Are rituals a way to become peaceful or are they a solution to life?
You can derive some benefits from ritual, if it has some element of science in it. However, rituals were popularly practiced when most people were ignorant.
When intellect is sufficiently evolved in society, the practice of performing rituals begins to slowly recede because this is just like old technology. We should use other methods that can easily transform a person. Rituals have now become a source of exploitation. There could be something to ritual, but it is overly exaggerated. If you want to be peaceful, there are some simple things that you can do with yourself. If you invest just a few minutes a day to yourself, remaining peaceful through the day is easy.
When the Gujarat earthquake happened, over 1,00,000 people died. Wherever I went, people asked: Is God angry with us? An earthquake is just Mother Earth stretching herself a little bit. It has always been happening. It is just that in India, if the smallest thing happens, 1,00,000 people die.
It is because of population density. In other parts of the world, an earthquake would not be a major issue. Everyday there are tremors in California, but nobody dies. Similarly, in Japan, almost everyday there are tremors, yet nobody dies; because they have taken necessary precautions and care about how to build their buildings, how to live there, how to be conscious about this. We have not done anything. We are a country that's still in God's hands. Unless we take it into our hands we will be a total mess.
Somebody conducted a major ritual on the coast of Andhra Pradesh so that earthquakes don't happen there. Over five lakh people had gathered; it was a major event. And i said, why is he doing a ritual for earthquake in Andhra Pradesh? In Andhra Pradesh, every year there are cyclones and if you can do a ritual for stopping the cyclone, I will bow down to you. Now you do it for earthquake in a place that has never experienced one.
In Tamil Nadu, someone put posters all over that said: "If you have any financial problems, come. If you do 25,001 rituals, all your financial problems will be over". Somebody's financial problems will definitely be over, but not yours. If someone has such a wonderful ritual that can solve all financial problems, why doesn't he do one for India?
Half of the country's population still doesn't eat properly, is that not danger enough? Over 300 million people are living on less than two dollars per day. That is a disaster of huge magnitude. One bomb explodes somewhere, one earthquake happens, one tsunami comes and a few thousand people die; yes, that is a tragedy.
But the poverty in this country is a far bigger tragedy and we are just sitting by and letting it happen. We can do something about it, but if we want to take up large responsibilities and do something, the first thing to do is we have to take care of our Self. You must be in a condition that you won't crack up and break down when situations demand exertion from you.
So it is important that you do some inner engineering, strengthen and stabilize yourself before setting out to face challenges. By SADHGURU JAGGI VASUDEV .