VIEWS EXCHANGED BY DR. VIJAYA RAJIVA AND SHREE VINEKAR
UNDER GOD? : THE GREAT YOGA DEBATE?
The Editor
Washington Post
(SEE: http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/undergod/2010/4/shukla_and _chopra_
the_great_yoga_debate.html )
Dear Editor,
Apropos to my letter of May 2, 2010, concerning Deepak Chopra's
article 'Sorry, Your Patent Has Run Out' (Washington Post, April
23, 2010) I am disappointed and dismayed by Dr.Chopra's
ongoing polemic directed at Hindu Yoga (The Great Yoga Debate,
Washington Post).
His problem seems to stem from the fact that he has
arbitrarily and rather arrogantly, if I may add, appropriated
the word 'consciousness' in one single continuum or modality which
he misguidedly thinks is the only contribution of Vedic wisdom
and meditative practice.
He presents himself supposedly as an Advaita Vedantin.
Fair enough. But, to extrapolate from this situation to all
aspects of Hindu thought and spirituality is inaccurate.
Further, his claim that only his understanding of Vedic
wisdom is the 'true' one is so utterly unlike his earlier
work in the field of consciousness and its benefits
in his medical practice.
Clearly, he seems to have lost his way . . .
The Vedic Rishis whom he seems to admire, thought in diverse
and profound ways which cannot be limited to one Deepak
Chopra's insights into ultimate reality. Neti, neti, (translated as
"not this, not that,") is one aspect of their vision of what ultimate reality is all about. And, this automatically rejects Dr. Chopra's dogmatism. Their great humility in the presence of infinite
ontological realities is a contrast to Chopra's hubris and
reductionism. They refused to label ontological realities by any
one definition. Hence, their 'neti, neti.'
His second error is his lack of historical perspective and his
confusion over the words 'Hindu' and ‘India', the former of
which predates the latter, which is an Anglicization. Rose is a rose, is a rose, is a rose; what is there in the name that changes it?
The Vedic seers meditated on the banks of the Sindhu-Sarasvati
rivers some 5,000 years ago. The Rig Veda, the oldest of the Hindu
scriptures, mentions the mighty river Sarasvati some 72 times. The
Sarasvati disappeared around 1800 B.C. and remained a mystery river
until recent advances in satellite photography and other scientific
disciplines discovered it as a dried up river bed.
The river Sindhu exists today, known in English as the Indus, the word coined by the Greeks (326 B.C.), who based that name on the earlier word 'Hindu' coined by the Persians (518 B.C.). And, the British Anglicized it all to Indus and India (and Indian).
These historical facts, surely known even to a school child, make it
evident that the word 'Hindu' is the older and more accurate word
for the culture of the subcontinent, rather than the word 'Indian.'
It is utterly baffling as to why Dr. Chopra takes umbrage at the word
'Hindu.' The world over, the word 'Hindu' is the most accepted word for
the culture and civilization of the subcontinent, and this has been so
for many centuries.
His third mistake is in denying the links between Hinduism
and its parent the Vedas. By implication he is denying that the
Patanjali Yoga Sutras, the definitive codification of Hindu Yoga (2nd
century B.C.), is an elaboration of Vedic contribution. Indeed, Dr. Chopra comes across intentionally or unintentionally as regarding himself as the custodian of Hindu spirituality (now packaged by himself as “Indian”) and its sole authentic interpreter.
What is the purpose of his futile debate with Dr. Aseem Shukla whose
main point seems to be that there is a definite link to the practice of
Yoga and the age old Hindu spirituality which has continuity over many millennia?
It is disappointing for those of us who considered Dr. Chopra not only
to be a fine physician but also an ambassador of goodwill for Hindu
spirituality, to see him engage in an unseemly and in the last analysis, a meaningless dispute over the phrase “Hindu Yoga.”
Sincerely,
Dr. Vijaya Rajiva
May 8th 2010
Dear Dr. Rajiva:
Thanks for sending me a copy of your letter to the Editor of Washington Post and I hope it is published.
There is no question Dr. Deepak Chopra is ill-informed or is deliberately engaging in his California Style identification with the American Yoga Journal. From your views it appears that he has grasped neither the historical sequence of events nor the basics of Vedic and Vedantic philosophy which he has so well commercialized under his brand named trade which is incidentally a big money maker. The undeniable motivation here is that he has great reluctance for displeasing his "constituency" which is mainly the local Americans and not the Indian Diaspora in California or in the West.
I have a slightly different view of what he is doing and why he does not want to be identified too closely with the word Hindu which is gaining or has gained pejorative accretions of nuances over the last couple of centuries in the US, although Emerson and Whitman drew considerable inspiration from the Vedic thought, and Vivekananda and Yogananda's efforts brought positive regard for Hindu identity for a few decades in this country. It is a sad commentary for Hindus that their self-effacement or staunch belief in non-aggrandizement of themselves motivated by their highly lofty ethical value of "prasiddhi parangmukhata" (as espoused by RSS for many decades and lived and exemplified by Shri Guruji and his contemporary Hindu leaders who even shunned appearing for any photographs, or signing their name to their articles, works of art or poems in contrast to "Sant Kabir, Mirabai, or Tulsidasa")is self-defeating. The lack of popularized positive versions of rational Hindu philosophy as against the most profound treatises, etc., has handicapped Hindus in projecting a positive image all over the world. It is amazing to see how Dalai Lama is exponentially more advanced in not only projecting himself as an intellectual and a spiritual leader with profound philosophy but also as capable of descending to the common man's level in communicating his grasp of Tibetan Buddhism in simple English to a lay reader in the West.
This deficiency may be what partly is responsible for the success of those like Deepak Chopra, Sri Sri Ravishankar, and even the ignoble Nityananda who have done well for publicizing watered down Hinduism and Hindu philosophy as well as culture and practice. With all due credit to them and many other ambassadors like Jiddu Krishnamurty, we should all pray for the emergence of a charismatic consistently rational spokesperson for Hinduism to lead to its "abhyudaya" in the world and for modifying the world view about Hinduism, Hindu culture and religion as a well as Hindu philosophy. Until then the small efforts that you and others are making to hold the fort are not insignificant but are phenomenal large steps to uplift Hinduism with its "bootstraps" to a slightly higher level of acceptance.
In this respect the credit goes to Aseem Shukla and HAF for succeeding for the first time in finding a column in a venue that is respectably recognized for significantly contributing to the prevalent world view (a small step for the Hindu Diaspora in the US but a giant leap for the mostly misunderstood passive Indian Hindus). Such achievement also induces conscious and unconscious jealousy in people like Deepak Chopra who are narcissistic enough to have a self appointed "prima donna" position in their fantasy as to how they are viewed in the Western World and, in fact, they are not wrong, if you count the millions of dollars they (Chopra, Ravishankar, Nityananda, etc. meaning the popular Hindu diminutive Dalai Lama equivalents in Western Hindu marketing) have accumulated by "selling Hinduism or its patented ideas." No one can argue with their “success.” It is a sad commentary on the Hindu identity though when these stalwarts package their ideas and practices as entirely original de-linked from the word Hindu and furthermore try to own intellectual property rights by brand naming their practices and acquiring a trade mark for each of them. It is the same plagiarizing “giant” sons who disown their Hindu heritage and de-link themselves and even Yoga from Hindu past to please their New Age or other American clients.
There is no question the secret admiration for Hindu ideas including "Avatar" and "Reincarnation" or "migration of the soul to other bodies ("Host")," "karma," etc.,have been appropriated imperceptibly in the world-view, so immiscibly now, that they have indeed lost their "Hindu patent" (Hindu parent culture) in a manner of speaking. Same is perhaps happening to Yoga and it may be that it is a mixed blessing for now this situation presents a potential for the Hindus to re-claim their Hindu originality and heritage regardless of “the patent running out.” Once these concepts are presented in a science fiction mode with different names or the same terms as used in Hindu culture they become so diluted, and if largely accepted in the world-view, they lose their Hindu identity just as the world "secular" has lost its Communist, British, French or Russian identity and its connection with Marx. This may be inevitable when world becomes totally flat even as regards the culture and world view. However, respectable sources of knowledge have no justification to deny the Hindu roots of Yoga, for example the Wikipedia erroneously traces the roots of Yoga only to Buddhism which originated in the sixth century BCE.
What Aseem Shukla and HAF are doing is absolutely the right thing to do when the Hindu children growing up in the U.S. are subjected to ridicule by their ignorant peers. They need to have the knowledge of their own heritage to take pride in it. The larger US and Western population needs be made aware of their cultural miseducation. (see “Historian’s Pitfall: Cultural Miseducation” on www.sookta-sumana.blogspot.com)
With best regards,
Shree Vinekar
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Monday, April 19, 2010
PAKISTAN KHATUMSTAN, WHAT NEXT?
PAKISTAN KHATUMSTAN, WHAT NEXT?
By Shree Vinekar and Seshachalam Dutta
Published 01/06/2008 Indian Politics
This is a sequel to “Terrorism: An Indian Perspective” originally published on www.swaveda.com and republished on www.india-forum.com
and
Demo-narchy Of Democratic Republic of India - 2
After condemning the brutal assassination of Benazir Bhutto, and with all due sympathies to late Benazir Bhutto’s family, it is imperative to examine the precedence being set by her in the South Asian Subcontinent to perpetuate dynasties within democracies to control the destiny of the country and its political parties from the grave as if these are personal estates that can be bequeathed in ones last will. If political leaders of the country start bequeathing their personal estates through their last will, there would be no questions asked, although any last will could be legally challenged by legitimate interests. If Kings and Queens in the 21st Century appoint their heirs to the throne that may be quite understandable.
There is really no custom or convention in the constitutional law or in the political parties for such a phenomenon. Nepotism during the lifetime of the political leaders is reluctantly accepted by their followers. Bilawal Bhutto, Rahul Gandhi and Pankaj Singh each may be viewed as the heir apparent for their respective party leadership positions in remote future. The difference is Bilawal, as precocious as he is, is appointed as per the last will the chairman of the party in absentia with proxy given to his father Assif Ali Zardari now newly renamed “Bhutto Zardari.”
Bilawal’s lofty statements regarding his faith in democracy and avenging his mother’s assassination through democracy are normal expressions of a grieving and mourning teenager but alas he does not see how democracy is highjacked in his political party. Of course, Pakistan has never been a true democracy and, at the very least, is more immature for a democracy than India. What is interesting though is that the population in India and Pakistan seems to take such developments in their political history in stride without any protestation.
There are ample number of responsible and mature citizens in both countries that not only look askance but justify these practices as necessary given the political immaturity of the population. There are many factors that play a part in such events and this essay will examine the historical, cultural, and other roots of such political immaturity both in Pakistan and India leading to a mindset that prefers “Demonarchy” in the South Asian or Indian Subcontinent. Necessarily the focus will not be exclusively on Pakistan. A non-compartmentalized, compare and contrast, approach will be used to illustrate the phenomena.
Some thoughts on Benazir Bhutto’s assassination from an Indian perspective may be in order prior to delving into the reasons for and consequences of “Demonarchies” in South Asian Subcontinent.
It appears that Benazir Bhutto believed in a form of Islam that does not exist. For example, she believed in a myth that assassination of a woman was unthinkable in Islam. After her reentry into Pakistan even after the attack by suicide bombers who killed 140 individuals she courageously left her position in house arrest admonishing the Muslims approaching her that she was a woman and not to be harmed by a good Muslim. She forgot the pointblank shootings in the head of women by Taliban captured on the video.
She had unwittingly supported Taliban as well as the Saudis among whom the Wahabis routinely behead women. One has to wonder how she developed such conviction of her invulnerability and her faith in chivalrous Muslims and especially in the harmlessness of terrorist Islamists.
Surely she was aware of the risks and had a premonition that she could fall victim to terrorists and so wrote her last will two days before her assassination. It indicates that her convictions regarding no fellow Muslim harming her because of her status as a woman and as a beloved political leader may have been a “denial” of Islam approving homicidal violence against women. She needed such denial, psychologically, and it may have had its unconscious roots in her exposure to Hindu culture. Conversely, this idea of “Islam” as stated in the previous statement does not represent, necessarily, the true spiritual philosophy of Islam but, rather, the skewed and grey-lined idea of primitive fundamentalist Islam which incorporates “laws” punishable by inhumane force.
CULTURAL AFFINITY OF INDIA AND PAKISTAN
This brings us to examine closely the cultural affinity the Pakistani Muslims have with Indian Muslims and Hindu culture rather than the Arabic ethos as erroneously some Muslims would like to believe. Even among the converted Indian Muslims their original caste, skin color, and “khaan-daan” is a major consideration in matrimonial arrangements. They also seem to marry with Muslims speaking the same local language rather than one who speaks only Urdu. Their apparel and food habits and culture are closer to the culture of their domicile state or region. They have friendly relationship with their non-Muslim neighbors and generally they fit in very well in the cosmopolitan cities in India and generally all over India amongst Hindus unless instigated by politicians or terrorist fundamentalist Mullahs.
This fact is not known to many non-Indians and especially the Muslims residing in foreign countries who do not seem to know that India has the second largest Muslim population after Indonesia. That is not to deny that many would like to imitate their Arabian Islamic brethren and assume that their original culture was Arabic because their religion took birth in Arabia and/or they were indoctrinated to do so. In actuality most Indian and Pakistani Muslims do not have a biologically speaking Arabic or Middle Eastern racial identity.
They are all typically classified as belonging to an “East Indian” race along with the Hindus in India.
“Yad hai jub utara caravan hamara – Sare Jahanse Accha Hindoasatan Hamara” (Do you remember our caravan coming down here? Our Hindustan is better than the entire world”) are the words of Iqbal, himself a grandson of a Kashmiri Brahmin, reminding the Pakistani and Indian Muslims that they are the descendents of the invaders who entered India on caravans. Such cultural miseducation is deeply rooted in the Pakistani and Indian Muslim minds. For example Pakistan took pride in naming its missile after an invader Ghori but no self respecting Indian will name an Indian missile Alexander although there may be residual Greek “blood” in some Indians.
This has presented a confusion of identity for the Muslims in India and in addition created a serious conflict of loyalty with half their heart pulled to Arabia though those who tried to live in middle East have sadly discovered that their social status in those countries is not elevated simply by virtue of their religion and that the status of Indian or Pakistani Muslims is not equal to that of the Middle Eastern Muslims in the Middle East.
Benazir had the same psychological need to identify with her Western Muslim neighbors rather than accept her cultural roots as Indian Sindhi. Such sympathetic identification may also be a reason for her deluding herself with denial of inhumanities of the Middle Eastern and Afghan fundamental Islam and the reason for her belief in a more humane Islam surrounding her than that was in actuality. Otherwise she would have insisted on stronger security from the government although it can now be questioned whether such was lacking by design.
Muslims of Indian Subcontinent have no distinct linguistic identity
Most Pakistani and some Indian Muslims consider Urdu as their mother tongue instead of Arabic. Urdu is a language born in India with Hindi grammar and structure with Parsee and some Arabic words interspersed. Many Urdu scholars and writers are Hindu, for example, Munshi Premchand. Former Prime Minister of India Atal Bihari Vajpayee is one such person who is proficient in Urdu and had excellent rapport established with General Parvez Musharraf. Neither Musharraf nor Vajpayee considered India or Pakistan as Banana Republics to allow foreign elements to enter freely to investigate internal matters.
What is amazing in the life and death of this leader, Benazir, is the generic problem of identity incidental to separation and partition from India that is the problem of Pakistan. This problem is in the psychological need to deny that the population of Pakistan has a Hindu soul with all its faults as illustrated below with many examples. The Pakistanis are cut out of the same cloth as the Indian Muslims and even the Hindus of India.
The evidence for this statement is the position of veneration enjoyed by Benazir Bhutto herself. It is only in India where the basic tenet of the society is that “wherever the women are venerated is where even the Gods choose to live.” Where else in the Muslim world other than in the Indian Subcontinent a Muslim woman can be a leader at the helm of a nation? This is true only for Bangladesh once and twice in Pakistan. The latter is still in its identity crisis trying to discover its soul. In Bangladesh there is no question the identity is easy for an average citizen as there is close identification with the Bengali language, literature and culture.
One must admit that Pakistan may have a different religion but not a different national identity as Allama Iqbal conceived. Even Iqbal may not have for psychological and political reasons recognized or accepted that the heart of Hindu soul throbs in all people of the Indian subcontinent. This, of course, cannot be fathomed by Sonia Gandhi, an Italian with legacy of notorious mafia connections and legacy of Nero and most cruel fascist like Mussolini besides her Catholic lineage and limited stay in India during her formative years. She was so quick to accuse the son of the soil, Narendra Modi, of being a “Mout ka saudagar.” It is besides the point that she was promptly reprimanded by the Indian Elections Commission for this expression. Such irresponsible language is inflammatory and adds fuel to fire and the damage done by this distortion may yet to take shape.
Demonization of political opponents presents them as enemies rather than just rivals. The Congress party may have to teach her some manners instead of writing her Hindi speeches in Roman script and setting her up as an empty headed reader. If they do, they may yet win next time even in Gujrat!! Congress when in power has the responsibility to put a stop to creation of a hostile atmosphere. There have been riots even in the times of Jawaharlal Nehru and Rajiv Gandhi but they were not blamed then by their political opponents as ‘Moutke Saudagars.” For example 3000 Sikhs were killed in the riots after Indira’s assassination.
The question Sonia and Rahul should have asked in Gujrat was how come the Muslims could not live peacefully and dare to initiate violence against innocent Hindus rather than create a demon out of Modi for responding with bringing the army in to quell the riots on March 1st after they broke out on or around February 28th, 2002, (Godhra train burning of February 27th by terrorists caused these riots) distorted much later by the media who forgot February had only 28 days and not 31 when they reported that Modi waited for 3 days before responding responsibly. It does not behoove well for responsible national leaders and the so called secular media to have such protracted falsifying histrionics over spurious issues that were not any different than with other riots in other eras when the Nehru dynasty was in power; it does not accomplish any good purpose besides further instigating psychotic and sociopathic Islamic terrorists.
As stated in the article on “Terrorism,” Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are two internationally recognized major instigators and state supporters of international terrorism, yet strangely they are the trusted allies of the U.S. The recent political events in Pakistan leading to a deplorable and deteriorating tragic condition with increasing focus on virulent terrorism backfiring on their own leaders needed a word to capture this state of affairs. Sadly in the interest of brevity the authors regrettably choose to do so by using the word “Khatumstan.” The British and U.S. encouragement for poor (rich) Benazir Bhutto to return to her beloved Pakistan turned out to be her last journey to her “Khatumstan.” “Khatum” is a word in Urdu and Hindi that means “end” or “finish.” These encouraging foreign political elements did not ensure her safety. The chaos generated after her death, it is feared, may lead to the end of Pakistan at least as we know it today. If that happens, it may also be called “Khatumstan.” The serious thesis of this article is that both India (Hindustan) and Pakistan have a potential to become “Khatumstans” if the destructive political events are not properly grasped by the leadership of both countries. The shape of both these countries could change if the current fragmenting psychosis is not precipitously diagnosed and treated. There is already great activism by expatriate Pakistani citizens mostly residing in U.K. to begin movement to divide Pakistan into many different countries. See Divide Pakistan to Eliminate Terrorism - Syed Jamaluddin www.dividepakistan.blogspot.com
“US: CNN airs mysterious 'Divide Pakistan' advertisements
UK-based author buys spots on news network to advertise book
Times of India
Sunday, March 11, 2007
By Chidanand Rajghatta posting from Washington”
Courtesy “Times of India”
These activists were hoping that Benazir Bhutto would win the elections and support their cause of dividing the country. They were surely dreaming. However, if she lost the elections, they proposed she should become the President of newly created country, Sindhudesh (a new name for Sindh province of Pakistan). All this may be mere hype to sell a book for profits through Amazon.com, it is postulated.
