On the Nasadiya suktam and the Big-bang(not a comparitive evaluation)

                                  Is this representation of creation correct?

I have always wondered why there was something at all called "existence" instead of nothing. Though it became clear to me as time went by, that I would not be able to fully understand the answer(if i get one) due to our own inherent human limitations, I still wanted one. Thoughts flashed across my mind about the vedic "ekameva adviteeyam"(One only without a second) and how it had spawned a chain of interpretations and polemics in the ocean of Indian philosophy. Adi Shankara's advaitam and one of the Buddhist schools' absolute shunyavaadam and  visishtadvaita were important currents in this ocean. I thought about the reason why vedanta deshika(a visishtadvaitin and one of the greatest acharyas of India) and others had accused Shankara to be a prachanna-bauddha( a buddhist in disguise) while Buddhism was precisely one of the many schools he was trying to win over during his lifetime. Did Shankara and Buddha tell the one and the same thing? Then one day i came across this one. "To me, nothingness is philosophically indistinguishable from undifferentiated oneness". This is a quote of a physicist.(Same as what our poorvacharyas were teaching us).

In my quest to find an answer to the question "Why not nothing?" and hence the related ones, why and how the universe came into being, I decided to look into two sources, employing two entirely different methods of inquiry. One of those was the vedic lore and the other, modern physics. While the Vedas are the eternal texts which codify eternal truth, science is an equally interesting field which is  essentially a self-modifying field(based on its trials and travails). One must at the outset, however remember that science is in its infancy now and even if developed cannot lead to god consciousness because there is no way science transcends space and time due to its inherent limited premises.

The vedam is the 'pramana', the fountainhead of all knowledge in India from time immemorial. It is both anadi(without beginning) as well as apauresheya (not created by any human). It is often asserted(though a modern trend) that the vedas, in a cryptic manner contain some extremely advanced scientific truths, including those yet to be discovered by science. I was looking into the Rig veda to see if i could get an answer to my questions. While I was turning the pages of the 10th mandala of Rig veda Samhita, I landed  on this specific suktam nicknamed by scholars as the Nasadiya suktam, because it begins as "Naasadaasi..". This is the 129th suktam of the 10th(and the last ) mandala. The reason why it has attracted considerable attention is that it talks about the moment of creation and what was there prior to it.

There are some parallels that can be recognised between this suktam and Big-bang theory(and this is to be taken with a pich of salt as there are vast differences as well and in no way one validates the other. There is obviously nothing 'Scientific' about Vedas in the sense that Science is limited by sensory perceptions.)

It begins in a very interesting way. (In another type of division of Rig veda this suktam belongs to the vargam 17 in 7th dhyayam in 8th ashtakam.)
परमेष्ठी प्रजापतिर्ऋषिः  ,  त्रिष्टुप् छन्दः,  भाववृत्तं देवता

1. नासदासीन्नो सदासीत्तदानीं नासीद्रजो नो व्योमा परो यत् |
किमावरीवः कुह कस्य शर्मन्नम्भः किमासीद्गहनं गभीरम् ||

Neither there was non-existent, nor the existent; nor there was any realm or region.What was wrapping? Where? In whose protection? Was water there, unfathomable deep?

This is the earliest idea revealed to humanity about creation and can be called the first cosmological insight. It is sad that most of us are not even aware of such a literature with us. The profundity of their meaning strikes a chord with us. Before the Big-bang there was the singularity, which cannot be explained by current level of scientific knowledge. Since the singularity was there, we cannot say that there was non-existence(asat). On the other hand, there was no existence (sat) either, because the measurements of singularity (which is a point) were zero. There was no air, nor any sky or space(alternatively any realm or region).

Moreover, the singularity was not  covered or surrounded by anything like space or water. Water, here is not the liquid water as we know but a plasma kind of substance that came after the big-bang.

In short, the first verse precisely talks about the singularity or rather more generally a pre-big bang state. I also think that vatapatrasayi or aalilai krishna was a deep symbolism of this singularity.

 Though we see water in the painting, i feel it signifies the unfathomable indescribable darkness before creation.

