[Advaita-l] Re: A Conversation between Divine Will and Free Will

[V. Krishnamurthy]

 Namaste.

(Continued from where we left in Post no.16192
http://www.escribe.com/religion/advaita/m16192.html   )

TD: We had just raised the question why the supernatural
interventionist God does not always intervene – even in
such tragedies like the Tsunami. 

DFW.  You said it right. Why did He not intervene and stop
the tragedy? If He exists but cannot remove our suffering
then He is not God. If He exists and would not remove our
suffering then He is not kind. If He exists and should not
remove our suffering then He is not the boss. If He exists
and suffering also has to exist then He is not the only
Truth.

DDW.  You seem to have analysed it thoroughly!

TD: All these are only rhetorical statements which do not
take into account the fact that a God, if He is really God,
should not be judged from our human norms of right and
wrong, justice and injustice.

DFW. You are only inventing an answer so that you can
escape answering the question.

DDW. I feel that these questions themselves  have been
invented to throw God out.

TD: My answer has a simple reason. No human being has
either the database or the holistic view that Divinity must
surely have of the universe and its contents.

DFW: I don’t understand you.

DDW: TD says God has an ultimate purpose for everything and
we may not know it.

TD: But His purpose could not be removal of human poverty
or illness.

DDW: Why not?

DFW:  Because if that were so , He should have done it long
ago. He did not have to wait for two or three millenia to
remove illness and poverty from the world.  At least it is
clear He has not done it yet.

TD:  I think we are going at a tangent. We wanted to
understand why it is that we cannot understand that He is
not removing our suffering even though by definition of God
as Almighty God, He should have been able to do it. And DDW
said that God perhaps has a purpose for everything. Shall I
tell you a real story why I feel DDW is right?

DDW and DFW together: Go ahead.

TD. Well it is a long story. But let me be as brief as
possible.  Two American youngsters living 100 miles south
of New York plan to spend a Saturday afternoon in a public
park near New York along with some of their friends (living
north of New York)  who promise to  join them at a certain
specified time  right at the entrance to the park. The plan
is made, almost to the minute.  But the two, on their way
to New York meet, first with a tire burst, then halfway up
with a hold-up by no less than the sheriff of the area for
speeding – both these incidents  taking off two hours from
their schedule. And then, after the hold-up, when they
start the car, the engine refuses to ignite and this causes
a further delay of another two hours because the cause is
traced to be battery failure.  But since they are only 25
miles from the park they decide to give it a try even after
the delay,  even though they are sure   their friends would
have given them up by this time. But soon after,  they have
to negotiate a long diversion of the route in view of a 
nasty accident on the highway ahead of them; and this
diversion delays them as much as another hour, because they
lose their way! Thus there have been   five coincidences
all working against them and when they finally reach the
park it is late evening and in fact the park is closing its
gates. Still they enter and look for their friends. The
park is deserted since everybody has gone. They are about
to curse their fate and return to their car when they hear
cries for  help from a lake in the park. Rushing there they
see two boys almost drowning. They jump in and being
first-aid-certificate holders themselves they are able to
save the two little boys of ten and twelve from certain
drowning and death. They think of the sequence of events
that happened to them during the whole trip. A few minutes
earlier they had thought that their journey was nothing but
futile, their day had been spent in vain, but now it became
 clear that it was not so; because if they had not arrived
at this late hour near that lake, those two boys would have
died by drowning! This is a true story.  The Almighty has a
purpose for everything!

DFW: That is interesting certainly. But we have strayed far
from our original quest of deciding between Free will and
Divine Will.

DDW: But we have to settle this question of God’s
non-intervention. When there is a natural calamity like the
Tsunami, we have only to take it that God does not want, by
His own Free Will, to interfere with Nature and its
workings – though all of it is His own creation.

DFW:  Wait a minute. You just said that God has Free Will.
Free Will implies multiple options and a freedom to
exercise choice. Does He have several options? Why does He
choose one of them?

DDW : Because He has a purpose for everything as I already
told you.

DFW: Purpose is always for achieving something. Does God
want to achieve something? But I have heard it said that
God has nothing to obtain which He has not already
obtained.

TD: His purpose could only be to bring back every erring
human being to His fold.

DDW: But then you are implicitly agreeing to the contention
 that human beings have the freedom of will to err. 

TD. Certainly,  that is what I have been saying from the
beginning. God gives you the commandment of satyam vada and
dharmam chara and also gives you the free will to disobey
them. But He also keeps on telling you to have the
willingness to obey them. 

DDW: Is not even this Free Will subject to the influence of
the Divine?

TD: You have touched a deeper chord.   Let us take it next
time. 

(To be Continued)

PraNAms to all seekers of Truth
profvk



Prof. V. Krishnamurthy

You are welcome to have a look at any of the following  books on my website:
http://www.geocities.com/profvk

1. Gems from the Ocean of Hindu Thought Vision & Practice
2. Live Happily, the Gita Way
3. Advaita Dialogue for beginners.
4. Discourses of the Paramacharya on Soundaryalahari.