Guest guest Posted June 13, 2001 Report Share Posted June 13, 2001 dear professors and scholars who are posting in non-english. a simple request and f.y.i. one. you can easily create private forums or mailing lists that only you can read and write to. the very reason you have a public forum on , is that you expect good valuable thoughts from everyone, not just your close buddies. two. just because you will use german or french on this forum will NOT act as filter. there are many of these 'fundamentalist hindus' who have learnt some of these european languages as well. and for others they can get some feeling of what you are trying to say and in what tone, by translating it on the web. I have translated some of them and even in the bad translation, one can make out utterly unscholarly egotistic tone of 'filtering out'. it simply tantamounts to censorship or refusal to listen the other or differing side. those who get their livelihood and life's passion from sanskrit, should at least be respectful of people of the land of the language. not every indian is a scholar or wise but many are. they don't need to be trained in western univs only to be heard. i am surprised and saddened that all you scholars of sanskrit have merely mastered the language and the facts and not at all got the soul of it. you may feel great about having 5 degrees in sanskrit, but if you can't imbibe what the seers have said then you are nothing more than the people you are slandering against on this group. and those who think that non-degree holder from foreign univs are not entitled to speak are just as castist, exclusionist as they claim the brahmin is. and those who think i am trying to be abusive to learned people and professors and international authorities, please i am not. INDOLOGY, zydenbos@g... wrote: > INDOLOGY, Michael Witzel <witzel@f...> wrote: > > > Herr Rau -- sicherlich; im Uebrigen hat er mir noch ein Jahr vor > seinem Tod > > --per Postkarte-- > > erlaubt, seine archaeologischen Artikel u. sein Buch ueber den Staat > ins > > Engl. uebersetzen zu lassen, was tatsaechlich im Gang ist. Man > fragt sich > > in der gegenwaertigen Lage, ob ihm damit gedient sein wird. > > 1989, bei meiner Promotion in Utrecht, hatte ich als Diskussionsthema > ('stelling') für die mündliche Prüfung angeboten: "Es gibt > ernsthafte Gründe dafür, dass wir das Deutsche wieder als > Sprache der > indologischen Wissenschaft pflegen sollen" - wobei eine > Hauptüberlegung war, dass das Deutsche kein Englisch ist. Die > lärmenden Persönlichkeiten, die die alte Liste zerstört > haben (und es jetzt auch hier versuchen) werden sich bestimmt nicht > die Mühe nehmen, andere in der akademischen Welt häufig > verwendeten > Sprachen zu lernen. > > > Chers collegues francais(es), utilisez donc votre langue dans ce > groupe > > largement ignorant. > > Peut-etre un debat professionel plus fructueux resultera (Que > pensez-vous, > > prof. Raman?) ****** > > Sans doute: la langue fonctionnera comme filtre. Jadis le latin (et le > sanscrit aussi) a eu une fonction pareille. > > > Immerhin immer noch die beiden wichtigsten indologischen Sprachen... > - > > (Non volo laedere: Italiani, Russkii, i.t.d...) > > Vielleicht doch gut, dass dies einmal 'en plein public' gesagt wird. > :-) > > Robert Zydenbos > Universität München Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 13, 2001 Report Share Posted June 13, 2001 INDOLOGY, shashi_kant_joshi wrote: > dear professors and scholars who are posting in non-english. > > a simple request and f.y.i. > > one. you can easily create private forums or mailing lists that only > you can read and write to. the very reason you have a public forum on > , is that you expect good valuable thoughts from everyone, not > just your close buddies. I think it is a mistake to assume that everyone who uses non-English is a close buddy. You read my message, and I do not know you. I read Dr. Kalyanaraman's Telugu. > two. just because you will use german or french on this forum will > NOT > act as filter. there are many of these 'fundamentalist hindus' who > have learnt some of these european languages as well. and for others > they can get some feeling of what you are trying to say and in what > tone, by translating it on the web. > > I have translated some of them and even in the bad translation, one > can make out utterly unscholarly egotistic tone of 'filtering out'. > it > simply tantamounts to censorship or refusal to listen the other or > differing side. No, this is an incorrect conclusion. Anyone is allowed to learn any language and read whatever is written in it. There is no 'censorship' involved here. But if persons of the strangely abusive kind want to vent their incomprehensible rage on serious scholars who happen to be non-Indians, they will at least have to put in some more effort. Even if avoiding English is not 100% foolproof (of course it is not), it may deal with a considerable percentage of the problem. (Fortunately we see that in recent years educated Indians are recognising the worth of Western cultures and societies that are not the USA, and slowly the teaching of other languages is spreading in India. My - perhaps misplacedly optimistic - assumption is that people who make the effort to learn German, French etc. are a different kind