Indian
Philosphy
by
Brahmasrii
Dr K C Varadachari
Buddhism when it went to china thanks to the scholar
monks at the invitation of the leading men of that country and was embraced by
them, was in a sense supplying a want in the people. Good conduct even in the
light of the Tao was not enough. Nor is this world-affirmation enough. There is
a yearning to know the mystery of the beyond and mystery of birth itself.
Buddhism has assumed that there is a beyond of blessedness and a returning
cycle of misery if one does not go beyond. The role that it played in India was in a sense reversed, whilst in India it was a
religion of negations it became even through its very negations a religion of
affirmations abroad. China
found in Buddha deliverer of the people from the thraldom to a habit of decency
and humanism to which Taoism led it, though it should be pointed out that it
was not so easy to confine Taoism to habit of cultured humanism. It required a
strenuous awareness even as Zen had demanded but as we know there is a fatality
in all practice that makes even consciousness sink into automations and habits.
Buddhism gave a clear impetus to the rousing of the imagination of the people
and in this great process of renunciation of life and
search for Bodhi or illumination arrived at by
renunciation of all life-values it formulated the greater vehicle. What
obviously could not be developed in India for Buddha in the context of
Indian mythology was developed abroad in the form of Mahayana theology of the
Buddha. Great concepts and techniques were developed. The bodhisattva and the
hierarchical arrangement of all the Gods, the mystico-occult methods of worship
all returned to the scene of the Buddha. Tantricism also developed along with
the basic urge to transcend all processes of nature. All desires were sought to
be yoked to the all embracing desire for nirvana and with a logic that is
capable of being understood only in the context of the need to satisfy the
lower human nature somehow. Sublimation might have been the aim but it is clear
that after a brief while they lost their capacity to transform man. It is no
longer the religion that Buddha taught but a Buddhism that somehow fulfilled
the needs of the hearts and passions of men that came to stay. However the
solemn beauty of a Buddha was a more personal matter than the impersonal Tao,
and China retained Buddha though not his basic teaching which was not quite
different in
matters pertaining to human conduct other than its own
original Taoism.
The
charm of Buddha, his purity and compassion, which is the dynamic urge in him to
change and transform men into real seekers after peace and health in the
nirvana have always that attractiveness which ages cannot remove. Even today
the message of Buddha appeals because there is in it the secret of peaceful
life, a life of renunciation and reason, a profound inner satisfaction of going
beyond the ego of a thousand personalities or masks or births.
Buddha
called upon man to form a true society or egoless souls and his greatest
concern was to see that such a satsangh grew up and did not develop the cult
consciousness or church consciousness which is but a glorified ego. That is why
the nihilism of the ego in whatever form or of whatever pattern individual or
social was his main consideration. Man should seek to be nobody, he should
absorb himself in the Buddha who is absolutely free from all ego. Buddham
Saranam Gacchami prays the Buddhist and only secondly does he say Dharmam
Saranam Gacchami, which is the
dharma of renunciation of ego and acceptance of all rules
and methods which lead to the abolition of the ego, and lastly alone did he
counsel the prayer of Sangham Saranam Gacchami for the sangha is the council of
egoless men who increase the egolessness rather than promote it, not even for
the sangha. However this last has been rarely achieved, and the sangha kills
the dharma and the Buddha.
A note:
Buddhism
influenced all the schools of Indian philosophy in a basic sense in so far as
it focussed the attention on the problem of human suffering rather than on the
problem of knowledge. Knowledge is not an end in itself but it is undoubtedly
the means for liberation from sorrow. This knowledge is not the knowledge of
reality but the knowledge of the causes of human sorrow. Likely it is that this
problem was under the surface consciousness of the vedic seers who were engrossed
in the metaphysical reality, the original cause of all things and of oneself.
This large problem was restricted to an ethical level not as a search for the
good, but as a search for the means of liberation from
misery.
