“Entitled to enter?”

With reference to the reports titled "Entitled to enter?” on the Gookrookh Gupta vs the Valsad Parsi Anjuman (VPA) case in the Gujarat High Court, Ahmedabad, which have been appearing in Parsiana, I would like to state that the Agiary Bejan Baug was built and is run with contributions made by the Shroff family of Hong Kong. My brother-in-law Rusy and his late brother Beji contributed to its building.

I know that Beji, if alive, would have been shocked and grieved that the VPA wants to debar entry to the holy precinct on the flimsy ground that Gupta married a non-Zoroastrian. I would like to state that the Shroff family has absolutely no objection to her attending and praying at the Agiary.

We all know that the ancients would be horrified if they saw how their teachings have been perverted; how religion has established itself as a "toll booth” to heaven; how warriors march into battle believing God favors their cause. We have lost the true meaning of religion. It exists in the all enduring texts from the Gathas to the Bible to the Koran and beyond. All whisper the same message: "Know ye not that ye are Gods?”

Please remember what Albert Pike, the 19th century American soldier, writer and Freemason said: "What have we done for ourselves alone dies with us. What we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal.” Our ancient religion was the first to realize that our thoughts worked wonders — and gave us the concept of faith and belief in all humankind.

Our physical bodies have evolved over the ages, but it was our minds that were created in the image of God. If the infinite had not desired man to be wise he would not have bestowed on him the faculty of knowing, as Canadian author and mystic Manly P. Hall had maintained.

Here I would like to gently remind our self-proclaimed messiah Khojeste Mistree (one of my esteemed students) that through the ages we all had the creator. We used many different names, difference faces and different prayers, but God was the universal constant for man. God was the symbol we all shared. Hence we must humbly acknowledge that we are all children of God and respect them and not differentiate on manmade religious symbols and meaningless rituals. Throw open your minds and gates of our revered religious temples to all and sundry and allow Gupta her undeniable right to enter our fire temple at Valsad. May Ahura Mazda, God and Allah guide you all.

Prof HOSHANG D. MOOGAT

Principal and Head of the Department of Mathematics (Retd)

Nowrosjee Wadia College, Poona