02-21-2009, 01:14 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-Husky+Feb 20 2009, 04:30 AM-->QUOTE(Husky @ Feb 20 2009, 04:30 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin--><!--QuoteBegin-Bodhi+Feb 19 2009, 04:07 PM--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Bodhi @ Feb 19 2009, 04:07 PM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->[...] two separate approaches to studying the itihAsa-purANa-s.
[...]
One should understand that there is this time factor that changes all human things including the practices in religious realm.
[right][snapback]94731[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Bodhi was talking about the Itihasas and Puranas not Vedas of course.
But still feel I need to state the obvious:
The Vedas, at least in TN and those parts of Karnataka I am familiar with and possibly other parts of greater Bharatam (in any case I've heard that the matter is the same in AP and Kerala), have been passed down unchanged not only in how they are performed and their recitation (like intonation) - the only things witzel seemed to want to admit to earlier - but also in <i>understanding</i>.
That is, the understanding these traditional Vadyars have of the Vedas is still exactly the same as what Hindus' ancestors had of the material since at least when this whole oral tradition started. Goes without saying that Talageri's (or Elst's, or for that matter Witzel et al's) interpretations of 'what the Vedas are actually saying' is only the <i>modern</i> understanding of what the Vedas 'must have meant' and what 'the ancients must have thought it meant' - it does not actually reflect what the ancient Hindus understood its contents as.
I may be misunderstanding, but I think this is what Dhu was discussing in his posts 83, 84 and 87 of the India/western Sociology, All about sociology - Deconstructing thread. And I imagine this is also what the following person commenting on VijayVaani's review of the latest from Talageri meant:
<!--QuoteBegin-Husky+Jan 5 2009, 03:22 AM-->QUOTE(Husky @ Jan 5 2009, 03:22 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->http://www.vijayvaani.com/FrmPublicDisplay...cle.aspx?id=322
<b>Comments on
"Demolished once for all: Aryan Invasion Theory"
Virendra Parekh</b>
<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Has it ever occurred to anyone, including you, that this entire debate bypasses a whole community of people who are well versed in the vedas? Have you ever noticed any comment from scholars of the Kanchi Kamakoti Peetham, for example? Do you really think that the translations and treatises on the vedas in various Indian universities has any value whatsoever?Â
 seadog4227Â
 04 Jan 2009Â
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->[right][snapback]92678[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->If people want to learn to understand Hindus' <i>past understanding of the Vedas</i>, best to go to some remote village - say in TN or Karnataka or wherever you know they have passed it down in unbroken line and unmodified - and learn from them, rather than learn to understand it from a textbook.
The fact that Witzel offered a position to Talageri (see Wacky on Talageri) and that Talageri refused saying he was an unapologetic nationalist, had long made me think on the matter. The west approves of his work - the methods and class of conclusions he draws - because this modern style of interpretation denies and delegitimises the traditional (ancient) Hindu understanding of the Vedas. Because it enables: "You Vadyars got it all wrong. What it <i>really</i> means and how it is really meant to be interpreted is..."
The christowest never could stand the continued Hindu institution that handed down the Vedas unaltered and unsubverted. The only difference is that now Hindus are unknowingly carrying out the same. This is not to impute any ill-intention to Talageri. He sees only the nationalist cause: that of defending Bharatam against the AIT. But the side-effect of his interpretations (and the inevitably western method he is using to make them) in order to mount this defense, is to merely tell the masses of Hindus that the actual traditional Vadyars who have been keeping the real Vedic system alive for Hindus for thousands of years are 'deluded and plain wrong'. When Hindus start accepting this (modern interpretations as the 'original' Hindu Dharma, and devaluing and outright denying the validity of the actual original Hindu Dharma), it tells me that the subversion is completely invisible/undetectable and therefore lethal now.
Somewhere last year I wrote the following to Bodhi in a personal communication:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->it reminds me of how Max Mueller wrote to his wife:
<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->'The translation of the Veda will hereafter tell to a great extent on the fate of India and on the growth of millions of souls in that country. It is the root of their religion, and to show them what the root is, I feel sure, is the only way of uprooting all that has sprung from it during the last 3,000 years.'<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->You said the Vedas were the supreme authority of Sanatana Dharma, yet what authority remains to these books now that they are reduced to being regarded as merely histories - from this perspective, they've really become irrelevant as they happened ages ago with characters that could barely concern us now. [...] What really is the supreme authority it has then? There's been a changeover in what Hindus understand the Vedas as, and Hindus missed this change. Yet this switch in perception - why it started, how it started, who if anyone started it, what way of thinking/what new manner of reading and interpreting the Vedas caused this change of perception - is something very important. It will have/already has repercussions.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->My view now is mostly unchanged from the above, though I wasn't able to find the appropriate words to express the ideas back then (still can't).
