Guest guest Posted January 26, 2002 Report Share Posted January 26, 2002 At 08:53 AM 1/23/02 -0500, Lynken Ghose wrote: >Dear Indology: > >Does anyone know of any literature in Hinduism which speaks of the human >birth being the highest type of rebirth because it is the place from which >one can obtain moksa, much like the idea in Buddhism? This topic is discussed in Srimad-Bhagavatam (Bhagavata Purana) 5.13.21-22: King Rahugana said: This birth as a human being is the best of all. Even birth among the demigods in the heavenly planets is not as glorious as birth as a human being on this earth. What is the use of the exalted position of a demigod? In the heavenly planets, due to profuse material comforts, there is no possibility of associating with devotees. It is not at all wonderful that simply by being covered by the dust of your lotus feet, one immediately attains the platform of pure devotional service to Adhoksaja, which is not available even to great demigods like Brahma. By associating with you just for a moment, I am now freed from all argument, false prestige and lack of discrimination, which are the roots of entanglement in the material world. Now I am free from all these problems. Best wishes, Chris Beetle > >Thanks, >Lynken Ghose > > > >_______________ >Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: http://mobile.msn.com > > > > > >indology > > > >Your use of is subject to > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted January 27, 2002 Report Share Posted January 27, 2002 At 08:53 AM 01/23/2002 -0500, Lynken Ghose wrote: > > Does anyone know of any literature in Hinduism which speaks of the human > birth being the highest type of rebirth because it is the place from which > one can obtain moksa, much like the idea in Buddhism? _____________ Although not exactly what you are looking for, because it refers to svarga instead of moksa, take a look at Mbh 12.309.79 (12.322.80 in M.N. Dutt's translation). See also 12.286.31-33 (Dutt, 12.298.32-34). Luis Gonzalez-Reimann University of California, Berkeley Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted January 29, 2002 Report Share Posted January 29, 2002 I read this passage several times, and i'm familiar with the text from which it is derived. IT seems what is being suggested is that the human birth is an exalted one because it offers the possibiity for association with saintly souls, devotees. This seems to offer a rather poetical, bhakti explanation and can be understood only within that context. Lena --- Chris Beetle <bvi wrote: > At 08:53 AM 1/23/02 -0500, Lynken Ghose wrote: > >Dear Indology: > > > >Does anyone know of any literature in Hinduism > which speaks of the human > >birth being the highest type of rebirth because it > is the place from which > >one can obtain moksa, much like the idea in > Buddhism? > > This topic is discussed in Srimad-Bhagavatam > (Bhagavata Purana) 5.13.21-22: > King Rahugana said: This birth as a human being is > the best of all. Even > birth among the demigods in the heavenly planets is > not as glorious as birth > as a human being on this earth. What is the use of > the exalted position of a > demigod? In the heavenly planets, due to profuse > material comforts, there is > no possibility of associating with devotees. > It is not at all wonderful that simply by being > covered by the dust of your > lotus feet, one immediately attains the platform of > pure devotional service > to Adhoksaja, which is not available even to great > demigods like Brahma. By > associating with you just for a moment, I am now > freed from all argument, > false prestige and lack of discrimination, which are > the roots of > entanglement in the material world. Now I am free > from all these problems. > > Best wishes, > Chris Beetle > > > > > >Thanks, > >Lynken Ghose > > > > > > > >_______________ > >Send and receive Hotmail on your mobile device: > http://mobile.msn.com > > > > > > > > > > > >indology > > > > > > > >Your use of is subject to > > > > > > > > Great stuff seeking new owners in Auctions! http://auctions. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted January 31, 2002 Report Share Posted January 31, 2002 At 10:44 AM 1/29/02 -0800, leena taneja wrote: >I read this passage several times, and i'm familiar >with the text from which it is derived. IT seems >what is being suggested is that the human birth >is an exalted one because it offers the possibiity >for association with saintly souls, devotees. The original question mentioned the human form is exalted because one can attain liberation from it. The section I quoted explains how that takes place by the association of saintly souls, devotees. In the end of the quotation I cited, the speaker describes how he became free from his material conditioning in that way. Although the devas or demigods are more powerful and opulent than human beings and therefore may be considered by some to be more exalted, their intoxication with their opulence is a disqualification for hearing from and serving great souls, and thus a ordinary human form is actually an advantage for such service and for consequent liberation. >This >seems to offer a rather poetical, bhakti explanation >and can be understood only within that context. Your wording here sounds as if you are deprecating bhakti. However, in Bhagavad-gita 18.55, Lord Krishna describes that is it only by bhakti that He is to be known in truth, and the person who knows Him