Thursday, December 01, 2005
With apologies to none
Sanatana Dharma means ancient way of life. This was the way of life for Indians for thousands of years. Sometime in the recent history, it was called "Hindu Religion", probably by invaders. 'Dharma' got translated to 'Religion' by someone who did not understand the subtle differences. Over a period of time it got de-generated. Currently, it is the villain of the secularists, as "Hindutva" is a much maligned term. (With politicians and communal forces as your friends, do you need foes?)
This way of life did not lead to progress on the worldly side. Mostly, there are two types of reactions from the so called "educated" people on this aspect:
- India & its dharma are useless. Had Indians did not waste their time on dharma, they would have surpassed west in scientific & technological fields :-(
- India had discovered everything including airplanes, surgery (surprise!) and over a period of time secrets were lost :-)
From whatever I have gathered, both represent highly biased opinions, which are based on very very superficial analysis. Why so?
Indians were far ahead of others upto some point in history. When people in other parts of the world were still nomads, indians were already predicting eclipses based on the planetary observations! The important concept of zero was introduced by indians. Is it likely that such people did not have scientific temper?
The scientific temper of the ancient indians did not lead to one discovery after another leading to tech-world. Instead, they realised that no matter what is achieved in the realm of this world of objects, there was no lasting happiness. So,they paused and started seeking answers for very basic questions like "who are we? why are we here? what is the way of permanent happiness?".
The quest gripped them so much that they simply gave up worldy science.
The answers to these questions are beyond the five senses and intellect. A seemingly simple question "who am I?" has no answer in the realm of mind, apart from play of words.
The progress achieved on this front is tremendous. When one studies the scriptures of sanatana dharma, the modern psychology looks like kid-stuff. I strongly believe that after much ado about all the science, mankind will be forced to direct their enquiry in this direction.
Is the current model of progress & development most appropriate? Happy reflection!
This way of life did not lead to progress on the worldly side. Mostly, there are two types of reactions from the so called "educated" people on this aspect:
- India & its dharma are useless. Had Indians did not waste their time on dharma, they would have surpassed west in scientific & technological fields :-(
- India had discovered everything including airplanes, surgery (surprise!) and over a period of time secrets were lost :-)
From whatever I have gathered, both represent highly biased opinions, which are based on very very superficial analysis. Why so?
Indians were far ahead of others upto some point in history. When people in other parts of the world were still nomads, indians were already predicting eclipses based on the planetary observations! The important concept of zero was introduced by indians. Is it likely that such people did not have scientific temper?
The scientific temper of the ancient indians did not lead to one discovery after another leading to tech-world. Instead, they realised that no matter what is achieved in the realm of this world of objects, there was no lasting happiness. So,they paused and started seeking answers for very basic questions like "who are we? why are we here? what is the way of permanent happiness?".
The quest gripped them so much that they simply gave up worldy science.
The answers to these questions are beyond the five senses and intellect. A seemingly simple question "who am I?" has no answer in the realm of mind, apart from play of words.
The progress achieved on this front is tremendous. When one studies the scriptures of sanatana dharma, the modern psychology looks like kid-stuff. I strongly believe that after much ado about all the science, mankind will be forced to direct their enquiry in this direction.
Is the current model of progress & development most appropriate? Happy reflection!
# posted by M P Keshava @ 9:05 AM 
