Greetings on Sanakara Jayanti - 2021
The first piece of this essay was written last year and is available here.
After a year, on to the second part!
Fundamentally, there are two ways in which unity can be fostered among a group of people.
People would unite based on mutual need. The need could be the safety or security. The strength of this unity fluctuates based on the changes in the resources people have to fend themselves. This is seen in case of nations as well as families. Nations with similar needs try to forge a front. Families stay together based on the mutual needs of the members. This unity is largely resource driven.
The second type of unity is a cultural unity. It is based on the shared beliefs/value systems and where the beliefs are not common, with a mutual respect of individual beliefs. This unity is strong as long as there is cognizance of the shared belief, knowledge of the common goals and a mutual respect. This is true in nations as it is in families. As the saying "birds with same feathers flock together" goes - humans with similar beliefs also flock together as they find that common thread to be one of sustenance. This unity is largely belief driven.
Given the social nature of human beings, sustainable unity can be brought through the exploration and understanding of beliefs and consequent value systems. A family is a good reflection of the society. It is common experience to see that families which are tied by cultural threads meet more often, derive mutual support in times of crisis and due to that tide over the crises more effectively. On the other hand, families that don't have cultural ties among its members find it extremely difficult to tide over hard times in spite of availability of large amount of resources.
Like the cultural unity in families comes from its wise elders, the cultural unity among various groups is identified by once-in-a-millennium reformers like SankarAchArya. Like it was delineated in the part I of this essay, the AchArya went beyond the symbolic ritual practices to identify the unifying themes among the various sects.
However rituals are important engagements for people. Therefore in order to prescribe such rituals, he created a framework for the worship of all gods as the manifestations of one God. Thus the rituals were enriched to relate to the higher goal and were no longer mechanical engagement.
Of course, even after the advent of AchArya from time to time, there have been clashes in sects of diverse beliefs but there have also been messiahs that have appeared at those times and by deriving strength from the spring of Sankara's teachings, unity has always been fostered in the society.
The above pic adapted from here is a classic example of showing unity in diversity. The harvesting festival is celebrated in every part of India with a different name. We can find so many differences in the cuisine, clothing, celebrations of this festival in all these states. But what is common is that it is a festival of harvest and time to show gratitude to mother nature for the blessing of bounty.
But this is not a magic wand to create unity. This calls for constant engagement with people who do not share our beliefs. The idea should always be to find common and unifying grounds rather than spotting the differences. Two important aspects to achieve this are
1. Commitment to engagement
2. Open mind
Commitment to engagement reflects the determination to find the unifying glue while the open mind ensures that neither the interests of the groups suffer nor does the goal.
Much of the chaos in today's society can be attributed to lack of open mind. This results in biases and almost everyone is approached with a bias if not suspicion. Symbolism has scored heavily over spirit. Since every group has a different symbol and are avowed to follow that, every sect feels insecure at the comments from other sects. But if we look beyond the symbolism and identify the common spirit there can be unity and peace.
The open mind is not needed only for unity in the society, it should be the second nature to any human being in any pursuit either personal or professional. Corporates are trying to exploit this in the name of diversity. But even there the diversity mostly stops at gender balancing! Real diversity that would benefit any organization is the diversity of opinions. But most leaders shy away from this and want to be surrounded by yes-men!
Handling diversity of opinion coupled with clarity of the goal will not only pay rich dividends to organizations but also ensure a healthy, peaceful and productive environment.
If one reads the life and works and achievement of SankarAchArya and how he brought about the unity of the land, there are many lessons lurking there for us to imbibe and solve many of our conflicts today.
I pay rich tributes to the memory and teachings of Sankara on this day. We are indeed enriched by his advent. May we explore his teachings more and find direction.
