Tradition need not be blamed to exploit the love on parents through the ritual

[dattaswami]

Tradition need not be blamed to exploit the love on parents through the ritual

Ritual-exploiting the weak point for a good purpose

It is told that if the priest eats the food, the departed soul gets that food. Even though this is a lie, it has some good purpose. Such a lie will initiate even the greediest person to perform the ritual due to love on his departed parents. When the ritual is performed and if the donation to deserving is done, it gives good fruits to him and also to the departed souls. It is a matter of exploiting the weak point for a good purpose. The weak point is not misused. The mother tells the child that if it eats the food, the moon will come down. It is a total lie but still the mother is not getting sin for deceiving the child. The lie serves good purpose in making the child eat the food. All such statements are pertained to the ignorant people only and not to the wise scholars. The Veda also says that you should perform the ritual to get heavenly pleasures. The ambition for heavenly pleasure already exists in every human being and this weakness is exploited in performing the ritual through which the doer is expected to be attracted towards God through prayers.

Here, the Veda is not responsible for creating the attraction to heavenly pleasures. It only exploits the already existing attraction in the human being. Therefore, the Veda need not be blamed for encouraging the attraction to heavenly pleasures as stated by Shankara (Jnapakam natu kaarakam). The Veda says to kill an animal in the sacrifice to offer to God. Here, the Veda does not encourage the killing of animals. Even without the Veda, the human being kills the animals to eat them. Here, the Veda asks the human being to offer the killed animal to God first and then to eat. The Veda is not responsible for killing the animals in the ritual. It is only responsible for the offering of food to God. The Veda adds the offering to God after killing the animal, which is already an existing tendency in the human being. Similarly, the tradition need not be blamed to exploit the love on parents through the ritual. The already existing love on parents is exploited to divert an ignorant person to love God through the ritual in which the prayers to God are offered.
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