Enquiry Beats Belief
Questioner: Sir, I was born in a Brahman family. And from the very start, the idea of spiritualism, the idea of having a belief system in God, has been engraved inside of me. That is my very upbringing. But recently, over the past few months, there’s been a crisis inside of me. It raises a question: which side is the right one? I have shifted between these two sides of mind.
As you have quoted in your book, Truth Without Apology, “Spiritualism is not an escape. It is a gentle light that guides us through our daily lives.” But let’s say there are two persons, one of them has a belief system, he is religious, he’s into spiritualism, and he seeks positivity and hope by means of God. And there is another person who is a man of logic, he’s a 100% reasonable, 100% rational thinker.
If we put both of them into a crisis, the first one relies on his belief system for positivity and hope. The second one tries to analyze the situation, accepts the situation, and tries to find a solution for it. Even if there is no solution, the acceptance of the situation gives him the hope and positivity he needs at that point.
So my question is: do we actually need spiritualism? Do we actually need a belief system, or is it just a mere escape for us from our problems? And if we do need spiritualism or any kind of belief system, then how can we differentiate actual spiritualism from the psychological comfort that we seek during times of crisis?
Acharya Prashant: Is there anything here that is made from belief? Any single thing here that is made from belief? This (pointing towards the mic), this (pointing towards the shirt), this (pointing towards the chair) those instruments, the watch, anything here that is made from belief? Belief obviously is a substitute to knowledge, right? When knowing is not possible, or when you don’t want to pay the price of knowing, or when your imaginations are threatened by knowing, then you want to stick to belief. Otherwise, why does one need to believe, and what can belief give you?
Anything here, does it come from belief? I’m asking you again. Point out a single object here that comes from belief. You’ll say, “But these are material objects.” All right, let me talk of your inner objects. Would you just want to believe that you have a good friend, or would you want to know that your friend is actually good? Please tell me. And if you just believe that you have a good friend, won’t you find yourself deceived or let down at critical points? Because you never knew. You just kept believing, and then you found yourself floored when the test came. Won’t that happen?
So forget about material things. Even in intangible things like relationships, does belief help? Can it help in anything? Please tell me. Can belief help in anything in life?
Questioner: What if we have some knowledge which is unknown to us? We are ignorant because we can’t learn everything, right?
Acharya Prashant: No. No. What do you mean by that? Give me an example.
Questioner: If I want to know about the purpose of my existence.
Acharya Prashant: So why will you believe? You will enquire, right?
Questioner: I will enquire, and if I keep enquiring, I start to get a sense of nihilism.
Acharya Prashant: You are afraid. If I enquire, then I start feeling bad, so I’ll not enquire and rather believe something that is in the air. I’ll believe something that is floating around, because when I enquire, I start feeling afraid. Now, what kind of argument is this? An argument of fear? Do you like this argument?
Again asking you, is there anything in your life where belief can have a gainful purpose? Please tell me.
Questioner: As in my case, I had a lot of down times in my life. I was very down, and belief in God, for instance, belief in God gave me a lot of hope. And so, isn’t belief related to hope in some context?
Acharya Prashant: Yeah, but then belief in an external power, God. Isn’t it first coming from belief in our internal powerlessness? So now you have a compensatory belief, and because it compensates for a pre-existing belief, you are saying this compensatory belief is wonderful.
What you’re not seeing is that you need the other belief only because first of all there is a pre-existing belief, and this pre-existing belief is so debilitating that it makes you go for another belief.
It’s like this — I’m sitting here, and I believe that there is an enemy behind me ready to stab me, and I’m shivering. And because I’m shivering and I can’t talk to you, even as you six are here, beautiful people asking me lovely questions, I find I cannot attend to this. Why? Because continuously there is a belief that behind my back lurks an invisible enemy with a dagger. That too is a belief, and hence I summon another belief and say, “No, this enemy, this negative energy, will not be able to harm me at all because there is an invisible positive energy also that I believe in.”
That positive energy is needed only because first of all you randomly believe in this negative energy. You randomly believe in your vulnerability. Are you vulnerable?
Instead of compensating for one belief with another belief, why don’t you enquire into the first debilitating belief itself?
Are you really so weak, so fragile, so brittle that you have to necessarily go through, as you said, the down times? What had befallen? What was the sheer curse? Why did you have to feel so disappointed? And what was the nature of disappointment, that disappointment could be ended with mere imagination?
