An agnostic’s grasp

People who say they are agnostics — popularly defined as those who hold that the existence of God and the essential nature of things...

People who say they are agnostics — popularly defined as those who hold that the existence of God and the essential nature of things are unknown and unknowable, or that human knowledge is limited to experience — are sometimes taken to be egoists (those who have a tendency to speak or write of themselves excessively and boastfully, or those who carry an inflated sense of their own importance).

I believe, both definitions are incomplete. The tendency among agnostics is that they tend to stand strong on their thinking capacity. They think they are thinkers and it is below their dignity to accept that there is a higher agency working behind the phenomena.

But non-belief is also a kind of belief; and though agnosticism has, for the purpose of academic classification, been defined as a ‘religion’, it is nothing more than a conceptual standpoint. After all, when we go to sleep we take it for granted that the sun will definitely rise next morning. Which agnostics is going to say, ‘I will think about it or I don’t know whether the sun will rise or not’? If we did not believe, why would we expect the earth to go on orbiting the sun to stay in its place? Thought alone is not enough. Instinct, sensitivity, premonition and conscience also shape our beliefs.

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The wandering monk, Swami Vivekananda, was once the guest of the king of Alwar. During their talks, the king told him he disliked people who worshipped statues made of stone, metal and wood, because they had nothing to do with God. There was an oil painting of the king on the wall behind the throne. Vivekananda took it down and asked a courtier standing by to spit on it. The nervous courtier refused to comply. Then Vivekananda asked the king to do the same. He too was taken aback.

Vivekananda then asked the assembly why they were hesitating, since the painting was just an amalgamation of colours and not a representation of the king? Nobody had any answer. He then explained that the devotee does not worship the metal or the stone. The representation is just a medium. The believer pays homage to the creator through the representation. Belief is what counts.