“When language was not transcendental enough to complete the meaning of a revelation, symbols were relied upon for heavenly teaching, and familiar images, chosen from the known, were made to mirror the unknown spiritual truth”.   —   William H. Hunt

Science is very good about finding out the “how,” but it is not equipped to explain the “why.” There is a void–a gaping chasm that religion traditionally fills but which a significant number of people reject. Is there no alternative? Philosophy can bridge the gap. Science provides the instruments, but philosophy is the symphony. According to Durant (1926);

“Science tells us how to heal and how to kill; it reduces the death rate in retail and then kills us wholesale in war; but only wisdom…can tell us when to heal and when to kill…[B]ecause in these days our means and instruments have multiplied beyond our interpretation and synthesis of ideals and ends, our life is full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Science gives us knowledge, but only philosophy can give us wisdom.”

Within the Shadow of Life | Acrylic on Canvas | 4ft x 4ft | 2014
Courtesy of Jeganathan Ramachandram

… we are but the make of billions of snakes
… some small and swimming the ocean of lust…this we call the sperm
… one…a mile long and wrapped in the head…we know him as the brain
… and another that folds itself like a stream downwards…the intestine it has come to be…
… the other sits moving sound…she is the tongue that wields the magic wand…
… while billions more in motion…unite with each other…river of veins and arteries they become…
… and yet many more are messengers to the pelvic rib and skull…threads of nerves they are…
… there is an even a Majestic One…standing in pride…a sculpture that holds all …the kingly spine…
… it is all snakes…serpents…worms and the sperm of life…
… and yet within all this…a moment happens
… where billions of stars appear dancing in a cyclic rhythm…
… sending fine waves of lights that flicker…
… igniting the spirit that dances within in bliss…the neurons at play!
… and there in a moment of union…billions and millions…merge into two…
… the female heart and the male mind…in coitus…
… performing the play…uniting the two into one…
… a song is composed…a play is staged…and love serenades all…

To quote back what Durant (1926) says about the power of philosophy if compared to knowledge in science, the truth lies on the way we think and both science and philosophy needed for us to find the answer. Science might help in logic but philosophy does help for us to find wisdom. Symbol is everywhere and the secret behind it is for us to know and understand. How we relate it is all up to everyone. Either we went through the process of religion or history, we will find the answer for all the question arises.