05-13-2005, 12:28 PM
cross posted:
People who think Sanskrit is dead, should think again.
Texts in Sanskrit have been composed continuously in India over the millenia and still do, although there has been a drop in last century.
Think of a future 1000 years from hence. It is highly unlikely that any of the modern languages will remain in the present form. For an example, Hindi has evolved in so many different forms from the Hindi of early texts such as Prithviraj-Raso of Chand Bardai as to make it quite difficult to understand without help.
In contrast Sanskrit hasn't. There are clear advantages to this. By learning Sanskrit I can connect easily with millenia of literary activity in India. But one who has learnt only the modern khari-boli hindi will have a hard time even with the hindi of Tulsidas etc.
If I write a text in Sanskrit today, say about Indian music, I can be confident that that text will be seen and understood in the continuity of musical texts even thousands of years from now. Sanskrit grammar and language, being highly codified, can be learnt withought significant distortions. That advantage doesn't belong to other languages. A text written in Hindi would perhaps be hard to interpret even for hindi speakers in remote future.
I am 100% for Sanskrit as an official language. The usual argument about the difficulty of learning a new language like Sanskrit is dishonest, the difficulty applies equally well, if not more, to English, a foreign language.
Just for a sense of perspective, English has been important in world affairs only for a few centuries. And when UK and USA decline in power, English as a language is quite likely to lose its primary position. I don't give more than a century (at most a couple of centuries) for English to remain predominant language in the world.
Indians should learn English because it is important at current juncture of history. But Sanskrit has been around much longer and is intertwined with India in a very deep manner. It is highly evolved language capable of great expressivity. Modern Indian language can't come even remotely close to the capabilities that Sanskrit possesses. If India and Indians truly want to wrest away the linguistic dominance from English, they have to look towards Sanskrit, no other Indian language fits the bill.
People who think Sanskrit is dead, should think again.
Texts in Sanskrit have been composed continuously in India over the millenia and still do, although there has been a drop in last century.
Think of a future 1000 years from hence. It is highly unlikely that any of the modern languages will remain in the present form. For an example, Hindi has evolved in so many different forms from the Hindi of early texts such as Prithviraj-Raso of Chand Bardai as to make it quite difficult to understand without help.
In contrast Sanskrit hasn't. There are clear advantages to this. By learning Sanskrit I can connect easily with millenia of literary activity in India. But one who has learnt only the modern khari-boli hindi will have a hard time even with the hindi of Tulsidas etc.
If I write a text in Sanskrit today, say about Indian music, I can be confident that that text will be seen and understood in the continuity of musical texts even thousands of years from now. Sanskrit grammar and language, being highly codified, can be learnt withought significant distortions. That advantage doesn't belong to other languages. A text written in Hindi would perhaps be hard to interpret even for hindi speakers in remote future.
I am 100% for Sanskrit as an official language. The usual argument about the difficulty of learning a new language like Sanskrit is dishonest, the difficulty applies equally well, if not more, to English, a foreign language.
Just for a sense of perspective, English has been important in world affairs only for a few centuries. And when UK and USA decline in power, English as a language is quite likely to lose its primary position. I don't give more than a century (at most a couple of centuries) for English to remain predominant language in the world.
Indians should learn English because it is important at current juncture of history. But Sanskrit has been around much longer and is intertwined with India in a very deep manner. It is highly evolved language capable of great expressivity. Modern Indian language can't come even remotely close to the capabilities that Sanskrit possesses. If India and Indians truly want to wrest away the linguistic dominance from English, they have to look towards Sanskrit, no other Indian language fits the bill.