a disurbing exerpt from one of koenraad elst's pages -
This fatality can still be seen today, when the libraries of many impoverished maharajas' castles are full of manuscripts which are decaying under our very eyes, turning large chunks of India's national memory and heritage into dust. Even of the oldest and most popular texts, the extant manuscripts are seldom older than a few centuries, copies made as the only guarantee to save the texts from the ravages of time which were destroying the earlier copies.
IS IT NOT POSSIBLE IN SOME WAY TO SAVE THOE MANUSCRIPTS AND TREATISES???
<!--QuoteBegin-Mudy+Aug 2 2005, 08:25 AM-->QUOTE(Mudy @ Aug 2 2005, 08:25 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->Sen is typical commie with overdose of Karl Marx. One should understand purpose of different assortment of awards given to disillusioned citizensâ world over.
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I'LL nevr quite understand the fixation most erudite people have with marxism.
i also dont see why people try to talk on subjects outside their field of excellence. more often than not they manage to make a fool of themselves, despite their stature in their respective field of excellence.
astrophysicist rajesh kochhar's seminal <!--emo&  --><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif' /><!--endemo--> work on Aryans comes to mind. and long before that tilak wrote a book called "the artic home of the aryans"!!!
Amarthya sen also had said in some other lecture that Panini was afghan, since he (panini) had mentioned some river in afghanistan in his other writtings. thats like saying kipling was also indian since he mentioned the forst of kanha or conan doyle was indian since he mentioned Andamans in one of the stories. i just wish people would stick to their own subjects.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->" The Wonder That Is Sanskrit"Â
by Sampad and Vijay
The book is published by Aurobindo Society, in association with Mapin Publishing, Ahmedabad., www.mapinpub.com .
It is simultaneously published in USA by Grantha Corporation in 2002. ISBN: 1-890206-50-4 (Grantha) , Distributed in USA Antique Collectors' Club, Market Street Industrial Park Wappinger's Falls NY 12590,  email: info@antiquecc.com
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from Daily Pioneer
Qualities of leadership
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>THE AVATAR WAY OF LEADERSHIP</b>
BY HARSH VERMA RUPA, RS 195
The following is an extract from The Avatar Way of Leadership by
Harsh Verma, published by Rupa.
The Three Archetypes of Leadership
The discussion on the difference in character, relationships and strategies of Rama and Krishna should have made it clear that they are essentially different leadership types. The differences between the two leadership styles can be explored on the following criteria:
Origin and pattern of life
Rama was born in an aristocratic family and lived an orderly life that was more or less predictable until a severe crisis dislodged him from fairyland into the real world. This was followed by intense personal pain and suffering. The struggle in turn legitimised his leadership stature enabling him to emerge as an acclaimed leader. It was the hardship of exile and the battle with Ravana that made him an acclaimed Avatar.
On the other hand, Krishna's life was unpredictable from the very beginning. He realised very well that the rewards of life would not be handed to him and would entirely be due to his own efforts. Born as a cowherd he made his mark with his initiatives. He did learn about his royal lineage as an adolescent but there was a big risk.
He was expected to evolve a way to defeat and kill Kansa. And when Kansa was eliminated he was again expected to rescue Mathura from the repeated invasions of Jarasandha. Krishna knew that neither family nor fate would give him the desired results, and he behaved unconventionally in order to gain success.
Attitude towards people
Rama had a direct and frank nature. He confronted his opponents directly and stated his opinions frankly. Thus, in his encounter with Parshurama, Rama challenged the sage to prove his worth and made the sage accept his superiority. Further, when Bharat came to see him, Rama was urged to revoke his forest exile by other sages who argued that the death of Dashratha had released him from his vow. Rama was enraged by the reasoning and berated them for their logic. He would not engage in tact.
Krishna on the other hand treated people with tact and diplomacy. While the enemies of Dwarka were given a befitting response, Krishna used his persuasive powers to the utmost to influence people to do his bidding. Krishna rarely ever spoke directly and harshly unless confronted with an ultimatum.
Sense of self versus the organisation
Rama was able to separate himself from the organisation and recognise that he and the organisation were two separate entities with differing needs and requirements. Further, he recognised that organisational needs took preference over personal whims and desires. That is why he took the decision to go into exile in order to preserve the sanctity of the royal word.
Krishna conflated his sense of self with that of the organisation since he believed that he himself was solely responsible for the welfare of Dwarka and his absence would cripple the republic. For him the interests of the organisation as well as his own coincided totally.
Opportunities: Internal versus external
Rama's leadership was internal. It focused on his role as the son of the king and as the descendant of the Ishkva-kus and the duties that arose as a result of these roles. Rama did not focus on growing the kingdom through addition of territories or taking any radical innovations that would change the character of the kingdom.
On the other hand Krishna's leadership focused, on opportunities in the external context. The organisation, i.e. the Yadava polity was secondary to the opportunity and was changed in order to realise the opportunities. Thus Krishna changed the capital from Mathura to Dwarka to take advantage of Dwarka's geographical location and changed the basis of economy from agrarian to mercantile. This would have been unthinkable for Rama.
Attitude towards change
Rama was dedicated to incremental change. Thus he advocated the principle of one man having only one wife and did not hesitate to defy his elders on issues of importance. However, the change came as a result of his own thinking that were far removed from any considerations of gain and profit.
The focus was on reforming social abuses, not changing his norms and views. Nor did he easily change his attitude and strategy unless forced to do so by external pressure. It was only when he realised that he could not defeat Ravana directly that he began to innovate in his strategy.
The leadership of Krishna on the other hand involved creating something new. There was a fascination for exploring new avenues. Krishna seemed to value disruption because it led to change. Further, the changes were strategically determined with a view for gain. Thus, Krishna left Vrindavana and went to Mathura because it offered better opportunities. He fled to Dwarka due to the pressure of Jarasandha and did not return to Mathura even after the death of the latter because Mathura did not offer any advantages over Dwarka.
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<!--QuoteBegin-acharya+Mar 13 2006, 10:40 PM-->QUOTE(acharya @ Mar 13 2006, 10:40 PM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->
    or
    "I am become Death,
    the Destroyer of worlds"
      as paraphrased by Robert Oppenheimer, nuclear physicist,
      at the site of the first atomic bomb test (Trinity), July 15, 1945
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http://www.aps-pub.com/proceedings/1442/Hijiya.pdf
Pride of India
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Pride of India A Glimpse into Indias Scientific Heritage
Compiled by Bhartiya Bouddhik Sampada and Published by Samskrita Bharati
Hardcover: 208 pages
Publisher: Samskrita Bharati; First edition (2006)
Language: English
ISBN: 8187276274
For the scientific community, this book is a veritable treasure trove containing the findings of a large team of dedicated scholars in various fields.  These scholars have worked to unearth and bring forth, for the benefit of the modern generation, the astounding Vedic knowledge in all their fields that lay dormant, long forgotten and unknown. It is a compendium of their research studies complete with references. The neat thing about this book is that it is systematically organized into chapters dealing with distinct disciplines of pure sciences like mathematics, physics and astronomy and applied sciences like civil and mechanical engineering, metallurgy, chemistry, medicine and life sciences.Â
Some of the Vedic postulates are really outstanding and unbelievable to the modern man. To cite one example, the number of Vedic verses in praise of each of the 5 planets corresponds exactly to the number of days the planet takes to orbit once around the sun in an elliptical path, for example, Mercury (87), Venus (225), Mars (687), Jupiter (4350) and Saturn (10816).
<b>India's contributions to philosophy, yoga are well known. Less known are Vedic contributions to science and technology. This book seeks to fill that gap. </b>
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Book review from Pioneer, Oct., 4, 2006
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Ritual arts of sacred groves
Deepti Omchery Bhalla tries to restore the diminishing knowledge of glorious temple arts, whose oral traditions have not been well documented because of the apprehension that it would defile the sanctity and divinity of the genre, writes Utpal K Banerjee
<b>Vanishing Temple Arts, Deepti Omchery Bhalla; Shubhi Publications, Rs 1950</b>
Temples of central and south Kerala, with their consanguineous Kanyakumari district (earlier part of Kerala, but bequeathed to Tamil Nadu by an erstwhile Travancore king), house a cultural tradition that goes back to antiquity. Ritualistic music and allied arts of those spiritually associated places have been preserved for centuries, yet the sacred practices were seldom exposed outside the temple sanctum. Perhaps the apprehension was that putting the oral traditions in writing would defile the divinity and sanctity of the art forms, as it might distort authentic expression of many typical sounds and cadenza, intonations and accents. The author identifies these divine abodes at Thirvattar, Suchindram, Parassala, Tripparappu and the well-known Thiruvanathapuram, where her ancestral family had the privilege to become familiar with, and learn from close quarters, their rituals, arts and practices.
