If today anyone in India were to have thought of oneself as Voltaire, the famous 18th Century CE satirist and novelist, and had mouthed too the provocative things that he did about Christianity in general, I wonder what might the horrible fate be to befall the person.
Nasty, horrible things did Voltaire certainly say and one can easily see how nasty they were from a sampling of his satire below. And yet in France, which is a devoutly Catholic country even today, they didn’t burn him at the stakes. But I am sure here today in India, Voltaire might have been issued a non-bailable warrant of arrest, be held guilty of a cognisable offence, charged as a malicious and dangerous enemy of public peace and social harmony and would have been hauled off and thrown into jail
- I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: ‘O Lord make my enemies ridiculous.’ And God granted it.
- Christianity is the most ridiculous, the most absurd and bloody religion that has ever infected the world.
- May God defend me from my friends: I can defend myself from my enemies.
- Of all religions, the Christian should of course inspire the most tolerance, but until now Christians have been the most intolerant of all men.
- When it is a question of money, everybody is of the same religion.
- The Bible. That is what fools have written, what imbeciles commend, what rogues teach and young children are made to learn by heart.
- God is a circle whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere.
- If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him; let us worship God through Jesus if we must – if ignorance has so far prevailed that this name can still be spoken in all seriousness without being taken as a synonym for rapine and carnage. Every sensible man, every honourable man, must hold the Christian sect in horror.
- You will notice that in all disputes between Christians since the birth of the Church, Rome has always favored the doctrine which most completely subjugated the human mind and annihilated reason.
- England has forty-two religions and only two sauces.
In India too we have 42 religions, no two sauces and one blasphemy law! Which is why we rue the fact that the law can quite often get our goose cooked. Which is just another way, really, of echoing Voltaire’s own words:
“Since the whole affair had become one of religion, the vanquished were of course exterminated.”
Sudarshan Madabushi
PS: and Voltaire said this too: It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong.