Justification of Judgements!

Looks connected? Maybe....!!!

(I wouldn't hurry your mind any further, and further complicate it!)...

But, we often 'explain' things.... The 'why-do-we-explain' part of it, let it rest aside for a while, for the very same reason—not to end up complicating it....

But, it is relatively safe to discuss about 'how we explain'.... (the safety is about remaining 'on-to-the-subject', and not being diverted...)

Researchers and scientists have to engage their mind into 'explaining'... a lot many times, avoiding that inclination to 'justify' anything that they themselves 'explain' ... (this reference to a 'scientist/researcher'... I presume, helps to calm our own temptation, to justify even the “tendency to justify....)”

.....

Why are you late? (Please see, our 'explanations'... is looked at as... 'mere explanations' or as 'our-own-justifications'!)

A candidate was late for job-interview at a large company involved in public transportation business... He was told... (amounting to, he-was-asked), “you are late for the interview”...

The candidate 'explained' (amounting to, he offered justification), “I traveled by your company's bus... which was running late”... (needless to add, he was appointed, as other parameters were okay!)...

....

'Explanations' are sought through 'charge-sheet', 'show-cause-notice', etc to 'delinquent' employees...

The letter seeking explanation carries a tone of threat usually... 'please tell us why you should not be punished...'... thereby suggesting that “we have already decided/concluded, that... you deserve to be punished”... only that the law imposes a fair chance to be given to explain oneself!... Even here, the “law” presumes (or assumes... for what ever it is worth—the difference between presumes-assumes....)... the law contemplates an ideal situation that the 'authority' is an equitable one, and just that some-error-of-judgement, or some 'inadequate-application-of-mind' happened, and therefore,.... if the employee merely 'explains' , ... it would facilitate a re-assessment, and proper judgement ! It rarely happens thus in real life! Therefore, the employee usually ends up offering only 'justification' and even hiding the 'real-explanations', at times!... (What happens to 'jurisprudence' and its concepts, is anybody's guess!)... I am reminded of a 'reverse-example' to 'explain' this .... Justice V.R.Krishna Iyer, an eminent jurist, it seems, once baffled everybody, even the defendant, (the defendants lawyer knew, the law was not in their favour!), when he pronounced a landmark judgement, upholding the very purpose of a 'provision' which was invoked to defeat a defendant... He said, something to mean thus: 'Even though the defendant does not hold the necessary qualifications needed for doing the work entrusted to him, and therefore the act of 'having entrusted him' also being against the provisions thereof... I can see from the evidence produced that the defendant had performed far better than even those who contest against him, with better qualifications than needed, and more so, when the beneficiaries of such performance are our esteemed guests from foreign countries, who have voluntarily and very generously praised the performance of the defendant.... I hereby .... uphold the act of having awarded the contract to conduct the business in favour of the defendant!” (we had this as an example in our law college classes, for jurisprudence lectures!)...

Kids initially try with 'innocent-explanations'... We adults often treat it with distrust, and then the need to 'inject' a dose of 'justification' arises... that injection immunises the kid for a life-time even.. Like some of our gadgets that come with 'life-time-guarantee'!... And when such a mind, seeks to know spirituality some time later, out of sheer curiosity even.. how to stop the interference of this mind's eagerness to 'justify its own conclusions/judgements?'...

What has all this got to do with spirituality?

Who knows?... Only spiritual Giants can 'explain'... or even 'justify'!... (Somebody it seems asked the 'supposedly' greatest ever teacher... about 'the state of tranquility'... and the teacher closed his eyes, ... obviously, to look at it afresh, experientially, and then talk about it... but the disciples had to wait for some 84 years to see those eyes getting opened, and only thereafter, to expect that teacher to even 'talk-about-it'... this went on for several times (the story goes thus...)!... If this story is even conceptually-true, then 'what to say' about the 'explanation' of that 'state'...!

It seems, the spirit within, only witnesses... neither explains, nor justifies, not even 'listens' to these two! If spirituality does not deal with 'spirit' ... we are dealing with a wrong 'person' then!

Bah! I am no good to talk about 'need' for justification, explanation, or the difference between the two... let me 'explain' why.. (now, I am trapped into my own web... see? That's the game!.. That 'explain & why'.. is a crude mixture of both... explanation and justification ... a justification-of-judgements... every sentence we speak, every thought we generate in our mind, is a conclusion, a judgement, one-way-or-other!!!... I am eager to learn if it is other-wise!!!)...

I dare not even ask for a humble data: 'What is for breakfast today?' (What I get in reply, is worse than the breakfast, quite often, when it is about 'digesting' it...!!!... That is how 'good-governance' works at my home, and the 'governess' has her way too... about it!... By-the-way.. we have self-governance at home...)

Justifiably yours,

psn (24th December, 2013)