Reincarnation and the Indian belief systems

The concept of reincarnation has always intrigued and fascinated man.  It has brought many believers into its fold over hundreds of years of human existence to alter or reinforce their core belief systems. This belief system has been propounded and existed since a little more than a couple of thousand years. The belief of Reincarnation exists in different organised religions across the world mainly eastern religions (apart from the Hindu faith) such as Buddhism, Jainism (albeit in a different form). Hindu belief system or the Sanathana Dharma which encompasses a wide range of belief systems proposed this concept through the Upanishads. There is no mention of reincarnation as a concept in the Rig Veda, the oldest written document (to be found till date in human recorded history).  Rig Vedas are believed to have been created by a series of enlightened Sages, sometime between 3500 years ago and 5000 years ago. The Vedas mainly consist of offerings and communion with the gods (Agni, Indra, etc.), attained as a result of various sacrifices offered with the chanting of hymns. The Upanishads which were thought to have been composed between 800 BCE and 500 BCE, were probably the first to propound the theory of reincarnation. The Upanishads had started to question the traditional Vedic religious order and an attempt was made in these texts to shift the focus of  spiritual life from external rites and sacrifices to internal spiritual quests in the search for answers.

The believers are attracted to this concept  as it provides an explanation about the differences that exist among people such as those that are born very rich or those in dire poverty, or in various diseased or deformed human conditions that one is born into. It is not under one’s control how one is born into this world. Some have success without being religious, others are constant losers, despite their religious adherence. If one is born in a poor family or one is born a leper or with some serious deformity, reincarnation explains that these are the results of past actions in previous lives. The bad deeds of the previous birth are passed on to this birth, thereby explaining away the unfortunate circumstances that one has to endure in the present life. On the other hand, reincarnation concept is also another way of negating the monotheistic teaching of the final judgment by a holy God, for sinners to be condemned to suffer in eternal hell. The reincarnation belief system motivates a person to do good deeds in the present life so that the benefit can be reaped in the next life.

Similarly, if one has to attain good births in future lives, one has to commit or do good karma in their present lives. The concept of Karma, which literally means “action”, is the idea that all actions have consequences, good or bad. Karma determines the conditions of the next life, just like our life is conditioned by our previous karma. There is no judgement or forgiveness, simply an impersonal, natural and eternal law operating in the universe. Those who do good will be reborn in better conditions while those who are evil will be reborn in worse conditions. Perhaps as an animal, perhaps as a human, perhaps as a god, but always in a regular cycle of deaths and resurrections.

As a necessary aid in explaining the reincarnation mechanism, Vedanta explains the concept of a “subtle body” (sukshma-sharira) which is attached to atman or soul as long as its bondage lasts. This “subtle body” is the actual carrier of karmic debts. The facts recorded by the “subtle body” are a sum of hidden tendencies or impressions (samskara) imprinted by karma as seeds that will generate future behaviour and personal character. They will materialize unconsciously in the life of the individual, without giving one any hint at understanding his or her actual condition. There can be no form of transmitting conscious memory from one life to another, since it belongs to the world of illusion and dissolves at death. In the Samkhya and Yoga darshanas, the entity that reincarnates is “purusha”, an equivalent of atman or soul. Yoga Sutra (2,12) defines a similar mechanism of transmitting the effects of karma from one life to another, as was the case in Vedanta. The reservoir of karmas is called “karmashaya”. This deposit of karma merely serves as a mechanism for adjusting the effects of karma in one’s life.

Passing from one life to another life is like the shifting of a dream. In between births, the individual soul spends time in the astral regions, sometimes just wandering and frittering time away, and sometimes in learning and evolving so the next life will be better and wiser than the previous one. This time spent in this intermediate state can be anything from a matter of hours to centuries and even thousands of years. This is precisely determined by one’s karma.

