Friday, January 17, 2014

The Power of Division in Religion - By Brendan.

I have many favorite bloggers whom I love to read and reread. And with the lady bug smiling at me, I have earned friendships of some of them as well. One such amazing thought provoking blogger is Brendan who authors Brandy, Whiskey & All That. A friend and guide, he had to be on my blog, I thought. And I hatched a wicked plan of having him here. So, one morning I pinged him and with quivering fingers I typed a message asking him to be a guest writer for CoffeeBeans. So, much for my wickedness. Being the sweet soul he is he typed a smiling "COOL" in reply. And here he is with a powerful post on power and supremacy of religion. I wont say anything further, its here for you to read. 



The Power of Division in Religion




The communal riots in the Central African Republic (C.A.R.) are not recent news. Muslims and Christians had been living in a state of unrest since its colonial power, France, granted them Independence. The nation that had been ruled by successive Christian governments till now was seized by Muslim rebels who installed Michel Djotodia as their leader. This man then disbanded his rebel group to bring peace to the country but to no avail. Both sides continue to fight and kill each other. The African Union and France who have sent in troops to maintain peace have realized that they underestimated the level of hatred that the two communities had for each other. Instead of minor sectarian violence, this situation had turned out to be ‘ingrained hatred’ that was cultivated in both communities. The last update by the BBC was that the rebel leader had stepped down due to pressure from neighbouring nations in order for the parliament to elect an interim leader.
Though we have seen it in India too, strained relations between Christians and Muslims seem a farce to me because it is widely believed that that the two religions along with Judaism had sprung from the same well. But today, Jews are fighting Muslims, Muslims are fighting Christians and so on and so forth. I do not mean to narrow this down to just these religions but when even their history is same, the religious matter contains the thing to a large extent and it is known for a fact that they are the branches of the same tree, then why fight?
One word: Power.
Wherever there are inter-religious tensions in the world, the one constant in the sea of variables is Power. There is a single motive for making people kill each other. As mentioned before, there may be other variables but if these problems are viewed with a magnifying glass, I bet even Sherlock Holmes would find Power to be elementary in these cases.
There are a number of examples that one can produce to make this fact clear as water but I refrain from doing so lest I find more examples of one community and less of the other, thus putting myself in the position of being called partisan. However, on browsing the internet or old records of newspapers, one is sure to find a number of riots, both in India and the world that took place for the sole reason of shifting the balance of Power.
I believe that people do not fight of their own accord, they are made to believe that their fight will be just, however incredulous that may seem. Adolf Hitler justified his war to his soldiers, so did Julius Caesar and Osama Bin Laden. It is not the religious that one needs to keep an eye out for, it s for those who would seek power in the manipulation of people. It is these serpents that lurk within and poison the society for their gain.

-By Brendan Dabhi
(Here is his latest : The prodigal Reader)
Top post on IndiBlogger.in, the community of Indian Bloggers

10 comments:

  1. Nice post Namrota, Kindly convey my compliment to your friend. :-)

    Religion is the opium of masses..said long ago and still equally relevant..

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Absolutely.

      Brandy is happy to receive your compliment :)

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  2. Now this was brilliant.
    On my way to check this blog!!
    Thank you for having him :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. He is a brilliant writer and I had to have him here :)

      Delete
  3. Very well said Namrota. As a matter of fact, those who fight for personal gains leave their religion behind and cause misery in the Society.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well, its my friend Brendan who wrote this :)

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  4. I think inclination to fight is within every one of us. Clever people tap the energy to serve their own interest. We need to be careful not to fall in the trap. However, this is easier said than done. Because nature plays itself out in certain predetermined fashion.

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    Replies
    1. Sir, you talk of the beast within, which is so graphically illustrated in the 'Lord of the Flies.' Yes, I too believe it is indeed so and that cunning people use this massive energy to propel their own vested interests.

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  5. Well brandy,as per my opinion it is not always a matter of power,sometimes it is a matter of survival also,it depends from which side you look upon it.

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    Replies
    1. Sir, there is always another angle. But in most cases, as you must have no doubt observed, 'survival' is just an excuse to tilt the base of power in favour of somebody else.

      Delete

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