Happiness for Sale

Awareness of the needs of others is the key. We become inured to our surroundings and fail to see that opportunities to help others abound.

Some friends and I came up with a game, which has really caught on, designed to increase this awareness and make altruism fun. See: www.helpothers.org. (I won't even bother with a hyperlink, since they don't seem to work in DC comments.)

Check it out!

MBJ
http://memestreamblog.wordpress.com

Thank you so much for sharing this delightful story!

Though cosmopolitans know about the hospitality traditions of the Middle East, others may find this a unique window to Muslim culture. (I have seen a similar ethos of generous hospitality in the sparsely-settled or frontier areas of America. Alas that cities erode such virtue!) I hope and expect that your essay will reduce the prejudice generated in Americans by the regular news of "Islamicist" terrorism!

I came across this story because Google Alert collects all news and blogs with the keyword "Wicca" within them. You see, I collect information on hate crimes, blood libels, and violations of the civil liberties of Wiccans and other Pagans.

Mr. Ghouse, your article is the FIRST TIME in my memory when a Muslim included Wicca among the world religions that bear the wisdom that doing good for others is a source of true happiness.

Pagans -- those who believe that Nature is the embodiment of the Divine -- understand that we are all not only brothers and sisters, but actually cells in a single body, along with the plants and animals. Like the cells in any body, we are all interdependent, and we actually serve each other BECAUSE of our differences. But when a cell thinks only of itself, it becomes cancerous. Thus, one of our central beliefs is that the good or evil each individual does, comes back three times.

Modern Pagans are fully aware that an assault on the religious liberties of ANY religion is an assualt on the religious liberties of ALL religions. Most of us are in "the broom closet," for fear of losing jobs and custody of our children. We are among the folks who stood up for tolerance after 9-11 because "Religious Freedom means freedom for ALL Religions!" And we support many "Interfaith" charitable organizations that are doing important charity but would never tolerate our public membership if our Pagan identities were known.

And so, Mr. Gouse, thank you, and peace be upon you, or as Wiccans like to say, Blessed Be.

Krista..

We look at acts of kindness with fondness because it reminds us of our true altruistic nature. It also reminds us of hypocratic world we have built around us which considers monetizing and commercializing human interactions as economics and development. We measure GNP by how much we have commercialized nature and human interactions. There was a time in India not too long ago when people lived without having any money - they shared whatever they produced with family, relatives, friends and neighbors and they in turn did the same - whoever had largest circle of such connections lived opulently and those who did not build such network lived on kindness of others - and those who remained hostile to others, well they too could meet their basic needs but at the expense of their pride. People now-a-days would call it exploitation of the weak. To get away from that, we have built new economic order where acts of kindness are few and far between. Why should a person provide a service and not charge for it? Such acts deprive the economy and state. Imagine if women are stopped cooking for families, it would spawn humogous restaurant sector creating millions of jobs and creating huge source of tax revenues to government. If women are stopped providing sex within relationship, it would spawn a huge industry to meet sexual needs of teeming billions, imagine how much employment and taxes it can generate. When each sexual encounter is valued for its marker value ie say $200, imagine how much it can add to economy and tax coffers. Remember, every time one has sex for free, it is depriving employment, development and taxes. State should consider it a crime.

I was reading about surrogate mother clinic of Anand, Gujarat where child-less families can have surrogate women bear children for $10k - surrogate moms are so happy they feel they would not have made that kind of money in 15 years what they can earn in just few months. Now imagine, if child-birth is commercialized for everybody, imagine what a robust industry it can build, and how much employment it can produce. Multiply 50 crores males of India needing to have baby times 10k per baby. I think India's GNP can outstrip even America. It can turn thankless job of pregnancy into multi-billion engine for economic growth and employment. Government should levy taxes on every pregnancy, because what it is losing out in taxes when people opt for free non-commercialized pregnancies. I know, in USA, government considers it tax evasion if family hires a babysitter and not pay social security taxes on it. By now, you know the gist of where I am going.

It is possible to commercialise every human need, every human interaction as commercial transaction - it would boost economy, GNP, per capita, employment, taxes, development. It will make people vie among each other to provide those as services rather than depend on social or cultural institutions - which can not guarantee that they would be available to everybody - Imagine if I can have sex with beautiful women every day rather than stuck with one person in a confined relationship. It is a win win for everybody. When people can bend over backward to provide their services, why need occasional and unpredictable acts of kindness? From pagan era, world evolved to feudal and colonial era where people competed ruthlessly to own nature and people as private property and exploit them to maximize their personal gains. In a modern era of services, we still compete, albeit democratically with every body having equal opportunity, to own nature and people, but for a noble pursuit - to make people compete as to who can provide maximum services to maximum number of people, people vying to find unmet human needs and tailor services to meet them. What could be more humanistic or moral than that? If their is any failures or shortages, it is a symptom of lack of development and not failure or limitation of this paradigm. Than what are we waiting for? Let the battle for development be joined. I will do my bit. I am now taking bids from women for providing sex to me. Its for the development and betterment of mankind, you know.

