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ETERNAL INDIA 10---ETERNAL HALF WORLDLINESS
KN Rao
29 December 2007, 6:36 AM
Forget the imperial propaganda and look at the growing, prospering, consumerist India of the twenty first century to know that Hindus love the material as deeply as anyone else in the world but with a difference---there is the other life, more sublime, to be wished for and attainable because they see examples of sublime spiritual life also of vanaprasthais and sanyasis.
It is not an otherworldly India but a worldly India with an other worldly ambition based on realism. That is the brilliance and beauty of division of life into four ashrams, brahmacharya, grihastha, vanaprastha and sannyas. To practise is the another four fold division of our efforts, known as purusharthas, dharma, artha, kaama and moksha.
The average Hindu mother trains her children in some sort of dharma right from childhood herself remaining hundred percent worldly.
Dharma is not the path to salvation but the path to religious thinking. You see a contradiction here. The child see its parents lead purely worldly life but talking of God and religion. It is not hypocrisy but the tradition of dharma. Then pursuing worldly life, money, sex, enjoyments are normal. These are artha and kama. The child sees great examples of worldly pursuits and also of acceptance of dharma.
Some of them, only some of the rarest of them, enter vanaprastha ashram and pursue moksha as the final aim. That is the eternal tradition of eternal India. It is actually, half other worldliness in most of the cases. Temple going, visiting pilgrimages, getting initiated by a guru are part of such a life. But does it end here? No. They also accept the supernormal as a fact of life.
Brajendra of Vrindavan
But let us not forget that in India we have strange supernormal experiences when you expect them least. Among many I have witnessed one relating to Brajendra, the wonder boy from Vrindavan who used to stay with me in the period 1980 to 84 in my Delhi residence had caused such a big commotion in many circles, from the poor, middle class families to the rich and mighty.
The boy had supernormal powers and could predict and forecast for people just by looking at them. I have referred to him in my longish article on Dr. Nagendra Singh, ( Predicting through Astrology and Clairvoyance) the former Justice of the International Court of Justice. He had told him that he (Nagendra Singh) would be re-elected for the ICJ for a term of seven years while the term was for nine years. I had predicted his reelection only.
Dr. Nagendra Singh did not live to complete his full nine years but died in the seventh year. How could Brajendra, a five year old boy with poorest powers of expression predict so easily for so many so often? In India, such phenomenon does not create big sensation while in USA they would immediately jump at it and produce a book calling him the greatest psychic of the world. But he had become something of a folk icon so long as he had those powers which he lost soon after and has now become a common half rustic young man.
But it is the reality of the Indian life--the normal and the supernormal co-exist, a perfect blending for the acceptance of holistic approach to life. It is here that astrology begins to play such a big part in our daily lives. The acceptance of holistic approach leads to the acceptance of the worldly and other worldly at the same time which makes most of us half other worldly. Scratch a Hindu and somewhere inside him you find a belief in the supernormal. It is a strange land, a land of hypocrisies and contradictions.Sample some examples.
1. A girl from an orthodox family does her MBA course, changes jobs four times and lovers three times in five years. Then when she decides to marry her latest lover, she wants her horoscope to be tallied with that of her latest lover. It is a universal fantasy that she must have astrological approval for her love affair while the fact is that when she has chosen someone herself, astrology has become irrelevant for her. If you refuse to do it as an astrologer, she will go to someone else who may frighten her and make substantial money in the name of remedial measures. I will give a strange instance of such a case subsequently.
2. India was, is and will always be a land of great hypocrisy, like every nation in the world, and also genuine spirituality, unlike other nations particularly in the west. If this contradition is understood then you accept this strange land called India, the land of great rishis and great frauds, genuine spiritual gurus and those fake ones who claim to have a great parampara and indulge in adultery uttering Sanskrit shlokas!
3. You have DMK and the chief minister of West Bengal questioning and doubting the existence of Lord Rama and a vast majority of Hindus protesting. That is the hypocritical brand of secularim handed over to the nation by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and the Congress party to the nation none of whom dare to utter a single word that would hurt the adherents of other religions. If a Hindu leader atttacks Hindu belief it is secularism.
4. Examine any aspect of Indian life and there is glut of hypocrisy and double standards. Astrology and some genuine saints restore your faith in the supernormal. Life goes on in this manner. It is a baffling, confusing life. Kamasutra and Khajuraho and Kedarnath and Kashi all exist in his life and he sees no contradiction in it because life must have all this and heaven too. That is the half worldly life.
5. Article 498, Domestic Violence Act for married women and Article 376 for unmarried girls are said to be the trishul (trident) in the hands of the girls in India to torture males now. Earlier, it was the marriage of the girl that was a story of torture. Now, the story is reversed. Is that the great India of rishis we boast of ? It is a strange experience to see the pitiable victims, the male and his family who have suffered imprisonment for some days in a jail.
What is other worldly element in it?
Yes, they go to astrologers, tantricks anyone who claims to have supernormal powers to change fate and spend a fortune. They will visit temples, go to pilgrimages and claim to be following some guru even.That is the half worldly India, indulge in villanies and take the help of someone who claims to have supernormal powers.