The sacred groves of the temple stages (koothambalams) harboured - and occasionally shared with temporary village stages (kavus) - their heritage of sacred (vaidika) music, later dividing into Marga and Sopanam systems dwelling into the temple sanctum sanctorum; secular (laukika) music, later thriving for the nobility and the hoi polloi; folk music as the fount head; and, theatrical (natya) music, combining the above three. Their sparkling varieties, natural freshness and simplicity, and hovering moods found expression in dance and rhythm as well, maintaining an aesthetic balance.
<b>The author outlines how the religious bards and composers of Vaishnavism (Alwars) and Shaivism (Nayanars) played a significant role under the benign patronage of Chola, Chera and Pandya kings to add to the corpus of spiritual melodies. The royalty planned and promoted different institutions of temple artistes who wholesomely participated in the daily rituals and festive occasions. The sacred groves (koothambalams), built to strengthen architectural foundations, go back to the eighth century. </b>
<b>The author attributes to Vaishnava saints of the 14th century the introduction of Gita Govinda, poet Jayadeva's exquisite musical opera, but probably she is alluding to the Bhakti savant Sri Chaitanya of 15-16th century, who had extensive interactions with the Jamorin king.</b> Also, the "general structure of Kathakali (Ramanattam) being more like Jayadeva's Ashtapadis than anything else" should perhaps be specific to Manjudhara tradition of Kathakali. The intimate associations of kings - Kartika Thirunal, Asvati Thirunal and Swathi Thirunal - with the temple arts have been seminal in the 18-19th century and find an honourable place here.
The harmonious balance in the triadic temple arts of vocal music (geetam), instrumental music (vadyam) and dramatic dance (nrityam) is the staple of this scholarly tome. <b>In folk music alone, Kerala as a gigantic storehouse of melodies that blends inseparably songs, dances and instrumental music.</b> Other than Carnatic music, which is a common legacy of the entire south, Kerala's dramatic music (Sangita Nataka) can be traced to the dance-theatre of Koothu, Kutiyattam, Ashtapadi, Krishnattam, Thullal and Theyyam, other than Kathakali. Sopanam system is the traditional music of Kerala, distinct from its Carnatic counterpart, with a remarkable style of singing: Initially slow and with few notes; treating every note in the raga as the Sthayee one, dwelling on it for long; and, going up or down, akin to Hindustani music's Alap. Interesting allusions are given to its practice by Buddhist and Jaina preachers, before adoption by the singing saints of Vaishnavism and Shaivism.
<b>Kerala's musical instruments are threefold: Classical, traditional (temple and theatrical) and folk.</b> Classical instruments like veena, tanpura, gottu vadyam, flute, nadaswaram, mridangam, ghatam, ganjiram and tavil are well-known. Maximum numbers of instruments are found in the temple ensemble (melam), where a chenda melam can display highly mathematical rhythmic skills. Kinnaram refers to cymbals, made of basins, accompanying sacred songs and alluding to mythic birds with high degree of musical power. While Ravana Hastam (same as the Rajasthani Ravan Hatta) is popular all over India, Kombu is a primitive metal-horn of pre-historic origin. Conch-shell (sankham) is the age-old trumpet in every temple. Edekka is a unique drum from the Silappadikaram times, suggestive of shadja, pancham and upper shadja, almost as a drone.
<b>Finally, Kerala's female temple-dancers were Thali Nankas, which has shaped the leading solo-dance of Mohiniattam.</b> Uttama Devangana (exalted temple-dancer) was treated as a virtual goddess: Silent and still, and often found in many communities and faiths.
Madhyama Sevangi: Visibly human and highly artistic, 'dancing like a creeper swinging in the gentle breeze and producing the splendour of a lotus sprout'. Adhama Dasysangi were the lowest, performing songs and dances, and even cleaning jobs. It is a pity the author has left out the highly interesting evolution of Thali Nankas into Mohiniattam out of her scope here.
The erudite scholar-author could possibly separate her general text for the common reader from the advanced sections: Meant for the initiated. It would help a lot: To retain the dual focus.
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Pioneer, 15 Otc., 2006
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Decoding the divine truth
The book is a laudable effort to provide meaning and psychological explanations to Hindu rituals and myths through the journey of Lord Shiva from a hermit to a householder, writes MV Kamath
Shiva to Shankara, Devdutt Pattanaik; Indus Source Books, Rs 225
Every Hindu is - or should be - aware of the Trinity, Brahma, Vishnu and Maheshwar. Brahma, the creator; Vishnu, the preserver; and, Shiva, the destroyer. For a creator, Brahma has few followers. Most Hindus are either Shaivites or Vaishnavites and it is a toss-up between the two as to who is more popular: Vishnu or Shiva.
There are innumerable myths about the three. Thus, it is said of Vishnu that in the beginning, on the ocean of milk, within the coils of the serpent of time, Vishnu stirred from his dreamless slumber. From his navel rose a lotus in which sat Brahma. Lonely, confused and frightened, he wondered who he was and why he existed. In his quest for answers he went about creating the world. What is significant about this work is that it seeks to understand the meaning of such events.
Thus, says Devdutt Pattanaik, the waking up of Vishnu, the blooming of the lotus, the birth of Brahma, his first set of four sons and his second set of 10 sons represent the quickening of the consciousness and the evolution of the mind. The mind evolves because Brahma seeks to understand his true nature. In his attempt to explain the significance of all these myths, the author goes to great lengths. Thus, he says, the awakening of Vishnu is pre-determined by the fact that he did go to sleep and what followed seems orchestrated, lacking spontaneity.
Brahma has first four mind-born children, indicating the four aspects of the primal mind - the discriminating intellect and the three containers of experience, desire and learning. He then has 10 more mind-born sons, representing the five sense organs (eye, ear, nose, tongue and skin) and the five response organs (face, hands, legs, anus and genitals). Then comes the girl child Ushas, the source of stimuli, the destination of responses, the fountainhead of experience, desire and learning. If we accept this explanatory characterisation, it should be possible for the reader to understand and accept what Shiva stands for or represents.
Shiva, as we all know, is represented by a sexual symbol, the lingam, placed within the reproductive female organ. Why? Says the author: "The quest for the answer has made me write this book" In the early Vedic scriptures, Shiva was known as Rudra, the much-feared god. In the Shatarudriya hymn of the Yajur Veda, he is considered highly potent and dangerous. In the Brahmanas, one is told never to the speak his name. In due course, the Vedic gods such as Indra and Agni get sidelined and the Middle Ages see the great rivalry between Shiva and Vishnu worshippers. In the Shiva Purana and Linga Purana, Shiva is often shown as the real force behind the power of Vishnu. The theme gets reversed in the Vishnu Purana and Matsya Purana.
What the author has done is to give meaning and psychological explanations to rituals and myths. He traces the god's journey from Shiva to Shankara, from being a hermit to being a householder. Everything of significance is imbued with meaning. Shiva is Tripurankata, destroyer of the three worlds. But one should not take them literally for the three worlds are the microcosm (the private world), the mesocosm (the social world) and the macrocosm (the rest of the world). Shiva dances, doesn't he? But that dance has deeper meaning.
Shiva's dance, says the author, represents Uttara Mimansa, the new school that looked at the meaning beyond the hymn and the ritual, inaugurating a revolution that brought cosmic wisdom from the classes to the masses. The rattle of the drum produced the music of life. Through his dance, says the writer, Shiva was telling the observer not to be afraid of the ever-turbulent material world and to focus on the still soul.
Pattanaik describes Sati, the youngest daughter of Dakhsha, as the embodiment of the material world who is determined to draw the indifferent Shiva into worldly life. Pattanaik debunks the belief that Shiva is a 'destroyer'. What Shiva really does, he says, is to destroy illusion and to bring peace, shanti, which in turn leads to sat-chit-ananda, the state of tranquillity when the mind is purged of all delusions. In that sense, Shiva is the real liberator of all beings from the fetters of karma. When Shiva marries Parvati, he becomes Shankara, the source of joy, Shambhu, the abode of joy and Ashutosh, the one who is easy to please.
