In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth #213 by parthaab

“He has to find it through the mirror of relationship, through the understanding of the contents of his own mind”

Indian holy men both Hindu and Muslim saints have used this method for finding the “truth” for ever. But this method in a way ignores other parts of us which is heart and our body. I say heart because yes a powerful melody, music or an artistic form can propel us towards “truth” as well. Similarly if one plays a sport, or an instrument or dances at a level where it becomes art at the highest level again we are approaching the “truth”.

But Indian thought’s obsession with the mind at the complete neglect of both body and soul, wouldn’t you say has been the fundamental problem that India has remained poverty stricken forever. It never valued the material (which would feed the body) or for that matter appreciate high art which could feed the soul. These were all secondary, lower variety pursuits, which were frowned upon by the upper classes (caste).

In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth #168 by Urstruly

Arey bhai kyon? In khurafaat ko aap kud hi naberrain – humain mukaan dukaan ki fikr kurnay dein.

In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth #156 by Urstruly

“Circular argument is not allowed in Logic and Philosophy and Logicians and Philosophers spend most of their time to identify and clean up the circular argument from their hypotheses.
So basically such argument does not reflect the inadequacy of God to do something or not but it reflects upon the inadequacy, inherent flaws and imperfections in the science of Logic. Is this what rationalists take pride in?? A flawed science??

Science, logic, philosophy starts when you start asking the questions WHAT and HOW instead of asking the mythical and religious questions of WHO and WHY. This is precisely how all the clutter gets cleaned up. Scientists, logicians or philosophers do not address God in their arguments – if or when they do they have gone beyond the realm of their disciplines.

The dichotomies, circular arguments, the forbidding of thinking beyond a certain point – not allowing questions to be asked are all in the realm of myth and religion. For which there are plenty of WHOs (Prophet or God) and WHYs (“Sometimes believing becomes driver and knowing takes the back seat”). So, (to quote your words back at you) “the inadequacy, inherent flaws and imperfections in RELIGION, is this what the THEOLOGIANS take pride in?? A flawed RELIGION??”

Keep humming Iqbal to maintain your juzba e shauk e shahadat.

In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth #139 by samar1982

“Infinity is nothing, i.e. Zero. Both infinity and Zero can not be assessed, measured or experienced by human beings.”

That is why God is unknowable – thus spoke Zarasuthra.

In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth #112 by hamidm2

In

#109 by dost-mittar

“the Hindu definition, which says that the soul (atma) is pure and good”

I beg to differ with Dost. Souls come in all forms and they are not all good. Hamid you are living proof of a khabees rooh for which God will send down a gunja farishta.

In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth #101 by ranjit

“Lets say that at some point in time, medicine becomes so advanced that our lifespan increases to centuries, i.e. you will rarely die of natural causes. Your organs can all be replaced as they age by using stem cell technology. How many of us would still respect a God if we reach that stage? After all, if you dont die, there is no heaven or hell to worry about, right?”

Lets take your scenario a bit further. Let’s say we get to a stage of development whereby we have expanded our brains to the extent that we can basically download all accumulated knowledge of the ages into it. In the physical sense we have developed ourselves to the extent that the body is nothing more then a drag. Why have organs, why a body at all, lets say we have morphed into pure consciousness. We don’t need a body because that just slows us down, without it we can travel at the speed of light to any corner of the universe.

Now – are we still connected to other human beings given that every one has basically the same knowledge or have we developed a collective consciousness? Or is it that with that knowledge we have developed individual consciousnesses that are unique to ourselves and different from any one else. Both alternatives are equally possible. Can this be called – if I dare say – we are approaching singularity or infinite plurality? We have definitely approached God to the point of union with him or found him in his infinite diversity. This is the drive towards the Good.

Any ways – this is just another dimension of my craziness.

In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth #80 by dost-mittar

“Then why bother?”


I wish it were that simple. Here you have an agnostic writing about God, why? The fact of the matter is agnostics and atheists are obsessed with God much more so as compared to the general community of believers. On the other hand, despite a widely held belief that God is unknowable does not prevent the believer to spend his lifetime trying to decipher the nature of God and develop his own conception of the Supreme Being. Some conceive God in their own image – Christ, or a vast human like form with unlimited powers, but essentially with human qualities. “Man is a measure of all things”, said Protagoras – because we cannot escape our own dimension.

