Enlightened Posted March 28, 2003 Report Share Posted March 28, 2003 I don't mean to be disrespectful to the ancient language of india ( I am an indian my self, but thats not the point). however, I do have a question pertaining to the wonderful people who maintain such a forum as this one. This question may be offensive, please don't mind. Question: why do we bother learning things in sanskrit. whenever my dad takes me to the temple, i see people chanting in sanskrit, but the fact is i don't get it. I don't understand it and it does not seem to be very helpful because if they are chanting the names of the lord himself, it is better that we understand the names. Isn't what's written in our scriptures important more than sanskrit, then why do have to chant it in sanskrit and not learn it in reality? sudszy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 28, 2003 Report Share Posted March 28, 2003 Don't you think that we need to have the knowledge of Sanskrit if we want to know what is written in the scriptures? Avinash Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 28, 2003 Report Share Posted March 28, 2003 Obeisances! Not Learning Sanskrite is considered offensive because it is the orignal language created by Bhagavan(GOD) and given to man as a blessing to aid in Sanatana Dharma -the eternal path of the soul. The petals of the Chakras are the intonation of the Sanskrite sounds. They, like the language itself, are manifestations of Bhagavan(GOD). Hence, All Sanskrite prayers, and Vedas, are considered the manifestation of Bhagavan(GOD) in text form for yours, mine, and everyone's benefit. Some sources say Lord Ganesha brought the Sanskrite language to this planet and the language is reportedly 25,000 years old. Also, exploration sources say it was first found in the orignal site of the "Garden of Eden", the Indus Valley. In fact, there is a scroll tablet found there, that to this day is still un-deciphered. ~OM NAMA SIVAYA! OM SRI GANESHAYA NAMAHA! OM TAT SAT (SANSKRITE EXAMPLES) NAMASTE Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Enlightened Posted March 28, 2003 Author Report Share Posted March 28, 2003 : ) I guess sanskrit is god, but it quite doesn't let my mind rest on the subject. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Streetstraw Posted March 31, 2003 Report Share Posted March 31, 2003 Y should physicians & pharmacists learn Greek? Y should musicians learn Italian? Y should ballerinas learn French? Y should scientists learn German? Y should ambassadors learn... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jagat Posted March 31, 2003 Report Share Posted March 31, 2003 Your question is unfounded. Very few devotees in Iskcon learn Sanskrit, Hindi or Bengali. Even those Westerners in the Gaudiya Math, who almost by definition are more serious about authenticity, rarely learn even Bengali. Though I am a firm believer in the modernization of the Vaishnava tradition--by which I mean allowing it to be informed by the philosophical and theological developments in other traditions, Christian, secular or other--I also feel that one can only get a real feel for the flavors or rasas of this tradition through a familiarity with its original languages. Religion is as much a matter of culture as of theology. Conversion to Vaishnavism means adopting certain cultural artefacts, but the medium of these artefacts is their language. I would also say that knowledge of the languages has the advantage of demystifying them. Those who don't know the language tend to mystify concepts with foreign words, etc., that they don't really understand. This is why in Iskcon in particular there is a suspicion of learning Sanskrit. Everything is in Prabhupada's books, they say, so what need of separate efforts to learn Sanskrit and getting confused, even becoming a dry scholar or Sahajiya? I have nothing but contempt for this attitude. Anyone who claims to be a "Brahmin" should learn Sanskrit as a matter of course. Your servant, Jagat Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jagat Posted March 31, 2003 Report Share Posted March 31, 2003 Just one more comment about culture. Language is a medium for love. Rupa Goswami, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Jiva Goswami, Vishwanath Chakravarti, Govinda Kaviraj, Narottam Das, Krishnadas Kaviraj, to name just a few, expressed themselves and their love for Gaura-Krishna in Bengali and Sanskrit. Bhaktivinoda Thakur, Saraswati Thakur, and Bhaktivedanta Swami all expressed themselves primarily in Bengali. One who claims to love these saints and has adopted them as gurus naturally tries to approach them, to come closer to them. How can you come close to someone without learning their language. Of course, I don't say that Krishna does not transcend language, nor that ultimately Krishna consciousness culture must become vernacularized and not the monopoly of a particular linguistic elite, nevertheless, the strength of the movement itself depends not only on its breadth, but its depth. The depth of the tradition depends on individuals going into it deeply and this means knowing the languages in which that tradition was born and developed. Jai Gaura! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted April 3, 2003 Report Share Posted April 3, 2003 Obeisances! Great Questions deserve Great Answers! Humbly Submitted for your review. http://acharya.iitm.ac.in/sanskrit/why_sans.html One day you will be self-realized and free from Samsara! OM NAMO KALKIYA! OM NAMO DEVADATTAYA! OM TAT SAT! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted April 25, 2003 Report Share Posted April 25, 2003 there is much around the vibration of words, and the energy of vibrations. as one works with the sanskrit sounds, rather than the english sounds, these have a tonality that assists in the various metaphysical properties. much like the jews use hebrew for particular purposes (vibration). there is much said to be in the root vibrations in sanskrit. i don't know the details specifically, i just remember that that is where i have come to over time looking into this. cheers. david Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 9, 2003 Report Share Posted June 9, 2003 The solution is to modernize Sanskrit teaching. Sanskrit is not very difficult to learn, especially if you have an Indian language as mothertongue. We have still a great deal of Sanskrit vocabulary in our mothertongues, wether is may be Hindi, Bengali, Kannada, Telugu, Malayalam, Marathi etc. And learn this wonderful language by using in daily life. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted September 5, 2003 Report Share Posted September 5, 2003 Was just surfing and found your posted mail . Your e-mail reflects your half knowledge in the subject. I am sorry if I would be offending you but a perosn who just has a limited knowledge about a subject has no right to talk about it. Another thing sanskrit is not just about chanting mantras nor is it something really magical. Its a language very is the most perfect of all with a perfect syntax and a perfect scientific language and that's probably the only reason why the NASA team is thinking of making sanskrit a programming language. So dont make a fool of yourself by posting such unresonable messages Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted December 7, 2003 Report Share Posted December 7, 2003 No reason to build up importance of the languages by pretending that NASA is planning on using it. NASA is not in the business of deciding on languages to start with. There are no ancient languages that are ideal for using in the scientific world. They are all inadequate for that use. Nor is any natural language usable as a programming language, simply because all computer languages are only commands, only a small part of any natural language. Also natural languages tolerate ambiguity, which is not acceptable in a computer language. I think the best reason to learn any language is to 1) communicate, and 2) satisfy a sense of curiosity. Since Sanskrit, like Latin, is effectively a language not used in modern communications, that leaves the second reason as the main reason to learn the language. It is a perfectly reasonable motivation to learn Sanskrit as it opens up an understanding of an ancient culture, religion, and literature. Have fun learning and exploring the worlds it opens up to you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted January 7, 2004 Report Share Posted January 7, 2004 Namaskar, With the exception to your comment that all the ancient languages allow ambiguity I would like to tell you that Sanskrit is perhaps the only language that _does_not_ allow ambiguity because the language is based on _rules_. Paanini had already made _all_ the rules for this language. So it actually does not allow ambiguity. As for the most popular language in vogue, English is very ambiguous. NLP(Natural Language Processing) is ambiguous mainly due to the reason that the language being used is English or the other languages derived from its parent languages. As for why to learn Sanskrit, I see it as my duty to uphold the culture and tradition. And the Vedas if they are to be pronounced correctly, Sanskrit is the only way to do it. If I have to understand the beauty of Illiad i would have to learn Greek, and if I have to learn the Upanishads or Vedas I have to use Sanskrit. No wonder if NASA _is_really_ going to use Sanskrit as a programming language. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 2, 2004 Report Share Posted February 2, 2004 Sanskrit is a great language to learn,and is very valuabe in understanding the ancient texts of india. But learning sanskrit by itself does not make you holy, you pray to god through your heart...communication with god is beyond earthly things as language. God does not discriminate based on what language you know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 1, 2004 Report Share Posted March 1, 2004 Where did you come up with the idea that NASA was considering using sanskrit in it's programming? I have a friend who works as an engineer there and when I asked her about that her reply was "what in the world is Sanskrit?" Anyway, Sanskrit, like Latin, is a dead language as far as communication goes. It's only use right now is to be able to read sanskrit poetry and religious texts in the original. If you are involved in an indian religion then this could be very helpful for you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinayakan Posted March 2, 2004 Report Share Posted March 2, 2004 Sanskrit is not dead, because ever year there are new litterary creation in Sanskrit. There are mamy people who speak Sanskrit fluenty (me included). Not as a first language, but as a second language. Sanskrit is also extremely important to understand the deeper substration of the modern Indian languages. Sanskrit is the unifying factor between the different Indian languages. New technical words in the modern Indian languages are token from Sanskrit. raaShTra-saMgha = United Nations vaishviikaranam = Globalisation. antarjaalam = internet ent. etc. And what about our dharma? All the original texts are in Sanskrit. With the knowledge of Sanskrit it is much easier to read and to understand them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brinthan Posted March 5, 2004 Report Share Posted March 5, 2004 If you really want to know about Sanatana Dharma and their scientific discovries which was discovered millions years ago by our sages, you should learn Sanskrit. Most of the Vedas you learn, or taught is translated by British (Christians) like Max Muller. So you cannot be sure that whatever said in Vedas are directly translated without any mistakes. I think only the people who are not ignorant can understand Vedas. But British whoever translated the vedas are ful of ignorant. And if you learn Sanskrit, and read our scriptures, you'll understand it more, and you can recognize, or might even discover the weapons or scientific discoveries done by our sages. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brinthan Posted March 5, 2004 Report Share Posted March 5, 2004 <<..Where did you come up with the idea that NASA was considering using sanskrit in it's programming?..>> I heard that Nasa has published a science book which it dedicated to the sages who lived in India. Most of the inventions done by Nasa, or today's word has already been done by our sages who lived in India. Because we are full of ignorant, we reject our scriptures. Because of the other religions influences , nowadays Hindus are ashamed of saying that they are hindus, and they think that Sanatana Dharma's scriptures have nothing in it. Read it with a scientific knowldge and you'll understand a lot. Vishvamitra sent a man in a satellite without special equipments. You'll see that happen in 50 years from now. Nasa and western scientists always read that, and discover the things said in there. Big Bang Theory has been taken from Vedas (Breath of Brahman). Cloning has been done by Vishvamitra, test tube babies are described in Mahabharat. Don't be in ignorant, read our scriptures with a scientific point of view. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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