of people, with a more open mind and a more respectful attitude towards fellow humans, not only towards $$, and that therefore they will listen and think and give useful responses, rather than misquote and distort and rant.) The same kind of incorrect conclusion lies in "refusal to listen the other or differing side". We read English, and we also read what 'other sides' have to say. Prof. Witzel's initial point was: why should there be English translations of Prof. Rau's writings? The second, extended point is: why should any of us write in English at all, if we neither are Anglosaxons nor live in an Anglophone country? Mainly as a gesture towards an Indian readership. But if we see (e.g., on this list) what the Indian readership does, one wonders whether the use of English is worth the effort. At least at the present point in time, there seems to be no noticeable benefit. > those who get their livelihood and life's passion from sanskrit, > should at least be respectful of people of the land of the language. > not every indian is a scholar or wise but many are. they don't need > to > be trained in western univs only to be heard. Of course not. And such persons can continue writing in English and be read. No censorship. No instant refusal. > i am surprised and saddened that all you scholars of sanskrit have > merely mastered the language and the facts and not at all got the > soul of it. I am curious about that 'soul of Sanskrit'. Surely it is not the mentality that underlies the postings on this list by some of the would-be patriotic, self-appointed and deluded defenders of India and Hinduism who do nothing more than a sterile bashing of Europe (or so they want to make it look. They may actually be writing about America, as Dr. Fosse suggested, since it seems that most of them are based there and I do not recognise much of Europe in their rant. But being based in the US, they perhaps do not want to bite the hand that gives them the life for which they left India, so they let loose their rage onto an imaginary thing which they call 'Europe' and believe is the indirect but ultimate cause of whatever their problem is). Finally, thank you for being one of those non-Macaulayites who do not think it beneath their dignity to read non-English. Robert Zydenbos Universität München Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 13, 2001 Report Share Posted June 13, 2001 INDOLOGY, zydenbos@g... wrote: They may actually be writing about America, > as Dr. Fosse suggested, since it seems that most of them are based > there and I do not recognise much of Europe in their rant. But being > based in the US, they perhaps do not want to bite the hand that gives > them the life for which they left India, so they let loose their rage > onto an imaginary thing which they call 'Europe' and believe is the > indirect but ultimate cause of whatever their problem is). Here we have that pseudo-psycho-analysis again. Actually I was wondering why Dr. Zydenbos is keeping quiet for such a long time since he is one of the most violent members of the Indologists Lynch Mob! I am an Indian. And I am based in the USA. I love India and I love the United States very much. The hand that gives me something for which I left India is very dear to me. And it is dear to most Indians that live here in the United States. I have great regard for Americans, their work ethic, generosity and their friendliness. My friends and colleagues here know that better than all of your self professed psychics. The same applies to most Indians working in the United States. In fact, I have not come across Americans who are as obnoxious as some scholars on this list. However, anything goes for pseudo-psychaiatrists like you. One could actually do plenty of such pseudo-analysis on you. For instance, I could say that a VHP leader/An Udipi Acharya denied you a Brahmin status if you were to convert to Hinduism and therefore you love VHP-bashing, love declaring Jaina roots of Dvaita Vedanta and so on. Or that you were cold shouldered at the Srngeri Matha and therefore you repeat this non-verified opinion again and again that the icon there was stolen from the Jainas. Or that, with an Indian wife, you feel that your endogamy would shield you from any anti-Indian remarks made by you. I could go on and on like Romila Thapars/Jeffrey Kripals with this kind of silly non-verifiable and non-falsifiable analysis. In fact, I do not have any hatred for Europe. Why should I have? But prejudiced people like you will see only what they want to see. BTW, coming to Norway, I think a lot of history books need correction. I still remember that in the chapter on World War II, there would be a map with different shades for countries that were in the Allied camp, or and a different for the Nazi supporters. Somehow Norway is always given the same color as Germany and Italy. And I used to wonder why! Maybe Dr. Fosse should give the 3% argument to the editors of the books. Likewise, he should also note that the RSS _claims_ 15 million members which is 1.5% of Indian population. Less than 3%. And these claims are quite questionable. Many people will tell you that one fine morning they woke up and suddently found that they were a member of such and such organization when they never signed up for it. I