#1- Religion of Kindness

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Disclaimer- I am not against any religion or any individual beliefs. I am only put out my perspective of it, which may or may not symmetrically align with everyone else’!!

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Questions to Address:

· What is religion?

· Is religion the only determining factor which makes us of what we are as a person?

· Has the whole world been crafted around the very doctrines of beliefs, which have been laid out in conjunction with the core of religions?

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Quote:

This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy. Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.
By- Dalai Lama

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Let us try to decode the aforementioned quote of his holiness Dalai Lama himself, and try to find the retorts we are trying to unearth. And for that reason, I shall break the quote into its logical chunks—one at a time—and elaborate.

This is my simple religion. There is no need for temples; no need for complicated philosophy.

His holiness Dalai Lama indicates that fundamentally every religion is simple and this very trait of it makes any religion a beautiful thing. Sometimes, we humans simply complicate things that are actually meant to be kept simple and straight. Religion is one of those things, which if kept simple, can spread its true meaning to a wider population, without its message being tweaked, tempered or adulterated by the middlemen, who call themselves the messengers of god.

Imagine a world where every single person, regardless of their religious beliefs, knows the core values of his or her religion. I will stick my neck out and claim that every religion teaches us—more or less—the below tenets and values:

1. “Do unto others what you would have them do unto you.”- Which means, one must do good to others, in order to get good in return. One mustn’t forget that the person who throws a stone at the mud; gets himself spattered with mud at the same time. This is the law of reciprocity.

2. “Speak the truth”- No matter how daunting the circumstances might be, one mustn’t deviate from the path of truth and honour. A simple lie might give birth to a thousand more, just to keep the first lie under cover.

3. “Giving more and ask less”- One must lead a life of generosity, filled with kindness and love for others. In return, he or she would get unbounded access to the reservoir of riches.

4. “Conquer with love”- The mightiest currency in this world is neither Dollar, Pound or “Euro”, nor it is Bitcoin, Litecoin or “Ripple”; it actually is the currency of love. And the beauty of this currency is that the more you spend it, the larger sum you get in return, from others.

5. “You reap what you sow”- Everyone one of us is ruled by this inevitable law of nature. Spread love and you get it back in loads. Or spread sadness and horror and it eventually boomerangs back to you with tenacity.

6. “Forgiveness”- One must have heart big enough to forgive & forget.

7. ”Follow the message of the scriptures, not the words”- Don’t blindly translate the literal meaning of the teachings given in any religious scripture, but try to gauge the message hidden behind those words. The teaching is important for the good of the mankind, not the literal meaning of it.

He also says—in the quote—that there are no need for any temple; where temple being just an example of a place of worship and not only place where this philosophy is applicable.

There is a beautiful song from an old Bollywood flick which is automatically playing in my ears, as I write this post:

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“घर से मस्जिद है बहुत दूर चलो, यूँ कर लें
किसी रोते हुए बच्चे को हँसाया जाये”

The above lines mean; “the mosque is far from the house, so in lieu of that, why not just do something that makes a crying baby smile”.

The song says that spending time in prayers is amazing, but spending your time in helping people in need is even bigger a deed than Lord ’s Prayer itself.

Our own brain, our own heart is our temple; the philosophy is kindness.

His holiness Dalai Lama continues to say that to seek happiness one doesn’t need to go to the temple. One need not go to the temples, in the search of god, as god resides in every one of us. A human body is a temple and if we take care of it well, then that can act as a link between the divine powers and oneself.

Taking care of one selves body means that the person must lead a happy & healthy lifestyle, and keep modern world’s adulterations at bay. A healthy & happy mind is the key to the doorway of prosperity and after-all, all of us want to achieve prosperity in our lives. Isn’t it?

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And the word philosophy is usually associated with things that can’t be appreciated easily by the meagre mortals, and can only be decoded with the elite few. But His holiness Dalai Lama says that kindness is the philosophy which he believes in. And this is one philosophy which all of us can understand and implement into our lives easily.

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The End

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Do share your thoughts on the topic in the comments section below.

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