Thank you sir. The 'Be good always' belief grew more stronger in this world. Thank you

Christa #2

Christa, pluralism is honoring every which way one honors the divine creator. I know of no religion that does not do it.

We do an annual event called Unity day USA in Dallas, where every faith is represented bar none, including the yoraba, an African Native and several American Native faiths. Wicca is always a part of it. In the Pluralism faith I conduced in July this year - you can see an young lady in black - doing wicca rituals, as every faith did their part. You literally see every faith representation.

http://picasaweb.google.com/MikeGhouse/UnityDayUSA2006_Album02

http://picasaweb.google.com/FoundationforPluralism/WomensPeaceConference

I have begged my Wicca friends to give me a short write up to include on the website www.Foundationforpluralism.com, would you send me? Symbols are already there.

Mike Ghouse

Christa # 2

By the way, I wrote to Dallas Morning News about including the headstone for Wicca at Arlington Memorial.

When I started including Wicca some four years ago, it felt like me against the world - as a few faith groups refused to join the prayers, they did not want to stand with a Wicca. By the way, they were not Muslims. I stood my grounds and went forward, though they were part sponsors. I was even told that there will be only about 8 Wiccas in the room of some 600 people, why I was focused on "them".

My scholar Imam gave me moral support and agreed with me that we cannot pretend unity, if we start excluding people, he said go with what is right, to include all.

Mike Ghouse

Great piece Mike! What can I say? It's commonsenseforall, yet people underestimate the power of just being plain nice to everyone without expecting anything in return!

Awesome post Mike. Happy New Year and I'm going to incorporate #4 in my new year resolution;)

Lovely post, Mike thank you. do visit Nipun Mehta at Charity Focus. Their spread-a-smile program and pay-it-forward ideas are fun. We can certainly create an alternative economy built on smiles and plain old goodness of heart!!

Excellent post. Mr. Ghouse
You speak of wisdom of religions. Unfortunately, wisdom from religions does not come without a lot of additional baggage. It is this baggage that is the cause of violence around the world. Add to that the conflicts of economic activities (may be kerty #3 has an answer here, although I don't quite get it) and it seems like we will never achieve peace, because we need both money and religion.

Ref 10

Morris thanks.

Kerty was perhaps referencing to our innate ability to measure everything in terms of money. I am sure Kerty is aware of new index being developed called human capital, i.e., all the potential mind, service, and labor available and developable towards creating equilibrium in the society of matching resources and their application.

You made a thoughtful comment "It seems like we will never achieve peace, because we need both money and religion." Although money and religion are not mutually exclusive nor is there any correlation between the amount of money one has and the degree of religion one follows.

Peace and co-existence is the core idea of all religions and I believe it is the practice of the average person on the street. Their focus is just living the daily life and getting along with least amount of hassles. Sometimes they take the abuse for the sake of keeping it from a conflict.

There may be a positive correlation between oppression and involvement of the members to oppose such oppression as in Palestine, Pakistan (at this time) and Burma. The fear of millenniums of oppression keeps the Jewish people on guard and gets them involved in the affairs of the world and the phrase "never again" to become part of their psyche.

Peace is achievable by individuals for themselves by refraining from employing words and actions that would engage them in conflict, once you become a conflict reducer, you find relative peace.

Mike Ghouse

After writing 18 Puranas when somebody asked maharshi Vedvyas the gist of the all those scriptures in simple words vedvyasa said:

"ashtadash Puraneshu vyasasasya vachanam dwaya
paropakarya punyay papay papeednam"

Which means the gist of 18 puranas is that `helping others is ultimate good and torturing others is ultimate sin'

same way Tulsidaas who wrote ramcharitmanas wrote :

`Parhit saris dharam nahi bhai, parpeeda sam nahi adhmai'

which means there is no religion greater then doing good to others and there is no evil worst then torturing others.

Hope your saudi freinds will enlarge their vision to whole creation of God and not limit themsleves to humans only. They will show the same kindness and help to other creatures as well in this beutiful creation and stop murdering animals even for food.

