Religiosity & Spirituality

Too much religiosity is proving to be a bane, rather than a boon, to mankind. In his famous novel, 'The Gospel According to Jesus Christ', Portuguese Nobel laureate Jose Saramago stated tellingly, 'Mankind has had enough of religiosity. It needs spirituality, but not the kind of spirituality we've been led to believe in. It's the spirituality of a compassionate and all-encompassing heart sans an iota of the so-called divinity.'

Yes, that Universal Spiritual Spirit of Aldous Huxley and Carl Gustav Jung can save the embattled mankind. Like love, spirituality is the most overused and misinterpreted word in our lingo. True spirituality sees no disparity. The root of all turmoil and unrest is disparity - in wealth, religions and sects, and in understanding others' viewpoints.

A spiritually educated, evolved and enlightened person will see a world in a grain of sand. And, a heaven in a wild flower, to use William Blake's metaphor from 'Auguries of Innocence'. Remember, religiosity shrinks but spirituality swells. Spirituality engenders empathy, universal empathy at that. Persian mystic Anwari called it Qahtif - an archaic Persian mystical word that connotes universality of emotions that paved the way for Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam, the world is one family, of Eastern consciousness.