This was stated by Punjabi University vice-chancellor Jaspal Singh, while presiding over a three-day international seminar on Religion and Human Social Responsibility here today. The seminar is being organised by the Department of Encyclopaedia of Sikhism in collaboration with Association of Himalayan Yoga Meditation Societies International (AHYMSIN), Rishikesh.

Talking about an affirmative aspect of material wealth, the V-C said that discontented from the material progress, feeling totally helpless and incompetent to grapple with the harsh realities of life, man starts moving on the path of self realization. Religion, he said, acts like a balancing power between two extremes of indulgence and repudiation.

Konard Meising from the Institute of Indology, Johannes Guttenberg University, Mainz (Germany) in his keynote address, said that social ethics govern both the individual and the community aspects of religion.

While the individual was concerned with personal salvation, community, on the other hand, demands social responsibility to ensure public well-being. Personal salvation, according to him, could best be attained by social means. 

Human social responsibility depends on relationship between self and other, between ego and alter, he said. In the modern world, religious and spiritual advice is increasingly complemented by secular social needs, he added.

Swami Veda Bharti, of AHYMSIN, Rishikesh, said that in some areas of life illogical and extremist interpretations of religion have led to most irresponsible and destructive behaviours. However, defending his own statement, he said, “A law misinterpreted is not thereby rendered invalid. It only requires correct interpretation for its jus application.”

Principles of religion down the ages, he said, have helped maintain stable social structures. It is simply greed of the few that impoverishes so many on this earth. Though the social systems have changed yet the religious principles remain perennial. It is only when we abandon these perennial principles that our contemporary social structures suffer the onslaught of unethical, violent and destructive behaviour, Swami Bharti said.

S.S. Gill, Dean, Academic Affairs, in his welcome address said that globalization was bringing in proximity principles of various religions for better understanding. J.S. Neki a noted theologian and psychiatrist said that a clear religious perspective helps us better understanding to respond to the outer world stimuli. He also talked about conflicting social responsibilities and aberrations of social responsibility affecting the human behaviour.