Papa Francis and grandpa Francis

We have a new Pope now. As a news junkie, my interest in the choice of the new Pope was intermittent at best, catching up with the election development on the web and on TV when I could, or when I wanted to. Didn’t even bother to check who the candidates were – just  a bunch of cloaked  father-figures, speaking in a variety of languages, who the media hounded to milk the papacy election event.

Given the sad state the Catholic church was in, my interest in the papal resignation and the election that followed was perfunctory at best – an organisation was seeking a head after its ill incumbent had resigned. It was not mystical or a particularly religious event as far as I was concerned.

Then the name was announced. And the fact that the new Pope was a Jesuit. The name Francis is dear to me – both personally and historically. My maternal grandfather’s name was Francis, named to honour Francis of Assisi, the saint of animals and the environment.

And thus my interest in both the papacy and the Roman Catholic Church – to which a chunk of my family belong – was piqued, again.

Of all the Christian saints, Francis is closest to my heart. It could possibility be that having a grandfather named Francis led me to delve more into the history and background of this particular saint more than others. Or it could be that I like to think Francis of Assisi as the paragon of the quintessential Christian – a follower of Christ, vowed to poverty and equality and compassion. With compassion heading the list – for compassion is not a forte of the Christian if the recipient is not a Christian.

So, are we actually going to see a different sort of papacy this time around? The past two predecessors were not so great, for the church at least. John Paul II did achieve celebrity status as a globe trotter and was popular while Benedict XVI endured a notoriety of sorts due his enforced conscription into the Hitler Youth and for sticking to the rule of the infallibility for the Church.

The Catholic Church has come under much attack and scrutiny under both these predecessors of Pope Francis. Lack of compassion for its followers, and for other branches of mankind, was one of its failings, with child abuse by the priesthood the most visible affront.

Now a Jesuit is the Pope, for the first ever. What does this entail for the Vatican, the Church and for the world?

The Society of Jesus (Jesuits) is the ‘enlightened’ arm of the Roman Catholic Church. Set up as a near-military order by Ignatius of Loyola after a battlefield conversion in 1534, the order is evangelical and see education as the basis of doing greater good in society.

And they have been at loggerheads with the Vatican for generations over deep-seated issues like homosexuality, abortion, women deacons and the liberation theory (with some calling the last, Christian Marxism).

From the start the Jesuits saw the Church as being in need of reform, and were kept at arms length by the Vatican for centuries due to concern for their creedal opposition and reformative fervour. Now this bunch have come into the limelight. And Pope Francis is said to be bringing with him all accoutrements of the Jesuit brotherhood to the Papacy –  extreme vows of chastity, poverty and righteousness.

And he is not alone. There are several cardinals of Jesuit background around him: they had been appointed by his two predecessors during their terms in office. A veritable coup is one way of looking at it. The vindication of righteousness and truth is another way.

While the Vatican, throughout its history, has had the ear of those in power, the Jesuits were generally seen by these rulers as interfering busybodies with a social agenda. Many a times in history, it was only the Jesuits who stood between colonial powers hell bent of taking over countries in the ‘new’ world and the slavery of the natives of those countries.

Not to say they did it completely out of the goodness of their hearts, for the Jesuits have had a chequered history as well. They were responsible for the Inquisition in Portugese Goa (India) and have done a sterling job of garnering animosity for the Catholic Church in almost every places in the world. They are elitists of the highest order – in the “if I see something white, and the Church says it is black, we will deem it black’” kind of way.

As an evangelical order, taking the message to and converting the natives to Christianity is always the main agenda and they have done well in this area for centuries. They set up bases of operations around the world, running missions profitably and influencing the locals to a great extent, both through education and political influence. Sometimes their work has been suppressed and sometimes they have been exiled, losing everything they had built in the bargain. But they have been, and continue to be, an order of social and political importance around the world.

