Larissa – what a display of – a lack – intellect. “Insights”??? The Veda was the luminous poetry of the Rishi, expressed through symbolic imagery, expressing the higher truths they experienced. You are focused on rituals but that is not the real truth of the Veda. I think your intellect is of need of some expansion.

And calling a first translation of the Rig Veda a “simple translation” displays your utter ignorance…it is useless to even descend to respond to such a level of intellect!

wah wah. Stop crying about it. Mueller’s translation was without understanding of the context of the Veda, which was the Rishis describing their spiritual experiences in poetic imagery. But Mueller had no clue to this – he took what he read, that of Arya’s defeating Dasas (i.e light defeating darkness in a psychological sense) and interpreted it in a physical context – that of white skinned people defeating dark skinned people. Thus it is a ***simple*** translation, because it does not take into account the subjective context to what the Rishis experienced; your emotional attachment to him means you could not understand the context in which i used the word “simple”, just as the original Indologists themselves could not understand the real meaning of the Veda.

Larissa, I suggest you give up your attachment to Mueller, as just because someone does a translation of a work, does not make him “great.” Greatness, first of all, is an attribute better given to those that create works, for instance Shakespeare. Secondly, if we are to give it to someone for doing a translation, one would hope that their translation would give an accurate feel for the original work – better to read Sri Aurobindo’s translations on the Veda than Muellers. At best we can thank Mueller for starting the process of rediscovering the past – just a “simple” thank you is enough.

The Greeks and Romans had philosophy and great learning, but they lived in an aristocratic culture–the slave was not considered fully human in that he had no political power (i.e. Aristotle Ethics). The slave could often be educated as they were often conquered folk, but insofar as they had no political power they did not count–Christianity brought in a revolution–all men were seen as the same in the “eyes of god” for Christians–So for the first time, even the slave had inherent worth and this was a social revolution. It is easy to see how Christianity created something like the first welfare state: the famous early Christians were widows, the poor, the orphaned, the shipwrecked in life, and it spread through public works and appealed to the poor. The early Christians worshipped underground–the Romans were against Christianity on the grounds that it was not Roman thinking and rightly so–It appears that Constantine converted as Rome was constantly disintegrating with barbarian attacks and he saw that Christianity could be a good unifying tool for the empire–Or it could be that he saw the victory against Barbarians as due to the Christian God, so being a pagan he wanted to revere it and thus wanted to allow this cult. I think that the Romans who were open to other religious cults did not properly understand how hostile Christianity was to the pagan way of thinking with “one book” and its “revealed truth”—What happened, however, was that Christianity wiped out the pagan culture of Greece and Rome–even to this day you can see a Church on top of a Mithraeum in Rome–science came to a halt and it was in the Renaissance you find that the western world connects again to its past Greco-Roman roots again–and rediscovers its greatness again through this process–you can see this in art history–after Christianity art seems to also stagnate until the Renaissance—
Christianity has been put under the scrutiny of science and now science checks it–I find that it has always been a graft on the Western world which is why among the educated it is not as appealing anymore–But after Christianity, the West basically lost touch with its pagan past, so Christianity is what it has as a spiritual heritage for the last 2000 years–without it most countries in the West have nothing, so I am in favor of religion, provided that they do not destroy other people’s religion. Christianity helped unify the ancient world after Rome was constantly disintegrating under barbarian attacks, it was a unifying tool for various parts of the West that came under the influence of Rome and parts of the Western world that had no culture of their own but borrwed from Greece and Rome.
In Iran, it is easy to see how Islam triumphed. The Romans and Persians had fought themselves to exhaustion and hence Persia was ripe for attack by those wanting to spread Islam. The defeat of Persia was also tragic and it took several decades,nearly a century, for Persia to be fully converted to Islam.
I have been always intrigued by how monasteries first arose in the Western world–you have nothing like in in Greece and Rome, whereas the Buddhist sanghas were in existence hundreds of years before Christianity. A theological student from Italy told me that there were many Buddhist monasteries in Syria–I find that were it not for the monotheisms of the Mid East like Christianity, Judiasm and Islam which are exclusivist, in between the West and further East, the Greco-Roman culture and that of Buddhism would have interacted in an interesting way…Moreover, the New Testament is so different in character from the old…it is easy to see influences from fruther east in the monastic tradition of Christianity etc.

Atheism needs to be taught. But man can naturally fathom God’s presence in his own way. He may not even call it God but reflects on the wonder of nature naturally and can feel it’s powerful presence. He calls the mover, God, that’s all.

So, any belief in God is better and more humane and natural than atheism.

Coming to Islam, it is not just that Islam also is “God-related” but it has it’s own baggage that is disagreeable to me. That baggage is carried by Muslims. Indeed, they cannot remain Muslims unless they carry that baggage. Without the baggage of Shar’ia, Islam would have been just another religion that people follow.

