Participant: Religion is supposed to be the means of peace,
attaining peace but in practicality in reality today every
religion has got a base of fundamentalism and involve in terrorism.
Can we not make an attempt to create a new world order
where there is no religion at all?
Sadhguru: Now, what you unfortunately know as religion in
the world today is just somebody’s belief systems.
Somebody believes God is round.
Somebody believes God is square.
Somebody else believes he is a triangle, that’s the situation, isn't it?
And you must understand this, once you start believing in something which
is not yet a reality for you, you are bound to be in conflict with somebody
else because somebody else is bound to believe
something else.
“No, no, no, I believe in my God but I am not a violent person,
I will not fight with anybody” - all this is just make up.
If they provoke you sufficiently you will fight.
Like for example, let's say you believe God has four hands.
I believe God has no hands.
These are two belief systems.
Tomorrow out of your love for God you put a 100 feet tall statue in Coimbatore
City, of course with four hands
but suddenly I feel so hurt.
These four hands look so ugly because God actually has no hands
because that’s my belief.
So, tonight I will go to that statue, I don’t intend to cause any damage to your
god, just to make him the way he really is without
hands, so I just cut off the four hands.
Tomorrow what’ll happen to you?
You want to cut off my hands, isn't it?
Simply because you believe one thing, I believe something else.
As long as people believe in something conflict is inevitable
because we may say “No, no, we are all brothers, we are all one,
we are…everything is okay with us” all this bhai bhai (brother) stuff.
When we really have to come to a point “When I believe what I believe is right,
I will try to manifest it.
I will try to make it a common thing everywhere,” isn't it?
Yes?
Once I believe what I believe is the truth, naturally I will try to impose it on other
people.
I don’t call it imposition; I call it saving you from ignorance.
Yes or no?
Once I firmly believe that this is the way God is
I will try to put it on to you, just to save you, not to hurt you,
but you will get hurt because any imposition hurts.
When you resist I will use other methods to put it into you,
whatever those methods are - sword has been used,
money has been used, every kind of inducement has been used, isn't
it?
Simply because I believe one thing, you believe another.
Religion is not about belief system.
All religions started as a method to turn inward
but…it's an inward step.
An inward step can be taken only by an individual.
Isn't it so?
It’s a very intimate thing; something very, very concerned with only with
you and nothing else to do with anybody else.
But when people try to organize this inward step,
naturally it gets distorted.
Now, we want to do our religion on the street.
Religion cannot be done on the street, it can only be done within you.
If you become truly religious you must be beyond any kind of conflict, isn't
it, both within and outside?
That is the whole crux of the religion, isn't it?
But today religion means conflict.
If you utter the word religion you are talking generally in terms of conflict
that is happening in the world, isn't it?
This is because you have reduced an inward step into a set of beliefs.
Because if you have to take an inward step you have to transform yourself.
If you have to believe something you don’t have to transform yourself,
you can do whatever nonsense you want and still believe God is up in the heaven,
isn't it?
Yes?
The crudest people, the cruelest people on the planet have always
been talking about God.
Isn't it so?
Yes or no?
Participants: Yes.
Sadhguru: All the warmongers in the world have been talking about God.
Isn't it so?
And God has been helping them.
See, the moment you believe something you have a new kind of confidence,
that’s the biggest problem.
When idiots become very confident the world is in danger.
An intelligent person is constantly hesitating with life.
With every step he wonders whether what he is doing is okay or not
but a fool has absolute confidence and when his stupidity gets stamped by God,
that’s it, no looking back,
just can go on doing the most idiotic things without any problem about it.
The very nature of your intelligence is such that if you do something stupid today,
tonight your intelligence will bother you, “Why did I do this?”
Isn’t it so?
But if you get God’s stamp on your stupidity you don’t have to turn back and see.
You can do grossest things on the planet and not bother about it,
feel very proud that you are anyway going to go to heaven
because you did all this nonsense.
There is no experiential dimension, you are just believing something.
Once you believe something, your belief and somebody else’s belief are
bound to clash somewhere.
The conflict in the world is not between good and evil, please see this.
Though people always claim it is so, it is not true.
It is always one man’s belief versus another man’s belief.
So, religion has become a problem because we have reduced it into just a set
of beliefs.
If it was experientially true that you really felt God
then could there be conflict?
There is no such possibility, isn't it?
But because you are growing from belief system you are not willing to make the effort of
going beyond what you have gathered from others and looking
at life by yourself; that is why there is conflict.
If you do not know there will be no conflict.
If you know there will be no conflict at all but when you pretend to know there is bound
to be conflict.
Sadhguru: I didn’t know questions were so popular (Few Laugh).
See, with all due respect to all the religious people…
See, religion essentially means belief in something.
Whenever somebody says, “I’m a religious person,” they refer to themselves as “believers.”
Yes?
“Believers.”
“Believe” means what?
Means you do not know something, but you’re not willing to admit, “I do not know”,
so you believe it.
