Brother Chaltahai, how come I have never seen that Ash that Hindus put on their foreheads on your mubarik paishaani? What’s the significance of it?
Haray Krishna, Haray Raam. Jay Kaali Maata.
That is because that ash is generally a result of a pooja or a havan. Fire i sused to offer prayers and the samigri that you put in to create the fire for the havan becomes the ashes that people place on their foreheads.
Fire as purifier...
Brother, could you please post an excerpt from Geeta for our spiritual enlightment? Thanks.
What is the difference between pooja and havan?
Pooja doesn't necessarily involve offerings through fire.
And sucker....you are wrong..there corrected!
Brother, I'm still waiting for some excerpts from Geeta for enlightment purposes. I feel spiritually hollow and need a little dose.
There is in this world neither sin nor misery, neither disease nor grief; if there is anything in this world which can be called sin, it is this ......fear
(Bhagvat Gita )
Beautiful. Seriously.
Explains a lot of things in the world man....glad you liked it. It; smy favorite..
Interesting thing is that in Ismalic faith, the masses are asked to fear Allah so that they won't have any other fears. In Hindu faith, it seems like fear itself is feared regardless of associating it to a diety as a nuetralizer to rest of the fears. Is that so?
It makes sense to me both ways as both of them basically stem out of faith. Once you have faith, regardless of whatever it is, you've a base to base yourself off to anything else.
I guess you are right with a portion of it. Fear itself is not-feared but is a sin. Whereas in some religions, fear is the way to instill morality and abstaining from sin. What is sin is still up in the air.
Sin is a relative concept controlled by the faith.
Tocuhe'....i agree
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*Originally posted by Roman: *
It makes sense to me both ways as both of them basically stem out of faith. Once you have faith, regardless of whatever it is, you've a base to base yourself off to anything else.
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without any fear....Jazak allah bl khair
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*Originally posted by Chaltahai: *
And sucker....you are wrong..there corrected!
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CH, you can suck upon my bajrangbali anytime you want.
There is in this world neither sin nor misery, neither disease nor grief; if there is anything in this world which can be called sin, it is this ......fear
(Bhagvat Gita )
That's a lovely quote CH.
About the ash, I understood that fire cleansed a person from sins. That's why the Islamic version of Hell is flames; as you said, purification.
That's surprising isn't it, that Islam and Hinduism share this identical premise? Would you say that was something borrowed from a purely monotheistic faith or was based off man's primal fear of fire, starting with Prometheus.
But why fire? Why not ice?
The Torah says, "In the beginning there was the Word, and the Word was light". The Angels in Islam are made out of light. There is a Surah in the Qur'an addressing light (Surah Noor).
Fire comes from light. Is fire then, a bridge to Heaven?
In Zoroastrianism, divine knowledge descends to Zarathustra in the form of fire. In the Bible, Moses sees God behind a bush in the form of Fire. Even Rumi said "I am fire"... implying hardness melts under fire, and hearts soften and become more pliable. When one talks about illumination, gaining knowledge, enlightenment.. we talk about light. Darkness itself is another face of light.
Darkness-Light-Fire - is this a vicious circle?
These are all unconnected thoughts, been a long day. I think I just I lost my thought on the ash....
But why fire? Why not ice?
Dear Ana, I picked the above to start off as rest of your thought (as you put it quite accurately) were too unconnected.
You do understand the difference between ice and fire, right? Fire burns you immediately. More painful. More observeable. It has an immediate, everyday source of appearance in the form of Sun. Ice, on the other hand, is not easily available across all continents of the globe. It does not omit light and is not a source of immediate attention.
Light and Fire go hand in hand. These are the immediate sources that fancied early humans' attention because of their miraculous effects. That has nothing to do with coincedence as, you see, God is smart too. He kows what humans fear immediately. So He kinda, sorta used the same natural stuff for hell-like descriptions. You don't expect him to scare you with a trojan computer virus instead, did you?
Whether or not God was in fact invented by man, fire still serves the purpose of initimidation. Hence you'd see it all religions. What else is there that is so consistently feared across all continents globally? The natural phenomenon that no matter where man is, it'd equally awe him?
The point is that, we cannot debate whether or not religion was invented by man, as it is a subjective matter but we can definitely be bit more sure of the forms of havoc that man may fear bring wrath of God upon him in case of a punitory course of action.
PS-
Sentinel, I apologize. This may very well had been totally over your head but in all sincerity I assure you that it was all related to religion.
[QUOTE]
Originally posted by Ana: *
*There is in this world neither sin nor misery, neither disease nor grief; if there is anything in this world which can be called sin, it is this ......fear
(Bhagvat Gita )
That's a lovely quote CH.
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Thanks Mme. Ana.
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*About the ash, I understood that fire cleansed a person from sins. That's why the Islamic version of Hell is flames; as you said, purification.
That's surprising isn't it, that Islam and Hinduism share this identical premise? Would you say that was something borrowed from a purely monotheistic faith or was based off man's primal fear of fire, starting with Prometheus.
[/QUOTE]
Unless the animals in the jungle are islamic. I am not sure if the fear of fire is derived from monotheism. We fear fire because it burns our skin..not becuse divinity told us to.
The point here is that the concept of fear itself is the ultimate sin. Fire has nothing to do with it.
