Yemen Diary – Part 2
Posted by Sreejan on January 26, 2007
While having lunch at a Lebanese restaurant in Sanaa, I got involved in an interesting discussion with a colleague. It happened so that it was prayer time for the Muslims, and my friend never missing a single prayer, religiously turned toward the direction of
Mecca and prayed.
Didn’t I pray, he asked. I do at times, but not regularly. He probably hadn’t realized till that moment that I wasn’t a Muslim like him. So are you a Christian? No, I am a Hindu. So what is the soul of your religion? And it had me dumbfounded. I pondered on it for a while and came up with a couple of explanations.
Hinduism is not a religion, it’s a philosophy, I said. As Hindus we need not adhere to certain rules, rituals, or regulations. In fact it’s not even Hinduism. The actual religion is “Sanatana Dharma.” We are independent to do whatever we want to do. We can live our lives the way we would like to, keeping in mind what is right and what is wrong. It’s more of a conscience thing. If your conscience allows you to do certain thing you very well can, unless it causes harm to others.
Religion brings peace to your soul, he said. And I could not disagree with him. He is a Muslim and Islam is his guide. He is a rational man, and a thinking man. But when it comes to religion, it’s slightly different. He rises above his intellectually arguing self (the “aham” in Sanskrit). He doesn’t want to dispute the holy book, though he agrees that there are a few aspects he doesn’t understand. But he believes that he won’t commit any wrong, if he does follow it. And that brings peace to him.
He is aware of what he is doing in his life. He follows a certain channel, the channel provided by god, and rediscovered by the Prophet, as they say.
As for me, I still am in search of alternative channels. The ones which are difficult to discover, as I think, I believe. The ones which probably the Supreme Being doesn’t want us to discover. Or is it so? I wonder…
