Comments on: Dissecting Contextual Morality: Part 2

By: Do Indians have Contextual Morality? | DesiPundit

Do Indians have Contextual Morality? | DesiPundit — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 19:15:40 +0000

[...] In an Rediff column, T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan wrote that the absence of moral absolutism enables Indians to justify everything. This concept was based on an article by the poet A K Ramanujam, which according to Mr. Ragahavan is the “the best ever written on the subject of how Indians decide on the morality of their actions.” In a three part post (1, 2, 3), Sandeep shows evidence of universal principles in Indian philosophy and explains why Ramanujam’s contextual morality concept is flawed. AKR’s omission of other Hindu treatises is as misleading as it serves its purpose of proving his point about contextual morality. The Sikshavalli of the Taittirya Upanishad clearly urges adolescent students to always speak the truth, follow righteousness, treat parents as God, respect elders, behave with dignity and courtesy in public…all qualities of the “universality” AKR regards so highly. What does this say about a society where childhood/adolescent education imparted this kind of foundation? Hundreds of Rg Vedic verses repeatedly stress on right conduct, morality, universal (yes!) prosperity, honouring only the good, harmony with all beings, and peace upon the entire universe. I can quote numerous such instances from several other sources but that’ll only be superfluous. [...]

By: Seriously Sandeep » Archive » Dissecting Contextual Morality: Part 3

Seriously Sandeep » Archive » Dissecting Contextual Morality: Part 3 — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 19:22:18 +0000

[...] After observing how AKR leaves us confounded with academic jargon and widely deviating from his original theme, I’ll continue the same examination a tad more. A commenter helpfully added some valuable information about AKR’s corruption of the ullurai concept. [...]

By: kaangeya

kaangeya — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 13:00:44 +0000

AKR wreaked havoc on threee traditions, the Sanksrit, the Kannada, and the Tamizh. Here he mangles the idea of uLLurai by a simple cut and paste. Munnurai (munn as in before or advance + urai as in account or narration) is used in Tamizh books of today to mean Foreword or preface. AKR instead of bothering to read up on some of the older Saiva texts - where the term uLLurai finds resonance has superposed the Christian idea of the soul (which is what god breathes into humans) into the inner space. AKR I am certain had no idea what he was talking about. This is straight out of the Universtiy of Chicago playbook. Doesn’t deserve even a failing grade.