On the other hand, there may be a hand of foreign governments in promoting such exorbitantly expensive propaganda. If so, this leads us to the Part II of our article, Demonarchy in Democratic India-2. There are many American academicians who are predicting that India too will be divided into many countries. Then with such Balkanization as was the fate of Yugoslavia, it will be a Federation of Pakistani states and Federation of Indian states that will emerge in the South Asian subcontinent.
There are many lessons to be learned from the recent events in Pakistan for India. Given the similarity of psychological gestalt of Indian and Pakistani population, regardless of religion, the fragmentation could easily occur if not guarded against with some form of unifying identity which poets like Iqbal tried to instill but may have failed in doing so. Similarly in India there has been any number of visionaries who have tried to unite Hindus or notably also Mahatma Gandhi who tried to unite the entire population both Hindus and Muslims on the basis of a common racial identity and have not succeeded spectacularly. Therefore, both countries are easy prey to the cunning political or even religious imperialistic interests wielding divide and rule tactics. Alas, both countries have failed to recognize who their true friends and foes are and have been taken on a ride for nearly a century now focusing their animosities on each other draining their economies to defend against each other while some other parties are constantly amused and profiting.
WHAT CAN WE LEARN?
First, dynasties die hard even in a democracy. Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi representing UPA and Congress can be read like a book by the majority of Gujratis and recognized as fake and lacking in substance. Their sympathies were clearly for the terrorists as expressed by their reluctance to support the Supreme Court decision vigorously supported by Narendra Modi. Name calling a law abiding Chief Minister of Gujrat, a “soudagar of mout” or “merchant of death” for insisting that law of the land be followed especially after the heart of India was systematically attacked by the brutal terrorist was quite absurd. It exposed their lack of loyalty to the victims of terrorism. Such tactics of vote bank placation for solicitation of political favors are quite transparent besides subtly encouraging terrorists against those who oppose them.
Presuming that their dismal defeat in Gurjat is a preview of their fate in the ensuing elections, one can envision the replication of what happened in Gujrat in almost all other states except West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala. In the event such wishful thinking does not actualize, one needs to envision future consolidation of dynastic rule in the Indian Republic. If that happens, the Pakistan and Saudi Arabia supported terrorism is likely to show an upheaval. The rest of India will need to recognize that to maintain its present economic engine in the same current momentum terrorism needs to be totally eliminated from India. That means there is no room for sympathizers of terrorists in the Indian politics.
Naturally, it is time that UPA and Congress seek an unceremonious exit from the Indian Political scene in all states. Otherwise under the fake banner of “Secularism” these parties will continue to support minorities defending minority terrorism rather than aligning with the mature, modern, progressive peace loving and anti-terrorist Muslims and other minorities that will pledge allegiance with India that is Bharat.
They are the “soudagars of fake secularism” using the word “secularism” as a marketable shield against a demonized “communalism.” In so doing they will blatantly and subtly support terrorism, cause divisiveness, and unrest in the population at large. What they forget is that even what they call communalism is a phenomenon that springs in reaction to age old endemic terrorism.
The goal of uniting Hindus should not be any less noble than ecumenical movement among the Christians. It would be absurd to call ecumenical efforts communalism. The dynasty survives in India using such illogical psychological warfare with people, constantly profiting from dividing the society rather than trying to unite it, because it buys the vote bank.
Secondly, India is like Pakistan divided by different languages and cultural identities and more so. Currently, the secular Indian identity is not the mode for the majority. Ideally, the standard of secular humanistic nationalism dreamed by developed countries is one divorced from race, religion, language, caste and class, and culture. Such nationalism needs to be the binding force for uniting the entire population of India. Let us face it; India is far from reaching this stage. Pakistan too has the same problem. So long as there is no oath of allegiance for every citizen to be loyal to his or her country, the question of secular national identity becomes moot. There is reluctance among Indians to accept the basic identity of Hinduness and Hindu culture as what is uniting India.
The Bollywood movies and songs smuggling in Hindi language through the movies in many states might lead to a common culture or pop-culture, but that will not arouse the national sentiments in the people to give a unity of spirit. Just on the side, the most cordial relationship between Muslims and Hindus in the Bollywood Film Industry since 1896 is quite remarkable and attests to their humane and human friendship. Just as even in a mature democracy like U.S. politicians routinely respect the “faith” of their constituency and openly align with it in a generic fashion, the politicians in India will need to use this cultural identity to establish rapport with their constituency which forms the majority. Building constituency for political leaders is a major challenge. After the end of the Independence movement and unity against the British, the Indian National Congress has not found any burning overriding principles or issues to develop and foster a national identity. There is no charismatic visionary leader swaying Indian population at large with issues like the social reforms, infrastructure development, national security, anti-terrorism, uniform sustained economic growth and development, elimination of poverty and corruption, uplifting of the disadvantaged, uniform civil code, better government, competing with China in manufacturing, maintaining sustained double digit economic growth, improved healthcare, sound foreign policy, entry into UN security Council, strategies to prevent fragmentation of the country, better educational opportunity for the masses and other widely appealing agendas in a manifesto that a common man on the street can identify with, speaking his/her language. Such talents could develop a constituency in a secular society. Rahul does not seem to have a potential to foot this bill.
In the absence of such secular National leadership, with hypnotizing but sincere appeal to all Indians, the Hindu cultural identity or identification with underprivileged masses, chosen by Mayavathi, as a medium to build a national constituency become viable alternatives. It is never to be anti-national and divisive in nature, in fact, always it is more nationalistic as well as hopefully all inclusive. To accuse such identity as “communal” and those adhering to such identity “saudagars of Dharma” in a pejorative manner is unrealistic. The Majority will wise up to it.
Having a strong identification with the majority is not to be looked down upon. The corrupt thinking that such identification only means that the politician will treat all minorities as second class citizens comes from a paranoia based upon the experiences with the Muslim regimes of the past and is also a vestige of the Colonial era. It is now sixty years since independence. It is high time that Indian people not remain paranoid and brain washed with Jawaharlal Nehru’s antiquated world view about such matters, although it has been swallowed lock, stock, and barrel by the so-called secular English media in India.
If strong efforts are not made by the majority across the length and breadth of India to unite, we can speculate that it will not be too long before we see foreign activism, interference, and financing to fragment India just like the current thrust in fragmenting Pakistan. The current exploitation of a positive transference to the name Nehru and Gandhi is not sufficient to produce a strong nationalistic unifying power like Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Rahul is not competent and cannot hold a candle to Jawaharlal Nehru or Indira Gandhi, leave alone Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Weak demonarchs like Sonia and Rahul will not only stymie and stifle even more talented and competent Congress politicians from growth in their popularity within and outside the Congress Party but will also create increasingly weak center that is difficult for people of India to identify with besides silly preference for dynasty rewarding incompetence at the helm of the nation.
That will lead to more powerful autonomous states like Gujrat and Tamilnadu, etc. which might seek separation from the Center especially if instigated by foreign powers. This is only a scenario and not the authors’ reading of the character of these states. The cursory look at the World history should show that the British and other Colonial European powers are adept at surreptitiously fueling violence between different “groups” and profiting by selling arms to both sides and later patronizingly come back with a price to establish peace in the same region they had ignited. India and Pakistan have been made fools once in the Kashmir conflict but are targets for many such future conflicts.
It can be easily surmised that Balochistan, Sindh, Pakhtoon, etc., are easy future targets like Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, and may be even states much closer to Delhi. These elements have been well suppressed by the military rule in Pakistan but will be difficult to handle if flare up in India. It is crucial therefore that Narendra Modi be recognized as being on target for providing a solution for strong India relying on the National Hindu Unity in the interest of national security and national integrity.
The usual mistake is to misinterpret that Hindus if united are only doing so to bully or fight the minorities. There is no historical basis for such paranoia.
Jawaharlal Nehru was quite astute in recognizing that the Hindu culture was the uniting force for the Indian people as he clearly expressed it in his book “Discovery of India” as “Unity in Diversity,” but his political acumen recognized that political leaders of the Majority will be his strong political rivals and he consciously or unconsciously became averse to them and implemented a divide and rule politics which he had learned so well from the British for political survival. It is conceivable though that if 800 million Hindus unite and organize themselves they may be a formidable force and not to be bullied with irrationalities as is the current plight of the non-united Hindus. Hindus will need to have a social reform to eliminate social evils in their own society and likewise to not allow other primitive people impose their primitive culture and laws upon the women and children of India no matter what religion they belong to.
Freedom to practice ones religion to attain spiritual peace is not to be construed as freedom to encroach upon other peoples’ rights, for example, by polluting the atmosphere with high decibel sounds all hours of the day and night even against the ordinances of the City (and the police) under the name of practice of religion. Such irrationalities will need to be curbed by placing pressure by the majority. Nonviolent persuasion will be the best policy and non-corrupt enforced law and order among the majority and minority will be the next avenue. Modi will be able to demonstrate it in his state of Gujrat. All citizens will need to be educated to carry their civic responsibility.
Third, although there is no central military rule in India the accusation that the Indian government is a Brahmin-Bania (Bumman-Bania) majority venture is like Punjabi Muslims being in control of Pakistan, its politics, economics, business, real estate, and military. Similar perception about India will be deleterious, if it persists sixty years after the independence, although the highly educated barristers and other politicians who led the freedom movement and inherited the political power in India were from the privileged classes.
The solution to this problem is to make education available to all Indians and especially to the underprivileged and encourage higher education in all fields for the underprivileged lower socioeconomic classes regardless of caste or OBC (“Other Backward Classes”) status. This thrust will eventually encourage young men and women from all classes and castes, minority and majority communities, to enter politics to partake in the governance of the country. If this is not done rapidly the divisive elements will replicate what is happening in Pakistan in India.
The question, “What next,” applies to the fate of both countries that have same flaws in their mindsets at a deeper level. India has no room to be complacent while Pakistan is rapidly disintegrating. India too could be on the verge of similar problems because of the weak dynasty trying to hold the fort at the center. It cannot be denied that neither Sonia nor Rahul have the command over the Indian public nor the organizational skills like those demonstrated by Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel.
Both countries, India and Pakistan, though not equal, are beset by the same faults. One of them is the irresistible loyalty to dynasties running contrary to democratic traditions, yet trying to fashion a Western type of democracy. This situation is fertile for foreign interference and control to use the puppet masters of the state to achieve the goals of other imperialistic countries. That may be what that threatened the insecure elements in Pakistan that may have sensed foreign hand in Benazir Bhutto’s return. Bilawal and his deputed acting chairman of the party, his father, may also be vulnerable to similar paranoid reactions and perceptions when the time comes for them to assume the helm of the country.
How can there be democracy where there is no democracy internally in the political parties partaking in the democracy? Besides, the morality and ethics, if not the legality, of such practices goes unquestioned. Nineteen year old son not even eligible for party membership is bequeathed the throne of the party with his father as his acting deputy. (Incidentally, Bilawal’s father was once nicknamed Mr. 10% Zardari for his corruption.) This resembles Akbar’s ascension to throne at age of 13 when the concept of democracy did not exist, but Zardari is no non-corrupt Birbal known for his genius. Bairon Khan was the guardian of Akbar who got rid of him in 4 years choosing Birbal as his friend, guide, and philosopher.
With all of her Oxford education Benazir Bhutto observed the tradition of the subcontinent, married one approved or chosen by her mother, unlike Rajiv Gandhi; she behaved like the Moghul kings of the past in naming her heir to the throne. She was sadly assassinated without provocation while Rajiv was a victim of his own military misadventure in Sri Lanka, sending Indian army to kill his fellow Indians settled there.
In the unlikely event of his being elected, will Bilawal bring Western style of “secular” peaceful democracy (secular may be a misnomer for a theocracy which Pakistan truly is) or will he relapse into the nativity on his return is the question, -- as this happens with so many Western educated leaders who on their return to their homelands have half forgotten the values they learned, if they learned them at all at Oxford, Cambridge, or Harvard.
The education of children of political leaders of developing countries in these Universities is a sham unless they are inherently brilliant like Jawaharlal Nehru or King Husain of Jordan. Their social promotion is guaranteed and looked askance by faculty for these independently wealthy students who are the political pawns of the future who are sure to return to their countries of origin to assume power and present no threat to employment market, local workers, or professionals. Their Oxford, Cambridge or Harvard qualifications are more often ornamental and are never verified by local employment experts in human resources department as is the sole privilege of the commoners and not of the “royalty” in demonarchies!!
These monarchs in democracy do not have to go through background check to have access to higher than top security issues or documents, with or without official position in the government. They can be the easy targets for foreign espionage and control, so they can maintain stability in the region by catering to their masters. Even though accused of mega corruptions they can repeatedly assume power defying the public interest using their political power and positions to quash the investigative or judicial processes.
Is weakened Pakistan a favorable situation for India? No, if it means upper hand for the primitive Islamists in Pakistan including their terrorist training grounds. Promoting the think tanks to formulate the impact of fragmented Pakistan or some form weakened Pakistan, if not “Khatumstan,” on the west of India is an urgent necessity.
The progressive, moderate, and educated Muslims who love democracy in India and who love India and have been enjoying peaceful pursuit of their businesses and careers need to join these think tanks and help Hindus and other Indians understand that there are truly peace loving friendly civic minded Muslims in India that want a strong India devoid of terrorist threats, and they too desire peaceful and harmonious society. They, too, are against Islamic terrorism just like Benazir Bhutto was during her lifetime. They need to be willing to accept the just and judicial consequences proffered to identified terrorists and any actions taken to redress the past injustices of imperialistic terrorism perpetrated upon the Hindu majority in India.
The economic growth of India is in the ultimate interest of all including minorities choosing to live in India, and also beneficial for Pakistan and Bangladesh. Hindu majority has been uniquely hospitable to all religions historically for 2000 years and will continue to be hospitable if not aggressed upon in the democratic Republic of India. There have been millions of Gandhis among the Indian Hindus in 5000 years who espoused Ahinsa (Non-violence). Mahatma Gandhi was a product of this culture. Fighting the majority and creating disturbances of peace is hardly the way to go. If this is not recognized and peaceful coexistence is not urgently implemented, the Pakistan Khatumstan history could repeat in India within a matter of few years. India probably has a special obligation to help stabilize Pakistan, if called upon, to ensure anti-terrorism oriented stable government in Pakistan.
There is all the more need now to have friendly relationship with Pakistan as initiated by Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Demonarchy thrives on divisiveness. The dynasty and demonarchy that engages in fragmenting Indian society and promulgating divisive policies must be seen as doomed in India, if India is to progress in the 21st Century. The Muslims and Hindus in India need to come together and not be further divided by vote-seeking politicians, for ultimate economic prosperity of the sub-continent through practice of mature democracy. For this to occur, “de-monarchization” needs to begin promptly (see previous articles for definitions) in India and hopefully in Pakistan too to prevent demonarchization of democracy. The people of both countries need to first become keenly aware of these phenomena to begin this process.
By Shree Vinekar and Seshachalam Dutta
Published 01/06/2008 Indian Politics
This is a sequel to “Terrorism: An Indian Perspective” originally published on www.swaveda.com and republished on www.india-forum.com
and
Demo-narchy Of Democratic Republic of India - 2
After condemning the brutal assassination of Benazir Bhutto, and with all due sympathies to late Benazir Bhutto’s family, it is imperative to examine the precedence being set by her in the South Asian Subcontinent to perpetuate dynasties within democracies to control the destiny of the country and its political parties from the grave as if these are personal estates that can be bequeathed in ones last will. If political leaders of the country start bequeathing their personal estates through their last will, there would be no questions asked, although any last will could be legally challenged by legitimate interests. If Kings and Queens in the 21st Century appoint their heirs to the throne that may be quite understandable.
There is really no custom or convention in the constitutional law or in the political parties for such a phenomenon. Nepotism during the lifetime of the political leaders is reluctantly accepted by their followers. Bilawal Bhutto, Rahul Gandhi and Pankaj Singh each may be viewed as the heir apparent for their respective party leadership positions in remote future. The difference is Bilawal, as precocious as he is, is appointed as per the last will the chairman of the party in absentia with proxy given to his father Assif Ali Zardari now newly renamed “Bhutto Zardari.”
Bilawal’s lofty statements regarding his faith in democracy and avenging his mother’s assassination through democracy are normal expressions of a grieving and mourning teenager but alas he does not see how democracy is highjacked in his political party. Of course, Pakistan has never been a true democracy and, at the very least, is more immature for a democracy than India. What is interesting though is that the population in India and Pakistan seems to take such developments in their political history in stride without any protestation.
There are ample number of responsible and mature citizens in both countries that not only look askance but justify these practices as necessary given the political immaturity of the population. There are many factors that play a part in such events and this essay will examine the historical, cultural, and other roots of such political immaturity both in Pakistan and India leading to a mindset that prefers “Demonarchy” in the South Asian or Indian Subcontinent. Necessarily the focus will not be exclusively on Pakistan. A non-compartmentalized, compare and contrast, approach will be used to illustrate the phenomena.
Some thoughts on Benazir Bhutto’s assassination from an Indian perspective may be in order prior to delving into the reasons for and consequences of “Demonarchies” in South Asian Subcontinent.
It appears that Benazir Bhutto believed in a form of Islam that does not exist. For example, she believed in a myth that assassination of a woman was unthinkable in Islam. After her reentry into Pakistan even after the attack by suicide bombers who killed 140 individuals she courageously left her position in house arrest admonishing the Muslims approaching her that she was a woman and not to be harmed by a good Muslim. She forgot the pointblank shootings in the head of women by Taliban captured on the video.
She had unwittingly supported Taliban as well as the Saudis among whom the Wahabis routinely behead women. One has to wonder how she developed such conviction of her invulnerability and her faith in chivalrous Muslims and especially in the harmlessness of terrorist Islamists.
Surely she was aware of the risks and had a premonition that she could fall victim to terrorists and so wrote her last will two days before her assassination. It indicates that her convictions regarding no fellow Muslim harming her because of her status as a woman and as a beloved political leader may have been a “denial” of Islam approving homicidal violence against women. She needed such denial, psychologically, and it may have had its unconscious roots in her exposure to Hindu culture. Conversely, this idea of “Islam” as stated in the previous statement does not represent, necessarily, the true spiritual philosophy of Islam but, rather, the skewed and grey-lined idea of primitive fundamentalist Islam which incorporates “laws” punishable by inhumane force.
CULTURAL AFFINITY OF INDIA AND PAKISTAN
This brings us to examine closely the cultural affinity the Pakistani Muslims have with Indian Muslims and Hindu culture rather than the Arabic ethos as erroneously some Muslims would like to believe. Even among the converted Indian Muslims their original caste, skin color, and “khaan-daan” is a major consideration in matrimonial arrangements. They also seem to marry with Muslims speaking the same local language rather than one who speaks only Urdu. Their apparel and food habits and culture are closer to the culture of their domicile state or region. They have friendly relationship with their non-Muslim neighbors and generally they fit in very well in the cosmopolitan cities in India and generally all over India amongst Hindus unless instigated by politicians or terrorist fundamentalist Mullahs.