We
can see that almost all the systems: Vaisesika, Nyaya, Samkhya and Yoga have
made the pratijna or assertion of their problem of relief from suffering
through knowledge. The Vaisesika Nyaya held that the knowledge of the
categories of experience (saptapadarthi) and knowledge of the categories of
dialectic or controversy are enough to liberate one from misery. Samkhya taught
that the knowledge of the nature of prakrti and her evolution and the nature of
the purusa or soul will liberate one from misery. Buddhism alone clearly put it
that such knowledge of categories however valuable as knowledge does not lead
to liberation but to a false sense of liberation. Thus Buddha gave up the path
of Yoga too which was dependent on this samkhyan approach. Buddha counselled
that the fourfold truths ought to be known and practiced. Thus the problem of
suffering was the paramount concern of Buddha and other schools had to answer
the problem. Even Vedanta had to assure its followers that liberation from
samsara or suffering will be final and complete only when Brahman the original
cause is known. Thus the causal approach which is
considered to be the approach of rationality has been the significant direction
of Buddhist philosophical ethical problem and solution.
ABHAVA
AND ANUPALABDHI OR Non – Existence and Non – perception
The
perception of non – existence is obviously rendered by the means of knowledge
known as anupalabdhi. This pramana or right means of knowledge has to be
admitted because it is claimed that this is a case of kevalavyatireki as a
matter of fact for in the example ‘when there is no vision of an object there
is no existence of it also since where there is vision of an object there is
its existence. But it is seen that there is no manner by which one can grasp
the want of vision or want of existence. This negative conjunction, if we may
so say is a case of kevalavyatireki and it can never be really a method of
arriving at an invariable concomitance. Negative being is held to be not an
object of perception though Naiyayikas have held that non-existence is
perceived as when we do not a fruit on a table where it was before.
a thing we look out for. Thus non-existence is dependent
only in respect of objects which are objects of perception, or revelation.
One
of the most important defects of medieval logistics is that it does not see
that its illustrations aim at proving the truth of revelation from the
observance of ordinary experiences or perceptions. Understood in the sense,
that the main motive of these scholars was to accept the pramanas which
indirectly can prove their metaphysical assumptions from revelation, we can
find that non-perception is used as a pramana to substantiate the non-existence
of an object. “Non-perception of a sensible object generates the notion of negation
immediately and not through other negations”. (Das Gupta. Vol I.p399). Advaita
utilizes this anupalabdhi of the Mimamsakas (Kumarila school) to hold that
negation is not a perception but merely the absence of perception. Thus abhava
is an inference based on the absence of perception.
However
let us ask ourselves in what context this pramana is being used even as
pratyaksa, anumana and sabda are being used.
The logic of Negation in Advaita Vedanta proceeds on the
ground of fundamental contrariety between perception facts and revelational
facts. The word ‘facts’ is used to designate the reality and existence of these
kinds – the phenomenal and the noumenal. This basic difference has to rest on
the reality or existence of both kinds of realities, the sensate and the
non-sensate (Brahmic). The two are in a sense related to each other as a
appearance and reality. If the two realms are held to be equally present as
facets or faces of one reality it would follow that we grant to the appearance
a permanence that cannot be removed. This is indeed a difficulty for the
general purpose of knowledge which assumes that there is a wide divergence
between the two and seeks to get rid of appearance as equivalent to
non-existence.
Thus
it assumes that there is contrariety between Brahman and the world including
the souls, and if the one is positive the other is negative and this logical
assertion is based on the psychological experience of non-presence of the
characteristics of the one in the other. Thus the world has qualities, has
change, has motion and differentiation or plurality, and
contrarily Brahman has the non-presence of these. However
whilst we see the world, we do not see inferential one so long as there is no
intuitive anubhava of Brahman. The contrariety then ceases to be just logical
but becomes psychological. That this experience of Brahman should lead to the
denial of the characteristics of the world and the souls of it is but natural
but not inevitable. The experience of Brahman as existence, intelligence, bliss
is a positive one, whereas the experience of its being without the qualities of
nature or its characteristics is a negative one in relation to the known world
and self. The former is intuitive and transcendental to the inferential and
perceptual and as such ‘other’ than these but need not be contradictory but
only an other: the latter is a logical hypostatis of the non-existence of the
perception as the Brahman – an inferential conclusion based on the
correlativity of negational predications.
