Sikhism

From: "Atheist Society" <atheist_society@hotmail.com>
To: afreethinker@hotmail.com
Subject: Dear Ali we have a problem, please help!
Date: Fri, 05 Oct 2001 20:40:30 +0000

Dear Ali, please help us. We were very impressed with your website and agreed that religion in general is no longer needed, we can all be humanistic and live in peace and harmony. We are in the process of making a website which will hopefully help to destroy the religious doctrines which divide humanity. We were doing great with knocking out Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Baha'i, even Buddhism but we have gotten very stuck with Sikhism. This religion is (to put it nicely) "a big pain in the ass" (Please pardon the language) We have only found one site which tries (very poorly) to argue that even this religion is not needed, but the argument is irrational and very unscientific unlike the very rational arguments you use. When we read the following from your website, we found what you said to be amazingly interesting:

"Doubt Everything Find Your Own Light."

"Last Words

Dear friend, if you look for meaning in life, don’t look for it in religions; don’t go from one cult to another or from one guru to the next. You can expend all your life or look for eternity and will find nothing but disappointment and disillusionment. Look instead in service to humanity. You will find “meaning” in your love for other human beings. You can experience God when you help someone who needs your help. The only truth that counts is the love that we have for each other. This is absolute and real. The rest is mirage, fancies of human imagination and fallacies of our own making." By Ali Sina



Why is this interesting? Because we found this religion of Sikhism to be in agreement with you! This is why we have a problem. We tried to look at their holy text (Adi Granth) but didnt find the usual absurdities we found in the other religious books. In fact its refreshingly inspiring and very good!? Maybe you can have some better luck. We tried to visit a couple of websites and got more of a shock. Did you know that they believed in Democracy, freedom of speech, choice, expression, freedom of religion, pluralism, human rights, equality between men and women, equality of all people regardless of race, religion, caste, creed, status etc. 300 years before the existance of the USA! Theirs is the only religion which says in their religious scriptures that women are equal in every respect to men. They even had women soldiers leading armies in to battle against "you know who" (The usual suspects - Muslims!) Their history is a proud one, they fought in both World Wars. Even Hitler praised them for their bravery and Aryan heritage!

Dear Ali, this religion is hard for us to try and criticise but you are an expert and may find some faults overlooked by us. In their holy book, there is a round earth, water is made from chemical elements, there is even mention of the evoution process, big bang and life on other planets! This is pretty crazy and amazing stuff, who would have thought that these New York taxi drivers (There are lots of Sikh taxi drivers in NY) would have such an amzing faith? We read up some information of what Bertrand Russell had to say about Sikhism, this is the man who destroyed Christianity (same applies to Islam and Judaism) and exposed its absurdities, but even this great man got stuck when it came to Sikhism! In fact he gave up and said

"that if some lucky men survive the onslaught of the third world war of atomic and hydrogen bombs, then the Sikh religion will be the only means of guiding them.

Russell was asked that he was talking about the third world war, but isn't this religion capable of guiding mankind before the third world war?

In reply, Russell said, "Yes, it has the capability, but the Sikhs have not brought out in the broad daylight, the splendid doctrines of this religion which has come into existence for the benefit of the entire mankind. This is their greatest sin and the Sikhs cannot be freed of it."

Please bear in mind that Bertrand Russell was a great philosopher and free thinker. We have been trying for weeks now to find a way to fairly and rationally criticize and find fault with this religion but have failed. We even found out that there are many people converting to this religion in the USA and Europe as well as Russia (Mostly well educated and affluent white people). We tried to find some of their literature and see what kind of claims they make, but unfortunatley they have no missionary material as they do not have missionsaries! People become Sikh by learning usually by chance or by coming in to contact with them. They are currently the 5th biggest religion in the world and growing quite fast in the west and Russia.