Bhagavad Gita (2:18-21) says, “Bodies are said to die, but That which possesses the body is eternal. It cannot be limited, or destroyed. Some say this Atman is slain, and others call It the slayer: they know nothing. How can It slay or who shall slay It? Know this, Atman is unborn, undying, never ceasing, never beginning, deathless, birth-less, unchanging for ever. It is within all, and it is without all.” Further, “Just as the self, advances through childhood, youth and old age in its physical body, so it advances to another body after death. The wise person is not confused by this change called death (2,13). Just as the body casts off worn out clothes and puts on new ones, so the infinite, immortal self, casts off worn out bodies and enters into new ones (2,22).

There are many accounts of death or near death related experiences by people that have led many to believe strongly in the concept of reincarnation. Brihadaranyaka Upanishad (4:4:1,2) explains that “The person in the throes of death neither sees, nor smells, nor tastes. He does not speak he does not hear. He does not think; he does not know. For all the organs, detaching themselves from his physical body, unite with his subtle body. Then the point of his heart, where the nerves join, is lighted by the light of the Self, and by that light he departs either through the eye, or through the gate of the skull, or through some other aperture of the body. When he thus departs, life departs; and when life departs, all the functions of the vital principle depart. The Self remains conscious, and, conscious, the dying man goes to his abode. The deeds of this life, and the impressions they leave behind, follow him.”

Shvetashvatara Upanishad says that, “Reincarnation is the practical way in which one reaps the fruits of one's deeds. By means of thought, touch, sight and passions and by the abundance of food and drink there are birth and development of the (embodied) self. According to his deeds, the embodied self assumes successively various forms in various conditions.

The Puranas provide a clearer picture of the specifics according to each kind of “bad acts” or "sin" one commits. For example, Garuda Puranas (17,50-57), states that, “Those men who are intent upon wisdom go to the highest goal; the sinfully-inclined go miserably to the torments of Yama. Thus the makers of bad karma, having experienced the tortures of hell, are born with the residues of their sins, in these stated forms. Then, obtaining for thousands of lives the bodies of animals, they suffer from carrying burdens and other miseries. Having experienced as a bird the misery of cold, rain and heat, he afterwards reaches the human state, when the good and evil are balanced. Birth and death are the lot of all embodied beings; thus turns the wheel in the four kingdoms of beings. As the wheel of time turns, so mortals revolve by my magic. They revolve at one time of earth, at another in hell, held fast by the noose of karma. He who does not mike gifts becomes poverty--stricken and through poverty he commits sin; by the force of sin he goes to hell, and is again born in poverty and again becomes sinful. Karma which has been made, whether good or evil, must inevitably be suffered. Karma not suffered does not fade away even in tens of millions of ages.”

Similar specific punishments are stated by The Laws of Manu (12, 54-69). As the karmic debt one recorded in the past is considerably large, a single life is not enough to consume it. Therefore, in order to attain liberation, many lives become a necessity. The external intervention of a god or a human guru is useless since it would compromise the role of karma.

In order that one can be “rid of” or “escape” the cycle of births and deaths (i.e., reincarnation), one has to attain the highest form of self-realization that is possible in highly evolved beings. This is the true and ultimate realization of a soul or atman. Brihadaranyaka Upanishad (4:4:6) says that “But he in whom desire is stilled suffers no rebirth. After death, having attained to the highest, desiring only the Self, he goes to no other world. Realizing Brahman, he becomes Brahman.”

In the Bhagwad Gita, Krishna says, (Chapter 8, Verse 16) “from the highest planet in the material world down to the lowest, all are places of misery wherein repeated birth and death takes place. But one who attains to My abode, O son of Kunti, never takes birth again” and in (Chapter 2, Verse 13), “as the embodied soul continually passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. The self-realized soul is not deluded by such a change.”

