Deep Faith Helps Overcome Fear
E-mail: anilrajvanshi@vsnl.com
Shri. Ramkrishna was very fond of telling the following story. A padre went to an island to preach. He went to a hut of an illiterate villager and heard him shouting and being angry with somebody. The villager saw the learned priest and came out and told the padre that he is trying to bathe and put his Gopal to sleep but being a naughty child he does not listen and hence his anger. The Padre wanted to see the child and was aghast to find that it was an idol of Lord Krishna. He scolded the villager, saying that God is formless, infinite and beyond such childish playthings. The illiterate villager thought the learned priest may be right and started taking lessons from him. After a couple of months the priest thought that his disciple has learned enough to follow the right path and hence left the island by boat. He must not have gone far when he was amazed to see the illiterate villager coming running after him and shouting him to stop the boat. When the disciple reached the boat he was crying and told the padre that he had forgotten the name of the formless God and hence could not recite the name and pray. The priest was speechless and finally asked the disciple how he could come running on water. The disciple replied "After you left I became very agitated because I forgot the name of the God and so started crying. My Gopal told me to go and ask you his name"! Deep faith has produced miracles all through the history of mankind and in all religions. It is like a deep thought where tremendous concentration and conviction is required. It is Bhakti Yoga in its ultimate form.
Most people have faith either in themselves, in a chosen religion, science or anything else. Faith provides the ego sense I, an anchor. Hence it allows the rest of the mind to become free to focus on the work at hand. Thus the brain's energy is not frittered away in trying to unravel the knots of doubts. If there is no faith then we tend to question everything, which results in waste of energy and precious memory space of brain. It also results in short attention span and does not allow us to focus on any thought for longer time. Faith provides stability and security to I, helps it to move forward, and hence provides purpose and meaning to our lives. Somehow it also has a mechanism to reduce the fear sense and deep faith can remove it completely. This is the essence of Bhakti Yoga where the deep faith in God gives a tremendous feeling of security. Deep faith also has been the basis of extraordinary efforts by great leaders of the world who have moved in unknown areas fearlessly and discovered great truths. Since the fear sense can be removed it is also possible that deep faith may help fight depression and may provide general feeling of well being.
Faith is always blind. It cannot be rationalized. Different people have different faiths. However one should not try to change other person's faith. Doing it is like shaking the foundation of the core belief, since it takes a long time to develop deep faith. As long as that faith does not lead to violence or harm others in any way, it should be left alone. If it helps someone achieve something in life it is worthwhile for him or her to have the faith. Some of the most heinous crimes in the history of mankind have been committed in the name of faith. Whether it is religion, or ism or way of life - the result is the same since one group or people try to impose their faith or belief on others. Almost all the major conflicts world over are because of this imposition and the present Iraq crisis is a classical example of this. This imposition of faith comes from our arrogance to control everything in the world. We should try to control ourselves, our actions and become better human beings. Once each individual becomes a better human being then it will have a multiplier effect on others who come in contact with such evolved beings. This will help make the world a better place to live.
Faith is also a great enabling force. Major efforts of mankind have been driven by faith - whether in making great masterpieces like Pyramids, Taj Mahal, great temples, churches etc. or even sending the man to the Moon. This force should be harnessed for betterment of mankind and making this world a better place to live. Hence faith should not be based on any religion or creed but should be pan humanistic and based on the belief that we can help this world by making ourselves better human beings and not by controlling others.
Published as an editorial article in Times of India, March 31,2003.