In narratives, Saraswati is supposed to be Brahma's consort, Lakshmi is Vishnu's consort while Shiva's consort is Shakti. As the author puts it, "The inner subjective world cannot exist without the outer objective world." Brahma cannot create anything without Saraswati, who is knowledge. Vishnu cannot sustain anything without Lakshmi, who is wealth; and, Shiva cannot destroy anything without Shakti, who is power.
What distinguishes this book from several others that deal with myths is the meaning that the author endows to everything. The damaru, or rattle drum, is described as an artefact modelled on two triangles, one representing man and the other woman, inner and outer reality, soul and matter, subject and object. When separated from each other, there is destruction. Even Shiva's linga, according to the author, represents matter drawing consciousness into the world. Shiva is outside. The goddess brings him inside. By engaging with the goddess, by observing the world, he will known who he truly is. It is a fascinating concept.
The author recalls scores of stories like the birth of Matsyendranath, the birth and beheading of Brahma, the seduction of Shiva, the boon for Taraka, the charm of Menaka, the birth of Skanda and Ganesh and how Parvati become Annapoorna.
Reading this book is like travelling through realms known and unknown. What this book does is to strip the Shiva-linga of all sexual significance. The author argues, "If Shiva were simply a fertility god, would his abode not be a sylvan retreat rather than a snow-clad mountain? Would he not be associated with romance and delight, rather than meditation and austerity? Would he not be called creator rather than destroyer?" Good questions. But the point is that the author provides luminous answers. Which is why this book is particularly relevant to our times.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I am not a big fan of Harsh Verma. Nevertheless here is another review on Harsh Verma's book.
http://www.indiacurrents.com/news/view_art...7094e8f11a0ef40
From The telgraph Kolkota, 22 Dec 2006
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->ENQUIRY OF AN EPICÂ
Editor's ChoiceÂ
Wise wordsÂ
<b>The Mahabharata: An Inquiry in the Human Condition
By Chaturvedi Badrinath, Orient Longman, Rs 1095</b>
The Mahabharata is one of the greatest and grandest books in the world. It is longer than both The Iliad and The Odyssey but it has not generated even a small percentage of the critical literature that surrounds the two Greek epics which are seen, with every justification, as the springs of European literature. The Mahabharata is more than literature. It is, as this book demonstrates, a treatise on philosophy as well as a tract on the conduct of everyday affairs.
This is not an easy book to read. But it is a rewarding read. Its difficulty lies in its mode of presentation. The author seeks to support every point he makes through quotations from the original text which are accompanied by his own translations. The ordinary reader, not familiar with Sanskrit, would have preferred a paraphrase or a summary of the text but Chaturvedi Badrinath, with his formidable learning and command of the text, is unwilling to make any such concessions.
The Mahabharata, as is well known, has 18 parvas or chapters. Only four of these are directly connected with the great war between the Kauravas and the Pandavas at Kurukshetra. The other chapters deal with a variety of issues, which are brought to the reader through stories and, sometimes, through stories within stories. Badrinath draws his material mostly from those 14 chapters that are not retelling the story of the great war. The focus of the book thus automatically becomes different from the conventional one.
<b>What are some of the issues that the epic brings to the fore? Badrinath writes, âThe concerns of the Mahabharata are the concerns of everyday life everywhere. In its inquiry into the human condition it raises those very questions the answers to which we all seek in the diverse circumstances of our lives. What is happiness? What is unhappiness? What is truth? What is untruth? Are they absolutes? And also whose truth? What is violence? Is one free to make oneself what one is? What is governance? What is order? And what is disorder? What relation do they have with time and place? What is death? And what is that which is deathless?â These are all profound questions but the epic addresses them in a manner which brings to them a practical as well as an abstract and philosophical dimension.</b>
The Mahabharataâs mode of inquiry is conversational. The problems are presented either through stories that are narrated in answer to a question or as a dialogue, for example, between Bhishma and Yudhisthira in the Santi parva or the Anushashan parva. Here it continues with the mode that was established in the Upanishads. The latter, Badrinath notes, begins and ends with an abstract problem of knowledge, seeking to know the nature of reality. <b>The epic begins and ends with concrete human life in all its complexities.</b>
A scholar once remarked that reading the Mahabharata is like entering a dark and dense forest to seek the truth. A book like this one is a help to light up the darkness. Truth remains elusive.
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02-09-2007, 11:25 PM
(This post was last modified: 02-09-2007, 11:26 PM by ramana.)
Literary journal
Has three articles of interest in it:
Shiva's dance
Naipaul's book
Pagan Influence in Christianity
Also members would benefit by reading the article about CW Jung's visions.
Pioneer, 12 Feb., 2007
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The song of immortality
Pranav Kumar
<b>The Seven Commandments of the Bhagavad Gita, JP Vaswani; Sterling Publishers, Rs 250</b>
Dharma is religion. Karma is fatalism. Brahminism is Hinduism. Varna is caste. Prana is breath. Lingam is phallus. Tantra stands for sex. Moksha or nirvana is salvation. Murti is idol. Shiva is malevolent, destroyer. Shakti is energy. Akash is sky. Ishvara is god. Itihasa is history. <b>So believed our colonial masters. Even today Wendi Doniger thinks that the Gita is a "bad" book. And thanks to our Marxist scholars, colonial myths continue unabated, and we, for the most part, have been reduced to being consumers of ideas.</b>
In these troubled times, JP Vaswani's The Seven Commandments of the Bhagavad Gita comes as a pleasant surprise. Written by Veda Vyasa, who compiled the Vedas, the Mahabharata is held to be the fifth Veda. It contains the gospel of action, the Gita - the sermon delivered by Lord Krishna about 5,000 years ago at the battlefield of Kurukshetra. A part of Prasthantrayam, the Gita is a scripture of synthesis as it believes in the triple path of purification (karma), illumination (jnana) and union (bhakti) to reach the one who is reflecting in many (Ekoham Bahusyam).
The Great Teacher asserts that death is an experience, not of the atman, the real self, but of the body, which is subject to change, disease and old age (Chapter II).
What the Lord demands is not the renunciation of work, but the renunciation of selfish desire. He brings forth the doctrine of nishkama karma. Surrendering all actions unto Me, with thy thoughts resting on the Self Supreme, from desire and egoism freed, fight thou, O Arjuna! (III: 30)
Krishna does not believe in the last and final word as assumed in the traditions of Abraham. He promises to descend as an avatara, in the words of Vaswani, "to help and heal, to protect the world, to save sinking humanity". (Chapter IV)
The Lord underscores the fact that same-sightedness ensues from knowledge. Nescience creates plurality and difference among beings, whereas omniscience reveals unity behind the seeming multiplicity. He also believes in the divinity of nature. All that exist is the manifestation of the Lord Himself (Bijam mam sarvabhutanam). This is contrary to what the prophets of 'the people of the scriptures' believe.
In the Chapter IX, the Divine Teacher states that Ishwara is everything. He is the father of this world, the mother and the grandfather. Krishna, the slayer of Mur, asserts: " I am Kratu (Vedic ritual), I am Yajna (sacrificial worship), I am Svadha (offering), the medicinal herb I am, I am Mantra, I am also the clarified butter, I am fire, I am oblation." (IX: 16)
<b>With the help of parables and anecdotes, Vaswani tries to explain difficult concepts of Sanatana Dharma. But he errs in believing that the war mentioned in the Mahabharata is allegoric representation of the fight between good and evil. Though there is no doubt that the Mahabharata warfare allows itself to be viewed allegorically too, that is not all.</b> To question the historicity of the Great War is as bad an idea as the claims of some historians that there was no Jewish Holocaust during World War II.