know you will want to have the last word. Go ahead. If some people do not want to translate Dr. Rau's works into English, that will be sad. More and more technical German journals are coming out with more and more English articles. They are read by lakhs of non German scientists and engineers because of their excellent content. When visiting Germany for technical exhibitions, one has not communications barries at all because even the policeman on the street sometims knows a little English. But some Indologists will prefer Oldenberg's books printed in the Gothic script or Geldners RV in bardic/medieval German to the 'Victorian' English of Griffith. German romanticism, shall I say? Vishal Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 13, 2001 Report Share Posted June 13, 2001 INDOLOGY, VAgarwalV@c... wrote: your endogamy would shield you from any anti-Indian remarks > made by you. The word should be read as 'exogamy'. Note that it is a Zydenbosesque pseudo-analysis only. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 14, 2001 Report Share Posted June 14, 2001 On Wed Jun 13, 2001, VAgarwalV@c... wrote: INDOLOGY, zydenbos@g... wrote: > They may actually be writing about America, > as Dr. Fosse suggested, since it seems that most of them are based > there and I do not recognise much of Europe in their rant. But being > based in the US, they perhaps do not want to bite the hand that gives > them the life for which they left India, so they let loose their rage > onto an imaginary thing which they call 'Europe' and believe is the > indirect but ultimate cause of whatever their problem is). << Here we have that pseudo-psycho-analysis again. Actually I was wondering why Dr. Zydenbos is keeping quiet for such a long time since he is one of the most violent members of the Indologists Lynch Mob! >> In Dutch we have an expression: "wie de schoen past, trekke hem aan" - in English translation: "whomever the shoe fits, let him wear it." - I did not mention you at all. Are you confessing, by this fierce and gushy reaction, that you are one of those people I referred to in the quoted message, those who may (just a suggestion) have a problem which they take out on innocent academicians? Lynch mob... hm. May I ask you for any substantiation of this ascribed membership to a fictive association, and also ask you what it means, or is this asking for too much? I was actually under the impression that it was *you* who was persecuting *me* for some reason. E.g., I think you will remember the Elst episode on the Old List, which you initiated by quoting a piece with a lie about me by the vicious N.S. Rajaram, who after the Frontline articles looks like a thoroughly exposed fraud. (Has it occurred to you that you may have played a role in his exposure?) And if you do take up the challenge (giving substantiation), do it sensibly, please. Not like in your message #413 on this list, a splendid exercise in uncritical thinking. I actually took the trouble of checking the URLs, and that was an unfortunate waste of time. (E.g., who cares if somebody on a Rediff chat group yells at Rohan Oberoi?) << One could actually do plenty of such pseudo-analysis on you. For instance, I could say that a VHP leader/An Udipi Acharya denied you a Brahmin status if you were to convert to Hinduism and therefore you love VHP-bashing, love declaring Jaina roots of Dvaita Vedanta and so on. >> Pseudo-analysis indeed, since you have nothing substantial to work on. I don't recall ever having spoken with any VHP leader about a supposed desire of mine to convert to Hinduism. As for the historically interesting question of the Jaina background of Dvaita Vedanta (thank you for the publicity), there is nothing mentally deranged about it, as you can find out from that article of mine in a reputed professional journal (Journal of Indian Philosophy vol. 19 (1991), pp. 249-271). In all of 10 years after its appearance, it still stands unrefuted and is a meaningful contribution to the understanding of the intellectual and social history of India. Do you have a problem with that? Is it because of the results, or do you have a problem tolerating academic freedom in general? You are of course free to disprove what I wrote in the article, if you feel up to it. Do it in a scholarly manner, in a reputed professional journal. << Or that, with an Indian wife, you feel that your endogamy would shield you from any anti-Indian remarks made by you. >> An Indologist who marries an Indian is anti-Indian? Hm. (No, I am not sorry if I offended your sensibilities by marrying outside my caste, or whatever.) May I ask you for (a) a definition of what is 'anti-Indian', (b) where I have made such remarks? Something verifiable / falsifiable? Or is this again asking for too much? Or do we have here another example of shouting out / repeating a lie in the hope that your readers may unquestioningly believe that you must be telling the truth, like in http://www.angelfire.com/in/zydenbos/dontlearn.html ? What is very sad about all this is that you seem to work at cross-purposes with the Indologists who try to make people outside India interested in and sympathetic about India (as the Indologists themselves are). Why do you do this? But I have a friendly proposal now: try to rehabilitate yourself and