Pride of Hinduism - Views of foreigners

[talwan]

Share:

Facebook X (Twitter) LinkedIn WhatsApp Email Share Link

:drum:

Dear All,
Here I start athread on the Glory of Hinduism by Foreign Scholars,Researchers.
Today I start with Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) American Philosopher, Unitarian, social critic, transcendentalist and writer. It was Ralph Waldo Emerson who aroused in him a true enthusiasm for India.

"In the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous and cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagavat Geeta, since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed, and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seem puny and trivial;

Alwan

 

[sarang]

[FONT=&quot]Dr. Carl Sagan, (1934-1996) famous astrophysicist.

[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The Hindu religion is the only one of theworld's great faiths dedicated to the idea that the Cosmos itself undergoes animmense, indeed an infinite, number of deaths and rebirths. It is the onlyreligion in which the time scales correspond, to those of modern scientificcosmology. Its cycles run from our ordinary day and night to a day and night ofBrahma, 8.64 billion years long. Longer than the age of the Earth or the Sunand about half the time since the Big Bang. And there are much longer timescales still. [/FONT]

 

[talwan]

Julius Robert Oppenheimer (1904-1967) Scientist, philosopher, bohemian, and radical. A theoretical physicist and the Supervising Scientist for the Manhattan Project, the developer of the atomic bomb. Graduating from Harvard University, he traveled to Cambridge University to study at the Cavendish Laboratory.

Oppenheimer acquired a deeper knowledge of the Bhagavad Gita in 1933 when, as a young professor of physics, he studied Sanskrit with Professor Arthur W Ryder (1877-1938) at Berkeley. ​

The Gita, Oppenheimer excitedly wrote to his brother Frank Oppenheimer, was. ​

“very easy and quite marvelous”. ​

Later he called the Gita “the most beautiful philosophical song existing in any known tongue.” He kept a well worn copy of it conveniently on hand on the bookshelf closest to his desk and often gave the book to friends as a present.
​

​

He continued to browse in it while directing the bomb laboratory. After President Franklin Roosevelt’s death in 1945, Oppenheimer spoke at a memorial service at Los Alamos and he quoted a passage from the Gita. ​

In later years, too, he would look back on the Bhagavad Gita as one of the most important influences in his life. ​

In 1963, Christian Century magazine (May 15, 1963 p. 647) asked Oppenheimer to list the ten books that “did most to shape your vocational attitude and your philosophy of life.” ​

It is significant that two of the ten works that Oppenheimer claimed as most influential were Indian (The Bhagavad Gita and Bhartrihari's Satakatrayam) and a third, The Waste Land by T S Eliot, alluded to the Hindu Scriptures, The Upanishads and The Bhagavad Gita and concluded with a Sanskrit incantation: Shantih, Shantih, Shantih.” ​

He said:

"Access to the Vedas is the greatest privilege this century may claim over all previous centuries."
​

 

[sarang]

[FONT=&quot]Alan Watts (1915-1973) a professor, graduate school deanand research fellow of Harvard University [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
To the philosophers of India, however,Relativity is no new discovery, just as the concept of light years is no matterfor astonishment to people used to thin king of time in millions of kalpas, (Akalpa is about 4,320,000 years). The fact that the wise men of India have notbeen concerned with technological applications of this knowledge arises fromthe circumstance that technology is but one of innumerable ways of applying it.[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]It is, indeed, a remarkable circumstancethat when Western civilization discovers Relativity it applies it to themanufacture of atom-bombs, whereas this Oriental civilization applies it to thedevelopment of new states of consciousness.

[/FONT]

 

[talwan]

Colonel James Tod (1782-1835) author of Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan: or the Central and Western Rajput States of India

"Where can we look for sages like those whose systems of philosophy were prototypes of those of Greece: to whose works Plato, Thales & Pythagoras were disciples? Where do I find astronomers whose knowledge of planetary systems yet excites wonder in Europe as well as the architects and sculptors whose works claim our admiration, and the musicians who could make the mind oscillate from joy to sorrow, from tears to smile with the change of modes and varied intonation?"
​

 

[talwan]

Sylvain Levi (1863-1935) French scholar, Orientalist who wrote on Eastern religion, literature, and history. Levi was appointed a lecturer at the school of higher studies in Paris (1886), he taught Sanskrit at the Sorbonne (1889-94) and wrote his doctoral dissertation, Le Théâtre indien ("The Indian Theatre").

In L'Inde et le monde ("India and the World"), he discussed India's role among nations. He wrote :​

"From Persia to the Chinese Sea, 'from the icy regions of Siberia to the islands of Java and Borneo, from Oceania to Socotra, India has propagated her beliefs, her tales and her civilization."