Your article is execelent example of step 1 of humanity.

Next step is extending this same kindness to animals and plants.

MG #11
"Peace and co-existence is the core idea of all religions" I am not sure of that althought I agree with the rest of that sentence. I wonder whether religions are not doing exactly the opposite i.e. making for us difficult to co-exist.

I think in the middle so long as the stronger power does not recognize the need to be fair and just the conflict will continue. Not necessarily all terrorism, but this one is related to the perception of injustice. On the other hand Arab states will have to recognize Israel's right to exist. I do not see easy way out of this one.

I lke your last Para.

REF 13

Thanks Morris for your comment, here is an expansion on the following idea :
"Peace and co-existence is the core idea of all religions".

If we track back on the genesis of a religion, any one, we may be pleased to see the cause and effect... The following are not quotes, they are an understanding of what was said.

i) When immorality gains an upper hand, Lord Krishna says, from among you one will appear to restore righteousness back",

ii) Moses came to restore common sense to people when they were doing all the immoral things and no one felt secure and

iii) Qur'aan says, God has sent a messenger to every nation and every community to bring them back into the fold of righteousness...

All religions have one thing in common - they came about to restore peace and co-existence, so people can live on.

If you take the essence of each happening, and not the literal expression, the theme is same.

Didn't Jesus start preaching for the same reason, when he saw that temple was not used for the purpose it was built, when he saw the lepers were treated inhumanely, he went to them to set an example, he honored the women who were dejected...

Didn't Buddha want to understand the misery and share that with people, so they can live an enlightened life?

Didn't Nanak do the same?

Every faith was formed with the intent of bringing sanity to people who were not following any system of law, leaving a mess - where no one felt safe or peaceful. It is in that context I said "Peace and co-existence is the core idea of all religions".

Mike Ghouse

Mike Mo is the exception here.

Mecca was more peaceful befor Mo.
People were more tolreance before Mo.
women could carry out international trade before Mo (his firts wife for example was running internation bussiness) but he pushed them behind the veil in the name of religion.

No prophet was ever avengeful and attacked tribe after tribe and kill their male 14 years and older and enslaved women and children of the tribe and slowly directly or indirectly forced them to convert to his religion.

No prophet ever legalised the booty of war to be shared by himself and his members.

In India Lord Rama defeated Rawana the king of demons. When Rawana's younger brother offered him the kingdom and treasurey, Lord Rama simply said my war was never against people of your country. It was against demoinic attitude of ur king and hence I have no intention to even see your wealth.

"swanmayi lankaapi na me rochte laxman, janai janabhumishcha swargadapi gariyasi"

whihc means O laxmana even lanka made of God doesn not attactact me as my own motherland is as great as heaven for me.

Can you see the difference?

Man Singh,

Man you can rake history, laced with as many stereotypes you can muster, until the proverbial cows come home. What happened thirteen hundred years ago, or a thousand years ago, is really irrelevant! We have to face up to the future issues and problems, instead of splitting hair (baal ki khaal).

Man Singh wrote:

"Mecca was more peaceful befor Mo.
People were more tolreance before Mo.
women could carry out international trade before Mo (his firts wife for example was running internation bussiness) but he pushed them behind the veil in the name of religion."

It would seem as if Man Singh had a ring-side seat as the events unfolded!

MG Ref # 14
Thanks for the expansion. I agree that all religions have teachings which support what you said. I wish that was all there was to it. But you know as well as I do that they are package deals and they come with a lot of baggages as I mentioned earkier, some more than the others. I am of the opinion that some carry so much baggage that they have become divisive and counter productive. What is the answer? We need leaders Like Gandhi in every religion who could inspire the people to rise above these baggages and restore sanity. Perhaps a wishful thinking.

REF 15

Man Singh,

"Mecca was more peaceful befor Mo.People were more tolreance before Mo."

Where did you get this stuff from? Read Karen Armstrong's book Muhammad, if you are open to learning.

Mike Ghouse

REF 18

Morris,

Wishing is the first step towards realizing. "We need leaders Like Gandhi in every religion who could inspire the people to rise above these baggages and restore sanity. Perhaps a wishful thinking." - If there is no wish, no dream then there is no reality.

As I extracted ideas from Bhagvad Gita, Qur'aan and other books, let take a look at the ordinary experiences. The idiom "Squeaky wheel gets the grease..." can be applied to day to day life.