Vatapatrasayi is often thought of as the final stage of pralayam(or when all of existence merges with Lord Krishna). In the bhagavatham, we find that there is a beautiful description of the moment of creation from the anantashayana Narayana. To me it seems to be logically following the previous state of pralayam. We will take a look at it later in this post.

[ Indian philosophy of subsequent yugas represented in the itihasas and puranas are quite at home with this fact of existence and non-existence. We find that in the Vishnu sahasranamam and Bhagavatham, Sriman Narayana is addressed as both sat and asat, ie, both existence and non-existence]

2. न मृत्युरासीदमृतं न तर्हि न रात्र्या अह्न आसीत्प्रकेतः |
   आनीदवातं स्वधया तदेकं तस्माद्धान्यन्न परः किं चनास ||

Neither was there death nor immortality then. There was no indication of day or night. That breathless one breathed upon by its own impulse/nature. Apart from that one, there was nothing else whatsoever.

(In sanatana dharma this verse indicates that paramatma,jivatma and acit(insentient matter) were together before creation. That is, though they were distinct, they seemed to be indistinguishable). There were no stars, planets or sun to demarcate night from day. Time also did not exist. This verse further emphsises the very different nature of singularity. The common misconception is that Big bang occured at a point in space which is false. The singularity contained space and time and it was present everywhere. Hence here we see that the verse stresses on the fact that nothing else whatsoever was there apart from it. Also, it introduces consciousness clearly into the picture of creation. Unlike being dry and indicating that we are here by chance, this verse indicates an intelligent being behind creation.

The next 2 verses are also equally interesting.

3.  तम आसीत्तमसा गूळ्हमग्रेऽप्रकेतं सलिलं सर्वमा इदम् |
तुच्छ्येनाभ्वपिहितं यदासीत्तपस्तन्महिनाजायतैकम् ||

Darkness was there;enveloped by darkness, a plasmic continuum, in which there was nothing distinguishable. And then, an empty(world), united under a causal covering came out on account of the austere penance(of that supreme one).

From the big bang theory we have a postulate: 

Before a time classified as a Planck time, 10^-43 seconds, all of the four fundamental forces are presumed to have been unified into one force. All matter, energy, space and time are presumed to have exploded outward from the original singularity. Nothing is known of this period.

There is a striking similarity between this statement and the above verse of our suktam.

4. कामस्तदग्रे समवर्तताधि मनसो रेतः प्रथमं यदासीत् |

सतो बन्धुमसति निरविन्दन्हृदि प्रतीष्या कवयो मनीषा ||

In the beginning, there was the divine desire, which was the first seed of the cosmic mind. The sages seeking in their hearts, have discovered by their wisdom the bond that operates between the existent(the manifested) and the non-existent(the unmanifested).

The 'sankalpa sakti' of paramatma as the cause for creation of the universe is pointed out in these two verses. It would be appropriate to look at the following bhagavatham verses 

In the beginning(of creation), with the desire of evolving the different worlds, the Lord assumed the form of purusha consisting of sixteen component principles and constituted of the cosmic intellect. (1.3.1)

While he was in yoga nidhra reposing on the causal waters, there appeared from the lake of his navel a lotus wherefrom sprang up brahma, the lord of the progenitors of the world. (1.3.2)

This form of the lord is the imperishable seed of various avataras and the abode to which they all return. It is by a ray of his ray that gods, human beings and the lower forms of life are created. (1.3.5)

Here, the "knowledge of connection between existence and non-existence" is very significant.

The question is how could something as big as our universe have come from a point that was smaller than even a proton. We struggle to imagine how all of existence can be packed into a dimensionless point. Science is yet to explain this. Atheists argue that the fact that we do not know how it happened does not necessarily prove that there is a creator. However, according to me it neither disproves a creator. More precisely, the easiest, most understandable and at the same time satisfying answer is 'intelligent design'

The simple explanation offered in religion to this question is, since brahmam is 'sarvashakta' or 'one capable of everything' , he can shrink his size arbitrarily as well as expand to any extent. Science plays with its usual ways of building a 'jargon mountain' and explaining around this problem in some way using obscure quantum effects which are equally unproven anywhere till now.