And they knew when to draw the line when it came to the things that mattered – compassion for all, education to break the stranglehold of Church doctrines on the masses, and “to prevent greed for money or power invading Jesuit circles”. The Nazi regime considered the Jesuits one of their most dangerous enemies (at a time when the Catholic Church was accused of not doing enough/remaining silent during the Holocaust). The Jesuits saved as many Jews and other ‘undesirables’ as they could during WWII.

Historically, some of their greatest struggles were against corruption, venality, and spiritual lassitude within the Roman Catholic Church.

So, is a Jesuit as the Pope exactly what the Catholic Church needs in this modern world? If Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI were termed traditionalists, could Pope Francis be called ‘liberal’?

The man I knew personally as Francis, my grandfather, will always be remembered  with honour by me for one thing he did – he fought to get my mother educated. In a time (40s and the 50s) in Fiji when most rural Indian girls were raised only to raise a family, my grandfather fought this prevailing thought (and my grandmother, to boot) to get my mother educated. He sold a mattress and slept on the hard bed to pay the school fees to get my mother’s education going. Is the term liberal aligned with the name Francis? I personally think so.  St Francis of Assisi was definitely liberal, possibly in ways to make our modern day liberals feel like right-wing bigots.

Accordingly, seeing a Pope Francis on the papal throne (though he appears to shun such trappings) I envisage some positive changes coming through his tenure. Maybe it will be through benevolent tyranny, for that is how the Jesuits roll.

Maybe it will be through some hard dialogue, some intensive communication, but largely it will be through great action.

How the Church fares in the future will depend on how readily the hierarchy accept the Jesuit way of doing things – down the line, no quarters given, just follow in the footsteps of Jesus. It is not for fun that the Jesuits call themselves Friends of Jesus, and see the Church only as His bride.

It will be hardcore. With a lot of compassion thrown in.

Indian Weekender link to article

Is the end near?

