Every Book, Like A Relationship, Has An Expiry Date

By Sumit Paul, New Age Islam

22 July 2023

Roshnai Hui Raaygaan, Kaaghaz Hue Kaale

Aql Par Phir Bhi Pade Rahe Aligarhi Taale

Nashtar 'Nishapuri'

(Ink went in vain, papers were blackened/ Yet, the wisdom remained under siege by the locks of Aligarh) - Aligarh is famous for its locks

"I urge, read you must

But only to remove the rust

If you don't read and think

Words are mere dust "

Writer's translation of Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar's Bangla quatrain

"I wrote no poetry. People weaved my ecstatic sighs of love into words and confined them into books...."

Hafiz Shirazi

While the wheelwright was making a wheel at the lower end of the hall, Prince Huan of Ch'i was reading a book at the upper end. Putting aside his chisel and mallet, the wheelwright called to the Prince and asked him what book he was reading. "One that preserves the words of the Sages," said the Prince. "Are those Sages alive? " asked the wheelwright. "Oh, no," said the Prince, "they're all dead." "Then what you're reading can be nothing but the dirt and scum of bygone people, " said the wheelwright. "How dare you, a wheelwright, find fault with a book that I'm reading? Justify your statement or you shall die." "Well, speaking as a wheelwright, "said the man, "this is how I look at the matter: When I'm fashioning a wheel, if my stroke is too slow, it cuts deep but is not steady; if my stroke is too fast, it's steady but doesn't cut deep.

The right pace, neither too fast nor too slow, will not get into the hand if it doesn't come from the heart. It's something that cannot be put into words; there's an art to it that I cannot hand on to my son. That's why I cannot let him take over my work, so here I'm at the age of seventy-five, still making wheels.

In my opinion, it must be the same with those who've gone before us. All that was worth handing on, died with them; the rest they put into their books. That's why I said that what you're reading is the dirt and scum of bygone people." The Prince stood transfixed. He tore the pages of the book and left the palace never to return. He became a monk, who never picked up a book till he breathed his last.

"No book is perennially useful to mankind," said English philosopher David Hume. How can any book, scripture or a written document be relevant for all eras?  Every book, like a relationship, has an expiry date.

No relationship, however profound it may appear, lasts forever. The same is with books. No book, no scripture remains eternally irreproachable. "Give me blank pages, no written words. Give me space, no instructions, " says the protagonist of a story written by the South African Nobel Laureate Nadine Gordimer. Every age, every era and every epoch has its unique issues that can only be resolved in a contemporary manner and not in a way, suitable to the hoary old past.

Our over dependence on books, scriptures and written words sucks the excitement out of our lives. We must always remember that books are after all, bloodless substitutes for life. They can't be compared with the pulsating joie de vivre of living existence. What the wise men wrote in books speaks of their way of looking at things at that point of time. What Moses, Muhammad and Jesus preached was their way of unifying the warring tribes of that primitive period in human civilization. But I'm afraid,  all their teachings no longer hold water in the present times. Most of them are outright obsolete and ludicrous. So are the preaching of Krishna in Gita, which justify violence and are against the very tenets of pacifism and irenic ideology. You just cannot absolve Krishna from his dubious role of an instigator in Mahabharata. It was Krishna who caused the Kurukshetra to take place, not the Kauravas.

The followers of Jainism put Krishna in the seventh hell, Raurav. They squarely hold him responsible for the unprecedented bloodshed. There's a beautiful anecdote about Buddha, described in Vaishampayan's 'Amritopam.'  One day Buddha was sitting with his disciples. One of his intelligent disciples Sariputra asked him, "Don't you want to leave behind books to immortalise your wisdom?" Buddha intently looked at Sariputra and then said, " Son, your very question is wrong".  Wisdom's immortal. It needs no help from books and words. And as regards your query to leave behind a book as my legacy, my dear son, this was the very reason for leaving my parental faith.

I was disenchanted with those books. “It’s worthwhile to state that Buddha was born into a Hindu family and got disillusioned with the Hindu scriptures and excessive ritualism. A wise man can envisage the future, but he's not a seer or a Trikaaldarshi.

Your truth is your truth. It's purely subjective. You've to find it for yourself. You cannot find it by reading and imbibing someone else's 'experience of enlightenment'. This cannot be found in any other book.

Jiddu Krishnamurty used to admonish people, "Come to me devoid of all bookish wisdom." Borrowed knowledge acquired from books doesn't make anyone truly wise. At the most, you'll be called a knowledgeable person, but not a man, full of wisdom. That comes only with experience and your interaction with people. Books often take you back to the past. But your interest should be in the future, because you're going to spend the rest of your life there. I'd like to round it off with the beautiful words of English poet William Blake that sum up the futility of books, "  Books, tomes, volumes and pages / Yet, mankind is troubled in all ages." Think over it.

In Evelyn Waugh's essay, "Bogged down by books, " one comes across a wonderful observation: " Though there's no substitute for reading, there's a problem. A 'silver fish' (bibliophile) often stops using his/her own brains if too much engrossed in books. One's own thinking gets subverted and this often happens to the readers of religious books."

At the same time, if we remain glued to books, when shall we speak? To quote Allama Iqbal, "Ye Dastoor-e-Zabaan Bandi Hai Kaisa Teri Mahfil Mein/ Yahan Toh Baat Karne Ko Tarasti Hai Zubaan Meri" (Why on your court this ban on word or speech/ My tongue is all athirst to open out and speak).  

 

URL:   https://newageislam.com/spiritual-meditations/book-relationship-expiry-date/d/130273

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