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Oleh/By : DATO SERI DR MAHATHIR MOHAMAD
Tempat/Venue : GRAND BLUE WAVE HOTEL, SHAH ALAM
Tarikh/Date : 10/12/2002
Tajuk/Title : THE WORLD FELLOWSHIP OF BUDDHISTS
AND WORLD FELLOWSHIP OF
BUDDHIST YOUTH GENERAL
CONFERENCES 2002
Versi : ENGLISH
I would like to thank the world Fellowship of
Buddhists for the opportunity to address this esteemed
gathering of world Buddhist leaders attending the 22nd
General Conference of the World Fellowship of Buddhists
and the 13th General Conference of the World Fellowship
of Buddhist Youth. I am made to understand that these
conferences are one of the biggest international
Buddhist conferences ever to be held in Malaysia.
2. For the past 50 years or so, after the greatest
world war humanity has ever experienced, there has been
no more great wars. But the world is far from being
peaceful. There was the Cold War, the proxy wars, the
wars for national liberation, the wars to regain
expropriated land, the wars against oppression and
bushfire wars. And now we are witnessing the great
world war against terrorism.
3. It would seem that despite the peace preached by
all the religions of the world, humanity has not
mastered the skills and the capacity to live at peace
with each other. When it suits us we are ready to
forget religious injunctions or at times to reinterpret
religion in order to justify wars.
4. Yet we hear today more talks and exhortations for
people, Governments especially, to respect human rights
and uphold them, to allow for the freedom of choice in
the election of Governments, for free speech and press
freedom, for the abolition of the death penalty, for
workers rights, abolition of child labour etc. One
would think that humanity has become truly civilised
even if they are less keen on religious and spiritual
values. Some even believe that they can be human and
humane without need for religion. They know what
values are good and honourable without having to be
told by religion about this.
5. But are people who downgrade religion, who claim
that God is dead; are they really so civilised and
sophisticated that they have no need for religion? The
turmoil and injustice that we see today does not seem
to indicate that today's man needs no religion.
6. We are today living in a world of fear. We are
all being threatened by modern terrorism. We fear to
fly, we fear visiting certain countries, we fear
unexpected and unprecedented attacks within our
countries, and between our countries, and we find
ourselves unable to put our economy back on track.
There is also the collapse of morality so that all the
things proscribed by religions are now flouted with
impunity. The institutions of marriage and family are
no longer respected. Worse still these institutions
are mocked because the law in some countries, very
civilised countries, permits man to marry man and woman
to marry woman and regard these couples as families.
Clothings are worn in order to expose the human body as
much as possible not to cover it. In fact not wearing
anything at all is a human right. Children are openly
begotten out of wedlock and they attend the mock
marriage of their parents.
7. Truly there is a total collapse of morality. The
injunctions of religions, the codes of human behaviour
are now totally rejected. Men it is claimed know what
is good for them. The most important creed is freedom
of the individual to do his own thing, to do what he
likes without any consideration for the sensitivities
and values of others, of the community. Any attempt to
curb this absolute individual freedom is considered as
abuse of human rights.
8. Yet democracy must be upheld. Democracy implies
the upholding of the rights of the majority. This must
necessarily be negated if the norms of the majority can
be totally disregarded by individuals. One cannot help
feeling that in this matter the world is very confused,
insisting on the upholding of values which are totally
incompatible. Yet woe betide those who try to practice
the rights of the majority as implied by democracy.
9. Now even the propagation of democracy itself is
undemocratic. Democracy means free choice. When there
were autocratic rulers, the democrats struggled for
free choice, i.e. free choice of the systems of
Government including choosing democracy. But now no
one is allowed to choose anything except democracy. If
democracy is not chosen then the democrats will apply
sanctions, will take military action, including bombing
and killing innocent civilians, until democracy is
forcibly practiced. Even when democracy is adopted
there is no let-up. Accusations of failures to
practice so-called true democracy are made and all
sorts of pressures are applied in order to force the
adoption of more liberal ideas about democracy.
10. There is a parallel to this in the history of
religion. When some Romans adopted Christianity, they
were persecuted by the "heathen" Roman Emperors.