"She has left indelible imprints on one fourth of the human race in the course of a long succession of centuries. She has the right to reclaim in universal history the rank that ignorance has refused her for a long time and to hold her place amongst the great nations summarizing and symbolizing the spirit of humanity."
​

 

[kunjuppu]

talwan,

i appreciate your intense and extensive research to show how high hinduism was and is viewed by foreign white western scholars.

every religion, has historically, its good points and its bad moments. infact many many bad moments.

i think we should all be careful, not to be carried away by the praises, and as a result, be blind to the inequalities of doctrinal nature perpetuated by many of our scriptures. a human is a human, and i think, especially nowadays, the concept of doctrinaire inequality, and stratification, is and must be unacceptable in the flat world that we live today.

once upon a time, an indian may have felt inferior to the white man. but with today's knowledge base, internet and communication improvements, i think, an indian may be justified in feeling, that he can be as good as a white man, in acquiring, understanding knowledge of the sciences, and applying it to his daily life.

one of the chief arguements against hinduism, today, is the concept of varna, and even more, the exclusion of the panchamars from even this varna classification. unless we deal with this concept, in an aggressive manner, and work towards not only an outwardly, but innardly within us and our progeny, a concept that before God, we are all equal, i think, we will have a tough time convincing many folks within our community, about the greatness of our faith.

i do not know how many of us deeply understand the very many insulting nuances, inbuilt within us, to exclude other castes and creeds. like it or not, this builds resentment, and much as we all say, that some our best friends are NBs, i would probably think, that many of our best friends are not NBs.

just my thoughts on reading your excellent posts. thank you.

 

[sarang]

[FONT=&quot]George Bernard Shaw, (1856-1950) a vegetarianand Nobel Laureate in Literature. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
The Indian way of life provides the visionof the natural, real way of life. We veil ourselves with unnatural masks. Onthe face of Indiaare the tender expressions which carry the mark of the Creators hand. [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
The apparent multiplication of gods isbewildering at the first glance, but you soon discover that they are the sameGOD. There is always one uttermost God who defies personification. This makesHinduism the most tolerant religion in the world, because its one transcendentGod includes all possible gods. In fact Hinduism is so elastic and so subtlethat the most profound Methodist, and crudest idolater, are equally at homewith it. [/FONT]

 

[talwan]

talwan,

i appreciate your intense and extensive research to show how high hinduism was and is viewed by foreign white western scholars.

every religion, has historically, its good points and its bad moments. infact many many bad moments.

i think we should all be careful, not to be carried away by the praises, and as a result, be blind to the inequalities of doctrinal nature perpetuated by many of our scriptures. a human is a human, and i think, especially nowadays, the concept of doctrinaire inequality, and stratification, is and must be unacceptable in the flat world that we live today.

once upon a time, an indian may have felt inferior to the white man. but with today's knowledge base, internet and communication improvements, i think, an indian may be justified in feeling, that he can be as good as a white man, in acquiring, understanding knowledge of the sciences, and applying it to his daily life.

one of the chief arguements against hinduism, today, is the concept of varna, and even more, the exclusion of the panchamars from even this varna classification. unless we deal with this concept, in an aggressive manner, and work towards not only an outwardly, but innardly within us and our progeny, a concept that before God, we are all equal, i think, we will have a tough time convincing many folks within our community, about the greatness of our faith.

i do not know how many of us deeply understand the very many insulting nuances, inbuilt within us, to exclude other castes and creeds. like it or not, this builds resentment, and much as we all say, that some our best friends are NBs, i would probably think, that many of our best friends are not NBs.

just my thoughts on reading your excellent posts. thank you.

Kunjuppu sir,
Thank you for your concerned posting.
You have rightly pointed out out the Good(praises)and bad(Varnasramams).
The praises are projected by me the following reasons.
When our own people cry against(you might have seen lot of postings in the site)
I wanted to project how outsiders have pointed out praised our religion.
This will make atleast some of us to appreciate our own religion.Motivational effect.

When praisings by our own persons may not have the same effect as would be by foreigners.

Regarding Varnasrama criticism we have to come out of the feeling of guilty.
We can explain Varnams as originally defined based on nature and work done are now been twisted as Castes in the course of time.You can see currently a Doctor
wants his son become as Doctor and like that others.Also with the limited oppurtunities availble for the wellbeing(earning),especially in Govt sectors people are crying aloud on Varnas.These points can be explained atleast to our Hindu/Brahmin brothers.
In nutshell we have to project the good points more and more and the Defend the Criticisms with proper reasoning.
Thanks for the concerns shared,

By the way I invite you take part in the poll on this thread.
Alwan

 

[talwan]

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1887--1961) was a great German philosopher and a philosophical predecessor of the New England Transcendentalists. He wrote in his "lectures on the Philosophy of History." Hegel belongs to the period of "German idealism" in the decades following Kant. He wrote:

“India has always been an object of yearning, a realm of wonder, a world of magic.”
​

"India is the land of dreams. India had always dreamt - more of the Bliss that is man's final goal. And this has helped India to be more creative in history than any other nation. Hence the effervescence of myths and legends, religious and philosophies, music, and dances and the different styles of architecture." [SUP]61[/SUP]​

"India has created a special momentum in world history as a country to be searched for."
​

 

[talwan]

Hi Sarang,
Thanks for your postings.
I invite you to take part in the polling on this thread.
Alwan

 

[talwan]

Alain Danielou a.k.a Shiv Sharan (1907-1994), son of French aristocracy, author of numerous books on philosophy, religion, history and arts of India, including Virtue, Success, Pleasure, & Liberation : The Four Aims of Life in the Tradition of Ancient India. He was perhaps the first European to boldly proclaim his Hinduness. He settled in India for fifteen years in the study of Sanskrit. In Benaras Daniélou came in close contact with Karpatriji Maharaj, who inducted him into the Shaivite school of Hinduism and he was renamed Shiv Sharan.

After leaving Benaras, he was also the director of Sanskrit manuscripts at the Adyar Library in Chennai for some time. He returned to Europe in 1960s and was associated with UNESCO for some years.He had a wide effect upon Europe's understanding of Hinduism. Danielou had been sharply critical of the Western-educated Congress leadership which led the country to Independence from British rule in 1947. ​

Danielou said:​

"The Hindu lives in eternity. He is profoundly aware of the relativity of space and time and of the illusory nature of the apparent world." ​

Hinduism is a religion without dogmas. Since its origin, Hindu society has been built on rational bases by sages who sought to comprehend man's nature and role in creation as a whole.
​

 

[talwan]

Thanks Sarang for voting in the poll.
Alwan

 

[talwan]

Erwin Schroedinger (1887--1961) Austrian theoretical physicist, was a professor at several universities in Europe. He was awarded the Nobel prize Quantum Mechanics, in 1933. During the Hitler era he was dismissed from his position for his opposition to the Nazi ideas and he fled to England. He was the author of Meine WeltansichtSchrodinger wrote in his book Meine Weltansicht
“This life of yours which you are living is not merely apiece of this entire existence, but in a certain sense the whole; only this whole is not so constituted that it can be surveyed in one single glance. This, as we know, is what the Brahmins express in that sacred, mystic formula which is yet really so simple and so clear; tat tvam asi, this is you. Or, again, in such words as “I am in the east and the west, I am above and below, I am this entire world.”

 

[Brahin]

Just voted, I hope I was not too late to vote.

 

[sarang]

Reposted as it got into a different thread.

Robert R. C. Zaehner (1913-1974) British historian of religion.

In the family of religions, Hinduism is the wise old all-knowing mother. Its sacred books, the Vedas, claim, 'Truth is one, but sages call it by different names.' If only Islam, and all the rest of the monotheistic 'book' religions, had learned that lesson, all the horror of history's religious wars could have been avoided. Which other religion has its God say, as Krishna does in the Bhagavad Gita, 'All paths lead to me.'

If only the Church had the sense to allow so many different and seemingly contradictory approaches to God, how much saner its history would have been!
It was the sublime ancient tolerance of Hinduism that he often stressed, that was the true proof of the wisdom and mature dignity of the Hindu tradition.

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident."

 

[talwan]

Nicola Tesla (1856-1943) the Serbian-American inventor, electrical engineer, and scientist,. Nikola Tesla, one of the most incredible inventors of all time, developed this Scaler technology in the early 1900's. Every major technology currently being used today was invented by Tesla including alternating current, television, radio, robotics etc. etc.

He used ancient Sanskrit terminology in his descriptions of natural phenomena.

As early as 1891 Tesla described the universe as a kinetic system filled with energy which could be harnessed at any location. His concepts during the following years were greatly influenced by the teachings of Swami Vivekananda. Swami Vivekananda was the first of a succession of eastern yogi's who brought Vedic philosophy and religion to the west. ​

After meeting the Swami and after continued study of the Eastern view of the mechanisms driving the material world, Tesla began using the Sanskrit words Akasha, Prana, and the concept of aluminiferous ether to describe the source, existence and construction of matter.
​

 

[talwan]

Just voted, I hope I was not too late to vote.

Thanks Brahin for voting.It was just before the closing.Thanks,
Alwan

 

[sarang]

Hu Shih, former Ambassador of China to USA:

"India conquered and dominated China culturally for 20 centuries without ever having to send a single soldier across her border."

