‘Evolution is based on difference, not on equality. Every person carries a somewhat different genetic code, and is exposed from birth to different environmental influences. This leads to the development of different qualities that carry with them different chances of survival… all men evolve(d) differently…’
As I read these words in the book ‘Sapiens – a brief history of humankind’, I literally danced around the room. It reverberated so closely with what I felt – ‘spiritual autonomy is as existential as life itself’. Brilliantly written with vivid narratives, the book very coherently sketches the evolution of human kind, touching upon every aspect of human life and thought. I recommend every human to read ‘Sapiens’, to simply know where we are and how long our journey has been.
Our evolution from neanderthals, denisovans and other archaic humans, to sapiens or ‘the wise ones’ is attributed primarily to the stories we are able to imagine and share in order to build common ideologies and work together. The author Yuvan Noah Harari, beautifully packs every thing we believe in daily life – money, corporates, empires, states and religion – to a common myth a group of sapiens begin to accept and work towards. There is no ‘America’ – it is merely a bunch of people with common laws and ways of life; there is no ‘Corporate’ for it is not the stocks, the shareholders, the products or even the wealth that constitutes a corporate. It is merely the common story or culture a group adheres to. So is the case with religion – a common thread, story, myth to bring a group of people together to combine efforts. The entire success of Homo Sapiens as a species, is the collective effort we bring based on the imagined order we share.
As I proceeded with the book and finished reading the chapter on religion, I was at an impasse. I can not in my right mind find even a single word wrong with what has been written. I myself have repeated to many, my guru Mahatria’s words ‘God is not a person’. The author’s explanation on the differences between monotheism, polytheism, Dvaitha, Vasishta Dvaitha & Advaitha philosophies was on point. In my opinion, he had not misrepresented or deliberately skewed up the words to imply ‘God was a myth’. The fact remains that the idea of ‘God’ is something that has come from man and has been used and built with extreme liberty and generosity to make it the one word every human has a unique concept about! After all, several millennia have been spent building the brand name ‘God’, dishing out too many versions to keep track of all of them. But I was at an impasse because after every layer of the onion of knowledge had been peeled there was nothing left inside to look for. Something within me knew there was a missing piece – a way to explain and express what my soul knew. But I had no clue how. I was never in ‘doubt’; did not feel ‘lost’. Yet I was helpless in my inability to even think coherently, let alone express what was breathing deep inside me. Alas, I couldn’t meditate.
‘The tragedy of industrial agriculture is that it takes great care of the objective needs of animals, while neglecting their subjective needs’, writes Harari. The problem with so much detailing on every aspect of scientific history, equally incapacitates the objective theories from addressing the subjective needs of the individual with a reason to wake up each morning. In the author’s words ‘happiness depends on the correlation between objective conditions and subjective expectations.’ The objective theories of evolution and intelligent design do not satisfy every individual’s subjective need of hope and a purpose to live. ‘Any meaning that people ascribe to their lives is just a delusion. The scientist who says her life is meaningful because she increases the store of human knowledge, the soldier who declares that his life is meaningful because he fights to defend his homeland, and the entrepreneur who finds meaning in building a new company are no less delusional than their medieval counterparts who found meaning in reading scriptures, going on a crusade or building a new cathedral’. And the author moves on to raise the most pertinent question ‘Does happiness really depend on self-delusion?’
Well, the answer is embedded in this very book! When I started reading the chapter on economics ‘The Capitalist creed’, and read the sentence ‘What enables the entire economy to survive and flourish is our trust in the future’ – there was a new clarity in everything! Harari goes on to explain how the entire modern world is built on money (which is a fiction), spent on things that currently don’t exist – like building a new bakery or developing a new product, for people who may or may not want to buy it in future. So the whole of economics is aspirational. Based on dreams and aspirations for a future, one is willing to spend time, energy and resources on it. When people come together for a common future aspiration, they form a state, a market, a religion, a society – investing their todays for a tomorrow they dream of. Take that aspiration out of the picture, there is no more corporates, markets, empires, countries, societies or religions. And Lo! I realised this is what Mahatria meant when he said ‘Faith’ is above ‘God’ in his pyramid!!!! Faith is Futuristic. Everything about faith is in the future, for in the present it becomes a fact. Everything began to fall in place so beautifully…
The farmer tills his land and prays to the bhoomi as his God, for he aspires a flourishing harvest. A fisherman bows to the sea for he aspires for the waters to be benevolent to him as he rows his boat into the future. Every human thus has his / her own ‘God’ – for ‘God’ is simply the variable we use to equate with what we aspire for. Not only is Viswaroop ‘seeing everything (all) in the one God’ and the converse of ‘seeing the one God in everything’. Viswaroop is also the potential for the aspiration called God to be anything from the next meal to changing the world – the possibility of a future!!! ‘Viswaroop’ means ‘all possible forms of aspirations – a promise of a future!!!!! As the realisation dawned, tears trickled down my eyes…
The author writes, ‘For most of history, polities could enrich themselves by looting or annexing enemy territories. Most wealth consisted of material things like fields, cattle, slaves and gold, so it was easy to loot it or occupy it. Today, wealth consists mainly of human capital and organisational know-how. Consequently it is difficult to carry it off or conquer it by military force.’ I pray, may Homo Sapiens who have evolved to understand the wealth embedded in the intangible, also learn to respect the need for an aspiration called ‘God’ (or known by any other name) which remains a subjective prerogative of every individual, to wake up each morn.
By whatever name, in whichever form, from whosoever it may have dawned – to me GOD remains my eternal friend – the one in whom I dissolve forever… My aspiration to be, become and thrive as the best ‘me’ possible. Completely and eternally dissolved in My Krishna…
Written by Gita Krishna Raj | Published in infinithoughts in July 2019
