Asking the right questions to awaken our past
We need to recognise that Hindus find succour in Hinduism because they find moral coherence that reason cannot provide; not because we invented planes and gadgets in the past
Awake: The Life of Yogananda is a stunning vision, a statement,
and an experience all at once. The little theatre in Berkeley where it
is playing has been extending its screening each week. One might think
fans of the movie are having an un-yogi-like difficulty in letting it
go, but the real reason you feel like watching it again is that it is an
experience and not a commentary.
In the brief respite of 90 minutes from the reality outside, what you witness is something of a new reality. You do not have to even presume to explain or defend such a view against charges of mysticism. You feel not just a holy man’s presence, or a philosophy’s coherence, but something much more powerful. What you see on screen might be the scientists and musicians, yoga teachers and professors, and the guru Yogananda himself, but what you really feel is an experience that shakes you out of your thoughts, stupor, fear and pride.
Finding spiritual meaning What is it that we really are? It is a question not just for gurus and scientists but for everyone, because what we think we are has consequences in terms of what we do as a people, as a society, and as a nation — both to ourselves and to others around us.
If our cultures — religious or secular — tell us we are special and brought here to this world to merely feed off the blood and sweat of others, we humans might do it, and have done it too. We have justified slavery; the exploitation of women; the wholesale slaughter of whole species of living beings — all in the name of both god and reason. These are realities we cannot ignore.
That is why Awake works. You see a man waking up a culture as it is busy fighting World Wars, setting off atom bombs, segregating minorities, and going on thinking it is all fine, that it is just the way things are. You see a story of spirit that is not mumbo jumbo but about this world we live in.
Just as Awake was opening the hearts and minds of people from many different faiths and nationalities, the land of its protagonist’s birth, the cradle of his spirituality, wisdom and — if there is a thing — the source of his mystique and power, was entertaining itself with the rather gratifying notion that ancient Indians had invented plastic surgery; why, just look at how they put an elephant’s head on a man’s body. We have also heard in the last few months on how our ancestors really invented airplanes, stem cell research, and genetics.
There is another one too. You might not have heard this because no one in public life has said it, but there was a theory doing the rounds a few years ago about how ancient Indians invented the laptop too — just watch the great NTR movie Mayabazar where Krishna gives Sasirekha a magic box in which she can see the image of her loved ones.
We do have to ask ourselves in a frank manner if this is the best we can do. True, there are problems with how Hinduism has generally been looked down upon in rarefied intellectual discourses, and there has been a growing disconnect between Hindu life and public debate for several decades now.
However, if we think that the solution to these problems is to project a fantasy from the past — with some Sanskrit-sounding names — onto the present, we are going to be doing a disservice to a great, and living, cultural legacy. After all, the measures of greatness we are using today to talk about our past and our civilisation are neither great nor civilised. Airplanes and plastic surgery are as ephemeral as any other invention, especially in the face of the perennial wisdom that has helped human beings of many different cultural dispositions find truth, happiness, and at least some moral coherence in their lives.
Even our comic books, when we were younger, paid as much attention to the moral implications of the stories as they did to the battles with demons and such. If our new history books, or our emerging public discourse, don’t recognise this, it will be a greater loss for our imagination than anything the pseudo-secularists may ever have done.
Probing into the right sources The way forward is to recognise that Hinduism is as alive today as it was millennia ago. Hindus — Indians, Americans and many others — are still turning to its real gifts because they see something in it that the stories of the modern world cannot provide; not because we supposedly invented planes and gadgets in the past. I agree that we do need better narratives of our past and a better critique of the ideas that deny us our past; but for that we need probe into the right sources.
By all means let us learn more about Ayurveda and Aryabhatta. But beyond that, let us keep our fantasies out of our glorious spiritual and philosophical heritage. What Valmiki said about the pushpaka vimana may or may not fly in the face of evidence today, but what he said about the human condition will liberate us in the way it is meant to.
( Vamsee Juluri is a Professor, Media Studies at the University of San Francisco and the author of Rearming Hinduism: Nature, Hinduphobia and the Return of Indian Intelligence.)
In the brief respite of 90 minutes from the reality outside, what you witness is something of a new reality. You do not have to even presume to explain or defend such a view against charges of mysticism. You feel not just a holy man’s presence, or a philosophy’s coherence, but something much more powerful. What you see on screen might be the scientists and musicians, yoga teachers and professors, and the guru Yogananda himself, but what you really feel is an experience that shakes you out of your thoughts, stupor, fear and pride.
Finding spiritual meaning What is it that we really are? It is a question not just for gurus and scientists but for everyone, because what we think we are has consequences in terms of what we do as a people, as a society, and as a nation — both to ourselves and to others around us.
If our cultures — religious or secular — tell us we are special and brought here to this world to merely feed off the blood and sweat of others, we humans might do it, and have done it too. We have justified slavery; the exploitation of women; the wholesale slaughter of whole species of living beings — all in the name of both god and reason. These are realities we cannot ignore.
That is why Awake works. You see a man waking up a culture as it is busy fighting World Wars, setting off atom bombs, segregating minorities, and going on thinking it is all fine, that it is just the way things are. You see a story of spirit that is not mumbo jumbo but about this world we live in.
Just as Awake was opening the hearts and minds of people from many different faiths and nationalities, the land of its protagonist’s birth, the cradle of his spirituality, wisdom and — if there is a thing — the source of his mystique and power, was entertaining itself with the rather gratifying notion that ancient Indians had invented plastic surgery; why, just look at how they put an elephant’s head on a man’s body. We have also heard in the last few months on how our ancestors really invented airplanes, stem cell research, and genetics.
There is another one too. You might not have heard this because no one in public life has said it, but there was a theory doing the rounds a few years ago about how ancient Indians invented the laptop too — just watch the great NTR movie Mayabazar where Krishna gives Sasirekha a magic box in which she can see the image of her loved ones.
We do have to ask ourselves in a frank manner if this is the best we can do. True, there are problems with how Hinduism has generally been looked down upon in rarefied intellectual discourses, and there has been a growing disconnect between Hindu life and public debate for several decades now.
However, if we think that the solution to these problems is to project a fantasy from the past — with some Sanskrit-sounding names — onto the present, we are going to be doing a disservice to a great, and living, cultural legacy. After all, the measures of greatness we are using today to talk about our past and our civilisation are neither great nor civilised. Airplanes and plastic surgery are as ephemeral as any other invention, especially in the face of the perennial wisdom that has helped human beings of many different cultural dispositions find truth, happiness, and at least some moral coherence in their lives.
Even our comic books, when we were younger, paid as much attention to the moral implications of the stories as they did to the battles with demons and such. If our new history books, or our emerging public discourse, don’t recognise this, it will be a greater loss for our imagination than anything the pseudo-secularists may ever have done.
Probing into the right sources The way forward is to recognise that Hinduism is as alive today as it was millennia ago. Hindus — Indians, Americans and many others — are still turning to its real gifts because they see something in it that the stories of the modern world cannot provide; not because we supposedly invented planes and gadgets in the past. I agree that we do need better narratives of our past and a better critique of the ideas that deny us our past; but for that we need probe into the right sources.
By all means let us learn more about Ayurveda and Aryabhatta. But beyond that, let us keep our fantasies out of our glorious spiritual and philosophical heritage. What Valmiki said about the pushpaka vimana may or may not fly in the face of evidence today, but what he said about the human condition will liberate us in the way it is meant to.
( Vamsee Juluri is a Professor, Media Studies at the University of San Francisco and the author of Rearming Hinduism: Nature, Hinduphobia and the Return of Indian Intelligence.)
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