Sikhism
From: "Atheist Society" <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: Dear Ali we have a problem, please help!
Date: Fri, 05 Oct 2001 20:40:30 +0000
Dear Ali, please help us. We were very impressed with your website
and agreed that religion in general is no longer needed, we can
all be humanistic and live in peace and harmony. We are in the
process of making a website which will hopefully help to destroy
the religious doctrines which divide humanity. We were doing great
with knocking out Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Baha'i,
even Buddhism but we have gotten very stuck with Sikhism. This
religion is (to put it nicely) "a big pain in the ass"
(Please pardon the language) We have only found one site which
tries (very poorly) to argue that even this religion is not
needed, but the argument is irrational and very unscientific
unlike the very rational arguments you use. When we read the
following from your website, we found what you said to be
amazingly interesting:
"Doubt Everything Find Your Own
Light."
"Last Words
Dear friend, if you look for meaning in life, don’t look for it
in religions; don’t go from one cult to another or from one guru
to the next. You can expend all your life or look for eternity and
will find nothing but disappointment and disillusionment. Look
instead in service to humanity. You will find “meaning” in
your love for other human beings. You can experience God when you
help someone who needs your help. The only truth that counts is
the love that we have for each other. This is absolute and real.
The rest is mirage, fancies of human imagination and fallacies of
our own making." By Ali Sina
Why is this interesting? Because we found this religion of Sikhism
to be in agreement with you! This is why we have a problem. We
tried to look at their holy text (Adi Granth) but didnt find the
usual absurdities we found in the other religious books. In fact
its refreshingly inspiring and very good!? Maybe you can have some
better luck. We tried to visit a couple of websites and got more
of a shock. Did you know that they believed in Democracy, freedom
of speech, choice, expression, freedom of religion, pluralism,
human rights, equality between men and women, equality of all
people regardless of race, religion, caste, creed, status etc. 300
years before the existance of the USA! Theirs is the only religion
which says in their religious scriptures that women are equal in
every respect to men. They even had women soldiers leading armies
in to battle against "you know who" (The usual suspects
- Muslims!) Their history is a proud one, they fought in both
World Wars. Even Hitler praised them for their bravery and Aryan
heritage!
Dear Ali, this religion is hard for us to try and criticise but
you are an expert and may find some faults overlooked by us. In
their holy book, there is a round earth, water is made from
chemical elements, there is even mention of the evoution process,
big bang and life on other planets! This is pretty crazy and
amazing stuff, who would have thought that these New York taxi
drivers (There are lots of Sikh taxi drivers in NY) would have
such an amzing faith? We read up some information of what Bertrand
Russell had to say about Sikhism, this is the man who destroyed
Christianity (same applies to Islam and Judaism) and exposed its
absurdities, but even this great man got stuck when it came to
Sikhism! In fact he gave up and said
"that if some lucky men survive the onslaught of the third
world war of atomic and hydrogen bombs, then the Sikh religion
will be the only means of guiding them.
Russell was asked that he was talking about the third world war,
but isn't this religion capable of guiding mankind before the
third world war?
In reply, Russell said, "Yes, it has the capability, but the
Sikhs have not brought out in the broad daylight, the splendid
doctrines of this religion which has come into existence for the
benefit of the entire mankind. This is their greatest sin and the
Sikhs cannot be freed of it."
Please bear in mind that Bertrand Russell was a great philosopher
and free thinker. We have been trying for weeks now to find a way
to fairly and rationally criticize and find fault with this
religion but have failed. We even found out that there are many
people converting to this religion in the USA and Europe as well
as Russia (Mostly well educated and affluent white people). We
tried to find some of their literature and see what kind of claims
they make, but unfortunatley they have no missionary material as
they do not have missionsaries! People become Sikh by learning
usually by chance or by coming in to contact with them. They are
currently the 5th biggest religion in the world and growing quite
fast in the west and Russia.
Please help us as we are stuck, to give you an example of they are
all about we found the following websites:
http://www.sikhnet.com (This is a pretty good site and helpful)
http://www.hope.at/sikhism (This site is very easy to follow,
check it out, they have a Womans section and a Martyrs section, it
looks like that you are not the only one trying to expose the
falseness of Islam, Sikhs scholars did it hundreds of years ago
and got killed for it!)
http://www.sikhs.org (This is the site that was on CNN when Sikhs
in the USA were mistaken for Arabs and Middle Easterners and were
attacked by mindless morons)
Please help us out, we cant make our website about religion being
the cause of war and disharmony when we have this one and only
religion which makes a hell of a lot of sense! lol (I thought
Atheism had all the answers but were kind of stuck now.)
We look forward to hearing from you, we respect your great views
and want to promote them to everyone, thank you for your time,
take care.
Dr. John Smith
Dear Dr. John Smith,
Thanks for the email. First of all let me assure you that I
have not embarked on the mission to destroy all the religions. If
the belief in a religion makes you happy and content, please go
for it.
My purpose in writing is to fight against hate not against
faith. There are many religions that preach good things. Buddhism,
Zoroastrianism and Baha'i are the examples. Even there is lots of
goodness in Christianity. I am afraid I have little
knowledge of Sikhism. I cannot agree or disagree with your e nthusiasm about this religion. I admit that my knowledge of
Sikhism is very superficial. Where I live there is a big Sikh community. They have many temples
and we often
hear they fight over ridiculous things like whether they should
sit on chairs or on the floor. There has been also some shootings
and assassinations among the moderate and the fundamentalist
faction of the Sikhs over, who should be in control of the temple
and handle the funds.
