Wrath of the Heavens

While discussing with a few friends about the vagaries of life and the difficulties that shadow, they alluded to a discussion they had about me with a very well known Ayurvdeic physician. He is also a keen subscriber to astrology and the belief in a super force called God. And these folks confided that they have now begun to seek the advice of astrology and vasthu. And have even hired friends to commit poojas and incentive offerings at temples suggested in the astrological extrapolations.  I wondered if their orthodox Christian faith sanctions such beliefs. Doesn’t that tantamount to herding after heretical doctrine?

 "I am the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before Me......” "Do not make an image or any likeness of what is in the heavens above..."

They were actually exasperated by the impertinent question I put forth. Their conversation with the Ayurvedic physician about my recaltricant attitude towards conventional religious diktats made him insist that they persuade me to go to him for a discussion. He was all the more insistent because they told him that I was an atheist.. In fact that pseudonym is not what I would appreciate, because my point of view is not of existence or otherwise of a big brother but more of what if he is and what if he is not. Well we will come to that later if necessary. But let me remind that I detest poking my nose into somebody’s beliefs and I may not appreciate someone sermonizing to me either from a selling point of view. That is labouring to instill mortal fear if possible. I prefer to base my beliefs or convictions on the evidence and knowledge I have as of date. Who can tell, may be I may be proved wrong tomorrow and vice versa!

I have not really ventured after clairvoyants and the intoxicating comfort they may provide. Though a couple of times, I have out of curiosity been to an ashram and also had

 yoga session with men in burnt orange- amber colored fabric draped around them. And bingo it was quality opium as some body had said before. You float like a feather and then bang you are back to earth and bruise your arse. So when I told them I have no hesitation in visiting this gentleman they transmitted the message to him. And his retort was “didn’t I tell you, he will agree to come.”.

So one recent Saturday morning I met him in his office in the precincts of his sprawling hospital and nursing home.. He was a man in his late fifties. He was tall, well built and with noticeable charm. His cabin had the Padma Sree awarded to him conspicuous on the wall. There were pictures of apparently of his parents next to the picture of a Hindu deity. He has obviously built up on the traditional ayurvedic sanctuary that his father began.. And the place stated loudly that he has since done commendable work. He began suggesting that we might have met before, but that was not the case! He said that when he was told about me he presumed that I must be a lean emaciated person in the mid fifties. I told him in any case I m into the fifties though I had to disappoint him about the bony –skinny physique. We laughed it away.

He asked me what my problems were. I told him it was just the problems which for some body would be on the family front yet to some on the physical side and to me it is more on the business or commercial front. .And I also in jest suggested that the vagaries and ups and downs of business cycle would perhaps be prolonging a bit far in my case. He asked me if I believed in God. I told him, I go to a temple or a church and with equal dispassion, and if he wanted to know whether I pray the answer is, no. And I could be at peace in the quietness of a small temple by the country side, or a church less frequented by the flock rather than in the commercial din and melee of a Guruvayoor or a Vellankanni. He wanted to know if I were a member of a communist party and perhaps that might have superseded my traditional grooming. I told him that was not the case. I have never liked subscribing to any ‘ism’ be it communism or Hinduism. And that after seventeen I have never prayed nor been to a temple to petition and ask for largesse. He asked if my maternal or paternal family had a “kula deivam” a devi or a devan.( god or godess) .I nodded in the affirmative that my mother’s side has a ‘Devi’ temple ascribed to their family origins, a totem perhaps!. Have you ever been there? he asked. I told him that thirty five years ago was the only time I have been to that temple. He told me categorically the difficulties I face in the official facet of life are the fall out of my being a turn coat, a renegade. “You were a believer till into your teens and then you forgot and turned your back to the power of your family deity. And I m certain the displeasure of the Goddess is haunting you in some way”. I did not feel like commenting, but was quite interested to see which way the discussion would ensue. He had in the meanwhile collected my birth date, from these people who directed me there and had crafted my horoscope. He was in fact waiting for this astrologer- a woman in her early forties. She knocked and came in, showed obeisance to him. She sat in the chair by the table next to me and began to lay out the paraphernalia traditional astrologers use to pursue their art. And in a while she began to tell my past and present. I wondered what was so exciting to know the one I already knew. She soon found in the melee of the constellations dictating my life and drafting my eventual journey on the planet that I m experiencing the wrath of the family deity. The stars are ominously positioned and it will continue another nine more years, though the severity and havoc it could wreck has passed and will cease to be effective and damaging by the end of April 2010. She also as it mostly happens with astrology almost caressed my past as it was. (Was she using some strange mystical mathematical calculations and extrapolating events that are now history, and inferring the drama of life of the future)? She stated that I carry with me lot of problems and keep them to myself. Ha who has a smooth ride anyway? She said that nemesis one after the other waits outside my door to enter and play pranks. And only the blessings of the deity and trustful prayer to god can alleviate my state and keep the bad omens at bay.

Now they reached upon the antidote for the whole state of affair. “You have forgotten your Amma. You let her out from your thoughts the last thirty five years”. I told them that every morning when I wake the first thing I do is to think of my mother and that would suffice to have peace in mind.  “But” , he replied, “you have ignored the Amma that gave you this amma”. You will have to go to the temple of the deity and prior to that you must give her handful of wealth. Apologise to her for turning away from her. And you will see the difference

I did not go there for a debate or verbal confrontation let alone intellectual discussion. I went their as going there may not be inhibiting me in any way to lead a normal life. One thing I noticed and have reinforced my convictions- that bribe and corruption begins in the presence of god. Providing quid pro quo to the Almighty is the genesis of sleaze and graft.

I did raise the question that there are many people whom I knew well and who are embodiments of falsehood and all that is lacking in ethics, but go to places of worship that they can find anywhere and where ever they happen to be, .and are in the traditional sense of the phrase god fearing. They pray and offer encomiums and munificence to their God. . And they lead awesome and wonderful life. And there are multitudes who suffer and live in pain of all sorts. Could they explain these strange phenomena, this contradiction to their summing up? ‘No that is something you should not think leave such people out of your thoughts’. Certainly that was not the answer to my question.

In the sum up, after my short interaction there, I came out with the beliefs and notions that I carried with me. You must live in fear and must believe in a big brother. Grease his hands often so that he is always in good terms with you. Inconvenient questions must not be thought of.nor put forth.
 But I still could not understand why human beings get excited and sensitive about somebody keeping to himself his way of life. Of course I m not an iota disparaging about this gentleman and his intentions of counseling or call it advise.

I still wonder why the hell a big brother or the Almighty up there must be controlling the celestial objects in certain many ways and play truant on us. Why must we think that we are the pinion in the life of the planet? The sun will rise and set each every day whether we are around or not? It is not "after me deluge".

 And this big brother if I can meet him will always want to tell him “brother you are quite in efficient in arranging things that you let lose, and it is time you retired and let living beings take care of themselves”.
And still the question remains unanswered and the answer a mystery. What must we make out of this?

This brings me to a message  I received a few days ago on my mobile. It read..

“Report of a random stranger...d celestial bodies wud agree wid me dat a change in their course is long due..d people hav been puttin up wid both nonsense and sensible stuff, d cause of which most often fails their good sense of comprehension..how easy it is for d celestial object to change its course n hence d life of another..it is often found dat a prolonged period of inaction burns out d leftover need for movement..but sometimes it works on d contrary..d object in question wud develop a deep sense of wander lust dat gives a momentum to last an eternity..a being hence pins its hopes on d celestial bodies to change its course n change lives”.

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