Highlights

Culture, an embodiment of social, moral and ethical mores, is what Civilization brings into human interactions. It may continuously evolve from a desire to seek knowledge and an understanding of all that happens around them and to them, to find ways to link with the Cosmos via Nature’s Laws evolving into what is called Sanatana Dharma, the Eternal Dharmic way, or from so-called ‘Revelations’, allegedly received by a Founder or a Prophet directly from God or through his Angels, requiring its followers to accept and be bound by them, thus be called a Religion (from Latin- to bind). We need to understand the differences between cultures, traditions, rituals and practices evolving from continual, steady and progressive efforts to arrive at better understanding of the relationship with the natural environment and even the Cosmos, and seeing ancestors as being in a spiritual world and still contactable for guidance through proper rituals and traditional methods, from those that are different, which are frozen as per revelations received at some time through some Founders or Prophets, and thereafter be bound by them, seeing their ancestors as Pagans and hence unworthy of consideration. We need to find ways to accommodate such differences in our today’s civilizational culture for happiness, prosperity and harmony for ALL.

Quotations for Consideration

“All great truths begun as blasphemies”. – George Bernard Shaw

Also, as the adage goes – “The truth shall set you free.”

“I would believe any religion that could prove it had existed since the beginning of the world. But when I read Socrates, Plato, Moses and Mohammed, I do not think there is such a one. All religions owe their origin to Man.” – Napoleon Bonaparte

“A people are as healthy and confident as the stories they tell themselves… Stories can conquer… They can make the heart larger.” – Ben Okri

“Meekness … Induced prejudices, have no place in the society of thinking humans” – Abhijit Naskar

“Morality is doing what is Right, regardless of what you are told. Religion is doing what you are told regardless of what is Right.” – Plato

“Make sure that your religion is a matter between you and God only.” – Ludwig Wetherstein

“Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws.” – Plato

“Religion is the last refuge of human savagery.” – Alfred North Whitehead

“Religion is the opium of the masses.” – Karl Marx

“People who want to share their religious views with you almost never want you to share yours with them”. – Dave Berry

‘In the ‘Mahabharata (Indian Epic): the ceremony of oath taking for a King called upon him to – ‘Be like a garland maker, and not like a charcoal burner’. The garland maker symbolizes social cohesiveness: it is a metaphor for dharmic diversity in which flowers of many colours and forms are strung harmoniously for the most pleasing effect. In contrast, the charcoal burner is a metaphor for the brute force reduction of diversity into homogeneity, where diverse living substances are transformed into lifeless ashes”. – Rajiv Malhotra

“Civilization is about how you behave. How much respect and dignity you give to those around you.” – Rachel Vincent

“Empathy is most essential quality of civilization” “Nurturing is what makes us human.” – Jeremy Griffit

“No civilization can prosper or even exist, after having lost the pride and connection with its own past.” – Anon’

“I respect faith, but ‘doubt’ is what gets you an education“ – Wilson Mizner

“We can make people believe anything, anything at all, if we work hard enough on them from childhood. Then Authority becomes Truth, instead of Truth being the Authority. Belief gives you confidence without clarity (this) is a disaster. There is no substitute for clarity.” – Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev

“Every formula of every religion, in this age of reason, has to submit to the acid test of reason and universal justice if it is to ask for universal assent.” – M.K.Gandhi

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