Advaita
thus in so far as it uses anupalabdhi or non-perception of the non-existence as
a means of proof or right knowledge concerns itself with the field of
non-perceived existents but how it could pass to non-existence is a mystery.
Non-perception of non-
existence is not capable of yielding any real positive
knowledge of the existents. The question then to be considered is how we can
speak of Maya as a existence or non-existence or both at once or as
indescribable in logical alternatives (kotis). Further to hold that anupalabdhi
is capable of being the proof for non-existence almost amounts to the
solipsistic view of esse ist percipi which is its polar-opposite-criterion.
That
this is certainly not the view of Advaita we can immediately realize and therefore
it is necessary to inspect a little more carefully what anupalabdhi means. It
is the most important part of our investigation to ask whether upalabdhi means
just sensory perception or all experience of anubhava. By parity of reasoning
which we adopted in respect of upamana and Upanishad, upalabdhi refers to the
concept of near or correspondential or similar identity. The non-existence of
that correspondential or similarity is what is strictly meant by anupalabdhi.
In respect of the real transcendental which is beyond all perceptions and
mindings and language, which cannot be grasped by any of these modes of
knowings, it is clear that it must be seized by a mode which is not like other
pramanas.
Thus it follows the existence of the transcendent is known
negatively by denial of the known characteristics in every sense of these. It
is not therefore that anupalabdhi (non-perception) is non-experience of the
non-existence, which is the significance of the negation of the nirvana concept
of the Buddhists. On the other hand, the anupalabdhi reveals the existence of
the transcendent, however much in a negative way.
The
mimamsa explanation (of kumarila) for the acceptance of this pramana lies in
his trying to explain the dynamic nature of negative perception or
non-perception or perception of the non-existent as in the case of the apurva
or the potency that works later rather than immediately as in causation,
through arthapatti or presumption is sufficient, yet in respect of the dynamic
nature of negation to which Buddhism had called attention, regarding even the
efficacy of the rites or karmas.
Though
anupalabdhi is a species of inference in the sense of our making an immediate
inference yet it is not strictly an inference based on vyapti or invariable
concomitance, observed in perception. Though a logical
instrument it is yet seriously dependent on the necessity
to substantiate the theory of the transcendent which is beyond all perception,
which sabda cannot by itself as aptavacana do. Indeed one is forced to the
conclusion that arthapatti and anupalabdhi and upamana as represented by the
Naiyayika and Purva mimamsa are assumed as the principles of the ‘Logic of the
Infinite’ or the transcendent which help the communication of the truths of the
transcendent or the real infinite to the finite consciousness.
‘A
logic of the Infinite’ thus requires the adaptation of the same principles of
our ordinary finitised and atomized and sensate thinking to the levels of the
Infinite. If we understand the technique of the liaison performed by these
principles without, as it has been unfortunately done even by the expositors of
these principles reducing them to the level of mechanical sensate explanation
or exposition, they would regain the flexibility and mobility and suggestibility
that is the nature of the Infinite consciousness. The sabda as revelation tries
to convey the truths of the transcendent and the Infinite to the
finite sensate mind through these triple pramanas of
Upamana, Anupalabdhi and Arthapatti.
YOGYATA
The
word yogyata means that which is fit for connection, from yoga and yuj - that
which is fit to be associated with or fit for any purpose that might be
realised or needs to be realised. Thus a word or term is fit to be connected
with another word or not; a particular means is fit to be used or is
appropriate for realising an end; or a particular act is appropriate at and for
a function. Surely the use of this word yogyata has been used in many senses.