When things really get out of handle, some one will rise to 'fix' the situation, here are few examples that I could think of;

When racism was growing to the point of no return - some one rose and against all odds, against all thinking - changed the world of America. Thirty three years ago an African American was not allowed to sit in the bus with others, now the same African American is running for the President - What a change it is! Thanks to Martin Luther King for making America what it is today.

When Israel and Egypt saw the futility of remaining on the war path, Anwar Sadat and Menachim Begin took bold steps to end the hostility; it disappeared like "Gadhay kay sir say sing Ghayab" (like the horns disappearing from donkey's head) . Jimmy Carter put his heart and soul into it.

With so much information available on the net, people are seeing two sides of an issue, in a face to face dialogue communication does not take place as the parties may not listen to each other, but on the net, many more read and see another point of view. When they are aware, the tend to take a principled stand... not in large numbers, but certainly the number is on rise. You see similar discussions in every group. The extremists are losing grounds, not at the pace to keep the world in peace, but the trend is there.

Morris, in reality, if each one of us can do our share and perhaps a little bit more, we can influence one person at a time. There is a Gandhi in each one of us; we need to wake him up. There is a genuine joy in doing things for others.

Mike

Mike ,

karen Armstrong is not more intelligent then any one of us. Nor she is is expert in islam or any religion.

I gave you simple tips:

1. Mohammed's first wife was running an international bussiness before islam and was pushed behind veil after islam.

2. People of Mecca in a most civilised way asked Mo to stop his nonsense. They never killed him though they were powerful enough to do that. But when Mo became strong he attacked his own hometown with 10,000 jihadis and destroyed meccan temple.

yes intellectuals always have difference of opinions and so were having meccans at that time. closeminded donkeys are quite disciplines and become blind followers.

Please compare methods of Budha, jesus, Sharnkaracharya , Mahaveer jain and Nanak with those of Mo and you will feel the difference unless you are biased towards him due to some reasons or the other?

None of the founders of religion in known history of India used terror to spread the religion.

Please read the letter below wrote by Mo to Julanda brothers of oman who were living peacefully there. message says either convert or my horses will destroy your power?

THE MESSAGE OF THE PROPHET TO THE OMANI PEOPLE
Here is the text of the message the Prophet Mohammad sent to the Julanda brothers through the intermediary of his Messengers, 'Amr bin al-'As al-Sahmi and Abu Zaid al-Ansari.
"Peace be upon the one who follows the right path! I call you to Islam. Accept my call, and you shall be unharmed. I am God's Messenger to mankind, and the word shall be carried out upon the miscreants. If, therefore, you recognize Islam, I shall bestow power upon you. But if you refuse to accept Islam, your power shall vanish, my horses shall camp on the expanse of your territory and my prophecy shall prevail in your kingdom."
[Photograph of the Arabic original (sizes 27K or 772K) and the English text (31K) as it is on display at Sohar Fort, Sultanate of Oman.]
The historian al-Baladhuri, writing barely two and half centuries after the coming of the Messengers to Sohar, described the event in these terms:
"When the people of Oman shall have responded to the evidence of truth and shall have promised obedience to God and His prophet, then Amr, their Amir, and Abu Zayid would be made responsible for conducting the prayers, for conveying Islam to the people and for teaching them the Quran and the precepts of the religion."
________________________________________
Muslims in the West often claim that Islam stands for "no compulsion in religion". Is not the sunna of their own prophet contradicting them?
________________________________________

Another threatening letter of Mohammed to sent to the prince of the Ayla tribe near Damascus during the expedition of Tabuk read:

"To John ibn Ru'ba and the chief of Ayla. Peace be upon you. .. I will not fight you until I have written thus unto you. Believe or else pay tribute (Jizyah). ...Ye know the tribute. If ye desire security by sea and by land, obey Allah and his apostle.... But if ye oppose and displease them, I will accept nothing from you until I have fought against you and taken captive your little ones and slain the elder; for I am the apostle of Allah in truth...." [Muir, p402] and Medina some of them by force and other by threat of military aggression. A letter sent to the prince of the Ayla tribe read:

"To John ibn Ru'ba and the chief of Ayla. Peace be upon you. .. I will not fight you until I have written thus unto you. Believe or else pay tribute (Jizyah). ...Ye know the tribute. If ye desire security by sea and by land, obey Allah and his apostle.... But if ye oppose and displease them, I will accept nothing from you until I have fought against you and taken captive your little ones and slain the elder; for I am the apostle of Allah in truth...." [William Muir, The Life of Mahomet , p402]

Just have a look and compare the methods of various prophets in history?

