By : Kesava Rao Tadipatri
Is God selectively cruel ? - pravachana video link
Q & A audio link
Shri Hari Vayu Gurubhyo namaH
One question/issue was put forward by Sri Galagali Acharya.
This is about a bird - how tactfully, it brings a worm to the banks of the lake - one of the facets and specialty in God's creation in providing the special kind of beak to the bird to catch the worm, the intelligence and improvisation capabilities that God gave to the bird in making the slithery worm eatable by the bird - how the bird places the worm in appropriate spot and consumes it - the father extolls the greatness of God's creation admiring the God's presentation of such capability to the bird enabling it to have its food so perfectly.
Then the son puts forth a simple question - "Oh father, it is great that the bird does all that. But how come the God let the worm become such a terrible victim to the bird? Isn't your God so cruel to the worm? Is there a different God to the bird and to the worm? If there is, then one Supreme God concept gets defeated. If there is not, meaning there is only one Supreme God for all, then God is partial to the bird, and cruel to the worm." The father just becomes speechless.
Of course, we have a ready-made answer "Well, that is the prArabdha of the worm and that of the bird. Every one has to pay for their own karma-s, etc". That may be right philosophically. But that answer will not make the boy happy or that will not give any good conviction for the boy. Is there a good answer that can be given to the boy at the level of the boy?
So the question in essence is "Is God selectively cruel?". We all say "NO". But what answer can we give not only to that boy, but also to our own inquiring minds?
I am giving some of my thoughts below.
==========
Before proceeding, I have to answer the answers or discuss the answers in general.
1. The hope concept - How can we expect a worm to have the hope that it will get better janma - I don't think they are that advanced as to think and hope for better birth. Even in humans, itself, there are many philosophical schools, who do not believe in rebirth. By kaimutya nyAya, where is the scope for the worm to think in those lines?
2. The worm getting enough j~nAna and repent - I think that this is also a very unlikely proposition.
3. Karma and its bearing fruits - I think, we wanted to keep this on the side for this topic.
4. A hunter can hit the bird and so God is not really kind to the bird - How will this take out that the God is not cruel to the worm - Now God is cruel to both the worm and the bird - compounding the problem.
5. The higher form of life kills the lower form and so it is ok -
There are two issues in this -
A. The man eaters like lions and tigers are not higher beings than man.
B. Even if 'a higher being' kills 'lower being', still pain is inflicted upon 'lower being'.
6. Even for the argument - the worm may get a better life - why not the worm have a more peaceful death than becoming a sport-food for the bird. The worm would not have the anusandhAna like Shibi chakravarty that it is becoming useful for the bird.
Now the boy saw that there is cruelty as far as the worm is concerned.
Let us approach it from a different angle. We have to proceed from the boy's point of view, rather than ours.
Lets us see if there is a way for God to be not cruel to the worm as the boy sees in front of him. (that means from the boy's point of view). So, we will try to do it by a process called reductio ad absurdum. That is an argument which can be either of the two -
I. seeks to demonstrate that a statement is true by showing that a false, untenable, or absurd result follows from its denial.
or
II. seeks to demonstrate that a statement is false by showing that a false, untenable, or absurd result follows from its acceptance.
We will use here II.
Statement: There is a way God could avoid the cruelty in bird-worm case as well as every predator-prey case.
We will accept this statement and by logical treatment prove that we will end up in a false, untenable or absurd situation.
There are two ways we can conceive the worm escaping become a victim of the bird -
1. Give the worm the capability that it wont be subjected to any injury or pain from the bird and so the bird will not be able to eat.
2. Some special ability to every worm to escape from the bird (like the worm suddenly gets wings and fly away, etc).
In essence, the bird will be deprived a chance to have food, then that will be cruel to the bird.
So, to have God as not cruel to both, there is only one possibility - make both bird and worm as vegetarian.
But then that is not sufficient. There are so many predators and preys in this world.
So, is it possible that the only choice left is to make the entire creation as vegetarian?
