There are many examples in life where the ‘kiss of death’ is everything.
There are many examples in life where the ‘kiss of death’ is everything.
sSome memories remain in the mind. Several years ago, a news report caught my attention partly because of the headline “Providential Escape”, but in large part, I think, it was because of the incident itself. A bus carrying employees of a company collided with the railing of a railway overbridge and miraculously landed on the railway track just above, about 20-25 feet below. No train was passing there when the bus collapsed and apart from minor injuries to a few, the bus and its passengers had what can only be called a possible escape.
I remember another story I read. A boy and a girl from a middle-class English family wanted to go to America on a ship, but sadly their father could not afford such an expensive trip. One day, the man surprised his wife and children by coming home with a ship ticket for all of them. Just days before the trans-Atlantic journey began, the boy was bitten by a dog and required a rabies vaccination. The travel agent told the father that the family’s tickets were being canceled as they could not put the other passengers at risk for any infection. The whole family was in shock. A month later came the sad news that the ship the family was supposed to go to, the Titanic, had sunk. What was it that saved the family? Was it the hand of Providence or just a coincidence?
There are many instances in life where the ‘kiss of death’ is all that is left. During my trip to Himachal Pradesh, the driver narrated to me the most incredible experience of slipping through a gorge of his car and miraculously engaging in the branches of a tree while watching the spooky valley beneath the icy slopes of Rohtang Pass. He told me he suffered a concussion and some spinal cord injury, and was eventually airlifted by a helicopter in the morning after surviving an entire chilly night inside a suspended car hanging from a branch. Why is it that some people get lucky and are able to survive or survive catastrophic situations? The Cambridge Dictionary defines providence as “an influence that is not human in origin and is thought to control people’s lives”. Of course, some others would say that these were mere coincidences and should not be read any further.
But what was it that saved the passengers of the bus or the family or the driver? While some believe that everything that happens in life happens for a reason, some others are more skeptical. The argument of coincidence, of course, cannot be extended beyond a point. There are some who even by chance see the hand of Providence. “Coincidence is a small miracle when God chooses to remain anonymous” is believed to have been said by Einstein.
Interestingly, the invocation and recognition of the power of Providence occurs only when a person survives a disaster and rarely when he succumbs to it!
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