One do not need labels. Live and let live.
DMR Sekhar.

Nice post and its indeed Informative!

Thanks, Raj, for that very informative comment.  My knowledge of tantriks is limited to hearsay and what I have heard is not 'good'.  You are also very right about the distinction between the really religious and the charlatans. 

Hi matheikal

1) Edamaruku has done well and the right thing in challenging such people who play on people's fears and superstitions.

2) Tantra (there's a Buddhist-Tibetan  tradition as well as a Hindu tradition) is of course a very wide area and I'm not sure if this Sri Surendra Sharma is a tantrik in the best sense of the word: tantriks  do not show off and their  knowledge is for healing and for mystical union with the divine or the universal essence or 'reality'. The Buddha admonished  a disciple from showing off any 'spiritual' powers and ths would hold  true for all true tantriks.

3) Much of what was called witchcraft was also fear in reverse - this time played by various denominations of the church  - as in the  case of the Salem witches.

4) At  the end of the day, this search for 'reality' (called religion/spirituality, etc) is simply about the relationship between the individual and  It  (Reality; the Ultimate; the Tao; the Logos; wha t is;  etc ) and everything else is showmanship and preying on the weaknesses of human beings. It is because we allow otehrs to act as intemdiaries between us and the Ultimate that
we get people out to deceive others.


In this context , Sanl Edamaruku has joined an illustrious line of sceptcis who expose the hollowness of charlatans and mountebanks. India's equivalent of the TIme magazine should name him Man of the Year 2008.

a unique and marvelous blog, matheikal...will return sometime later for a second reading of this marvelous blog

Hi matheikal!!! well said about edamaruku

Thank you, Binu, for your visit and comment.  Sampath ji, It's yet another profound statement from you, thanks.

Dear Matheikal: 

Your explanation is on the mark. Rationalism does not deny aesthetics and other ennobling features of what it is to be a human. It merely stays afar. My point is that there is a difference between "explanations" and "appreciation". A rational explanation can be appreciated (apprecaition comes out of the explanation), but the other apprecaitions do not have equivalent explanations. Yes, in this respect rationalism is limited (no explanation, no appreciation). 

I recently read a sentence in a newspaper article, "Galapagos is nature's Mona Lisa." The appreciative meaning comes through crystal clear just as in your sentence. But, as the beauty of Mona Lisa cannot be explained under any paradigm, so cannot the beauty of Galapagos. But, rationalism comes to one's "rescue" in the latter. Rationalism can and does explain things and offers its own appreciation. Yes, as you say, only to a limited number of people and that is the pity.

You can apprecaite the twinkling star without science, but you can appreciate AND explain only through rationalism. This is what I wanted to stress. On this I follow the footsteps of Richard Feynman and Fred Hoyle.

Thanks for your detailed response.

Raghuram Ekambaram

the reality is not rational
man wants to order his world and brings rationality.
but obviously irrationality can not order irrationality.
very right you are 
i am totally with you.

hi

This is very well written blog. There are so many fraud people running the business of religious perching. Your blog clearly indicate that kind of an incident. The moral support giving by these extremist teachers create havoc in ordinary people’s life

regards

Binu