Even that is not sufficient. Even the plants have life. So, none on this planet should live on plants, as that will hurt the plants as well. What is the other option?
The entire creation must be made to live on lifeless things like Earth, sunlight, etc.
In other words, All the living beings will live like the plants - that is practically becoming plants !!
That is an untenable and absurd situation. So, there is no way to avoid such a cruelty.
As some mentioned, we can see that there is a global food chain and God has maintained a perfect balance. That itself is His kindness. Note that in all the cases, the number of preys is much higher than the number of predators. If at any time the predators out number the preys, the predators will become
extinct. Why does God do that. In his global process, he makes way for the others and that is all again part of balance. We know some of the species that have become extinct. There may be quite many which have become extinct and which we don't know. If nothing ever becomes extinct, we don't know what disaster that may cause.
The God also gives the ability to generate preys - like the man growing the grains, plants yielding various foods like fruits, nuts, leaves, vegetables, etc.
Just as plant farms, the man also builds animal farms - of course in all these cases, one can feel the invisible Hand of God every where. Though it is not seen, it is experienceable.
There may be thousands of birds which eat the worms, but there are millions of worms. If there are no worm-eating birds, there can be an out-growth of worms, which the man himself will not like!! If there are not enough worms, either the worm-eating birds should adopt to eat something else or perish. The God also gives inherent ability for the worms to be slithery, slippery, etc which gives some kind of protection. Yet out of millions of worms, only a portion becomes food for the birds. Which worm will become the food - it looks like a random process for us. But in a Gigantic, global scheme of God, nothing is accidental or random. From the boy's point of view, he can see that only some worms are used as food. So God is kind to many other worms. Even if the birds did not eat, those worms will anyway perish within a short time itself.
The real problem is in our minds. We have two phase problem.
Phase 1 : All the living beings have abhimAna for deha (except the Rujus - since adruShTa is not in scope, let us put this aside)
Phase 2 : To understand any situation, we put ourselves into the shoes of some one or something else. For example in the present topic, the father's focus was on the bird and the son's focus was on the worm. Similarly, when we think of extinct species, we focus on those extinct species.
We must realize that God does not have body and also he does not have any affinity to any being.
It does not bother him if bird eats worm or the worm eats the bird. So, the question of cruelty does not arise. For an act of cruelty, the selfishness will be the motive - be it to gratify the stomach or be it to gratify the mind. The God is beyond that.
In case of death, what is dying? If we say body dies, that can't be as body is jaDa. If we say jIva is dying, that is also not true. Even the boy will accept that the Jiva will be reborn.
What is birth and death? Birth is coming together of body and soul and death is separation.
What is pain, due to the abhimAna of the JIva for the body, it feels all things that happen to the body are actually happening to the Jiva. When it sees others suffering, the same kind of abhimAna comes in.
We don't hesitate to spray and kill thousands of mosquitoes.
The selfishness is also inherent nature of the Jivas. Is that right?
sharIramAdyaH khalu dharmasAdhanam. So for our survival and happy sustenance, we perform these acts and so we need not feel guilty about that.
There was a corollary question. The incident of 9-11. Can it be explained with the boy's point of view or without bringing pApa, puNya and prArabdha?
The answer is no, because of the complexity of the issue. Can we explain complex analysis at the level of a small boy - the answer is "no".
We cannot approach this in the manner of reductio ad absurdum. There is no laukik way of approach for this. God brings together all those who had that prArabdha to go thru and gave the result that they deserved. He had no selfish motive in that. Hence no cruelty. The only laukik approach we can take here is that it brings the universal awareness and warns the humanity of the dreadfulness of such inhuman acts and keeps us alert.
The alarm and dreadfulness in an incident springs from our association to our own species as well. In case of killing thousands of mosquitoes, we would never think "I could have been in that situation of the mosquitoes". But in case of 9-11, the thought "I could have been in that situation of the victims" lurks behind in our minds.
