Dr. Vijai S Shankar MD.PhD.
Published on www.academy-advaita.com
The Netherlands
6th October 2016
Responsibility
“Moral dilemma”
Responsibility is an expectation to do the right thing and not to do the wrong thing. It also includes an expectation to guide someone to do or not to do. It could also mean being accountable for something which you have done or not done. Responsibility is expected from everybody.
Therefore, responsibility implies that a man or a woman has a moral duty to perform. Logic and reason imply that according to knowledge responsibility is normal and is expected from everybody. But the enlightened have declared that what is meant to happen will only happen. The declaration by the enlightened regarding doing is to be deeply understood in order to understand responsibility.
As far as doing anything is concerned, man needs to understand that the movements of a doing by a body are not separate from the movements of the body that is not a doing. The body moves while resting as well as during sleep. This implies that the body moves continuously and the continuous movement of the body is intermittently interpreted during the waking state as doing.
The enlightened understand that a doing is a sophisticated movement of the body, which includes responsible doing. It is not separate from the movements that are less sophisticated as during rest and sleep, which do not include a responsible doing or not doing.
The enlightened also understand that the body moves in every moment and that a movement would not appear in every moment if the moment was not present. Therefore, a moment has to be present before man for man to move in it. The moment in life was present much before man to include vegetation and animal kingdom. This implies that a movement of the body is present in the moment and man neither makes the moment nor the movement that is present in the moment.
Similarly, the enlightened realise that a responsible word or thought too gets spoken or thought, if it is meant to get spoken or thought. This implies that the declaration of the enlightened that what is meant to happen will happen includes responsibility of a doing, speaking or thinking.
This implies that it is life’s responsibility to lead life. By this understanding man’s moral dilemma of responsibility is replaced by trust and patience in life.
Author: Dr. Vijai S. Shankar
© Copyright V. S. Shankar 2016
Editor’s Note:
Man saddled himself with the burden of responsibility when he assumed the functions of doer, thinker and speaker on the great stage of life. The consequence of this is and must be that he or she leads a life that is dogged by mistrust and impatience both on a universal and an individual scale. In response to man’s dilemma, therefore, the wise have revealed that the determination of what happens or does not happen resides in life. In order to understand that this is so life has provided man with trust and patience, nature’s gifts for every man and woman to discover. Be it so.
Julian Capper, U.K
German Translator’s Note:
Whatever we do, we are kept responsible for it. This can be quite a challenge from time to time. We want to improve our moral capacity and try hard to be a better human being next time. Sometimes this endeavor ends up with success, sometimes not. This drama in our minds will not change, even with the understanding presented here by a wise man that life is the only responsible in life, and not man. But it is recognized as a drama in the mind and no longer taken for a reality in life. Furthermore, it is also life’s responsibility to make us responsible in an illusory manner, in order to maintain the illusion of humans as a doer, speaker and thinker. Admiration of life’s intelligence to provide a perfect illusion of responsibility is what remains, after an understanding has happened.
Marcus Stegmaier, Germany.