can enter the eternal abode. Srimad Bhagavatam 1.2.7 explains that both knowledge and renunciation result from bhakti. Actually the truth about bhakti is that it is so powerful that it can control God. It is because of Arjuna's bhakti that Lord Krishna agreed to drive his chariot. Best wishes, Chris Beetle > >Lena > >--- Chris Beetle <bvi wrote: >> At 08:53 AM 1/23/02 -0500, Lynken Ghose wrote: >> >Dear Indology: >> > >> >Does anyone know of any literature in Hinduism >> which speaks of the human >> >birth being the highest type of rebirth because it >> is the place from which >> >one can obtain moksa, much like the idea in >> Buddhism? >> >> This topic is discussed in Srimad-Bhagavatam >> (Bhagavata Purana) 5.13.21-22: >> King Rahugana said: This birth as a human being is >> the best of all. Even >> birth among the demigods in the heavenly planets is >> not as glorious as birth >> as a human being on this earth. What is the use of >> the exalted position of a >> demigod? In the heavenly planets, due to profuse >> material comforts, there is >> no possibility of associating with devotees. >> It is not at all wonderful that simply by being >> covered by the dust of your >> lotus feet, one immediately attains the platform of >> pure devotional service >> to Adhoksaja, which is not available even to great >> demigods like Brahma. By >> associating with you just for a moment, I am now >> freed from all argument, >> false prestige and lack of discrimination, which are >> the roots of >> entanglement in the material world. Now I am free >> from all these problems. >> >> Best wishes, >> Chris Beetle >> >> >> > >> >Thanks, >> >Lynken Ghose >> > >> > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 1, 2002 Report Share Posted February 1, 2002 Chris Beetle, It is true that human birth is exalted because one can attain liberation as a human being . According to Jain tradition even gods have to take human birth to attain Moksa . It is also interesting to note in this context that there is a vital connection between the concept of ahimsa and the concept of rebirth. A belief in the doctrine of rebirth led to the idea of unity of all life and, consequently to the ethical concept of non violence in ancient India. Once the doctrine of migration of souls came to include rebirth on earth in animal as well as human form depending upon one's karma, it created humanitarian sentiment of kinship among all life. To have developed this ethical principle is therefore a pioneering step in human history . The great contribution of Jain culture to this evolution has to be noted.It is in this context the Jain ahimsa is thoroughgoing. As Dr.Albert Schweitzer, the Nobel-Prize winner German medical missionary said: The laying down of the commandment not to kill and not to damage is one of the greatest events in the spiritual history of mankind. starting from its principle, founded on world and life denial, of abstention from action, ancient Indian thought - and this is a period when in other respects ethics have not progressed very far- reaches the tremendous discovery that ethics know no bounds! so far as we know this is for the first time clearly expressed by Jainism". Thus Jainism is undoubedly the pioneer in propagating the the concept of ahimsa- ahimsa paramo dharmah in human civilization. The concept of ahimsa was also foreign to Vedic culture. Lokmanya Tilak acknowledged that the Indians should be grateful to Jain ahimsa because it stopped the indiscriminate slaughter of animals in Yagnas. Prof W.Norman Broawn says in his Tagore Memorial Lectures, 1964-65: Man in the Universe "Though Upanishadas contain the first literary reference to the idea of rebirth and to the notion that one's action-karma- determines the conditions of one's future existences, and though they arrive at the point of recognising that rebirth may occurnot only in animal form but also in animal bodies, they tell us nothing about the precept of ahimsa. Yet that precept is later associated with the belief that a soul in its wandering may inhabit both kinds of forms. Ancient Brahmanical literature is conspicuously silent about ahimsa. The early Vedic texts do not even record the noun ahimsa nor know the ethical meaning which the noun later designated. Nor is an explanation of ahimsa deducible from other parts of Vedic literature. The ethical concept which it embodies was entirely foreign to the thinking of the early Vedic Aryans, who recognised no kinship between human and animal creation, but rather ate meat and ofered animals in the sacrifice to the gods.". Therefore, Prof.Brown concludes: "The double doctrine of ahimsa and vegetarianism has never had full and unchallenged acceptance and practice among Hindus, and should not be considered to have arisen in Brahmanical circles. It seems more probable that it originated in non-Brahmanical environment, and was promoted in historic India by the Jains and was adopted by Brahmanic Hinduism. >From the foregoing analysis it is also noteworthy that the main pillars of the Indian metaphysical thought constituted by the concepts of rebirth, karma and slavation through a way of life governed by non-violence are the characteristic contribution of Jaina faith because logically and spiritually they are so spiritually interlinked. In this context one can appreciate the conclusion arrived at by Hermann Jacobi, the German Indologist, when comparing Jainism with buddhism and Brahmanism. Jacobi