, ask a Hindu who prays to his favourite deities every morning, and you will see what I mean.
The course of history would have been very different had it not been for God. The world's civilisations grew not under different leaders, Kings or presidents but under the name of different religions. There's a story about how an English King was made to wait for hours outside in the snow to meet the Pope. God is called the King of kings without pleasing whom no kingdom could survive. The British monarchs till today are gifted the Holy Bible on their coronation ceremony. The Trojans made their battle moves based on signs of the Gods. In India, no marriage is possible till the stars assigned by the Gods agree for the matrimony to happen.
It's true that God is omnipresent. He exists in all cultures, everywhere without exception. He is almighty as in his name, kingdoms have been deposed, kingdoms have been made. In India, we have a BJP led government in power that is being headed by a former hardline Hindu fundamentalist: Narendra Modi. Someone who was charged with the mass killing of people from the Muslim community. The Hindus in India see him as their liberator from the foreign rule of Muslims which they believe lasted for over a thousand years in the past. And under the Congress party, Hindus continued being marginalised in the name of secularism. Today
In short, had it not been for his Hindutva image, Modi would never have been the Prime Minister.
In the modern day India, religion rules the roost. The next world war might even be fought in the name of God. After the recent attacks in France by the so-called warriors of God, the Pope said that we already have a world war going on.
God, the unseen presence, has the world moving and shaking. The human beings are perhaps the greatest believers who are ready to kill, maim, enthrone and depose for a guy in the heavens that they can't wait to meet after they die. We'd perhaps be the only species that craves a posthumous reward more than the reward of the present moment.
But not all is bad in this world under God's dominion. He is the hope of the hopeless. He kindles faith where there seems no reason in it. He has books from his various publications (call them religion for your convenience) that preach love, truth and other such virtues. They act like the compass for cultures across nations. It is a different matter whether they actually abide by it or whether the interpretation of these texts is correct or not. The point is that there are some whose lives are infinitely better with God in it than without him, or should I say, "Him" with a capital "H".
In the play by Samuel Beckett, 'Waiting for Godot', this frustration for uncertainty has been depicted by two vagabonds who are waiting for a guy named Godot who never actually comes.
Now this is not a question of whether God is or isn't. It is just that this is the only figure in human history that has made the most impact without having ever been seen.
There have been prophets. Messengers of God: Muhammad and Christ being the most famous among them. People who came, preached His message and left millions to come for generations to follow that unseen almighty being.
Some may question a discussion on God when talking about history. But I think that it would be dishonest not to mention him right at the start. Ask a Muslim who prays five times a day, ask a Hindu who prays to his favourite deities every morning, and you will see what I mean.
The course of history would have been very different had it not been for God. The world's civilisations grew not under different leaders, Kings or presidents but under the name of different religions. There's a story about how an English King was made to wait for hours outside in the snow to meet the Pope. God is called the King of kings without pleasing whom no kingdom could survive. The British monarchs till today are gifted the Holy Bible on their coronation ceremony. The Trojans made their battle moves based on signs of the Gods. In India, no marriage is possible till the stars assigned by the Gods agree for the matrimony to happen.
It's true that God is omnipresent. He exists in all cultures, everywhere without exception. He is almighty as in his name, kingdoms have been deposed, kingdoms have been made. In India, we have a BJP led government in power that is being headed by a former hardline Hindu fundamentalist: Narendra Modi. Someone who was charged with the mass killing of people from the Muslim community. The Hindus in India see him as their liberator from the foreign rule of Muslims which they believe lasted for over a thousand years in the past. And under the Congress party, Hindus continued being marginalised in the name of secularism. Today
In short, had it not been for his Hindutva image, Modi would never have been the Prime Minister.
In the modern day India, religion rules the roost. The next world war might even be fought in the name of God. After the recent attacks in France by the so-called warriors of God, the Pope said that we already have a world war going on.
God, the unseen presence, has the world moving and shaking. The human beings are perhaps the greatest believers who are ready to kill, maim, enthrone and depose for a guy in the heavens that they can't wait to meet after they die. We'd perhaps be the only species that craves a posthumous reward more than the reward of the present moment.
But not all is bad in this world under God's dominion. He is the hope of the hopeless. He kindles faith where there seems no reason in it. He has books from his various publications (call them religion for your convenience) that preach love, truth and other such virtues. They act like the compass for cultures across nations. It is a different matter whether they actually abide by it or whether the interpretation of these texts is correct or not. The point is that there are some whose lives are infinitely better with God in it than without him, or should I say, "Him" with a capital "H".
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