In the logic of the propositions the word yogyata is used in the sense of a
word or term being fit to follow the first term. The second word that follows
the first is said to be fitness (yogyata). The usual example that is given in
the textbooks looks to be very odd and itself not fit to be an example of
yogyata.
asked is salt (saindhavamanaya)1, this
is a case of ayogyata. But this ayogyata is an example of the ambiguous use of
the word saindhava (horse:salt) rather than an unfitness to the sentence at
all. In fact the unfitness in this case is the ambiguity in the word rather
than the act of bringing horse instead of salt.
A
clear exposition of this fact was made by me in a paper published many years
ago. The three important criteria needed for a meaningful vakya (proposition in
logic rather than a sentence in rhetoric or prose or even in the scripture) are
akanksa (expectancy) yogyata and sannidhi (nearness). The first term evokes
certain questions thus a word saindhavam evokes the questions, which, what,
from where and so on. Any of the answers to these questions respectively would
complete the meaning. Thus if one knows the meaning of the word saindhavam, it
is easy to say what it is and do what is needed; but an ambiguous word makes
any reply impossible: in fact it is not a clear case or it is a meaningless
proposition. Thus the use of un-
1 The usual
example is the fire is sprinkled. This is said to be ayogyata because it is an
impossible thing – of course not impossible today.
ambiguous words is almost one of the additional
necessities in language and this may be stated to be not merely a case of
yogyata but a different condition altogether.
The
expectancy (akanksa) is a valuable condition which reveals the necessity for
completeness of meaning in a proposition - intended statement. The language
construction in respect of statements of truth, either of fact or action or
meaning, is different indeed from the sentences which are definitely
imperatives either categorical or hypothetical or conditional. Imperatives flow
from and towards actions, ethical or political. But statements of truth are not
of the same order. Thus yogyata in this sense would be different even as
expectancy. A servant waiting for the command of his master or a ritualist
performer waiting for the command of his priest or the regiment waiting for an
order, are all cases of imperatives, and expectancy is conditioned by the
situation. There can be no meaningless commands or imperatives of obligation
which are not definitely action – directing. But logical propositions are not
of this order
limited to the predication of the term. There cannot be
any other. Similarly once the second term or the predicate is stated it is
clear that this involves the concept of sannidhya or nearness. The concept of
sannidhya has again suffered at the hands of the logicians in India. The
concept is simply the statement that the akanksa selects the appropriate term
defined by its predicate - nature. The remoteness of the term or nearness of
that term wither in a long winded sentence or in time as separated by many
hours as assumed in the usual description of this condition of sannidhya, seem
to be utterly unintelligible as logical explanations. The first term calls up
the second and this second that is called up is that which is in our experience
contiguous with the former. Thus we know that among the laws of association we
have contiguity, contrast, similarity or striking quality words or terms
becoming associated in our consciousness. Sannidhya seems to mean just
contiguity or nearness or side-by-sideness. Thus a substance will recall its
quality or qualities, a cause will recall the effect which is successive to it,
and the correlative terms seem to be called up. In this thus comprises the
basic meaning of sannidhya.
mean temporal discontinuity in utterance of the words
comprising the sentence or proposition is to miss the natural psychology.
The
usual construction of the Sanskrit sentence is the occurrence of the verb at
the end of it. Thus whilst the English sentence will be Rama is King, the Sanskrit
will Rama king is. Thus the natural linkage between the two previous terms
comes last. Thus akanksa, sannidhi and yogyata stand for the two terms and the
copula of affirmation or denial. Yogyata thus means to express the copula
between the terms. Yogyata includes ayogyata also. So too in the imperative
sentences the yogyata is expressed by the vidhi and its negation by nisedha.
This makes the conditions of the logical proposition clear and precise and not
what the expositors of the three have done in their commentaries.
The
Aristotelian analysis of the proposition reveals this strict naturalness even
as the psychological naturalness of the Indian logician’s exposition of the
nature of a vakya (proposition that is verbalised: vac).
