Both good and evil are made of truth. But good cannot tolerate any degree of falsehood and survive, while evil cannot survive without being disguised by some truth. Hypocrisy is a common human deformity. We all take some measures to avoid negative scrutiny. But this is often done out of weakness or insecurity. A spiritual abuser, on the other hand, is an imposter who is methodically dedicated to the cultivation of an image, a disguise, a false personality — not just to… Read more
In a free society, you are what you pretend to be. In an authoritarian dictatorship, you are what you are told to be. But on a desert island, you are who you are. What makes solitude a religious discipline is that only when we are totally isolated can we discover our true identity apart from both social and political considerations. When the only relationship available to us is the one with God, the only emotion—apart from loneliness—becomes love. Even our… Read more
In a free society, you are what you pretend to be. In an authoritarian dictatorship, you are what you are told to be. But on a desert island, you are who you are. What makes solitude a religious discipline is that only when we are totally isolated can we discover our true identity apart from both social and political considerations. When the only relationship available to us is the one with God, the only emotion—apart from loneliness—becomes love. Even our… Read more
The ancient Stoics believed that we suffer more from imagination than from reality. But these days, even our imagination could not have conceived of all that has happened in recent years. There is plenty to be anxious about. Anxiety disorders are common, can be serious, but they are ultimately treatable. Anxiety is not a choice. It is our body’s natural response to stress and it does not matter whether that stress is real or perceived. Stress is stress. Here are… Read more
German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche bemoaned the destruction of Spanish Cordoba, calling it the one truly authentic civilization to have mastered the art of living physiologically and spiritually well. Modern-day historian Chris Lowney corroborates those observations- no lamentations required. The famous Muslim poet, Muhammed Iqbal, May have been the first to expose the similarities between 12th-century Muslim writer Hayy ibn Yaqzan, and Robinson Crusoe, but It was Chris Lowney who draws the most superlative analogy of all, in his book titled,… Read more
When you are the strongest person you know, you cannot help but feel weak. Everyone needs a hero. Once we understand this, terms like strength and weakness become interchangeable. In a world where survival of the fittest has come to mean survival of the most brutal, is it any wonder that it’s a man’s world? When we turn our attention to the most powerful women in the world, we should not just celebrate women who have succeeded in this world… Read more
When a nation is facing a rapidly deteriorating situation, it only takes a single voice of confident resistance to revolutionize an entire culture. This is not an exaggeration. Human history is full of examples of heroic individuals who displayed courage where others would have exercised caution. Their secret, was moral conviction. Civil Rights pioneer Rosa Parks encapsulated the spirit of moral conviction when she said, “I have learned over the years that when one mind is made up this diminishes… Read more
What is Truer than Truth? The answer: A story. Once upon a time, there was a man named Jesus, and the rest, according to Reza Aslan’s book, Zealot, is just history. When historians like Reza Aslan treat us to the un- romantic version of Jesus of Nazareth who walked on land, as opposed to the romantic version of a Jesus Christ who walked on water, I have a blasphemous urge to ask, what does history have to do with… Read more
If you have ever visited a holy site you may have been tempted to ask, “Is this where ‘it’ literally happened?” To which an exasperated tour guide might reply; ‘Does it really matter?’ Billions of people believe that it did. And billions of people throughout human history have brought their energy, their fears, their pains, their passions, their souls and laid them on this threshold, or this shore, or that rock. Isn’t that enough? To which you will respond,… Read more
The worst kind of oppression is not the kind that breaks a man’s back, but the kind that breaks his spirit. And the only way to break a man’s spirit is to arbitrarily change the rules of survival. In a free and fair society, the primary rule of survival has traditionally been that hard work equals success. But in spite of the narrative, the rules of survival in the United States do not always subscribe to this pure formula. Unless you are… Read more
