Enquiry: Opening the doors of wisdom
The controversy after the questions of a young girl to a young spiritual leader of India led to a question cum dilemma in the mind of much knowledge seeking youths” Is there anything wrong with enquiry? Why to worry so much about enquiry?” For most of the people, a query about enquiry may not be a source of worry but to those who are always looking to delve deep into the mysteries of life and excavate the truths that are often kept buried from normal vision, enquiry is the much needed food for their soul. Therefore, Peter Abelard while emphasizing the importance of questioning and enquiry once quoted” by doubting, we are led to enquire and by enquiry, we perceive the truth.”
Enquiry as Sign of Higher Intelligence
If we analyze ourselves, then we can safely conclude that a human being is naturally inquisitive. He desires to explore the concepts that he studies in books and perceive the phenomenon which are being perceived by others. After this experiential learning, the natural outcome is an enquiry. In a classroom, when an intelligent student raise his hand to ask a question, many of his friends sitting beside him may not appreciate his enquiry because of apprehension of extended study period but if we look from the perspective of this inquisitive student, the answer to his question provide him the necessary food for thought, the much needed impetus to know more about things around him. From an intellectual point of view, enquiry is a sign of higher intelligence. An uninformed child on seeing an airplane may think” This plane is flying automatically.” But an intelligent person uses the tool of enquiry to know the person flying the plane because he can understand that word automatic implies an invisible designer and controller. When newton was sitting under a tree and an apple fell down, Newton instantly developed this query” Why this apple fell down?” After observation, he found that all the apples were falling down only and not even a single apple went up. He again questioned” Why this apple fell down?” This enquiry served as the building block to discovery of law of gravitation which is one of the most important laws governing the engineering of the cosmos. This is sufficient to prove the power of an enquiry in making transformation in the life of people and dissipate the doubts associated with a query about enquiry.
US President Theodore Roosevelt
Tap the power of enquiry
Having understood the importance of enquiry, we may think of exercising this privilege to unravel the mysteries of life but before venturing into this journey of knowing the mysteries, we must prepare ourselves with some pre-requisites. The most important of all is the openness of heart. When we ask questions, we should be open to accept the logic. Many times, when people are confronted with tough questions of life, death etc. and when the answers to them come from spiritual domain, many often reject it. When we talk about God, soul, rebirth, people often question: Why discuss such unscientific things in this modern age? This question originates not from their scientific thinking but from their belief in scientism, the peculiar school of thought that places around science a halo of omniscience. Former US President Theodore Roosevelt had consequently warned about the consequences of scientism: “There is superstition in science quite as much as there is superstition in theology, and it is all the more dangerous because those suffering from it are profoundly convinced that they are freeing themselves from all superstition.” What we need is an open mind which is ready to accept something supported with logic. Just as science has its distinctive methodology, so does spirituality. So, scientific methodology can discover basic spiritual principles like the existence of soul and God. However, only spiritual methods like mantra meditation will enable us to experientially verify advanced spiritual principles like the identity and the personality of God.