There is one more point that might be referred to in this
connection. The mimamsa rule of interpretation of any name is opposite. Suppose
there is a hymn addressed to Agni and in the course of it there is the name
Indra used to address Agni, the rule enjoins that the word Indra shall be
interpreted as yoga and not a rudhi. The word yoga is usually interpreted as
connotatively by root – meaning rather than any other. Similarly rudhi means
that which has been inculcated as a proper name. All proper names can become
connotative though their normal function is denotative. In this context of
usage this connotative or root meaning should be taken. Yoga here means thus a
merely appropriate to the context meaning. This is the meaning of connectable
(from yuj).
Thus
it can be seen that yogyata is a comprehensive analysis of the entire scope
word – usage in the sentences.
There
is a problem raised whether sentences are to be equated with propositions. A
truth sentence is a judgment (judges pronounce sentences) and sentences must be
clearly a truth statement or real proposition as INDIAN PHILOSOPHY – YOGYATA
contrasted with abstract or unreal or fictional
propositions. Indian logic demands a real logic, a logic set towards the
ascertainment of Reality (correspondence or coherence etc being but ways of
this ascertainment and statement - judgment or sentence). It is therefore clear
that Yogyata is precisely the expression of ascertainment.
SANSKRIT
OUR IMPERATIVE NEED
It
would be indeed quite unnecessary to mention to the most cultured audience of
Sanskrit savants about the glory of our ancient Sanskrit literature which has
continuously fed us with the life blood spiritual freedom, whatever might have
been the vicissitudes of our political life. When therefore it was found that
invisibly for no reason men were beginning to lose interest in this literature,
it was realized at once that we are also going the way of lost civilizations.
Thanks to our spiritual leaders this threat to spiritual life was no sooner
realised met by a definite call to the study of our most ancient Literature,
namely the Vedanta (Upanisads), Bhagavad Gita which has become the gospel of
Gandhi and Tilak and Sri Aurobindo as it was the gospel of Sankara, Ramanuja
and Madhva of old. Ramayana and Mahabharata once again revived interest and
reading translations in English
beginning many a young man not having had Sanskrit
education at the beginning had begun to learn the alphabets and study the Gita.
Indian
philosophy began to be taken serous note of by the Western scholars and not
merely brushed aside. Comparative philosophy and comparative Religion, which
are considered to be scientific approaches to the study of language and
religion entailed close study of Sanskrit which was recognized as one of the
oldest languages in the world. What was more remarkable was that this Ancient
language was not primitive, original and aboriginal, but well-made with its own
grammar and metre and one which could be shown to be the matrix from which the
others took rise. It was thus known as Devanagari and Sanskrit the language of
the Gods (illuminating the mind) and of the cultured (Rsis, seers of truth and
reality).
We
all know that though the earlier writings of the Buddha and Jina were in
prakrts, so called language of the people, later writings needing exactness and
precision had to be in the language of Sanskrit.
respectability but of clarity and it was more the clarity
that gave Sansrkit the lead over the prakrts. However again and again we find
this eclipse of the Sanskrit and its coming to its own, and these synchronise
with the fortunes of the people. Sanskrit again and again was studied to
discover one’s roots. Thus it was a reviving function that Sanskrit played down
the ages of our History. Its inspiration flowed into the regional languages.
When
therefore some say that Sanskrit is a dead language one wonders whether it not
Sanskrit that makes dead languages and dying languages rise from their ashes.
This
secret of Sanskrit is not in the magic of its language as such but what
inalienably it carries with it, the spiritual power that has been imparted to
it by the ancient seers of the Veda. We need not indulge in any sort of
mysticism here: it is that peculiar quality of the Sanskrit language to grant
that spiritual vitality to any thing that it touches. One cannot divorce the
Ultimate Cultural process underway in humanity
which is for the spiritualizing of man from the language
of Sanskrit at all.
The
need to study the language of Sanskrit is not thrown only on the teachers and
research workers but on every body who would like to be undying in the true
sense of the term. Thus in a truer sense than recognized, Sanskrit is the
mother of al culture and of all languages.