explain to us what exactly you are trying to achieve here. After being thrown off the Old List for bad behaviour, you signed up here as soon as the opportunity offered itself, and you are spending a lot of time here; so whatever you are trying to achieve must be a very urgent matter. But it is not clear what the matter is. Is there anything positive and constructive that you would like to achieve? Is somebody paying you to do this? An explicit statement of purpose may help all of us, also you. By the way, you may refer to me as Professor Zydenbos. (Am I pulling rank on you? Yes.) And as a professor, I also have other things to do. I do not let everything on this list clutter my mailbox but just have a look at this list online at the office once or twice a week, which seems to be enough. If you want more reactions from me, you will have to come up with something special. (You are lucky that today is a holiday for me.) Coming back to the subject line: should somebody like you be filtered out? You do have amusement value, with your unparallelled intense viciousness. My non-English messages apparently did filter you out. Maybe I will reconsider. Maybe not. Prof. Dr. Robert J. Zydenbos Institut für Indologie und Iranistik Universität München / Munich University Deutschland / Germany Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 14, 2001 Report Share Posted June 14, 2001 INDOLOGY, zydenbos@g... wrote: > INDOLOGY, shashi_kant_joshi wrote: > > dear professors and scholars who are posting in non-english. > > > > a simple request and f.y.i. > > > > one. you can easily create private forums or mailing lists that > only > > you can read and write to. the very reason you have a public forum > on > > , is that you expect good valuable thoughts from everyone, not > > just your close buddies. > > I think it is a mistake to assume that everyone who uses non-English > is a close buddy. You read my message, and I do not know you. I read > Dr. Kalyanaraman's Telugu. please robert, :-)) i forgot to put the phrase in quotes, i meant 'close buddies' :-) my point was, changing the language thinking that most 'nationalist' (or use your prefered adjective) indians wouldn't understand and hence not be able to respond and hence 'filter out' (use your favourite adjective again) the noise or rantings or flames or whatever is not very effective or scholarly. and if everyone would start using their own languages then that will be real noise. i am sure you don't all the languages that the people on this list can speak ... i of course am relying on the bable.altavista.com translation, and the smilies etc. of course you have the right to pass any remarks anywhere, but i think it was not very 'scholarly' or mature to say that lets speak in another language on a public forum whihc is primarily in english just to filter out the noise. you can always maintain a small email list perosnally no needed! and no one but the 'similar-minded' people can read and enjoy. i hope you are baiting me with sarcasm, for this was not my intention :-) anyways. > > two. just because you will use german or french on this forum will > > NOT > > act as filter. there are many of these 'fundamentalist hindus' who > > have learnt some of these european languages as well. and for > others > > they can get some feeling of what you are trying to say and in what > > tone, by translating it on the web. > > > > I have translated some of them and even in the bad translation, one > > can make out utterly unscholarly egotistic tone of 'filtering out'. > > it > > simply tantamounts to censorship or refusal to listen the other or > > differing side. > > No, this is an incorrect conclusion. Anyone is allowed to learn any > language and read whatever is written in it. There is no 'censorship' > involved here. But if persons of the strangely abusive kind want to i think you get me wrong here sir. did i ever say one is not allowed to learn a language. this is a public forum, and the primary language is english. the discusison is about india and heavily geared towards sanskrit. so, the only prefered languages would be english and of course sanskrit. if you were all to carry out discusison in sanskrit then of course no one can object and that should filter out the noise :-)) > vent their incomprehensible rage on serious scholars who happen to be > non-Indians, they will at least have to put in some more effort. :-)) Even > if avoiding English is not 100% foolproof (of course it is not), it > may deal with a considerable percentage of the problem. (Fortunately > we see that in recent years educated Indians are recognising the worth > of Western cultures and societies that are not the USA, and slowly the i really want to differ sir. indians are very well aware of europe and all its culture and history, maybe more than others are aware of india. the people on net that you see who are mainly in u.s.a. do see the usa side of the story but it is only a continuation of what started in europe. you can't deny that india had been under english rule and what all tactics the imperialists have used not just in india but everywhere in the name of culture, education and science. the current name calling is nothing in front of the slanders used by british viceroys in their apparently private diaries that