==========
Shri KrishNArpaNamastu
Is God selectively cruel ? - pravachana video link
Q & A audio link
Shri Hari Vayu Gurubhyo namaH
One question/issue was put forward by Sri Galagali Acharya.
This is about a bird - how tactfully, it brings a worm to the banks of the lake - one of the facets and specialty in God's creation in providing the special kind of beak to the bird to catch the worm, the intelligence and improvisation capabilities that God gave to the bird in making the slithery worm eatable by the bird - how the bird places the worm in appropriate spot and consumes it - the father extolls the greatness of God's creation admiring the God's presentation of such capability to the bird enabling it to have its food so perfectly.
Then the son puts forth a simple question - "Oh father, it is great that the bird does all that. But how come the God let the worm become such a terrible victim to the bird? Isn't your God so cruel to the worm? Is there a different God to the bird and to the worm? If there is, then one Supreme God concept gets defeated. If there is not, meaning there is only one Supreme God for all, then God is partial to the bird, and cruel to the worm." The father just becomes speechless.
Of course, we have a ready-made answer "Well, that is the prArabdha of the worm and that of the bird. Every one has to pay for their own karma-s, etc". That may be right philosophically. But that answer will not make the boy happy or that will not give any good conviction for the boy. Is there a good answer that can be given to the boy at the level of the boy?
So the question in essence is "Is God selectively cruel?". We all say "NO". But what answer can we give not only to that boy, but also to our own inquiring minds?
I am giving some of my thoughts below.
==========
Before proceeding, I have to answer the answers or discuss the answers in general.
1. The hope concept - How can we expect a worm to have the hope that it will get better janma - I don't think they are that advanced as to think and hope for better birth. Even in humans, itself, there are many philosophical schools, who do not believe in rebirth. By kaimutya nyAya, where is the scope for the worm to think in those lines?
2. The worm getting enough j~nAna and repent - I think that this is also a very unlikely proposition.
3. Karma and its bearing fruits - I think, we wanted to keep this on the side for this topic.
4. A hunter can hit the bird and so God is not really kind to the bird - How will this take out that the God is not cruel to the worm - Now God is cruel to both the worm and the bird - compounding the problem.
5. The higher form of life kills the lower form and so it is ok -
There are two issues in this -
A. The man eaters like lions and tigers are not higher beings than man.
B. Even if 'a higher being' kills 'lower being', still pain is inflicted upon 'lower being'.
6. Even for the argument - the worm may get a better life - why not the worm have a more peaceful death than becoming a sport-food for the bird. The worm would not have the anusandhAna like Shibi chakravarty that it is becoming useful for the bird.
Now the boy saw that there is cruelty as far as the worm is concerned.
Let us approach it from a different angle. We have to proceed from the boy's point of view, rather than ours.
Lets us see if there is a way for God to be not cruel to the worm as the boy sees in front of him. (that means from the boy's point of view). So, we will try to do it by a process called reductio ad absurdum. That is an argument which can be either of the two -
I. seeks to demonstrate that a statement is true by showing that a false, untenable, or absurd result follows from its denial.
or
II. seeks to demonstrate that a statement is false by showing that a false, untenable, or absurd result follows from its acceptance.
We will use here II.
Statement: There is a way God could avoid the cruelty in bird-worm case as well as every predator-prey case.
We will accept this statement and by logical treatment prove that we will end up in a false, untenable or absurd situation.
There are two ways we can conceive the worm escaping become a victim of the bird -
1. Give the worm the capability that it wont be subjected to any injury or pain from the bird and so the bird will not be able to eat.
2. Some special ability to every worm to escape from the bird (like the worm suddenly gets wings and fly away, etc).
In essence, the bird will be deprived a chance to have food, then that will be cruel to the bird.
So, to have God as not cruel to both, there is only one possibility - make both bird and worm as vegetarian.
But then that is not sufficient. There are so many predators and preys in this world.
So, is it possible that the only choice left is to make the entire creation as vegetarian?
