June 27, 2025
Prayers are prayers addressed by man to God! Why do we label them Hindu prayers, Muslim prayers or Christian prayers? The language is different, but the content, the message, is the same.
We use even these words — Hindu, Muslim, Christian — indiscriminately. Out of these are mine fashions images, masks. These masks then collide, bringing about disharmony, conflict and violence someone defined Hindu as one who has banished ‘himsa’ (violence) from his heart. A Muslim is one who has surrendered himself to God. A Christian is one who loves God and loves his fellow man these words whose meaning is identical, if you are sincerely looking for the meaning and not the excuse to distinguish yourself from the other and to distinguish yourself above the other!
Such indiscriminate discrimination is a sign of ignorance. But what is ignorance? Is it not an object or an entity which is supposed to obstruct our vision. Ignorance is a type of knowledge that tells us that we are looking in the wrong direction or through the wrong glasses which pervert our vision. (Hence it is denoted by the negatively-worded a-vidya or a-jnana in Sanskrit.) We are looking: but not in the right direction and in the right perspective and not bother 'meet' a brother-seeker professing another faith; and even if we do meet him, we look at him and his face through the glasses of prejudice and in discriminant discrimination. If we abandon this we might still see the distinguishing characteristic of 'our' faith, without even wishing to distinguish ourselves or consider ourselves as superior or inferior! Allah in Arabic is God in English and Ishvara in Sanskrit: the words are different, the languages are different, the spelling is different: but they denote the one Truth.
The mind, when it analyzes itself, will not easily accept its defects. The thief will not confess his hidden guilt to you! You will have to take him to a magistrate or a politician who will get the truth from him. Only buddhi or God can discover one's faults.