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THAT ACKNOWLEDGING THE POSITIVE IN PEOPLE HAS TO BE DROPPED TOO -- THE WHOLE PACKAGE HAS TO GO, DOES IT NOT?
Yes, the whole package of judging has to go.
Nobody has the right to judge anybody, negatively or positively. These are the ways of dominating people. When you judge someone you are trying to interfere in his life, which is not your business.
A real, authentic man simply allows people to be themselves.
It is not my business to judge anybody as good, as bad. Everybody has to be conscious of his own qualities. If I want to help people, I cannot help by judging; I can help them only by making them more conscious.
If I want to help people -- and there is great beauty in helping, great joy -- then the first thing is a total acceptance of the person, whoever he is, whatever he is. This is the way existence has brought him. There must be some need that he is fulfilling; without him existence will be a little less, he will be missed. And nobody can replace him; he is so unique that he is irreplaceable.
But the whole history of man is that we have not been told about the uniqueness of people. We have been told that people have to be in a certain way, have to behave in a certain way, have to live in a certain way -- then they are good, then they should be rewarded by respect, by honor here on earth. And they should be rewarded in the other world also, with all kinds of pleasures. We have been told things which are bad -- and those people should be condemned here, dishonored, rejected by the society, made to suffer in every possible way. And finally, after death they will have to suffer in hell.
And the things that decide goodness and badness are shifting, changing -- what was good yesterday is no longer good today. What was bad one day becomes good another day. Just look at the long span of history and you will be surprised....
For example, Rama, Krishna, Parasurama, who are incarnations of God, are all non-vegetarians, meat eaters. They are very ancient; you can think of the present time -- Ramakrishna used to eat fish. Being a Bengali and not eating fish seems to be impossible. In fact, every Bengali house has
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