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Pioneer, 13 March 2007
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Celestial choreography
Utpal K Banerjee
<b>Odissi: The Dance Divine, Ranjana Gauhar, Niyogi Books; Rs 2500</b>
Was the celestial danseuse Urvashi the world's first devadasi? <b>The author alludes to an endearing legend of the marathon churning of primordial seas by joint forces of the gods and demons in the mythic times that yielded, beside the coveted ambrosia, many wondrous beings and non-beings. There emerged the ethereal 'Parijat' flower; the ever-yielding fruit-tree 'Kalpataru'; fauna like the divine milk-cow 'Kamadhenu', horse 'Uchchaishrava', and elephant 'Airavat'; and, finally, goddess Lakshmi carrying the vessel of nectar. It is only the dancing apsaras and their performance in paradise that are cited by the author, where the prima donna Urvashi was momentarily distracted by the handsome son of Indra and faltered on a delicate footfall. The blemish did not go unnoticed, however, and Urvashi was cursed to be born on earth as devadasi.</b>
Nearer history, <b>the cave-sculptures of the Udayagiri and Khandagiri hills near Bhuvaneswar bear testimony to dancing damsels, with a multitude of panels that celebrate the artistic lifestyle of King Kharavela's time in the early millennium. First inscriptional records of the devadasi dancing tradition are from Kesari temples of the 10th century where devadasis were temple-maids with the sole duty to dance at rituals and ceremonies for the deity within the temple-premises and outside. Their's was an unbroken lineage: From the aesthetic awareness of Buddhists to the yogini dancers of Tantrik cult (akin to the esoteric Charya Nritya, the Buddhist Tantrik dance of Nepal) up to the glory of the Shiva-temple dancing girls, with the dance-tradition profoundly influencing physical manifestation and religious association during every stage of Orissa's early history.</b>
Celebrated for devotion to Vishnu in the Ganga dynasty, the monumental temple of Jagannath in Puri and the sun temple in Konark continued patronage of the devadasi dance tradition to the first few centuries of second millennium.
While Lord Jagannath is an excellent instance of a Hindu-tribal dichotomy - with Daitas (former tribals) and Vedic Brahmins among his priests in Puri - the author glosses over the historicity of Jayadeva, the court-poet of the 12th century Bengal of the Sen dynasty, and places him squarely - with his dance-wife Padmavati - in Puri. This is evidence of bringing Jayadeva's lyrical work of Gita Govinda to Puri and its contiguous villages by Sri Chaitanya in the 15th-16th century and, under the guidance of his disciple Ray Ramananda, King Prataparudra Deva making the singing and dancing of Gita Govinda mandatory by the Maharis, the devadasis of Jagannath's sanctum sanctorum.
Ramananda, the vastly-talented governor, added the Jayadeva classic to the Mahari repertoire - enhancing their knowledge, talent and refinement, and making it an integral part of Odissi dance.
Maharis as devadasis, points out the author, were divided among Nachunis (dancing girls), Bhitara Gaunis (singers of the inner apartments), Bahara Gaunis (singers performing outside the temple) and Gaudasanis (those who fanned the lord). They were supported by male accompanists: Venakaras (veena-players) and Madelas (drum-players). By the 19th century, Maharis turned out to be so accomplished that "it was not considered seemly for ordinary women to learn to read, sing and dance", lest they might be mistaken for dancing girls!
After a prolonged period of precipitate decline in the British era, the revival began in the last 50 years primarily under guru Kelucharan Mohapatra - teacher, performer, choreographer and researcher - and Pankaj Charan Das, other than the seminal work done by Jayantika, the conclave of gurus and scholars that sought in the late 1950s to vitalise the Odissi form and fight for its recognition. It is to Jayantika that Odissi owes its refinement of methodology, definition of repertoire, and ornamentation along classical lines.
All classical dances need their source-text and Odissi draws from the 15th century Abhinaya Chandrika, beside the Nanadikeshwara tome Abhinaya Darpana of the earlier times. Although the author seems a little hazy on rasa and bhava that needed to derive clarity from Bharata's Natya Shastra, her delineation of the technical details is superbly done.
A few points that need be made are that Natya Shastra mentions eight rasas, with the ninth added later. In our time, Kelucharan's epic work in the sunset years of life to record in his cameras - both still and video - the remote temple-sculptures enriching the form so much and the painstaking ground-work being done by Odissi Research Centre in documenting and cataloguing Odissi style (analogous to the famous Laban Institute's work in London for the Western dance) under Kumkum Mohanty's able guidance in Bhuvaneswar seem overlooked.
Also, there is not a word on group choreography that has blossomed out of the essentially solo form and, beginning with Kelucharan's dance-drama Gita Govinda, flourished throughout the land and overseas, including Malaysia. These are, however, minor blemishes and can be overcome later.
The high point of the book is its gorgeous genre of illustrations and art-plates that enhances its appeal. In a carefully assembled photo-folio, the Kolkata guru Muralidhar Majhi and the established Odissi dancers from abroad like Ratna Roy, Ramli Ibrahim and Ananya Chatterjee seem to have escaped notice.
What remains, however, glaring is that, besides the author's own sumptuous pictures, there are umpteen others whose photos appear but who have remained totally nameless!
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
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1. Indian Philosophy- A Counter Perspective ( Revised & Enlarged
Edition)/ Daya Krishna/ Rs. 750
ISBN: 81-7030-845-3, Series - Sri Garib Das Oriental Series No. 310
About the Book
An earlier collection of some of these articles under the title Indian
Philosophy: A Counter Perspective was published in 1991. This new
collection includes many articles written after that period, Some
published and others unpublished. The articles include in this book
are: Is Indian Philosophy " Theological" in Character ? ; Three myths
about Indian Philosophy ; Three conceptions of Indian Philosophy ;
Indian Philosophy and Moksha: Revisiting an old controversy ; The Vedic
Corpus: some questions ; The Vedic Corpus and the two Sutras- text,
concerned with it ; the Mimamsa Sutra and the Brahma Sutra ; The
Upanisads- What are they? ; The Yoga Sutras: The undeciphered text
anomalies, problems and paradoxes ; Yajna and the doctrine of Karma- A
contradiction in Indian Thought about action ; Apoha & Samavaya in
Kantian Perspective ; The text of the Nyaya Sutras: Some Poblems ;
Prasastapada's mapping of the Realm of qualities: a neglected chapter
in Indian Philosophy ; Is Isvarakrsna's Samkhya Karika really
Samkhayan ; Vedanta- Does it really mean anything? ; Adhyasa- a non-
advaitic beginning in Samkara Vedanta ; The myth of the Purusarthas ;
Rasa- The bane of Indian Aesthetics ; Consciousness , materiality and
spirituality: issues , dilemmas and the future of mankind ; Bondage of
Birth and death. The book contains Annexures and Index.
Other Books by the Author
1. The Nyaya Sutras - A New Commentary on an Old Text/ Prof. Daya
Krishna/ Rs. 500
2. Indian Philosophy- A New Approach/ Daya Krishna/ Rs. 500
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2. Defining The Image: Measurements in Image Making/ Charles Willemen ,
Rs. 200
Table of Contents:
Introduction; The Sanskrit Pratimalaksana: Translation, Sanskrit; The
Chinese Pratimalaksana: Translation, Chinese; Glossary: Chinese-
Sanskrit- English, Sanskrit- Chinese- English; Bibliography:
Abbreviations.
ISBN: 81-7030-842-9
About the Book
In the applied arts of India iconometery, talamana, the knowledge of
the measurements and the proportions of images, has an old tradition,
not entirely different from the Greek and the Renaissance
tradition.Ever since B.Laufer's study about the Citralaksana in 1913
the subject has raised new interest among artists and scholars alike.
The Indian Buddhist Pratimalaksana, which is edited in transcription
and translated into English here, may date from the 10th century,
anyway before Atisa (died 1054) . The Tibetan translation was made by
the Tibetan Grags-pargyal-mtshan (ca. 1285-1378) and the Indian
Dharmadhara, in souther Tibet before 1322, date of Bu-ston's catalogue.
The text most probably belongs to the Mulasarvastivada tradition. The
Chinese translation is the work of the Mongolian aristocrat mGon-po
skyabs, Gongbu Chabu in Chinese ( ca. 1690-1750) , The text was brought
out in 1742 at Qianlong's court in Beijing. mGon-po skyabs translated
the Tibetan text in Chinese , and he added a commentary using Tibetan
Literature, Thge Chinese text in this volume is based on the Japanese
edition T. 1419, but the stanzas are numbered, and the commentary in
prose is separated from the main text. Illustrations have been added.
The glossaries at the end will help further more research, it is hoped.
The Chinese Translation of Sanskrit words is often very useful to know
the exact meaning of a term, in both languages
Charles Willemen obtained his Ph.D in 1971 with a study of the Chinese
Udanavarga. Studied in Japan under H. Nakamura in the University of
Tokyo in 1972. Fullbright- Hays Visiting Scholar at Harvard University,
Dept. of East Asian Languages and Civiliazation in 1974. Has taught at
many Universities in Europe and in Asia. E.g. Guest Professor : Beijing
Language and Culture University , Xi'an Jiaotong University , Banaras
Hindu University , Nava Nalanda Mahavihara, Vishvabharati University in
Shantineketan. Has published extensively about Buddhism in South and
East Asia and about Chinese Art. Member of the Belgian Royal Academy of
Sciences since 1997.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
.3. Concept of Vac in the Vedic Literature/ Pratibha M.Pingle, Rs. 500
ISBN: 81-7030-841-0, Series: Sri Garib Das Oriental Series No. 309
About the Book
The word VAC is derived from VAC, to speak. But VAC for Vedic Indians
was not merely speech. The word carries with it a deeper significance.