You perhaps have more information of the tenets of Sikhism, but
as Christ said, "you'll know them by their fruits". When
I see the Sikhs, I do not see much difference between them and the
rest of the people. As the matter of fact many of them are shrewd
businessmen but many people try not to deal with them because of
their bad reputation. (unreliable, bad service, etc) I personally
have great business associates among them and have been dealing
with them for years. I have had bad experiences with some of them
but those with whom I stay put are trustworthy and I am very
pleased of them.
As I said my intention is not to fight religions. I want to
fight hateful doctrines not false beliefs. I personally would not
endorse any belief system. I encourage rational thinking,
independent thinking and freethinking. Religious thinking is
opposed to that. In any religion you have a guru, a prophet or a
messenger who is inspired by superior knowledge and all the the
rest are followers. Independent thinking is encouraged as long a
it does not contradict with the thinking of the leader. This
brings stagnation of thought. One is given certain liberties to
think on his own but s/he is not allowed to exceed the limits set
by the original guru. The words of prophet or the guru are the
ultimate balance to distinguish between the right and the wrong.
I recall few years ago there was a legal fight where the Sikhs
wanted to enter into RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) and keep
their turban. In my opinion this was the sign of backwardness
because it showed that the followers of Sikhism are unable to
adapt with time. I was sorry when the politicians bent the
rule and allowed Sikh police wear turbans because they wanted
their votes.
All those good teachings that you attribute to Sikhism exist in
many other religions. As a matter of fact Bahaism is the most
advanced doctrine. Bahais also do not have that negative image
that the Sikhs have left of themselves like their outdated dress
code, hair code, ceremonial dagger and a history of violence. You
praised the Sikhs for their bravery and for fighting against
Islam. In my opinion Baha'is are much more brave for facing
Muslims without any fight, sword or violence. This is bravery.
Anyway, I do not wish to refute any religion if that religion
does not advocate violence or threaten the peace of the world. But
I have chosen not to be a follower. I was a follower and now I am
a freethinker. Freethinking is better. I think the desire to be a
follower (of any religion) stems from the fact that people are not
yet mature and like children do not have the self reliance to
choose their own ways. They need someone else telling them what is
right and what is not.
It is interesting however, that the same brainwashed followers
brag about the good teachings of their religions to prove that
their way is better. One wonders if they know that these teachings
are good, they must have used their own judgment, and if they have
used their own judgment then they are perfectly capable to
distinguish between the good and the bad. So why they need these
religions to begin with? You enumerated all the good teachings of
Sikhism. If you KNOW that these are good teachings, why you
need to follow someone to tell you what you already know? What if
this person you want to follow tell you: "kill the
unbelievers, beat your wife or cut the hands of the thief"
would you still follow him blindly? If you believe in him you
should. But if you take the exception to these barbaric teachings
then you are using your independent thinking and in that case
following a guru or a prophet is superfluous.
Kind regards
Ali Sina
Ryan
Responds to Ali Sina on Sikhism:
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Caveat:
Atheist Society is a fraud. Such thing does not
exist. The person signing as Dr. Smith is a Sikh pretending to be
someone else. This is a facile trick by a Sikh trying to pull a fast
one. Childish games like this are often played by Muslims too.
hahaha!!!!
Good
one dear sir!!!!
Actually
Sikh religion or rather branch was established by guru Govind Singhji to
fight Islamic terrorist Aurangzeb who was emperor of India and very cruel
at that time.
So
essentially the Sikhs were sword arm of Hinduism for over 300 yrs. Even
now, Sikhs make up to 20% and more of Indian army and all paramilitary
forces, although they are only 2.5% of population!!!
But as
the saying goes, power corrupts, so some Sikhs, with help from our
neighbors Pakis [who were Hindus a mere 400-500 yrs ago wanted to
cleanse Punjab of Hindus, and establish Khalistan. Much Hindu blood was
shed, as always. Over 100,000 innocent Hindus died with no fault of
theirs. the govt as usual did not do anything.
Finally
a Sikhs body guard of Indira Gandhi, the then PM of India, killed her.
There was very sever backlash form Hindus, and the Sikhs were re-paid with
king.
Actually
the trouble was started by Indira Gandhi, who did not want the Sikh Akali
party to rule, but wanted her congress party to rule.
The
Pakis also started to disown the Sikh slowly. Anyway. After that the Sikh
realized that they are better off with us kafir-infidel-idolater Hindus.
So, now again they are part of India, and fight Islamic terrorists with
India. Now, the things are getting worse. Earlier we had Islamic jihadis
having suicide squads and stuff; now Hindu leaders are saying creation of
Pakistan was mistake, and will take it by force and convert it to India,
and convert Arabia to its pre Islamic pagan - read kafir [I luv being a
kafir ] traditions.
I
don’t know what way world is heading. We have Paki terrorists and
mullahs. We have Hindus who are also more than serious than the Pakis and
Saudis to convert them all to Hinduism...
Hinduism
is good it is pluralistic, but the caste system is a burden that is
unbearable. I just hope caste system is destroyed in earliest possible
time. We can’t do much; we are middle class ppl, helpless in what we
are. But fortunately, slowly caste system is being dismantled. Hope we can
successfully dismantle caste system and have peace in India and the world.
Nothing makes sense. Sorry to trouble u. but maybe u can make some sense
of it.
ramesh
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