05 Nov 2018
Shri Anil asked: In Mahabharata war Arjuna based on the advise of God Krishna fought the war and the war was organised by God Krishna to destroy the evil. It is God's work. The final solution for Sabrarimala issue was given by You and it is the final ultimate verdict, which supreme court judges could not give. My question is this case, a case of God like Mahabharata war in which God involved directly and gave final verdict. Similarly the final verdict of You could have come from the mouth of those judges being it the case of God since this case differs from normal cases like disputes between two parties for a piece of land? Kindly give Your response. at Your Lotus Feet. , Anil Antony
Swami replied: The purpose behind creation is totally different from the purpose you have selected in such issues. Your purpose is achieving peace in a hurried manner, whatever may be the way. The purpose behind creation is not achieving peace by the miraculous will of God working on certain human beings. The purpose is achieving peace by the reformation of people while giving them full freedom. From your angle, you may say that the Mahabharata war itself could have been avoided by changing the mind of Duryodhana, using the miraculous will of God Krishna. But God did not change the mind of Duryodhana using His miraculous power. In fact, even in the case of Arjuna, Krishna did not perform any miraculous change of Arjuna’s mind to make him fight the war. God tried His level-best to convince Arjuna to fight the war. After presenting the logical analysis, Krishna did not force Arjuna to fight. Instead, the last words of God Krishna were “You analyze on your own whatever I have told you and take the decision as per your will”.
Hence, no force through the miraculous power of God is seen. What appears instead is only God’s miraculous way of presenting the explanation perfectly. If the soul is not convinced with God’s explanation and analysis, and continues to commit a sin, the miraculous power of God will certainly appear to give the proper punishment to the soul for the sin. It is not a question of achieving the solution by any means. It is a question of getting the solution in a proper way. Even if God were to change the mind of Duryodhana through His miraculous power, the effect would not be permanent. Unless the soul gets reformed, no permanent solution is possible. Hence, God tries to bring about the reformation of the soul through His preaching of divine knowledge. He does not try to bring temporary change through miraculous powers.
In the beginning of creation during the first age called Kruta Yuga, almost all souls were sages. They followed the commandments of God strictly, like robots following the instructions fed to them. At that time, there was no question of any reformation of souls. The cinema of creation after the Kruta Yuga, was like a film reel replaying the same movie show once again as it is. But in course of time, freedom was granted to souls. As a result, variations in behavior started. Each soul acted as per his or her free will. Some souls committed sins while others did good deeds. Reformation of the sinners then became necessary and some souls were reformed resulting in betterment. The background settings like planets, earth, hills, rivers etc., remained without any change. The change was only in the behavior of the souls.
The resulting variations in the behavior of souls brought newness to each following show. This newness gives real entertainment to God, like watching a movie, whose story is unknown. The basis of this newness is only the freedom given to souls. We need not blame God that He granted this freedom to souls just for the sake of His entertainment. Thinking like this is totally wrong! When the souls lacked freedom and were acting like robots, they became unhappy. They developed an urge for freedom. The Father-God has only tried to remove the unhappiness of His children by sanctioning freedom to souls. He knew that the result of such freedom is sin. So through the scriptures, He warned His children-souls to avoid sin. He has also constantly been preaching to souls personally by descending in the form of Incarnations in every human generation. Yet the future behavior of a soul always remains unknown. This brings some anxiety and newness. When the Gita was preached by God Krishna, Arjuna was perfectly convinced whereas Dhrutaraashtra scolded Krishna for brainwashing Arjuna through the Gita! The uncertainty and unpredictable behavior of souls is due to the freedom granted to souls. This uncertainty brings some ignorance even to God. God likes this enjoyment through ignorance (Avidyaa). If He wishes, He can effortlessly know what is going to happen (Vidyaa). But He does not want to know what is going to happen in the movie of creation, even before watching it. This entertainment is not the main aim of God. It is only an associated secondary benefit that developed on its own. A person attending a seminar in Mumbai, completed all his duties at the seminar. Afterwards, he went for shopping and purchased some gifts for his family before leaving Mumbai. You cannot say that the person went to Mumbai only to purchase the gifts and that he arranged the seminar in Mumbai only for the purpose of his shopping!
★ ★ ★ ★ ★