The material for the book is collected from the principal Samhitas-the
Regveda, the Atharvaveda, the five Samhitas of Yajurveda (the
Taittiriya, the Maitryani, the Vajsaneyi, the Kathaka and the
Kapisthalakatha). The Brahamanas (the Aitreya, the Sankhyana, the
Satapatha, the Taittiriya, the Pancavimsa, the Sadvimsa and the
Gopatha), and the eighteen principal Upanisads.
Dr. Pratibha M. Pingle is editor Sanskrit Dictionary, Deccan college,
Pune.
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4. Introduction to Indian Astrology/ Rama R Rao, Rs. 200
ISBN: 81-7030-835-6
About the Book
Curiosity to know one's future is both natural and universal; and
therefore any method which attempts to unravel the mystery of the
future has an attraction for the future has an Astrology, palmistry,
numerology and various extrasensory processes which claim to predict
the future have a popular appareal. An elementary knowledge of
astronomy and a historical perspective are indispensable for a
beginner. After going through the authoritative texts like Brihat
Jataka, Brihat Parasara, Horasastra, Phaladipika etc., one arrives at
the conclusion that the variables one has to tackle are far too many
and the interpretations far too numerous and the task of integrating
the diverse material is too complex. The subject requires deep study
and one has to develop an insight and intuition to become a successful
astrologer. The author has tried to present the essentials of Hindu
Astrology with as objective an approach possible.
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5. Navagraha Kosa/ S.K Ramachandra Rao 2 Vols, Rs. 400 per vol. Rs. 800
(set)
ISBN: 81-7030-839-9
About the Book
The ideology of the Nine Planetary deities (The Nava-Grahas) is an
important one in our country. All the rituals, dairy and occansional,
involve the propitiation of these Grahas. The volumes includes all the
available texts relating to the worship of the planetary deities.
Mainly it includes texts of Navagraha Puja Vidhi and Graha Yoga
Paddhati, excepts from popular texts like Mantra Mahodadhi and from
rare texts like Vaikhanasa-agama Khiladhikara and Bhrigu Samhita
relating to the worship of the Nava-Graha especially of Surya.
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6. Srividya Kosa/ Prof. S.K Ramachandra Rao, Rs. 600
ISBN: 81-7030-832-1, Series: Sri Garib Dass Oriental Series No. 304
About the Book
Srividya is discipline where abounds considerable mystery, esotericism
and occultism. There is among common people quite some ignorance
concerning its philosophy and practice. There is also a host of doubts
and uncertainties among practitioners themselves. The presence of
different tradition in Srividya is a further source of confusion. The
textual background to Srividya has almost become obscure and obsolete;
it has become more a matter of individual lineages of practices. In the
circumstances there is a need for an authentic and comprehensive
account of all three aspects of Srividya, viz. The Yantra, The Mantra
and The Tantra. This Book is an attempt to provide one. Along with all
textual details concerning the philosophy and practice of Srividya,
relevant iconographic details with illustrations have also been given.
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7. The Tantric Practices in Sri Vidya/ S.K Ramachandra Rao, Rs. 300
ISBN: 81-7030-836-4 , Series: Sri Garib Das Oriental Series No. 306
About the Book
Sri Cakra has rightly been regarded as the 'prince among cakras'
(cakra-raja). It is best known and most worshipped among hundres of
sacred designs that are prescribed in the traditional lore. Despite
this celebrity, an air of mystery surrounds this cakra. The present
book gives details of the design, the significance of those details,
the philosophical framework that renders the details relevant, the
prevailing symbolism, and the nature of source - materials have been
explained based on authoritative texts and traditional understanding.
The book also contains text and English translation of the text
Sarada-Catusatika
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8. Agama Encyclopaedia / S.K. Ramachandra Rao 12 Vols. Rs. 250 - per
vol. Rs. 3000 (Set)
I- Introduction, II- Saiva & Sakta Agamas, III- Vaikhanasa Agamas, IV-
Pancaratragama, V- Devyagama, VI- Alaya & Aradhana, VII- Preparation
for Puja, VIII- Mudras in Puja, IX- Consecration, X- Nityarcana, XI-
Utsavas, XII- Source Book
ISBN: 81-7030-823-2 , Series: Sri Garib Das Oriental Series No. 292
About the Book
The Agama literature includes the Silpa-Sastra, which is basic to
iconography. Worship dealt with I the Agama necessarily involves images
which are worship-worthy. The rituals and sequences that are elaborated
in the Agama books find relevance only in the context of an icon which
is contained in a shrine. And icons are meaningful only in the context
of shrines and worship. Agama texts are not easily accessible to the
people. A large number of them are still available only in manuscripts,
some of them which have been printed are only in their Sanskrit
originals. There is need, therefore, to present relevant excerpts from
them at least, to make the volumes on iconography more meaningful.
Further, Indian temples are to be considered only in the general
framework of temple culture, which include not only religious and
philosophical aspects also. The volumes named Agama Encyclopaedia named
Agama Encyclopaaedia deals with the temple-culture and Agama framework,
the sectarian division of the Agama into Saiva, Vaisnava and Sakta, and
the topics selected from the Agama texts follow. Thus, the entirety of
the Agama, literature in so far as it is relevant to the temple-culture
is brought within the scope of the Agama Encyclopaedia.
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9. The Compendium on Ganesa/ S.K Ramachandra Rao/ Rs. 500
ISBN: 81-7030-828-3, Series: Sri Garib Dass Oriental Series No. 301
About the Book
Ganesa's popularity is manifold. He is the favourite god of the
masses. He is also the favourite subject for curio-hunters and
collectors of icons. Painters and sculptors have revelled in depicting
this god in a variety of forms and postures. The Tantrik practitioners
have found in him a benevolent power, quick to acquire and enduring in
nature. Literature about Ganesh is remarkable, varied and large. Works
in Sanskrit, which appear to have provides the main source material for
all of them, are themselves large in number and varied in nature. An
attempt has been made here to present a comprehensive picture of Ganesa
that is of interest to an Indian mind. The picture assumes the Vedic
origin of Ganesa and the Smrti and the Tantrick involvements of the
deity. It recognizes the primal importance given to this god in the
daily life of millions of Indians. And it seeks to provide authentic
information about Ganesh from texts. The books contains drawings of
numerous Ganesa Icons, worshipped in our temples or preserved in
museums.
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10. Metaphysics and Mysticism in Mahayana Buddhism- An Analytical Study
of the Ratnagotravibhago-Mahayanottaratantra-sastram / C.D. Sebastian/
Rs. 500
ISBN: 81-7030-826-7, Series: Bibliotheca Indo-Buddhica Series No. 238
About the Book
Canonical and classical Mahayana literatue falls into two classes viz.,
Prajanaparamita and the Tathagatagarbha classes. The Ratnagotravibhago
Mahayanottaratantra Sastra, popularly known as the Uttaratantra, is the
foremost example of the Tathagata-garbha literature. In this volume the
author makes an exegetical and analytic study of the same text, and
brings out the metaphysical and mystical bearings of Mahayana Buddhism.
The teaching of the Uttaratantra is a perfect blend of philosophy,
religion, spiritual discipline, mysticism and metaphysics - a blend
which is characteristic of Buddhism. Tathagata-garbha is an important
Mahayana principle, which explains that all living beings possess the
essence of Buddha-hood (Sarvasattvas-tathatagata-garbhah).
Tathagata-garbha toeory is a teaching that gives great optimism for all
living beings in the pursuit of Bodhi (Enlightenment) of Buddhatva
(Buddha-hood). This theory enshrines in it a sublime concept that all
the sentient beings are potential Buddhas or all will attain
Buddha-hood. Owing to the presence of Tathagata-garbha in all, one
perceives the equality of oneself with others, and works for the
wellbeing of all living beings, as one's entire life motif. According
to A.K. Chatterjee, an outstanding authority on Yogacara Idealism, the
author "brings out beautifully the implication of the notion of the
Tathagatagarbha" in this volume.