I do not deny Christianity’s past. Nor can anybody deny it’s numerous depredations. But I don’t see any sense in wishing for a return to aboriginal Australia or a tribal Africa or a Red-Indian United States. I am more interested in ensuring the past is not repeated anymore. I’m not even sure if the aborigines/Red Indians wish to administer Australia/USA on their own, themselves. There are natural constraints; lack of population etc. See the point? What better future does a tribal Africa have against a Christian one on merits? It’s all very well to cry for the past but that’s not going to do anything for us. What we must do is to protect what we have managed to preserve into the present. That, in the Indian scene, would amount to nurturing Hinduism in all it’s multifarious splendor.

On secularism, suffice to say that without a Christian situation and a Christian ethic in play, one would not have seen the rise of secularism. We do not see secularism in the Islamic environment. Nor do we see it in a Hindu environment. Whatever you see, is an imposition. Don’t you think there must be a reason for this?

I cannot fathom your defense of Christianity on the basis that a belief system accepts God is better than atheism. That means that Islamic belief system is better than atheism, is that not the logical inference? Furthermore, why should a “belief system” that accepts God be superior to any other ideology at all? Christianity and Islam stem from the same sort of a “belief system” and have uprooted many civilisations and it’s precisely their “belief system” that wreaked this havoc. One does not need to “believe” in God; one can logically deduce that there is God by reflecting and meditating on the Supreme (or first) cause without which there would have been no other causes eventually resulting in the world we see today. Vedic seers have also attested the truth of these by experience.

To my mind, saying secularism grew out of Christian ethos is a bit far fetches. The European Renaissance was what led to the separation of Church and the State (commonly referred to as Secularism). In contrast to Secularism evolving out of Christian ethos, it arose as a consequence of distancing the Church from the State. And this is also a consequence of a rise of Atheism or Agnostism that led to Secularism. To say that Secularism evolved from Christian ethos is twisting the facts owing from what I see is a soft corner in your heart towards Christianity.

Please do not forget it is Christianity that has contributed to the continuing destruction of cultures and civilisations in Africa, Australia and is doing so in India (coincidentally this is also the latest blog post here). Speaking of fanatics, do you think that the Pope is a benign character? Or for that matter Mother Theresa was one such benign character?

As regards my comment about not caring for groups of people, I wish to see human unity in ending suffering and not a constant confrontationist situation of “us vs them”. My sympathies do not lie with “Hinduism” and “Hindus” alone but also with others like the Aborgines in Australia who are fighting against predatory religions. The spiritual heritage of Aborgines in Australia has been almost wiped out by the benevolent influence of a Judeo-Christian heritage.

You can see my earlier post to understand my stance properly.

Yes, Christianity has shown much greater complexity than has Islam. It’s historical development is testimony to it. The fact also, that secularism developed out of a Christian ethic proves my point. There is tremendous scope to reform Christianity more as Christians would deem fit.

I have not forgotten the “crusades and the inquisitions”. I am simply stating, again, a pertinent fact, that no one speaks that language anymore within Christianity. Of course fanatics are present. They remain exceptions. You may want to prove me otherwise.

Yes, if you boil down Christianity, you will find an Islamic style belief system. But “complexity” assumes the fact that stuff grows around that basic ingredient which lends enough strength and material to look at more options for reform. This is what has happened.

“Frankly, I do not care about groups of people; whether they be Hindus or Muslims or Buddhists or whoever.”

- I find this assertion astounding. Why do you not care? Why then are you bothered about what happens to Hindus and Hinduism?

“And hence I don’t have an opinion of whether Muslims should become Hindus or lesser Muslims as long as they don’t go infecting others with the deadly Islam virus that leads to more suffering all around.”

- I think this is the core issue. You don’t care about groups and yet you would like the most aggressive of these groups to not “infect” others. That’s a contradiction between what you want for results and what you don’t want to recognize as “groups” providing you cause to demand such results. I hope you understood me.

You say I do not rely on facts. Where have you seen this behavior? On the other hand, you want to believe Kalam and Premji are your examples of lesser Muslims without telling me how?

I feel you should rethink your stance more.

I agree that I jumped to conclusion. You did keep the focus on a subset of ‘educated Muslims who socialize with non Muslim friends’ among the sample of educated Indians under discussion. And I admit I did not read it as such and apologise for the latter inferences.

But then later in your post, you say this

“It’s a two-way road, and I think we Hindus are so brain-washed into believing that it’s only one-way and only we Hindus have to adapt. Let the other community adapt for a change.”

and I guess I was thrown off track with this “Hindus vs. Muslims” statement and the seemingly confrontationist and hardline picture you painted that got me to read into the post the way I did and hence the response for which I fully take on board your response. Even as I say that I understand what you are saying regarding the problems that the Muslims face in liberating themselves of the Islamic ideology.

My basic contention is that non Muslims have to be extremely mindful of what they speak when discussing Islam and have to keep the focus on the ideology and not on the group that follows the ideology lest this gives rise to a defensive reaction that will push the Muslims to seek refuge in numbers. The social and political discourse wrt discussion of Islam has to come about with a criticism of Islam and not by demonising Muslims. Non Muslims should focus on playing a supportive role to the Muslims for detoxifying themselves of the disease arising out of the Islamic virus.

And when I see some comments made by some people on a forum like this that fail to distinguish between Islam and Muslims, I cannot but think that this will only push Muslims to hold on to their identity even more tightly. And then I wonder if we can ever get the society rid of Islam.