Is India A Spiritual Disneyland
By Ram Lingam
As a spiritual destination India has been well known for eons.
For centuries, the world has been at India’s doorstep for her science
and wealth and got influenced by her spirituality. Given the smorgasbord of
spiritual traditions in India,
India has been called a
spiritual Disneyland for a decade or so by
people who got instructed into the transcendent. So, does that make India a Spiritual Disneyland
and is this term justified?
In 2004 Alfred Ford, a great grandson of Henry Ford was
planning a magnificent religious complex in Paschim Banga (West Bengal)
at the headquarters of the global Hare Krishna sect which he liked to call as a
‘spiritual Disneyland’ . This complex he said was planned as a retreat to
rejuvenate spirit and body.
Some more examples…
Another such place that many said was close to a spiritual Disneyland experience (minus the guy in the Goofy outfit) was the Sathya Sai Baba Ashram in Puttaparthi, Andhra Pradesh. However this term was not restricted to guru based ashrams and movements.
Another such place that many said was close to a spiritual Disneyland experience (minus the guy in the Goofy outfit) was the Sathya Sai Baba Ashram in Puttaparthi, Andhra Pradesh. However this term was not restricted to guru based ashrams and movements.
The pilgrim township of the Himalayan Rishikesh was also
called ‘spiritual Disneyland’ by visitors who
experienced package of meditation, tantric yoga and spiritual inspiration. In
the same league of being a spiritual Disneyland is the Akshardham temple – a
100-acre cultural complex with 20,000 superbly sculpted figures, over 2 km long
double-storeyed pilgrim pathway, 22-acres of lush lawns and trees with 900,000
saplings and shrubs of 250 varieties. Auroville ashram in Puducherry was also
termed that way by ardent devotees. Off late, even the BJP a national political
party included this term ‘spiritual Disneyland’
in their latest election manifesto only to boost religious tourism in Uttar
Pradesh.
Is this ‘spiritual Disneyland’ a right
term for India?
This term ‘spiritual Disneyland’ is probably poorly conceived as Indian spiritual destinations are no fantasy-lands and like Disneyland there is no entertainment value in Indian spirituality. Rather India could be called as a Global spiritual university where one can undertake a journey in learning to be fuller, holy and happier day after day.
This term ‘spiritual Disneyland’ is probably poorly conceived as Indian spiritual destinations are no fantasy-lands and like Disneyland there is no entertainment value in Indian spirituality. Rather India could be called as a Global spiritual university where one can undertake a journey in learning to be fuller, holy and happier day after day.
Says Osho,
India’s
brilliant mystic,
“India is a symbol for nothing else
except for learning meditation. It is a university of meditation and it is not
just today – for centuries it has been the University of Meditation”.
Why India has been a mystical land…
For centuries, India has been a mystical land of
meditation, contemplation and enlightenment where spiritual traditions
flourished and still continuing to inspire. Given that India was the birthplace of non-dogmatic
dharma-based traditions of Sanatan Dharma, Baudh Dharma, Jaina Dharma and Sikh
Dharma, of which the first three are ancient, it is no surprise that India also has
had many enlightened masters and Gurus. This happened despite who the ruler was
and despite notorious invasions into the country since c. 300 BCE.
The invasions were from the North, West and the East for
various reasons but had no detrimental effect on spiritual India. Of those
who invaded India,
majority of them were looters, rank despots and iconoclasts. They came simply
because India
had immense wealth.
According to modern economic historians
between the 1st and 11th century CE, ancient India
produced roughly 30% of the world’s GDP, followed by China. By comparison, in 1,000 CE
entire Europe’s GDP was just 11%.
Wealth being the main attraction of the invaders, the
science and spirituality only caught the attention of the intellectuals,
scholars and pilgrims. Hardly any invader could understand the hidden or real India because
they came from mono-cultures and never had any exposure to the diversity that
Indian society had, especially in the realm of spirituality.
How to know the real spiritual India?
To get a fair understanding of real spiritual India, one
can go through tons of Indian literary sources, royal court records, dynasty
charitras, archeological evidence, inscriptions, coins, monuments, temple
structures and accounts of those intellectuals who visited India like the Greek
ethnographer Megasthenes (350 – 290 BCE), the Chinese pilgrims Fa-Hien (337 –
422 CE) and Huang Tsang (602 – 664 CE), the Iranian Alberuni (978-1048CE) etc.
Another simper way is to visit any ashram and learn from a Guru who suits your
rationality.
But finding the spiritual India
in today’s modern India,
which has become a land of contrasts and stereotyped mainly on the
negatives, is not easy. The stereotypes about India are due to a short sighted
and one-eyed pedestrian view and an inability to recognize the hidden treasure.
The pedestrian view is unable to make out the sublime and the spiritual out of
the materially inadequate India.
However with the information age, things are changing and spiritual India is
getting the recognition it deserves.
Where to find the real stuff…
As with the typical diversity of Indian food, climates,
languages, sub-cultures, sects, customs, traditions etc, India has
various pilgrimage and spiritual places all over the country. India is well
known for being a spiritual land for pilgrimages.
Modern India
still has all those holy places that ancient India had plus much more that shows
us the real stuff. India has the holy cities, the sacred rivers, the abodes of
divinities, the 4 Char-dhaam destinations, the 12 Jyotirling temples, the eight
Ashta-Vinayak temples, the 6 Aaru-padai Murugan temples, the 56 Shaktipeeths,
the temple cities like Tirupati, Madurai, Mathura etc, the various ashrams of
the Gurus, birthplaces of the god incarnations, ancient temples and caves,
places of enlightenment of the Gurus, the spiritual monuments of the various
global movements and sects, etc…the list can go on.
Add to this the ancient monuments which keep inspiring the
seekers. In fact, each state in India
has a good share of many of the above holy places. One can also even follow the
Buddhist trail to explore the true essence of Baudh Dharma – traveling to those
places that were sanctified by the great Lord Buddha. This trail has beautiful
caves, awe-inspiring monasteries, ancient Stupas, impressive shrines etc. of
Lord Buddha. Same is with Jain and Sikh places of worship.
What’s an alternative term…
So a tag like spiritual Disneyland to Indian holy places
is at best a gimmicky way of highlighting the wonderment of India’s
cultural and the spiritual assets that are beyond normal
comprehension. Moreover Disneyland as we
all know is an American amusement park and a fantasyland mainly with fictional
characters for children. To call Indian holy spots as a spiritual Disneyland is
not apt as India
is a treasure trove of spirituality for all humanity and cannot be analogous to
a fantasyland, even for marketing sake.
Spirituality
is an inner quest and a staid one to which any commercial labeling is distasteful.
Perhaps a better term for India
would be ‘Spiritual
University” or even a
“Spiritual multiversity”. Or how about calling “India
– the Fifth avenue of spirituality” or even”India – Rodeo drive for
spirituality”.
Om Tat Sat
(Continued...)
(My
humble salutations to Sri Ramalingam ji and hindu samskrit dot com for the collection)
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