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11. Lhasa - The Holy City / F. Spencer Chapman with an Introduction by
Sir Charles Bell K.C.M.G. K.C.I.E/ Rs. 200
About the Book
This book gives first hand beautiful account of Lhasa by a leading
traveller. The book gives details of Monasteries, Feativals and
Processions, Lhasa City, The Potala Palace, Norbhu Lingka, Gyantse,
Phari, Recreations, Tibetan New Year.
The book if profusely illustrated with Maps and Plates
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
12. Buddhist- Art, History and Culture- Essays by Prof. L.M Joshi/ Ed.
D.C Ahir. Rs. 300
ISBN: 81-7030-799-6, Series: Bibliotheca Indo- Buddhica Series N. 233
Contents:
1. Life and times of the madhyamika philosopher Nagarjuna. 2. Modernity
of Buddha's Gospel. 3. True Buddhism. 4. Buddhist principle of
non-Egoity. 5. Aspects of Buddhism in ancient Indian culture. 6. The
concept of Dharma in Buddhism. 7. The mind and the mere mind in
Buddhism. 8. Faith and devotion in Buddhism. 9. Buddhist tradition and
Guru Nanak: aspects of absolute reality. 10. Modernity of ancient
Buddhism. 11. The way to Nirvana according to the Dhammapada. 12.
Buddhist contribution to art and architecture. 13. Aspects of Buddhism
in Indian history. 14. Santideva's Siksamuccaya - karikas
About the Author
D.C. Ahir (born 1928, Punjab) is a reputed scholar of Buddhist studies,
and has made notable contribution to the history of Buddhism during the
last 42 years. He retired as Director to Goverment of India in February
1986, and since then fully engaged in enriching literature. He already
has more than 40 published works to his credit, besides numerous
articles on Buddhism.
In appreciation of his noble and notable contribution to the Buddhist
Literature as a Distinguished Scholar and Author, the Maha Bodhi
Society of India, Sarnath conferred on him on 30th November 2001 the
Honorary Title of Bauddha Sahitya Shiromani.
Other Books by the Author
1. Buddhism in South East Asia- A Cultural Survey/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 450
2. Buddhism in North India & Pakistan/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 300
3. Buddhism in South India/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 200
4. Buddha Gaya Through the Ages/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 225
5. The Pioneers of Buddhist Revival in India/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 120
6. Buddhism in Modern India/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 200
7. A Panorama of Indian Buddhism- Selections From the Maha Bodhi
Journal (1892- 1992)/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 500
8. The Status of the Laity in Buddhism/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 150
9. Himalayan Buddhism Past & Present- Mahapandit Rahul Sankrityayan
Centenary Volume/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 225
10. Glimpses of Sri Lankan Buddhism/ D.C Ahir/ Rs. 450
11. Buddhist Sites & Shrines in India- History, Architecture/ D.C Ahir/
Rs. 1200
12. Vipassana- A Universal Buddhist Technique of Meditation/ Ed. D.C
Ahir/ Rs. 200
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13. Sagathavagga Samyutta- Division of Discourses with Verses/ Tran. U
Tin U/ Rs. 500
ISBN: 81-7030-798-8, Series: Bibliotheca Indo-Buddhica Series No. 232
About the Book
The present book contains the English translation of verses from
Sagatha Vagga of Division of Discourses from the Samyutta Nikaya. The
five groups contained in this volume are Devata Samyutta (Group of
related discourses to various un-named devas), Devaputta Samyutta
(Group of related discourses to various named devas), Kosala Samyutta
(Group of related discourse to King Pasenadi of Kosala), Mara Samyutta
(Group of related discourses involving Mara), and Bhikkhuni Samyutta
(Group of related discourses concerning bhikkunis).
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14. Sri Sudodhini - Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation / T.Ramanan
About the Book
This Volume presents, for the first time in English language, the
translation, based on devotion to our Lord Shri Krishna (bhakti),
bringing out, from the original Sanskrit text, the "bhavartha"
(meaning of the innerspirit and underlying loving sentiments, with
which, this treatise has been written), of the monumental commentary
Sri Subodhini, on the Maha Bhagavata Purana, by Mahaprabhu Sri
Vallabhacharya (c 1479-c 1531). The tenth canto of Sri Bhagavatam is
considered by all Vaishnavas as the most valuable and sacred canto,
among the 12 cantos of this Purana- as this canto deals with the divine
leelas of our lord Shri Krishna, who is the Shri Purushothama-the
supreme lord of the universe. Shri Vallabhacharya's Sri Subodhini, is
available only for the 1st , 2nd, 3rd, 10th and few chapters of the
11th canto of Sri Bhagavatam. Sri Subodhini is considered as the most
detailed commentary, among all the available commentaries, of Sri
Bhagavatam.
Volumes No.
1. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 1
to 4/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 1), Rs. 650
2. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 5
to 8/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 2), Rs. 600
3. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 9
to 11/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 3), Rs. 500
4. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 12
to 17/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 4), Rs. 650
5. Sri Subodhini- Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 18
to 22/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 5), Rs. 650
6. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 23
to 28/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 6), Rs. 650
7. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 29
to 35/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 7), Rs. 950
8. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 36
to 42/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 8), Rs. 750
9. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 43
to 49/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 9), Rs. 950
10. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bbagvata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya -Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 50
to 56/ T.Ramanan, (Vol. 10), Rs. 750
11. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagavata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya- Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 57
to 63/ T.Ramanan, [824-0] (Vol. 11), Rs. 750
12. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagavata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya- Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 64
to 70/ T.Ramanan, [829-1] (Vol. 12), Rs. 750
13. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagavata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya- Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 71
to 77/ T.Ramanan, [830-5] (Vol. 13), Rs. 750
14. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagavata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya- Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 78
to 84/ T.Ramanan, [833-X] (Vol. 14), Rs. 750
15. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagavata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya- Text and English Translation Canto Ten Chapters 85
to 90/ T.Ramanan, [834-8] (Vol. 15), Rs. 950
16. Sri Subodhini-Commentary on Srimad Bhagavata Purana by Mahaprabhu
Shri Vallabhacharya- Text and English Translation Canto Eleven Chapters
1 to 5 (includes Vritrasura Chatusloki) / T.Ramanan, [843-7] (Vol. 16),
Rs. 750
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<b>Indo-Judaic studies in the 21st century</b>
<b>Book Description</b>
This book is an analysis of the affinities and interactions between Indic and Judaic civilizations from ancient through contemporary times. The contributors to this volume come together to propose new and global understanding of patterns of commerce and culture, to reconfigure how we understand the way great cultures interact, and to present a new constellation of diplomacy, literature, and geopolitics.
<b>About the Author</b>
Nathan Katz is Professor and Founding Chair, Department of Religious Studies, Florida International University. Ranabir Chakravarti is Professor of Ancient History, Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University. Braj M. Sinha is Professor of Religious Studies, University of Saskatchewan. Shalva Weil is Senior Researcher at the Research Institute for Innovation in Education, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel.
This Book is the first Academic level Defence of Hindu thought, culture & symbols, a Must for people interested in intellectually defending our traditions & philosophies.
For those already familiar with the book, please go to its website http://invadingthesacred.com and join the discussion board to discuss, & possibly promote the book. (I have a review at Invading The Sacred -A Review on sulekha for those interested in more)
=====<b>PRESS RELEASE</b> =======
New Book, â<b>Invading the Sacred</b> : <i>An Analysis of Hinduism Studies in America</i> ,â Explores Academic Anti-India Bias
New York, July 9 2007:
The launch of a new book titled <b>Invading the Sacred</b> : <b><i>an Analysis of Hinduism Studies in America</i></b> , edited by <b><i>Dr. Krishnan Ramaswamy, Prof. Antonio de Nicolas </i></b> and <b><i>Aditi Banerjee </i></b> was announced today. This book brings together essays by many well-known scholars and seeks to facilitate a nascent grassroots movement to challenge the systemic misrepresentation of Indian culture and philosophy by certain American academicians.
<b>Invading the Sacred</b> is a product of an intensive multi-year research project that <b><i>uncovered shoddy and biased scholarship driven by certain power cartels</i></b> . This book <b> narrates the Indian Diasporaâs challenges to such scholarship, and documents how those who dare to speak up have been branded as âdangerousâ. This raises serious questions about intellectual freedom in the American academy </b> .
â<i>This is a thoughtful, reasoned, yet passionate plea that the perspectives and sensitivities of Hindus be considered in the presentation of Hinduism in scholarship, textbooks and the media. What is remarkable is that many western academics are so resistant to it</i> ,â wrote <b>Nathan Katz</b> , Professor of Religious Studies, Florida International University, Miami.
