Does faith have to be masochistic?

Here is a story about a friend of mine. He was a person who grew up in love with Air Force. He decided to make it in to his identity while growing up. He used to wear the sunglasses because pilots used to wear them. He made secret passwords with his friends so that when as a pilot he would be captured he would be able to talk in code words. He had named his bicycle F16. As he reached his teenage years every endeavor was a "mission". Describing a mission was always "debriefing". At night when he roamed around his house in dark so as not to wake any body, it was a "stealth mission". And when he meant to give respect to friends he would call them sir. If you have not already guessed, his growing environment was conducive to this kind of a love affair. His father was in the air force and he had grown around fighter jets and fighter pilots. Freud would have had interesting things to say about fighter planes, the thrill of speed and the wish to be better than his father.

Anyways this person could not make it in to Air force. He did not take his failure well. So for the first time he was thwarted in getting what he truly wanted. Some thing that would determine his cognitive make up for ever after. He had never failed in anything before in his life. One way or the other he had always been on top of his class in academics or sports. He was the person with the flawless morality and an unshakable loyalty. But yes there was a shadow too. And as he grew so did his shadow. The shadow was locked up in a closet and hidden from all. From time to time he would feel guilty about the presence of the shadow and as a reaction to it he would go back to his ideals with a zest. The more time he spent as his shadow, the bigger was his drive towards his ideals. This oscillation defines the very fundamental and extreme positions in any person's life. All that needs to be ascertained is the coordinates of these positions and the motion becomes clear. The ideal would tend to carry the exact opposite traits of what the shadow would carry.

If the shadow had in it a certain under confidence about his abilities, then the ideal would be the fighter pilot bravado. If the ideal was the retention of all memories so as to maintain one's coordinates in the uncharted space of life's projections, then the shadow was complete dissolution and lack of concern over anything linked to the definition of one's personality. He did not drink or use other mind altering substances to loose that definition of his personality. He also did not give heed to reckless passions that arose in him. But what he did was make his ideal in to maintaining a link with his person and yet refuting it altogether. He found the path to salvation through striving to attain his ideal through self abnegation. Freud would certainly find these masochistic super ego-ic tendencies aimed at his ego interesting. Freud would have also drawn some parallels to these and the masochistic tendencies targeted towards his father and then sublimated in to emulation. Both have the fear of standing up as an independent individual and facing one's destiny based on one's strengths and weaknesses. Masochism allays the fear of being killed and exterminated by a stronger force. This is we note is the classic religious position. The position of Christ and the cross and the position of a sinner asking for mercy from the Lord because he hath sinned. Some people flail themselves in guilt and others get up in the middle of the night in winters to do ablution with cold water. It is the same person who believes that the most valuable prayer times are the prayer timings of a Summer's Asr and Winter's Fajr.

Returning back to our protagonist, his concept of love was finding a woman who was made for him. He would find himself by completely denying himself for her sake and she would find herself completely denying herself for his sake. Thus the two halves would have been complete. "Supposedly", and for the sake of discussion let us suppose that to be true, he did find someone like this. I did not know how happy he was but when the question of marriage came up, both him and the lady were reluctant. The reluctance was based upon istikharas. Multiple people had engaged in this fortune telling event and had determined that this was not going to be a propitious arrangement for both of them. The heavens was not going to be with this union. He was upset about this but did not have it in his power to go for what he wanted.

He performed the Hajj and during that had a very moving experience. He also did an Istikhara which re iterated the same concept as before. Since all this journey was filled with miraculous things making him believe that God was giving him a message. He was convinced of the irrefutability of the test that God had put him in to. He decided not to have anything to do with the lady he was associating himself with. Instead he asked his parents to search for a suitable match for him. After a girl was found who met all the criteria of a checklist, he was engaged to be married. He is now awaiting his marriage with a contended heart because he has been one of the wise people who hearken to God's message and abandon their willfulness. He is a little uncomfortable about the fact that his first wedding night will be sex after a brief introduction. But this is how it used to happen with our parents also. A great many people have gone through this with successful marriages, why could he also not be one of them.

Freud would have given this particular gentleman a lot to think about. I do not know whether Freud would have been right or not. New age thinking or Zen-ism would have thought this person is in sync with his inner voice. I do not know whether that would have been an accurate assesment. But I do know this that life will continue to go on. He took this road and he will face certain gifts that he has chosen for himself. He will be deprived of some because he has chosen this for himself. But regardless, this person, my dear childhood friend will be doomed if ever guilt enters in his mind again.

I am ofcourse willing to take bets on the matter whether he will feel guilty about this or not.