Re: g_b About aditya, bitchiness, prophets, and impotence
Hi again Aditya,I understand what you are saying, and couldnt agree more that ritualism has overtaken spirituality for the most part, to the extent that most of the so-named prophets (no phropets !) would cringe to see what has become of their well meaning advice.Your concern about the finality of the Bahai prophet's words is so true - its borne out already by Mr. Messenger who in his latest bulletin informs us that Muhammad was the last of them, look no further.Now to the meat of it - You say that you posed your rhetorical question about further prophets in the 'crassest' way because "only when asked in this manner will it provoke a response that exposes the hollowness of the rituals, semantics, and dogmas of all religious faiths". Did it work ? Did it provoke a response that exposed the hollowness of religious rituals ? No, it did not. It simply hurt some people, while others deleted it in irritation and disgust. If your question were not impolite, there was more of chance that you would be taken seriously, and thence get the response you elicited. Think about it.You are without doubt, at liberty to tell off the bigots, but nothing that you have experienced in your life as a gay man, gives you the right to hurt the unbigoted. Unless you believe that innocents getting killed in military crossfire deserve no apologies.Cheers SalilAditya Bondyopadhyay [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:Dear Salil,I shall not dispute or deny your calling me crass. Sometime I feel that I am crass myself, and absolutely justify it as the freedom of my _expression_, without any remorse or regret. I am convinced that I cannot be changed, for I do not want to change. And I think I cannot be more honest than that. Thanks for writing in anyways. As to the the pointer on Baha'ul'llah, yes I have been reading up on Baha'i literature for some time, and I am generally impressed, except where Baha'ul'llah and the Ba'ab pronuces on homosexuality, and denounces it as the crudest abomination. The Lotus Temple in Delhi for almost 6 years was nearly across the road from where I stayed in Kalkaji. I have had many interesting sessions with the many people from all parts of the world who flock there. What really rankled me is the virulence of the Baha'i dictates against homosexuality, when juxtaposed agains the general message of peace, harmony, and tolerance that permeates the Baha'i faith otherwise. But more interestingly in your pointer is the line 'I'm their final consumation'. The finality of those innocent words will become the dogma of tomorrow when there will be a few hundred million more Baha'is in the world. Its a growing religion, only over a century old. Much like Islam was at one point. At that time when it was a youth of a religion, Islam was more concerned with the message and less with the dogma and the semantics of finality of its own phrophet. But the similarity is uncanny. Phrophets of all hues seem to be convinced of the finality and the end of phrophethood with them. The 'I'm the latest, best, and only possible version from here on', is the comomon thread to making phrophesies. By the time the dogma has taken roots over the message, Baha'is would also be calling for the blood of the newest phrophet in the horoizon, and his followers. The newest phrophet would be as much an apostate to the Baha'is as Baha'ul'llah was to the muslims of Iran. And by the way another prophet is the leader of the Ahmediya sect, founded by Hadhrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1835-1908) in a small and remote village, Qadian, inPunjab, India, who also followed after Phrophet Muhammad. Read more at http://www.alislam.org/introduction/index.htmlWhich brings me toyour reading of why I asked the question on God not producing any more Prophets. I certainly was not simply curious about religious tradition. I know the tradition, of most major religions, and to be really honest, am not impressed. I posed a rhetorical question in the 'crassest' way because only when asked in this manner will it provoke a response that exposes the hollowness of the rituals, semantics, and dogmas of all religious faiths. The real message of religions remains important, the adherent sadly do not give half ounce of shit about the real message. They are just concerned with establishing their one upmanship, using mindless and mind numbing rituals as a weapon, and often by the process of finding the external enemy to beat up. Established religions and Fascism have an uncanny similarity in the way they ritualise everything and find some enemy to target. As a homosexual person, I have been beaten up enough number of times by religions and the religious, to have earned my right to be crass. If this offends you, then its a clash between your offence and mine, your pain and mine, and your hurt and mine, so I dont really care. A bigot ina gay listserve will be told off, very
Re: g_b About aditya, bitchiness, prophets, and impotence
