The journey I am referring to is both the journey of our ancestors over thousands of years as well a journey that I took you along for the past several episodes talking about that.
Exactly a year ago I started this rather long series on the Vedas. As you know, the Vedas are probably the oldest of the repositories of human knowledge preserved meticulously over thousands of years. Though many Indians take pride in attaching a ‘Indian’ or ‘Hindu’ tag to them, I personally view them to be belonging to the entire humanity both because their origin, practice as well as their message were not restricted to present political entity called India. They went far beyond. More specifically, their message was and is universal.
I had split my talks into broadly two aspects of the Vedas. The first part that ran for nearly 26 episodes was focused around the ritual parts of the Vedas, the so called Samhitas and Brahmanas. The second part which also ran for almost the same duration was centered around the philosophical parts of the Vedas namely the Upanishads.
As always, my intent was to set right some misconceptions and misinterpretations. Many of the topics and statements made during my talk can be debatable and controversial. But I have no interest in scoring over anyone nor I was merely playing the role of a historian. I was more concerned about the effects of wrong perceptions that could lead to creation of rift among human beings no matter to which geographic region or set of faiths they belong to. As I have commented in the conclusion of my previous episode, I am more keen on seeing a more peaceful world rather than proving right and wrong.
I started with the history of Vedas and tried to clear lot of misconceptions about them in terms of authorship, dating, intellectual level of the authors, and so on. I have tried to be as unbiased and truthful to facts as possible in those efforts. I have also touched upon possible roots of many societal evils that seemed to have emerged from these Vedas or from their wrong understanding.
Just to mention a few – I have tried to show how hollow the ‘Aryan invasion theory’ is, which is often used by motivated people to divide communities and races. I have also provided enough hints to suggest that our ancestors were not as primitive as we tend to think. More specifically, advancing on the timeline does not necessarily make us more evolved either intellectually or ethically. Though biological evolution might follow a timeline, intellectual evolution may not follow any such chronology. We as modern people may be far behind as compared to many of our ancestors who had more lofty concepts and positive attitude towards life.
At the same time, the dark spots that plagued the society in terms of stratification of the society, though not originated from the Vedas, owe to the way these Vedas are looked at. I have also expressed my displeasure on the overemphasis on rituals that forms core of Samhitas and the Brahmanas. These make us more materialists, and beyond a point that has its own drawbacks.
In the second part of the series on the philosophic parts of the Vedas, I presented a completely different world view supported by the Vedas. These views are drastically opposed to the views of most modern dominant religions and their faith systems. But as I went on, I have also suggested how these conflicting views can be brought together and the conflicts resolved. My purpose was not to project one view as superior to another. It was more to show how the ancient Upanishads come up with a world view that is relevant even to this day, even seen totally from a logical perspective.
In doing that, I was faced with clarifying lot of misconceptions created by modern Hindu philosophers who interpret these Upanishads in a way a bit differently from what is obvious from their text. I have gone at length to dispel many confusions that may defeat the very unification purpose of the Upanishads. To me peaceful coexistence is more important than intellectual wins or for that matter, knowing the ultimate truth. I have shown that if one reads the Upanishads with an unbiased mind without ‘axes to grind’ one does find enough evidence in the Upanishads that drive to that end.
Before I conclude, I would like to submit that my only intention has been to clarify things rather than get into some debate or rake up some controversy. It was also not my intention to pull down any individual or a belief system. The oblique references that I kept making were meant as illustration and not as personal attacks. I hope that I have been successful in my approach.
Sarve Bhavantu Sukhinah
Sarve Santu Niraamayaah |
Sarve Bhadraanni Pashyantu
Maa Kashcid-Duhkha-Bhaag-Bhavet |
Om Shaantih Shaantih Shaantih ||
Let there be happiness everywhere
Let there be wellbeing everywhere
Let us see good everywhere
Let there be no suffering anywhere
Let there be peace, peace and just peace
No comments:
Post a Comment