Hindu Socrates?

“The Unknowing Sage” is an interesting little book about Faqir Chand, a Hindu guru within the Radhasoami tradition. The book contains interviews conducted with Faqir by David Christopher Lane, a former devotee of this particular tradition, and Mark Juergensmeyer, a scholar of comparative religion.

Apparently, many Hindu gurus (including Radhasoami ditto) claim to have the miraculous power of appearing to their devotees in response to prayer, while physically remaining in another location. Faqir has also “appeared” in this fashion to people who worshipped him. In contrast to most other gurus, however, Faqir claims that these apparitions are all illusory. They are projections of the devotee's own mind, the result of the devotee's own faith and love in the Divine. Faqir also points out that many “holy men” died terrible deaths, or had family problems and other foibles while living. They were influenced by the law of karma, just as everyone else.

Faqir himself doesn't claim to have absolute power to work miracles, regards his disciples as his gurus, and talks openly about his spiritual failings as a young man and seeker. He apparently rejects the central tenet of the Radhasoami tradition (the mystical visions of the divine “Light” and “Sound”), claiming that the really important thing is the “Self” which experiences these phenomena. The Self, in turn, is just a small bubble of consciousness, which is infinite and hence impossible to know in its entirety.

Since nobody, not even religious leaders and teachers, can know the whole Truth, the best path is to admit unknowingness, stay humble and accept whatever karmic consequences comes one's way. Faqir doesn't even claim to know what will happen to him after his physical death. However, he concedes that most people can't meditate on the formless, and therefore should choose a divine form and worship it as a technique to eventually reach the unfathomable.

Mark Juergensmeyer compares Faqir Chand's message to Mahayana Buddhism and to the Tibetan Book of the Dead. By contrast, Lane has a tendency to put a sceptic-agnostic spin on the old man's message. Personally, I suspect that Faqir's message is really perfectly compatible with certain strands within Hinduism. Advaita? Even his radical critique of cheating, corrupted gurus strikes me as less revolutionary than it might seem at first glance. His *real* message is one of fatalistic quietism and humbleness, not militant anti-guru activism. I think Socrates was more annoying!

That being said, “The Unknowing Sage” is an interesting study and I therefore give it five stars.