This fact is not known to many non-Indians and especially the Muslims residing in foreign countries who do not seem to know that India has the second largest Muslim population after Indonesia. That is not to deny that many would like to imitate their Arabian Islamic brethren and assume that their original culture was Arabic because their religion took birth in Arabia and/or they were indoctrinated to do so. In actuality most Indian and Pakistani Muslims do not have a biologically speaking Arabic or Middle Eastern racial identity.
They are all typically classified as belonging to an “East Indian” race along with the Hindus in India.
“Yad hai jub utara caravan hamara – Sare Jahanse Accha Hindoasatan Hamara” (Do you remember our caravan coming down here? Our Hindustan is better than the entire world”) are the words of Iqbal, himself a grandson of a Kashmiri Brahmin, reminding the Pakistani and Indian Muslims that they are the descendents of the invaders who entered India on caravans. Such cultural miseducation is deeply rooted in the Pakistani and Indian Muslim minds. For example Pakistan took pride in naming its missile after an invader Ghori but no self respecting Indian will name an Indian missile Alexander although there may be residual Greek “blood” in some Indians.
This has presented a confusion of identity for the Muslims in India and in addition created a serious conflict of loyalty with half their heart pulled to Arabia though those who tried to live in middle East have sadly discovered that their social status in those countries is not elevated simply by virtue of their religion and that the status of Indian or Pakistani Muslims is not equal to that of the Middle Eastern Muslims in the Middle East.
Benazir had the same psychological need to identify with her Western Muslim neighbors rather than accept her cultural roots as Indian Sindhi. Such sympathetic identification may also be a reason for her deluding herself with denial of inhumanities of the Middle Eastern and Afghan fundamental Islam and the reason for her belief in a more humane Islam surrounding her than that was in actuality. Otherwise she would have insisted on stronger security from the government although it can now be questioned whether such was lacking by design.
Muslims of Indian Subcontinent have no distinct linguistic identity
Most Pakistani and some Indian Muslims consider Urdu as their mother tongue instead of Arabic. Urdu is a language born in India with Hindi grammar and structure with Parsee and some Arabic words interspersed. Many Urdu scholars and writers are Hindu, for example, Munshi Premchand. Former Prime Minister of India Atal Bihari Vajpayee is one such person who is proficient in Urdu and had excellent rapport established with General Parvez Musharraf. Neither Musharraf nor Vajpayee considered India or Pakistan as Banana Republics to allow foreign elements to enter freely to investigate internal matters.
What is amazing in the life and death of this leader, Benazir, is the generic problem of identity incidental to separation and partition from India that is the problem of Pakistan. This problem is in the psychological need to deny that the population of Pakistan has a Hindu soul with all its faults as illustrated below with many examples. The Pakistanis are cut out of the same cloth as the Indian Muslims and even the Hindus of India.
The evidence for this statement is the position of veneration enjoyed by Benazir Bhutto herself. It is only in India where the basic tenet of the society is that “wherever the women are venerated is where even the Gods choose to live.” Where else in the Muslim world other than in the Indian Subcontinent a Muslim woman can be a leader at the helm of a nation? This is true only for Bangladesh once and twice in Pakistan. The latter is still in its identity crisis trying to discover its soul. In Bangladesh there is no question the identity is easy for an average citizen as there is close identification with the Bengali language, literature and culture.
One must admit that Pakistan may have a different religion but not a different national identity as Allama Iqbal conceived. Even Iqbal may not have for psychological and political reasons recognized or accepted that the heart of Hindu soul throbs in all people of the Indian subcontinent. This, of course, cannot be fathomed by Sonia Gandhi, an Italian with legacy of notorious mafia connections and legacy of Nero and most cruel fascist like Mussolini besides her Catholic lineage and limited stay in India during her formative years. She was so quick to accuse the son of the soil, Narendra Modi, of being a “Mout ka saudagar.” It is besides the point that she was promptly reprimanded by the Indian Elections Commission for this expression. Such irresponsible language is inflammatory and adds fuel to fire and the damage done by this distortion may yet to take shape.
Demonization of political opponents presents them as enemies rather than just rivals. The Congress party may have to teach her some manners instead of writing her Hindi speeches in Roman script and setting her up as an empty headed reader. If they do, they may yet win next time even in Gujrat!! Congress when in power has the responsibility to put a stop to creation of a hostile atmosphere. There have been riots even in the times of Jawaharlal Nehru and Rajiv Gandhi but they were not blamed then by their political opponents as ‘Moutke Saudagars.” For example 3000 Sikhs were killed in the riots after Indira’s assassination.
The question Sonia and Rahul should have asked in Gujrat was how come the Muslims could not live peacefully and dare to initiate violence against innocent Hindus rather than create a demon out of Modi for responding with bringing the army in to quell the riots on March 1st after they broke out on or around February 28th, 2002, (Godhra train burning of February 27th by terrorists caused these riots) distorted much later by the media who forgot February had only 28 days and not 31 when they reported that Modi waited for 3 days before responding responsibly. It does not behoove well for responsible national leaders and the so called secular media to have such protracted falsifying histrionics over spurious issues that were not any different than with other riots in other eras when the Nehru dynasty was in power; it does not accomplish any good purpose besides further instigating psychotic and sociopathic Islamic terrorists.
As stated in the article on “Terrorism,” Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are two internationally recognized major instigators and state supporters of international terrorism, yet strangely they are the trusted allies of the U.S. The recent political events in Pakistan leading to a deplorable and deteriorating tragic condition with increasing focus on virulent terrorism backfiring on their own leaders needed a word to capture this state of affairs. Sadly in the interest of brevity the authors regrettably choose to do so by using the word “Khatumstan.” The British and U.S. encouragement for poor (rich) Benazir Bhutto to return to her beloved Pakistan turned out to be her last journey to her “Khatumstan.” “Khatum” is a word in Urdu and Hindi that means “end” or “finish.” These encouraging foreign political elements did not ensure her safety. The chaos generated after her death, it is feared, may lead to the end of Pakistan at least as we know it today. If that happens, it may also be called “Khatumstan.” The serious thesis of this article is that both India (Hindustan) and Pakistan have a potential to become “Khatumstans” if the destructive political events are not properly grasped by the leadership of both countries. The shape of both these countries could change if the current fragmenting psychosis is not precipitously diagnosed and treated. There is already great activism by expatriate Pakistani citizens mostly residing in U.K. to begin movement to divide Pakistan into many different countries. See Divide Pakistan to Eliminate Terrorism - Syed Jamaluddin www.dividepakistan.blogspot.com
“US: CNN airs mysterious 'Divide Pakistan' advertisements
UK-based author buys spots on news network to advertise book
Times of India
Sunday, March 11, 2007
By Chidanand Rajghatta posting from Washington”
Courtesy “Times of India”
These activists were hoping that Benazir Bhutto would win the elections and support their cause of dividing the country. They were surely dreaming. However, if she lost the elections, they proposed she should become the President of newly created country, Sindhudesh (a new name for Sindh province of Pakistan). All this may be mere hype to sell a book for profits through Amazon.com, it is postulated.
On the other hand, there may be a hand of foreign governments in promoting such exorbitantly expensive propaganda. If so, this leads us to the Part II of our article, Demonarchy in Democratic India-2. There are many American academicians who are predicting that India too will be divided into many countries. Then with such Balkanization as was the fate of Yugoslavia, it will be a Federation of Pakistani states and Federation of Indian states that will emerge in the South Asian subcontinent.
There are many lessons to be learned from the recent events in Pakistan for India. Given the similarity of psychological gestalt of Indian and Pakistani population, regardless of religion, the fragmentation could easily occur if not guarded against with some form of unifying identity which poets like Iqbal tried to instill but may have failed in doing so. Similarly in India there has been any number of visionaries who have tried to unite Hindus or notably also Mahatma Gandhi who tried to unite the entire population both Hindus and Muslims on the basis of a common racial identity and have not succeeded spectacularly. Therefore, both countries are easy prey to the cunning political or even religious imperialistic interests wielding divide and rule tactics. Alas, both countries have failed to recognize who their true friends and foes are and have been taken on a ride for nearly a century now focusing their animosities on each other draining their economies to defend against each other while some other parties are constantly amused and profiting.
WHAT CAN WE LEARN?
First, dynasties die hard even in a democracy. Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi representing UPA and Congress can be read like a book by the majority of Gujratis and recognized as fake and lacking in substance. Their sympathies were clearly for the terrorists as expressed by their reluctance to support the Supreme Court decision vigorously supported by Narendra Modi. Name calling a law abiding Chief Minister of Gujrat, a “soudagar of mout” or “merchant of death” for insisting that law of the land be followed especially after the heart of India was systematically attacked by the brutal terrorist was quite absurd. It exposed their lack of loyalty to the victims of terrorism. Such tactics of vote bank placation for solicitation of political favors are quite transparent besides subtly encouraging terrorists against those who oppose them.
Presuming that their dismal defeat in Gurjat is a preview of their fate in the ensuing elections, one can envision the replication of what happened in Gujrat in almost all other states except West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala. In the event such wishful thinking does not actualize, one needs to envision future consolidation of dynastic rule in the Indian Republic. If that happens, the Pakistan and Saudi Arabia supported terrorism is likely to show an upheaval. The rest of India will need to recognize that to maintain its present economic engine in the same current momentum terrorism needs to be totally eliminated from India. That means there is no room for sympathizers of terrorists in the Indian politics.
Naturally, it is time that UPA and Congress seek an unceremonious exit from the Indian Political scene in all states. Otherwise under the fake banner of “Secularism” these parties will continue to support minorities defending minority terrorism rather than aligning with the mature, modern, progressive peace loving and anti-terrorist Muslims and other minorities that will pledge allegiance with India that is Bharat.
They are the “soudagars of fake secularism” using the word “secularism” as a marketable shield against a demonized “communalism.” In so doing they will blatantly and subtly support terrorism, cause divisiveness, and unrest in the population at large. What they forget is that even what they call communalism is a phenomenon that springs in reaction to age old endemic terrorism.
The goal of uniting Hindus should not be any less noble than ecumenical movement among the Christians. It would be absurd to call ecumenical efforts communalism. The dynasty survives in India using such illogical psychological warfare with people, constantly profiting from dividing the society rather than trying to unite it, because it buys the vote bank.
Secondly, India is like Pakistan divided by different languages and cultural identities and more so. Currently, the secular Indian identity is not the mode for the majority. Ideally, the standard of secular humanistic nationalism dreamed by developed countries is one divorced from race, religion, language, caste and class, and culture. Such nationalism needs to be the binding force for uniting the entire population of India. Let us face it; India is far from reaching this stage. Pakistan too has the same problem. So long as there is no oath of allegiance for every citizen to be loyal to his or her country, the question of secular national identity becomes moot. There is reluctance among Indians to accept the basic identity of Hinduness and Hindu culture as what is uniting India.
The Bollywood movies and songs smuggling in Hindi language through the movies in many states might lead to a common culture or pop-culture, but that will not arouse the national sentiments in the people to give a unity of spirit. Just on the side, the most cordial relationship between Muslims and Hindus in the Bollywood Film Industry since 1896 is quite remarkable and attests to their humane and human friendship. Just as even in a mature democracy like U.S. politicians routinely respect the “faith” of their constituency and openly align with it in a generic fashion, the politicians in India will need to use this cultural identity to establish rapport with their constituency which forms the majority. Building constituency for political leaders is a major challenge. After the end of the Independence movement and unity against the British, the Indian National Congress has not found any burning overriding principles or issues to develop and foster a national identity. There is no charismatic visionary leader swaying Indian population at large with issues like the social reforms, infrastructure development, national security, anti-terrorism, uniform sustained economic growth and development, elimination of poverty and corruption, uplifting of the disadvantaged, uniform civil code, better government, competing with China in manufacturing, maintaining sustained double digit economic growth, improved healthcare, sound foreign policy, entry into UN security Council, strategies to prevent fragmentation of the country, better educational opportunity for the masses and other widely appealing agendas in a manifesto that a common man on the street can identify with, speaking his/her language. Such talents could develop a constituency in a secular society. Rahul does not seem to have a potential to foot this bill.
In the absence of such secular National leadership, with hypnotizing but sincere appeal to all Indians, the Hindu cultural identity or identification with underprivileged masses, chosen by Mayavathi, as a medium to build a national constituency become viable alternatives. It is never to be anti-national and divisive in nature, in fact, always it is more nationalistic as well as hopefully all inclusive. To accuse such identity as “communal” and those adhering to such identity “saudagars of Dharma” in a pejorative manner is unrealistic. The Majority will wise up to it.
Having a strong identification with the majority is not to be looked down upon. The corrupt thinking that such identification only means that the politician will treat all minorities as second class citizens comes from a paranoia based upon the experiences with the Muslim regimes of the past and is also a vestige of the Colonial era. It is now sixty years since independence. It is high time that Indian people not remain paranoid and brain washed with Jawaharlal Nehru’s antiquated world view about such matters, although it has been swallowed lock, stock, and barrel by the so-called secular English media in India.
If strong efforts are not made by the majority across the length and breadth of India to unite, we can speculate that it will not be too long before we see foreign activism, interference, and financing to fragment India just like the current thrust in fragmenting Pakistan. The current exploitation of a positive transference to the name Nehru and Gandhi is not sufficient to produce a strong nationalistic unifying power like Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Rahul is not competent and cannot hold a candle to Jawaharlal Nehru or Indira Gandhi, leave alone Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Weak demonarchs like Sonia and Rahul will not only stymie and stifle even more talented and competent Congress politicians from growth in their popularity within and outside the Congress Party but will also create increasingly weak center that is difficult for people of India to identify with besides silly preference for dynasty rewarding incompetence at the helm of the nation.
That will lead to more powerful autonomous states like Gujrat and Tamilnadu, etc. which might seek separation from the Center especially if instigated by foreign powers. This is only a scenario and not the authors’ reading of the character of these states. The cursory look at the World history should show that the British and other Colonial European powers are adept at surreptitiously fueling violence between different “groups” and profiting by selling arms to both sides and later patronizingly come back with a price to establish peace in the same region they had ignited. India and Pakistan have been made fools once in the Kashmir conflict but are targets for many such future conflicts.
It can be easily surmised that Balochistan, Sindh, Pakhtoon, etc., are easy future targets like Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, and may be even states much closer to Delhi. These elements have been well suppressed by the military rule in Pakistan but will be difficult to handle if flare up in India. It is crucial therefore that Narendra Modi be recognized as being on target for providing a solution for strong India relying on the National Hindu Unity in the interest of national security and national integrity.
The usual mistake is to misinterpret that Hindus if united are only doing so to bully or fight the minorities. There is no historical basis for such paranoia.
Jawaharlal Nehru was quite astute in recognizing that the Hindu culture was the uniting force for the Indian people as he clearly expressed it in his book “Discovery of India” as “Unity in Diversity,” but his political acumen recognized that political leaders of the Majority will be his strong political rivals and he consciously or unconsciously became averse to them and implemented a divide and rule politics which he had learned so well from the British for political survival. It is conceivable though that if 800 million Hindus unite and organize themselves they may be a formidable force and not to be bullied with irrationalities as is the current plight of the non-united Hindus. Hindus will need to have a social reform to eliminate social evils in their own society and likewise to not allow other primitive people impose their primitive culture and laws upon the women and children of India no matter what religion they belong to.
Freedom to practice ones religion to attain spiritual peace is not to be construed as freedom to encroach upon other peoples’ rights, for example, by polluting the atmosphere with high decibel sounds all hours of the day and night even against the ordinances of the City (and the police) under the name of practice of religion. Such irrationalities will need to be curbed by placing pressure by the majority. Nonviolent persuasion will be the best policy and non-corrupt enforced law and order among the majority and minority will be the next avenue. Modi will be able to demonstrate it in his state of Gujrat. All citizens will need to be educated to carry their civic responsibility.
Third, although there is no central military rule in India the accusation that the Indian government is a Brahmin-Bania (Bumman-Bania) majority venture is like Punjabi Muslims being in control of Pakistan, its politics, economics, business, real estate, and military. Similar perception about India will be deleterious, if it persists sixty years after the independence, although the highly educated barristers and other politicians who led the freedom movement and inherited the political power in India were from the privileged classes.
The solution to this problem is to make education available to all Indians and especially to the underprivileged and encourage higher education in all fields for the underprivileged lower socioeconomic classes regardless of caste or OBC (“Other Backward Classes”) status. This thrust will eventually encourage young men and women from all classes and castes, minority and majority communities, to enter politics to partake in the governance of the country. If this is not done rapidly the divisive elements will replicate what is happening in Pakistan in India.
The question, “What next,” applies to the fate of both countries that have same flaws in their mindsets at a deeper level. India has no room to be complacent while Pakistan is rapidly disintegrating. India too could be on the verge of similar problems because of the weak dynasty trying to hold the fort at the center. It cannot be denied that neither Sonia nor Rahul have the command over the Indian public nor the organizational skills like those demonstrated by Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel.
Both countries, India and Pakistan, though not equal, are beset by the same faults. One of them is the irresistible loyalty to dynasties running contrary to democratic traditions, yet trying to fashion a Western type of democracy. This situation is fertile for foreign interference and control to use the puppet masters of the state to achieve the goals of other imperialistic countries. That may be what that threatened the insecure elements in Pakistan that may have sensed foreign hand in Benazir Bhutto’s return. Bilawal and his deputed acting chairman of the party, his father, may also be vulnerable to similar paranoid reactions and perceptions when the time comes for them to assume the helm of the country.
How can there be democracy where there is no democracy internally in the political parties partaking in the democracy? Besides, the morality and ethics, if not the legality, of such practices goes unquestioned. Nineteen year old son not even eligible for party membership is bequeathed the throne of the party with his father as his acting deputy. (Incidentally, Bilawal’s father was once nicknamed Mr. 10% Zardari for his corruption.) This resembles Akbar’s ascension to throne at age of 13 when the concept of democracy did not exist, but Zardari is no non-corrupt Birbal known for his genius. Bairon Khan was the guardian of Akbar who got rid of him in 4 years choosing Birbal as his friend, guide, and philosopher.
With all of her Oxford education Benazir Bhutto observed the tradition of the subcontinent, married one approved or chosen by her mother, unlike Rajiv Gandhi; she behaved like the Moghul kings of the past in naming her heir to the throne. She was sadly assassinated without provocation while Rajiv was a victim of his own military misadventure in Sri Lanka, sending Indian army to kill his fellow Indians settled there.
In the unlikely event of his being elected, will Bilawal bring Western style of “secular” peaceful democracy (secular may be a misnomer for a theocracy which Pakistan truly is) or will he relapse into the nativity on his return is the question, -- as this happens with so many Western educated leaders who on their return to their homelands have half forgotten the values they learned, if they learned them at all at Oxford, Cambridge, or Harvard.
The education of children of political leaders of developing countries in these Universities is a sham unless they are inherently brilliant like Jawaharlal Nehru or King Husain of Jordan. Their social promotion is guaranteed and looked askance by faculty for these independently wealthy students who are the political pawns of the future who are sure to return to their countries of origin to assume power and present no threat to employment market, local workers, or professionals. Their Oxford, Cambridge or Harvard qualifications are more often ornamental and are never verified by local employment experts in human resources department as is the sole privilege of the commoners and not of the “royalty” in demonarchies!!
These monarchs in democracy do not have to go through background check to have access to higher than top security issues or documents, with or without official position in the government. They can be the easy targets for foreign espionage and control, so they can maintain stability in the region by catering to their masters. Even though accused of mega corruptions they can repeatedly assume power defying the public interest using their political power and positions to quash the investigative or judicial processes.
Is weakened Pakistan a favorable situation for India? No, if it means upper hand for the primitive Islamists in Pakistan including their terrorist training grounds. Promoting the think tanks to formulate the impact of fragmented Pakistan or some form weakened Pakistan, if not “Khatumstan,” on the west of India is an urgent necessity.
The progressive, moderate, and educated Muslims who love democracy in India and who love India and have been enjoying peaceful pursuit of their businesses and careers need to join these think tanks and help Hindus and other Indians understand that there are truly peace loving friendly civic minded Muslims in India that want a strong India devoid of terrorist threats, and they too desire peaceful and harmonious society. They, too, are against Islamic terrorism just like Benazir Bhutto was during her lifetime. They need to be willing to accept the just and judicial consequences proffered to identified terrorists and any actions taken to redress the past injustices of imperialistic terrorism perpetrated upon the Hindu majority in India.
The economic growth of India is in the ultimate interest of all including minorities choosing to live in India, and also beneficial for Pakistan and Bangladesh. Hindu majority has been uniquely hospitable to all religions historically for 2000 years and will continue to be hospitable if not aggressed upon in the democratic Republic of India. There have been millions of Gandhis among the Indian Hindus in 5000 years who espoused Ahinsa (Non-violence). Mahatma Gandhi was a product of this culture. Fighting the majority and creating disturbances of peace is hardly the way to go. If this is not recognized and peaceful coexistence is not urgently implemented, the Pakistan Khatumstan history could repeat in India within a matter of few years. India probably has a special obligation to help stabilize Pakistan, if called upon, to ensure anti-terrorism oriented stable government in Pakistan.
There is all the more need now to have friendly relationship with Pakistan as initiated by Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Demonarchy thrives on divisiveness. The dynasty and demonarchy that engages in fragmenting Indian society and promulgating divisive policies must be seen as doomed in India, if India is to progress in the 21st Century. The Muslims and Hindus in India need to come together and not be further divided by vote-seeking politicians, for ultimate economic prosperity of the sub-continent through practice of mature democracy. For this to occur, “de-monarchization” needs to begin promptly (see previous articles for definitions) in India and hopefully in Pakistan too to prevent demonarchization of democracy. The people of both countries need to first become keenly aware of these phenomena to begin this process.
Sunday, April 18, 2010
DEMYSTIFYING SHRI GANESHA
Demystifying Shri Ganesha
by
Achintyachintaka
Date: June 30th 2005
Some of us Hindus celebrated Ganesh Jayanti or Shri Ganesha's birthday on the 12th of February 2005. One wonders what the difference is between Ganesha Jayanti and Ganesha Chaturthi (Bhadrapad Shukla Chaturthi), or the Sankashta Harana Chaturthi which comes once every month. Shri Ganesha is worshipped with sixteen different offerings. It is, of course, a mythological event of a "birth" with a mythological date. Ten days of Ganesh Chaturthi are thus set aside every year to remember Him reverently, glorify Him, and worship Him besides the two conjectural birthdays mentioned above.
According to our ancient Indian philosophy Shri Ganesha is the first "shabda" (AUM) or vibrations manifested when the manifest Universe begins. Hence, He is associated with the "beginning." Some people have loosely described him as the "Lord of Beginning." The word "shabda" is usually wrongly translated as the "word" or "sound." These "vibrations," that are ubiquitous in the Universe, are not mythological entities but verifiable someday perhaps with modern scientific sensing techniques that can be extended far beyond the human senses. However, the attribution of a quality of supreme knowledge and primordial design of the multidimensional universe as "information" in invisible form entailed in this entity of "vibrations" is still difficult for the human mind, trained in modern science (which sees the intellect as a faculty of the mind, which is in turn the function of the human brain and, therefore, a by-product of the physico-chemical processes in the nerve cells or biological entities, etc.) to comprehend. The presence of the Universal Intelligence as preceding the emergence of life in the universe is difficult for the scientifically trained mind to comprehend and fathom. It is like the drop of ocean water attempting to comprehend the magnificence of the entire body of ocean waters on the earth and realize that the drop is made of the same substance. It is quite possible that the human intelligence which is no doubt quite amazing in its capabilities is only a miniscule drop in the ocean of the Universal Intelligence though sharing some of its elementary qualities in minutiae. In a circular argument human intelligence which is the product of the human brain that is a supreme example of what the supreme Universal intelligence could design and produce if one could attribute intentionality to the Universal Intelligence. Therefore, the Vedic culture appropriately recognizes this problem and assigns this form of knowledge a different category known as "para" (roughly equated with "meta") "vidya" (roughly translated as knowledge or the intellectual or meditative processes entailed in acquiring knowledge or "jnaana")(Such knowledge is theoretically not entirely based on the information processing at the cognitive level or through the left cerebral hemisphere of the human brain. The faculty responsible for this and other human knowledge is termed "Dhee." Please see "Dhee:The Essence of Hinduness" on :
www.swaveda.com for Part I and kalyan97.googlepages.com for Part II
Therefore, the sincere students who truly want to understand these esoteric concepts of Vedic philosophy or "vedic science" need to have the intellectual honesty to accept the limitations of the human brain and mind in conceptualizing the essence of the true nature of the Universe with their "acquired" crystallized intelligence or cognitive pragmatism which is generally used to analyze and comprehend other usual and familiar subjects in the human affairs. The modern physics and psychology, or even psychoanalytic thinking, even if these are correctly applied, (they are often misapplied, as for example, by the infamous Paul Courtright and Wendy Doniger, as well as a bunch of Emory and Chicago University cadre) are not amenable to fathom the depths of the (ultimately scientific) "truths" that are beyond the dimensions of the time-space-mass-energy-mind-dimension-complex. Simply put, the current cultural and scientific software, available to the human brains, with all due respect to the advances of the so-called Western science, is not equipped to comprehend this "greatest shabda" which is the beginning of the Universe with all of its order, beauty, magnificence, creativity, as well as the chaos, disorder, destruction and dissolution, all programmed into this incomprehensible "shabdabrahma" which was identified with the sound "OM," which in turn may have the closest resonance with the original shabdabrahma, which does not require the presence of air to vibrate and exist, as it predates the origin of air.
This "shabdabrahma" is termed "pranava" or "om-kara." "Pranava," because it is not only the primordial ("beeja"-seed- or aadibeeja) universe, but it is also the entity from which all life energy, "Prana" (bioelectric energy) emerges. The ancient Tantric philosophers were ingenious in using symbols that had the power to reach the deepest layers of the human mind and they were also expert iconographers with enormous creativity that would capture the fancy of multitude of generations that had a sincere desire to be curious about the nature of the Universe. They also understood the meditative techniques that could be used successfully to gain insight into the "para-vidya" and hence they transformed "OM" first into a symbol and then anthropomorphized it into an image for personal and group worship (and of course, meditation). They built this image into a mythological human form with a head that had resemblance to the elephant head. This created the mystique of the form of Shri Ganesha which baffled many Indian and Western scholars who had no access to the original Tantric esoteric or arcane knowledge.
As they have done it with their concrete and limited minds, sometimes with deliberate ulterior motive to demean, and take a pejorative view of the Hindu culture, or sometimes out of mere ignorance, they have turned Shri Hanumana into the "Monkey God" and Shri Ganesha into the "Elephant God" of the "Hindus." The reason to place quotation marks around the word Hindus is that the word "Hindu" did not exist when the concept of "OM" and "Shri Ganesha and Ganapati" emerged in ancient India. Many uninformed Hindus have learned about their culture and their religion from these erroneous English or European translations that are essentially demeaning or ignorant representations of their Hindu culture, religion, and their Hindu objects of worship which are naturally merely viewed as "curiosities" by the Westerners who did not have any respect for the profound philosophy or the insights into the cosmogony that the ancient Indian Vedic culture had elaborated over the ages, leave alone any reverence.
'Om-kara' personified is Shri Ganesha. It is also known as 'Pranava' or a precursor of 'Praan Shakti', at the beginning of the creation. It emerged from Sadashiva, (sada) "always" only pure consciousness (shiva), who is always in meditation (limitless potential energy of creation that is supposed to be forever in meditation, undisturbed by it all while creating and dissolving) and his consort Shakti or Parvati (the energy of creation) which is the origin of all that is manifest as matter, time-space and energy complex to the humans. The manifest Universe emerges from the combination of Shiva and Shakti through the "birth" of Shabdabrahama "OM" represented by Shri Ganesha.
In Dnyanaeshwary, which is the Marathi representation of (commentary on) Shri Bhagwat Gita written by Santa Dnyanaeshwara, while saluting Shri Ganesha at the beginning of the first chapter, Dyanaeshwara describes Him in Marathi language thus:
"A-kaara Charan yugala/ Uu-kara udara visha(a)la/ Ma-kaara
mahamandala/ mastakakaren/ He tinhi ekavatale/
Tithen Shabdabrahma kavalalen/ Ten miyan Shree Gurukrupa
Namilen/ Aadibeeja/"
Santa Dnyanaeshwara says describing the form (roopa) of Shri Ganesha: "The vowel or the sound of 'a' are your two legs. Vowel or sound of 'u' is your huge abdomen. Letter or consonant of 'm' is the enormous shape of your head. These three sounds merged together and limitless energy of the greatest shabda emerged. It is concentrated in the shape of your face. I witnessed it with the help of the great blessings from my Guru (spiritual teacher)- Santa Nivruttinatha. That is the original seed of creation." (This, of course, is an approximate translation as all translations in English for such quotations normally are.) Without the basic knowledge of the "beejaksharas" and concept of "Aadi" as the beginning in the non-linear concept of cyclic time, etc., the translation in itself sounds very concrete for the uninitiated.
In Vedic philosophy the "time" is a function of the manifest universe and therefore, a secondary quality of the universe and is a concept that becomes amenable for cognition only after the beginning is initiated by Shakti-Prakriti-Kali.(Interesting that Prakriti which is necessary for time to become an entity or a dimention is called Kaali and time is "kaala.") One cannot "go back in time" and catch the moment of "creation." Time does not exist without space, matter, and energy, and presence of time pre-supposes some motion of one entity relative to another. When the Universe "jagat" becomes manifest something that is born or emerging, "ja," immediately, as it were, almost simultaneously acquires motion, "gat," and therefore, the entire universe qualifies for the term "jagat." To understand the true nature of the Universal Consciousness, the Human Consciousness has to go beyond or cut through the "Moola-Prakriti" by meditating on the primordial Universal Shabdabrahman "OM." This process is known in Yoga as "pratiprasava." It literally means retracing steps of the process of emergence of human consciousness. (Retracing the ontogenesis of Human Consciousness back in opposite direction to "Sad-Chid-Aananda,"--- the human awareness or "chitta" being a mere reflection or a derivative of the "Chid" nature of the Brahman.) Opposite of "jagat" or "jaga" is "gaja" a word that curiously stands for the "elephant." The Tantric mystics had a message beyond the simple coincidence that the symbol "OM" turned 90 degrees clockwise assumed the likeness (or the shape) of the elephant's head with a twisted curved trunk -"vakratunda." Meditating on "OM" can lead to the identification with the Universal or Cosmic Consciousness.
Such identification can occur only in the Fourth state of Consciousness or "Turiya." This state of consciousness is experienced as the most enjoyable bliss (and therefore, "Modaka"- that which gives bliss and joy- is the name given to the sweet pastry which is offered and is in the hand of Shri Ganesha.)
The secret message of the Tantrik Ganesha image and its birth on the fourth day of the Lunar calendar every month is that the Vedic culture values the emergence of this "fourth" state of consciousness in which as if the Ganesha is potentially born in any human mind. The Hindus and the followers of the Vedic or Hindu culture (Jains, Buddhists,and Sikhs) revere Ganesha as the Ultimate Absolute or the Shabdabrahma and the Hindus worship Him on the Chaturthi of every Shukla paksha or the fourth day of the waxing moon every month. The fourth day of the waxing Moon in the Lunar calendar symbolically represents "Turiya" and is a reminder of the fourth state of consciousness.
Thus can be explained the mythology of the birth of Shri Ganesha on the "chaturthi" and the mythology of the date of his birth. There is no pain or suffering once the Cosmic consciousness is attained. Since the cosmic consciousness figuratively "rules over" all the order and chaos in the universe, it is also capable of relieving all discomfort, remove all obstacles, and establish harmony and bring all processes to complete fruition. Such interpretation will throw light on the concept of the loosely translated words as "vighnaharta" and "vighnakarta" as the remover of obstacles who can also pose obstacles. The appelation Vinaayaka is a distortion of the word Vighna-Nayaka or controller of Vighnas or obstacles. There is no "trickery" here. This Universe comes with its "baggage" of order and chaos. There is no human value system to be projected on the Cosmic Consciousness which is beyond all three Gunas. These three gunas are Satva (negative entropy, order, purity, harmony and beauty, etc.), Rajas (dynamism, motion, ambition, competence, etc.) and Tamas, (darkness, disorder, chaos, ignorance, entropy, dissolution, and destruction,etc.). These are the all three qualities(Gunas)of Prakriti(Nature).
Sankata Hara Chaturthi is an opportunity presented every month for contemplation on the above clarified concepts that are very profound and when meditated upon may likely yield immense benefits for internal peace for those who understand Shri Ganesha and what he stands for. For those with limited minds like that of Paul Courtright, Shri Ganesha is only an "elephant headed God" with a proboscis which in contrast to its true strength in the animal world is chosen by Paul Coutright to be viewed as a "limp" organ. Paul Courtright has taken the liberty to project his own vulgar fantasies on this "elephant's head and proboscis" to depict his utter ignorance of the arcane and esoteric noble knowledge conveyed by the symbol "OM" and its anthromorphic representation in Shri Ganesha.
Let us illustrate how the two vowels and one consonant merge into Shri Ganesha's shape (see accompanying image: Graphic OM). Please see the image beside this
article on www.swaveda.com .
Now adorn this figure with clothes and ornaments and Aayudhas meaning weapons each one of which also has its symbolic meaning in the "para vidya" which incidentally does not yield usually to psychoanalytic interpretation though no one can stop anyone from interpreting any symbol with any psychoanalytic jargon. This article will not go into elaborating the meanings of all the Aayudhas or the Mushaka vahana of Shri Ganesha (the meaning of the mouse on which He rides) and reserve those explanations for a future article.
Thus "Lord" Shri Ganesha is Shabda Brahma, i.e., the cosmic vibratory energy on the continuum of electromagnetic waves intuitively perceived by human meditating mind as waves of sound and not necessarily auditorily "heard," although some yogis will get engrossed in the "naada" of OM after constantly meditating on the sound of OM. He is also the Aadibeeja or the original seed of energy which is the egg of Creation where there is a perpetual action of creation along with dissolution and every conceivable action in between.
Shri Ganesha has limitless attributes because He is "Tat" or that total manifest and non-manifest Brahman, e.g., "Twam Sarvam Khalu Idam Brahmaasi, Twam Sakshaat (d) Aatmaasi Nityam". Various shlokas or stuties attempt to describe him and admit to his limitlessness that is hard to fathom. It is, therefore, somewhat meaningless for us, who cannot fully comprehend Shri Ganesha,to believe that he existed and exists in a human form and he took birth on a particular day and actually had a brother, mother, and a father, etc., and believe in all the mythological stories that have been accretions around his legends as anything more than an attempt to simplify the most profound philosophy for the simple-minded. These stories are concrete and thus can be fascinating for child-like minds and sometimes quite confusing and bewildering. All cultures have such stories that are enchanting because they are a combination of the childlike primary process thinking mixed with adultlike secondary process thinking illustrating the abstract with concrete conepts simplified for the simple-minded. Most people love to hear the entertaining stories from the Epics or the Puranas that are more fascinating than the deep philosophy of the East or the West, from the Vedas, Vedantas, or philosophical treatises. In the Indian culture the stories illustrating the deepest philosophical truths are called the "Divya Kathas" (enlightening stories) but the concrete minded have great difficulty in making a leap from the symbols to the level of the abstract principles (tatvas) illustrated. Also, the poetic figurative representations are viewed as literal by some poor souls. Not unlike some stand-up comedians some pranksters place them in unexpected context to create humor or bizarre pejorative parodies or caricatures. In this context it may be intriguing to note that Vyasa dictated the Mahabharata to Shri Ganesha who actually transcribed the dictation. The epic of Mahabharata may thus be the divya katha to illustrate in an enchanting manner the story of the spiritual struggles of the human race "written" by no one else than the deity of knowledge and wisdom.
The questions that were raised at the beginning in the first paragraph as to the difference between the Ganesha Chaturthi on Bhadrapada Shukla Chaturthi and the Ganesha Jayanti become moot issues for those who view Shri Ganesha for Who He really IS.
http://www.swaveda.com/articles.php?action=show&id=108
by
Achintyachintaka
Date: June 30th 2005
Some of us Hindus celebrated Ganesh Jayanti or Shri Ganesha's birthday on the 12th of February 2005. One wonders what the difference is between Ganesha Jayanti and Ganesha Chaturthi (Bhadrapad Shukla Chaturthi), or the Sankashta Harana Chaturthi which comes once every month. Shri Ganesha is worshipped with sixteen different offerings. It is, of course, a mythological event of a "birth" with a mythological date. Ten days of Ganesh Chaturthi are thus set aside every year to remember Him reverently, glorify Him, and worship Him besides the two conjectural birthdays mentioned above.
According to our ancient Indian philosophy Shri Ganesha is the first "shabda" (AUM) or vibrations manifested when the manifest Universe begins. Hence, He is associated with the "beginning." Some people have loosely described him as the "Lord of Beginning." The word "shabda" is usually wrongly translated as the "word" or "sound." These "vibrations," that are ubiquitous in the Universe, are not mythological entities but verifiable someday perhaps with modern scientific sensing techniques that can be extended far beyond the human senses. However, the attribution of a quality of supreme knowledge and primordial design of the multidimensional universe as "information" in invisible form entailed in this entity of "vibrations" is still difficult for the human mind, trained in modern science (which sees the intellect as a faculty of the mind, which is in turn the function of the human brain and, therefore, a by-product of the physico-chemical processes in the nerve cells or biological entities, etc.) to comprehend. The presence of the Universal Intelligence as preceding the emergence of life in the universe is difficult for the scientifically trained mind to comprehend and fathom. It is like the drop of ocean water attempting to comprehend the magnificence of the entire body of ocean waters on the earth and realize that the drop is made of the same substance. It is quite possible that the human intelligence which is no doubt quite amazing in its capabilities is only a miniscule drop in the ocean of the Universal Intelligence though sharing some of its elementary qualities in minutiae. In a circular argument human intelligence which is the product of the human brain that is a supreme example of what the supreme Universal intelligence could design and produce if one could attribute intentionality to the Universal Intelligence. Therefore, the Vedic culture appropriately recognizes this problem and assigns this form of knowledge a different category known as "para" (roughly equated with "meta") "vidya" (roughly translated as knowledge or the intellectual or meditative processes entailed in acquiring knowledge or "jnaana")(Such knowledge is theoretically not entirely based on the information processing at the cognitive level or through the left cerebral hemisphere of the human brain. The faculty responsible for this and other human knowledge is termed "Dhee." Please see "Dhee:The Essence of Hinduness" on :
www.swaveda.com for Part I and kalyan97.googlepages.com for Part II
Therefore, the sincere students who truly want to understand these esoteric concepts of Vedic philosophy or "vedic science" need to have the intellectual honesty to accept the limitations of the human brain and mind in conceptualizing the essence of the true nature of the Universe with their "acquired" crystallized intelligence or cognitive pragmatism which is generally used to analyze and comprehend other usual and familiar subjects in the human affairs. The modern physics and psychology, or even psychoanalytic thinking, even if these are correctly applied, (they are often misapplied, as for example, by the infamous Paul Courtright and Wendy Doniger, as well as a bunch of Emory and Chicago University cadre) are not amenable to fathom the depths of the (ultimately scientific) "truths" that are beyond the dimensions of the time-space-mass-energy-mind-dimension-complex. Simply put, the current cultural and scientific software, available to the human brains, with all due respect to the advances of the so-called Western science, is not equipped to comprehend this "greatest shabda" which is the beginning of the Universe with all of its order, beauty, magnificence, creativity, as well as the chaos, disorder, destruction and dissolution, all programmed into this incomprehensible "shabdabrahma" which was identified with the sound "OM," which in turn may have the closest resonance with the original shabdabrahma, which does not require the presence of air to vibrate and exist, as it predates the origin of air.
This "shabdabrahma" is termed "pranava" or "om-kara." "Pranava," because it is not only the primordial ("beeja"-seed- or aadibeeja) universe, but it is also the entity from which all life energy, "Prana" (bioelectric energy) emerges. The ancient Tantric philosophers were ingenious in using symbols that had the power to reach the deepest layers of the human mind and they were also expert iconographers with enormous creativity that would capture the fancy of multitude of generations that had a sincere desire to be curious about the nature of the Universe. They also understood the meditative techniques that could be used successfully to gain insight into the "para-vidya" and hence they transformed "OM" first into a symbol and then anthropomorphized it into an image for personal and group worship (and of course, meditation). They built this image into a mythological human form with a head that had resemblance to the elephant head. This created the mystique of the form of Shri Ganesha which baffled many Indian and Western scholars who had no access to the original Tantric esoteric or arcane knowledge.
As they have done it with their concrete and limited minds, sometimes with deliberate ulterior motive to demean, and take a pejorative view of the Hindu culture, or sometimes out of mere ignorance, they have turned Shri Hanumana into the "Monkey God" and Shri Ganesha into the "Elephant God" of the "Hindus." The reason to place quotation marks around the word Hindus is that the word "Hindu" did not exist when the concept of "OM" and "Shri Ganesha and Ganapati" emerged in ancient India. Many uninformed Hindus have learned about their culture and their religion from these erroneous English or European translations that are essentially demeaning or ignorant representations of their Hindu culture, religion, and their Hindu objects of worship which are naturally merely viewed as "curiosities" by the Westerners who did not have any respect for the profound philosophy or the insights into the cosmogony that the ancient Indian Vedic culture had elaborated over the ages, leave alone any reverence.
'Om-kara' personified is Shri Ganesha. It is also known as 'Pranava' or a precursor of 'Praan Shakti', at the beginning of the creation. It emerged from Sadashiva, (sada) "always" only pure consciousness (shiva), who is always in meditation (limitless potential energy of creation that is supposed to be forever in meditation, undisturbed by it all while creating and dissolving) and his consort Shakti or Parvati (the energy of creation) which is the origin of all that is manifest as matter, time-space and energy complex to the humans. The manifest Universe emerges from the combination of Shiva and Shakti through the "birth" of Shabdabrahama "OM" represented by Shri Ganesha.
In Dnyanaeshwary, which is the Marathi representation of (commentary on) Shri Bhagwat Gita written by Santa Dnyanaeshwara, while saluting Shri Ganesha at the beginning of the first chapter, Dyanaeshwara describes Him in Marathi language thus:
"A-kaara Charan yugala/ Uu-kara udara visha(a)la/ Ma-kaara
mahamandala/ mastakakaren/ He tinhi ekavatale/
Tithen Shabdabrahma kavalalen/ Ten miyan Shree Gurukrupa
Namilen/ Aadibeeja/"
Santa Dnyanaeshwara says describing the form (roopa) of Shri Ganesha: "The vowel or the sound of 'a' are your two legs. Vowel or sound of 'u' is your huge abdomen. Letter or consonant of 'm' is the enormous shape of your head. These three sounds merged together and limitless energy of the greatest shabda emerged. It is concentrated in the shape of your face. I witnessed it with the help of the great blessings from my Guru (spiritual teacher)- Santa Nivruttinatha. That is the original seed of creation." (This, of course, is an approximate translation as all translations in English for such quotations normally are.) Without the basic knowledge of the "beejaksharas" and concept of "Aadi" as the beginning in the non-linear concept of cyclic time, etc., the translation in itself sounds very concrete for the uninitiated.
In Vedic philosophy the "time" is a function of the manifest universe and therefore, a secondary quality of the universe and is a concept that becomes amenable for cognition only after the beginning is initiated by Shakti-Prakriti-Kali.(Interesting that Prakriti which is necessary for time to become an entity or a dimention is called Kaali and time is "kaala.") One cannot "go back in time" and catch the moment of "creation." Time does not exist without space, matter, and energy, and presence of time pre-supposes some motion of one entity relative to another. When the Universe "jagat" becomes manifest something that is born or emerging, "ja," immediately, as it were, almost simultaneously acquires motion, "gat," and therefore, the entire universe qualifies for the term "jagat." To understand the true nature of the Universal Consciousness, the Human Consciousness has to go beyond or cut through the "Moola-Prakriti" by meditating on the primordial Universal Shabdabrahman "OM." This process is known in Yoga as "pratiprasava." It literally means retracing steps of the process of emergence of human consciousness. (Retracing the ontogenesis of Human Consciousness back in opposite direction to "Sad-Chid-Aananda,"--- the human awareness or "chitta" being a mere reflection or a derivative of the "Chid" nature of the Brahman.) Opposite of "jagat" or "jaga" is "gaja" a word that curiously stands for the "elephant." The Tantric mystics had a message beyond the simple coincidence that the symbol "OM" turned 90 degrees clockwise assumed the likeness (or the shape) of the elephant's head with a twisted curved trunk -"vakratunda." Meditating on "OM" can lead to the identification with the Universal or Cosmic Consciousness.
Such identification can occur only in the Fourth state of Consciousness or "Turiya." This state of consciousness is experienced as the most enjoyable bliss (and therefore, "Modaka"- that which gives bliss and joy- is the name given to the sweet pastry which is offered and is in the hand of Shri Ganesha.)
The secret message of the Tantrik Ganesha image and its birth on the fourth day of the Lunar calendar every month is that the Vedic culture values the emergence of this "fourth" state of consciousness in which as if the Ganesha is potentially born in any human mind. The Hindus and the followers of the Vedic or Hindu culture (Jains, Buddhists,and Sikhs) revere Ganesha as the Ultimate Absolute or the Shabdabrahma and the Hindus worship Him on the Chaturthi of every Shukla paksha or the fourth day of the waxing moon every month. The fourth day of the waxing Moon in the Lunar calendar symbolically represents "Turiya" and is a reminder of the fourth state of consciousness.
Thus can be explained the mythology of the birth of Shri Ganesha on the "chaturthi" and the mythology of the date of his birth. There is no pain or suffering once the Cosmic consciousness is attained. Since the cosmic consciousness figuratively "rules over" all the order and chaos in the universe, it is also capable of relieving all discomfort, remove all obstacles, and establish harmony and bring all processes to complete fruition. Such interpretation will throw light on the concept of the loosely translated words as "vighnaharta" and "vighnakarta" as the remover of obstacles who can also pose obstacles. The appelation Vinaayaka is a distortion of the word Vighna-Nayaka or controller of Vighnas or obstacles. There is no "trickery" here. This Universe comes with its "baggage" of order and chaos. There is no human value system to be projected on the Cosmic Consciousness which is beyond all three Gunas. These three gunas are Satva (negative entropy, order, purity, harmony and beauty, etc.), Rajas (dynamism, motion, ambition, competence, etc.) and Tamas, (darkness, disorder, chaos, ignorance, entropy, dissolution, and destruction,etc.). These are the all three qualities(Gunas)of Prakriti(Nature).
Sankata Hara Chaturthi is an opportunity presented every month for contemplation on the above clarified concepts that are very profound and when meditated upon may likely yield immense benefits for internal peace for those who understand Shri Ganesha and what he stands for. For those with limited minds like that of Paul Courtright, Shri Ganesha is only an "elephant headed God" with a proboscis which in contrast to its true strength in the animal world is chosen by Paul Coutright to be viewed as a "limp" organ. Paul Courtright has taken the liberty to project his own vulgar fantasies on this "elephant's head and proboscis" to depict his utter ignorance of the arcane and esoteric noble knowledge conveyed by the symbol "OM" and its anthromorphic representation in Shri Ganesha.
Let us illustrate how the two vowels and one consonant merge into Shri Ganesha's shape (see accompanying image: Graphic OM). Please see the image beside this
article on www.swaveda.com .
Now adorn this figure with clothes and ornaments and Aayudhas meaning weapons each one of which also has its symbolic meaning in the "para vidya" which incidentally does not yield usually to psychoanalytic interpretation though no one can stop anyone from interpreting any symbol with any psychoanalytic jargon. This article will not go into elaborating the meanings of all the Aayudhas or the Mushaka vahana of Shri Ganesha (the meaning of the mouse on which He rides) and reserve those explanations for a future article.
Thus "Lord" Shri Ganesha is Shabda Brahma, i.e., the cosmic vibratory energy on the continuum of electromagnetic waves intuitively perceived by human meditating mind as waves of sound and not necessarily auditorily "heard," although some yogis will get engrossed in the "naada" of OM after constantly meditating on the sound of OM. He is also the Aadibeeja or the original seed of energy which is the egg of Creation where there is a perpetual action of creation along with dissolution and every conceivable action in between.
Shri Ganesha has limitless attributes because He is "Tat" or that total manifest and non-manifest Brahman, e.g., "Twam Sarvam Khalu Idam Brahmaasi, Twam Sakshaat (d) Aatmaasi Nityam". Various shlokas or stuties attempt to describe him and admit to his limitlessness that is hard to fathom. It is, therefore, somewhat meaningless for us, who cannot fully comprehend Shri Ganesha,to believe that he existed and exists in a human form and he took birth on a particular day and actually had a brother, mother, and a father, etc., and believe in all the mythological stories that have been accretions around his legends as anything more than an attempt to simplify the most profound philosophy for the simple-minded. These stories are concrete and thus can be fascinating for child-like minds and sometimes quite confusing and bewildering. All cultures have such stories that are enchanting because they are a combination of the childlike primary process thinking mixed with adultlike secondary process thinking illustrating the abstract with concrete conepts simplified for the simple-minded. Most people love to hear the entertaining stories from the Epics or the Puranas that are more fascinating than the deep philosophy of the East or the West, from the Vedas, Vedantas, or philosophical treatises. In the Indian culture the stories illustrating the deepest philosophical truths are called the "Divya Kathas" (enlightening stories) but the concrete minded have great difficulty in making a leap from the symbols to the level of the abstract principles (tatvas) illustrated. Also, the poetic figurative representations are viewed as literal by some poor souls. Not unlike some stand-up comedians some pranksters place them in unexpected context to create humor or bizarre pejorative parodies or caricatures. In this context it may be intriguing to note that Vyasa dictated the Mahabharata to Shri Ganesha who actually transcribed the dictation. The epic of Mahabharata may thus be the divya katha to illustrate in an enchanting manner the story of the spiritual struggles of the human race "written" by no one else than the deity of knowledge and wisdom.
The questions that were raised at the beginning in the first paragraph as to the difference between the Ganesha Chaturthi on Bhadrapada Shukla Chaturthi and the Ganesha Jayanti become moot issues for those who view Shri Ganesha for Who He really IS.
http://www.swaveda.com/articles.php?action=show&id=108
Friday, March 19, 2010
SOCIAL INJUSTICE IN HINDU RITUALISM
Humanity, Spirituality, and Ritualism
By
Bharatahitachintaka
The short story of Kiran: Twice born, twice abandoned, twice orphaned, twice abused, twice exalted, and twice dead, waiting posthumously after fifty years for his third exaltation and third funeral.
Any similarity in the names and events is accidental. This is an objective critique of a social phenomenon in India from a psychosocial perspective.
An eleven year old boy is chosen to become the spiritual head of a Brahmin community and is initiated into the Sanyasa-ashram at that tender age with the consent of his parents. The tradition required that he perform the ritual of his own funeral. Also, he is not to see his parents, especially his mother as she is a woman, and as an avowed lifetime celibate he is not to have any contact with any and all women. He is initiated by the spiritual head of the community into spiritual tradition by giving him diksha so he can attain his spiritual enlightenment to make him worthy of becoming a Guru. He is, from all external observations, seen to be delighted in being a child, enjoying play, tinkering with radio, and fascinated with transmitters, etc., though missing out on secular education in a traditional school providing socialization opportunities. Before the Internet it was a healthy way of coping with the extreme social isolation imposed upon a child. Home schooling (or in-ashrama schooling) is to give him all the education necessary for him to become a Guru, and a few years' stay in Varanasi will provide him the necessary education in Sanskrit and Hindu scriptures. Thus equipped, Kiran will have the respectable position as an authority on Dharma. In this position he is to be revered by all in the community even to the point of touching his feet and performing his paad-pooja, meaning worshipping his feet by washing them to attain the punya of worshipping the Guru. So far so good.
However, the child guru is not seen to be physically or psychologically maturing fast enough after the death of his Guru to look big enough like his Guru. It is decided by the medical consultant that he needs to be administered Human Growth Hormone injections to augment his growth. This hormone in known to cause what is called giantism. Kiran started showing signs of this syndrome by gaining enormous weight, height, and signs of virility with a hairy appearance. Along with this, other side effects of testosterone excess caused severe internal distress especially with the externally imposed celibacy standards and requirements. This led to conflicts with the puritan priests, who themselves were seen to be engaged in behaviors that were not appropriate for child-swami to be exposed to when he was to be kept in a less stimulating environment. His rebelliousness in not submitting to the ritualistic and other requirements imposed on him led to his falling out of grace. He was considered unfit to be the Guru and eventually had to leave the ashrama to fend for himself.
No widely publicized, written, or exlpicit public apology for abusing the child guru with medical malpractice was ever forthcoming, although as a result of the toxic Growth Hormone administration the Guru developed Juvenile Diabetes, and severe Secondary Hypertension, both leading to early death. He did not receive any assistance for medical care or a pension from the community for whom he had been chosen to be the spiritual head. He became an orphan when he was snatched away from his parents and then again when his beloved Guru himself died only a few years after he was initiated.
Being an avowed Sanyasin devoid of any skills for employment, lacking traditional schooling, not even receiving high school education, leave alone a bachelor’s degree, Kiran remained truthful to his chosen path as a Sanyasin. Abandoned by his parents, and now abandoned by his ashrama, abused by his caregivers, he decided to fend for himself. Before that, while he enjoyed the status of the Spiritual Head of the community as a young man in his twenties, he decided to visit the foreign land. His once removed Guru (meaning his Guru's Guru or spiritual grandfather) had excommunicated several prominent members of this community for crossing the ocean. A prominent judge refused to take prayashchitta meaning official publicly performed repentance by ingesting the cow dung and cow’s urine along with cow’s milk, yogurt and ghee.
Now the present spiritual head was rebellious enough to disregard this injunction against crossing the oceans. He was in an exalted position though a controversial Guru. In his foreign travel he requested an old friend of his to have a private psychiatric interview but in his position of "house arrest" or surveillance, being watched for 24 hours by the priests and others in authority, a pediatrician and a retired judge, members of the executive committee of the ashrama, traveling with him, insisted on being present during the interview. Kiran expressed his misery as to how he was suffering emotional pain and the ill-effects of the toxic doses of Human Growth Hormones administered by a Dr. Kini. This information was not to be publicized. No one is to be responsible for this abuse. The writing was on the wall that as a result of this malpractice the Swami’s life-span was markedly shortened and he knew that quite well too. He was prepared to die early in the God forsaken place near the foot of a mountain where the Buddhist monks lived many centuries ago but he now had a different mission than that entrusted to him when he was the official Guru supporting all the ritualistic habits of his community. He was no longer the ritualistic Guru bound by the traditions. He was more of a humanitarian with other goals than performing rituals day after day and spending community resources for such purpose but wanted hospitals for poor people and rest homes for the elderly. He was humbled by the attitudes of the community and never once claimed to be a spiritual head of any community in his isolated abode.
The community was living in its imaginary spiritual bliss of the Guru and not paying attention to the humanity of their Guru. Neither his, nor his mother’s, feelings or suffering were or are publicly acknowledged by any of the community leaders. Kiran continued to draw a small following and lived in a small hutment in a remote place away from civilization in the middle of rice paddies. No one bothered to see that he had enough food or medications to survive and there he died of the ill effects of abuse inflicted upon him in the Chitra-nagar ashrama where he was administered the toxic hormones during his pubertal and early adolescent years. The rice paddies would get flooded during the monsoon. The local farmers, the Marathas, and the farm hands became his followers. The donations started flowing in after his death. This is his second death and his second funeral was quite pompous with public burial into a “Samadhi”. After his death he again became exalted in a small segment of the parent community probably because of unexpressed unconscious guilt of the community and other factors. Thus, as a born Brahmin who had undergone the Upanayana ceremony, he was twice born, to be twice abused, twice abandoned,twice orphaned, twice exalted, and twice dead. The saga continues without regard to man’s inhumanity to another human being because it is occurring and it has occurred under the intoxicating shroud of spiritualism and ritualism with no regard to the humanity of Kiran or his mother. Such spiritualism and ritualism can be quite blinding.
Social responsibility and civic sense is utterly lacking in his community which is still living in the spiritual bliss totally oblivious to the social injustice perpetrated on Kiran and his family. The property and donations created by the positive transference to Kiran is not enough to sustain the temple and the rest home that was built in the locale of his Samadhi. The feud around who is in control of the property and money has distracted people from the human aspects of this story. No apologies to Kiran and his parents for the abuse have come forth to this day from the community. Human memory is short lived. Besides, how can empty words lacking true and sincere regrets heal the repeated wounds inflicted over fifty years? Revictimizing the victim repeatedly is the pattern in this saga.
Humanity, Spirituality and Ritualism all have to be balanced without attaining dominance over the other in a good Dharma. The people who cared for Kiran when he was abandoned by his community are now not to touch his Samadhi, though they fed him by walking through the flooded waters when no one from his community came to see the plight of their abandoned Guru then. They are all either shoodras or dalits and if they ever enter his Samadhi they cause bhrashtakara and desecrate the holy place. They are now to be prohibited from entering his samadhi when his community took full control of it, but had nothing to do with him when he was living, and when he was cared for by the people who are now not to come anywhere near him. Even his mother is not to enter the premises by a legal order sought for from the Charity commissioner for other reasons than ritualistic. Where is the sense of justice or a sense of social responsibility, where is the social decorum or humanity, leave alone a regard for the sacrifice of the mother and the respect for her feelings of loss and love for her departed son?
Kiran is now waiting in his spirit to see if his community will ever be in touch with the reality of humanness of their abandoned Guru and respect the other humans he loved and whom he considered as equal; will the community exalt him once more as a more spiritually advanced Guru, who himself became excommunicated by his own choice, probably to pay for the social injustice committed by his spiritual grandfather by ousting the Judge out of the community for taking a voyage to England for his legal education at Oxford? Will the community follow his example of humanitarian ways? Or, will the community perform his third funeral by abandoning everything he stood for as a humanitarian by degenerating into base discriminatory brahmanistic ritualism that totally ignores humanity, leave alone spirituality?
By
Bharatahitachintaka
The short story of Kiran: Twice born, twice abandoned, twice orphaned, twice abused, twice exalted, and twice dead, waiting posthumously after fifty years for his third exaltation and third funeral.
Any similarity in the names and events is accidental. This is an objective critique of a social phenomenon in India from a psychosocial perspective.
An eleven year old boy is chosen to become the spiritual head of a Brahmin community and is initiated into the Sanyasa-ashram at that tender age with the consent of his parents. The tradition required that he perform the ritual of his own funeral. Also, he is not to see his parents, especially his mother as she is a woman, and as an avowed lifetime celibate he is not to have any contact with any and all women. He is initiated by the spiritual head of the community into spiritual tradition by giving him diksha so he can attain his spiritual enlightenment to make him worthy of becoming a Guru. He is, from all external observations, seen to be delighted in being a child, enjoying play, tinkering with radio, and fascinated with transmitters, etc., though missing out on secular education in a traditional school providing socialization opportunities. Before the Internet it was a healthy way of coping with the extreme social isolation imposed upon a child. Home schooling (or in-ashrama schooling) is to give him all the education necessary for him to become a Guru, and a few years' stay in Varanasi will provide him the necessary education in Sanskrit and Hindu scriptures. Thus equipped, Kiran will have the respectable position as an authority on Dharma. In this position he is to be revered by all in the community even to the point of touching his feet and performing his paad-pooja, meaning worshipping his feet by washing them to attain the punya of worshipping the Guru. So far so good.
However, the child guru is not seen to be physically or psychologically maturing fast enough after the death of his Guru to look big enough like his Guru. It is decided by the medical consultant that he needs to be administered Human Growth Hormone injections to augment his growth. This hormone in known to cause what is called giantism. Kiran started showing signs of this syndrome by gaining enormous weight, height, and signs of virility with a hairy appearance. Along with this, other side effects of testosterone excess caused severe internal distress especially with the externally imposed celibacy standards and requirements. This led to conflicts with the puritan priests, who themselves were seen to be engaged in behaviors that were not appropriate for child-swami to be exposed to when he was to be kept in a less stimulating environment. His rebelliousness in not submitting to the ritualistic and other requirements imposed on him led to his falling out of grace. He was considered unfit to be the Guru and eventually had to leave the ashrama to fend for himself.
No widely publicized, written, or exlpicit public apology for abusing the child guru with medical malpractice was ever forthcoming, although as a result of the toxic Growth Hormone administration the Guru developed Juvenile Diabetes, and severe Secondary Hypertension, both leading to early death. He did not receive any assistance for medical care or a pension from the community for whom he had been chosen to be the spiritual head. He became an orphan when he was snatched away from his parents and then again when his beloved Guru himself died only a few years after he was initiated.
Being an avowed Sanyasin devoid of any skills for employment, lacking traditional schooling, not even receiving high school education, leave alone a bachelor’s degree, Kiran remained truthful to his chosen path as a Sanyasin. Abandoned by his parents, and now abandoned by his ashrama, abused by his caregivers, he decided to fend for himself. Before that, while he enjoyed the status of the Spiritual Head of the community as a young man in his twenties, he decided to visit the foreign land. His once removed Guru (meaning his Guru's Guru or spiritual grandfather) had excommunicated several prominent members of this community for crossing the ocean. A prominent judge refused to take prayashchitta meaning official publicly performed repentance by ingesting the cow dung and cow’s urine along with cow’s milk, yogurt and ghee.
Now the present spiritual head was rebellious enough to disregard this injunction against crossing the oceans. He was in an exalted position though a controversial Guru. In his foreign travel he requested an old friend of his to have a private psychiatric interview but in his position of "house arrest" or surveillance, being watched for 24 hours by the priests and others in authority, a pediatrician and a retired judge, members of the executive committee of the ashrama, traveling with him, insisted on being present during the interview. Kiran expressed his misery as to how he was suffering emotional pain and the ill-effects of the toxic doses of Human Growth Hormones administered by a Dr. Kini. This information was not to be publicized. No one is to be responsible for this abuse. The writing was on the wall that as a result of this malpractice the Swami’s life-span was markedly shortened and he knew that quite well too. He was prepared to die early in the God forsaken place near the foot of a mountain where the Buddhist monks lived many centuries ago but he now had a different mission than that entrusted to him when he was the official Guru supporting all the ritualistic habits of his community. He was no longer the ritualistic Guru bound by the traditions. He was more of a humanitarian with other goals than performing rituals day after day and spending community resources for such purpose but wanted hospitals for poor people and rest homes for the elderly. He was humbled by the attitudes of the community and never once claimed to be a spiritual head of any community in his isolated abode.
The community was living in its imaginary spiritual bliss of the Guru and not paying attention to the humanity of their Guru. Neither his, nor his mother’s, feelings or suffering were or are publicly acknowledged by any of the community leaders. Kiran continued to draw a small following and lived in a small hutment in a remote place away from civilization in the middle of rice paddies. No one bothered to see that he had enough food or medications to survive and there he died of the ill effects of abuse inflicted upon him in the Chitra-nagar ashrama where he was administered the toxic hormones during his pubertal and early adolescent years. The rice paddies would get flooded during the monsoon. The local farmers, the Marathas, and the farm hands became his followers. The donations started flowing in after his death. This is his second death and his second funeral was quite pompous with public burial into a “Samadhi”. After his death he again became exalted in a small segment of the parent community probably because of unexpressed unconscious guilt of the community and other factors. Thus, as a born Brahmin who had undergone the Upanayana ceremony, he was twice born, to be twice abused, twice abandoned,twice orphaned, twice exalted, and twice dead. The saga continues without regard to man’s inhumanity to another human being because it is occurring and it has occurred under the intoxicating shroud of spiritualism and ritualism with no regard to the humanity of Kiran or his mother. Such spiritualism and ritualism can be quite blinding.
Social responsibility and civic sense is utterly lacking in his community which is still living in the spiritual bliss totally oblivious to the social injustice perpetrated on Kiran and his family. The property and donations created by the positive transference to Kiran is not enough to sustain the temple and the rest home that was built in the locale of his Samadhi. The feud around who is in control of the property and money has distracted people from the human aspects of this story. No apologies to Kiran and his parents for the abuse have come forth to this day from the community. Human memory is short lived. Besides, how can empty words lacking true and sincere regrets heal the repeated wounds inflicted over fifty years? Revictimizing the victim repeatedly is the pattern in this saga.
Humanity, Spirituality and Ritualism all have to be balanced without attaining dominance over the other in a good Dharma. The people who cared for Kiran when he was abandoned by his community are now not to touch his Samadhi, though they fed him by walking through the flooded waters when no one from his community came to see the plight of their abandoned Guru then. They are all either shoodras or dalits and if they ever enter his Samadhi they cause bhrashtakara and desecrate the holy place. They are now to be prohibited from entering his samadhi when his community took full control of it, but had nothing to do with him when he was living, and when he was cared for by the people who are now not to come anywhere near him. Even his mother is not to enter the premises by a legal order sought for from the Charity commissioner for other reasons than ritualistic. Where is the sense of justice or a sense of social responsibility, where is the social decorum or humanity, leave alone a regard for the sacrifice of the mother and the respect for her feelings of loss and love for her departed son?
Kiran is now waiting in his spirit to see if his community will ever be in touch with the reality of humanness of their abandoned Guru and respect the other humans he loved and whom he considered as equal; will the community exalt him once more as a more spiritually advanced Guru, who himself became excommunicated by his own choice, probably to pay for the social injustice committed by his spiritual grandfather by ousting the Judge out of the community for taking a voyage to England for his legal education at Oxford? Will the community follow his example of humanitarian ways? Or, will the community perform his third funeral by abandoning everything he stood for as a humanitarian by degenerating into base discriminatory brahmanistic ritualism that totally ignores humanity, leave alone spirituality?
Saturday, February 27, 2010
SEE PETITIONONLINE TO ENDORSE THIS PETITION
TRASH WENDY DONIGER'S "HINDUS: AN ALTERNATIVE HISTORY"
http://www.petitiononline.com/dharma10/petition.html
To: Penguin Group USA Penguin Books India
SCANDALOUS cover jacket of the book - copy for ready reference at http://www.scribd.com/doc/26565460/Scan-0002
To:
Ms. Susan Peterson Kennedy
President , Penguin Group (USA)
375 Hudson St, New York, NY 10014, USA
Mr. Mike Bryan,
CEO & President, Penguin Books Pvt Ltd.
11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi 110 017
India
Dear Ms. Peterson Kennedy, Mr. Mike Bryan,
The following is a petition from concerned signatories to the Penguin Group asking for an apology for the publication of the factually incorrect and offensive book “The Hindus-An Alternative History” by Wendy Doniger. We expect Penguin Group to withdraw the book immediately.
“The Hindus: An Alternative History” is rife with numerous errors in its historical facts and Sanskrit translations. These errors and misrepresentations are bound and perhaps intended to mislead students of Indian and Hindu history.
Throughout the book, Doniger analyzes revered Hindu Gods and Goddess using her widely discredited psychosexual Freudian theories that modern, humanistic psychology has deemed limiting. These interpretations are presented as hard facts and not as speculations. Doniger makes various faulty assumptions about the tradition in order to arrive at her particular spin. In the process, the beliefs, traditions and interpretations of practicing Hindus are simply ignored or bypassed without the unsuspecting reader knowing this to be the case. This kind of Western scholarship has been criticized as Orientalism and Eurocentrism. The non Judeo-Christian faith gets used to dish out voyeurism and the tradition gets eroticized.
A. FACTUAL ERRORS
The following are a just a SMALL SAMPLING of examples of the factual errors that run rampant through this disgusting book. By due diligence that is badly overdue from your editors, you can either find for yourself, or we will be glad to direct you to, scholarly references so that you can verify these errors yourself and withdraw this obscenity.
[Page number precedes a reference to inaccurate statements in the book. This is followed by a comment citing verifiable facts.]
Maps in front pages: Maps titled ‘India’s Geographical Features’ and ‘India from 600 CE to 1600 CE’
COMMENT: In the first map, the Waziristan Hills area is marked erroneously as ‘Kirthar Range’. The Kirthar Range is at least 200 miles further south. In the third map, Janakpur, Nagarkot, Mandu and Haldighati are marked several hundred miles from their correct geographical location.
Pg. 67 - It is claimed that the entire Harappan culture had a population of 40,000!
COMMENT: This is estimated as the population of Mohenjo-Daro alone. The population of the entire culture is estimated around 500,000.
Pg 112 - Wheat is mentioned as a food item in the Rigvedic period.
COMMENT: Wheat is not mentioned in the Rigveda at all. It first occurs in the Maitrayani Samhita of the Yajurveda.
Pg 130 - The author claims that there are no Gods in the Vedas who are Shudras.
COMMENT: It is anachronistic to assign castes to Rigvedic deities, but nevertheless, Pushan, Vesmapati and others have been considered Shudra deities in later times.
Pg 194 fn.- Gandhi's commentary on the Gita (a sacred Hindu scripture) was titled 'Asakti Yoga' (translated as ‘the science of deep attachment’).
COMMENT: The title of Gandhi’s work is 'Anasakti Yoga' (trans. ‘Science of non-Attachment’).
Pg 206 - The book wrongly states that the Hindus had only a triad of passions.
COMMENT: Hindu scriptures list six main evils and the concept of shadripus (six internal enemies) is very well known.
Pg 441 - The book claims that Firoz Shah redeemed a number of Hindu slaves…
COMMENT: A misrepresentation of the fact that he employed (not ‘redeemed’) 12,000 of his 180,000 slaves forcibly in royal factories for producing articles of consumption by Muslim elites. No “manumission” was involved.
Pg 445 - Dates of Saint Kabir are given as 1450 – 1498.
COMMENT: His demise is believed to have occurred in 1518, and the traditional date of birth is 1398.
Pg 448 - In 713 Muhammad ibn Qasim invaded Sind.
COMMENT: Muhammad bin Qasim invaded Sind in 711.
Pg 450- It is claimed that Emperor Ala-ud-Din Khalji did not sack temples in Devagiri.
COMMENT: His contemporary Amir Khusro clearly mentions that the Emperor sacked numerous temples and raised mosques instead.
Pg 459 - King Ala-ud-din Husain of Bengal patronized Saint Chaitanya.
COMMENT: Saint Chaitanya never met the king, and left his kingdom to avoid persecution, as did his disciples. The king had destroyed Hindu temples in Orissa.
Pg 532 - Emperor Akbar moved his capital from Fatehpur Sikri to Delhi in 1586.
COMMENT: Emperor Akbar moved his capital to Lahore in 1587, and thereafter to Agra.
Pg 537-8 - The Sikh teacher Guru Govind Singh was assassinated in 1708, while 'attending Emperor Aurangzeb'. Emperor Aurangzeb died in 1707.
COMMENT: Guru Gobind Singh was assassinated in 1708 during the reign of Aurangzeb’s successor, Emperor Bahadur Shah I. It is insulting to say that the Guru was ‘attending’ on the Emperor.
Pg 550 - The book claims that Mirabai lived from 1498-1597, and then on p. 568, the author claims that Mirabai lived from 1450-1525!
COMMENT: Both dates are wrong and the commonly accepted dates are 1498-1547.
Pg 552 - The book claims that the Ramcharitmanas was written at Varanasi.
COMMENT: Both modern scholarship as well as tradition accept that the work (or at least most of it) was written in Ayodhya.
Section on Bibliography: “Shekhawat, V. “Origin and Structure of purushartha Theory: An attempt at Critical Appraisal.” Journal of Indian Council of Philosophical Research 7:1 (1900), 63-67.”
COMMENT:The correct issue and year of this Journal issue are actually 8:2 and 1991. The bibliography has dozens of errors. Some references cited by Doniger simply do not exist.
B. DEROGATORY, DEFAMATORY AND OFFENSIVE STATEMENTS
Clumsily written, each chapter is a shocking and appalling series of anecdotes which denigrate, distort and misrepresent Hinduism and the history of India and Hindus. Doniger uses selective quotations from obscure and non-original, peripheral and ignorant references with a bizarre emphasis on sexuality and eroticism. Cited below are only a handful of quotes along with our understanding and interpretation, with references from Hindu scripture.
[Page number precedes the quote from the book. This is followed by a rebuttal comment.]
Pg 40 – “If the motto of Watergate was ‘Follow the money’, the motto of the history of Hinduism could well be ‘Follow the monkey’ or, more often ‘Follow the horse’.”
COMMENT: Very derogatory and offensive. The motto of Hinduism is to follow the truth and unite with God.
Pg 112 - The author alleges that in Rigveda 10.62, it is implied that a woman may find her own brother in her bed!
COMMENT: The hymn has no such suggestion. It is offensive to suggest that the sacred text of Hindus has kinky sex in it.
Pg 128 - The book likens the Vedic devotee worshipping different Vedic deities to a lying and a philandering boyfriend cheating on his girlfriend(s).
COMMENT: This is offensive and ignores that fact that in the Rigveda, the gods are said to be all united, born of one another, and from the same source.
Pg 225 -“Dasharatha’s son is certainly ‘lustful’... Rama knows all too well what people said about Dasharatha; when Lakshmana learns that Rama has been exiled, he says, “The king is perverse, old, and addicted to sex, driven by lust (2.18.3)”
COMMENT: Sri Rama is revered and worshipped as a deity. The highly acclaimed and critical edition of Valmiki’s Ramayana records no such statement attributed to Lakshmana. An imagined phrase, 'kama-sakta' is mistranslated as 'addicted to sex' by the author whereas it normally means ‘filled with desires’. Valmiki uses a phrase 'samani-madhah' (trans. Possessed of passion).
Pg 467 - Harihara and Bukka (the founders of the Vijayanagara Empire that saved Hindu culture in S India) ‘double-crossed’ the Delhi Sultan when they reconverted to Hinduism.
COMMENT: The brothers committed apostasy as they had been imprisoned and forcibly converted to Islam, and immediately reverted to Hinduism when they were 1000 miles from the Sultan, under the influence of a Hindu ascetic.
Pg 468-469 -“…The mosque, whose serene calligraphic and geometric contrasts with the perpetual motion of the figures depicted on the temple, makes a stand against the chaos of India, creating enforced vacuums that India cannot rush into with all its monkeys and peoples and colors and the smells of the bazaar…”
COMMENT: It is simply unacceptable that a scholar can flippantly, pejoratively and derogatorily essentialize the Hindus as “monkeys and peoples, colors and smells.., and chaos” in most insulting manner with the aspersion thrown at the entire Hindu culture and community all over the world. Such generalization has no place in serious scholarly work.
Pg 509 - ”Shankara and the philosopher’s wife…This tale contrasts sex and renunciation in such a way that the renunciant philosopher is able to have his cake and eat it, to triumph not only in the world of the mind (in which, before this episode begins, he wins a series of debates against the nonrenouncing male Mimamsa philosopher) but in the world of the body, represented by the philosopher’s wife (not to mention the harem women who clearly prefer Shankara to the king in bed).” The author attributes the tale to Shankaradigvijaya of Madhava and to Ravichandra's commentary on Amarushataka.
COMMENT: The author concocts the story as a sexual orgy in which the Saint Adi Shankara and King Amruka take turns making love to the latter’s wives after he is tired. Both her sources however state that the King was already dead and the Saint transferred his soul into the dead King’s body through his yogic powers. There is no suggestion in the texts that the queens ‘prefer Shankara to the king in bed’.
Pg 571- It is alleged that in a hymn from Saint Kshetrayya’s poetry, ‘God rapes’ the women devotees.
COMMENT: The hymn merely presents devotion using spiritual metaphors and the hymns of the Saint seen collectively depict it as a passionate love affair between the God and the devotees. No rape is implied in this hymn at all.
Again, the above is simply a sampling of the scandalous and offensive statements in the book. By her own admission in the book, Doniger has no credentials as a historian and the title of the book is misleading as the book is not on the “History nor an Alternative History” of India. This shows that the author is not an authority on the subject as she is not able to understand the deep meaning of Sanskrit verses or Indian Concepts. These cast serious doubts about the author’s integrity as a researcher and ability to interpret accurately. Additional examples of the author’s shoddy scholarship will be made available upon request.
We emphasize that this defamatory book misinforms readers about the history of Hindu civilization, its cultures and traditions. The book promotes prejudices and biases against Hindus. Can Penguin’s editors really be incompetent enough to have allowed this to pass to publication? If this is not deliberate malice, Penguin must act now in good faith.
As concerned readers, we ask PENGUIN GROUP to:
1. WITHDRAW all the copies of this book immediately from the worldwide bookshops/markets/Universities/Libraries and refrain from printing any other edition.
2. APOLOGIZE for having published this book “The Hindus: An Alternative History”. This book seriously and grossly misrepresents the Hindu reality as known to the vast numbers of Hindus and to scholars of Hindu tradition. PENGUIN must apologize for failure to observe proper pre-publication scrutiny and scholarly review.
Sincerely,
Your Signature
http://www.petitiononline.com/dharma10/petition.html
To: Penguin Group USA Penguin Books India
SCANDALOUS cover jacket of the book - copy for ready reference at http://www.scribd.com/doc/26565460/Scan-0002
To:
Ms. Susan Peterson Kennedy
President , Penguin Group (USA)
375 Hudson St, New York, NY 10014, USA
Mr. Mike Bryan,
CEO & President, Penguin Books Pvt Ltd.