On 21 December, 2012 the world is going to end. Or not. A somewhat large chunk of the online community worldwide has latched on to the ‘end of the world’ based on the Mayan calendar stopping on this date.
If the Mayans, sez them people, could extrapolate their calendar out to CE 2012 three thousand years ago, they must have known something. And that something is the end of the world, of that they are adamant.
Who are the Mayans? More importantly, why should any one place any importance on their calendar collated circa 3000 BC?
The Mayans are an ancient race in South America noted for their pyramids and ancient city ruins. Some say they may be the remnants of an even older race, the Olmecs, who may, or may not, have been the architects of several cities with pyramids in South America. The ruins of these cities offers glimpses of high technology and science that existed in a time before present memory – whether during the Olmecs or the Mayan dynasties is still in questions.
What do the people think will happen on, around, or after 21 December?
1. The planet will slip its skin. This includes pole shift (or reversal) ; rise of new continents/islands; submerging of existing landmass - either all or some. Could lead to gigantic tsunamis or super volcanoes happening all over the planet.
2. Cosmic collision – while NASA has ruled out any heavenly body heading towards Earth, it has not stopped some of coming up with bizarre theories. These include Planet X or Niburu offloading its inhabitants or offloading all of itself on Earth. Or the earth veering from its designated path around the Sun, leading to great climate calamities – a new mini ice age, or a barren, hot planet.
3. Cosmic bombardment – the Earth will lose its magnetic shield. This could happen if the planet’s rotation either speeds up or slows down (or the planet stops rotating altogether), cutting into its ability to generate the magnetic shield that keeps at bay the Sun’s harmful ultraviolet rays. Some people are actually looking forward to getting this huge dose of radiation so that mankind can ‘evolve’ on to its next stage.
4. Natural disasters galore. In a bid to correct the imbalances imposed by the human population, the Earth will seek out to balance itself and in doing so, will ‘adjust’ its climate accordingly.
On the more thoughtful side, there are people who think some great cosmic change will befall earthlings – a greater understand of their situation and their purpose in the cosmic web of life. Too many doubt that will happen as we no longer believe in the spirit, and thus, logically, this would be impossible.
If we are inclined to believe the Mayan calendar stating 21 December 2012 as the time of end of the world, let’s just keep one thing in mind: the Mayan civilisation ended hundreds of years ago and they had little or no inkling of their demise. If they had, they would have stated it somewhere in stone. They put everything else of importance in stone – which is how we know of their calendar.
So, why are we pinning our understanding on a calendar made by people long dead, who may be just a surviving off shoot of a still more ancient civilisation, and who were left scattered into primitive tribes after the collapse of their civilisation (aided by invaders)? One thought is that history repeats itself and repeated history, though boring, is a teaching device for the intelligent. And we must learn this history to find out what happened to these people so we can be prepared for whatever killed their civilisation.
What caused the end of this extraordinary civilisation – mentioned even in the epics of ancient India? Uloopi of the Arjuna saga was of the serpent nation, similar to the feathered serpent legend of the Mayans and Toltecs. In most cases, the South American nations were at loggerheads with ancient Indian civilisation and sometimes went all out to destroy each other.
Most believe climate change was one cause of their demise. Just as the great Saraswati civilisation on the Indian peninsula disappeared almost into nothing after the course of  the river was diverted/disappeared, so something calamitous happened with the South American civilisation. Planetry upheavals left seaside cities 3000 metres up in the mountain, sunk some of them without a trace, and left others without resources to sustain itself. It was the end of that civilisation as they knew it.
The geology of the Earth is full of evidence of great terrestrial upheavals since from before the time of the dinosaurs. The Earth remakes itself as and when it feels the need. And its inhabitants are either wiped out, or learn to adapt, or go on to flourish in the new climate. Scientists say one such great upheaval is long-overdue.
As to their calendar, could it just be that the astrologers who were compiling that calendar one day decided they had bean-counted enough into the future and left the rest to be completed by someone else? And then disaster struck and no-one could or wanted to carry on – they would just be trying to survive. Let’s not put so much importance to the Mayan calendar and the sudden end of days it seemingly states. Rather, seek to find out what the history of that civilisation has to teach us. And start taking climate change seriously.
Meanwhile, Christmas is around the corner and probably no-one cares about the end of the world – not with so much happening. People have been saying “The end is nigh” since the beginning of the Christian era. The Book of Revelations has been quoted, misquoted and quoted again, and the second coming has been happening for 2000 years. And we have been going from strength to strength in our ‘achievement’ as the crowing glory of life on Earth. We are good.
What is there to worry about? So, Merry Christmas - if we do reach that date.

Why does God incarnate?

We love the avatars of God, but, really, how much do we understand why they happen?

An avatar is a particular coalescing of the all pervasive spirit/soul called Brahman (for the non-dualist), or Vishnu or Shiva or Shakti (Devi) (for the dualist as per whether they believe whether Vishnu or Shiva or Devi to be the supreme expression of a personal godhead)

An avatar is said to be called into Being by the heartfelt cries of agony of the sadhus, the pious among us. The sadhus plead for an incarnation or manifestation to take place because of the grave danger mankind has placed itself into.

And then the avatar happens: a set of parents are selected, the form of the avatar enters the womb of the mother, the birthing of the avatar happens. The rest is what we read about in the scriptures – about Rama, Krishna and other major avatars, as well as the minor avatars. (Please note: an avatar is the descent of spirit into matter, while an enlightened godman is the raising of a human into the realm of the spirit.)

For the avatar, this descent into matter cannot be a good thing. Pure spirit confines itself into flesh, becoming subject to its limitations and its inherent problems. Granted, the avatar comes with a particularly divine set of his tools of trade – omniscience, great doses of power and prowess and an understanding of things beyond the ken of man. But, he is ‘born’, and he ‘dies’ and is assailed by all those things we mere humans are assailed by, except he appears to handle them with aplomb and dignity, while we weep and wail our fate.

We who benefit from the avatar’s descent cannot imagine the pain of this descent, although some of more enlightened among us have tried to put them in words for our benefit.

