BLOG - Krishna Vattam

Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Seeing Krishna in Jesus

As I was going through a Washington datelined report Deccan Herald - Hindu Senator told to find soul in Jesus - I was sad that a few Americans have not bothered to understand or feel the spirit of India, her concept of God and of the Ultimate. However, a majority of them are conscious of the Quintessence of Indian Dharma and Culture as was amply demonstrated by them in the election of the first ever Hindu to the Minnesota State Legislature, who contested as a Democratic Candidate defeating the Republican opponent by netting 63 percent of votes.
Obviously frustrated over her defeat Rae Hart Anderson in an email message to Senator Satveer Chaudary congratulating him said ‘It is my sincere wish that you will get to know Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. Reacting to this, as the newspaper report said Chaudary said, ‘ when I read it I just shook my head. This just sums up the type of campaign voters were rejecting ‘ Later in the afternoon , Andersons’s former campaign Manager Barbara Black said in a statement to the media that Anderson wrote to the Senator because ‘ Chaudary is not Christian and he needs to find his soul

As I was reading this report my thoughts went back to my participation three decades ago in a function in which President of India, renowned Philosopher and Statesman Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan pleasantly surprised the gathering of teachers and students in the Demonstration School by quoting a three-line passage he had written as an extension to the verse of a 11th century Indian Philosopher Uddanachar who speaks about the essence of Hinduism and concept of God..The students sang this a the School prayer, and as soon as they had stopped , Dr Radhakrishnan quoted his passage and said if this 11th century Philosopher had been alive he would have included Islam and Christianity, Allah and Jesus.

Again in one of his speeches Dr Radhakrishnan said a devout Hindu bows before the church and a mosque with all devotion as he does while standing in front of a temple. Recently a Christian preacher had come to me with some Christian literature and was asking me to purchase the same literature.I showed him the same literature I had bought some time ago. In the conversation that followed I explained to him that I could see my Krishna through Jesus and Jesus through Krishna. But the preacher who was obviously a fundamentalist began questioning me as ‘ how that could be , there is only one Jesus’ . Well I excused myself and said good bye to him.