Hinduism's Bhagavad Gita is an excellent example of the profound effect that perceived nature of reality can have on moral construct. The text begins with Arjuna on the brink of war and in a moral crisis. His enemy happens to be a cousin tribe, and the ensuing battle will certainly kill many of his relatives. He is paralyzed, unable to rank his kingdom's conquest above his good will for his extended relations.
He seeks permission from Krishna (his god) to stop the battle. Krishna responds with a mini-lecture on the nature of reality. He explains that the body can be killed, but the true self cannot and that the most important thing for Arjuna to do is carry out his duty as a warrior, with a sense of detatchment.
By explaining an "extra-mortal" nature of reality, Krishna is able to help Arjuna lower the stakes of engaging in a bloody battle. Moral choices seem to involve a ranking of values. Krishna's sermon teaches Arjuna to rank duty over life... a ranking that has great potential for producing immoral behavior in a construct that ranks life first.
This text was formational to both Oppenheimer and Gandhi, so obviously the degree of literal interpretation that one takes has a profound effect on the application, but they both found great resolve to act outside their contemporary paradigms, presumably because their personal understanding of reality covered different ground than the status quo. The concept of "right" or "moral" must be located on the map of the way things "really" are, and so conversations on the nature of reality are foundational to any definition of moral behavior.
Can you think of examples of shifting values based of paradigm shift/expansion in other religious or philosophical constructs?
The concept of Dharma (duty) is also very interesting from a moral standpoint, but I'll save that for another post.
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2 comments:
you see Oppenheimer and Gandhi as formed partly by this text. I don not think this is an issue of literalness. They were both fulfilling their Dharma (destiny, I think is a better gloss) or what they were born to do.
Oddly I think they both had the same goal in life: peace. Gandhi took the extraordinary path of non-violent "civil" disobedience (which BTW would never had worked against someone like the Soviets or the North Koreans, or the Nazis).
Oppenheimer developed a weapon so totally destructive that no one would ever oppose it supposedly and therefore peace would be the result.
I am told that Islam has as one tenet that deceiving an unbeliever is permitted. I think that bad things happening to someone under Hinduism is perceived as bad Karma from previous lives for the victim. Even within Christianity the theology of some sects has people "sinning" so much that it almost seems permitted as long as they can go to a priest or ask forgiveness or something.
Finally, I have seen the paradigm shift of westerners in recent years in regard to property. Most people I know would not steal a CD or DVD from a store but they seem to think that a digital copy is OK to take from a friend. It is a new paradigm that needs to be worked out carefully.
I was referring to Gandhi taking the whole Gita as an allegory... man fighting the battle within himself. I don't think Gandhi thought non-violence was the path that HE was supposed to take b/c it was his Dharma, I think he thought it was THE moral/ethical way to bring about social change. It was the "turn the other cheek" of Christianity that he embraced. I don't think he would have felt Krishna's instructions to Arjuna in a literal sense were moral. And I think he may have advocated non-violent protest against even a brutal oppressor... the important thing being to go out with clean hands... Ahimsa.
Good examples... each worthy of it's own post. When can I quit my day job???
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