BLIND FAITH

On this Diwali, I woke up late in the morning. My routine for that particular day was disturbed actually. Normally, on the morning of this particular festival, I wake up early. That’s not because I go to temple, or seek blessings from parents on this auspicious occasion. Temple is all the same for most of the days of the year. But what makes it special on this day is flock of beautiful girls. Adoring themselves with vibrant clothes and glittering jewelry, they metamorphose the shrine into something tempting for oglers like me.

Well, on the eve of Diwali, I was informed that I was posted at hospital for the duty next day. As an intern doctor, I was the least expected person to obey the orders. Now, what made me respect my duty, my consensus may be, I don’t know, but I was at hospital that morning. Patients were scarce. Festivals had provided them with much needed joy, which was treating their ailments. So, I was just killing my time in outdoor department, toying with my cell and examining few patients. Then an old, frail looking lady turned up to me, barely able to stand herself up. She was in her 70s, living alone and presented with severe diarrhea and vomiting since 2 days. She was most likely suffering from acute gastroenteritis and was in dire need for parental fluids. So, I suggested her to admit in the hospital, so that we can start her on the pints. But she refused. Citing the reason, she told me that she had not finished with her daily morning pooja still, and she had not eaten anything since morning. And she would not eat or drink anything until her pooja is finished, not even in this threatening condition. She asked me to provide herself with oral medication. I did my best to explain her condition, but that was in vain. Her religious faith was stronger than my scientific logic.

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The incident kept hovering in my mind the whole day, even for the next few days. I was completely dumbstruck by the overpowering victory of her faith over my rationale. Under the towering strength of blind faith, an ordinary person exemplifies such extraordinary determination. And that leads me to delve into the nature of religion. Examine any society or culture of the world, religion is the opium of masses. Of course, religion was not meant to be like this. At least I believe so. Religion should be the most personal thing within you. Instead, we have made it most socialized. A set of commandments or a bunch of hymns, followed unquestioningly by millions, make us a herd, not human. For most of the people, religion is the strongest identity, by which they identify themselves. Moreover, we have juxtaposed, most confusingly, culture with religion. This socialization of religion has made it so stiff, that to modify it, even slightly, is out of bounds for an ordinary soul. For a common man, his strongest identity is the thing, which sometimes seems alien to him. During our evolution, with domestication of animals and crops, we have unnecessarily domesticated a phenomenon, religion! And this domestication has made religion more virulent.

That is perhaps the reason, why, in spite of expansion of our intellectual horizon in almost every other field, we have constricted it in the field of religion. At the same time, when world is becoming a global village, religious extremism is scaling its peaks. Even the best minds of our time are not able to defy it. Ayman al-zawahiri and Praveen Togadia, both are medical doctors.  Be it fanaticism or self-mortification as in the incident above, the founthead for them is the same, that unquestioning submission. The best way to restrain this growing fanaticism is, perhaps, to unrestraint the religion itself…!!!