Sambodhi 1989 Vol 16

Author(s): Ramesh S Betai, Yajneshwar S Shastri
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 93

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DR. RADHAKRISHNAN ON "KALKI OR FUTURE OF CIVILIZATION"
Dr. R. S. Betal
"Man himself seems terrifyingly near the knowledge of how to des troy his planet in a blazing chain of reaction, and terrifyingly far from the self-control necessary to avoid using his knowledge." G. G. Simpson.
Any man can say, just with a superfloous glance at the events that are happening in the world to-day that man is faced with a unique problem of realizing his own self. He struggles and struggles for the comforts and happiness of his life, but the way he conducts himself shows that he is running after the things that he fails to understand. He probes deep into the mysteries of life and unravels so many of its secrets, but the attainments that follow bring in store for him qualities of joys and sorrows, happiness and sorrow both. Ambition, greed and materialisim are his guiding principles; thirst for power, pride and vanity are his Gods. Freedom amounting to licence is his ideal and the ethics. The evident result is that he seems to march with a rather quickened pace to meet his own end, end amounting to self-annihilation. The reason of all this turmoil is that he has lost hold over his own self, but to his utter misfortune, he is not prepared to take a lesson from the past. He has for gotten the truth that "the extent to which we can hope to understand ourselves and to plan our future depends in some measure, on our ability to read the riddles of the past." But it seems that man is not much interested in reading the riddles of the past. It seens that he wants to shake off the past that he feels is too much with him; hardly realizing that the past is too much with him; it is in his very blood, veins, in his mind and conscience. As a result he stands at cross-roads. One road leads to progress and happiness and the other to extinction and sorrow. He is not able to decide which path he should tread upon. Like Duryo dhana man seems to feel.-"I am in the know of Dharma but not activated towards it; I know Adharma but know not how I can avoid it".2
Dr. Radhakrishnan, in his 'Kalki or Future of Civilization', written more than half a century back, looke upon the present state of civiliza tion as "one of its periodic crisis." (P-1). He says