<b>Air Marshall Raghavendran</b> , (retd) PVSM, AVSM, warns that such biased but apparently scholarly images of India as a degraded and oppressive culture, impacts US-India relations, and paves the way for US intervention in Indiaâs human rights affairs. â<i>In such an environment, acts of aggression against us - such as by sanctions, wholesale conversion, terrorism or âinsurgencyâ - can be âjustifiedâ as âlegitimateâ fights against an abusive culture. The foundations are being laid for this, under advice and prompting from scholars and faith-based organizations, by the US State Department declaring year after year that India is a country lacking in respect for human rights and religious freedom</i> .â The book also examines how such scholarship can wreak psychological damage on individuals and entire cultures, particularly second-generation Indian-Americans.
<b>About the Book</b>
India, once a major civilizational and economic power that suffered centuries of decline, is now newly resurgent in business, geopolitics and culture. However, a powerful counterforce within the American academy is systematically undermining core icons and ideals of Indian culture and thought. These scholars have <b>disparaged the Bhagavad Gita as âa dishonest bookâ</b> ; <b>declared Ganeshaâs trunk a âlimp phallusâ; </b> <b>classified Devi as the âmother with a penisâ</b> and <b>Shiva as âa notorious womanizerâ who incites violence in India</b> ; pronounced <b>Sri Ramakrishna a pedophile who sexually molested the young Swami Vivekananda</b> ; <b>condemned Indian mothers as being less loving of their children than white women</b> ; and <b>interpreted the bindi as a drop of menstrual fluid and the âhaâ in sacred mantras as a womanâs sound during orgasm</b> .
<b>Prof. Kapila Vatsyayan</b> , one of the most respected scholars of Indian culture in the world, notes that scholars have tried to over-sexualize and reduce the rich, complex, and multilayered world of Indian symbols, icons, and mythology, âthrough a single perspective of a Freudian psycho-analytical approach applied to the exclusion of the others. Also there is a sense of bewilderment when one notes that rather outdated and almost passe theories of the psycho-analytical are being applied, when the discipline has taken in many more penetrative paths.â
<b>Pandit Jasraj</b> , the Hindustani music maestro, pleads, âTo American scholars whose negative scholarship on Indian Divinity has been highlighted in this book - If you do not have enough knowledge about a culture and religion, you should not write about it!â
The book inquires whether these are isolated instances of ignorance, or whether there is an institutionalized pattern of bias driven by certain worldviews? Are these academic pronouncements based on evidence, and how carefully is this evidence cross-examined by other scholars? How do these images of Indians created in the American academy influence public perceptions through the media, the education system, policymakers, and popular culture?
<b>Prof. Anantanand Rambachan</b> , at Saint Olaf College, Minnesota describes the book as âa valuable historical resource for those who want to understand better this debate, and those who wish to become participants in the conversation ... Scholars should welcome a critical voice from the community that is the focus of their study, for a mutually enriching dialogue.â
<b>Prof. Kapil Kapoor</b> , the former pro Vice-Chancellor of Jawaharlal Nehru University, sees this book as a very valuable contribution to the dialog of civilizations: âThe intellectuals featured in this book, with their bold decision to take on this scholarship, have entered into a serious dialogue about motives, methodology and substance and, using their own tools, have reversed the gaze back on to the scholarly establishment to their understandable discomfort.â
The issues here are so critical that Air Marshall Raghavendran says that âIt should be required reading for every Indian diplomat, the defense department and those in foreign affairs, and especially for Indian scholars.â
The book hopes to stir serious debate on topics such as:
<b><i>How do Hinduphobic works resemble earlier American literature depicting non-Whites as dangerous savages needing to be civilized by the West?
Are Indiaâs internal social problems going to be managed by foreign interventions in the name of human rights?
How do power imbalances and systemic biases affect the objectivity and quality of scholarship?
What are the rights of practitioner-experts in âtalking backâ to academicians?
What is the role of Indiaâs intellectuals, policymakers and universities in fashioning an authentic and enduring response?</b></i>
TITLE: Invading the Sacred: An Analysis of Hinduism Studies in America
EDITORS: Krishnan Ramaswamy, Antonio de Nicolas, Aditi Banerjee
PUBLISHER: Rupa & Co.
PAGES: 545
Available at www.invadingthesacred.com
Contributors to the volume include the renowned anthropologist Prof <b>SN Balagangadhara </b> (University of Ghent, Belgium); the scholar of religion, <b>Prof. Arvind Sharma </b> (McGill University); the noted psychologist <b>Dr Alan Roland</b> , <b>Pandita Indrani Rampersad </b> (the first ordained female Hindu priest in the West Indies), and the educationist Dr <b>Yvette Rosser</b> , among others.
<b>About the Editors </b>
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<b>Krishnan Ramaswamy </b> PhD is a scientist with a background in psychometric research. His areas of research include clinical outcome trials in major mental and neurological illnesses. He is a student of the Vedas, Vedanta, Sanskrit and Panini, and has a lifelong interest in bhakti poetry from various regions of India, particularly in Marathi.
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<b>Antonio T. de Nicolas</b> PhD is Professor Emeritus of philosophy at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. He has authored twenty seven books, including Avatara: The humanization of Philosophy through the Bhagavad Gita, a classic in the field; and Habits of Mind, a criticism of higher education, whose framework has been adopted as the educational system for Russia. He received critical acclaim for his translations of the poetry of the Nobel Prize winning author, Juan Ramon Jimenez, and of the mystical writings of Sr. Ignatius de Loyola and St. John of the Cross. He is presently Director of the Bicultural Research Institute.
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<b>Aditi Banerjee</b> received a B.A. in International Relations, magna cum laude, from Tufts University, and a J.D. from Yale Law School. She is a practicing attorney in New York. Her publications include: The Hyphenated Hindus, in Outlook India; Hindu-American: Both Sides of the Hyphen, in Silicon India; and Hindu Pride, in Buddhists, Hindus, and Sikhs in America (Jon Butler et al. eds., Oxford University Press.).
From Pioneer, July 31, 2007
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Revisiting Krishna
Utpal K Banerjee
Krishna in Performing Arts, Shovana Narayan, Shuvi Publications, Rs 2500
Shovana Narayan, the author of the book under review, has impeccable credentials to write such a tome. A well-known Kathak dancer who has acquired honours and encomium in the arts arena, she is also a veteran civil servant ensuring her contribution in important postings. A combination of these two contrasting worlds has equipped her with a rare sensitivity revealed to most of those who come in personal touch with her. Marriage to a seasoned diplomat from Austria has given her the third dimension: Global understanding that comes from her many peripatetic missions. No wonder she has already authored nine books on classical and folk dances, and their links to theatre and other traditional arts.
The present book is an absolute delight and one does agree with the blurb: "Krishna holds eternal fascination or writers, poets, philosophers and artists... He demands love, faith, devotion and surrender." Yet, there is, on the one side, the butter-eating, flute-playing pastoral Krishna - mischievous to the core, associated with demon-killing legends and growing up to be the frolicsome youth having dalliance with milk-maidens of Vrindavan and the blooming Radha. On the other side is the extraordinarily mature Krishna, the fount-head of all wisdom and counsellor to the Kuru clan, who propounded the universal truths of Bhagavat Gita.
Many authorities doubt if these two Krishnas could be one and the same, and not really merged in the popular psyche in the post-Srimad Bahgavat era. The monumental work of Sri Krishna Chaitanya (KK Nair, otherwise) is relevant in this context, which connects and interprets the Krishna-lore in terms of the performing and visual arts, assumed as integrated here.
Barring this important distinction, the book does ample justice to the chosen subject. <b>The intertwining of spirituality, devotion and arts is intense in Indian performing arts, and is established early, before embarking on the divine romance of Radha and outlining the available research on chronology of Radha, beginning from the 10th century. Jayadeva, the court-poet of Bengal king Lakshman Sen in the 12th century, did elevate Radha - in his epic poetry Gita Govinda - to a central deity of worship. It was, however, Andhra saint Nimbarka who took her to Vrindavan and put her on the pedestal of a goddess, not mentioned here.</b>
There is an excellent recapitulation of the semiotics connected with jewellery, coiffeur, forehead-marks, flute and apparel: All linked with Krishna and their significance in the arts. The bhavas (sentiments) and their expressions are well captured in the Vatsalya Rasa of mother Yashoda and Shringaera Rasa (emanating from Madhurya Bhava) that symbolises surrender of the self to the Supreme: As the highest form of bhakti.
