Today is India’s 68th
Independence day.
The concept of a nation
so diverse in terms of language, ethnicity, social customs, religion, natural
resources, geographical spread, would not have been valid in the history of our
civilization had it not been for the phenomenon that is India.
Amidst all the warring
and strife that is tearing this world apart today, I wish to share with you the
words of one of India’s most famous sons – the “warrior prophet” or the “militant
mystic” as he was known in his time – Swami
Vivekananda.
Take this, for example :
“Strength is Life, Weakness is Death.
Expansion is Life, Contraction is Death.
Love is Life, Hatred is Death.”
Or this :
“The fire that warms us can also consume us; it
is not the fault of the fire.”
Food
for thought – and you are free to draw parallels.
More than 120 years ago, Swami Vivekananda –
then an unknown wandering monk - had delivered a speech at the Parliament of
Religions in Chicago (1893) – a speech that captured the hearts of all those
who heard it. And, still relevant.
I present a few paragraphs from that speech :
“…….I am proud to belong to a religion which has taught the world
both tolerance and universal acceptance. We believe not only in universal
toleration, but we accept all religions as true. I am proud to belong to a
nation which has sheltered the persecuted and the refugees of all religions and
all nations of the earth……..”
“…….I am proud to tell you that we have gathered in our bosom
the purest remnant of the Israelites, who came to the southern India and took
refuge with us in the very year in which their holy temple was shattered to
pieces by Roman tyranny. I am proud to belong to the religion which has
sheltered and is still fostering the remnant of the grand Zoroastrian nation….”
“……Sectarianism, bigotry, and its horrible descendant,
fanaticism, have long possessed this beautiful earth. They have filled the
earth with violence, drenched it often and often with human blood, destroyed
civilization, and sent whole nations to despair. Had it not been for these
horrible demons, human society would be far more advanced than it is now….”
“…..But their time is come; and I fervently hope that the bell
that tolled this morning in honor of this convention may be the death-knell of
all fanaticism, of all persecutions with the sword or with the pen, and of all
uncharitable feelings between persons wending their way to the same goal….”
***
More than a century later, we have landed
people on the moon… we have landed spacecraft on Mars and plan to do so on a
comet…
We have
an orbiting space station that sees the world as one blue planet… And yet… That
last paragraph has remained a dream – not a prophecy that came true.
We are yet to see one calendar week without
strife, killings or persecution taking place in the name of ethnicity or
religion, in some part of the world or the other.
On this day – the 68th Independence
Day of India – I pray – for world peace.
***
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