Fwd: Western Vedic Research from Hindu Dharma

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advaitin , " B VAIDYANATHAN "

<vaidyanathiyer> wrote:

Western Vedic Research from Hindu Dharma

In the present sorry state in which the nation finds itself it has

to

learn about its own heritage like the Vedas from the findings of

Western scholars called " orientalists " and from Indians conducting

research on the same lines as they. I concede that European scholars

have made a very valuable study of the Vedas. We must be thankful to

them for their work. Some of them like Max Muller conducted research

out of their esteem for our scriptures. They took great pains to

gather the old texts and published volume after volume incorporating

their findings.

Two hundred years ago Sir William Jones, who was a judge of the

Calcutta high court, started the Asiatic Society. The number of

books

this institution has published on Vedic subjects should arose our

wonder. With the help of the East India Company, Sir William

published the Rigveda with the commentary of Sayana and also a

number

of other Hindu works. Apart from Englishmen, ideologists from

France,

Germany and Russia have also done outstanding work here. " The

discovery of the Vedas of the Hindus is more significant than

Columbus's discovery of America, " thus exclaimed some ideologists

exulting in their findings.

These foreigners discovered Vedic and Vedantic texts from various

parts of the country. They translated the dharma-, grhya- and

srauta -

sutras. The Kundalini Tantra gained importance only after Arthur

Avalon had written extensively on it. A number of Westerns have

contributed studies of other aspects of our culture also. It was

because of the Protection of Ancient Monuments Act that came into

force during the viceroyalty of Lord Curzon that our temples and

other monuments were saved from vandals. Fergusson took photographs

of our artistic treasures (sculptures) and made them known to the

world. Men like Cunningham, Sir John Marshall and Mortimer -Wheeler

did notable work in Indian archaeology. It was because of the

labours

of Mackenizie who gathered manuscripts from various parts of India

that we come to know about many of our sastras. The department of

epigraphy was started during British rule.

We suffered in many ways at the hands of the British but it was

during their time that some good was also done. But this good was

not

unmixed and had undesirable elements in it. The intention of many of

those who called themselves orientalists or ideologists was not

above

reproach. They wanted to reconstruct the history of India on the

basis of their study of the Vedas and, in the course of this, they

concocted the Aryan- Dravidian theory of races and sowed the seeds

of

hatred among the people. Purporting to be rationalists they wrongly

interpreted, in an allegorical manner, what cannot be comprehended

by

our senses. In commenting on the Vedas they took the view that the

sages were primitive men. Though some of them pretended to be

impartial, their hidden intention in conducting research into our

religious texts was to propagate Christianity and show Hinduism in a

poor light.

A number of Westerners saw the similarity between Sanskrit and their

own languages and devoted themselves to comparative philology.

We may applaud European ideologists for their research work, for

making our sastras known to a wider world and for the hard work they

put in. But they were hardly in sympathy with our view of the Vedas.

What is the purpose of these scriptures? By chanting them, by

filling

the world with their sound and by the performance of rites like

sacrifices, the good of mankind is ensured. This view the Western

ideologists rejected. They tried to understand on a purely

intellectual plane what is beyond the comprehension of the human

mind. And with this limited understanding of theirs they printed big

tomes on the Vedas to be preserved in the libraries. Our scriptures

are meant to be a living reality of our speech and action. Instead

of

putting them to such noble use, to consign them to the libraries, in

the form of books, is like keeping living animals in the museum

instead of in the zoo.

 

courtesy: kamakoti.org

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