The above is what I <i>think</i> Dhu's post 86 and Acharya's post 81 with ref to Balagangadhara, Sociology thread are kind of discussing.
[right][snapback]94749[/snapback][/right]
<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
[...]
One should understand that there is this time factor that changes all human things including the practices in religious realm.
[right][snapback]94731[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->Bodhi was talking about the Itihasas and Puranas not Vedas of course.
But still feel I need to state the obvious:
The Vedas, at least in TN and those parts of Karnataka I am familiar with and possibly other parts of greater Bharatam (in any case I've heard that the matter is the same in AP and Kerala), have been passed down unchanged not only in how they are performed and their recitation (like intonation) - the only things witzel seemed to want to admit to earlier - but also in <i>understanding</i>.
That is, the understanding these traditional Vadyars have of the Vedas is still exactly the same as what Hindus' ancestors had of the material since at least when this whole oral tradition started. Goes without saying that Talageri's (or Elst's, or for that matter Witzel et al's) interpretations of 'what the Vedas are actually saying' is only the <i>modern</i> understanding of what the Vedas 'must have meant' and what 'the ancients must have thought it meant' - it does not actually reflect what the ancient Hindus understood its contents as.
I may be misunderstanding, but I think this is what Dhu was discussing in his posts 83, 84 and 87 of the India/western Sociology, All about sociology - Deconstructing thread. And I imagine this is also what the following person commenting on VijayVaani's review of the latest from Talageri meant:
<!--QuoteBegin-Husky+Jan 5 2009, 03:22 AM-->QUOTE(Husky @ Jan 5 2009, 03:22 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->http://www.vijayvaani.com/FrmPublicDisplay...cle.aspx?id=322
<b>Comments on
"Demolished once for all: Aryan Invasion Theory"
Virendra Parekh</b>
<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Has it ever occurred to anyone, including you, that this entire debate bypasses a whole community of people who are well versed in the vedas? Have you ever noticed any comment from scholars of the Kanchi Kamakoti Peetham, for example? Do you really think that the translations and treatises on the vedas in various Indian universities has any value whatsoever?Â
 seadog4227Â
 04 Jan 2009Â
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->[right][snapback]92678[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->If people want to learn to understand Hindus' <i>past understanding of the Vedas</i>, best to go to some remote village - say in TN or Karnataka or wherever you know they have passed it down in unbroken line and unmodified - and learn from them, rather than learn to understand it from a textbook.
The fact that Witzel offered a position to Talageri (see Wacky on Talageri) and that Talageri refused saying he was an unapologetic nationalist, had long made me think on the matter. The west approves of his work - the methods and class of conclusions he draws - because this modern style of interpretation denies and delegitimises the traditional (ancient) Hindu understanding of the Vedas. Because it enables: "You Vadyars got it all wrong. What it <i>really</i> means and how it is really meant to be interpreted is..."
The christowest never could stand the continued Hindu institution that handed down the Vedas unaltered and unsubverted. The only difference is that now Hindus are unknowingly carrying out the same. This is not to impute any ill-intention to Talageri. He sees only the nationalist cause: that of defending Bharatam against the AIT. But the side-effect of his interpretations (and the inevitably western method he is using to make them) in order to mount this defense, is to merely tell the masses of Hindus that the actual traditional Vadyars who have been keeping the real Vedic system alive for Hindus for thousands of years are 'deluded and plain wrong'. When Hindus start accepting this (modern interpretations as the 'original' Hindu Dharma, and devaluing and outright denying the validity of the actual original Hindu Dharma), it tells me that the subversion is completely invisible/undetectable and therefore lethal now.
Somewhere last year I wrote the following to Bodhi in a personal communication:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->it reminds me of how Max Mueller wrote to his wife:
<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->'The translation of the Veda will hereafter tell to a great extent on the fate of India and on the growth of millions of souls in that country. It is the root of their religion, and to show them what the root is, I feel sure, is the only way of uprooting all that has sprung from it during the last 3,000 years.'<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->You said the Vedas were the supreme authority of Sanatana Dharma, yet what authority remains to these books now that they are reduced to being regarded as merely histories - from this perspective, they've really become irrelevant as they happened ages ago with characters that could barely concern us now. [...] What really is the supreme authority it has then? There's been a changeover in what Hindus understand the Vedas as, and Hindus missed this change. Yet this switch in perception - why it started, how it started, who if anyone started it, what way of thinking/what new manner of reading and interpreting the Vedas caused this change of perception - is something very important. It will have/already has repercussions.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->My view now is mostly unchanged from the above, though I wasn't able to find the appropriate words to express the ideas back then (still can't).
The above is what I <i>think</i> Dhu's post 86 and Acharya's post 81 with ref to Balagangadhara, Sociology thread are kind of discussing.
[right][snapback]94749[/snapback][/right]
<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->