In
an age such as ours – the Age of Science and the Age of Self awareness and the
age of the Common man, there are questions raised by people who think that
Sanskrit having been one of the oldest cannot have any place. By that token
materialism in the only language of science and politics and spirit is an outmoded
explanation. This alliance between science and materialism is unholy and not at
all conducive to evolution or good life. Whilst man is extending the limits of
his knowledge of the outer world, and perhaps even making efforts to know about
his own physical body, he is not growing in wisdom that comes from spiritual
culture.
immortality or the immortal-vidyaya amrtam asnute-is no
longer valid, for his knowledge is not capable of making one grow wiser and
saner and holier recognizing the Supreme Divine in all things. He is losing
faith in religion, that bond between man and God, the Universal Self of all,
and lacks the spiritual basis for his life. The gains of science for man
enriches his self confidence whilst promoting his impoverishment in his relations
with other men all the world over and the spiritual unity that supports all.
Far
deeper than any social, economic, political readjustment, mankind is in dire
need of a readjustment on the spiritual plane. What is needed is then the
rediscovery of our roots. Secularism may be a stop-gap arrangement in the
present moment, it is however never to be something that rules out all
spiritual values from the ordinary life of man. The present crisis in the world
or rather series of crises, are all due to the purely secular pursuits, whether
humanistic or scientific or materialistic, all these ignore the spiritual
yearning of man for growth and higher knowledge.
manifestations of life in the universe, human or animal,
plant and mineral. A spiritual reconstruction of mankind alone can save mankind
from self-annihilation. There are undoubtedly many ways proposed for the
rehabilitation of spiritual values and moral rearmaments and so on. However it
is in the lives of dedicated souls that we find this spontaneity of individual
cultural transformation. The problem of Recovery of Faith is as urgent as any
other. How can religion once again become the centre of man’s concern in all
walks of his life? What is gained in comfort from science is unfortunately
bought at great price and the spiritual claims are being brushed aside. However
in India as elsewhere science can be hardly a substitute, for religion. There
are more things in reality and man than the science can explain. However in the
mad race that is on it almost appears that science is winning all along the
line. The Vacuum that it is creating in the lives of the human beings by this
external expansion is however posing or will soon pose problems of serious
concern to secularists themselves. What is the inner restraint that will be
laid on men of science under the control of ambitious men of politics not to
shatter the
world of culture and life and reduce it to ashes and thus
turning the universe into a vast graveyard (smasana)? Indian mythology indeed
speaks of this vast development at the time of Ramayana and how the Avatar once
for all destroyed the destroyers and created a world of culture out the
derelicts of Ravana’s people. So too was the age of Mahabharata. Science set up
for destruction and conquest for secular purposes is moving inevitably (as the
materialists of the dialectical variety say). Our spiritual education alone can
rectify the situation and make real peace possible in this world. It is agreed
that peace is indivisible, and so one should promote peace all round and at
every point of life. Individuals as well as communities and nations have to
learn the bitter lesson that the inordinate pursuit of power through science
will tend to reduce men to the level of monsters. Education is thus central to
our entire development and basic as a programme for peace. But here again what
type of education should we encourage. It is to be integral; the secular must
be subordinated to the spiritual and the spiritual must be made to express
itself through the secular; thus the conflict between the secular and the
spiritual should be resolved not by merely limiting the
domains of each but by permeating the one by the other. Secularism has a
tendency to divide and separate man from man but the spiritual tends to unite
the divided not by annulling the same but by integration. This is clearly seen
in the very development of the organic. Vedanta (and we have three phases of
it) insists that the spiritual govern and determine the birth and growth and
goal of sciences.
That
these syntheses of all arts and crafts (kalas) have been achieved by the
ancient seers of India can well be seen in the Epics and puranas of Yore.
Scientific works of rare quality have been produced and written down in the
technical jargon of each science and today research in these branches of
ancient science seems to be absolutely necessary. The indefatigable Dr.
