Page Text
________________
of my trust in them, I would have to say that I believe that Dr. Wasir is a good man, which actually means that I hope that he is a good man. I hope, because I do not know him yet. It is only when I come to know who he really is, through what he does, that I know that he is a good man. If he keeps his word, if he is responsible, if he is truthful, if he is honest, if he is reliable, if he has a compassionate heart, I will know that he is a decent person. All these things I come to know only through direct practical experience. When I have that adequate practical experience, I do not say, “I believe he is a good man." I do not have to believe, I do not have to hope because I know directly. So belief is a bridge between the known and the unknown. You approach it through hope and through search. Through dedication it becomes deeper and deeper. Semantically you can call it faith.
Faith means commitment and there is no such thing as blind faith. Blind faith ultimately results in blind stupidity or fanaticism. However, any faith starts with a blind acceptance. For example, if you tell me that there is a place called Jamalpur and I do not accept or believe or hope that there is a place called Jamalpur, then I will never take a few steps to go towards the direction where Jamalpur is supposed to be. So at first, belief is acceptance, but if with that, I make no move forward, I am being a total hypocrite or just plain stupid or dishonest. It is only when I go, make a move, make an effort to search and find out whether there really is a place called Jamalpur that belief becomes faith. That is the commitment, that is the search, that is the dedication, that is the reality of belief. That is called faith. So the reality of acceptance is only through the result of the search; until then, you can only say, "'I hope so".
There are many practical things that you should know. We can, for example, look at a statement like "everybody has his own truth". Nobody has his own truth, because truth is universal and eternal. There are different approaches to truth, there are different experiences of truth, there are different opinions about truth.
I will give you a simple example. In this room, let us say that it is 24° C. I feel it is rather hot. Now, to a person who is a bit sick, it will be rather cool. To a person who has come walking rapidly, it is quite hot. But that does not mean that the
94
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
| SR No. | 014011 |
| Book Title | Yoga Sagar |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Paramhamsa Satyananda |
| Publisher | Bihar School of Yoga Munger |
| Publication Year | 1994 |
| Total Pages | 436 |
| Language | English |
| Classification | Seminar & Articles |
| File Size | 24 MB |