avidyaàjévanaàçünyaàdik-çünyäçcaabändhaväù
putra-hénaàgåhaàçünyaàsarva-çünyädaridratä
Life
without knowledge is empty, and all directions are void for those without
friends. Household life without a son is void, and for the poor the whole world
is void.
In the
contemporary world we often equate knowledge with information. But according to
the Vedas real knowledge is not merely a database of facts and figures; it is a
practical method for solving our problems.
We are drowning
in an endless ocean of information. Modern man prides himself as well-informed,
in fact he claims to be the best informed person in the whole history of
mankind. This is usually viewed as a sign of progress; but what part of this
information is actually useful in our practical day to day life and can it actually
resolve our real problems?
Well,
first of all, what are these real problems of life? War? Famine? Crime? The
social and economical unrest? The environmental crises? Terrorism? To answer
these questions we need real knowledge and not just information.
The
difference between knowledge and information resembles the difference between
philosophy and science. Science is mainly concerned with making human life
easier by offering a constant flow of new technological solutions. Philosophy, on
the other hand, is supposed to deal with the question “What is the purpose of
human life?” In his book “Substance and Shadow” Suhotra Swami pinpoints the
problem:
Scientists are often heard to dismiss the speculations of these great
thinkers [the philosophers] as unreliable. But they should not dismiss the
original purpose of philosophy, which is to explain information,to probe
beneath the surface data that makes up the world of bodily objects. Philosophy
grapples with the why of the world. If…this is irrelevant to today's
scientists, then science only informs. Though by the grace of science today's
world is perhaps better informed than it ever has been, there is no certain
metaphysical foundation to all this information. The result is information
chaos.
The
American writer Fred Reed shares similar thoughts on the matter:
Science
enjoys great prestige as it has led to great results, such as iPhones. Perhaps
because of this scientists, for some reason
thought to be smarter than the rest of humanity, are seen as oracles and almost
as priests. Yet they have nothing to say, and can have nothing to say about
meaning, purpose, origins, destiny, consciousness, beauty, right and wrong,
Good and Evil, death, love or loathing.
Trouble begins when one tries to stretch a system beyond its premises.
Here we come to scientism, as distinct from science. A great many people, some
of them scientists, want science to explain everything whatever. This of course
is the function of a religion.
Scientism, like other varieties of political correctness, is de rigueur among much of the cognitive or approximately cognitive elite,
and has been inculcated in the populace by endless repetition. The credo runs
roughly: Big Bang, stars form, planets, oceans, life, evolution, Manhattan.
Acceptance—unexamined acceptance—of scientism is now regarded as evidence of
right thinking. Most who accept it have no idea what they are accepting, but
they know that it is the proper thing to do.
For much of the public, this
is a sort of religion by Disney, “the
Force Be With You”, with an origin of the universe that, well, you
know, the scientists understand it, and we are evolving upward and onward into
like, better beings and all. And death? Let us speak of other things.
Information,
of course, can be useful in many ways. But if information (we are using the
word as a synonym to modern science) does not give solution to the core
problems of life (how to eradicate birth, death, old age, and disease) it is
dismissed by the Vedic sages asno better than refined ignorance. The inherent
inability of materialistic science to solve the real problems of life led an
increasing number of people to doubt even the need of the whole scientific
enterprise. A noted philosopher of science, Paul Feyerbend commented, “It is
good to be constantly reminded of the fact that science as we know it today is
not inescapable and that we may construct a world in which it plays no role
whatsoever (such a world, I venture to suggest, would be more pleasant than the
world we live in today.”Many would disagree with Feyerbend by pointing out that
science and technology gave us more power and control than anything in the
past. Nonetheless, even they would have to admit that modern science is
dangerously imperfect. As the American educator and cultural critic Neil
Postman remarks in his book “The End of Education”,
Its story of our origins and of our end is, to say the least,
unsatisfactory. To the question, How did it all begin?, science answers,
Probably by accident. To the question, How will it all end?, science answers,
Probably by an accident. And to many people, the accidental life is not worth
living. Moreover, regarding the question, What moral instruction do you give us?,
the science-god maintains tight-lipped silence. It places itself at the service
of both the beneficent and the cruel and its grand moral impartiality, if not,
indifference, has made it welcome the world over.
The Vedic
version is that real knowledge will make life happy instead of complicated.
Many of us confuse happy life with complicated life. As pointed out by Neil
Postman in his book “Technopoly – The Surrender of Culture to Technology”,
To the question ‘What problem does the information solve?’ the answer is
usually How to generate, store, and distribute more information, more
conveniently, at greater speeds than ever before…For what purpose or with what
limitations, it is not for us to ask; and we are not accustomed to asking,
since the problem is unprecedented.
The Vedic
sages urge us to ask precisely this question, “unprecedented” in the modern
world: “What is the meaning of all this informational chaos? Is there anything
beyond producing and consuming goods?” The actual answer to this question
constitutes real knowledge. This knowledge has three parts: 1) Knowledge of ourselves
and our relationship with God and the Universe, 2) Knowledge of the ultimate
goal of human existence, and 3) The method for attaining this goal.
One cannot
solve these problems relying on mental faculties or empirical data. Thus real
knowledge is necessarily transcendent. It must come down from a perfect source
outside the matrix of our limited material experience and reasoning. As the
Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein said, “The sense of the world must be
outside of the world”. In this connection Fred Reed urges us:
Note that the
premises of the sciences, if accepted other than provisionally for a particular
investigation, lead to paradoxes, as for example the Aquarium Effect. Scientists
view the universe as if it were an isolated system in a vast aquarium. They can
look at it, poke at it with sticks and instruments, but they are apart from it.
If they regard themselves as being within the system, problems arise.
For example,
the brain is an electrochemical mechanism, all parts of which follow the laws
of physics and chemistry. Successive states of a physical mechanism are
completely determined by preceding states, just as they are in a computer.
Physical systems cannot choose their behavior: a rock when dropped cannot
decide to fall sideways. Our thoughts are therefore predestined. Are they then
still thoughts?
Which leads to the obvious conclusion that one
cannot simultaneously be part of a physical system and fully understand it. Like
conjugate variables or something. But we are part of the
universe.
According
to the Vedas we are indeed “part of the universe”, and thus incapable of
acquiring perfect knowledge, only until we choose to ignore God. However this
is not our constitutional position. Originally we are spiritual, eternal
beings, parts and parcels of God, who is the creator and controller of all the
Universes. Our objective is to reestablish our loving relationships with Him
and the way to do this is by performing devotional service for His pleasure. Without
this type of knowledge we will, sooner or later, find our life empty.
Real
knowledge is never merely theoretical, it is meant to be applied in life and to
produce good results. The Vedic sage Narada Muni famously said that the
ultimate result of all studies should be development of good qualities.
Similarly in the Bhagavad-gita Lord Krishna defines knowledge as virtues:
Humility; pridelessness; nonviolence; tolerance; simplicity; approaching
a bona fide spiritual master; cleanliness; steadiness; self-control;
renunciation of the objects of sense gratification; absence of false ego; the
perception of the evil of birth, death, old age and disease; detachment;
freedom from entanglement with children, wife, home and the rest; even-mindedness
amid pleasant and unpleasant events; constant and unalloyed devotion to Me;
aspiring to live in a solitary place; detachment from the general mass of
people; accepting the importance of self-realization; and philosophical search
for the Absolute Truth—all these I declare to be knowledge, and besides this
whatever there may be is ignorance.