Given this limitation – in the final analysis each one of us develops our own individual unique conception of God. This can be called also as our own unique path to God. Perhaps here, Islam is at its finest. There is no clergy, no hierarchy, nobody to tell you really what your relationship to God is – you can make it any way you like.

For myself – I define God as the Supreme Good. The perfect point of every endeavor, every product, every quality, in short everything. A continuum of progress, of stages, of levels, moving up and up till there is none, but that is elusive. It is like Beethoven’s 5th symphony can it propel you to that eternal truth, that perfection? Yes, sometimes, in the right circumstance, at a moment when you may get that clarity that you feel touched by the Ultimate Truth. But it doesn’t have to be just through music, in every one of our endeavors as we propel our arete (Greek for excellence) we move closer to God and this is what the purpose of life is. To continuously strive towards God, towards the Good, steadfast in seeking the truth, always doing the right thing, with temperance and fortitude

In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth #26 by ranjit

Virtue is only important if you want a good life. The best life you can have – get the most out of the brief existence you have on this planet. This goes back to basically the question – why the heck am I here? You can define it differently as our rationality would allow it, you can live a life on a different basis then being virtuous. But it would be unnatural, because every species no matter what, wishes to propagate itself and it does so by doing the best it can for itself. It is an effort towards betterment. So, virtue is driving towards the ideal, the ultimate good.

Interwoven with this is the concept of Love. Which my guru (Plato) defines as the path that connects the temporal with the eternal. Right from when a young man like yourself carves out his name with his beloved’s on a tree trunk “Ranjit and Aishwarya” for ever, it is the expression - the longing for eternity. He is looking for permanence.

In this quest we are always trying to seek the highest level of relative truth that we can achieve. Truth being the top, numero uno of all virtues. Hitler, my friend! Violated this principle and paid the price for it. He lied and lied continuously to the point of delusion and self delusion. The trouble with myth and myth based societies is that although within the myth there are grains of truth which tend to help a society but are no match to a systematic methodical system based upon verifiable truths, of concepts and predictable results, which order the truth to a much higher level and the results are obvious. The societies become much more virtuous then those still wrestling with their mythical demons.

Understanding the Death Fatwa on Taslima Nasreen #275 by zeemax

”If that is so, you have a few more things to learn. Forty years is nothing.”

Zeemax I agree with you. Hamid has never said any thing nice about me on chowk or in the 40 years that he claims that he has known me. A part of me is suspicious of his motives, but I also wonder if he is getting mushy – this is cause for alarm.

In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth Nature of God


If God is truly unknowable why does humanity spend its entire existence trying to decipher him? Isn’t that what religion is, trying to explain the nature of God? I think the best explanation for me of this paradox is Rafael’s painting of the Academy where he shows Plato and Aristotle. Plato is pointing up towards the Gods. Pointing out that it is all about striving for the ideals, the form of the perfect, the Good (God – is the plural for the good).

Aristotle on the other hand is pointing straight out - saying yes that is the ultimate perfection but man has to live in this world, which is imperfect and has to live by totally different rules then those needed to understand or be God like. We live in imperfection, life is a balancing act between imperfect, competing and misty alternatives. More over this is the life of flux, of change, a fleeting wrinkle in time, how can we capture even a glimpse of the eternal when we are completely consumed by the transitory.

Plato makes a tremendous case for the pursuit of the Good, he talks about the forms his dialogues are methodically constructed all the time raising man towards the ultimate good. Till you come to his dialogue called Parmenedes, and here every thing falls apart. Beyond a certain point every thing becomes a unity or gibberish. Just like Paradox suggested in his #15 at the singularity it means nothing you are just revolving around looking at your naval because that is the perfect state. Similarly at ultimate plurality everything becomes meaningless because you cannot understand any thing. So again we come back to the fundamental dilemma of human existence.

So! What is a good life? The best life is the one which is lived at the middle. Aristotle called it the Golden mean. Islam refers to it as the Sirat e Mustaqeem. This is where we live in a body which is fully engaged. Our construct is such that what we do not use - we loose. So the best body is the one which exercises each and every portion of it. The exercise in sports, the mind in rational discourse, the heart in appreciating beauty, art, music, indulging in good food, good drink are all parts of what adds to a good life. But the most important of all is virtue, being virtuous, always trying to lift our self to the highest level we can. It is the journey, never actually achieving perfection but always striving for it that is the pursuit of God - that is Love. Once in a great while actually getting a glimpse of perfection a moment of clarity, he refers to as an Aha moment. We mere mortals experience such moments a couple of times in our lives. But if you can stay in that state, you have achieved Nirvana, that is what Buddha found under the Banyan tree. I don’t know – this just blows my mind.