5. तिरश्चीनो विततो रश्मिरेषामधः स्विदासीदुपरि स्विदासीत् |
रेतोधा आसन्महिमान आसन् स्वधा अवस्तात् प्रयतिः परस्तात् ||

Their controls(rays or reins) were stretched out, some transverse, some below and others above. Some of these were shedders of seed and the others strong and superb- the inferior, the causal matter here and the superior, the creator's effort there. 

I think this rk might have also been an inspiration for sankhya philosophy (which deals with prakriti and purusha)  propagated later on by kapila.

It also explains the process of expansion as well as simultaneous creation of matter from condensing energy. It is said that the young universe was a hot place with a huge soup of sub-atomic particles, which later on condensed and bonded to form all the variety of elements and objects that we observe today. This view is also corroborated in vedic literature where prior to creating brahma, 24 tattvas were created by parabrahmam sriman narayana. These all started from moola prakriti, which was nothing but the primordial matter forming the body of paramatma before expansion. Based on some latest scientific speculations such as string theory(which is discussed later), we are inclined to accept the fundamental unity of all matter.

 6. को अद्धा वेद क इह प्र वोचत्कुत आजाता कुत  इयं विसृष्टिः |
अर्वाग्देवा अस्य विसर्जनेनाथा को वेद यत आबभूव ||

Who really knows, who in this world can declare it, whence came out this creation? When was it engendered? When will it end? Nature's bounty came much later and hence who knows whence this creation was manifested?

This has a huge philosophical import as well as scientific dilemma about the age of our universe. Though vedic scriptures describe in detail the time scales of manvantara, kalpa and hence are aware of when the creation came about, this cryptic verse conveys the meaning of an eternal cycle of creation and absorption. Also it gives a voice to the human awe at the gigantic timescales involved in this existence(so huge that it is as good as unkown beginning and end). 

Science , after revising its estimate for the age of the universe several times has now come up with a value of 13.7 billion years(and now there are few members of the scientific community who have proposed that the Universe might be much older than 13.7 billion years). To explain any further, we need to grasp the fundamentals of a current theory about the universe. 

In a quest for a unified theory of the universe, scientists came upon what is called the string theory.It states that the fundamental building block of the whole universe including all the forces observed in nature, are infact ‘strings’ which are nothing but tiny threads of energy oscillating/vibrating at various frequencies. The mathematics of the theory predicts(and also requires) that there are tiny curled up extra dimensions(upto 6) at every point of space and we are unable to see them because they are billions of times smaller than even an atom. These dimensions gain prime importance because according to string theorists the actual nature of vibration of strings would depend on the precise shapes and curls of these extra dimensions. Hence, we could even stumble upon an explanation of why we have the exact scientific constants that we have in the universe if we can know more about these dimensions.[ An interesting comparative study here is that while string theory explains the universe as a symphony of strings, vedic idea is that  the whole existence is made of vibrations, a part of which is the Vedas that we have inherited. The idea of shabda brahmam is a notable one. Vedas are given the ultimate authority and importance in Indian culture because it represents the cosmic vibration in a fundamental way. Om, infact encompasses the whole of existence.]

The “M-theory”, an extension of the string theory is the latest development in this field. It is yet to be verified by observation from experiments but has striking resemblances to what we already know from ancient Indian cosmology and science. M-theory, among others could stand for Membrane theory, which talks about 3 dimensional membrane universes floating on a 11 dimensional space. Bhagavatha mahapuranam praises the lord as the infinite power who just breathes out countless universes as he wishes. One theorist describes the possibility of our universe as a tiny bubble floating in higher dimension multiverse that contains infinite other universes! (Note: Here again there is a fundamental difference between science and religion. While bhagavatam talks about all these universes having separate brahmas creating life in each of these, M-theory just speculates on random universes sprung up by chance where we happen to be in a universe supporting life)

This gives a twist to the big-bang theory, that it was not a unique beginning. The big-bang, according to M-theorists is nothing but a collision of two 3d membranes in the 11 dimensional space. They also further theorise that big-bangs could be happening all the time in the 11 dimensional space and ours was not anything unique. In fact this does not really seem to contradict vedic cosmology as well because, it says that srushti(creation) and pralayam(the ultimate deluge) happen cyclically and as seen earlier also admits multiple universes. This might be one of the possible explanations between the difference in the ages of the universe as given by Vedas(~311 trillion years) and the one predicted latest by science(13.7 billion years)

As said before, the devas came much later than initial creation of 24 tattvas and brahma and hence sail in the same boat with us when it comes to knowing when creation started.

