Religion Is On The Rise But Spirituality Is On The Wane: Value Fellow Humans And Significance Of Relationships
By
Sumit Paul, New Age Islam
17 November
2022
Spirituality Is Developing And Nurturing Noble
Humane Qualities Like Love, Compassion And Kindness, Not That Conventional
Scriptural Obeisance To Some Fictitious Allah, God, Jesus Or Muhammad
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Years ago
at the library of the University of Hull ( UK), I got a chance to read Stanley
Seymur's out of print book, 'Following the Mughals’. There's an
extremely poignant episode in the book. When a very young Babar defeated
Ibrahim Lodhi in the First Battle of Panipat in 1526, his general Mustaqeem
Qain brought the blood-oozing head of the vanquished Ibrahim Lodhi as a gift to
Babar, he ( Babar) shouted Qafiindaahaz, Qafiindaahaz (oh no, in Uzbeki,
Babar's mother tongue). He then admonished Mustaqeem and told him that though
he was a soldier, he was predominantly a human and such gory spectacles shocked
him. Babar described this incident in his memoirs Tuzk-e-Babari, originally
written in Chagatai dialect.
And put
this incident vis a vis Aftab's reaction to see his live-in partner's head in
the freezer. It has been reported that he'd nonchalantly look at the torso-less
head of his partner, Shraddha, every day.
This is complete
absence of emotions. Five hundred years ago, a seasoned soldier and ruler was
flabbergasted to see the blood-soaked head of his adversary and now an urbane,
city-dweller cuts his live-in partner's body into pieces and makes love to some
other woman in the same pad. All in a state of utter nonchalance.
Somewhere,
we're all directly or indirectly responsible for this type of absolute erosion
of emotions and sense of remorse. Somewhere, we all have become too
materialistic and unnecessarily matter of fact. Parents have no time for kids.
All are glued to their hi-end gadgets and i-phones. We've no time for healthy
conversations and no time even for reading a newspaper, let alone books. It's
affluence, but no finesse.
Religion is
on the rise but spirituality is on the wane. By spirituality, I mean developing
and nurturing noble humane qualities like love, compassion and kindness, not
that conventional scriptural obeisance to some fictitious Allah, god, Jesus or
Muhammad. They’re chiefly responsible for making us so inhuman like living
zombies.
This
shocking incident must make humans introspect deeply and also make them aware
of the value of fellow humans and significance of relationships.
That we're
violent is a fact. But how can we minimise and dilute this embedded violent
streak is a question before the humanity. Sooner we sort this out, the better
it'll be for mankind.
-----
A
regular columnist for New Age Islam, Sumit Paul is a researcher in comparative
religions, with special reference to Islam. He has contributed articles to the
world's premier publications in several languages including Persian.
URL: https://newageislam.com/spiritual-meditations/religion-spirituality-humans-relationships/d/128417
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