“I’m so disappointed, I’m so disappointed. There is somebody behind me ready to kill me.” What do I need to take care of this disappointment and fear? Nothing, just close my eyes and believe that there is somebody else protecting me. How amusing is that!
If I am not all right, should I not first enquire into my dependencies? You are not born to be internally weak. If you are feeling internally weak, instead of rushing after belief, shouldn’t you enquire why you are feeling internally weak?
Maybe you are feeling internally weak because you are carrying random expectations, dependencies, or greed, right? When you carry all those things, those things weaken you from within. But instead of dropping those things, you go and pray and start feeling relaxed that now you’ll be taken care of by an invisible energy. Please tell me.
I don’t want to offend anybody. But please tell me, what do people go to places of worship for? Don’t people go to those places just to get what they desire?
No, you are carrying those rubbish desires within, and they make you feel small and defeated and poor. Instead of enquiring into those desires, instead of dropping those desires, you summon up, you conjure a big power outside of you, and then you go and you kneel and you say, “Now my belief system has come to my rescue.”
That which you require defense against is in itself imaginary. That which gets hurt within you is in itself imaginary. Why do you want to defend the imaginary with the imaginary? There is the imaginary threat standing behind me. I want to annul this imaginary threat using an imaginary belief. A fairy with a weapon is just coming to take care of this monster. Why is the fairy needed? Because there is a monster. What if there is no monster at all in the first place? The monster is imagination. To take care of this imagination, now you are imagining a fairy and a great weapon.
Please see — there is no monster, there is no fairy, there is no weapon. Why are you going mad?
Next thing, spirituality and belief should not be spoken of in the same breath. Organized religion is belief. All organized religions begin with a belief system — you have to believe in such and such things. Only then you are a proper theist; otherwise, you are called a non-believer. In fact, you are called a believer when you are in organized religion. That’s what you are called, a believer. And they’ll address you, “Listen, O believers.”
All organized religion begins with belief. But spirituality is not belief. Spirituality is the unrelenting enquiry into all beliefs in life. “Why am I living on imaginations? I want to question.” This is a spiritual process. You are seeing it because you have questions, right? And I can say something, and you may say, “No, but I don’t agree with this.” There is a big “but” still remaining. This is spirituality. Am I asking you to believe? No. I’m raising questions continuously. I’m raising questions, and I’m dealing with your questions. This is spirituality.
Now, how would it have looked had it been a religious gathering? This I am saying here is spiritual because what we have is open, honest, transparent questioning, right? Instead of this, how would it have looked had this been a religious congregation? Kaisa hota? The religious authority would sit here — no, not like this obviously, you are mere mortals. Who are you? How can you occupy the same stage as I do and sit at the same level? No, no, you’re not allowed. So you’ll be sitting there, and you cannot sit this way with the mic in hand.
How should your hands look when you are sitting in front of a religious authority? (Joining both hands). And I won’t be taking questions really, continuously just preaching, preaching, preaching. And even if I have to take questions, I’ll take questions from, you know, deeply religious and mature people. Why will I allow kids to question me? That’s how religion proceeds — organized religion. It does not allow you to ask questions.
It says, “This is it, and you have to believe in it.” Do you like this? This is it and you believe. Otherwise, there is always this “otherwise” hanging over your head like a sword. “Otherwise, come on, God will come later. I will punish you.” That’s how belief systems operate, because they are very, very insecure.
I believe in a yellow god. You believe in a blue god. He believes in a red god. She believes in a white god. And we all will be very insecure because no one really knows. We are all just?
Questioner: Believing.
Acharya Prashant: Believing. Because my tradition told me God is red, his tradition told him blue, his tradition told him yellow, the white there and violet here. We will all be very insecure because we cannot be secure without the truth. And we do not know the truth; we are just believing. So he comes to me and says, “God is red.” I’ll say, “No, my God is yellow.” And then we’ll fight and kill each other down. That’s what belief systems do — they breed violence.
Truth cannot breed violence because truth is the same for all. But beliefs will definitely be different for all.
Do you now see why religions fight with each other?
Because they are based on belief. And you now know why scientists cannot fight. Because it doesn’t matter whether you are coming from Germany or the US or India or any other place — the facts of science remain the same. Hence, scientists will not fight. In fact, they collaborate. Scientists across countries and cultures collaborate, and religious people across cultures and beliefs continuously fight because beliefs cannot match, because stories cannot match, because imaginations cannot match.
