Guilt - An absolute sin🔗

A small story:

A great rishi (sage) was doing penance in a deep forest. Suddenly one night, he had an unexpected guest. One man came and knocked at his door. He requested the rishi, 'Can I stay here tonight? Tomorrow morning I will leave you. I will leave from this place.' The rishi said, 'You are welcome. Please come and stay.'

Next day morning , the rishi casually inquired, 'Who are you? Where are you from?' The man said, 'Please don't be frightened. I am a thief. Last night, I robbed the palace and escaped. I came to your hut straight away. I am really very happy that you took care of me by giving food and shelter. I am leaving. Please bless me.' So saying, the man left.

The rishi felt very disturbed, 'What a big sin I have committed by giving shelter and food to a thief!' He started weeping not knowing how to atone for the sin. He wanted to wash away his sin. He started praying. 'Oh God, please forgive me. I don't know what I should do to remove the sin. I gave shelter and food to a thief for one full night. Please forgive me.' He was weeping and wailing.

Suddenly he heard a voice from heaven. The voice was also weeping. He was surprised. He asked 'Who is weeping?' From above he heard the voice, 'I am God. I am weeping.' Surprised, the rishi asked, 'Why are you weeping?' God replied, 'You have given shelter to the thief for one day. You think that is a big sin. I am giving him food and shelter everyday. Where will I go and wash my sin? That is why I am weeping.'

You need to understand there is a beautiful thing to be understood from the story. The rishi had a concept that he is holier than the thief. He had more ego than the real feeling of compassion. His ego was only corrected by God's message.

All our guilt, all our rules, all our morality, all our idea of right and wrong is created by only this type of rishis. Not all rishis, but this type of people who think they are holier than others, they are purer than others or they are greater than others. They created the rules which created the guilt in you.

According to me, guilt is the greatest sin. At least other sins will punish you after your death. Guilt will punish you when you are alive.

The guilt that retards your growth and puts you into a vicious cycle of misery and suffering is what society feeds on, what religion thrives on. It condemns all the basic emotions all humans have instead of giving the technique to transform the base emotions into the higher emotions.

An important thing we have to notice: all so-called activities of social service are to get rid of the guilt feeling due to having 'too much' money. But you don't realize it is not money that is the problem, but it is your mind that is dilemma by nature.

Right or wrong? A relative, subjective scale

Look little deep. What is the root cause of guilt? It is our idea about right and wrong. Our understanding about what is right and wrong. Only from that, the guilt starts. What is right? What is wrong? Let us start analyzing.

After all, what is the scale to measure right or wrong? In Hinduism, vegetarianism is right; and in Christianity non-vegetarianism is right. In Hinduism you can marry only once; in Islam you can marry four times. In Hinduism, you can't drink alcohol and liquor; but in Christianity, Jesus himself consumed wine.

There are so many rules, so many regulations in different places, different situations, different societies. In South Bharat, fish is considered as non-vegetarian food. In Bengal, they call it Gangaphal (fruit from the Ganga). Bengali brahmins (priestly class) eat fish. There is no Bengali house which doesn't have a small pond infront of their house. They grow fish. They eat fresh fish. Ramakrishna used to eat fish. Bengali brahmins take fish and fish is considered as vegetarian food. For Bengalis, fish, sweet, and tobacco are the basic things. Ramkrishna used to smoke. Vivekananda used to smoke. So, where is so called morality? It is just local customs! In course of time, they become morality.

If you see the ancient scriptures, epics of Bharat, Mahabharata, Draupadi was married to five men! So many different kind of life systems, so many different kind of customs. Kunti was married to five men! Kunti had five sons from five different men! Draupadi lived with five men! There are so many different kinds of morality. So many different kinds of life structure. So many different kinds of thinking systems.

Different times, different rules were formed by different leaders. In some society, some thing is morality. In some other society, same thing is immorality. In some society, some thing is right and in some other society, the same thing is wrong.

Here, in the US, I saw something that was really funny. In one state, casinos are allowed. In the neighbouring state casions are illegal. A river separates the two states and the border line between the two states passes through the river. So, inside the river itself, there is a big casino!

On one side it is legal, and on the other side it is illegal! Something is law in some place and the same thing is illegal in some other place. So, where is the scale of right or wrong? For somebody a particular food is amruta (nectar), for some other person the same thing is poison! Where is the scale to measure what is right and what is wrong? There is no scale.

Morality should happen out of integrity, not through guilt. Guilt is a wedge inserted into your inner space. It makes you schizophrenic.

People who hide their personal life create rules and regulations to create guilt in you so that they can rule you, exploit you. Once you have guilt you can be cheated and exploited.

They can not make you do things logically, so they create guilt in you by hiding their personal lives and make rules for you.