Vivekananda on the Vedas (part 151)

[Guest guest]

Parts 1 to 150 were posted earlier. This is part 151. Your comments are welcome... Vivekananda Centre London

Earlier postings can be seen at http://www.vivekananda.btinternet.co.uk/veda.htm

 

SWAMI VIVEKANANDA ON THE VEDAS AND UPANISHADS

By Sister Gayatriprana

part 151

h) The Violent Conflict between the Western and Vedic Ideals Produced a Wave of Reformers Who Simply Played into the Hands of the Europeans

In the beginning of the present century, when Western influence began to pour into India, when Western conquerors, sword in hand, came to demonstrate to the children of the sages that they were mere barbarians, a race of dreamers, that their religion was but mythology, and God and soul and everything they had been struggling for were mere words without meaning, that the thousands of years of struggle, the thousands of years of endless renunciation, had all been in vain, the question began to be agitated among young men at the universities whether the whole national existence up till then had been a failure, whether they must begin anew on the occidental plan, tear up their old books, burn their philosophies, drive away their preachers, and break down their temples. Did not the occidental conquerors, the people who demonstrated their religion with sword and gun, say that all the old ways were superstition and idolatry? Children brought up and educated in the new schools started on the occidental plan drank in these ideas from childhood; and it is not to be wondered at that doubts arose. But instead of throwing away superstition and making a real search after truth, the test of truth became, "What does the West say?" The priest must go, the Vedas must be burned, because the West has said so.(24)

India is slowly awakening through her friction with outside nations; and as a result of this little awakening, is the appearance, to a certain extent, of free and independent thought in modern India. On one side is modern Western science, dazzling the eyes with the brilliancy of a myriad suns and driving the chariot of hard and fast facts collected by the application of tangible powers direct in their incision; on the other are the hopeful and strengthening traditions of her ancient forebears, in the days when she was at the zenith of her glory - traditions that have been brought out of the pages of her history by the great sages of her own land and outside, that ran for numberless years and centuries through her every vein with the quickening of life drawn from universal love - traditions that reveal unsurpassed valor, superhuman genius, and supreme spirituality, which are the envy of the gods - these inspire her with future hopes. On the one side, rank materialism, plenitude of fortune, accumulation of gigantic power and intense sense-pursuits have, through foreign literature, cause a tremendous stir; on the other, through the confounding din of all these discordant sounds she hears, in low yet unmistakable accents the heart-rending cries of her ancient gods, cutting her to the quick. There lie before her various strange luxuries introduced from the West - celestial drinks, costly, well-served food, splendid apparel, magnificent palaces, new modes of conveyance, new manners, new fashions, dressed in which well-educated girls move about in shameless freedom - all these are arousing unfelt desires. Again, the scene changes and in its place appear, with stern presence, Sita, Savitri, austere religious vows, fastings, the forest retreat, the matted locks and orange garb of semi-naked sannyasins, samadhi and the search after the Self. On one side is the independence of Western societies based on self-interest; on the other is the extreme self-sacrifice of the Aryan society. In this violent conflict, is it strange that Indian society should be tossed up and down? Of the West, the goal is individual independence, the language of money-making, education, the means politics; of India, the goal is mukti, the language of the Vedas, the means renunciation. For a time, modern India thinks, as it were: I am ruining this worldly life of mine in vain expectation of uncertain spiritual welfare hereafter which has spread its fascination over me; and again, she listens spellbound - "Here, in this world of death and change, where is thy happiness?" (25)