Apart from the foregoing discussion on the age of the current universe or kalpa or maha-kalpa, there is a very important concept in this verse. It is "anaadi" or beginninglessness. It is a concept which is virtually impossible for human mind to comprehend. The universe has been created and destroyed infinite number of times in the past and will continue to be so into the future forever. So, no one knows when the creation began(in fact it did not!).

7. इयं विसृष्टिर्यत आबभूव यदि वा दधे यदि वा न
यो अस्याध्यक्षः परमे व्योमन् सो अङ्ग वेद यदि वा नवेद  

He from whom this creation arose- verily he may uphold it or he may not(and then of course none else can do it). The one who is sovereign in this highest heaven he assuredly knows or even he knows not(or who else knows)

Contrary to popular interpretation that this verse is on a skeptical note and is the source of atheism in indian thought etc., this actually talks about the greatness of paramatma. The sense of this rik is that brahmam is infinite in all attributes that he himself does not know his extents and powers(this is a statement to emphasise the infinity to finite people like us).

Interestingly, no one knows the size of the universe. We always talk about the extent of the visible universe only and have absolutely no idea of the size of the universe, leave alone the multiverse. It is impossible to know this quatity because it changes with every unit of time. In other words even now space is constantly expanding everywhere as you are reading this sentence.

A nice video about the big-bang

It appears that  non-existence and existence do not differ as we think from a limited, conditioned point of view. Paramatma shrinking all this creation unto himself can be said to be the state of non-existence( though absolutely speaking, it is not so).
One last note is a quote by aurobindo regarding the inadequacy of science when it comes to metaphysics, in the context of rebirth

"Rebirth is for the modern mind no more than a speculation and a theory. It has never been proven by the methods of modern science or to the satisfaction of the new critical mind formed by a scientific culture. Neither has it been disproved; for modern science knows nothing about a before life or an after life for the human soul, knows nothing indeed about the soul at all, nor can know; its province stops with the flesh and the brain and nerve, the embryo and its formation and development.Neither has modern criticism any apparatus by which the truth or untruth of rebirth can be established. In fact modern criticism with all its pretensions to searching investigation and scrupulous certainity, is no very effiecient truth-finder. Outside the sphere of the immediate physical it is almost helpless. It is good at discovering data, but except where the data themselves bear on their surface their own conclusion it has no means of being rightly sure of the generalisations it announces from them so confidently in one generation and destroys in the next."

This is true for any issues related to religion and science. So, I take a cautious step here by saying that as of now we can sense a parallel between the nasadiya suktam and big-bang(sans its atheistic interpretations).

Note:
To see the Nasadiya suktam with the svara marks(accent marks) see the following link, hymn 129


http://www.sanskritweb.net/rigveda/rv10-120.pdf

Evanescent Dharma -How is our cultural and religious corrosion catalysed?

Note: I am referring to bharatiya culture and sanathana dharma in this context.

असतो मा सद्गमय
तमसो मा ज्योतिर्गमय
मृत्योर् मा अमृतं गमय
ॐ शांति शांति शांति
( बृहदारण्यक उपनिषद् 1.3.28)

Day by day, the Kali yuga proceeds and the foresight of the rishis unfold in a very predictable fashion. In the name of freedom, people live as examples of "nrupasu", meaning man who is equal to an animal. This article talks about the various factors which slowly are invading the hindu society to cut it off from its roots, which is sanathana dharma(or "eternal dharma"). These are the ones I wish to concentrate in this post, while several others might also be the reasons.

