Why is the realization of God easily achieved in old age?

[sridatta]

[This is part of a mahā satsaṅga or a great spiritual discussion between Swami and several devotees who had come from various places, seeking the clarification of their doubts.]

Swami replied: O Learned and Devoted Servants of God! During old age, the person has the leisure to review his or her entire life passed. The person can correlate several incidents carefully to conclude and repeatedly confirm that God certainly exists and that He gives good fruits for one’s good actions and bad fruits or punishments for one’s sins. The person is able to make the correlations due to the similarity in the nature of action and result. For example, if an old man had spoiled somebody’s marriage during his young age, in course of time, someone else spoils the marriage of the man’s own son.

On observing this, the old person realizes that the unimaginable God certainly exists and that God also possesses unimaginable power to punish souls for their sins. Similarly, the old man may also find that someone saved his son’s marriage. He recalls that he had helped some other person’s son or daughter get married in the past. Upon analysis, he realizes that his son’s marriage being saved in the present was the result of his similar good action in the past. With this, the old person again confirms the existence of the unimaginable God, who gave him the good fruit for his good action.

After thus analyzing their own actions done in several practical situations and the fruits of those actions, old people certainly develop a strong belief in the existence of the unimaginable God’s administration on earth. Despite this strong realization, old people neither have much time nor much energy left to worship God. If this same realization comes to a person at an earlier age, that person is indeed very lucky. The person has sufficient time and energy to concentrate on devotion to God. Sometimes, a soul may develop a very strong realization in old age.

Due to the advanced age, the soul is not able to practically serve God and earn His grace. However, the strong impression of that realization gets carried forward to the next birth, in which the soul attains such a realization at a much younger age. Then the soul can serve God, sacrifice to Him and attain His permanent grace.

[Diogenes]

The title of this post assumes facts not in evidence. Where is your data supporting your assumption of a correlation between "realization of God" [not sure what that even means] and "old age?"

I'm 74 and the notion of a "God" seems much more absurd and ridiculous now than it did in my youth. My experience based on talking to other elders, including my 100 year old mother, is that the idea of "God" becomes more ephemeral and less as an actual "being" as one ages. Tillich's claim that god is not a being at all, but the "very ground of being" makes more sense. However this 'kind of god' tends to merge with the universe itself and thus be equivalent to 'no god at all,' an impersonal god, a 'god' without a personality. This is not a god of popular theism. Rather it would be a god beyond defining.

[sridatta]

The title of this post assumes facts not in evidence. Where is your data supporting your assumption of a correlation between "realization of God" [not sure what that even means] and "old age?"

I'm 74 and the notion of a "God" seems much more absurd and ridiculous now than it did in my youth. My experience based on talking to other elders, including my 100 year old mother, is that the idea of "God" becomes more ephemeral and less as an actual "being" as one ages. Tillich's claim that god is not a being at all, but the "very ground of being" makes more sense. However this 'kind of god' tends to merge with the universe itself and thus be equivalent to 'no god at all,' an impersonal god, a 'god' without a personality. This is not a god of popular theism. Rather it would be a god beyond defining.

If universe is God then who created this universe? Such a question arise...

[sridatta]

The title of this post assumes facts not in evidence. Where is your data supporting your assumption of a correlation between "realization of God" [not sure what that even means] and "old age?"

I'm 74 and the notion of a "God" seems much more absurd and ridiculous now than it did in my youth. My experience based on talking to other elders, including my 100 year old mother, is that the idea of "God" becomes more ephemeral and less as an actual "being" as one ages. Tillich's claim that god is not a being at all, but the "very ground of being" makes more sense. However this 'kind of god' tends to merge with the universe itself and thus be equivalent to 'no god at all,' an impersonal god, a 'god' without a personality. This is not a god of popular theism. Rather it would be a god beyond defining.

Importance on existence of God and spiritual knowledge is always yield good results only. For example it play a good role in controlling many vices like corruption etc in the society to a large extent. For instance in ancient India, the education system was mainly concentrated on divine knowledge and development of devotion. There were no courts, police department and anti corruption-department. Only the king used to deal all the cases with the help of a board of judges because the number of sins was very little.

The education system contained little concentration on the earning of money needed for food, cloth and shelter. Only little money is sufficient for the basic needs and hence, much concentration on professional education was not done. The ethics of the society was the most predominant field of education, which can be achieved only by knowledge and devotion.

Temples were many than universities and colleges. The scholars in the temple used to preach the spiritual knowledge to develop ethics in public. Hence, such huge temples are seen. They were learning centers of spiritual education. Now, the temples have also become centers of business because here the devotees come and bargain with the Lord. They offer money to God for some favour in return. Even God is dragged into corruption! Today, the centers of professional education are everywhere and the spiritual knowledge disappeared. This is the reason for the present corruption, which is going to disturb the society finally leading to chaos.

[Diogenes]

If universe is God then who created this universe? Such a question arise...
....
Importance on existence of God and spiritual knowledge is always yield good results only. For example it play a good role in controlling many vices like corruption etc in the society to a large extent.
....

The universe has always existed. It needed no creator. The fallacy is obvious. Theists claim God has always existed. This is the same case I make for the universe, but with fewer assumptions since we know the universe exists.

As for God being needed to control corruption, it is only the idea of a God, the fear of an imagined god that influences people to avoid evil. This is one of the reasons leaders invented gods, to trick their followers into obedience for fear of some imagined terrifying all powerful 'god' who could see their innermost thoughts and secret actions.
God is not necessary, only the fear of god.

[sridatta]

As for God being needed to control corruption, it is only the idea of a God, the fear of an imagined god that influences people to avoid evil. This is one of the reasons leaders invented gods, to trick their followers into obedience for fear of some imagined terrifying all powerful 'god' who could see their innermost thoughts and secret actions.
God is not necessary, only the fear of god.

If that is the case why there is police and court in this world?

[sridatta]

If universe is God then who created this universe? Such a question arise...
....
Importance on existence of God and spiritual knowledge is always yield good results only. For example it play a good role in controlling many vices like corruption etc in the society to a large extent.
....

The universe has always existed. It needed no creator. The fallacy is obvious. Theists claim God has always existed. This is the same case I make for the universe, but with fewer assumptions since we know the universe exists.

As for God being needed to control corruption, it is only the idea of a God, the fear of an imagined god that influences people to avoid evil. This is one of the reasons leaders invented gods, to trick their followers into obedience for fear of some imagined terrifying all powerful 'god' who could see their innermost thoughts and secret actions.
God is not necessary, only the fear of god.

It is true that a few people exploited the concept of God for personal benefits. But, based on the few exceptions, you should not remove the basic system itself. A few railway accidents happen and due to such accidents, you should not cancel all the trains. You should concentrate to avoid the accidents. Similarly, some students might have copied in the examinations.

Try to catch, such students. But, do not remove the system of examination itself. The system serves majority, doing a lot of good. You forget the vast positive side of the system based on the minor negative side. The concept of God controls the sin in the society. If the concept of God is removed, lot of people will do lot of sins since already the ways to escape the punishment in courts are already available.

The society will be crushed into pieces in the absence of the fear for sin. If God disappears, the hell disappears subsequently. The concept of sin will drown and destroy the society like a Tsunami. However, this does not mean that the concept of God is again a created view only to save the society. Such conclusions are not correct. The concept of God is basically true and we have explained the positive side of such concept. It is a real concept and hence, the positive side is also real. Of course, the minor negative side is also real and control should be implemented to keep such negative exploitations in check.