Tomichan Matheikal's blog

Imagine a world without evil. Goodness everywhere. People are as good as angels or better. Roses have no thorns and tigers don’t eat deer. No bugs and worms. No virus and bacteria to infect us with deadly diseases. No slander and plunder. No ruler and the ruled. Plain goodness, happiness, beauty… Impossible? Why? Nicholas, the neighbourhood saint, chastises me for uttering blasphemy. “How can there be good without bad, light without darkness, joy without sorrow?” “Do you believe in heaven?” I ask Nicholas. “Of course.” “Is there good without bad, light without darkness and joy without sorrow there?” I repeat his words trying my best to conceal my scorn. “That’s heaven!” He is scandalised. “We’re on earth.” “My question is why we can’t have heaven on earth if there is a God who created it all and has the power to create the kind of world He wants.” “You can’t question God,” he stamps his foot impatiently. “Why not?” “Because He is God. And ...

Orchha 2015 I live alone with my wife. This solitude is my choice because other people make me feel intimidated. There are rare exceptions, of course. This is about those exceptions. They are not many. Just one here and another there. That’s all. Most people I come across look like impenetrable fortresses. They are solid people. They know how to handle situations, what to say and what not to, when to smile, and so on. I am infinitely clumsy in comparison. I feel awkward and out of place wherever there are people. Except a few people. Those few exceptions are people with cracks in their fortresses. They look happy by and large but there is an undercurrent of sadness somewhere in the depth of their being which they don’t let others see. They don’t laugh boisterously. But they don’t weep either. They smile a lot. And you can see a shade of sorrow running along the contours of their smiles. They are not the wind that bends the reeds; they are the breeze that caresses t...

The following is an extract from my new book Coping with Suffering . Your suffering is your choice to a great extent in Hinduism. Your karma determines what comes your way. Karma is the principle that governs the unfolding of events in your life. Your karma depends on the integrity with which you lived your previous lives. It is not a punishment because unlike in the Abrahamic religions there is no punitive God sitting in any heaven meting out retribution to people. Karma is the unfolding of the moral law that drives the whole universe. As Dr S Radhakrishnan put it, “The working of karma is wholly dispassionate, just, neither cruel nor merciful.” It is not about cruelty or mercy. It is the natural consequence of what you do. If you eat salt, you will drink water. Quite as simple as that. There is no escape from it because it is part of the eternal law of the universe which is applicable to everything and everybody in the universe without any discrimination. The high and the low, ...

Pilate and Jesus, a painting by James Tissot, 19th century French painter When Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe, Pilate said to them, “Behold the man!” [Bible – John 19:5] One of the most poignant passages I came across recently is the following. Those who wounded us were not superior, impressive beings who knew our special weaknesses and justly targeted them. They were themselves highly frantic, damaged creatures trying their best to cope with the litany of private sorrows to which every life condemns us. The lines belong to a book titled The School of Life: An emotional education co-authored by 20-odd writers. I stopped reading the book after reading those lines. I was struck by a lot of thoughts. An image rose from the depth of my consciousness. It was the image of Jesus standing mangled before a hostile mob that bayed for his blood. The same people who had flocked to him for his miracles primarily and for his counsels secondarily...

Presenting my new book The corona-virus disease made me think about human suffering. This book is the result. The following extract from the introductory chapter will give you an idea what the book is like. Extract: Life is a constant struggle. It is a struggle against many odds such as the vagaries of nature, threats to health, manmade evils, and an endless list of other things that appear from nowhere. There is no escape from suffering. To be human is to suffer, to endure. This is the first thing we need to accept if we wish to understand life and be as happy as we possibly could. Even religions teach us the necessity of suffering while believing in omnipotent deities who should theoretically be able to remove suffering from life. The quintessential symbol of Christianity, the cross, is a symbol of suffering. In Christianity, salvation is possible only when the believer is ready to carry out within himself Christ’s destiny of suffering, death, and resurrection. Life is d...