6. Escape superstition🔗

We often wonder how things become a superstition or a moral code?

A small story: In an ashram in India, one Master used to hold worship every morning. Now, the Master had a pet cat. The cat used to jump and play around. It got in the way of Master and his disciples. It never allowed them to finish their worship peacefully. Gradually the cat, in all its playfulness, became a big nuisance. The Master did not want to get rid of the cat. One day he asked his disciples to cover the cat with a basket before he began the worship. That day, the worship was peaceful. The Master asked his disciples to do the same next day. This soon became a part of their routine. Unexpectedly the Master died. The disciples continued the tradition established by their Master. They began their daily worship by covering the cat with a basket. Soon after, the cat too died. Now, the disciples faced a big dilemma. How could their worship be complete without covering the cat with a basket? They got another cat and subjected it to the same treatment. After a few days, the cat escaped. Soon, all cats in neighborhood moved away. The disciples gradually found it hard to get a cat for their worship. But to worship without a cat? It was a sacrilegious! Gradually they stopped the worship because there was no cat! This is how a practice becomes a superstition, and a superstition takes on its own life to become a binding rule. Morality is one such rule. It is like superstition that has taken a life of its own. When we have no understanding about the roots of the rules that have formed the morality, we will also behave like the disciples in search of a cat. Be clear. As long as morality is given, spoon fed to us we react. When morality is served as a rule, we rebel. When morality is enforced, we create two things in our mind. First, we try our best to escape from it. When we cannot, we do not want to give in to it anyways. We create a deep guilt in our system when we ignore the rules every time. Morality, guilt, superstition are all the same. They all arise from our lack of understanding or poor reasoning. Don't carry the burden of guilt, or morality without understanding its meaning. Be aware and alert.