observed in Jaina Sutras, Part I (Introduction) that there are four elements comon to all the three religions and these are according to him: (i) faith in rebirth of spirit, (ii) karma theory, (iii) salvation from rebirth and (iv) belief in periodic manifestations of prophets to resurrect religious spirit on earth. Jacobi concedes that the first three are a logical outcome of a faith in non-violence and hence they could not arise in the Aryan culture consistent with its sacrificial cult and that is why they are apparently borrowed from non-Aryan faith , that is Jainism. The far-reaching efect of Jain ahimsa culture is seen in the Hindu assimilation of Jain motives as shown by K.A. Nilkatha Sastri in his essay "The Scendency & Eclipse of Bhagvan Mahavira's Cult in Tamil Nadu". He states: Ït is necessary at this stage to state briefly what a Sankara mutt was and how it copied the Jaina church in its technique of organisation. It was legally constituted body, Pitha, headed by a bachelor hermit, (Brahmachari, Sanyasin) exercising absolute control over all the Hindu hermits of the entire quarter. This pontiff and his loval representatives, practising asceticism themselves, were to tour their respective regions supervising the religious rites (Samskaras) and daily practices (dinacharya) of the four Varnas. "They coordinated the worship of Siva, Vishnu, Sakti, surya, Kumara and Ganapati and recommended the consecration of the images of all these deities in every home and temple.But the most important and epoch-making innovation was their advice to all performers of Vedic sacrifices to substitute vegetable oferings for live animal victims. The Manimekhalai, one of the five great tamil epics, tells us that some orthodox Brahmins of that age were performing sacrifices, involving the killing of many animals, incljuding the cow. One Brahmin body it is said, successfully set free a cow, an intended victim and he was, therefore, hounded out of the locality as well as the community by the other Brahmins. Where actual blood had been spilt in certain atharvanic rituals, the Sankara-mutt recommended coloured mineral water (arati) and the breaking of cocoa-nuts and ashgourds. Where intoxicants, such as soma juice, had been used, they substituted 'pachagavya'and 'madhuparka'. Ïn food habits too, vegetarianism and prohibition were strictly enforced, with penalties of ex-communication for their transgression. Ahimsa, satya, triple baths every day and free teachings of sanskrit were rewarded with ecclesiastical honours and grants. Except for the doctrinaire difference , the pattern of the mundane aspects of the mutt was but a replica of the Jaina church." I cannot help touching briefly on the issue of the sanctity of the cow and Brahmanic Hinduism. I have translated from german into English a monograph History of Vegetarianism and Cow Worship in India by the renowned German Indologist the late Prof.Ludwig Alsdorf which gives the most exhaustive scriptural evidence from Hindu, Buddhist and Jain sources. Prof.Alsdorf notes examples of cow-sacrifice and consumption of cow-flesh even in late and post-Vedic period. this is proved by the fact that there used to be a Court position of govikarta during the Brahmana period meaning çow-carver'showing that his position was not a disreputable one in ancient times, and that cow-flesh held good as a prized means of nourishment during Brahmana period. Another great scholar & Indologist, A.B. Keith says in his Cambridge History I, p.137 : "But it was still the custom to slay a great ox or goat for the entertainment of a guest, and the great sage, Yajnavalkya ate meat of milch cows and oxen, provided that the flesh was amsala, a word of doubtful import, rendered either 'firm'or 'tender'by various authorities. Prof.Brown has noted in his article The Sanctity of the Cow in Hinduism'' published in the Journal of the Madras University, Section A, Humanities-28-2-1957, pp.29-49 : Yet in all these richness of references to cattle in (Vedas) there is never, I believe, a hint that the animal as a species or the cow for its own sake was held sacred and inviolable...It should be noted that though the Brahman's cow is sacred, it is not sacred because it is a cow. It is sacred because it is Brahman's. All his property is equally inviolable. The wicked king's sin lay in robbing the priesthood, nor in taking animal... "There is also testimony of cow-flesh consumption in the well-known medical text-book Susruta-Samhita. In an important chapter on the articles of food and their medical qualities and therapeutic worth flesh plays a very big role. The cow comes after horse and mule, before ass, camel, goat, sheep. Stotra 89 enjoins: "Cow-flesh is good for asthma, cough, catarrh, chronic fever, exhaustion and for quick digestion. It is holy (pavitra) and alleviates the wind. Dealing with pregnancy-longings and the avoidance of fulfilment of certain foods Sausruta mentions that cow-flesh pregnancy longings must be fulfilled. >From this it is clear that according to Sushruta which in its original form belonged to "latest to the first century A.D. ) cow-flesh was considered to be an esteemed article of food even for the satisfaction of pregnancy-longings and that it was considered to be so by an important medical text which it did not feel any occasion to suppress such passages. I must state that I have given all this scholarly evidence in a Jain spirit of Anekant and to bring out