<!--QuoteBegin-Pandyan+Jun 20 2008, 08:47 PM-->QUOTE(Pandyan @ Jun 20 2008, 08:47 PM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->Me, not being a Brahmin, wanted to know if there were contributions from other castes as well.[right][snapback]83086[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->You're a Hindu/Dharmic. That's all that's necessary to know, and it's certainly all that is necessary in order to have an equal share in it. Never let anyone convince you differently.
Everything any Hindu ever did is our inheritance. The Shaivite dynasty in Afghanistan (Shahiyas) kept islam at bay? We are Hindus, they were Hindus - therefore we are their only direct descendants and are so in the only sense that matters. The rest is nitpicking about details (distance, time). The Chozhas and Pandyas - your chosen username! - built Tamizh Hindu Kovils? Hence Kashmiri and Bengali Hindus can boast with equal shamelessness about the magnificent Temples their ancestors of TN built.
This has always been Hindu/Dharmic mentality. That's why when the older members of my family narrated episodes from the Itihasas and Puranas, they tell it in the way that comes naturally to us all: "Then, our Rama and Sita left for the forest accompanied by Lakshmana." My family is neither from Ayodhya nor descended from Rama nor are they Kshatriyas. (Of course, Rama is <i>also</i> "our" in a different sense.) Similar for the retellings of how Pandavas did this and that (Kauravas are never "our", of course <!--emo&
--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo-->) and for how various Rajas of TN built Kovil X for Umachi or fought Rakshasa Y according to local historical traditions.
Whatever our Hindu ancestors did - regardless of their community - is the heritage of all Hindus. The background of a historical Dharmic is immaterial. (The only time this is brought up is when people get brainwashed into saying community X did not contribute.)
What they did is all of ours by right. All the people who served our country and Dharma in their many ways - whether they are named and remembered by name today or whether they worked anonymously (and regardless of how insignificant they imagined their own contributions were at the time) - all those people are our ancestors. And everything they did mattered and matters to us, and it's inconsequential how grand their efforts may or may not have turned out some centuries down the track (remember that humans contribute in small ways as well as large, though people tend to notice only the large kind). What they did and/or achieved is a maalai ("garland") for our Dharma. And we are the inheritors of that. No one else.
For instance, I have no reservations about mentioning how everything that the Reddy Kings did (all the way in AP) are the work of my Hindu ancestors. Because they are. Therefore it is not wrong for me to state the obvious.
So what I'm saying is: You have every right to ownership. No one can deny it you. Take it then.
Everything any Hindu ever did is our inheritance. The Shaivite dynasty in Afghanistan (Shahiyas) kept islam at bay? We are Hindus, they were Hindus - therefore we are their only direct descendants and are so in the only sense that matters. The rest is nitpicking about details (distance, time). The Chozhas and Pandyas - your chosen username! - built Tamizh Hindu Kovils? Hence Kashmiri and Bengali Hindus can boast with equal shamelessness about the magnificent Temples their ancestors of TN built.
This has always been Hindu/Dharmic mentality. That's why when the older members of my family narrated episodes from the Itihasas and Puranas, they tell it in the way that comes naturally to us all: "Then, our Rama and Sita left for the forest accompanied by Lakshmana." My family is neither from Ayodhya nor descended from Rama nor are they Kshatriyas. (Of course, Rama is <i>also</i> "our" in a different sense.) Similar for the retellings of how Pandavas did this and that (Kauravas are never "our", of course <!--emo&
--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo-->) and for how various Rajas of TN built Kovil X for Umachi or fought Rakshasa Y according to local historical traditions.Whatever our Hindu ancestors did - regardless of their community - is the heritage of all Hindus. The background of a historical Dharmic is immaterial. (The only time this is brought up is when people get brainwashed into saying community X did not contribute.)
What they did is all of ours by right. All the people who served our country and Dharma in their many ways - whether they are named and remembered by name today or whether they worked anonymously (and regardless of how insignificant they imagined their own contributions were at the time) - all those people are our ancestors. And everything they did mattered and matters to us, and it's inconsequential how grand their efforts may or may not have turned out some centuries down the track (remember that humans contribute in small ways as well as large, though people tend to notice only the large kind). What they did and/or achieved is a maalai ("garland") for our Dharma. And we are the inheritors of that. No one else.
For instance, I have no reservations about mentioning how everything that the Reddy Kings did (all the way in AP) are the work of my Hindu ancestors. Because they are. Therefore it is not wrong for me to state the obvious.
So what I'm saying is: You have every right to ownership. No one can deny it you. Take it then.