16 Nov 2008
God gives value for the spiritual knowledge contained in the religion. Religion is the external cup and spiritual knowledge is the internal material supplied to the customer in the hotel. The customer pays for the internal material and not for the external cup. The sweet Payasam in the cheap ceramic cup will have high payment. The cheap drinking water given in costly golden cup has no payment at all. The customer takes the material only and not the container. Similarly, the spiritual knowledge alone follows the soul from birth to birth and not the religion. When the external body is left over here, the soul raises up in a new energetic body. The soul in the new energetic body is associated with the spiritual knowledge alone but not with the religion. A Christian after leaving the external body does not remember that he is Christian. Similar is a Hindu, similar is a Muslim and similar is the human being of any religion. When the soul goes up, it stands before God and is enquired irrespective of its religion. Only its service to the world under the guidance of God is counted. Just like you come out of the hotel with the Payasam in your stomach, leaving the cup in the hotel, you will go up along with spiritual knowledge leaving the religion in this world. Only the good and bad works done by you will have the corresponding fruits, whatever may be your religion. There is no Hindu heaven, Christian heaven, Islamic heaven etc. There is only one heaven to enjoy the fruits of your good deeds. Similarly, there is no Hindu hell, Christian hell, Islamic hell etc. There is only one hell to enjoy the fruits of your bad deeds.
The ignorant people are fond of the external culture, language and religion. They pay for the external cup and not for the internal material. You give value to the external religion, which you have to leave in this world. You pay a lot of money for the cheap drinking water given to you in the golden cup! You do not want to pay for the Payasam since it is given in ceramic cup! What a great foolishness is this! You do not pay for the material that enters your stomach! You want to pay for the material of the cup, which is to be left over in the hotel itself! You praise the external cup and do not give value to the internal material. You are proud of your religion, heritage and external culture. You are never bothered about the internal material.
Taking the Good Aspects of All Religions
In every religion, there are good traditions as well as bad traditions. A good tradition is to be decided by the value of the internal material or spiritual knowledge and similarly, a bad tradition. You have to take good traditions and reject bad traditions based on the internal material, even though the external religious tradition is common. You should not praise all the traditions of your religion blindly without examining and analyzing the internal content. Similarly, you should not discard the traditions of other religions without analyzing the internal content. Your religion may be costly gold. Another religion may be cheap ceramic. You should not blindly accept all the golden cups. One golden cup may have a good medicine in it, which is useful for your health. Another golden cup may have poison, which may harm your health. You should not drink both medicine and poison due to your passion for gold. You should distinguish both the golden cups based on the analysis of internal material. Sometimes, you may have poison in golden cup and good medicine in ceramic cup. You have to reject the golden cup and accept the ceramic cup. Similarly, you may have to reject a wrong tradition of your religion and must accept a good tradition of other religion. You must not say that all the golden cups contain medicine and all the ceramic cups contain poison. In every religion, there are both good and bad traditions. Some golden cups contain medicine and some golden cups contain poison. Since you belong to the gold group, you must not say that all golden cups contain medicine only. Same is case with ceramic cups. If you are capable of rejecting the golden cup containing poison and capable of accepting ceramic cup containing medicine, you belong to the Universal Spirituality. Our Universal Spirituality is a religion of medicine irrespective of the external cups. Sometimes, we may give you the medicine in the golden cup and sometimes, we may give you the same medicine in ceramic cup. We will quote the scripture of any religion to preach the same spiritual concept. We are not bothered about the external material of cup, which is the religion. We are bothered only about the internal material, which is the spiritual knowledge. The word Universal Spirituality means that the spiritual knowledge or medicine is one and the same irrespective of the external religion or cup. We don’t mind criticizing a golden cup if it contains poison. We don’t mind to praising a ceramic cup if it contains medicine.
Develop Courage and a Broad Mind
I belong to Hindu religion. It does not mean that I will praise every tradition of My religion. I have the courage to criticize the bad tradition of My religion and reject it. I have the broad mind to praise a good tradition of another religion. When I praise the good tradition of My religion, you should not misunderstand Me that I am a fan of My religion. If I criticize a bad tradition of My religion, I should not be condemned by you as a critic of My own religion. I praise the chaste Sita of My religion but criticize the unchaste Ahalya of My religion, who is the wife of a great ancient sage dressed in saffron cloth with pious garlands of beads. People think that Gautama (husband of Ahalya) cursed her even though she was deceived by Indra, who came in disguise of Gautama. This is wrong. Gautama could see the fact by his super powerful vision. Ahalya met Indra knowing that he is Indra in disguise (Devarajamtu vijnaya… Ramayana). Kamandalu is a pious vessel of My religion. But, if it contains beer, I will not respect it. Similarly, the chaste Desdimona of a foreign religion is appreciated by Me even though she was the wife of the most cruel Othello. Her external dress may be western pants and shirts. Because she belongs to another religion and culture, I should not criticize her and I should not praise Ahalaya since she belongs to My religion. There may be a bottle labeled with the word ‘beer’. But, it may contain the divine water of river Ganga. Based on the external label and the glass material of the bottle, I should not say that it contains only beer. Similarly, I may criticize the prostitute of a foreign religion. This does not mean that My criticism is based on the point that she is a foreign lady. You should judge the value based on the internal Samskara that is established by the spiritual knowledge.
You should not base your conclusions on the external aspects like region, religion, language, external habits of food, dress and style etc. You should not be fond of the external aspects like religion, culture, nationality, caste, gender, age etc. I belong to the caste of Brahmins but I condemn Ravana, who is a Brahmin and worship Rama, who is a non-Brahmin. I belong to masculine gender. I don’t appreciate Ravana or Duryodhana, who are men. I praise Sita, who is a woman. I am an old man but I praise Prahalada, who is a boy and condemn Dhrutarastra, who is also an old man. When all the people in the world become the members of Universal Spirituality, peace will exist everywhere. If the world is peaceful, the stage or the foundation is strong. Therefore, God gives priority to establish this stage or Pravrutti (Dharmasamsthapanaarthaya—Gita). Nivrutti or pleasing God is the drama that is enacted on this strong stage. If you spoil Pravrutti, God becomes furious with you. In such case, you cannot dream of Nivrutti, which is pleasing the God.
Truth is always universal. Spiritual knowledge is truth and cannot be influenced by the external traditions of religion. A true tradition must be respected, whether it is of your religion or of other religion. The concepts of Science are true and Universal, irrespective of region and religion. Both the scientific discoveries of foreign Einstein and Indian Raman are true concepts and are adopted in practical applications of our life. The spiritual concepts given by God are also universal since God is Universal. Do not follow blindly since they are your traditions or condemn blindly the traditions of others. If you analyze, the concept is one and the same in the good traditions of all religions. The Gita says that you will laugh at the blind traditions if you analyze with your sharp intelligence (Buddhyayukto yaya partha karmabandham prahasyasi…). It is said that all old is not gold and all new is not bad (Puraanamityeva nasadhusarvam nachapisarvam navamityavadyam…). You have to analyze both and take good rejecting bad (Santah parikshyaanyatarat bhajante…). A fool follows either old or new completely rejecting the other (Mudhah parapratyayaneyabuddhih…). This rigid fool, a conservative, drinks salty hard water from a well stating that the well was dug by his ancestors (Tatasya kupoyamitibruvaanaah ksharamjalam kapurushah pibanti…).
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