Dogma and narrow sentiments

The sentiment that grows out of love for the indigenous soil of a country is called “geo-sentiment”. From this geo-sentiment, many other sentiments emerge, such as geo-patriotism, geo-economics and many other geocentric sentiments, including geo-religion. This geo-sentiment attempts to keep humanity confined within a limited part of this world. But the innermost desire of people is to expand themselves maximally in all directions.

I have already said that when people move along the path of a particular geo-sentiment in the social sphere – even worse than in the case of geo-sentiment in the religious sphere – they do not think at all of others. They thrive on the lifeblood of others, thinking this to be natural. The other day I said that in practical life, fascism is born from such a mentality – and also imperialism, capitalism, oligarchy and bureaucracy. Thus you can easily understand how dangerous this mentality is, and how detrimental to the progress of humanity.

Next comes socio-sentiment, which promotes the interest of one’s own society at the expense of other societies. Based on this sentiment are many other sentiments, such as socio-patriotism, socio-religion, socio-economics, socio-art, -architecture, -literature, and so on. A social group’s own deity “says” to the people, “Your God is the true God: all other gods are false. You are the chosen people in this universe: all others are cursed!” These are the preachings of socio-religion. Similar is the case with socio-patriotism and socio-economics: “Let that country be destroyed. I will conquer that nation and drain its vitality for the sake of my own country” – this is socio-patriotism, also called “fascism”. “Let others be ruined. I will exploit that country to serve the interests of my dearest homeland” – this is socio-economics.

A collective tendency, a tendency to live in groups, that is based on sentiment, is called “socio-sentiment”. Socio-sentiment is a million times more harmful than geo-sentiment, because socio-sentiment leads people much further from proper thinking than does geo-sentiment. As long on this earth as group mentality or collective mentality – a collective mentality behind which operates a sentimentality based on innumerable superstitions – persists in a noticeable form, it is bound to cloud the otherwise clear human intellect – unless a rationalistic mentality awakens in humans. In the absence of rationalistic mentality, human beings are bound to harm other groups, and even subgroups of their own groups.

What is dogma? Dogma is a preconceived idea which forbids human beings to outstep the limits of that idea or object. In this situation the human intellect cannot freely function. Some people say, “All right, we may not get the maximum utilization of our intellect, yet we can have at least ten to twenty percent of its services.” My considered opinion is that where there is dogma, even ten to twenty percent of the human intellect cannot be properly utilized; and the meagre amount of intellect used is not something worthwhile. The greatest treasure of human beings is their psychic faculty, or their intellect. When I cannot utilize this precious intellect to its fullest advantage – what more tragic situation could there be than this! So we need the liberation of the human mind, and even before this we need the liberation of the human intellect.

Self-seeking people do not want the collective intellect of the human race to be utilized for the welfare of the entire human race; rather they, in the name of humanity, want to perpetuate divisive tendencies in society, because if they succeed in creating a rift in human society, that will pave the way for their personal benefit or self-aggrandizement. Thus they concoct various so-called scriptures and formulate all kinds of logic. They maintain to humanity that the different races in this world are not equal. Thus instead of considering the interests of the entire human society, they give preference to the interests of a particular community. This loud-mouthed propaganda in favour of a particular community, this parading of irrational logic, this sort of fallacious argument, all combine to stifle the spontaneous growth of human intellect. This sort of mentality is called dogma.

Such groups perpetuate exploitation in the social sphere by injecting a fear complex in the minds of those whom they want to exploit. They infuse the feeling in their minds, “We are inferior, and they are superior.” As the inevitable result, the so-called low castes of India really consider themselves to be inferior, and this becomes an ingrained habit. Even if you catch hold of their hands and cordially invite them to sit on your cot, they refuse, because over the centuries they have developed such an inferior mentality. By creating fear complexes in others’ minds, such groups indirectly inject inferiority complexes in them and superiority complexes in themselves. This is how they widen the social gap, until the framework of society is broken. Thus a well-knit society can never develop.

They exploit people’s sentiments primarily for their own social position and secondarily for other purposes also. In this regard, they are not at all eager to promote human welfare; rather they look upon people as pawns, saying, “Well, I will deploy these one hundred thousand, two hundred thousand, people for this purpose; another five hundred thousand for that purpose.” This is how they calculate. Those simple and unwary people who placed their faith and trust in them and were misguided, may become uprooted from their ancestral homes and be forced to live a life of shame and disgrace. As refugees, they have to move for shelter from place to place like street dogs.

Now then, what is the most powerful weapon with which to fight this geo-sentiment? What is the most solid ground on which to challenge it? The answer to both questions is, rationalistic mentality. Rationalistic mentality has to be developed in two ways: First, through the study of various subjects (studies both of the kind called pát́ha in Sanskrit [pát́ha means “study” – that study may be of any subject], and of the kind called svádhyáya [“study of spiritual subjects”]). But what about those who are illiterate? Can they not join the fight against geo-sentiment? Certainly they can. They will learn by listening to the discourses of others; thus it is the duty of those who have understood, to make others also understand. In this way, all will be able to develop their rationalistic mentality to fight against geo-sentiment and protect their precious psychic wealth.

If someone moves along the path of sentiment instead of the path of rationality, there is a hundred percent probability of great danger. Those who move along the path of sentiment do not discriminate between the proper and the improper, but merely silently accept all superstitions surrounding the goal towards which they have been running. Even the least question regarding propriety or impropriety does not arise in their minds, because they are moving along the path of sentiment. Now as a human being, what should one do? One should follow the path of rationality. Rationality is a treasure of humanity that no animal possesses. And those who possess the inner asset of devotion within their hearts and follow the path of rationality in dealing with the external world, must be victorious. They alone can accomplish worthy deeds in this world.

A firm foundation will have to be created which will support humanity to face all these conflicts. What is that firm foundation? It is the realization that all the creatures which have come to live in this world, do not want to leave it – they all want to survive. Thus we must grant them their right to remain in this world, their right to survive. We must forever fulfil their needs so that they will not have to leave this world prematurely. We must make arrangements for the food, clothes, education, shelter and medical treatment of each and every individual, so that all can live in this world as long as possible and become assets to the earth. We must provide them with the inexhaustible resources for their forward movement towards their spiritual goal. This very mentality is known as sama-samája tattva. All the expressions of human life will have to be based on this sama-samája tattva.

You must awaken those religious people who are not aware of what they are doing, and make them aware. Let the ideals of Neohumanism reach their ears and be implanted in the core of their hearts. With their liberated intellects they will throw all their illusions into the dustbin. But those who are deliberately propagating dogmas as the agents of injustice, will become furious and violent when they hear the propagation of truth. Let them so become – let them fill their cup of sins to the brim. Their destruction is inevitable – their annihilation is the inexorable decree of fate.