Wednesday 30 March 2016

Face Materialism - Indian way

In the modern society, man seems to be concerned only with acquiring money. But a time comes when even that appears meaningless. But for want of anything better or meaningful, he still runs after money and the objects of enjoyment.

Danah Zohar and Ian Marshall write in their book SQ: The Ultimate Intelligence,
The major issue on people's mind today is meaning. Many writers say the need for greater meaning is the central crisis of our times. …Indeed most people seeking some spiritual fulfilment see no relation between their longing and formal religion.

Swami Vivekananda pointed out,
There are times in the history of a man's life, nay, in the history of the lives of nations, when a sort of world-weariness becomes painfully predominant. It seems that such a tide of world - weariness has come upon the Western world. There, too, they have their thinkers, great men; and they are already finding out that this race after gold and power is all vanity of vanities; many, nay, most of the cultured men and women there, are already weary of this competition, this struggle, this brutality of their commercial civilisation, and they are looking forward towards something better. There is a class which still clings on to political and social changes as the only panacea for the evils in Europe, but among the great thinkers there, other ideals are growing. They have found out that no amount of political or social manipulation of human conditions can cure the evils of life. It is a change of the soul itself for the better that alone will cure the evils of life. No amount of force, or government, or legislative cruelty will change the conditions of a race, but it is spiritual culture and ethical culture alone that can change wrong racial tendencies for the better. Thus these races of the West are eager for some new thought, for some new philosophy; the religion they have had, Christianity, although good and glorious in many respects, has been imperfectly understood, and is, as understood hitherto, found to be insufficient. The thoughtful men of the West find in our ancient philosophy, especially in the Vedanta, the new impulse of thought they are seeking, the very spiritual food and drink for which they are hungering and thirsting. And it is no wonder that this is so. (CWSV, vol. III, pp. 181-182)

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