Heaven and hell are myths created by man. Man has not gracefully accepted his condition in nature. So he needs phantoms. He is overly self-conscious, and that has turned him into a bundle of contradictions. He is forever trying to reach his limitations and potential. The Renaissance man said that 'that he likes best which flies beyond my reach'. He is restless and cannot remain stay put. Is it any wonder that he has descended from the apes?

Both bird and beast are in perfect harmony with nature. They are the attributes of nature and they remain in tune with it. Man is also an aspect of nature. But he is fighting for his own condition and nature. He is at loggerheads with himself and his environment. Hence the ceaseless reformation and revolutions. He is a flame of curiosity. That makes him an explorer, a conqueror and consequently a sufferer and a loser. On an account of these ups and downs in his fortunes, he has also become neurotic. His neurosis is born out of his inability to accept or cope with his condition gracefully. He cannot accept his short life-span and his mortality. All living things come into being and they return to dust. But man rejoices in his birth and his growth but despairs in decline and death.

It is this despair and this neurosis which has driven him in the past to invent gods and heaven, rebirth, immortality and so on. Its moral sense, possibly developed in the context of community living, would have made him think of punishment after life and hell and so on. For thousands of years man has lived with and accepted religions and gods and now it is extremely important for most people to junk those habits. Man loves to be a devotee of something or the other. When he becomes a devotee of something, he goes on exaggerating the significance of the object of his devotion- whether it is god, a woman, wealth or sins. Or even a suitable study he specializes in.

 One does not know whether his weakness is his strength. In the sense, if someone is devoted to something, to that extent he is out of mischief. Because an ideal mind develops distortions. The problem arises only when one becomes a devotee of evil like Shakespeare's Iago or Richard, III. So devotion alone is not enough. Devotion to something positive is helpful to oneself and to others around.

Possibly, as man moves further into the 21st century most of the myths may peel off. I keep saying that god will be the last superstition for man to give up. Most of us have already kept by our side many myths and superstitions. But one does not know whether future generations will consider our scientific discoveries and technological achievements as we think that many we have received from the past are fairy tales. Anyway one can only be true to one's own times.

By Rambler