Books and Movies Reviews

Sunday, February 26, 2012

We would still be reading this 200 years later…Age of Reason by Thomas Paine…

Just finished reading Thomas Paine's "Age of Reason"

What can I say?

That a book written more than 200 years ago could find so much resonance today is something that is needs to be read to be believed

Thomas Paine was a man who was so far ahead of his time that he would be called far ahead of his time today!!

The moral courage and the personal integrity that exemplified his entire life marks his written work. Age of Reason was a book that caused such an explosion in its time that it did two things - immortalized him for posterity and condemned him during his lifetime.

Yet at the end of his life, when he was dying a painful death, deserted by friends and shunned by people who had hailed him a hero once, he stuck to what he had believed in and displayed the same sense of sarcastic humour that he showed in his work. A life lived as written

Age of Reason is an all out attack on the system of organized religion - more specifically Christianity, this being the religion that Paine encountered in England, France and America, the places where he lived and fought all his life. Paine was a brilliant pamphleteer and so was used to laying out his ideas concisely and clearly without using any dense logic or arguments. He uses the same technique in his writings.

Reading this, even 200 years later, feels like a stirring call to arms. And the fact that a large part of this book was written and completed at a time when Thomas Paine was under the belief that he could be executed anytime makes you appreciate the book more...

There are two important aspects of the book that stands out - the material of the book and the way it is written

The material of the book is based on a simple premise - Organized religion is a sham at best and dangerous at worst. This is because the purpose of organized religion is to make us act contrary to our innermost feelings, filling our head with impossible and fantastic things that has no basis in reality. The only true religion is that of Deism and the true bible is Nature.

Because, as Paine explains so beautifully, God has anyway given us an abundance of miracles in everything around us, in existence itself. Why do we need foolish miracles or religion? This was the first time that material like this was published in a direct and plainly written attack, even though the thoughts on which Paine based his work had been around for some time - in the work of David Hume and Spinoza for example.

The book is divided into two parts - the first is a general discussion on religion and on Paine's personal beliefs. This is where he puts forward his most compelling and beautiful arguments for the religion of the mind and the heart. He explains what he feels and why he feels so. The second part deals directly with Christianity. Deals is a wrong word actually. Rips apart is perhaps more appropriate. Paine takes some of the implied and maybe even cherished beliefs of Christians and literally rips them to shred...

Which brings me to the fascinating way the book is written. He is attacking organized religion in open field, which at that time was immensely powerful and controlled almost every aspect of life. Yet, he never uses any circular arguments, does not hide behind any one else and or any other theory. His attacks are straight to the point and argued so logically and beautifully that the modern reader will still find the reasoning fascinating, no matter how many Richard Dawkins he may have read.

When he is attacking Christianity, he maintains his good quality acerbic humour to mock the beliefs and at the same time gives irrefutable proof of why he considers the beliefs to be wrong. He picks up different aspects of Christianity - the bible and its different books, the

characters of Moses, Joshua, Jesus and the significant events on which Christianity is based - most importantly the resurrection of Jesus. This was written to make perfect sense to a complete layman on the street. And this it does brilliantly!!!

The style has a wonderful sense of a person who is simply trying to wake up the reader to things which seem painfully apparent once explained...

This is a book that I hope I will be revisiting many a times. The book that has inspired people from Mark Twain to Christopher Hitchens is not something that can be digested in one reading...

This a book that cannot be reviewed enough, Instead I will leave the reader of this post with some of the sentences in the book that are so powerful and beautiful that they need to be read again and again...

Quotes from “Age of Reason”...Read below...

Labels: america, banned, Books, controvery, deism, England, historical, history, religion

Tuesday, January 31, 2012

(Movie) Inshallah Kashmir directed by Ashvin Kumar

Banned in India by the ever faithful Big Brother of a censor board, the director took the unprecedented step of releasing this online (apparently there is no law against releasing something online…yet). Ashvin actually opened it up for download for one day – on 26th January, the Republic Day. That’s quite a symbolic gesture!!

And once you see this you know why…

Which is why you need to see it

It has been the practice of all governments to try and dictate what we must see and hear and there us always an effort by all governments to make the public buy into their version of current and historical events.

And there has been an increasing virulence of intolerance by self-appointed patriots whose sense of injustice bleed too easily. Look at what happened to Symbiosis university’s Kashmir seminar “Voices of Kashmir”, which was cancelled due to the ‘fatwa’ by the right wing fringe.

And Kashmir is one topic which will always invoke strong reactions. And this is one topic which will always see an effort to give the ‘official’ version of the story

Labels: banned, controvery, documentary, india, kashmir

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Books and Movies Reviews

Sunday, February 26, 2012

We would still be reading this 200 years later…Age of Reason by Thomas Paine…

Tuesday, January 31, 2012

(Movie) Inshallah Kashmir directed by Ashvin Kumar

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