These beautiful lines from Sri Aurobindo’s poem A God’s Labour gives a hint to the predicament of an avatar:

He who would bring the heavens here

Must descend himself into clay

And the burden of earthly nature bear

And tread the dolorous way.

We generally give praise for an avatar taking ‘birth’ among us and feel ever so grateful that we have breathed the same air as Him. But we give little, if any, thought to what the avatar would be going through – and we are not talking about any apparent distress caused by physical ailment.

Day in, day out the Avatar has to endure a body of flesh, fluid and frailties – eating, excreting, keeping it clean, stop it from dropping dead. He, the pure spirit, has to encompass that spirit in a limited form called as body and suffer the indignities of that same body.

There is another beautiful telling of a devotee of Krishna who wanted to kill Draupadi, Arjun and several others who were close to Krishna. After reading the Mahabharata, he sat sharpening a wicked looking knife and when asked why he was doing it so intently, he answered he wanted to seek out Arjuna, Draupadi and others and kill them.

He said he wanted to kill them because they had caused so much pain to his Lord: Arjuna for making a charioteer out of Krishna and forcing him into the battlefield in that lowly role and Draupadi for calling on Krishna and forcing him to provide great lengths of cloth to cover her when she was being stripped naked in the court.

He goes on to tell of the other ‘indignities’ other people had heaped on Krishna and how he would hunt them down and kill them.

At first reading this appears to be the ravings of sentimental fool, especially since he was from an era in which Krishna, Arjuna and others were long-gone. But the sentiments behind the raving is something to think about. Here was a man who felt deeply for the Avatar, who felt that we should have treated Him as something very precious, to be treasured and loved, and not taken advantage of, which is what he believed Arjuna and Draupadi had done. And he felt these sentiments as if Krishna, Arjuna and Draupadi existed for him at that time – not as if they were just tales in a book.

We take it for granted that the avatar is happy to be with us and we take for granted that He will ‘be there for us’. We hardly think of the great sacrifice undertaken in the ‘birthing’ of an avatar – the taking of a form on Mrityu Loka – the world of death; the limiting of the spirit into a vessel of matter and the bombardment of negativity that he has to suffer during his sojourn on Earth.

Yes, the avatar’s physical form is put together to take on this negativity. Ramakrishna Paramhansa is said to have taken on the negative forces (illness, mental and physical) of those who came to him, so much so that he was a physical wreck by the time he passed away. Shirdi Sai Baba was took on boils, burns, wounds and sickness from those he chose to save, as did Satya Sai Baba.

Again these lines from A God’s Labour (the full poem can be found here http://intyoga.online.fr/labour.htm):

Coercing my godhead I have come down

Here on the sordid earth,

Ignorant, labouring, human grown

Twixt the gates of death and birth.

I have been digging deep and long

Mid a horror of filth and mire

A bed for the golden river’s song,

A home for the deathless fire.

I have laboured and suffered in Matter’s night

To bring the fire to man;

But the hate of hell and human spite

Are my meed since the world began.

Given that we have the law of karma governing the universe, is there a need for God to incarnate on Earth? The above gives us a hint of why an incarnation takes place.

An avatar is a catalyst of change – each time one comes, the world changes significantly. We, who only read about their exploits, take in only a fraction of the full scope of their doings. We are privy only to their recorded exploits.

• Rama took up a war of attrition that devastated a whole civilisation. And Ravan is now a household name equated with wickedness, pride and arrogance, and the futility of great learning without understanding and compassion.
• Krishna brought about a fratricidal war that decimated entire clans, including his own. His exploits range from killing his own uncle to turning his cousins against each other that sees the end of the Dwapar Yuga, and the beginning of the least benevolent of all yugas for mankind (yet, a yuga which is said to be the best placed for as higher understanding of godhead).
• Parashurama cut down the ranks of the kshatriyas 21 times to cool his vengeance. Sometimes he is seen as an example of the wrath of the Brahmin caste – of what they are capable of if they are not treated with respect and awe. It is a tale of the curbing of unbridled arrogance and malpractices associated with the ruling classes.
• The other avatars undertook epic battles against opponents of great courage and strength, sometimes in battles that ranged over time and space, other times using wit to outwit (to stop Bali’s expansion plans into other realms), others battled for the human soul because of their compassion for humans.