The narrow escape of a 'cool' tech-savvy retiree

I have always prided myself to be a 'cool' tech-savvy person.  I was preening around tutoring every non computer literate person, at every available opportunity, helping on troubleshooting the computer application problems and even on the newer mobile phone technicalities.  I had become a sort of “go-to” person in my close family and friends circles for all technology related advice.  All this was well documented and things were running pretty smooth, until the day of the reckoning which arrived sooner than expected.  It all began one lazy afternoon, when I was in a deep slumber after having partaken a rather heavy lunch.  I was jolted awake by an insistent phone call from an unknown number.  As was my post lunch custom, a siesta had become a regular thing after my retirement.

The caller was a plain spoken gentle male voice speaking in Hindi from my Bank advising me of an apparent mistake in my insurance premium paid through my credit card.  The premium amount would be debited every month instead of one time payment, he said.  I was rudely awakened.  I expressed some doubt which he clarified hurriedly mumbling that this was an oversight that happens to most people.  He explained the technicality of rectifying the error by asking me to open the bank app and change some of the controls and settings.   I had become a putty in the hands of the caller with absolutely no idea of the things he was saying.  I listened to him intently while changing all the parameters on which he advised me.  He had sent me a WhatsApp message from the Bank containing a file.  He asked me to install the file and click send.  I tried doing just that.  The send message was not going through.  He asked me to change the settings in the phone to install ‘unknown’ files.  I did just that.  You would think that I was dumb enough to follow all that he said.  In my defence, I would say that his voice was mesmerizing and so helpful that I went along with his tone.  At this  exact moment, the alarm bells in my mind had started ringing.  It was the Archimedes' “Eureka” moment.   The sixth sense in me was working overtime to compensate for the rookie mistake I was about to commit. It had dawned on me at the 'nth' moment that I had not made payment of any Insurance premium lately using my bank credit card.   Then, what was it I had been doing all along, my mind was now wide awake from the deep slumber. 

I nimbly disconnected the phone and tried blocking the unknown caller.  The caller kept ringing several times and I kept rejecting his calls.   Now fully awake to the fraudulent transaction that I was about to commit, I realised the enormity of my blunder and swiftly started undoing all that I was asked to change on my phone.  For good measure, I blocked all internet transactions on my bank credit card.  I dashed off an email to my bank explaining the situation.

All my world around me had come tumbling down in that instant.  Luckily I had escaped from the skin of my teeth.  All was not lost still.  However, all  my confidence had evaporated and I felt I was the most lame and gullible person to have been a willing participant in my own doom. 

A fitting lesson learned.  Ever since the incident I have stopped receiving phone calls from unknown callers.  I am very cleverly diverting it to my spouse to help me out in dealing with the unknown callers.   I am no longer the 'cool' tech-savvy person that I had deemed myself to be all along.  So be it.  

Stray thoughts on ‘what constitutes Happiness’

In a recent article, what I read about ‘Happiness’, made me think deep and apply it to my own life. The article went on, “Happiness is the ultimate purpose of our existence, whether as a conscious or unconscious decision. It is every human being's inalienable right. Yet, how do we measure happiness? It comes in so many different forms and for such diverse reasons that there can never be a consensus of what constitutes happiness.” The words rang true.   The author had so eloquently expressed it.  When I looked up on the Wikipedia and many other resources (Thank God for Google!) there were numerous and confusing definitions of what constituted happiness and I felt that the subject was too complex for a confused layman, like me, to handle; in effect, there was no consensus on the definition of happiness as concluded by the above said author.

Man, has lived and survived in this World for thousands of years, yet, if happiness is the ultimate purpose of all our existence, is there no simple answer to this perennial question of how to be happy?

I held this thought.  A beautiful quote had stuck with me, in my sub-conscious mind for a long time. 

“It is so simple to be happy….. yet it is so difficult to be simple”.  This was a quote from a Hindi movie of yesteryear “Bawarchi”, a cult classic from the inimitable Hrishikesh Mukherjee. Although, this truism had a deep sense of meaning and suggested an elaborate word play, in effect, this implied to me, that simplicity, could be the answer to happiness.  If one leads a simple life with no material wants or desires; following asceticism, good virtues and moral character, life would be much simpler and thereby hangs a tale; Man, can be happy, if he chooses to remain simple.

