Many shocking events happen
in our society and we try to search for answers and are disappointed that there
are no easy answers. It is at such times, that spirituality comes like a beacon
of light and can shed light on the darkness surrounding such incidents. On
recent horrendous incident has been the brutalization of a young woman in a
moving bus causing her untimely death. I have been following various articles
and reactions of people, most common of which are:
- Why
did such an event happen to her?
- Why
did God not intervene?
- How
should society treat these criminals?
My answers to above are
based totally based on spirituality and not based on any current laws or the
existing morals in society.
To answer the first
question, we have to turn to none other than Karma. We have a bunch of desires
and the sum total of all the desires is Sanchita karma. A sub-set of that
ensures we take birth in the current environment and that is Prarabdha. What we
do in the current environment using our free will is Purushartha.
So, any environment that we
face in life is due to a complex set of interacting desires. Now, the question
would be, why would that girl have desired to be brutalized? Let’s understand
this with some examples. Assume I am rowing a boat in turbulent waters, even
though I am trying to row ahead, the boat may go in totally different direction
because of the turbulence. So in spite of me desiring to reach shore, it may
well end up that I fall off a cliff. This is easily understood because we see the
forces arraigned against us.
Let me take another example.
Assume a block of wood on a smooth surface. Assume that I have tied a string to
this block and am pulling from West to East, the block will move towards East.
Now at the same time, assume there is an invisible person who has tied a string
to same block and is pulling in opposite direction. Further assume that both of
us are invisible to the other. So, try as hard as I pull, the block will not
move the way I want because of the invisible force in opposite direction. Let’s
add more complexity. Assume there are more people with strings, all of them
invisible to others, who are pulling the block in different directions. Each of
them assumes that the block will move the way they are pulling. However, since
they do not know that at same time, others are pulling in different directions,
they are bewildered as to why the block is not moving the way they “desire”.
In exactly, the same way,
for each of us, the driving force in life is some desire. Only because I desire
to go to work, I drive a car. Only because I need money to support my family, I
desire to go to work. Now, over a period of this life time and several earlier
births, we accumulate desires, some of which are fulfilled and some are not. It
is obvious to any of us that only unfulfilled desires propel us to do
something. If I am fully fed, I won’t desire another sweet. So, at any point of
time, the sum total of all the pressing desires come together to create an
environment. As we have seen earlier, the actual state based on my perceived desire
may be totally different from my required state due to unseen desires. So, for
this unfortunate girl, a set of desires over several births created an environment
where the outcome was likely to be totally different from what she would have
desired.
Before we despair and say
everything is pre-ordained, it’s good to remember that karma only creates an
environment. What I do in an environment is totally my free will or Purushartha.
So in the environment created in the above situation, the criminals took the
action of taunting based on their free will and that triggered the series of
actions that resulted in the tragedy. What if they had not taunted? What if the
girl’s friend had not reacted and somehow found a way to call the cops? What if
the girl somehow had called someone? These are all actions that could have been
possible. But because of the free will of the criminals who took the wrong
action, the whole environment turned deadly.
Next is the most common
question as to what was God doing. Let’s ask ourselves, what did we expect? As
Hindus brought up with stories of various Gods, did we expect that somehow Lord
Krishna would turn up and kill the criminals with his chakra or somehow Hanuman
would come and beat them to pulp. Similarly with the Gods from other beliefs,
did we expect a physical God to do something? Much as we believe in God, I am
sure we all agree that this expectation is too far-fetched Again our concept of
God may be the problem. God is like the petrol in a car. God provides the
necessary energy for us to do whatever we wish. Just as petrol cannot prevent a
bad driver from having an accident nor can it protect devotees rolling off a
hill during a pilgrimage, there is no way God can prevent bad action nor can he
promote good action. So, does this mean that all our beliefs about saviors or
unseen angels are wrong. No, they are not wrong. Again, we have to turn to
karma to answer this. We discussed briefly about individual karma. In exactly,
the same way, there is a societal karma. Now, at the time that the girl was
being brutalized, if somehow a cop had appeared and stopped the bus or if by
some chance another vehicle had hit this bus, the tragedy probably could have
been averted. These would have been the unseen angels. But they do not appear
from thin air. For these angels too, based on their own complex set of desires,
they would be brought into an environment, where they can save a life. So,
angels are very much possible, depending on the collective karma at that point
in time.
Finally, the question arises
of how to treat these criminals. Legally, they should face the maximum
punishment. No questions about it, at all. But how should we react to these
people? Suppose instead of these people on the bus, someone by mistake had left
a basket of poisonous snakes and they have bit the girl. What would our
reaction be? Would it be based on hatred? We would just know that the cobra’s
nature is to kill and we would have probably ensured the cobra was killed. But
we would have done it not out of hate for the cobra, but out of a intellect that
cobra’s behavior is to kill and our duty to society is to ensure that this
cobra does not kill again and we would take the necessary steps. In exactly,
the same way, there is no need to hate the criminals. We have to realize with
our intellect that these people were a vicious victim of their own desires and acted
that way. However, to prevent such actions, we have to ensure the necessary
actions to put such criminals away from society. Taking such an attitude
prevents the impact of karma on us. Without such an attitude, each of us gets an
unfulfilled desire to eradicate such criminals and because it is an unfulfilled
desire, it manifests in some form in some future birth in a situation
influenced by competing desires and may lead to an outcome we do not desire.
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