In Flesh And Blood

Are godmen here to stay?

- Ajay Gudavarthy

German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche declared in the 19th century that Christianity and religious morality can no longer offer the organising principles of social life as Christian morality is a 'slave morality' of the vanquished, and he went on to ask what can possibly replace God. He famously declared 'God is dead' and pleaded for individual 'will to power' to replace collective morality. A century later came along French philosopher Michel Foucault, who this time famously declared 'Man is dead'. He meant 'man' or 'human' is a social construct of its times and it is futile to attempt to discover an essence. It is a life without essence, and therefore, a life with infinite opportunities to be explored. Foucault's anti-humanism sounds exciting but restless. There is no place to rest. Can self-discovery and self-reliant individualism provide enough succours in living a life, even if it lays a premium on freedom against imposed moral order? How do we escape collective control without getting reduced to atomised selves?

Both the philosophers could not have predicted an ingenious postcolonial alternative in finding faith in godmen, babas and gurus. God took reincarnation as godmen. Euphoria around the temple in Ayodhya lost steam just a week after the pran pratishtha, but thousands of people thronged to collect the soil on which Bhole Baba walked in Hathras. Gurus animate life and seem to compensate for the disenchantment with the 'traditional' God, religiosity and rituals. Modern gurus are more transactional and interactive than 'waiting for God-ot'.