have since gone public. nor should anyone interested in india be unfamiliar with macaulay and his design and effects. how they ruined the indigenous education system to replace it with a bookish one. how they introduced a whole new class of landlord in baanglaa (then Bengal, now bangladesh) to raise indigo to destroy cotton industry. they used indology to turn it against the indan free thought and the slightest indian pride that a citizen may have. this is not fantasy but fact. it is just a fact that english is mor popular among foreign lanaguges, but if you see that thre are 15 constitutional languages, and most indians know at least two languages they are already at par with you :-)) > teaching of other languages is spreading in India. My - perhaps > misplacedly optimistic - assumption is that people who make the effort > to learn German, French etc. are a different kind of people, with a > more open mind and a more respectful attitude towards fellow humans, once again, sir, i think you are yourself narrowminded or frustrated or simply using sarcasm inappropriately as those you are critisizing here. no one says english is any better than any other language, actually it is a very pathetic language. but what can one do, fate has it that as of yet it is the most popular foreign language. i myself had one course of french but that was about it. and i found it was much more closer to hindi than english is! do you know that in indian schools kids learn 3 languages! respect for fellow humans is not dependent directly on what language you speak but what ethics, manners your parents inculcate in you or you grow to like. weren't the nazis german speaking? ... you get the drift. > not only towards $$, and that therefore they will listen and think and > give useful responses, rather than misquote and distort and rant.) i fail to understand you bringing the $$ in picture? you don't care anout money and all other differing view indians do?? please. need i even elaborate? :-) > The same kind of incorrect conclusion lies in "refusal to listen the > other or differing side". We read English, and we also read what > 'other sides' have to say. Prof. Witzel's initial point was: why > should there be English translations of Prof. Rau's writings? The > second, extended point is: why should any of us write in English at > all, if we neither are Anglosaxons nor live in an Anglophone country? i hope my point has been clarified. i didn't uphold english as a better languge but as the prefered lang on this forum. using another langauges to 'filter out' is where i had objection. do it on a private forum if you don't like the noise, i have no problems. > Mainly as a gesture towards an Indian readership. But if we see (e.g., > on this list) what the Indian readership does, one wonders whether the > use of English is worth the effort. At least at the present point in > time, there seems to be no noticeable benefit. once again, i will overlook this as you misunderstood my comments. > > i am surprised and saddened that all you scholars of sanskrit have > > merely mastered the language and the facts and not at all got the > > soul of it. > > I am curious about that 'soul of Sanskrit'. Surely it is not the > mentality that underlies the postings on this list by some of the > would-be patriotic, self-appointed and deluded defenders of India and > Hinduism who do nothing more than a sterile bashing of Europe (or so > they want to make it look. They may actually be writing about America, you had made such a good point had you not used these adjectives. from what i read on this particular thread, these people you qualified with the adjectives, didn't appear to not have a point. there is no stupid question, if you know enough. and scholars, specially of a language whose literature is laden with philosphy, should have the patience to not degrade themselves with egotism or name calling when the other person(s) merely started a topic. i guess the topic was the role of indologists in nazi movement. why do you as an indologist feel bad about it and expect a hindu not feel about the term 'saffronizing the education' when saffronizing is used in the most degrading way? have you tried to cry injustice to such a great notion - safrrom color. what it stands for? it stand for renunciation. the sanyasin wears it. just because some political party used it, you don't degrade the term saffron. the natinal flag has it as the first color. just as anyone who thinks swastik is evil (because hitler used it), so is one who think saffronising of education in india is bad just because some political party may have used it. you can have all sympathy for hitler's victims and you can cry hoarse over the pseudo-scholars and nationalistic hindus, but do you cry hoarse over the injustice done to india, bhaarat, hinduism, hindutva, sanskrit by anyone - be it communists, missionaries or political parties. i am not with b.j.p. or r.s.s. and i don't sunscribe to b.j.p.'s political handling either, but injustice has been dealt to hindus, hinduism and india by anyone who has been able to. and it were outsders, muslims invaders or european colonists. now if some people want to raise their head in indignance, please at least be symathetic to them and guide them properly instead of outright