Talibanization of Pakistan #61 by zeemax

“Unresolved issues are the progress of `Islamic Democracy` onwards following Muhammad`s death”
#155 by zeemax on April 21, 2007 1:36pm PT
”You can all have your fun. While we do some serious stuff.”

What could be more serious then that? I am still waiting.

Understanding the Death Fatwa on Taslima Nasreen #221 by zeemax

“Come and fight me in the street.”

Are you out of your frikkin mind? Hold on to your belt Old Man! While I call in your coordinates.

Understanding the Death Fatwa on Taslima Nasreen #200 by zeemax

“These people won`t even sacrifice a single hair of their body much less their lives for their cause. They just talk. They have no commitment.”

That is where you are sadly mistaken. In prior times, I would have agreed with you. We were in fact paralyzed, the mullah, the so called aalim kept us confused, he could feed us what ever crap he wished in the name of religion, which we had taken for as supreme Good. We thought he was our well wisher in this world and the here after. But now the fog has lifted, we don’t need him to tell us what is written in the Quran, we can read it ourselves. Both Quran and hadith are available in searchable form on the internet. Similarly any student of history like you or I can pick up Al Tabri or Ibn e Ishaq and discover what is what for ourselves. The spinners don’t have the power any more to spin their webs.

The confusion is gone and now we know what it is. It is all a power play, without any fundamental values, without honor, without dignity for work or for anything else which makes life worthwhile. No liberty, no justice, no happiness – only submission. Yes your side is committed, full of jazbah e shauk e shahadat, we will grant you that. But our commitment comes from knowledge, the fact that we stand upon fundamental truths, upon basic values which are non negotiable.

I will quote you a passage from Pericles death oration delivered after the first year of the Peloponnesian war in the 4th century B.C.

“If then we prefer to meet danger with a light heart but without laborious training, and with a courage which is gained by habit and not enforced by law, are we not greatly the better for it? Since we do not anticipate the pain, although, when the hour comes, we can be as brave as those who never allow themselves to rest; thus our city is equally admirable in peace and in war. For we are lovers of the beautiful in our tastes and our strength lies, in our opinion, not in deliberation and discussion, but that knowledge which is gained by discussion preparatory to action. For we have a peculiar power of thinking before we act, and of acting, too, whereas other men are courageous from ignorance but hesitate upon reflection. And they are surely to be esteemed the bravest spirits who, having the clearest sense both of the pains and pleasures of life, do not on that account shrink from danger.”

Talibanization of Pakistan #110 by zeemax

I know where you are coming from. You are right these stakeholders are the ones who make our life worth living. Where as the picture of those baton-wielding Jamia Hafsa undergraduates makes you desirous of heaven. Bibi aaj maaf kur do.

P.S. my abilities to post pictures or highlight stuff on chowk is woefully lacking.

Talibanization of Pakistan #131 by hamidm2

“hope the world has seen the last of the neville chamberlains and this time it will not wait till it is too late”

Ditto! We shall not yield, we will fight them on land, on the high seas (not to worry they are scared of water and don’t know how to swim) in the air (despite their army of green angels and jinns). We shall not surrender, not give them a penny of dhimmi tax, not allow these self professed purdhans of God’s will to infringe on any of our freedoms. We wont even give them an inch of our pak sir zameen to maintain their napak cult.

Talibanization of Pakistan #105 by zeemax


Like you pointed out this Mullah is fairly liberal in terms of allowing his wife to drive and shop but then again he could have an epiphany – wake up one morning choose a more restrictive ayah, an example from sirah or find another hadith and change his stance. Arbitrary power, followed with legitimacy from the holy law, backed by God and beyond death ultimate salvation? Do you in your right mind could trust any individual, however much his claim to wisdom and piety with such power? Man this would be worse then Hindus in their hey day, they even didn’t allow the Brahmin to be King. We are looking at an unmitigated disaster.

Ultimate Sovereignty may belong to God, but we are not going allow any human to exercise it in his name.