Every one of the exploits of our avatars are told from the point of view of a human being – from the point of view of people who reacted with the avatars. There is no standalone narration by the avatars themselves, including the Gita, which is retelling by a third party of a direct conversation between Krishna and Arjuna.

Simply put, our scriptures, especially the bhagavads, the Puranas, are largely someone’s take on a series of incidents that they saw, heard about or were directly involved in with regards to a particular avatar. It is as Sri Aurobindo says of our understanding: “A fragment of Truth is his widest scope”.

And I pose the question once again: Do we really know why God incarnates among us?

If what Rama, Krishna and Parashurama did was the mission of those avatars – then huge chunks of mankind died as a result. And to what end, just to save (or avenge) a few human beings beloved of the avatar?

Let’s look at the last stanza from set of lines from Sri Aurobindo’s poem listed above:

I have laboured and suffered in Matter’s night

To bring the fire to man;

But the hate of hell and human spite

Are my meed since the world began.

Let’s replace ‘hell’ with Patala – the underworld of our mythology. While we think of patala as the infernal regions, Narada is said to have said that it rivalled and beat Indralok in beauty, and it abound with every kind of luxury and sensual gratification.

So, Patala, far from being a place of darkness and drear, was a place of light and beauty, a place of sense gratification, love for luxury, hedonism, self-indulgence, intemperance, and decadence.

Since the world began, God has been incarnating because he hates hell – all the things associated with the above-listed negative elements that make our character. And human spite – when we hurt others for the sake of seeing them squirm or suffer – is not something God likes.

So, instead of saying: “Whenever evil rears its head, and wickedness prevails, God incarnates to punish evil doers,” would it be more appropriate to say “Whenever hedonism increases, and decadence prevails, God incarnates to pull the rug from under our feet?”

God incarnating is a saving mission, but executed in a painful way. Its purpose is to

take us back to godhead, to divinity - kicking and scratching, if need be.

For man’s mind is the dupe of his animal self;

Hoping its lusts to win,

He harbours within him a grisly Elf

Enamoured of sorrow and sin.

The grey Elf shudders from heaven’s flame

And from all things glad and pure;

Only by pleasure and passion and pain

His drama can endure.

God incarnates to remind us of our origins, our divinity – ‘To bring the fire to man’. We, in our human folly, believe he incarnates to give us happiness and wealth as we pursue our pleasurable lives on Earth. And we worship avatars to that end – begging and pleading for a long life to enjoy our fruits, families and fumblings. So far from the truth.

The Truth of truths men fear and deny,

The Light of lights they refuse;

To ignorant gods they lift their cry

Or a demon altar choose.

Maybe it is time to put aside our kindergarten approach to our avatars. Let’s not raise a ‘demon altar’ and hope a few minutes of obeisance is enough to sway God into our way of thinking; let’s not ‘lift our cries to ignorant gods” and then complain you

have not been heard; let’s not refuse, and fear and deny, what our scriptures have proclaimed for eons – God is Truth, and in Truth lies the real victory.

Instead, seek the ‘Truth of truths’, the Light of lights. Dive deep into your beliefs, and sometime, challenge them, so as to be privy to the truth they hide among their superfluity. The teachings of our ancients may appear superfluous at first attempt but that is only because they have been dumbed down by those who would use them to their own ends.

Do not let tradition, or traditionalists, hold you from finding the Truth. Do not let culture bind you to the mire. Expand your mind and see the beauty of the philosophy that has endured millennia, that has endured every kind of influx and still remains true to this day.