I am saying, if you do not know something, why don’t you just say, “I do not know”?
Hello?
Is it okay?
Participants: Yes!
Sadhguru: I do not know something, I say, “I do not know”,
because “I do not know” is a tremendous possibility.
Only when you say “I do not know”, the longing to know, the seeking to know
and the possibility of knowing becomes a living reality in your life.
Everything “I do not know”, I believe.
This has led to a whole lot of things.
One thing it does is, it brings you confidence.
“I believe!” means it brings you confidence.
But confidence without clarity is a disaster.
This is a disaster that is unfolding in the world in many different levels.
People who don’t know a damn thing, who can’t see what’s in front of them, they
are super confident.
It’s dangerous.
If you cannot see, at least you must be hesitant, isn’t it?
Hello?
If you cannot see, you must at least be hesitant.
But you cannot see, but you’re confident.
This is what belief gives you – confidence without clarity.
How do you arrive at your belief?
There’re many ways.
Can I tell you a joke?
Is it okay, it’s a serious question?
Participants: Yes.
Sadhguru: Is… are you okay?
Participants: Yes.
Sadhguru: You’re looking so serious, I’m scared of you (Laughter).
This happened in New York City.
A eight year old boy came home from school in the afternoon.
At home, he had a very progressive mother.
Obviously, she was single.
He came home and asked, “Momma, is God man or a woman?”
See this is a big debate in America.
Is God a man or a woman is a very big debate in America.
You know in the last election, they tried to settle it and you know what happened (Few
laugh).
The mother thought, being a progressive woman, she thought through this, all this gender
politics that are going on in the country and after much thinking, she said, “Both!”
Then the boy went into deep thought.
After sometime, he came back and asked, “Momma, is God black or white?”
You know in the previous election, they tried to settle this issue (Few laugh),
because racial politics is a very big thing.
She thought through all the racial politics that are going on in the country.
After much, much thinking, she said, “Both!”
Then the boy went into profound thought.
After much thinking, he came back and asked, “Momma, is God straight or gay?”
She thought through all the politics concerned with that aspect of life, and she said, “Both!”
Then the boy jumped in joy, “I got it!
I got it!
It’s Michael Jackson (Laughter/Applause)!”
I don’t know how you arrived at yours (Few laugh).
You must understand, this is a Godless culture.
In this culture, we always told you, “Your life is your karma.”
Yes or no?
Participants: Yes.
Sadhguru: You’ve forgotten.
In this culture, we always told you, “Your life is your karma,”
this means your life is your making.
There’s nobody managing you from there (Gestures).
Your life is entirely your karma.
You are tall, you are short, you are capable, you are incapable, you can do something,
you cannot do something, we say, “Ayyo karma (Laughter).”
We are… we’ve been telling you forever, “Your life is entirely your making.”
But this we have turned it into somethingelse and now we are also start looking up, Upar
Waala!
You are all engineering students.
You tell me, is this planet round or flat?
Participants: Round.
Sadhguru: Really?
It’s round?
Participants: Yes.
Sadhguru: Some of you saying no.
This girl (Laughter).
Is it a round planet, I’m asking you.
Participants: Yes.
Sadhguru: Yes.
Is it spinning?
Participants: Yes.
Sadhguru: So you are not even on the North Pole, you are at this Chennai.
Here, if you look up and the planet is spinning, you are inevitably looking up in the wrong
direction.
Hello?
Participants: Yes.
Sadhguru: You don’t even know which is up.
In this cosmos, do you know which is up and which is down?
Hello?
Is it somewhere marked “This side up”?
Can you ever figure out which side is up in this cosmos?
Participants: No.
Sadhguru: No.
Then you’re looking up at what?
When you do not even know what is up, how do you know who is up (Applause)?
Does it mean to say, I created the universe?
No.
Obviously before you and me came, everything was here, isn’t it?
So now you must at least say, “I really don’t know.”
The problem is, somebody is a theist, somebody is an atheist.
They are not different people, just different clothing, same nonsense (Few laugh).
One person believes what he does not know in a positive way, another person believes
what he does not know in a negative way.
Both of them are believers of something that they do not know, isn’t it (Applause)?
what is the problem with the human being that you cannot admit “I do not know?”
It’s so wonderful of you, so human of you to say “I do not know”, isn’t it?
If you do not know, if you realize that you truly do not know,
your intelligence will be always alert, it never sleeps.
Always, every moment of your life.
Even in your sleep, it’ll stay awake, if you realize “I truly do not know.”
This believing has made you just eat pongal and (Gestures) (Few laugh) you know, just
become lethargic.
The world has become lethargic.
When I say lethargic, not physically, intelligence has become lethargic, because they believe
something.
Everybody believes some nonsense.
Can we be straight enough, the youth of this nation, I am asking you.
The youth of this nation, are we straight enough to say, “What I know, I know, what
I do not know, I do not know.”
Is this okay with you?
Participants: Yes.
Sadhguru: The youth of India, I’m asking you.
Participants: Yes!