He will never be able to prove God is white. He will never be able to prove God is yellow. And I’ll say both of you are idiots, and not just idiots, you are committing blasphemy, heretics who deserve to be killed. “God is white. Do you all agree or not? Or should I pull out the gun? Repeat after me, God is white. And if you don’t, we’ll have riots.” That’s belief. Nobody knows anything. All have their stories. That’s belief.
Spirituality is not belief. Please, please. In fact, spirituality is constantly sniffing for belief. And if I smell belief there, I’ll come hunting. Do you get this?
Do you also see how within the human being there is something that just lazily wants to believe? Why? Because the truth is arduous. Truth demands hard work. “The sun is hanging there because the gods ordered it.” How much work does it take to come up with this fancy story? How much work does it take? No work it takes.
“The earth is the center of the universe and the suns and the moons and the stars and the galaxies are all orbiting around the earth.” How much work does it take to come up with this kind of nonsensical story? Zero work. Therefore, we go for easy, lazy beliefs.
But to discover the distance between the sun and the earth, to really come to the shape of the orbits, to derive equations, to come to the exact numbers, to determine the speed of light — all that takes effort. Therefore, we settle for easy, lazy beliefs because we don’t want to work and because we are also afraid.
He said the sun is circling the earth. If I say, “No, no, that is not right,” I will be killed. And you know the names of the gentlemen, you know of Bruno, you know of Galileo, you know what happened to them. You also know that even Newton was threatened.
Do you understand this? You are not born to believe. Belief is simply a validation of ignorance. If I’m blind and I want to get out of this hall, I’ll have to ask you. And then I may have no recourse but to belief, right? “Which way is the exit, please?” And you’ll tell me, and I’ll have no option but to believe.
But what if I do have eyes, and I still keep believing what others tell me? And this one is telling me, “You can get out of this room only by blasting through the roof. There’s a fire here,” and I’m believing that the only way to exit is through the roof. I’m stupid, am I not? I have my eyes. I can see. I can know. Why do I need to believe? How stupid would I look if, in spite of being gifted with eyes, I still keep asking all and sundry and believing what they say, and also get roasted in the process?
What is it that you cannot know? Please tell me. What is it that you cannot even question? Please tell me. Just that the process of enquiry is long but beautiful. Be it the external world, be it the internal world, none are exempt from the question mark.
Can’t you ask yourself, “There is a certain attraction I’m feeling towards this individual, where is this coming from?” Why can’t you ask this? Just as the scientist, the experimenter, proceeds in his lab, why can’t you question your emotions, your intuitions, your instincts, your love, your anger, your greed? Have you seen, when you look at yourself, it is possible to see what is happening within? Have you seen it? You are unreasonably irritated. Somebody asks you, “What’s the matter?” You say, “No, no, no, just the mood.” But
If you honestly look at yourself, you’ll discover there is a reason why you are irritated. Enquiry does yield results, but it requires honesty. In the absence of honesty, belief is the crutch.
Even more confused?
Questioner: Spirituality then is an extension of logic?
Acharya Prashant: Not really. Because see, what is logic? What is the definition of logic? Logic simply is: there are these two statements, and then you derive a conclusion from the two statements. If the conclusion follows from the two statements, then you say it is logical. That’s how logic is defined. So, spirituality is way beyond logic.
You see, I’ll tell you, there is a conclusion in logic, and these statements on which you base your conclusion are called propositions. Logic will only test whether the conclusion follows from the propositions, but logic will not test the validity of the propositions itself. The conclusion is never seen as truth. The conclusion is said to be logical.
For example: He is stupid. She is stupid. They recommended this towel to me. This towel must be the wrong one. Now, this is logical but not necessarily true. Why?
Because I am basing my conclusion on two statements. The conclusion, yes, definitely follows the two statements. But how do I know whether the two statements themselves are fact-based? Maybe he is not stupid. Maybe she’s very, very wise. Maybe I am an idiot. Maybe I have a personal grudge against the two of them; therefore, I’m labeling them idiots. Logic will not test that. Logic will not take you to truth, but logic is useful in testing the veracity of the conclusion. So, spirituality is not really logic. Spirituality is an examination of the self. “If I am doing something, why am I doing it? What have I become? Do I really need to chase that desire? Where is that desire, first of all, arising from?” That’s spirituality.
The fundamental question — “Who am I?” That is spirituality. And in that, there is no space for beliefs.