If
knowledge culminates in devotion to God and a good character, lack of knowledge
must result in godlessness and vice which naturally leads to degradation of
human relationships. Many people today will agree that if we don’t have at
least one real friend our life is empty. Who is a real friend? The one who is
willing to help us in a difficult moment. That rules out the thousands of our
so-called friends in the social networks. This type of facebook “friends” are
really cheap, they will not be there for us in adversity. Of course, we won’t
be there for them either. This is because friendship is not formed by simply
clicking the virtual button for “sending or accepting an invitation”;
developing actual friendship requires a serious amount of knowledge, time,
energy, and commitment. Usually we don’t mind having thousands of cheap friends
online until a time of need comes and we realize that we can’t count on them. This
is neatly summed up by Brad Pit’s character in the movie “The Counselor”: “If
your definition of a friend is somebody who is ready to die for you, then you
have no friends.”
All valuable things in life have a price and require
time. But since we are very busy trying to have fun, we don’t have the time and
energy to invest in the actual values. Instead we are content with the cheap,
“practical” substitutes for everything, from food to friendship, family, and
love. We are in the position of a person who wants to possess a precious gem,
but does not want to pay the price for it.
In the
ultimate sense, the real friend can help us by pointing out our real problems
and by giving the solution. In Bhagavad-gita our best friend, God himself,
informs us that there are four main problems in our life: “janma-måtyu-jarä-vyädhi”–birth,
death, old age and disease. There are no material solutions to these problems.
The only possible solution is spiritual: by developing spiritual consciousness
we can transfer ourselves to a higher, spiritual dimension, were these problems
do not exist. Material problems pertain to the material body and they trouble
us as long as we persist in our wrong identification with matter. As soon as we
realize that we are not dull matter but pure spirit soul, our material
anxieties cease to exist. Then only can we enjoy life to the fullest extend and
this enjoyment is found in the pure loving relationships which the soul
exchanges with God.
According
to Chanakya Pandit another reason for living an empty life is poverty. But how
do we define poverty? We find that some people enjoy simple, happy life, while
some others, although rich and affluent, suffer from isolation and depression.
In this sense only those who have mastered the art of being content with whatever
destiny offers them are truly happy. According to Srimad Bhagavatam the lack of
satisfaction is dangerous even for persons who are materially advanced:
Many persons with varied experience, many legal advisers, many learned
scholars and many persons eligible to become presidents of learned assemblies
fall down into hellish life because of not being satisfied with their
positions.
Bhaktivedanta
Swami, the foremost proponent of the Vedic wisdom in our age, writes in this connection:
For spiritual advancement, one should be materially satisfied, for if
one is not materially satisfied, his greed for material development will result
in the frustration of his spiritual advancement. There are two things that
nullify all good qualities. One is poverty.
Daridra-doñoguëa-räçi-näçé. If one is poverty-stricken, all his good
qualities become null and void. Similarly, if one becomes too greedy, his good
qualifications are lost. Therefore the adjustment is that one should not be
poverty-stricken, but one must try to be fully satisfied with the bare
necessities of life and not be greedy.
The great
sage Chanakya tells us that there is yet another reason for an empty life – the
lack of a son in the family. According to the Vedas death is not the end but
merely a change of the body. If one follows his religious duties properly, in
his next life he is promoted to higher realms in the Universe. In order to stay
there longer, his descendants should continuously perform Vedic ritualistic
ceremonies to please the managers of the Universal affairs. Or, in a case when after
death the father goes to the lower regions, the son can save him from there by
performing a special rite.
Besides
that, according to Vedic culture (which includes the ancient European tradition
too) the son imbibes the father’s skills and occupation, inherits the father’s
property, pays off his debts and takes care of the rest of the family,
accomplishing whatever the father couldn’t. Such a son is traditionally
accepted as an expansion of the father’s personality. For example according to
the Vedic tradition a widow is not really a widow, if she has a son since the
son is a representative of the father. In the East and West the daughter did
not inherit the father’s assets (unless she was the only child), nor she could
perform religious duties like funeral rites and sacrifice to forefathers on her
own; she belonged to the family of her husband.
Therefore
the begetting of a pious and obedient son is very important in the Vedic
society.