The villanous girl who now can torture her husband, armed with new legislation, also breaks down at some stage and is trapped by a Tantrik who exploits her sexually. Mostly, the belief in the supernormal, particularly Tantriks, by these women has proved dangerous. It means that the so-called belief in the supernatural proves to be their doom.
( 8 December 2007)
It is not an otherworldly India but a worldly India with an other worldly ambition based on realism. That is the brilliance and beauty of division of life into four ashrams, brahmacharya, grihastha, vanaprastha and sannyas. To practise is the another four fold division of our efforts, known as purusharthas, dharma, artha, kaama and moksha.
The average Hindu mother trains her children in some sort of dharma right from childhood herself remaining hundred percent worldly.
Dharma is not the path to salvation but the path to religious thinking. You see a contradiction here. The child see its parents lead purely worldly life but talking of God and religion. It is not hypocrisy but the tradition of dharma. Then pursuing worldly life, money, sex, enjoyments are normal. These are artha and kama. The child sees great examples of worldly pursuits and also of acceptance of dharma.
Some of them, only some of the rarest of them, enter vanaprastha ashram and pursue moksha as the final aim. That is the eternal tradition of eternal India. It is actually, half other worldliness in most of the cases. Temple going, visiting pilgrimages, getting initiated by a guru are part of such a life. But does it end here? No. They also accept the supernormal as a fact of life.
Brajendra of Vrindavan
But let us not forget that in India we have strange supernormal experiences when you expect them least. Among many I have witnessed one relating to Brajendra, the wonder boy from Vrindavan who used to stay with me in the period 1980 to 84 in my Delhi residence had caused such a big commotion in many circles, from the poor, middle class families to the rich and mighty.
The boy had supernormal powers and could predict and forecast for people just by looking at them. I have referred to him in my longish article on Dr. Nagendra Singh, ( Predicting through Astrology and Clairvoyance) the former Justice of the International Court of Justice. He had told him that he (Nagendra Singh) would be re-elected for the ICJ for a term of seven years while the term was for nine years. I had predicted his reelection only.
Dr. Nagendra Singh did not live to complete his full nine years but died in the seventh year. How could Brajendra, a five year old boy with poorest powers of expression predict so easily for so many so often? In India, such phenomenon does not create big sensation while in USA they would immediately jump at it and produce a book calling him the greatest psychic of the world. But he had become something of a folk icon so long as he had those powers which he lost soon after and has now become a common half rustic young man.
But it is the reality of the Indian life--the normal and the supernormal co-exist, a perfect blending for the acceptance of holistic approach to life. It is here that astrology begins to play such a big part in our daily lives. The acceptance of holistic approach leads to the acceptance of the worldly and other worldly at the same time which makes most of us half other worldly. Scratch a Hindu and somewhere inside him you find a belief in the supernormal. It is a strange land, a land of hypocrisies and contradictions.Sample some examples.
1. A girl from an orthodox family does her MBA course, changes jobs four times and lovers three times in five years. Then when she decides to marry her latest lover, she wants her horoscope to be tallied with that of her latest lover. It is a universal fantasy that she must have astrological approval for her love affair while the fact is that when she has chosen someone herself, astrology has become irrelevant for her. If you refuse to do it as an astrologer, she will go to someone else who may frighten her and make substantial money in the name of remedial measures. I will give a strange instance of such a case subsequently.
2. India was, is and will always be a land of great hypocrisy, like every nation in the world, and also genuine spirituality, unlike other nations particularly in the west. If this contradition is understood then you accept this strange land called India, the land of great rishis and great frauds, genuine spiritual gurus and those fake ones who claim to have a great parampara and indulge in adultery uttering Sanskrit shlokas!
3. You have DMK and the chief minister of West Bengal questioning and doubting the existence of Lord Rama and a vast majority of Hindus protesting. That is the hypocritical brand of secularim handed over to the nation by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and the Congress party to the nation none of whom dare to utter a single word that would hurt the adherents of other religions. If a Hindu leader atttacks Hindu belief it is secularism.
4. Examine any aspect of Indian life and there is glut of hypocrisy and double standards. Astrology and some genuine saints restore your faith in the supernormal. Life goes on in this manner. It is a baffling, confusing life. Kamasutra and Khajuraho and Kedarnath and Kashi all exist in his life and he sees no contradiction in it because life must have all this and heaven too. That is the half worldly life.
5. Article 498, Domestic Violence Act for married women and Article 376 for unmarried girls are said to be the trishul (trident) in the hands of the girls in India to torture males now. Earlier, it was the marriage of the girl that was a story of torture. Now, the story is reversed. Is that the great India of rishis we boast of ? It is a strange experience to see the pitiable victims, the male and his family who have suffered imprisonment for some days in a jail.
What is other worldly element in it?
Yes, they go to astrologers, tantricks anyone who claims to have supernormal powers to change fate and spend a fortune. They will visit temples, go to pilgrimages and claim to be following some guru even.That is the half worldly India, indulge in villanies and take the help of someone who claims to have supernormal powers.
The villanous girl who now can torture her husband, armed with new legislation, also breaks down at some stage and is trapped by a Tantrik who exploits her sexually. Mostly, the belief in the supernormal, particularly Tantriks, by these women has proved dangerous. It means that the so-called belief in the supernatural proves to be their doom.
( 8 December 2007)