Please help us as we are stuck, to give you an example of they are all about we found the following websites:

http://www.sikhnet.com (This is a pretty good site and helpful)

http://www.hope.at/sikhism (This site is very easy to follow, check it out, they have a Womans section and a Martyrs section, it looks like that you are not the only one trying to expose the falseness of Islam, Sikhs scholars did it hundreds of years ago and got killed for it!)

http://www.sikhs.org (This is the site that was on CNN when Sikhs in the USA were mistaken for Arabs and Middle Easterners and were attacked by mindless morons)

Please help us out, we cant make our website about religion being the cause of war and disharmony when we have this one and only religion which makes a hell of a lot of sense! lol (I thought Atheism had all the answers but were kind of stuck now.)

We look forward to hearing from you, we respect your great views and want to promote them to everyone, thank you for your time, take care.

Dr. John Smith

Dear Dr. John Smith,

Thanks for the email. First of all let me assure you that I have not embarked on the mission to destroy all the religions. If the belief in a religion makes you happy and content, please go for it.

My purpose in writing is to fight against hate not against faith. There are many religions that preach good things. Buddhism, Zoroastrianism and Baha'i are the examples. Even there is lots of goodness in Christianity.  I am afraid I have little knowledge of Sikhism. I cannot agree or disagree with your enthusiasm about this religion. I admit that my knowledge of Sikhism is very superficial. I live in a part of Canada that has a big population of Sikhs. They have many temples here and we often hear they fight over ridiculous things like whether they should sit on chairs or on the floor. There has been also some shootings and assassinations among the moderate and the fundamentalist faction of the Sikhs over, who should be in control of the temple and handle the funds. 

You perhaps have more information of the tenets of Sikhism, but as Christ said, "you'll know them by their fruits". When I see the Sikhs, I do not see much difference between them and the rest of the people. As the matter of fact many of them are shrewd businessmen but many people try not to deal with them because of their bad reputation. (unreliable, bad service, etc) I personally have great business associates among them and have been dealing with them for years. I have had bad experiences with some of them but those with whom I stay put are trustworthy and I am very pleased of them. 

As I said my intention is not to fight religions. I want to fight hateful doctrines not false beliefs. I personally would not endorse any belief system. I encourage rational thinking, independent thinking and freethinking. Religious thinking is opposed to that. In any religion you have a guru, a prophet or a messenger who is inspired by superior knowledge and all the the rest are followers. Independent thinking is encouraged as long a it does not contradict with the thinking of the leader. This brings stagnation of thought. One is given certain liberties to think on his own but s/he is not allowed to exceed the limits set by the original guru. The words of prophet or the guru are the ultimate balance to distinguish between the right and the wrong. 

I recall few years ago there was a legal fight where the Sikhs wanted to enter into RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) and keep their turban. In my opinion this was the sign of backwardness because it showed that the followers of Sikhism are unable to adapt with time.  I was sorry when the politicians bent the rule and allowed Sikh police wear turbans because they wanted their votes.     

All those good teachings that you attribute to Sikhism exist in many other religions. As a matter of fact Bahaism is the most advanced doctrine. Bahais also do not have that negative image that the Sikhs have left of themselves like their outdated dress code, hair code, ceremonial dagger and a history of violence. You praised the Sikhs for their bravery and for fighting against Islam. In my opinion Baha'is are much more brave for facing Muslims without any fight, sword or violence. This is bravery. 

Anyway, I do not wish to refute any religion if that religion does not advocate violence or threaten the peace of the world. But I have chosen not to be a follower. I was a follower and now I am a freethinker. Freethinking is better. I think the desire to be a follower (of any religion) stems from the fact that people are not yet mature and like children do not have the self reliance to choose their own ways. They need someone else telling them what is right and what is not. 

It is interesting however, that the same brainwashed followers brag about the good teachings of their religions to prove that their way is better. One wonders if they know that these teachings are good, they must have used their own judgment, and if they have used their own judgment then they are perfectly capable to distinguish between the good and the bad. So why they need these religions to begin with? You enumerated all the good teachings of Sikhism. If you KNOW  that these are good teachings, why you need to follow someone to tell you what you already know? What if this person you want to follow tell you: "kill the unbelievers, beat your wife or cut the hands of the thief" would you still follow him blindly? If you believe in him you should. But if you take the exception to these barbaric teachings then you are using your independent thinking and in that case following a guru or a prophet is superfluous. 

Kind regards 

Ali Sina

Ryan Responds to Ali Sina on Sikhism: