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Symbolism in Hinduism

When we say that the modern youth or the modern college student has no faith at all, we are only insulting him, misnaming him because the fact is not that he has no religion, but the religion that is available at this moment is not capable of catering to his demands or his problems at all. His problem is much deeper. His is not a problem of security because he is born in the age where he knows life is nothing, it may go off at any time. So he has not placed any great value on life. All that he wants is only to live dynamically. The threatening condition of a danger, and a feeling of the total annihilation of the world-it is under that cloud that the poor young boy has grown up and as he grows up he finds no consolation, no strength in himself to face this great challenge of this new age. At that time the old religion comes with the ringing of the bell or throwing of the flowers or offering of sweets. He thinks “why should I offer to these silent Gods?”. He has no more understanding of it because it is not bringing him anything. The poor boy is demanding a new religion which would give him the new fire and enthusiasm, make him greater than what he has created for himself out of his own intellect.

The religion of Vedanta can alone satisfy the modern man. We can teach him that in him alone is the Master of the mighty, the centre-most Reality. Man should discover in himself the essential knowledge that “I am nothing but the Spirit and as the Spirit I am the universal entity and not an individualized speck identifying with and limited by my body or mind or my intellect.” If he is given the capacity to de-condition himself and experience his nature of pure divinity, then alone can he ever be converted to religion. All the rest is only a political or economic programme.