Even that is not sufficient. Even the plants have life. So, none on this planet should live on plants, as that will hurt the plants as well. What is the other option?
The entire creation must be made to live on lifeless things like Earth, sunlight, etc.
In other words, All the living beings will live like the plants - that is practically becoming plants !!
That is an untenable and absurd situation. So, there is no way to avoid such a cruelty.
As some mentioned, we can see that there is a global food chain and God has maintained a perfect balance. That itself is His kindness. Note that in all the cases, the number of preys is much higher than the number of predators. If at any time the predators out number the preys, the predators will become
extinct. Why does God do that. In his global process, he makes way for the others and that is all again part of balance. We know some of the species that have become extinct. There may be quite many which have become extinct and which we don't know. If nothing ever becomes extinct, we don't know what disaster that may cause.
The God also gives the ability to generate preys - like the man growing the grains, plants yielding various foods like fruits, nuts, leaves, vegetables, etc.
Just as plant farms, the man also builds animal farms - of course in all these cases, one can feel the invisible Hand of God every where. Though it is not seen, it is experienceable.
There may be thousands of birds which eat the worms, but there are millions of worms. If there are no worm-eating birds, there can be an out-growth of worms, which the man himself will not like!! If there are not enough worms, either the worm-eating birds should adopt to eat something else or perish. The God also gives inherent ability for the worms to be slithery, slippery, etc which gives some kind of protection. Yet out of millions of worms, only a portion becomes food for the birds. Which worm will become the food - it looks like a random process for us. But in a Gigantic, global scheme of God, nothing is accidental or random. From the boy's point of view, he can see that only some worms are used as food. So God is kind to many other worms. Even if the birds did not eat, those worms will anyway perish within a short time itself.
The real problem is in our minds. We have two phase problem.
Phase 1 : All the living beings have abhimAna for deha (except the Rujus - since adruShTa is not in scope, let us put this aside)
Phase 2 : To understand any situation, we put ourselves into the shoes of some one or something else. For example in the present topic, the father's focus was on the bird and the son's focus was on the worm. Similarly, when we think of extinct species, we focus on those extinct species.
We must realize that God does not have body and also he does not have any affinity to any being.
It does not bother him if bird eats worm or the worm eats the bird. So, the question of cruelty does not arise. For an act of cruelty, the selfishness will be the motive - be it to gratify the stomach or be it to gratify the mind. The God is beyond that.
In case of death, what is dying? If we say body dies, that can't be as body is jaDa. If we say jIva is dying, that is also not true. Even the boy will accept that the Jiva will be reborn.
What is birth and death? Birth is coming together of body and soul and death is separation.
What is pain, due to the abhimAna of the JIva for the body, it feels all things that happen to the body are actually happening to the Jiva. When it sees others suffering, the same kind of abhimAna comes in.
We don't hesitate to spray and kill thousands of mosquitoes.
The selfishness is also inherent nature of the Jivas. Is that right?
sharIramAdyaH khalu dharmasAdhanam. So for our survival and happy sustenance, we perform these acts and so we need not feel guilty about that.
There was a corollary question. The incident of 9-11. Can it be explained with the boy's point of view or without bringing pApa, puNya and prArabdha?
The answer is no, because of the complexity of the issue. Can we explain complex analysis at the level of a small boy - the answer is "no".
We cannot approach this in the manner of reductio ad absurdum. There is no laukik way of approach for this. God brings together all those who had that prArabdha to go thru and gave the result that they deserved. He had no selfish motive in that. Hence no cruelty. The only laukik approach we can take here is that it brings the universal awareness and warns the humanity of the dreadfulness of such inhuman acts and keeps us alert.
The alarm and dreadfulness in an incident springs from our association to our own species as well. In case of killing thousands of mosquitoes, we would never think "I could have been in that situation of the mosquitoes". But in case of 9-11, the thought "I could have been in that situation of the victims" lurks behind in our minds.
==========
Shri KrishNArpaNamastu
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