It is not in my character to give up on the material wants and desires; I do not wish to lead an ascetic’s life, though I believe I have strong moral character and have some fine virtues.  Excuse me, it is not that I crave to own a palatial bungalow in Sadashivanagar or own a high-end Merc or BMW or Audi or even travel around the world, first class.  There is no end to what a person can crave for and the World can offer.  I, on other hand, would love to enjoy the material and mundane pleasures, life has to offer, within the limited resources, I have. I am digressing.

The more I thought about it, the more I felt that, happiness, is after all, one’s state of mind.  When we are at peace with our inner self and surrounded by Nature’s wonders, perhaps, a wave of ‘well-being’ emotions would sweep over us (could I say this is happiness, or may be, one would call it euphoria?); On the other extreme, just as an illustration, when we are walking on the street, in a heavy traffic zone filled with smoke emanating from vehicles; and we see dirt and squalor strewn all around, an opposite kind of wave, perhaps, nausea, would sweep over us, making us feel unpleasant; could this constitute unhappiness during that moment?  Is this too simplistic an explanation, for what happiness or unhappiness could mean to ordinary humans?

Have we all not heard the famous quote, that ‘darkness’ is the absence of light?  Similarly, in my mind, the absence of inner strife (our devilish thoughts and conflicting emotions) and/or the absence of problems/issues we face in our daily life, constitutes happiness. Apart from this, I really do not understand, what one would call happiness.  May be, an ascetic who is in deep penance in the Himalayan jungles would understand the term happiness in a better perspective.  I, for one, cannot. In that sense, in my present state, I am profoundly happy, thank you!

Bicycle chronicles

The complex neural networks within my brain do not properly extend and complete the circuit for memories to flow. As retirement has made me happy, lazy and contended, my mind seems to be losing its grip; the process of forgetting things has just hastened up, since turning the retirement age. Surprise, surprise! I can still remember things of the distant past to a minute detail. I don’t know how things work inside the brains’ neural networks; only a neuro-scientist can explain this phenomenon with any degree of accuracy. Apologies, I am rambling on, unconnected to the story I am about to relate!

The other day, I saw a wizened old man riding a rather poorly maintained rusty old bicycle. It was a ‘Raleigh’ cycle and it appeared to be decades old. Memories flooded back to my younger days when I had dreamt of owning a ‘Raleigh’ cycle. That was not to be. I never owned a bicycle with my own money or my father's money.  I learnt cycling with my uncle’s ‘Rallis’ bicycle (though not a ‘Raleigh’ brand in the strict sense, but somewhat nearer I suppose) on the streets of Bengaluru. The streets were deserted back then; it was easy to learn cross-legged cycling, at the beginning. This is a complex way to learn balancing. The first hard lesson I learnt was holding the hand brake lever while simultaneously holding the bar grip. When I slackened the brake lever grip somewhat, the bicycle would veer off- control and knock some pedestrians on the street. Many a few pedestrians have had a lucky break or two, darting here and there during my bicycle learning days. Some of the pedestrians let me off easily without fuss, while some others glared hard at me hard with a few gripes for trying to learn the bicycle on the streets. Falling off of the bicycle innumerable times, I finally graduated to riding half-resting on the bar (the bar connects the seat to the handle). Once I gained mastery over cross legged cycling and bar-riding, the final step was hopping on to the seat and balancing the bicycle. It was an exhilarating experience. The next logical step was balancing the bicycle without holding the handle bars and riding out in style, inviting the harsh scowl of the senior pedestrians!

As I never owned a bicycle, the alternative was renting out a bicycle at the rate of 60 Paisa per hour. The bicycle renter wanted a deposit of Re.1, so that we don’t ride away with the bicycle. Riding out on the rented bicycle and exploring newer roads and neighbourhoods was a very popular pastime, amongst young boys of my era. As my parents invariably did not want me to spend more time outside, I had to sometimes settle for half-an-hour renting of the bicycle (at 30 Paisa only).