the pre-eminence of Jain ahimsa since the beginnings of history. It is also essential to understand this historic background because there is a concerted propaganda by the Samgha Parivar that Jains are Hindus and a section of the Swetambra Jains who to the BJP & Hindutva lobby also join it forgetting the glorious legacy of the unique Jain tradition of vegetarianism and ahimsa. The minority status on par with Buddhists and Sikhs is necessary to preserve the religious identity of Jainism. Otherwise the Jain religion and community is in danger of wholesale conversion to so-called Hinduism. Minority status is also necessary for every section of the Jain community be they Digambaras or Swetambaras for the furtherance of educational & cultural institutions. The minority status enables an educational institution to reserve 50% seats to one's own community students and also enjoy certain concessions under the Income-tax Act. Already the Mahasweta organisation of the Swetambaras in Maharashtra has passed a Resolution to support the movement for recognition of the Jain community as a Minority Community as actively pursued by me as the Convenor, Jain Minority Status Committee, Dakshin Bharat Jain Sabha. The National Minority Commission have also twice recommended to the Central Government to declare Jain community as a Minority community. My Petition seeking an expeditious declaration accordingly is pending in the Supreme Court of India. The bombay High Court has already issued an Order in 1997 to the Central Government in pursuance of my Writ Petition that the Government should take an expeditious decision in this matter. - "Chris Beetle" <bvi <INDOLOGY>; <INDOLOGY> Friday, February 01, 2002 3:31 AM Re: [Y-Indology] human birth > At 10:44 AM 1/29/02 -0800, leena taneja wrote: > >I read this passage several times, and i'm familiar > >with the text from which it is derived. IT seems > >what is being suggested is that the human birth > >is an exalted one because it offers the possibiity > >for association with saintly souls, devotees. > > The original question mentioned the human form is > exalted because one can attain liberation from it. > The section I quoted explains how that takes place > by the association of saintly souls, devotees. > In the end of the quotation I cited, the speaker > describes how he became free from his material > conditioning in that way. Although the devas or > demigods are more powerful and opulent than human > beings and therefore may be considered by some to > be more exalted, their intoxication with their opulence > is a disqualification for hearing from and serving > great souls, and thus a ordinary human form is > actually an advantage for such service and for consequent > liberation. > > >This > >seems to offer a rather poetical, bhakti explanation > >and can be understood only within that context. > > Your wording here sounds as if you are deprecating > bhakti. However, in Bhagavad-gita 18.55, Lord Krishna > describes that is it only by bhakti that He is to be known > in truth, and the person who knows Him can enter the eternal > abode. > > Srimad Bhagavatam 1.2.7 explains that both knowledge and > renunciation result from bhakti. > > Actually the truth about bhakti is that it is so powerful > that it can control God. It is because of Arjuna's bhakti > that Lord Krishna agreed to drive his chariot. > > Best wishes, > Chris Beetle > > > > >Lena > > > >--- Chris Beetle <bvi wrote: > >> At 08:53 AM 1/23/02 -0500, Lynken Ghose wrote: > >> >Dear Indology: > >> > > >> >Does anyone know of any literature in Hinduism > >> which speaks of the human > >> >birth being the highest type of rebirth because it > >> is the place from which > >> >one can obtain moksa, much like the idea in > >> Buddhism? > >> > >> This topic is discussed in Srimad-Bhagavatam > >> (Bhagavata Purana) 5.13.21-22: > >> King Rahugana said: This birth as a human being is > >> the best of all. Even > >> birth among the demigods in the heavenly planets is > >> not as glorious as birth > >> as a human being on this earth. What is the use of > >> the exalted position of a > >> demigod? In the heavenly planets, due to profuse > >> material comforts, there is > >> no possibility of associating with devotees. > >> It is not at all wonderful that simply by being > >> covered by the dust of your > >> lotus feet, one immediately attains the platform of > >> pure devotional service > >> to Adhoksaja, which is not available even to great > >> demigods like Brahma. By > >> associating with you just for a moment, I am now > >> freed from all argument, > >> false prestige and lack of discrimination, which are > >> the roots of > >> entanglement in the material world. Now I am free > >> from all these problems. > >> > >> Best wishes, > >> Chris Beetle > >> > >> > >> > > >> >Thanks, > >> >Lynken Ghose > >> > > >> > > > > > > indology > > > > Your use of is subject to > > > Bal Patil Member, Maharashtra State Minorities Commission Government of Maharashtra Convenor, Jain Minority Status Committee, Dakshin Bharat Jain Sabha, Co-author: JAINISM with Colette Caillat, ex-Rector, Sorbonne University, Paris,& A.N. Upadhye,a former President, All-India Oriental Conference, 54, Patil Estate 278, Javji Dadaji Road, Mumbai 400007, INDIA Tel. (022) 3861068, 3893030 Email: president Website: http://www.globaljains.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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