Christians were regularly thrown into the arena to
fight and be killed by ferocious animals. But
eventually Christianity was adopted by the Romans. And
when most Europeans became Christians they were as
intolerant of non-Christians or suspected heretics as
were the heathen Romans of the past. Heretics were
tortured and burnt at the stakes. During the Spanish
Inquisition the suspected heretics, the new converts
from Judaism and Islam, were tried, tortured until they
confess to the correctness of the charges, then
tortured again for heresy and burnt at the stake. In
other forms we are still seeing this today.
11. The situation today is not unlike that which
prevailed when Christianity was being spread. Not only
must we adopt the new religion called democracy, but
also the worship of Mammon which has come together with
it. "Globalisation" is about making money. All else
is not important. Nothing must stand in the way of
making as much money as possible. The borders which
insulate nations and obstruct the capitalists must be
brought down in the name of one world. Nations should
not exist, nor should national Governments. If they
exist, it is merely to enable the money worshippers to
get at the money more easily. The Governments are
there to prevent any opposition to the invasion and
predations of the capitalists. They are there to
uphold the rules that the capitalists have formulated
to facilitate their making more money.
12. Why should there be small banks and companies in
any country when international giant banks and
corporations can provide better service and products.
The word international is indiscriminately used for
entities which are owned and operated by the rich, for
the rich. The argument is that the poor will benefit
from the more efficient goods and services provided by
the giants through the vaunted economies of scale. If
the small banks and businesses have to shut down and
their owners, managers and workers thrown out of work,
that is a small sacrifice to make for better services
and goods. But what happens to these people who are
now unemployed? Well, they should be content with the
unemployment benefits paid by the Government. But
poor countries have no unemployment benefits like the
rich countries have. That is too bad. They really
should have. It is their fault if they don't.
Whatever, they must not stand in the way of progress in
a globalised world. One day they will realise how
globalisation has brought benefit to them.
13. There was a time when the world gaped and admired
the millionaires like Rockefeller, JP Morgan, Pierre
Dupont and others. Today anyone can be a millionaire.
They are dime a dozen. We talk now about billionaires
and we are looking forward to the first trillionaire.
We must not just admire these people but we must
worship them. For they are the greatest worshippers of
Mammon, the only true religion. They won't call it a
religion of course. That is old-fashioned. But what
is religion? Religion in the broadest sense is belief
in the almighty. For the worshippers of Mammon, the
almighty is wealth as represented by the amount of
money possessed by the followers. The greater the
amount, the greater the degree of faith.
14. The ancient religions place more emphasis on
spiritual values. Indeed while they do not decry
wealth, they do not regard wealth as the deity.
Spiritual well-being, peace with oneself and with the
world is what the old religions promote. Wealth
acquired should be given away to help the less
fortunate, the poor, the deformed and the sick. The
satisfaction of the spirit comes from the good feeling
after doing good, after helping fellow men.
15. But what need is there for a billion dollars to a
man. He cannot eat or drink or have houses or
entertain himself more than a normal person can. But
he feels a need for the money to make more money and to
make even more money. If he has to destroy the lives
of millions of people in order to do this, he will. It
is just too bad. He will give away something for
charity and have his name emblazoned on the front page
of magazines and journals as a great philanthropist.
But giving away a few billions will not make up for the
misery of millions brought about by his greed for
money.
16. Religion has been assailed ever since man
discovered science. Through science Man believes he
has discovered the origins of everything to be found in
this world. He has no more need for obscurantist
religious explanations. He knows why there is life in
this world, how it is propagated, how the species are
developed and improved. He knows how oxygen breathes
life into living things and lack of oxygen kills. He
knows all the elements which produce all the compounds
which make up the materials on this earth, its core and
its atmosphere. He has learnt how to artificially
combine the elements and the compounds in order to
produce new synthetic materials which are even better
than what is found naturally. Now he can create life
itself, he can play God and even more. What need is
there for religion, for submission to a superior being.
Knowing about everything around him he can
scientifically create more than that created by what we
call the Creator, by God.