downplaying them. > as Dr. Fosse suggested, since it seems that most of them are based > there and I do not recognise much of Europe in their rant. But being > based in the US, they perhaps do not want to bite the hand that gives > them the life for which they left India, so they let loose their rage this again is laden with unwantd sarcasm dripping with superiority complex. and this is one i am not going to take it lighlty. do you think indians who are in u.s.a. are beggars who have been done a favor to by anyone in giving them a job? do you want to belittle the hard working indian who comes so far from his own country, society and makes it successful? are you trying to tread on moral high grounds or what? and since when has it been a crime or lowly to seek livelihood anywhere? even from time ancient, man has been doing commerce overseas. and u.s.a has a tough screening process to give work visa or green cards. immigrants pay equal amount of taxes. they are kept because the usa econmy needs them desparately. since when do you think usa has become a saint to give economic asylum to poverty ridden third world trash like india? you have shown your true color here, sir, and i have lost complete respect for you. if you feel anyone here deserves any respect, i expect you to express an apology on this account. you may be angry at anyone person on this group or you may feel disgusted to 10 of them or even at me, but to club every indian working in usa as money hungry, sycophant is utterly insulting. do you know that c.e.os of some of the biggest giants are indians? the companies like oracle, microsoft, sun and the entire silicon valley is ridden with highly qualified indian people? most of whom earn in a month what you earn in decade? this truly shows your egoticitc and may i say so called west/white/european/colonial supremacy thinking. you should be ashamed to call your self doctor of anyting, or a professor or a scholar. > onto an imaginary thing which they call 'Europe' and believe is the > indirect but ultimate cause of whatever their problem is). nope. indians are not blaming europe or usa for all of their problems. but plundering of india by the british, portugese and french is a relaity. they also plundered south america, africa and you can see the devastating effects there as well. the subtle plotting of the church, king and the scholars in india is not a news. if you think it is, i am sorry you are an indologist. > Finally, thank you for being one of those non-Macaulayites who do not > think it beneath their dignity to read non-English. nope, i don't think any language is beneath anything. i myself speak 3 languages fluently, understand 2 more a lot, and am pretty okay with one more. so that makes 3-5 languages. i am sure most macaulayites you are refering understand more than a few languages themselves. i am saddened because scholar, professors etc are falling to name calling, unwanted sarcasm that is below the belt kind, and not the subtle literary kind. it is beneath them. and as for the soul of sanskrit, why does one study sanskrit? someone study for aryabhaata's maths notes, but then they are not called indologists. if they study for the theatrical treatise by bharat, they are still not called indologists or scholars on india. if you simply teach middle school sanskrit you don't even profess anything on such lists. when you talk about vedas, and comment on them with adjectives as most westerns have, (some have indeed got good words for india as well) they are stepping beyond their limits. to comment on anything the seers have said, requires not mere knowldege of sanskrit or any other language, it foremost requires understanding basics of logic, and of philosophy, and a surrender to divinity, at least of what the seers themselves are talking about. things like, complete lack of ego, always ready to learn, never ridiculing or being proud of one's knowledge, and never thinking one has known it all. only then you can be wise, else you can merely be a walking robot, a humn encyclopedia no better than a digital one. before you say giita is trash because krishna says i created the four varNas and saying that it was fabricated later to counter buddhism, you must read it and try to understand it. how it is a fantastic summary of the entire vedic and upanishadic system of thought! before you utter anything else, repeat the gaayatri mantra and thank the seers for having created it, for it is only in the land of the seers, of sanskrit and not in iran, or germany or arabia or china that you find earliest thoughts about 'world is my home', 'truth is one expressed variably', 'let good thoughts come from all directions', 'that is whole, this is whole...', 'truth alone triumphs' etc the beauty of ramayan having been composed when perhaps the pyramids were constraucted or even before is disarming. the wisdom in them the story telling in them is beyond the petty definition of 'religion' of western languages. the very term religion has got its bad name from church's strong hold which caused only regression in europe. and by overthrowing the church only europe progressed. but that doesn't mean all religions are like that or has been like that. people often quote manusmriti in fighting aganist any self priding hindu. they only quote