In a recent private communication, a bright gaian soul asked me this question : ”do we share same faith or two good faiths.”

An attempt to identify the underlying spirit and intention of the UNIVERSAL CONSCIOUSNESS is important and useful. However, there is also this risk that such exercise may lead people astray. By the very nature, these attempts remain explained in analogies and abstract ideas only. We should reflect on these and discuss them keeping in mind that in the final analysis we must always resign ourselves to never fully knowing God's wisdom and mercy.

“God disdains not to use the similitude of things, lowest as well as highest. Those who believe know that it is truth from their Lord; but those who reject Faith say: “What means God by this similitude?” By it He causes many to stray, and many He leads into the right path; but He causes not to stray, except those who forsake (the path).” (Al-Baqarah 2: 26)

We know that different traditions have different ideas about the nature of Ultimate Reality, but in the final analysis, this Reality is a Mystery which lies beyond the reach of any thoughts, ideas, words, or concepts whatsoever.
 Lao Tzu, the founder of Taoism, opened his The Tao Te Ching with these famous lines:

"The Way which can be verbalized is not the true Way."

Dionysius the Areopagite, the 6th century Christian mystic wrote:

"That One which is beyond all thought is inconceivable by all thought."

Again,  Sufi Al-Junayd  said similar words:

"Whatever may be imagined in thy heart, God is the opposite of it."

Sufi Abu Bakr al-Kalabadhi maintained:

The fact that we describe God as having all these attributes in no way bestows any attribute on Him: our description is merely our own attribution, an account we give of an attribute which exists through Him.

The Upanishads declared:

"The Spirit supreme is immeasurable, inapprehensible, beyond conception, never-born, beyond reasoning, beyond thought. His vastness is the vastness of space."

Nagarjuna  the Buddhist sage said:

"The ultimate truth which is indeterminate is the unutterable dharma. There the sphere of the speakable ceases, the activities of the mind come to an end."


Buddha said of his own teachings:

"These teachings are only a finger pointing toward Noble Wisdom … They are intended for the consideration and guidance of the discriminating minds of all people, but they are not the Truth itself, which can only be self-realized within one's own deepest consciousness."

According to Varaha Purana, Lord Brahma’s son Kashyapa had four wives. Kashyapa’s first wife gave birth to Devas, second to Garudas, third to Nagas (snakes) and fourth to Daityas (demons). The third wife was called Kadroo, so Nagas are also known as Kadrooja.

Kadru was mother of one thousand Nagas. Some prominent names being Sesha,Vasuki, Takshaka, Anant, Kanwal, Karkotak, Kalia, Aswatar, Padma, Mahapadma, Shankh, Kulik, Pingal etc.

When all these snakes started tormenting human-beings,lord Brahma cursed them that they would be annihilated due to the curse of their own mother, but that is another story.

The snakes got terrified and promised to mend their ways.They then requested lord Brahma to give them a place to live in.Lord Brahma instructed them to go to three different netherworlds-Sutal,Vital and Patal. He also warned them that during Vaivaswat manvantar Janmejay would perform a grand yagya with the objective of destroying the wicked snakes but the virtuous among them would manage to survive.

It was Shraavan Shuddh Panchami ( The fifth day of the Bright half of the Hindu month Shravan-July-August). On that day the entire snake family got a new lease of life (( read my blog How the snakes were saved - A Hindu mythology). This day is considered a sacred day by Hindus. The festival Nag Panchami is celebrated on this day.  The five Nāgas worshipped on Nag Panchami are Ananta, Vāsuki, Taxak, Karkotaka and Pingala.

Note: Please note that there are also several other legends associated with Nag Panchami.