17. But the scientist is wrong. He thinks that he
knows all the answers. Actually he does not. For
science cannot and can never answer the question "why".
He can explain how things happen, how things possess
the qualities that they have. But he can never answer
why things happen the way it happens or have qualities
that they have. Whenever he tries to explain why he
ends up by explaining how things are but not why things
are as they are.
18. We know that two atoms of Hydrogen combine with
one atom of oxygen will form water - H2O. That is how
water is formed but why should it be two atoms of
Hydrogen and one atom of Oxygen? Why cannot it be some
other elements combining with each other? Why cannot it
be two atoms of Chlorine and one atom of helium or any
other gas? The scientists can explain how but not give
a reason why. Every time they try they end up
explaining how and not answering why.
19. Every time science explains anything about the
materials or the phenomena on earth or in the universe
it fails to explain why. Light travels at a certain
speed and it takes light years to travel from stars to
earth, from stars to stars, thus explaining how big is
the universe. But again why should it take this time,
why should it be so big or distant -- these are things
science cannot explain.
20. Finally science concludes that it is nature. But
why should nature determine all these phenomena; from
the electron, protons and neutrons, the electrical
charges to the stars which are thousands of times
bigger than the sun of ours, emitting enormous heat,
science cannot explain beyond lamely saying that it is
natural.
21. One can say that it is natural but one can also
say that there is a certain power that determines this.
And that power is the God that humans through the ages
worship. That super-power, that super being is the
answer to the question why.
22. So no matter how great science is, how much it can
unravel and recreate things, what science can achieve
is only what God permits it to achieve.
23. Science must go on to investigate the origins of
things and how things are what they are; science must
use the information to create and build new things; but
science must not assume that religion, the teachings to
be subservient to a great unseen and unexplainable
power is superstition and should be discarded. Science
is no substitute for religion, for no matter how great
humans can be, in the end humans have to admit that
there is a power greater than all humans. Indeed the
greater the knowledge of science, the greater will be
our wonder at the creations of the Creator, the God
that we worship.
24. Religion is therefore even more necessary and
relevant now, in the age of science, than when humans
were more ignorant. The Apocalypse can still happen as
for example when the world collides and the human race
is wiped out or through some other of a myriad of
phenomena that can by God's will happen. We should not
give up on science. We should study, unravel and make
use of the knowledge that science brings but we should
never be so arrogant as to conclude that faith,
religion has no more place in this world.
25. The humility that comes along with the realisation
that despite all our knowledge, we are really not
masters of the universe, will make us better humans.
If today the world is in such a state of turmoil, if
today science can kill and has killed more people than
it saved, it is because humans, especially those who
have successfully applied scientific knowledge, have
lost their way and think that science has made God
replaceable or irrelevant. Base desires and emotions
have overcome them. They glory in their capacity and
their willingness to destroy the human race in order to
fulfil their base desires.
26. We who still have faith in religion can only pray
and work to bring them back to their senses. They must
be made to realise that the nuclear warheads that they
possess can ignite and detonate and bring about the
apocalypse that they don't believe in.
27. I would like to thank you for inviting me, a
Muslim, to officiate at this General Conference of the
World Fellowship of Buddhists and Buddhist Youth. I
know there will be some among my co-religionist who
will question my involvement in the affairs of another
religion. Some indeed would use this to condemn me and
accuse me of being an apostate.
28. But Islam recognises the right of other religions
to exist. Islam agrees that we will be different. To
you your religion and to me mine.
29. Today Islam and the Muslims have been vilified and
condemned because some Muslims have been involved in
acts of terrorism. I feel that it is the duty of all
Muslims to try and correct the wrong perception of
Islam. As much as the Spanish Inquisition and the
pogroms were not a reflection of the teachings of
Christianity, the terror attacks are not a reflection
of the teachings of Islam. Certainly the sex scandals
which involve the Christian priests are not due to
Christianity, but just human failings. Among Buddhists
too there must be failures.
30. We all have to attend to our failures and I am
sure your conference will focus on the many problems
which affect the human race and the role of your
religion in bringing back a confused world to sanity.
Sumber : Pejabat Perdana Menteri
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