Notes

Avatars of Shiva

One lists has the following as the 11 avatars of Shiva

1 KAPAALI

2 PINGAL

3 BHEEM

4 VEERUPAAKSH

5 VILOHIT

6 SHAASTA

7 AJPAAD

8 AHIBURDHANYA

9 SHAMBHU

10 CHAND

11 BHAV

Others put 28 avatars for Shiva

Although Puranic scriptures contain occasional references to avatars of Shiva, the idea is not universally accepted in Saivism. As an avatar requires residence in a womb, Shiva as ayonija (not of a womb) cannot manifest himself as an avatar.

The Linga Purana speaks of twenty-eight forms of Shiva which are sometimes seen as avatars. In the Shiva Purana there is a distinctly Saivite version of a traditional avatar myth: Shiva brings forth Virabhadra, one of his terrifying forms, in order to calm Narasimha, an avatar of Vishnu. When that fails, Shiva manifests as the human-lion-bird Sharabha. The story concludes with Narasimha becoming a devotee of Shiva after being bound by Sharabha.[47] However, Vaishnava followers including Dvaita scholars, such as Vijayindra Tirtha (1539–95) refute this Shaivite view of Narasimha based on their reading of Sattvika Puranas and Sruti texts.[48] The monkey-god Hanuman who helped Rama – the Vishnu avatar is considered by some to be the eleventh avatar of Rudra (Shiva). Some regional deities like Khandoba are also believed by some to be avatars of Shiva. Other stated avatars of Shiva, according to some sources, are 8th century non-dualist Vedanta philosopher (Advaita Vedanta) Adi Shankara. He was named "Shankara" after Lord Shiva and is considered by some to have

been an incarnation of the god and Virabhadra who was born when Shiva grabbed a lock of his matted hair and dashed it to the ground. Virabhadra then destroyed Daksha's yajna (fire sacrifice) and severed his head as per Shiva's instructions.

In Dasam Granth, Guru Gobind Singh have mentioned two avtars of Rudra: Dattatreya Avtar and Parasnath Avtar.

Avatars of Devi

Avatars are also observed in Shaktism, the sect dedicated to the worship of the Goddess (Devi), but they do not have universal acceptance in the sect. The Devi Bhagavata Purana describes the descent of Devi avatars to punish the wicked and defend the righteous—much as the Bhagavata Purana does with the avatars of Vishnu. Like Vishnu, his consort Lakshmi incarnates as Sita and Radha – the consorts of Rama and Krishna avatars. Nilakantha, an 18th century commentator on the Devi Bhagavata Purana – which includes the Devi Gita – says that various avatars of the Goddess includes Shakambhari and even the masculine Krishna and Rama – generally thought to be Vishnu's avatars. Lakshmi and Saraswati are also goddesses worshipped as Devi avatars.

PATALA. [Source: Dowson's Classical Dictionary of Hindu Mythology] The infernal regions, inhabited by Nagas (serpents), Daityas, Danavas, Yakshas, and others. They are seven in number, and their names, according to the Vishna Purana, are Atala, Vitala, Nitala, Gabhastimat, Mahatala, Sutala, and Patala, but these name vary in different authorities. The Padma Purana gives the names of the seven regions and their respective rulers as follow: -- (1.) Atala, subject to Mahamaya; (2.) Vitala, ruled by a form of Siva called Hatakeswara; (3.) Sutala, ruled by Bali ; (4.) Talatala, ruled by Maya; (5.) Mahatala, where reside the great serpents; (6.) Rasatala, where the Daityas and Danavas dwell; (7.) Patala, the lowermost, in which Vasuki reigns over the chief Nagas or snake-gods. In the Siva Purana there are eight: Patala, Tala, Atala, Vitala, Tala, Vidhipatala, Sarkarabhumi, and Vijaya. The sage Narada paid a visit to these regions, and on his return to the skies gave a glowing account of them, declaring them to be far more delightful than Indra's heaven, and abounding with every kind of luxury and sensual gratification.