The Weave, religion and Politics

Why religion?

Maybe it is a way of life I am not really very sure. What occurs to me is we are dealing with the divine right issue here.

Religion is essentially a state of religiosity, I would say sister Nirmal is in her 20^th year of religion but saying Yogi Whateveranand is the 20^th year of his religion sounds rather whacky.

In everyday life we look at religion as a personal or institutional set of practises. It means conformity, it eludes a cause of principle or system or belief held with ardent faith. Now here is the crux of the matter, my principle or your principle, you or me, me over you, makes me more powerful.

The non Abrahamic orient was quite happy in the texture of divine right, the king was divine, if he was human like Dhritarashtra then we sanctifying him by having a diety endorse him, like Krishna did to Yuddishtra, or a Brahmin sanctifying him using scriptures.

Interestingly in the abrahamic tradition, the first murder came out from an religious act, the offering brought to God by Abel and Cain the sons of Adam and eve, Cain the farmer offers the first fruits of the soil, while Abel the shepherd offers the first lamb, and god plays favourites… Cain’s jealousy gives way to rivalry and violence and viola murder happens. This pattern is still on just look at the story of Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau down the lineage, we have the Christians versus the Jews, Jews versus Muslims and Muslims versus the Christian and hellaluja,,, my bitchy conclusion comes at the end.

But think of it religion has spilt blood all through the Jain scriptures claim that Ravana was a Vidhyadhara prince, and the disciple of the 2^nd Jina ajithanatha, he was killed by Rama who wanted to protect the animal sacrifice’s , and lo behold the story of winner became the story of God against demons.

Despite being healing religion maintains its killing side.

In this era of Trump and being fashionably  global perception of religion, and politics is,

• Islamophobia
• Gay marriages
• Abortions etc.

In India it is about Islamophobia of course, other than that is about the altering north-Indian pattern of patriarchy. And south being confused, with northern values and ideology being flushed on them these are social issues and not religious. So how does religion play into politics… I could be wrong but this is what came in my space

Religion does effect political belief, at quite an individual level, if you look at it, religion could lead to political conversions and the vice-versa could happen too.

From political vantage, the choice people make is strongly influenced by their religious allegiance campaigns are framed on this, history shows that their people who have changed their religion for political gains, well lets me respectable and say beliefs.

• To some people religion could be a shadow influence on the political belief, this is when they are part of particular religious groups so early that the symbols and narrative are part of the mindset, so despite of converting out it stays, these people tend to substitute strong political views for religious views. – to me this was the dominant generation that claims to have got us our independence. – this is also the space where we find our political activists.
• Another set which is reverse of the previous, its starts with no religious afflation, and convert to a religion over time and this effects his political belief, the stage that our society is in today.
• Then you have the political activist, where there is no political conversion, but simply consists of children keeping their family’s religious lifestyle by applying it to a political sphere which could foreign to their family, here religion fuels political activism, this is the space where the catholic clergy aiding the poor,comes from, we also have the VHP equivalent of educating the north-eastern youngsters.
• Then there is a prototype where primacy is on the political arena than on religious experience, the person may or may not be engaged in religion. Though the person may present religious stances and inspiration, his religion takes a back seat to his politics, which is the exact reversal of the first.
• The fifth totally rejects the political realm and places primacy on religion. The community centres round sequestering themselves from outside, and estrange themselves from the political happenings around them.

To me these become important because we are talking about. Man being community being, family being the smallest unit the hierarchy is built to the country. Family places a role in organized religion, and like I said, organized religion is about power hierarchy. We begin to talk about personal space, and way of living.  Issues of life style and values get threatened.

The great war of abrahamic nations continues in India, interestingly the game changer Christianity has remained in the shadow, it the Christianity that gave the modern Hindu his definite identity… not just a  person who is not a Muslim or not a Christian. It is the Christian education that told the modern Hindu about his oppression, in return the Hindu plays the game.

The divine right is still the essence except the from the kings the divinity has passed to the Ram Mandir, and Babri Masjid. Instead of Cain and Abel or  Isaac and Ishmael, we have Hindu and Muslim !!

So I guess what cannot be cured as to endured and resolved.

written for indispire 161 edition, prompt by Tomichan Matheikal who blogs at  https://matheikal.blogspot.in/

I swear Tomichan I have not used brains for really ages, I actually had to rescue it from coma… so do excuse me if my writing is out of the loop.