I simply wonder if hetrosexuals do carry this much pride in just being themslves as hetrosexuals. Just to gain more confidence in oneself, this is much more deeper in identifying oneself as individual with normal living is no lesser than what regligion Guru's have done in respective era. Some people just live for the sake of it. My father used to say inmy childhood "You live as an living thing, differentiate urself from others in either way if not all" Aditya,I really appreciate the confidence you carry on ur shoulder which has such strong base that no one can really deter it.Share more of ur perspective on different aspects of life, what you feel. Otherwise I read a lot about it thru various medium.AngelAditya Bondyopadhyay [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:Dear Salil,I shall not dispute or deny your calling me crass. Sometime I feel that I am crass myself, and absolutely justify it as the freedom of my _expression_, without any remorse or regret. I am convinced that I cannot be changed, for I do not want to change. And I think I cannot be more honest than that. Thanks for writing in anyways. As to the the pointer on Baha'ul'llah, yes I have been reading up on Baha'i literature for some time, and I am generally impressed, except where Baha'ul'llah and the Ba'ab pronuces on homosexuality, and denounces it as the crudest abomination. The Lotus Temple in Delhi for almost 6 years was nearly across the road from where I stayed in Kalkaji. I have had many interesting sessions with the many people from all parts of the world who flock there. What really rankled me is the virulence of the Baha'i dictates against homosexuality, when juxtaposed agains the general message of peace, harmony, and tolerance that permeates the Baha'i faith otherwise. But more interestingly in your pointer is the line 'I'm their final consumation'. The finality of those innocent words will become the dogma of tomorrow when there will be a few hundred million more Baha'is in the world. Its a growing religion, only over a century old. Much like Islam was at one point. At that time when it was a youth of a religion, Islam was more concerned with the message and less with the dogma and the semantics of finality of its own phrophet. But the similarity is uncanny. Phrophets of all hues seem to be convinced of the finality and the end of phrophethood with them. The 'I'm the latest, best, and only possible version from here on', is the comomon thread to making phrophesies. By the time the dogma has taken roots over the message, Baha'is would also be calling for the blood of the newest phrophet in the horoizon, and his followers. The newest phrophet would be as much an apostate to the Baha'is as Baha'ul'llah was to the muslims of Iran. And by the way another prophet is the leader of the Ahmediya sect, founded by Hadhrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1835-1908) in a small and remote village, Qadian, inPunjab, India, who also followed after Phrophet Muhammad. Read more at http://www.alislam.org/introduction/index.htmlWhich brings me toyour reading of why I asked the question on God not producing any more Prophets. I certainly was not simply curious about religious tradition. I know the tradition, of most major religions, and to be really honest, am not impressed. I posed a rhetorical question in the 'crassest' way because only when asked in this manner will it provoke a response that exposes the hollowness of the rituals, semantics, and dogmas of all religious faiths. The real message of religions remains important, the adherent sadly do not give half ounce of shit about the real message. They are just concerned with establishing their one upmanship, using mindless and mind numbing rituals as a weapon, and often by the process of finding the external enemy to beat up. Established religions and Fascism have an uncanny similarity in the way they ritualise everything and find some enemy to target. As a homosexual person, I have been beaten up enough number of times by religions and the religious, to have earned my right to be crass. If this offends you, then its a clash between your offence and mine, your pain and mine, and your hurt and mine, so I dont really care. A bigot ina gay listserve will be told off, very crassly. God can go take a back seat while I speak to his bigots. Best, Aditya On 22/04/06, Salil [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Manoj,The word Impotent is most commonly used to denote the inability to get an erection, or more generally, to denote powerlessness. It is definitely not used to denote inability per se. It is a word that is bound to raise the hackles of those people on the list who choose to believe in God. Using Aditya's own lingo, this irritation is faitth-based and not logical in nature. I feel you are ascribing noble motives to Aditya's email when in fact there are none. He simply seems curious about why religious tradition has not thrown up any prophets or messiahs after muhammad (which
