Sincerely In Search Of Truth!

Dear All,

I have a very intense desire to know the Truth. I am ready to take it even if it is painful to digest. I wont say that I am not hurt by pain, but I will surely say that I would welcome that pain if that’s what is required to know the truth. All my childhood life, I had been subconsciously searching out for the truth and after that in my youthhood, I have been very consciously searching out for the Truth. I just have to know the Truth! Perhaps such a quest is termed as philosophical, but I don’t really care what it is termed as by others. All I know is “I want to know the Truth”.

With this background, perhaps my readers can now appreciate why I painstakingly right logical arguments in a lot of articles. However, I would like to add that understanding God is by definition of God, beyond logic. This statement suddenly seems to deflate all the high sounding things I have written in the first para.. but if you think deep enough, it just gets us back to the question “am I ready to accept the truth even though it doesn’t make sense to me at this moment?” Note that we are talking about truth, that which exists without any other support. Truth is truth whether one likes it or not.

However, it also does not mean that one cannot understand anything about God. Saying that it is beyond logic does not mean that there are no other means. The other means we will come to later once there is an honest acceptance of the limitations of logic to understand or express something beyond its domain. Any elementary logician will accept that. One cannot prove properties on fractions in a logical system that defines only integers and transformations on them. Similarly, one cannot prove properties of the inconceivable potencies of God with a logical system that only defines conceivable things and their conceivable transformations. Unless one accepts the limitations of contemporary scientific logic, how can one wholeheartedly focus on a superior logic that explains God quite easily. Why? Because that logic is based on the axiom that God exists and has inconceivable qualities!

No logician can logically argue against an axiomatic system for the simple reason that all practical logical systems are axiomatic. The number theory (who has not heard about it?) is based on the undefined axiom of the point. So, does that mean arithmetic is not a valid truth? In fact, throughout the (quite short) history of modern science, the observations have come first, the hypothesis next, and then the logical systems that were built around the observations so as to mathematically model the perceivable observations. And remember, these logical systems are all based on unverifiable or undefined assumptions which are called axioms!

Modern science accepts (should accept) a theory (or a logical system) only when that theory explains all observable events in that particular domain. Even if the theory is based on axioms (which it always is), as long as it can explain all observations in the particular domain, that theory has some merit. However, as soon as the theory falls short in explaining an event in that domain, the theory is no longer valid and has to be either totally rejected or modified to incorporate the new observation while still able to retain the other observations in its provables. A well known example of how well established logical and mathematical systems can prove ineffective in certain circumstances is how the laws of linear geometry don’t apply in curved spaces. For example, in curved spaces, parallel lines can meet!

But truth, by definition, is unchangeable.

What this means is that a theory constructed by a human being does not represent the truth. It represents a mathmatization (or philosophization) of the observations so far in a limited domain of human perception. And what to speak of the realm of the imperceptible? No scientist or philosopher can claim that his theory or philosophy is the last word in realizing the truth. Any theory or philosophy has to always by definition lag the truth!

This is what I want to establish by this article. That a theory or a system of logic coming out of the human brain can never claim that it is perfect. In fact such a theory will kill the modern understanding of scientific research! How will scientists earn a living if the perfect scientific theory is discovered? Perhaps this is one of the concerns of modern scientists in not accepting the perfect science of God as it is given by the spiritual masters (scientists) of the ancient times. The truth never changes and thus the science given by them is equally valid even today and will always be valid in the future eternally.

So then, is scientific research or philosophical research a waste of time? Yes and No. Yes, if one is concocting a hypothesis based on observations made by undoubtedly limited and imperfect senses, and then constructing a scientific theory or philosophy around it just to satisfy ones intellectual hankering and/or perhaps to get some fame. No, if the scientific research and philosophical understanding is directed towards trying to better understand the already well known and universally accepted Absolute Truth – The Supreme Personality of Godhead!

Having said this, I want to assert that the intent of this particular article is not to prove that God exists or to get into an argument with those who believe otherwise. As I have already mentioned clearly earlier in this article, any theory, whether proposing the existence of God or proposing His non-existence, coming from the limited human intellect, is bound to be imperfect. However, the truth remains irrespective of whether we have a theory that supports it or not. And the human endeavor should be to find out what it is!

Once reaching this mutual understanding that there in no evidence that any theory coming from human intellect can possibly explain all that exists, all the parties involved will be forced to think of alternative ways to find out the truth. This I am saying assuming that all parties are really interested in the truth and not in personal fame and/or in gratifying their own intellectual hankerings.

So, what is the way to get perfect knowledge? The Bhagavad Gita comes to our rescue! Just ask someone who knows it, a bona fide spiritual master, because he has seen the truth! He has seen it because he followed the instructions of his own spiritual master. And so on.. And the original spiritual master is? Yes, you guessed it – God! In the absence of any evidence contrary to this, one has no choice but to accept this method. It saves time too! For a person eager to know the Truth, this is exactly the method. If one carefully analyses this system of ways and means and the ultimate goal (achieving love of God), and carefully studies under the guidance of the bona fide spiritual master, then that person will no doubt realize that this system is more robust than any that has ever been built by modern science. He will realize that this is as scientific (or even more so) than the so called scientific theories of modern science.

But, that initial step forward is required. One has to start following the process to appreciate the system and the philosophy. Any sincere seeker of the truth will take this step, but not those who are not really looking for the truth.

Let me conclude with this : I am not against science. But I am also very much eager to know the truth. And I rather take it from a source that has never got amended (Vedic literature) as instructed by a pure saintly person than from a source that has always proven to be inadequate (modern science with its innumerable amendments) practiced by people full of desires for personal fame and glory and who would not hesitate to change their experimental observations just to prove a theory that they have proposed.

Thank you,
Abhijit.