11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi 110 017
India
Dear Ms. Peterson Kennedy, Mr. Mike Bryan,
The following is a petition from concerned signatories to the Penguin Group asking for an apology for the publication of the factually incorrect and offensive book “The Hindus-An Alternative History” by Wendy Doniger. We expect Penguin Group to withdraw the book immediately.
“The Hindus: An Alternative History” is rife with numerous errors in its historical facts and Sanskrit translations. These errors and misrepresentations are bound and perhaps intended to mislead students of Indian and Hindu history.
Throughout the book, Doniger analyzes revered Hindu Gods and Goddess using her widely discredited psychosexual Freudian theories that modern, humanistic psychology has deemed limiting. These interpretations are presented as hard facts and not as speculations. Doniger makes various faulty assumptions about the tradition in order to arrive at her particular spin. In the process, the beliefs, traditions and interpretations of practicing Hindus are simply ignored or bypassed without the unsuspecting reader knowing this to be the case. This kind of Western scholarship has been criticized as Orientalism and Eurocentrism. The non Judeo-Christian faith gets used to dish out voyeurism and the tradition gets eroticized.
A. FACTUAL ERRORS
The following are a just a SMALL SAMPLING of examples of the factual errors that run rampant through this disgusting book. By due diligence that is badly overdue from your editors, you can either find for yourself, or we will be glad to direct you to, scholarly references so that you can verify these errors yourself and withdraw this obscenity.
[Page number precedes a reference to inaccurate statements in the book. This is followed by a comment citing verifiable facts.]
Maps in front pages: Maps titled ‘India’s Geographical Features’ and ‘India from 600 CE to 1600 CE’
COMMENT: In the first map, the Waziristan Hills area is marked erroneously as ‘Kirthar Range’. The Kirthar Range is at least 200 miles further south. In the third map, Janakpur, Nagarkot, Mandu and Haldighati are marked several hundred miles from their correct geographical location.
Pg. 67 - It is claimed that the entire Harappan culture had a population of 40,000!
COMMENT: This is estimated as the population of Mohenjo-Daro alone. The population of the entire culture is estimated around 500,000.
Pg 112 - Wheat is mentioned as a food item in the Rigvedic period.
COMMENT: Wheat is not mentioned in the Rigveda at all. It first occurs in the Maitrayani Samhita of the Yajurveda.
Pg 130 - The author claims that there are no Gods in the Vedas who are Shudras.
COMMENT: It is anachronistic to assign castes to Rigvedic deities, but nevertheless, Pushan, Vesmapati and others have been considered Shudra deities in later times.
Pg 194 fn.- Gandhi's commentary on the Gita (a sacred Hindu scripture) was titled 'Asakti Yoga' (translated as ‘the science of deep attachment’).
COMMENT: The title of Gandhi’s work is 'Anasakti Yoga' (trans. ‘Science of non-Attachment’).
Pg 206 - The book wrongly states that the Hindus had only a triad of passions.
COMMENT: Hindu scriptures list six main evils and the concept of shadripus (six internal enemies) is very well known.
Pg 441 - The book claims that Firoz Shah redeemed a number of Hindu slaves…
COMMENT: A misrepresentation of the fact that he employed (not ‘redeemed’) 12,000 of his 180,000 slaves forcibly in royal factories for producing articles of consumption by Muslim elites. No “manumission” was involved.
Pg 445 - Dates of Saint Kabir are given as 1450 – 1498.
COMMENT: His demise is believed to have occurred in 1518, and the traditional date of birth is 1398.
Pg 448 - In 713 Muhammad ibn Qasim invaded Sind.
COMMENT: Muhammad bin Qasim invaded Sind in 711.
Pg 450- It is claimed that Emperor Ala-ud-Din Khalji did not sack temples in Devagiri.
COMMENT: His contemporary Amir Khusro clearly mentions that the Emperor sacked numerous temples and raised mosques instead.
Pg 459 - King Ala-ud-din Husain of Bengal patronized Saint Chaitanya.
COMMENT: Saint Chaitanya never met the king, and left his kingdom to avoid persecution, as did his disciples. The king had destroyed Hindu temples in Orissa.
Pg 532 - Emperor Akbar moved his capital from Fatehpur Sikri to Delhi in 1586.
COMMENT: Emperor Akbar moved his capital to Lahore in 1587, and thereafter to Agra.
Pg 537-8 - The Sikh teacher Guru Govind Singh was assassinated in 1708, while 'attending Emperor Aurangzeb'. Emperor Aurangzeb died in 1707.
COMMENT: Guru Gobind Singh was assassinated in 1708 during the reign of Aurangzeb’s successor, Emperor Bahadur Shah I. It is insulting to say that the Guru was ‘attending’ on the Emperor.
Pg 550 - The book claims that Mirabai lived from 1498-1597, and then on p. 568, the author claims that Mirabai lived from 1450-1525!
COMMENT: Both dates are wrong and the commonly accepted dates are 1498-1547.
Pg 552 - The book claims that the Ramcharitmanas was written at Varanasi.
COMMENT: Both modern scholarship as well as tradition accept that the work (or at least most of it) was written in Ayodhya.
Section on Bibliography: “Shekhawat, V. “Origin and Structure of purushartha Theory: An attempt at Critical Appraisal.” Journal of Indian Council of Philosophical Research 7:1 (1900), 63-67.”
COMMENT:The correct issue and year of this Journal issue are actually 8:2 and 1991. The bibliography has dozens of errors. Some references cited by Doniger simply do not exist.
B. DEROGATORY, DEFAMATORY AND OFFENSIVE STATEMENTS
Clumsily written, each chapter is a shocking and appalling series of anecdotes which denigrate, distort and misrepresent Hinduism and the history of India and Hindus. Doniger uses selective quotations from obscure and non-original, peripheral and ignorant references with a bizarre emphasis on sexuality and eroticism. Cited below are only a handful of quotes along with our understanding and interpretation, with references from Hindu scripture.
[Page number precedes the quote from the book. This is followed by a rebuttal comment.]
Pg 40 – “If the motto of Watergate was ‘Follow the money’, the motto of the history of Hinduism could well be ‘Follow the monkey’ or, more often ‘Follow the horse’.”
COMMENT: Very derogatory and offensive. The motto of Hinduism is to follow the truth and unite with God.
Pg 112 - The author alleges that in Rigveda 10.62, it is implied that a woman may find her own brother in her bed!
COMMENT: The hymn has no such suggestion. It is offensive to suggest that the sacred text of Hindus has kinky sex in it.
Pg 128 - The book likens the Vedic devotee worshipping different Vedic deities to a lying and a philandering boyfriend cheating on his girlfriend(s).
COMMENT: This is offensive and ignores that fact that in the Rigveda, the gods are said to be all united, born of one another, and from the same source.
Pg 225 -“Dasharatha’s son is certainly ‘lustful’... Rama knows all too well what people said about Dasharatha; when Lakshmana learns that Rama has been exiled, he says, “The king is perverse, old, and addicted to sex, driven by lust (2.18.3)”
COMMENT: Sri Rama is revered and worshipped as a deity. The highly acclaimed and critical edition of Valmiki’s Ramayana records no such statement attributed to Lakshmana. An imagined phrase, 'kama-sakta' is mistranslated as 'addicted to sex' by the author whereas it normally means ‘filled with desires’. Valmiki uses a phrase 'samani-madhah' (trans. Possessed of passion).
Pg 467 - Harihara and Bukka (the founders of the Vijayanagara Empire that saved Hindu culture in S India) ‘double-crossed’ the Delhi Sultan when they reconverted to Hinduism.
COMMENT: The brothers committed apostasy as they had been imprisoned and forcibly converted to Islam, and immediately reverted to Hinduism when they were 1000 miles from the Sultan, under the influence of a Hindu ascetic.
Pg 468-469 -“…The mosque, whose serene calligraphic and geometric contrasts with the perpetual motion of the figures depicted on the temple, makes a stand against the chaos of India, creating enforced vacuums that India cannot rush into with all its monkeys and peoples and colors and the smells of the bazaar…”
COMMENT: It is simply unacceptable that a scholar can flippantly, pejoratively and derogatorily essentialize the Hindus as “monkeys and peoples, colors and smells.., and chaos” in most insulting manner with the aspersion thrown at the entire Hindu culture and community all over the world. Such generalization has no place in serious scholarly work.
Pg 509 - ”Shankara and the philosopher’s wife…This tale contrasts sex and renunciation in such a way that the renunciant philosopher is able to have his cake and eat it, to triumph not only in the world of the mind (in which, before this episode begins, he wins a series of debates against the nonrenouncing male Mimamsa philosopher) but in the world of the body, represented by the philosopher’s wife (not to mention the harem women who clearly prefer Shankara to the king in bed).” The author attributes the tale to Shankaradigvijaya of Madhava and to Ravichandra's commentary on Amarushataka.
COMMENT: The author concocts the story as a sexual orgy in which the Saint Adi Shankara and King Amruka take turns making love to the latter’s wives after he is tired. Both her sources however state that the King was already dead and the Saint transferred his soul into the dead King’s body through his yogic powers. There is no suggestion in the texts that the queens ‘prefer Shankara to the king in bed’.
Pg 571- It is alleged that in a hymn from Saint Kshetrayya’s poetry, ‘God rapes’ the women devotees.
COMMENT: The hymn merely presents devotion using spiritual metaphors and the hymns of the Saint seen collectively depict it as a passionate love affair between the God and the devotees. No rape is implied in this hymn at all.
Again, the above is simply a sampling of the scandalous and offensive statements in the book. By her own admission in the book, Doniger has no credentials as a historian and the title of the book is misleading as the book is not on the “History nor an Alternative History” of India. This shows that the author is not an authority on the subject as she is not able to understand the deep meaning of Sanskrit verses or Indian Concepts. These cast serious doubts about the author’s integrity as a researcher and ability to interpret accurately. Additional examples of the author’s shoddy scholarship will be made available upon request.
We emphasize that this defamatory book misinforms readers about the history of Hindu civilization, its cultures and traditions. The book promotes prejudices and biases against Hindus. Can Penguin’s editors really be incompetent enough to have allowed this to pass to publication? If this is not deliberate malice, Penguin must act now in good faith.
As concerned readers, we ask PENGUIN GROUP to:
1. WITHDRAW all the copies of this book immediately from the worldwide bookshops/markets/Universities/Libraries and refrain from printing any other edition.
2. APOLOGIZE for having published this book “The Hindus: An Alternative History”. This book seriously and grossly misrepresents the Hindu reality as known to the vast numbers of Hindus and to scholars of Hindu tradition. PENGUIN must apologize for failure to observe proper pre-publication scrutiny and scholarly review.
Sincerely,
Your Signature
Monday, February 22, 2010
INSTANT RAMAYANA & MAHABHARATA (Part II)
SYMBOLISM IN RAMAYANA & MAHABHARATA
(Part II)
A quick preview for Warner Brothers' Ramayana to be released on Oct. 15, 2010
(SEE PART I AND POSTINGS IN JUNE, JULY & AUGUST 2010 ON THIS TOPIC)
By
Achintyachintaka
For Part I please click on:
http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4160064815613449047#editor/target=post;postID=6522686463812268353
The simplified “matita-artha” (essential summarized meaning worth contemplating on) of symbolism in Ramayana was presented in Part I. Part II will require some prerequisite background.
The first fact that needs to be confronted is that once a translational flaw is entrenched then all semantics in the host language takes quite a different shape and distorts the appearance of the guest language and its perception. Here the host is the English or the European languages and the guest is the Sanskrit which is translated into English.
For example the word “deva” in Sanskrit is erroneously translated as “God” in English. God is an inoculated concept in Sanskrit. There is “Ishwara” in Sanskrit but even “He” is not a “deva for all” (more on it later – it is an optional “concept” –a vikalpa- as per sage Patanjali). The concept of “deva” clearly refers to an entity that is perceived as presenting “light” or “that which can enlighten”- an inherently bright one. Only when the human consciousness perceives this light in a “tatva,” these entities or tatvas can be called "Devas or Devis.” So, as an example, a mentally challenged individual (poor soul) who has no capacity to create poetry or appreciate a poem will never be in a position to comprehend “Saraswati” as a “Devi.”
On the other hand, a highly creative individual, who marvels at the speed at which he/she can create art, poetry, literature, poems, or even mathematics (as in the case of Ramaanuja, the mathematician) spontaneously without any efforts on the part of the creative individual, will begin to realize the power of Saraswati and if so enlightened will begin to understand the beauty of the concept of “Saraswati Devi.” In this sense, the deification (If you may call it) of the tatvas occurs purely in the subjective domain and whether the entity called Deva and Devi has a separate existence or not becomes a moot point for the individual who experiences it (anubhuti or anubhava). This concept is foreign to Western culture, and therefore, translation of deva and devi as God and Goddesses has led to great confusion in the English versions of Hindu philosophy. Western Theologists and Indologists have not comprehended this subjective domain of “God consciousness” as applicable to human mind including their own.
Another example is Agni. Ak (Ag) + Nee an agency named for that which transforms and takes one forward or beyond. Therefore, the entire universe that transforms from one state of existence to another, or even from nonexistence to existence, can be postulated to have a “transforming agency” like for example a catalyst or an enzyme (Jatharaagni, for example) that is a tatva which is universally essential. A tatva is a principle and cannot be put in a bottle to exhibit. It is an abstraction for those who have the capacity to abstract and comprehend. This tatva of Agni when recognized as essential for the manifest Universe to exist must be revered as a “deva” by only those who subjectively are enlightened to appreciate its existence in the Universe. It is so very important that the Veda (Knowledge) regards this principle as the foremost to be revered and the leader or in poetic term the “officiating principle” of the Universe. Hence, the very first declaration of the Rig Veda is “Agnim eele purohitam.” A gross injustice has taken place by translating Agni as the “Fire God,” it is needless to say for those who have followed the above discussion.
We now have to descend to Mahabharata wherein the author who composes it is Vyasa (Veda Vyasa meaning the one who is knowledgeable of Vedas) the grand-son of a “female fish.” His mother was the fisherwoman who was raised by a fisherman after she was found by him inside the mother fish. This symbolism would have escaped the mankind but for Darwin. The human race or species has evolved from the Pisces via Amphibians is a symbolism of Mahabharata. Of course, the son of a fisherwoman raised by his adoptive grandfather fisherman becomes the most knowledgeable scholar of the Vedas is a stunning challenge to those who harp on casteism in Hinduism. Vyasa had no caste and so also Valmiki. The usual wisdom is that one must not look for the origin of the Rishis and the (sacred) rivers. So, most Hindus habitually have repressed that Mahabharata was written by the grandson of a fish, the son of her daughter.
Similarly, the concept of test tube babies was totally a fiction until recently and even in current era it is still a science fiction. Those who have studied embryology will remember blastoma that has every cell capable of becoming an individual. The mother of 100 Kouravas raises them in the kumbhas. They are individual cells from the blastoma with one fifth not attaining full term.
The remaining one hundred are identical “centuplets” (one hundred simultaneously conceived babies) though raised in one hundred test tubes. Thus begins the story of Mahabharata giving details of science fiction around the mystery of reproduction.
Here one has to accept that there was no knowledge of “blastoma” with 128 equipotential cells that could produce identical 128 individuals and that each would need intrauterine environment for 40 weeks including continuous oxygenation with circulating blood exchanging oxygen from placental oxygenated blood for Oxygen (O2) and Carbon-dioxide (CO2) exchange and other nutrients and elimination of products of metabolic waste. However, one needs to marvel at the symbolism of biological adventure imagined in this story.
The symbolism here is the greed for hundred cloned male children to protect and expand the empire and how all hundred identical centuplet had all the instincts that could be qualified by the prefix “du” at the beginning of each of their names. This shows that there is a clear understanding that the human nature is biologically driven, potentially evil if unrestrained and all the “good” in human nature cannot be readily explained as a biological derivative. This is the mystery of Dharma in human beings and speculation regarding its origin. Mahabharata is the conflict between the Dharmic domain (Dharmakshetra) and the biological domain (We will call it Kurukshetra or the karmakshetra).
Let us not forget that the biological grandfather of all hundred Kaouravas and the five Pandavas, the main contesting characters at “war,” was no one else but Vyasa himself the grandson of the fish. Thus ironically the warring cousins are the fifth generation from the great-great-grandma fish.
Dhritarashtra stands for the blind (avidya) ego that holds on to the biological instincts and Draupadi stands for that aspect of ego who has access to Prajna that holds on to the five sons of the supramundane devas that guide the individual’s spiritual nature in the human beings. She is equally bonded to five of them. These five are the Pandavas who do not have the legitimate biological right to the rasthra but represent the Dharma and his brothers.
The story of Mahabharata is the eternal struggle in the human beings between the biological drives and the superior, uniquely human, qualities that make humans comprehend and follow Dharma. Draupadi is the Krishna Sakhi or the long time friend of Supreme Conscioiusness (that rescues her when abandoned by the five aspects of the human ego ideals or compassionate superego qualities that are essential to follow Dharma.) When so abandoned she becomes vulnerable to the abuse by all the base biological drives and needs to be rescued by the Supreme Consciousness (sublime or sublimated instincts which is possible only in the human beings and more so only in the civilized ones.)
This is also a psychoanalytic interpretation of the Ramayana and Mahabharata presented here as “Instant Ramayana and Mahabharata” in contrast to the “Id-Ball” Wendy Doniger’s interpretations. Wendy is preoccupied by all the morbid in the Id and sees no balancing act in her representation of these epics in her book, “The Hindus: An Alternative History”. If one focuses on the Id alone one is doing a great disservice to Freud and his psychoanalytic concepts. Hopefully Wendy and her children as well as all the Western Indologists who are lost in the Western Dandakaranya will come out of it one day to see the light which the beacons of Vedic wisdom presented as divya kathas in the form of Mahakavyas (epics) by the Rishis, Valmiki and Vyasa, both of whom were exalted long before Wendy’s empathy for the downtrodden Indians and Hindus emerged used by her as a justification to denigrate the divyakathas of Sanatana Dharma for focusing only on the imagined and alluded sexual aspects with her own imagination going wild.
Wendy does not recognize for a moment why there was not ever a single Mother Teresa in the Ghettoes of New York, Baltimore, and Chicago or in many Southern states or none was to be found in the Native American reservations when they faced the trail of tears, or when the slaves were lynched. Where is Wendy’s empathy for these down trodden or all the people subjected to genocides in the Western societies who consequently have no castes (?) because the unwanted were eliminated, segregated, aparthied, or extruded (into epileptic colonies or burned at the stakes as witches) for the elite to enjoy the fruits of their labor or their usurped land, properties, and even kingdoms, to be colonized and exploited? What moral ground does a Western Indologist like Wendy have to criticize the comparatively far less malignant “social evils” of other cultures when he/she has no awareness of the stinking excreta sticking to his/her own shoes?
(Part II)
A quick preview for Warner Brothers' Ramayana to be released on Oct. 15, 2010
(SEE PART I AND POSTINGS IN JUNE, JULY & AUGUST 2010 ON THIS TOPIC)
By
Achintyachintaka
For Part I please click on:
http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4160064815613449047#editor/target=post;postID=6522686463812268353
The simplified “matita-artha” (essential summarized meaning worth contemplating on) of symbolism in Ramayana was presented in Part I. Part II will require some prerequisite background.
The first fact that needs to be confronted is that once a translational flaw is entrenched then all semantics in the host language takes quite a different shape and distorts the appearance of the guest language and its perception. Here the host is the English or the European languages and the guest is the Sanskrit which is translated into English.