​

 

[talwan]

Alistair Shearer has postgraduate degrees in literature, Sanskrit, and Indian studies. He has lectured for many prestigious institutions, including London University, the British Museum, and the Royal Academy of Arts. A teacher of meditation, Shearer leads cultural tours to the Indian subcontinent and has published ten books including The Hindu Vision: Forms of the Formless

He affirms:

"The Hindu understanding of the universe has often been misunderstood as bizarre and primitive."

"The Hindu imagery is in fact a sophisticated iconography conveying universal religious truths only now beginning to be understood in the West."
​

 

[talwan]

Dr. Carl Sagan, (1934-1996) famous astrophysicist,in his book, Cosmos says:

"The Hindu religion is the only one of the world's great faiths dedicated to the idea that the Cosmos itself undergoes an immense, indeed an infinite, number of deaths and rebirths.

It is the only religion in which the time scales correspond, to those of modern scientific cosmology. ​

Its cycles run from our ordinary day and night to a day and night of Brahma, 8.64 billion years long. Longer than the age of the Earth or the Sun and about half the time since the Big Bang. And there are much longer time scales still."
There is the deep and appealing notion that the universe is but the dream of the god who, after a Brahma years, dissolves himself into a dreamless sleep. The universe dissolves with him - until, after another Brahma century, he stirs, recomposes himself and begins again to dream the great cosmic dream."
​

 

[talwan]

"Immanuel Velikovsky (the author of Earth in Upheaval) in his book Worlds in Collision, notes that the idea of four ancient ages terminated by catastrophe is common to Indian as well as to Western sacred writing. However, in the Bhagavad Gita and in the Vedas, widely divergent numbers of such ages, including an infinity of them, are given; but, more interesting, the duration of the ages between major catastrophes is specified as billions of years. .. "

"The idea that scientists or theologians, with our present still puny understanding of this vast and awesome cosmos, can comprehend the origins of the universe is only a little less silly than the idea that Mesopotamian astronomers of 3,000 years ago – from whom the ancient Hebrews borrowed, during the Babylonian captivity, the cosmological accounts in the first chapter of Genesis – could have understood the origins of the universe. We simply do not know.
The Hindu holy book, the Rig Veda (X:129), has a much more realistic view of the matter:

 

[prasad1]

I am sorry to have missed your poll. Great thread.

 

[talwan]

***​

T. S. (Thomas Stearns) Eliot (1888-1965) American-English Harvard educated poet, playwright, and literary critic, a leader of the modernist movement in literature.
​

Eliot was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1948. He drew his intellectual sustenance from the Bhagavad Gita. He considered it to be the greatest philosophical poem after Dante's Divine Comedy. (source: Resinging the Gita). ​

Also, he kept a copy of The Twenty-eight Upanishads in his personal library for ready reference. (Among the books from Eliot's library now in the Hayward Bequest in King's College Library is Vasudev Lazman Sastri Phansikar's The Twenty-Eight Upanishads (Bombay: Tukaram Javaji, 1906). ​

Inscribed on the fly-leaf is the following note: Thomas Eliot with C.R. Lanman's kindest regards and best wishes. Harvard College. May 6, 1912. At Harvard, Eliot studied Sanskrit and Pali for two years (1920-11), probably in order to acquaint himself with Indian philosophical texts in the original, for he later admitted that though he studied "the ancient Indian languages" and " read a little poetry," he was "chiefly interested at that time in philosophy." ​

As early as 1918, Eliot reviewed for The Egoist an obscure treatise on Indian philosophy called Brahmadarsanam or Intuition of the Absolute by Sri Ananda Acharya.

(source: T. S. Eliot Vedanta and Buddhism - By P. S. Sri p. 10-11 and 126).​

Eliot wrote in 1933: ​

"Their (Indian philosophers') subtleties make most of the great European philosophers look like schoolboys."
​

 

[talwan]

David Bohm (1917-1992) Born in Wiles-Barre, Pennsylvania on December 20, 1917, he studied under Einstein and Oppenheimer, received his B.Sc. degree from Pennsylvania State College in 1939 and his Ph.D. in physics at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1943. He was the last graduate student to study with Oppenheimer at U.C. in the 1940s, where he remained as a research physicist after Oppenheimer left for Los Alamos to work on the atomic bomb.

Bohm was one of the world's greatest quantum mechanical physicists and philosophers and was deeply influenced by both J. Krishnamurti and Einstein, was one of the world's greatest quantum mechanical physicists and philosophers. ​

David Bohm explains his theory that there is something like life and mind enfolded in everything. ​

Bohm was profoundly affected by his close contact with J. Krishnamurti. ​

"Yes, and Atman is from the side of meaning. You would say Atman is more like the meaning. But then what is meant would be Brahman, I suppose; the identity of consciousness and cosmos....This claims that the meaning and what is meant are ultimately one, which is the phrase 'Atman equals Brahman' of classical Hindu philosophy."
​