selected parts. they don't acknoledge that manusmriti's present form is already adulterated in medieval times to counter the growing islam in india. they don't realise that manusmriti is not a religious text it is merely a social one. and it does have a lot of good things as well. you all are great minds in the field of indology. you should have more compassion for india. you should raise yur heavy voices where it counts to see that good things happen to india, and the good things is NOT making india just like the 'modern' nations. the 'modern' nations are realising their mistakes in completely neglecting religion, in having such a consipated religion as we know, they are again relaising the importance of their original pre-church roots in the european folk traditions. please help the cause and don't let a living tradition die, one that you have devoted your lives for. why are you indologists? surely not because it is the highest paying job? you may disregard my mail as being emotinal and unscholarly but that is your loss and loss of indian cause. those who choose to remain apolitical are simply endorsing the caste system silently. krishna says in giitaa, 'it is better to die doing your own duty incorrectly than to try doing someone's elses'. so you say you are not politicians but scholars. but what use is the scholarship? to fill shelves for coming generations to use as paperweigts? if you don't raise your voices to all injustice or only selectively raise your voice for one side only (which seems to be harming the ethos of india) you are betraying your own life. then you indeed have an agenda and not the love for indology nor the meagre salary. the braahmaNa in india has always been the scholar, or to say the scholar has been called the braahmaNa. in true sense one who knows of the brahma, one who has realised it is a braahmaNa, and hence he gets the right and moral duty to teach others. for a soceity this takes various roles, philosophical and non philosophical from ministers to teachers to priests. choose your level. but when injustice has risen braahmaNa has risen up. not for one's self interest but for the interest of the society. i am not refering here to the temple panDaas who have misused the system. everyone knows they are not braahmanas but lower than a shudra. i hope that non-indian scholars will get some compassion for india, and indian patriots will restrain their lanaguage and tones. both sides please do give others a benefit of doubt as well. time permitting, i will answer the allegation against sita ram goel as well. thanks you who has read till here. indeed you have given me a lot of your precious time, i hope to have been useful to you. shashikant Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 14, 2001 Report Share Posted June 14, 2001 INDOLOGY, Robert J. Zydenbos <zydenbos@g...> wrote: Are you confessing, by this fierce > and gushy reaction, that you are one of those people I referred to in > the quoted message, those who may (just a suggestion) have a problem > which they take out on innocent academicians? VA: When did I say that your remarks were addressed to me. They were rather addressed to everyone of Indian origin settled in the USA. Kind of subtle hatemongering against a community whose contributions and competence is appreciated by the other members of the country of their adoption. I do not have to wait for people to name me specifically before I speak up for others. Strange that coming from Danmark you should behave like this. As for 'innocent' academicians, well well. Calling others fundamentalists and fanatics but ignoring Norwegian revisionists who want to change history books which paint their country in the same color as German (where you work now) and Italy. > > Lynch mob... hm. May I ask you for any substantiation of this ascribed > membership to a fictive association, and also ask you what it means, or > is this asking for too much? VA: It means a coterie of verbally violent Indologists who harass, abuse, and defame others who do not agree with their prejudiced opinions. >I was actually under the impression that > it was *you* who was persecuting *me* for some reason. VA: You suffer from persecution mania. Some people do not have the courage to join the 'My children, no Indians' bandwagon in their own countries and so they indulge in subtle hatemongering against Indian American diaspora in their writings in the USA. - Another Fosse/Zydenbos style analysis. > E.g., I think you > will remember the Elst episode on the Old List, which you initiated by > quoting a piece with a lie about me by the vicious N.S. Rajaram, who > after the Frontline articles looks like a thoroughly exposed fraud. > (Has it occurred to you that you may have played a role in his > exposure?) VA: Other than sophistry, your answer is nonsense. As for Fraud on the alleged doctoring of a seal, Farmer/Witzel/Vassilkov owe an apology to him. Of course, you will prefer to cheer your European cousins. > > And if you do take up the challenge (giving substantiation), do it > sensibly, please. Not like in your message #413 on this list, a splendid > exercise in uncritical thinking. I actually took the trouble of checking > the URLs, and that was an unfortunate waste of time. (E.g., who cares if > somebody on a