There is a well-known passage in the Bible about the importance of time:
‘There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot…’
The truth of these words becomes evident when we hear or read about well-intentioned actions done in vain, or backfiring.
Even the best of seeds will not produce much if sown in the wrong season. Similarly, a medicine taken at the wrong time may prove ineffectual, or even harmful.
When the time is favourable or appropriate, even a little effort can produce good results. ‘Make hay while the sun shines’, exhorts an old proverb.
In Indian philosophy, time is said to move cyclically, with each cycle divided into four ages that occur one after the other.
In the beginning is the Golden Age, also referred to as heaven or paradise, because everything was in its perfect form during that period. Human souls were free from evil influences and nature was in its pristine state. Pain and sorrow were unknown.
As time goes by, souls gradually lose their purity and power, and consequently the quality of their actions deteriorates. As a result, they start experiencing sorrow. This decline accelerates over time, and the world that was once heaven comes to be called hell.
Our way of thinking changes so much that things that would have been shocking or unthinkable in an earlier age come to be accepted as normal. But the majority of people choose to swim with the tide, adopting the prevalent notions of right and wrong, good and bad. Few have the inclination or courage to stand up for values that have become old-fashioned.
At such a time, those with good intentions find their efforts are all in vain or even land them in trouble. Today, a good Samaritan offering to help a stranger is likely to be greeted with suspicion, or even falsely accused of causing harm. Charitable acts are as likely to win appreciation as they are to invite insinuations of a hidden motive.
Sometimes, those who want to do good find their hands tied by circumstances and they have to acquiesce in decisions that go against their conscience.
All too often, the conscience is unable to resist the negative forces prevailing everywhere. Just one lapse of judgement can ruin a life or forever stain a person’s reputation.
The truth is that goodness can flourish only in good times. No one can be pure when there is impurity everywhere, one can only be relatively less impure.
This is why God has to eventually intervene, when evil reaches extreme proportions, to usher in good times. He awakens us souls, His children, to our true identity, reminding us that we are not bodies but souls – tiny, sentient points of light that give life to the body.
He also tells us that purity, peace, love and truth are our natural qualities. It is when we see ourselves as bodies that vices such as ego, anger, lust, and greed arise and the soul begins to act under their influence.
God then tells us to remember Him, because remembrance is the subtle link by which we can draw power from the Almighty. This power enables us to overcome the temptations, deceptions, and force of the vices and become clean once again.
When a critical mass of people brings about this inner transformation, the positive energy emanating from them changes the atmosphere of the world. A new era dawns, in which goodness is the order of the day. It is the time for this inner transformation, now.
B.K. Sheilu is a Rajyoga teacher at the Brahma Kumaris headquarters in Mount Abu, Rajasthan.