Acharya Mahaprajna
The world is mutative
In this mutative world, everything changes then how can word remain unchanging? Word also changes and its meaning also changes. At some time, the word "sampradāya" (community or sect) had celebrated meaning. It was indicative of preceptor-lineage (guru paramparā) and its holy literature (āmnāya). For several centuries, it continued to have this glorious meaning. The change of meaning is associated with some event. Sects indulged in undesirable behaviour, sown the seeds of hatred and acrimony. The result was the words sampradāya and sāmpradāyikatālost their glory. Today the feeling of meanness is associated with them. Its prime reason is, desire to have rise of one’s sect and to sow the seed of hatred for others. Human being has his weaknesses and they get manifested in any form. To give importance to one’s own self, to give importance to one’s ideology, to increase one’s power, to increase ones following all these tendencies have been poisonous seeds for sect. Because of these within the fold of sect there have been quarrels and conflicts.
The question is that of difference and non-difference
In contemporary times, many attempts are being made to curtail communalism. One of the attempts is comparative study. Generally, all religious sects have given a respectable place to non-violence and truth and therefore their basic elements appear similar. It is said - the basic stuff of all religions is one and the same. By pointing out non-difference among all we have tried to minimize communal strife. This cannot be said to be undesirable. Still its consequences have not been very much pleasing. Among hundred non-differences even a single pronouncement of difference renders them still, and conflict assumes newer form.
Just to talk of non-difference is one sided view. If along with non-difference our vision can also be difference-oriented, then there will not be any occasion or very little occasion for the rise of intolerance. Which religious sect has made what new contribution? What new thought it had developed? This matter should reach common people, then their view point can change, tolerance for other's thought may increase. Comparison does not mean merely pointing out similarities. To point out dissimilarities is also its important aspect.
Problems related to society
Similarity and dissimilarity-on the basis of these two alone the crop of tolerance can be sown. In the field of religious sect intolerance has not decreased. Very few people know how to tolerate the views different from or opposed to one's own. If there is intolerance in other fields then it is not a matter of surprise, but in the field of sect it is a matter of surprise. If I turn around I find that it is also not a matter of surprise. I am thinking of religious sects enlivened by spirituality. Many religious sects are directly connected with social organization. Their vision cannot be like the sect enlivened by spirituality. The development of non-violence depends upon development of tolerance and development of tolerance depends upon development of nonviolence. This dependence can be possible only in spirituality enlivened religious sect. Religious sects connected with social organization cannot think or speak in the language of nonviolence. Their thinking and speech will go along with politics. By understanding the basic nature of the sect, we can discuss their non-difference and difference. Spirituality dominated sect can neither promote violence nor can it be intolerant, nor it can be a menace for others. All these problems are connected with society. One who gives prominence to social organization cannot remain free from these problems.
Let religion be conjoined with consciousness
If there is no classification made in the changing conceptions of sect, then the possibility of great blunder cannot be eliminated. The blood-stained history of religious sects has been written with the swords of kings. Its reason has been - delusion to spread ones sect. Whenever and wherever religion has been coupled with sword at all times the number of followers has increased but religiosity has not increased. In this age of science religion, sect, and the mentality of expansionism associated with it have to be weighed with separate weighing measures. Then only justice can be done to them. To weigh all of them with the same weighing measure will neither be correct evaluation nor will it be proper justice. Today the universal thinking is not flowing toward sect. It is flowing toward the reality. Religion is reality. There can be variation in the movement to reaching it. There is no uniformity in its nature. We get perplexed by regarding evenness in reaching it as the reality.
In order to remove this perplexity, it is necessary to study the non-difference and difference among religious sects. The thinker of today is experiencing this need and is engaged in this task. That day will be significant in world history when religion will be free from the bondage of number and will be
associated with consciousness. Waiting for this moment can be done only in the age of science.