Raghavan has to be warmly congratulated on his pioneer work but much more has
to be done. Sanskrit was capable of evolving technical language to express
advanced techniques in almost all the sciences, sculpture, iconography, temple
engineering, icon casting, bridge building, metallurgy,
etc., So too the planning of towns and drains and raising
trees and building hospitals and in general town administration suited to the
genius of the spiritual God-centered humanism. Arts also were scientifically
explained and music, dance, plays of all kinds and decorations and dress making
got treatises. So too taming the animals, elephants and horses and bulls became
an art-not only for circus purposes but for spiritual purposes also. Sanskrit
as the vehicle of all literature and scientific knowledge has played an
admirably role which it can even now begin to play. But it requires the large
dedication of men of sincerity and culture who have belief in its intrinsic
spiritual power to rise to fullest heights. Of course it has to conquer the
spirit of the Indian youth by its abiding spiritual quality.
Our
temples in South India played a very great part in our cultural tradition.
Barring certain extremist tendencies, it is undoubtedly a capital fact that
Sanskrit spiritual literature played as great a role as the indigenous
literature which has also a hoary spiritual tradition. The most important
feature that we find is that after the extraordinary collapse of the Buddhist
and
Jaina adventures against the Vedantic tradition (which
one might well refer to their purely humanistic developments if not nihilistic)
that Temples became the centre of all life: Temple Culture is not to be
interpreted as an idolatrous culture, on the contrary it was to make man
ego-centric rather tan ego-centric or anthropo-centric. It was as great a
revolution as the Copernican revolution. Great temples demanding for their
construction and maintenance skills of kinds were dedicated to the cultural
development of a peaceful Society. South Indian Religions have had in common,
whether of the Saiva or Vaisnava denomination, the quest for inward peace as
well as outer harmony between the members of the society or village or town who
had each his allotted function which he did in a spirit of spirituality or
sacrament. Spiritual equality thus became a realized fact that harmonized
without hitch or bitterness with the secular inequality that is organizational.
Thus all gained that Peace that passeth understanding. A harmonious society
demanding from each of its members his task or kriya which he can do and ought
to strive in love to do and do well is bound to stand all the perils of outer
attack.
It was asked recently by an eminent writer as to wherein
lay the strength of the Indian Society, one could well say it lies in the
spiritual unity that pervades all the functions of the men dedicated to God in
the temples. Once the temples are made weak it will not be long that our
society will fall even like the mounds of Buddha.
Practical
religion and culture were the concern of temples and the restoration of the
temples to their pristine function is one of the major concerns of Modern
Administration of the temples. The training of competent Vedic Scholars in the
temples is almost an immediate number one concern. In an age where
technocrative developments are disrupting the original forms and shape of the
members of the different people engaged in the diverse occupations necessary
for the efficient working of the temple, a determined effort has to be made to
attract the best of men to take up this work of the temple to fill in the gap.
Thus the investment on the temple reorganization of all sorts of functions and
needs to suit modern conditions too without much distortion or without and
possibility of distortion of the
ancient ideal is bound to be a very sound investment on
the spiritual side. We need scholars in Sanskrit in large numbers not only for
daily needs of the temple but for spreading Sanskrit Culture in its spiritual
purity to one and all through reciting and expounding the great literature to
all. Surely the Tamil and Telugu literatures will have their role to play but
they would also profit by this integration of themselves with Sanskrit. A new
dynamic spiritual revolution once again centered round the temple which
resembles more and more an autonomous University will transform the minds omen
and turn them away from the glamour of duel, strife and competition, and war.
Cooperation is the central concept of the Temple Culture and we are realizing
that it is by far the best solution to human affairs. It however can never gain
the spiritual strength if it remains as an attractive humanistic ideal or
political solution of our economic needs. A spiritual call to the inward unity
of all and towards cooperation for realising inward peace as well as outer
harmony is about the only plausible solution. Look at the grant monuments and
cities like Kanchi, Srirangam and even lesser cities like Tanjore and Tirupati,
we have the visual picture of a great
peace and harmony brooding over all minds soaking men in
the purity that peace and harmony grant.
Om Tat Sat
(Continued...)
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