<b>The book's strength is its splendid graphics mainly from the genre of Indian classical dances. It is amazing how the abhinaya forms, namely, sattvik (facial expressions), vachik (musical utterances from literature), angik (body-postures) and aharya (adornments and costumes) could widely vary across the genre, but the content would hark back to the myriad Krishna themes in their essence!</b>
Dance, opera and theatre have been treated as a group and given a good coverage. It is a sheer nostalgic experience to find allusions to the classical 'trinity' performing together: Bharati Shivaji (Mohiniyattam), Shovana Narayan (Kathak) and Kiran Sehgal (Odissi) in an obeisance to the Almighty. In the narrative of the performing arts, theatre seems to emerge as the poor cousin, since only Dhanur Yatra of Orissa finds a mention, to the exclusion of the multiple variety of mythological dramas of the entire eastern India.
Music coverage on Krishna motifs is an excellent section. Festivals are another valuable part of the book and the catalogue of the coverage on Krishna-related festivities is quite illuminating.
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From Pioneer, 18 Au.g 2007
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Children of a dead god
The book seeks to analyse the causes and effects of academic Hinduphobia in the US, writes NS Rajaram
Invading the Sacred: An analysis of Hinduism studies in America, Krishnan Ramaswamy, Antonio de Nicolas & Aditi Banerji (Edited), Rupa, Rs 595
Like anthropology, Indology is a colonial creation. While anthropology has acquired a degree of respectability by allying with empirical disciplines like archaeology, Indology remains rooted in its colonial past. During its brief existence, Indology has rested on two pillars - the Aryan invasion/migration myth and the Hindu religion. For almost 150 years the Aryan myth and its offshoots remained the most visible face of Indology. Six decades after the collapse of Nazi Germany the myth is now in its last gasp, despite a last ditch effort by a few fringe groups to keep it alive in the guise of Indo-European studies and philology. It is a sign of things to come that Cambridge and Berlin have shut down their Indology programmes.
With the collapse of the Aryan myth, the other wing of Indology targeting the 'heathen' Hindu has moved to the centre-stage. Its home is no longer Europe, but American academia. Its most visible member is Wendy Doniger O'Flaherty, a professor of religion at the University of Chicago. The agenda of O'Flaherty and her camp followers - Jeffrey Kripal, Paul Courtwright and others (commonly known as 'Wendy's Children') - is to project almost all Hindu beliefs and practices as rooted in sexual fantasies by applying what they claim to be 'Freudian analysis'. The result is a grotesque caricature of Hindu thought and literature as a pornographic parade.
To these Hinduism scholars, Freudian psychology serves the same role that 'race science' did for Arthur de Gobineau and Houston Chamberlain - the founding fathers of the Aryan master race theory. In language and style, Doniger O'Flaherty and her ilk are a throwback to Julius Streicher and his Nazi propaganda sheet, Der Strummer, published 70 years ago. (The same holds for Michael Witzel and his Indo-Eurasian Research, but that is a different story.) As always, such an exercise reveals more about the state of mind of the perpetrators than the subject they claim to be writing about. For these academics, 'Hinduphobia' - a word coined by Rajiv Malhotra - has replaced anti-Semitism of the Aryan invasion/migration theorists.
Invading the Sacred is a collection of scholarly articles that seeks to analyse the causes and effects of academic Hinduphobia. The contributors represent a wide range of disciplines from religion and philosophy (Sharma, De Nicholas and Balagangadhara) to education and mass communication (Yvette Rosser, Indrani Rampersad and Ramesh Rao), and clinical psychology (Roland and Ramaswamy). This broad representation has allowed the claims of Hinduphobic scholars to be put to test using the very tools they claim to be using in their analysis.
The self-proclaimed knowledge of Freudian psychology of these Hinduphobic writers is not taken seriously by practicing psychologists represented in Invading the Sacred. It simply serves as a fig leaf to give them the licence to give a sexual twist to everything in Hindu literature and practice while invoking Freud as authority. It is not much different when it comes to the sources: Their familiarity with the subjects they claim to be writing about ranges from weak to non-existent. This is true especially of their knowledge of Indian languages and literature. All this is a testimony not only to their shoddy scholarship, but also intellectual hypocrisy.
To their credit, the contributors to Invading the Sacred refrain from polemics by taking the scholarly high ground, and analyse their subjects (including their authors) on the merits and demerits of their work. One of the contributors (Balagangadhara) makes the perceptive observation that the social sciences and the humanities in the West are rooted in Christian theology. And for this reason, in rhetoric and conclusions, these scholars are often indistinguishable from Christian missionaries of a hundred years ago.
Their missionary roots are on display in another of their claims - that these Hinduphobic scholars are only helping to "cleanse" Hinduism of its sins, presumably because the degraded Hindus are incapable of doing it themselves. This is no different from the missionary heaping abuse on the heathens to save their souls from eternal damnation. The more things change, the more they remain the same.
In this situation, anti-Hindu bias is inevitable even though denied by academics who proudly flaunt their Marxist and/or Freudian colours. To counter this, Arvind Sharma in his informative preface makes a long overdue suggestion: Why not use statistical methods to test their claims of being unbiased. After all, statistics has proved its mettle in analysing such problems. Bias detection is a well understood statistical technique.
In the final analysis, these Hinduphobic scholars' 'scholarly' contributions will prove no more lasting than that of the Aryan theorists before them. The real question is what drives their visceral anti-Hinduism? Or as Shakespeare asked about those who murdered Julius Caesar: "What private griefs these men have," for their behaviour cannot be explained on rational grounds.
Chapter 10 (It's All About Power) takes a step towards answering the question by pointing out how these scholars feel insecure that Hindus in the West are succeeding in the professions and may soon topple them from their self-appointed positions of intellectual superiority. To make things worse, Hindus are succeeding without losing their spiritual moorings.
More than a century ago Nietzsche, in his Thus Spake Zarathushtra, diagnosed their malady: Their god is dead. The resulting spiritual vacuum, he warned, would be filled by what he called "barbaric brotherhoods". The following century was to witness several of these - Fascism, Communism and Nazism, each with its own underlying secular theology. Academic Hinduphobia, like anti-Semitism, is an outgrowth of this spiritually barren landscape.
In the face of this we should see these not as 'Wendy's Children', but the children of a 'dead god', Wendy included.
-- The reviewer is a scientist and historian. His latest book is Sarasvati River and the Vedic Civilization: History, science and politics
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Pioneer, 7 Sept., 2007
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Dharma of life deciphered
Chandril Basak
<b>Hindu Tenets, J Agarwal, Pustak Mahal, Rs 150</b>
What made J Agarwal write this book? <b>The author came across several Hindu professionals in his long stay in the US who were ignorant of the concepts of Hinduism. Being motivated by the ignorance of a majority of people, Agarwal decided to write Hindu Tenets, depicting the philosophy of 'Sanatan Vedic Hindu Dharma'.</b>
In Hinduism, the word dharma does not simply mean religion, as it is commonly understood. Before elucidating the term, it is necessary to describe the meaning of 'religion'. <b>Swami Vivekananda had once observed, "Religion is the manifestation of the divinity already in man. It is the idea which is raising the brute unto man, and man unto God. The secret of religion lies not in theories but in practice. To be good and do good - that is the whole of religion." </b>
As for the term dharma, <b>Sri Aurobindo, said: "Dharma is the Indian concept in which rights and duties lose the artificial antagonism, created by view of the world which makes selfishness the root of action, and regain their deep and eternal unity." Dharma, therefore, is the necessary code of conduct by following which man can attain the ultimate objective.</b>
<b>The book provides the Vedic definition of Hinduism, which says that a man "irrespective of his caste, colour or creed" can be a Hindu if he is noble and "discharges his sublime duties (dharma) and conducts himself with dignity and self-confidence in society, keeping the welfare of others uppermost in mind." </b>
Contrary to the common belief, the <b>Vedic Hindu Dharma has never had any divergence with science and material prosperity;</b> rather, they are complementary to each other. <b>The discussion on creation of the cosmos transpires that the Vedas corroborate the modern theory of formation of nebulae, which finally transformed into several cosmic objects.</b>
<b>As per the Vedas, Hinduism is monotheistic in its philosophy</b>. One wonders how can there be a conflict between the Vedas and the dominant Hindu notion of multiple gods. The book clears the air of confusion on such issues.
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