For example the word “deva” in Sanskrit is erroneously translated as “God” in English. God is an inoculated concept in Sanskrit. There is “Ishwara” in Sanskrit but even “He” is not a “deva for all” (more on it later – it is an optional “concept” –a vikalpa- as per sage Patanjali). The concept of “deva” clearly refers to an entity that is perceived as presenting “light” or “that which can enlighten”- an inherently bright one. Only when the human consciousness perceives this light in a “tatva,” these entities or tatvas can be called "Devas or Devis.” So, as an example, a mentally challenged individual (poor soul) who has no capacity to create poetry or appreciate a poem will never be in a position to comprehend “Saraswati” as a “Devi.”
On the other hand, a highly creative individual, who marvels at the speed at which he/she can create art, poetry, literature, poems, or even mathematics (as in the case of Ramaanuja, the mathematician) spontaneously without any efforts on the part of the creative individual, will begin to realize the power of Saraswati and if so enlightened will begin to understand the beauty of the concept of “Saraswati Devi.” In this sense, the deification (If you may call it) of the tatvas occurs purely in the subjective domain and whether the entity called Deva and Devi has a separate existence or not becomes a moot point for the individual who experiences it (anubhuti or anubhava). This concept is foreign to Western culture, and therefore, translation of deva and devi as God and Goddesses has led to great confusion in the English versions of Hindu philosophy. Western Theologists and Indologists have not comprehended this subjective domain of “God consciousness” as applicable to human mind including their own.
Another example is Agni. Ak (Ag) + Nee an agency named for that which transforms and takes one forward or beyond. Therefore, the entire universe that transforms from one state of existence to another, or even from nonexistence to existence, can be postulated to have a “transforming agency” like for example a catalyst or an enzyme (Jatharaagni, for example) that is a tatva which is universally essential. A tatva is a principle and cannot be put in a bottle to exhibit. It is an abstraction for those who have the capacity to abstract and comprehend. This tatva of Agni when recognized as essential for the manifest Universe to exist must be revered as a “deva” by only those who subjectively are enlightened to appreciate its existence in the Universe. It is so very important that the Veda (Knowledge) regards this principle as the foremost to be revered and the leader or in poetic term the “officiating principle” of the Universe. Hence, the very first declaration of the Rig Veda is “Agnim eele purohitam.” A gross injustice has taken place by translating Agni as the “Fire God,” it is needless to say for those who have followed the above discussion.
We now have to descend to Mahabharata wherein the author who composes it is Vyasa (Veda Vyasa meaning the one who is knowledgeable of Vedas) the grand-son of a “female fish.” His mother was the fisherwoman who was raised by a fisherman after she was found by him inside the mother fish. This symbolism would have escaped the mankind but for Darwin. The human race or species has evolved from the Pisces via Amphibians is a symbolism of Mahabharata. Of course, the son of a fisherwoman raised by his adoptive grandfather fisherman becomes the most knowledgeable scholar of the Vedas is a stunning challenge to those who harp on casteism in Hinduism. Vyasa had no caste and so also Valmiki. The usual wisdom is that one must not look for the origin of the Rishis and the (sacred) rivers. So, most Hindus habitually have repressed that Mahabharata was written by the grandson of a fish, the son of her daughter.
Similarly, the concept of test tube babies was totally a fiction until recently and even in current era it is still a science fiction. Those who have studied embryology will remember blastoma that has every cell capable of becoming an individual. The mother of 100 Kouravas raises them in the kumbhas. They are individual cells from the blastoma with one fifth not attaining full term.
The remaining one hundred are identical “centuplets” (one hundred simultaneously conceived babies) though raised in one hundred test tubes. Thus begins the story of Mahabharata giving details of science fiction around the mystery of reproduction.
Here one has to accept that there was no knowledge of “blastoma” with 128 equipotential cells that could produce identical 128 individuals and that each would need intrauterine environment for 40 weeks including continuous oxygenation with circulating blood exchanging oxygen from placental oxygenated blood for Oxygen (O2) and Carbon-dioxide (CO2) exchange and other nutrients and elimination of products of metabolic waste. However, one needs to marvel at the symbolism of biological adventure imagined in this story.
The symbolism here is the greed for hundred cloned male children to protect and expand the empire and how all hundred identical centuplet had all the instincts that could be qualified by the prefix “du” at the beginning of each of their names. This shows that there is a clear understanding that the human nature is biologically driven, potentially evil if unrestrained and all the “good” in human nature cannot be readily explained as a biological derivative. This is the mystery of Dharma in human beings and speculation regarding its origin. Mahabharata is the conflict between the Dharmic domain (Dharmakshetra) and the biological domain (We will call it Kurukshetra or the karmakshetra).
Let us not forget that the biological grandfather of all hundred Kaouravas and the five Pandavas, the main contesting characters at “war,” was no one else but Vyasa himself the grandson of the fish. Thus ironically the warring cousins are the fifth generation from the great-great-grandma fish.
Dhritarashtra stands for the blind (avidya) ego that holds on to the biological instincts and Draupadi stands for that aspect of ego who has access to Prajna that holds on to the five sons of the supramundane devas that guide the individual’s spiritual nature in the human beings. She is equally bonded to five of them. These five are the Pandavas who do not have the legitimate biological right to the rasthra but represent the Dharma and his brothers.
The story of Mahabharata is the eternal struggle in the human beings between the biological drives and the superior, uniquely human, qualities that make humans comprehend and follow Dharma. Draupadi is the Krishna Sakhi or the long time friend of Supreme Conscioiusness (that rescues her when abandoned by the five aspects of the human ego ideals or compassionate superego qualities that are essential to follow Dharma.) When so abandoned she becomes vulnerable to the abuse by all the base biological drives and needs to be rescued by the Supreme Consciousness (sublime or sublimated instincts which is possible only in the human beings and more so only in the civilized ones.)
This is also a psychoanalytic interpretation of the Ramayana and Mahabharata presented here as “Instant Ramayana and Mahabharata” in contrast to the “Id-Ball” Wendy Doniger’s interpretations. Wendy is preoccupied by all the morbid in the Id and sees no balancing act in her representation of these epics in her book, “The Hindus: An Alternative History”. If one focuses on the Id alone one is doing a great disservice to Freud and his psychoanalytic concepts. Hopefully Wendy and her children as well as all the Western Indologists who are lost in the Western Dandakaranya will come out of it one day to see the light which the beacons of Vedic wisdom presented as divya kathas in the form of Mahakavyas (epics) by the Rishis, Valmiki and Vyasa, both of whom were exalted long before Wendy’s empathy for the downtrodden Indians and Hindus emerged used by her as a justification to denigrate the divyakathas of Sanatana Dharma for focusing only on the imagined and alluded sexual aspects with her own imagination going wild.
Wendy does not recognize for a moment why there was not ever a single Mother Teresa in the Ghettoes of New York, Baltimore, and Chicago or in many Southern states or none was to be found in the Native American reservations when they faced the trail of tears, or when the slaves were lynched. Where is Wendy’s empathy for these down trodden or all the people subjected to genocides in the Western societies who consequently have no castes (?) because the unwanted were eliminated, segregated, aparthied, or extruded (into epileptic colonies or burned at the stakes as witches) for the elite to enjoy the fruits of their labor or their usurped land, properties, and even kingdoms, to be colonized and exploited? What moral ground does a Western Indologist like Wendy have to criticize the comparatively far less malignant “social evils” of other cultures when he/she has no awareness of the stinking excreta sticking to his/her own shoes?
Monday, February 15, 2010
INSTANT RAMAYANA & MAHABHARATA (Part I)
INSTANT RAMAYANA AND MAHABHARATA
SYMBOLISM OF RAMAYANA AND MAHABHARATA
(Part I)
by
Achintyachintaka
A quick preview for Warner Brothers' Ramayana to be released on Oct. 15, 2010
(SEE PART II AND ALSO JUNE, JULY, AUGUST 2010 POSTINGS ON THIS TOPIC)
(Confronting the frivolous erotic and morbid symbolism from the Unconscious
of Wendy Doniger in her recent book "The Hindus: An Alternative History")
Hindus have understood the meanings of Ramayana and Mahabharata for many millennia because they view both as products of the Prajna and Pratibha of two greatest Yogis, Rishi Valmiki and Rishi Vyasa. These are the divya kathas or enlightening stories told in a highly ornamental poetry. Prajna is that faculty of Dhee which leads to Jnana. Pratibha is the reflection of the light representing the Jnana.
Raama is the divine in each human being that is enjoying life. The word comes from the root,"rama," which is a verb meaning "to play." The concept is that every human being has this divine element that is residing in him/her. It is a tatva that Narada indicates as fully “seen” (drishtva) by Valmiki before he started composing this Mahakavya, as stated in the introduction to Valmiki’s Ramayana. (Tat sarvam tatvatah drishtva). In what state of mind did Valmiki “see” this? Valmiki is described by Narada as “Yogastha” or “Samadhistha.” After such "self-realization" Valmiki decided to write this perennial story of Rama.
Rama is abandoned or banished in the dandakaranya which is the darkness of the Unconscious in every human being and Rama lives in incognito form, struggling with many undesirable human drives and instincts for “fourteen"” years. The forteen years is to be understood as year after year just like the month after month the year passes imperceptibly. The Bhumi tatva or Prakriti is represented by Sita. The human body is the product of the earth with all elements in it originating from the earth. So, Sita is described by the pratibha of Valmiki as originating in the Earth. Simply speaking, the “Kaala-kshepa Ramayana” (Ramayana projected through time) sung in any temple in South India in the afternoon pravachana (lecture) year after year for many millennia or centuries gives this simple meaning for human existence which is evolving from the mundane to “spiritual” (no such word exists in Sanskrit) which is a close translation of Adhyaatmic.
Rama is to return to conscious awareness for the human being to realize his true nature (divine) in the domain of Ayodhya (the domain where there are no conflicts) where there is peace. “That is the way it is,” which in Sanskrit means “Itihaasa,” sometimes erroneously translated as “History.” It is in the nature of things that someday Rama has to distance himself from his earthly attachment. So Sita has to return to where she came from, which is to her mother, the bhumi or earth. In the Hindu tradition the body without Rama goes through the process of cremation or “chitaa” or Agni. So the union of Rama and Sita is a joyous one but not a permanent one.
In this plot then there are many subplots but they are all illustrations of this divya katha depicted in the Aadikavya by Aadikavi Valmiki who was incidentally a fisherman turned into a “highway robber” meaning given to robbing innocent travelers. This too symbolizes that even such base behaviors are modifiable when an individual is reformed by the blessing of realization of Rama. This is all explained in the introduction to Valmiki’s Ramayana and it is shown how after his reformation Valmiki became compassionate and cried with tears in his eyes when he saw a Hansa (swan) injured by a hunter’s arrow. The empathy for other living beings’ pain is a quality he experienced in himself, which he did not have when he was killing travellers to rob them. So, Valmiki then asks Narada to be introduced to an ideal man that has compassion for all living beings. Narada tells him the story of Rama which Valmiki’s pratibha (poetic inspiration) has elaborated in the most beautiful poetry which is even made sweeter by Santa Tulasidasa in Ramacharitamanasa.
Western culture will find this frame of reference from Vedic understanding gained by Valmiki in his Yogic consciousness rather difficult to comprehend although some of the Western Indologists may be recognized in the West as the “foremost authority on Hinduism” as Wendy Doniger is grandiosely described by her publisher. The Western Indologists lacking the cultural bearings and background will distort and may even demean this story, a divya katha. Indians and Hindus are to be urged not to pay attention to such corrupt and sexualized versions of this story as is depicted in the misrepresentations deliberately inflicted on the Hindu sacred epic in a recent book , “The Hindus: An Alternative History.” (Wendy insists that Lakshmana described his own father Dasharatha as a "sex addict", and Rama chased the deer to hunt it down to fulfil Seeta's taste for high quality Tiffany style clothes while banished in the forest!!!) May these individuals lost in the Western dandakaranya (dark forest)find their own Rama someday to achieve the "humanness" needed in all human beings including for those who call themselves Professors in the School of Divinity at University of Chicago (SEE ARTICLES POSTED ON WENDY DONIGER IN JUNE, JULY & AUGUST 2010 ON THIS WEBSITE).
Interesting take on fact and truth. Both refer to different aspects of reality. Both can be correct and can co-exist. So dvaita and advaita are two different ways of looking at the reality.
Please see the commnet by Desh Kapoor:
Very interesting take. But after reading the very fine translation of Yoga Vasishta by Swami Venkatesananda (himself a spiritual giant) - I am convinced that to understand Ram, one has to read Yoga Vasishta. It is BY FAR the most profound book ever written. Check it out here - http://www.amazon.com/Vasishta-Yoga-Venkatesananda/dp/0791413640, There are 36 reviews of it and except one (3 star), ALL are 5 stars.. never seen any book with that kind of rating on Amazon.
It is sad that our encounter and understanding of Ram has only been limited to Ramayana - which is exemplary, but Yoga Vasishta was at a different level...
As for what is often referred to as "Mythology" by others in Hinduism.. Sadguru Jaggi puts it correctly, when he says that Shiva created the world and can destroy it by just chanting Aum. Now this may not be a "Fact" but it is the "Truth". Just like - pointing to a lady - that you are a woman is a "fact", but inputs of both a man and a woman went into creating you.. so the "Truth" is that you are BOTH! Btw, anybody needing to know more on Karma/Liberation etc in detail may also like to read "Mystics Musings"... it should be a required reading along with Yoga Vasishta for everyone!
--
Desh Kapoor
SYMBOLISM OF RAMAYANA AND MAHABHARATA
(Part I)
by
Achintyachintaka
A quick preview for Warner Brothers' Ramayana to be released on Oct. 15, 2010
(SEE PART II AND ALSO JUNE, JULY, AUGUST 2010 POSTINGS ON THIS TOPIC)
(Confronting the frivolous erotic and morbid symbolism from the Unconscious
of Wendy Doniger in her recent book "The Hindus: An Alternative History")
Hindus have understood the meanings of Ramayana and Mahabharata for many millennia because they view both as products of the Prajna and Pratibha of two greatest Yogis, Rishi Valmiki and Rishi Vyasa. These are the divya kathas or enlightening stories told in a highly ornamental poetry. Prajna is that faculty of Dhee which leads to Jnana. Pratibha is the reflection of the light representing the Jnana.
Raama is the divine in each human being that is enjoying life. The word comes from the root,"rama," which is a verb meaning "to play." The concept is that every human being has this divine element that is residing in him/her. It is a tatva that Narada indicates as fully “seen” (drishtva) by Valmiki before he started composing this Mahakavya, as stated in the introduction to Valmiki’s Ramayana. (Tat sarvam tatvatah drishtva). In what state of mind did Valmiki “see” this? Valmiki is described by Narada as “Yogastha” or “Samadhistha.” After such "self-realization" Valmiki decided to write this perennial story of Rama.
Rama is abandoned or banished in the dandakaranya which is the darkness of the Unconscious in every human being and Rama lives in incognito form, struggling with many undesirable human drives and instincts for “fourteen"” years. The forteen years is to be understood as year after year just like the month after month the year passes imperceptibly. The Bhumi tatva or Prakriti is represented by Sita. The human body is the product of the earth with all elements in it originating from the earth. So, Sita is described by the pratibha of Valmiki as originating in the Earth. Simply speaking, the “Kaala-kshepa Ramayana” (Ramayana projected through time) sung in any temple in South India in the afternoon pravachana (lecture) year after year for many millennia or centuries gives this simple meaning for human existence which is evolving from the mundane to “spiritual” (no such word exists in Sanskrit) which is a close translation of Adhyaatmic.
Rama is to return to conscious awareness for the human being to realize his true nature (divine) in the domain of Ayodhya (the domain where there are no conflicts) where there is peace. “That is the way it is,” which in Sanskrit means “Itihaasa,” sometimes erroneously translated as “History.” It is in the nature of things that someday Rama has to distance himself from his earthly attachment. So Sita has to return to where she came from, which is to her mother, the bhumi or earth. In the Hindu tradition the body without Rama goes through the process of cremation or “chitaa” or Agni. So the union of Rama and Sita is a joyous one but not a permanent one.
In this plot then there are many subplots but they are all illustrations of this divya katha depicted in the Aadikavya by Aadikavi Valmiki who was incidentally a fisherman turned into a “highway robber” meaning given to robbing innocent travelers. This too symbolizes that even such base behaviors are modifiable when an individual is reformed by the blessing of realization of Rama. This is all explained in the introduction to Valmiki’s Ramayana and it is shown how after his reformation Valmiki became compassionate and cried with tears in his eyes when he saw a Hansa (swan) injured by a hunter’s arrow. The empathy for other living beings’ pain is a quality he experienced in himself, which he did not have when he was killing travellers to rob them. So, Valmiki then asks Narada to be introduced to an ideal man that has compassion for all living beings. Narada tells him the story of Rama which Valmiki’s pratibha (poetic inspiration) has elaborated in the most beautiful poetry which is even made sweeter by Santa Tulasidasa in Ramacharitamanasa.
Western culture will find this frame of reference from Vedic understanding gained by Valmiki in his Yogic consciousness rather difficult to comprehend although some of the Western Indologists may be recognized in the West as the “foremost authority on Hinduism” as Wendy Doniger is grandiosely described by her publisher. The Western Indologists lacking the cultural bearings and background will distort and may even demean this story, a divya katha. Indians and Hindus are to be urged not to pay attention to such corrupt and sexualized versions of this story as is depicted in the misrepresentations deliberately inflicted on the Hindu sacred epic in a recent book , “The Hindus: An Alternative History.” (Wendy insists that Lakshmana described his own father Dasharatha as a "sex addict", and Rama chased the deer to hunt it down to fulfil Seeta's taste for high quality Tiffany style clothes while banished in the forest!!!) May these individuals lost in the Western dandakaranya (dark forest)find their own Rama someday to achieve the "humanness" needed in all human beings including for those who call themselves Professors in the School of Divinity at University of Chicago (SEE ARTICLES POSTED ON WENDY DONIGER IN JUNE, JULY & AUGUST 2010 ON THIS WEBSITE).
Interesting take on fact and truth. Both refer to different aspects of reality. Both can be correct and can co-exist. So dvaita and advaita are two different ways of looking at the reality.
Please see the commnet by Desh Kapoor:
Very interesting take. But after reading the very fine translation of Yoga Vasishta by Swami Venkatesananda (himself a spiritual giant) - I am convinced that to understand Ram, one has to read Yoga Vasishta. It is BY FAR the most profound book ever written. Check it out here - http://www.amazon.com/Vasishta-Yoga-Venkatesananda/dp/0791413640, There are 36 reviews of it and except one (3 star), ALL are 5 stars.. never seen any book with that kind of rating on Amazon.
It is sad that our encounter and understanding of Ram has only been limited to Ramayana - which is exemplary, but Yoga Vasishta was at a different level...
As for what is often referred to as "Mythology" by others in Hinduism.. Sadguru Jaggi puts it correctly, when he says that Shiva created the world and can destroy it by just chanting Aum. Now this may not be a "Fact" but it is the "Truth". Just like - pointing to a lady - that you are a woman is a "fact", but inputs of both a man and a woman went into creating you.. so the "Truth" is that you are BOTH! Btw, anybody needing to know more on Karma/Liberation etc in detail may also like to read "Mystics Musings"... it should be a required reading along with Yoga Vasishta for everyone!
--
Desh Kapoor
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