REF 21



Man Singh;

I am repeating some of the information here;

When the European kings were threatened by the invading Kings from Arabia in the 10th and 9th Centuries - it was the human greed, not the religion that caused wars and propaganda. (Please do not label these kings with a religion, the picture would be clearer)

They could not stop those Kings - in history, almost all kings, including Indian Kings were in the business of annexing the neighbors land and looting the wealth of the worship place (general terms for universal applicability) in next city state or town. That is all their business was - Wars and annexations.

The best way for European kingdoms to get their subjects to go to war was to demonize the Kings from Arabia - by hook or crook, just as the Neocons of the world are doing today.

Pay the writers to translate Qur'aan in a demeaning way, to mis-interpret the verses of Qur'aan to make Jews and Christian's enemies of Mohammedans. These copies are available and considerable research is going on to undo the games the kings played.

Roped the Pope to issue a fatwa to crush the Muslim and Jewish infidels and got the subjects who were Christians to riled up and march to Jerusalem to kill and get killed in the name of Jesus.

Much of the European writings on Islam are built on that false foundation.

You included a sentence "and you will feel the difference unless you are biased towards him due to some reasons or the other?"

There is no other reason other than that he was painted wrongly to suit political needs of people. For many years I was an agnostic person; I did not have anything to do with religion of my birth. I was driven by the same mis-information, and whenever I read the Qur'aan a few verses bothered me and I stayed away and I checked frequently and decided religion was not for me. After 9/11, when a plethora of attack was piled up on Islam - my curiosity rose to the point of taking action. I decided to do independent research one more time and I dived into it full time. I was shocked to see the truth. That discovery led me to be a Muslim again. It was a religion maligned for political purposes. However, I will never claim any religion is superior to the other, all have the same mechanism built into it to make one a better human. Qur'aan is also mistranslated by the Muslim Kings, who paid the translators to paint the other as enemies. Today, there are 18 Translations available on the market including the wrong ones. So the reader can read them all and find the truth for themselves and finding the truth is one's own responsibility and I found that out the hard way my friend.

Your item #1 and # 2 are misinformation. His first wife did not wear the Burqa, she wore the same veil that Mother Mary and the Christians and Jews wore at that time. Burqa in its current form is developed over centuries and is cultural symbol that has become religious. All Qur'aan says is to be modest and cover the bosom for women and for men to be modest and wear pants to the ankles and not show off the body. I have written quite extensively and it will perhaps take me another five to six years to completely respond to it. Take a look at this - http://worldmuslimcongress.blogspot.com/2007/07/burqa-to-no-burqa.html

On the other items, you will have to do your own research. Finding the truth is your own responsibility and will bring Mukti to you - freedom from the bondage of malice you MAY have towards Islam.

All religions my friend preaches peace to oneself and peace with what surrounds - life and matter. That is the truth I have discovered over the years of intense involvement. You may find a greater truth than I and I pray it will work for you to keep you happy and free from any bias. It is in your own interests, as your happiness and freedom is dependent on the right knowledge.

It is not the Muslims in west that claim, it is in the Quraan that there is no compulsion in faith, you cannot make one believe any thing by force. I am writing a full blown article on it.

By the way it was Karen Armstrong who made me see Muhammad the man who was committed to building societies of justice and peace. That is the quality of all the prophets, teachers or Gurus. They live for the sake of others.

May you find the truth and find peace within you.

Mike Ghouse

MG Ref #20

"When things really get out of handle, some one will rise to 'fix' the situation,"

I guess Bin Laden and Bush are helping the world by taking us in that direction. I am not as optimistic as you are. I hope you are right.

I am following your discussion with Man Singh. I do not know enough to comment who is on the right side of the history. But let us look at the current situation. Don't you agree that baggages of Islam have increased enormously? Perhaps, in the recent past. One can argue whether they were so in the distant past. One could only blame minority so long. Is'nt it clear that violence in Islam has connection with religion? Or is it? If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and squacks like a duck, it got to be a duck. I think an admission that there is a problem there will give a good starting point. I am not sure denial will make situation any better. You are right, a lot of info is available on the net and it can help spread messages of peace. But such messages will not make sense if you contiue insisting that all is OK with Islam. Perhaps all is not OK with other religions too. But their problems seem to be manageable. That is my humble opinion.

Mike,
Humbling article. One worth printing and filing.

Two things comes to my mind.

"Vaishnavjan to tene re kahie je pid parayi jane re - Narasinha Mehta"

And for all the Hippocrates..
"Pothi padhi padhi jug muwa, pandit bhayaa na koi; dhai aakhar premka padhe su pandit hoye - Kabir"

Regards
Amit