Husky, Please understand the difference in purpose of the two separate approaches to studying the itihAsa-purANa-s.
- For the orthodox/religious student, the historicity of any thing does not matter. itihAsa-purANa is a source of religious inspiration and practice for him.
- For the history/archaeology student, the religiousity matters little and the text is a source of understanding of old times.
Both are valid, as long as scope of the purpose of their study is clear in their minds. Confusion starts when either of them start meddling in the realm of the other. Like when the mlechCha indologists with their half-understanding and their own motivations, start "interpreting" the Hindu traditions. Equally likewise, when the religious ones start claiming their belief as practiced today to be the literal history of the bygone time.
Then there is a valid overlapping ground too -- religious Hindu using modern means to ALSO understanding the past of his practice and beleifs. For him are all these troubles you mention. But for him, the way out is to clearly understand the framework of the ancestors -- the difference between the 'Past' and 'History' has to be understood. This was so eloquently explained by Balagangadhara in context of rAmasetu in the article recently posted by dhu on some other thread.
Since I do not want you to get angry at me, let me illustrate with a rather less offensive example. Recently a discussion had come up, when orthodox ones claimed that the philosophy of vegetarianism, as prevalent today, had always been practiced like that in the Hindu society. To do this, a gentleman, very learned of course, had gone to lengths to prove the 'correct' interpretations of the texts. That is when the conflict starts. Yes, today's Hindu traditions largely teach vegetarianism, for a long time now. That should be good enough conclusion for the orthodox ones. But claiming that it has 'always' been so, this is nothing but ahistoric claim. So again, the religious/practicing Hindu, who also wants to study these sources for the sake of History, should understand that all practices, all beliefs, and traditions have evolved (or devolved as per some) over time. One should understand that there is this time factor that changes all human things including the practices in religious realm. The claim for sanAtana dharma in its present form to historically be "sanAtana", in literal sense of the term, becomes a major source of the confusion.
- For the orthodox/religious student, the historicity of any thing does not matter. itihAsa-purANa is a source of religious inspiration and practice for him.
- For the history/archaeology student, the religiousity matters little and the text is a source of understanding of old times.
Both are valid, as long as scope of the purpose of their study is clear in their minds. Confusion starts when either of them start meddling in the realm of the other. Like when the mlechCha indologists with their half-understanding and their own motivations, start "interpreting" the Hindu traditions. Equally likewise, when the religious ones start claiming their belief as practiced today to be the literal history of the bygone time.
Then there is a valid overlapping ground too -- religious Hindu using modern means to ALSO understanding the past of his practice and beleifs. For him are all these troubles you mention. But for him, the way out is to clearly understand the framework of the ancestors -- the difference between the 'Past' and 'History' has to be understood. This was so eloquently explained by Balagangadhara in context of rAmasetu in the article recently posted by dhu on some other thread.
Since I do not want you to get angry at me, let me illustrate with a rather less offensive example. Recently a discussion had come up, when orthodox ones claimed that the philosophy of vegetarianism, as prevalent today, had always been practiced like that in the Hindu society. To do this, a gentleman, very learned of course, had gone to lengths to prove the 'correct' interpretations of the texts. That is when the conflict starts. Yes, today's Hindu traditions largely teach vegetarianism, for a long time now. That should be good enough conclusion for the orthodox ones. But claiming that it has 'always' been so, this is nothing but ahistoric claim. So again, the religious/practicing Hindu, who also wants to study these sources for the sake of History, should understand that all practices, all beliefs, and traditions have evolved (or devolved as per some) over time. One should understand that there is this time factor that changes all human things including the practices in religious realm. The claim for sanAtana dharma in its present form to historically be "sanAtana", in literal sense of the term, becomes a major source of the confusion.