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A New Social Paradigm Based On Spiritual Values by Dada Maheshvarananda
A New Social Paradigm Based On Spiritual Values by Dada Maheshvarananda
A New Social Paradigm Based On Spiritual Values by Dada Maheshvarananda
To understand how the Prout model can transform our society, we must
look at one of its fundamental differences with capitalism: their
different attitudes toward private property. Capitalism adopted the
ideas of the seventeenth century English philosopher John Locke who
said that a human being had the right to use his or her labour to alter
the gifts of Nature and other things and hence make them productive.
Locke argued that by clearing an area of forest, cultivating the land
and collecting the harvest, a person made it productive and hence had a
right to own it and use it as he or she pleased. This unquestioned
belief in the supreme value of private property is fundamental to
capitalism.
Basic Principles
What is the proper approach. It can be put down into one principle,
which as stated by PR Sarkar is:
The wealth and resources available in the crude, subtle and causal
worlds should be developed for the welfare of all. All resources hidden
in the quinquelemental world -- solid, liquid, luminous, aerial and
ethereal -- should be fully utilized, and the endeavour to do this will
ensure the maximum development of the universe. People will have to
earnestly explore land, sea and space to discover, extract and process
the raw materials needed for their requirements. There should be
rational distribution of the accumulated wealth of humanity. In other
words, all people must be guaranteed the minimum requirements. In
addition, the requirements of meritorious people, and in certain cases
those with special needs, will also have to be kept in mind. (Ananda
Sutram 5:13, 1962)
Cosmic Inheritance
How would Prout consider the vast properties of land in Brazil, for
example? The Bradesco Bank Group owns 900,000 hectares of land, the
Antunes-Caemi financial group owns 2,250,000 hectares, and the
foreign-owned Manasa/Cifec group owns over 4 million hectares, that is,
40,000 square kilometres! Most of this property is cleared to create
pasture for the beef industry, which requires very few employees. At
the same time, millions of unemployed farm labourers have no land to
cultivate in order to meet their basic needs.
The philosophy of humanism may also lead one to neglect other species,
to consider them inferior and to exploit them for human welfare. This
has also been called speciesism or anthropocentrism. Overcoming this
limitation means including animals and plants and all of life in our
definition of what is "real" and "important." While human
beings are clearly the most evolved species on this planet, we should
expand our empathy to include love and respect for all beings, both
animate and inanimate, in the universe.
Nature has lost its pramá, its dynamic equipoise, because our human
society has also lost its balance. The lack of pramá or balance and
equipoise in society is apparent in all three spheres of existence -
physical, mental and spiritual. This imbalance has occurred in both
individual life and collective life.
Examples of this loss are not hard to find in our human society:
intolerance, breakdown of the family, exploitation, religious
fanaticism, widespread pornography and exploitation of women, drug and
alcohol abuse, ever-rising crime rates, children killing other
children, child slavery, environmental destruction.
This same type of breakdown can be observed taking place in the lives
of countless individuals. For example, first nervousness, confusion,
adopting unhealthy habits; then distrust, selfishness, self-destructive
behaviour, lack of purpose, recklessness, uncontrollable anger; and
finally hopelessness, depression, thoughts of suicide. Mental problems
are now considered the norm amongst 25% of the population, as if this
is to be accepted and lived with rather than transcended.
Meditation
In the struggle for peace and justice in the world, we should not
neglect our own peace within. Human beings possess an inherent thirst
for profound peace and happiness. External objects cannot satisfy this
inner longing, because the pleasure they offer is only temporary;
instead we have to journey within ourselves to find that peace and
happiness.