However, life has been more than fair to me. One of my uncles gifted me his used ‘Rallis’ bicycle when he himself graduated to owning a Scooter. This gifted bicycle was my pride and joy until I completed my college study and landed my first job. I rode the same bicycle for the first six months (or so) into my new job with my head held high while most of my other colleagues were travelling by local city bus!

Once on a joyride, I was speeding down the street, taking my hands off the handle-grip; the front wheel encountered sand particles on the road and gave away sliding!  I was thrown off the bicycle and landed on my elbow.  It was a serious fracture and that ended my cycling days!

The Mouse Hunt

The Mouse Hunt

The small mammal close to humans, the house mouse, can cause extreme reactions in us, humans, if they infest our homes. There was one such house mouse which had invaded our home recently and stayed put for more than two weeks. You may not believe it, the tiny rodent started playing with all our human emotions and created short circuits in our brains. I am not exaggerating. All of us, in our family were on tenterhooks, waiting to explode at any time, due to the ruckus created by the tiny mouse. To be fair to the mouse, all this was not the fault of the tiny rodent, it was just living its life under our auspices, enjoying the warmth of the refrigerator motor unit cubicle and the cool climes of the kitchen cupboards.

It all began on a rainy day, when the weather was cool in Bangalore. We thought, Bangalore was slowly regaining its original rainy climate (the climate that existed so many decades ago) when the days were rainy and the skies overcast. Our home was cool and dark. We had to switch on the lights to lighten the gloom inside our home. On one such gloomy day, while cooking lunch, my wife noticed some sounds emanating in the kitchen cabinets below the granite kitchen platform. When she told me that, this could be the handiwork of a house mouse, I was aghast. I told her, she was imagining things. The problem, was, as always, my sceptical behaviour. I do not believe in things, until I see them with my own eyes. My wife was insistent, that I was wrong, as usual. The kind of light banter that happens routinely in most households, continued between husband and wife, back and forth.  The next day, she told me that more sounds were coming from the cupboard and she was quite certain this time, as she had seen the mouse with her own eyes, scurrying within the cupboard, when she had the cupboard door open to pick some house hold items from there. It was my turn again to be adamant. I told her that her imagination was running riot, she had better rein in her imagination.  She scoffed and challenged me to open the cupboard door and verify it for myself. I am normally hesitant to challenge the rodent family or for that matter even the roach family or lizard family. I have to admit to myself, (not in front my wife, of course) that I am, rather scared of the house pests. Not that, I would run away from them, if found in the vicinity; only that, I would not dare to put myself in the pests’ path and go looking for them in cupboards or elsewhere. As usual, my wife accused me of being less of a man, if I dare not shoo away the mouse from our home. She felt vindicated with her assessment, when I refused smugly to look into the kitchen cupboard.

As can be expected, the mouse had to venture out of its hiding place, in search of food some day. Within the next two or three days after its first sighting, the mouse came out from the kitchen cupboard and scurried into the room. Even then, I did not notice the mouse. Only from the reactions of those around, I could gather that a lightning bolt had hit in the vicinity. This time around, I was convinced that there was, indeed, some pest, going about the house and a strong, positive action, was required from me. Being the man of the house, I retrieved the mouse trap from the loft and gathered all my wits for setting the bait using the mousetrap. I searched for some help online, looking for a perfect bait that would attract the mouse into the trap. Some of them had suggested, cheese would be the best bait to trap the mouse. We did not have cheese in the house, so the next alternative we had, was, a small toffee. The bait was set and the trap kept near the refrigerator, where we thought it had gone into hiding, the previous night. On the next morning, we were eager to see the result of our smart move. Nothing in the trap. The mouse was not really bothered about the toffee. Our neighbour rubbished and laughed at the idea of a toffee as bait and said, ‘no way; the mouse will not be attracted by a toffee, you are simply wasting your time’ (You see, we were so desperate that we had consulted our immediate neighbourhood looking for the best ways of trapping a house mouse). The next day, we purchased rat poison from the retailer nearby, who told us, that this is the best way to get rid of rats. We placed the rat poison nimbly near the refrigerator with a fond hope that the mouse would be dead the next morning after having tried the poison. But, our mouse was made of sterner stuff, it was, in no way attracted to the poison. The rat poison idea too, had failed to achieve its objective.