Rediff chat group yells at Rohan Oberoi?) VA: What is Rediff Chat group? Where did I quote that? Apparently you do not know what you are saying. I was referring to an article on the Rediff. > Pseudo-analysis indeed, since you have nothing substantial to work on. I > don't recall ever having spoken with any VHP leader about a supposed > desire of mine to convert to Hinduism. VA: Nevertheless, you WERE told that you are or will not be a Brahmin. Your email is preserved with me. So either you are speaking a half truth now or were lying then. My analysis has greater credibility than yours and is less harmful since it analyszes an individual rather than disparaging a community of 1.7 million people. BTW, I hope you do not deny the Srngeri episode now :-) >As for the historically > interesting question of the Jaina background of Dvaita Vedanta (thank > you for the publicity), there is nothing mentally deranged about it, as > you can find out from that article of mine in a reputed professional > journal (Journal of Indian Philosophy vol. 19 (1991), pp. 249-271). In > all of 10 years after its appearance, VA: Oh Well. I suggest that you read a multi-part rebuttal at the following website (login and password are both 'Dvaita'). Or you can just dismiss the author as a Hindu fanatic like George Thompson http://www.dvaita.org/list/ > Do you have a problem with that? Is it because of the results, or do > you have a problem tolerating academic freedom in general? You are of > course free to disprove what I wrote in the article, if you feel up to > it. Do it in a scholarly manner, in a reputed professional journal. VA: Scholarly Journal - you mean gossipy glossy tabloid like EJVS or Frontline? As for academic freedom , it is members of the lynch mob like you who promote totalitarian behavior in institutions controled by them. I have no problem against the article as such, I was only applying your own analysis to you. > An Indologist who marries an Indian is anti-Indian? Hm. (No, I am not > sorry if I offended your sensibilities by marrying outside my caste, > or whatever.) May I ask you for (a) a definition of what is > 'anti-Indian', (b) where I have made such remarks? Something > verifiable / falsifiable? VA: Well, the statement is not less true than your clan member's statement that Indians in the USA hate that country but vent their spleen on Europe. >Or is this again asking for too much? Or do we > have here another example of shouting out / repeating a lie in the hope > that your readers may unquestioningly believe that you must be telling > the truth, like in > > http://www.angelfire.com/in/zydenbos/dontlearn.html ? VA: Did I claim that I am speaking a truth or a fact. I clearly said that my anaysis is pseudo, like your clan member's (and yours too, since you endorsed it). This distinction seems to be too difficult for your comprehension. > > What is very sad about all this is that you seem to work at > cross-purposes with the Indologists who try to make people outside India > interested in and sympathetic about India (as the Indologists > themselves are). Why do you do this? VA: Why do you gang up with people who have low ethical standards, abuse Indians, promote communism in India, defame others and so on? > > But I have a friendly proposal now: try to rehabilitate yourself and > explain to us what exactly you are trying to achieve here. After being > thrown off the Old List for bad behaviour, you signed up here as soon > as the opportunity offered itself, and you are spending a lot of time > here; so whatever you are trying to achieve must be a very urgent > matter. But it is not clear what the matter is. Is there anything > positive and constructive that you would like to achieve? Is somebody > paying you to do this? An explicit statement of purpose may help all > of us, also you. VA: I have the same questions for you. You have time and again acted in the capacity as a member of the Lynch Mob. Whom do you want to verbally hurt now? > > By the way, you may refer to me as Professor Zydenbos. (Am I pulling > rank on you? Yes.) And as a professor, I also have other things to do. > I do not let everything on this list clutter my mailbox but just have a > look at this list online at the office once or twice a week, which > seems to be enough. If you want more reactions from me, you will have > to come up with something special. (You are lucky that today is a > holiday for me.) VA: Well Professor Zydenbos, please learn some manners and acquire a sense of justice of fairness before preaching to others. Ask your own colleagues first to stop talking nonsense before preaching to the hated 'other'. > > Coming back to the subject line: should somebody like you be filtered > out? You do have amusement value, with your unparallelled intense > viciousness. My non-English messages apparently did filter you out. > Maybe I will reconsider. Maybe not. VA: When we were kids, our parents taught us not to speak in languages which people in the vicinity did not understand. I was told that the Americans also believe in such good manners. Apparently some Germans, a Norwegian and a Dane does not to these things. I know you will come back. Vishal Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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