Fire as a purifier in Hinduism indeed maybe similar in latter day monotheistic religions.
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*But why fire? Why not ice?
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Ice preserves but doesn't purge...I think.
[QUOTE]
*The Torah says, "In the beginning there was the Word, and the Word was light". The Angels in Islam are made out of light. There is a Surah in the Qur'an addressing light (Surah Noor).
Fire comes from light. Is fire then, a bridge to Heaven?
[/QUOTE]
Might be...that's interesting. I would think the concept of cause and effect as to which is borne out of which, re: fire and light might be debated.
[QUOTE]
*In Zoroastrianism, divine knowledge descends to Zarathustra in the form of fire. In the Bible, Moses sees God behind a bush in the form of Fire. Even Rumi said "I am fire"... implying hardness melts under fire, and hearts soften and become more pliable. When one talks about illumination, gaining knowledge, enlightenment.. we talk about light. Darkness itself is another face of light.
Darkness-Light-Fire - is this a vicious circle?
These are all unconnected thoughts, been a long day. I think I just I lost my thought on the ash....
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I am sure there are reasons for humans to be in awe of fire. I am not sure if divinity needs to reveal itself through that means. It might make us feel better in the end (in awe) but not sure how real any of that is.
As long as we are talking about Rumi...another great prphet from Jersey also said..."I'am on Fire"...wanna guess who? :)
Think The Boss!!! :)
Thank u C & R for the write ups. Roman, yes, it makes sense..intimidation.. fire is the ultimate dread for all mankind. The Sun is a constant reminder, how apt.
CH, didn't get a chance to read what all u wrote b4 the edit, but the remainder still serves its purpose. Two items I found very interesting - ice preserves but does not purge. Preserver is like savior, concept of giving life, sustaining life.. ice in liquid form is water. In Islam, water is the origin of all creation, all life. That's why 2/3rds of the earth is covered by it. So water gives life to the body & fire cleanses the soul. One is for physical being, the other for metaphysical.
This started another thought. Fire cleanses the soul... fire is akin to passion (not objectively of course). Fire intimidates, passion/zeal/zest also can intimidate - others, and sometimes yourself. So is passion asked to be toned down or subdued by divine religions, in order to lessen fear? Or maybe to focus fear ... remove fear of all things and concentrate it only on God? Am I babbling here? Religions, I have noticed, are afraid of passionate people. They exist to arouse and stir feelings but if the human's emotions overtake him/her then all of a sudden religion puts the lid on the boiling pot and says "extremism is bad". It wants an on-off switch and wants machine-like devotion, but the machine is not allowed to explode. Is it because passion clarifies the soul for a person, and if a person can see things too clearly then there will be no more fear, no need of fire or universal punishment? Does passion purify, or pollute? Not well-expressed, I apologize.
Another point was the concept of fear as the ultimate sin. This is an antithesis to monotheistic belief in a sense that we are encouraged to fear God. Even if all other fears are removed, the ultimate fear is of God. If fear of God is a sin, that would make ... blasphemy. Followed by anarchy, followed by downfall of mankind perhaps? Is it right then to preach fear as a sin? I wonder...
I personally believe fear is a sin, but does fear also have a good side to it, a necessary side - like Roman said, see the Sun everyday, even if there is ruination on earth, the fear of fire still exists. To preserve law and order, do humans need fear? Is it an inherent part of our makeup, to instinctively fear?
BUT, I just remembered. Are we taught to fear fire, or is it instinct? Until we don't go thru fire ourselves, do we fear it? There was a story about the baby Moses, who loved brightly colored things. He saw a flame once and stuck his tongue out to try and lick it, and got burned in the process. That's why he stammered for a good part of his life. See, the baby didn't fear fire until he felt it. So.. aren't all humans like that? We've been trained to fear it. Then, when Moses grew up and attained Prophethood, he conversed with God from behind a bush... and God appeared in the guise of a bright burning flame. Preconditioning - baby learns to be afraid of fire grows up to be a man now fearing God when He appears to him as fire. Thus, we have fear of God.
Looks like someone's playing a game with us. Very well-planned, all this. L8r.
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The supposition is that ultimate fear is god in your post above. What might work for islam does not work for other religions. I agree with you that fear is necessary, but that fear should allow us to drum up strength from within us. Not dictate what we should/not do or else. In Hinduism we have the concept of karma/Dharma. Sort of similar...I am not sure how much I believe in all that but the message is the same.
Also, I see no correlation between, fear as a sin and blasphemy, followed by Anarchy followed by downfall of man etc..That to me sounds like the diatribe from Bender in "The breakfast Club" (Judd Nelson). :)
We can read into alot of what the scriptures say to vallidate our "god". Ultimately my god is ephemeral and ubiquitous. She has given me the brain to find out for my self the virtues of fire and ice and stripjoints. I will explore, decide and discard, where I feel necessary. Just don't tell me that god doesn't want me to eat beef or god doesn't want me invest in Exchange traded funds because interest is haraam. That is not spirituality.
In what you have written there are tons of similarities in the message. That is what's more important. Rather than how I get the message.
Fire is a conduit...if I am offering something to god, that to me is more important than the conduit I choose. I am sure she feels the same way :)