My wife reminded me of a funny story which goes something like this. It appears that Saif Ali Khan (son of Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi and Sharmila Tagore) had once taken out his shotgun to go after a colony of Indian mole rats that was pestering his neighbourhood. The story goes that Saif Ali Khan was called in every time an Indian mole rat was spotted in the neighbourhood and he was nicknamed the ‘Rat hunter’ as he had hunted down the rat every time with alacrity. His more famous father was nicknamed the ‘tiger’ as he had hunted real tigers in the jungle, while his son had followed in the footsteps of his famous father and become a ‘Rat hunter’!

Back to our mouse story. Based on one of our neighbour’s suggestion, the next day we kept a burnt dry coconut piece as bait in the mouse trap. The mouse seemed to have guessed our intentions and remained disinterested even in the dry coconut offering. The next bright suggestion came from our house maid. She said that there is a new mouse bait available in the market, called magic mouse trap or some such thing, which had an extremely sticky substance smeared on a piece of cardboard. She purchased the thing and bought it for us. All we had to do was place the cardboard contraption in the path of the mouse. Our maid had all words of praise on the new mouse trapping device; she had tried it out several times with positive results. She was confident the trap would work. It seems, the bait had been manufactured in such a way, that when the mouse, scurries over the cardboard piece, all of its four feet get stuck right there. The mouse would be left whimpering for someone to rescue it from the sticky cardboard. All one had to do was, dispose of, the whimpering stuck mouse, outside of their homes. Our mouse was smarter than any of us and avoided treading on the magic cardboard for days together. We all looked like fools and were left holding the cardboard contraption without any success.

We had formed a formidable team of mouse hunters to trap the mouse. The house maid as the team lead; as man of house, I, was the second lead, wife being the chief co-ordinator and rest of the family members, the curious onlookers. All our efforts to catch the mouse had failed and the team had, almost, given up on its mission.

In the meanwhile, our smart mouse was creating havoc within our house. We were, of the impression that the mouse would just move around on the ground floor alternating between the kitchen and the room. It had no dark place to hide elsewhere in the living room. We never expected that the mouse could climb up to the first floor and invade our bedroom. It did just that! One evening we saw the mouse scamper across in our bedroom and go back to its hiding place inside my writing desk kept on the first floor living room. My writing desk held all sorts of attraction to the mouse, it was an ideal hiding place. I had stored photo albums, old books, dusting clothes, toolbox kit and many more in my writing desk drawer. There was an opening behind the writing desk, which was convenient for the mouse to hide itself within this desk drawer. I avoided sitting at my writing desk for a few days, due to the fear of disturbing the mouse or its position. The mouse had made it a habit of moving from first floor to ground floor kitchen refrigerator during the night times and staying in the writing desk during the day times without fear of any disturbance from us, the humans.

Using all our wits and with the help of suggestions from various family members and neighbours, we finally hit the jackpot after two weeks of mental torture. We set a fried piece of savoury doughnut snack as the bait in the mousetrap, by dangling it, via the small metal wire inside. The hapless mouse, at last, felt bold enough to try out the tasty snack. This was its undoing. The mouse was finally trapped and the housemaid, the team lead, disposed it off, outside our home. All the team members, heaved a huge sigh of relief and felt good for having trapped a wily house mouse which had eluded capture for over two weeks. The successful team has been disbanded for the time being!