1 The Christian Missionary activity and Islamic terrorism.
I would like to start with Kanchi paramacharya's quote on the stupidity of certain important tenets of these abrahamic religions.

"We cannot, however, help asking whether their belief is right. People who do not follow either Christ or the Prophet, are they really condemned to hell? A little thinking should show that the belief that the followers of Christianity or Islam have an exclusive right to salvation cannot be sustained. It is only some 2, 000 years since Jesus was born and only about 1, 400 years or so since the birth of the prophet. What happened to all the people born before them since creation? Are we to believe that they must have passed into hell? We are also compelled to infer that even the forefathers of the founders of Christianity and Islam would not have earned paradise. If, like Hindus, all those who lived before Christ or the Prophet had believed in rebirth, we could concede that they would have been saved: they would have been again and again until the arrival of Christ or the Prophet and then afforded the opportunity of following their teachings. But if we accept the logic of Christianity and Islam, according to which religions there is no rebirth, we shall have to conclude that hundreds of millions of people for countless generations must have been consigned to eternal hell."

These untenable religions have such claims which cannot be even reconciled among themselves. Now, they start "saving" the world with their"peaceful" religions. While I acknowledge that there might have been people who were motivated towards humanitarian endeavors because of every religion, the violence in the reference texts are way beyond any acceptable limit.

Exodus 35:2 -- For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day shall be your holy day, a Sabbath of rest to the LORD. Whoever does any work on it must be put to death.

Dueteronomy chapter 7 : Talks only about violence towards other nations and nothing else.

Ephesians 6:5 --- Slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear, and with sincerity of heart, just as you would obey Christ.

Numbers chapter 31---ridiculously eulogises violence. (For eg, verse 17-18 goes like... Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man)

Dueteronomy 21:18-21--If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and will not listen to them when they discipline him, his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his town. They shall say to the elders, "This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a profligate and a drunkard." Then all the men of his town shall stone him to death. You must purge the evil from among you. All Israel will hear of it and be afraid.

This list is much longer. Some more verses as ready examples are Collossians 3:22-24, 1 Samuel 15:3 , Judges 15:8 , Luke 12:49, Matthew 10:34-39 etc. With inspiration from such a scripture, the missionaries who followed the sailors literally burnt off cultures on their path.

The consistency of the missionary behaviour is a giveaway regarding the influence of their religious text on their actions. Christianization of Europe roughly extending over a period of 700 years from 350 AD to 1100AD was one of the most violent in terms of religious conversion. The Ancient greeks were tortured beyond imagination to give up their faith. Many important intellectual works were destroyed in the conversion frenzy. The medieval inquisition and witch hunt are sad episodes in the world history. Millions were killed. The inquisition in fact spread its roots even till Goa in India. Deigo de Landa burnt thousands of books of the Mayans and tortured them endlessly for following their faith. The South American native civilizations also perished in a similar way. African colonization and christianization attempt is another brutal episode. There are few places where they have not left their bloody footprint. (Of course, In India they tried more of an intellectual approach to conversion compared to violence)

Though the vedic religion survived because of its inherent strength and bhagawan's grace, the darker side of the truth is conspicuous. The Dalai Lama during his visit to one of the Kumbha melas(that has been recorded and released as a CD titled 'Shortcut to Nirvana') said that conversion is an outdated concept. I agree. Ancient India had a practise of philosophical debates to initiate conversions. Of course that shows a mature way of dealing with things. However, such fine practices are unknown to the missionaries, who lurk around in every place even now and start preaching whenever it is possible. There is absolutely no need of any new religions in India. The need of the hour is reforms in the age old tradition, to bring the wisdom of the dharmic religions to the masses.

As far as the other monotheistic religion, Islam, I have nothing to say here, because it would consume much of my post. I personally checked out a copy of Quran from my university library. It had been translated by 2 faithful Muslim scholars. To me the text appears to be just a political violence manual. In fact according to some statistics, 61% of quran talks only about violence towards non-believers. Check this out for yourself in the following link(Extremely interesting)

http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Pages/Quran-Hate.htm

No wonder The Muslim people and Kings in India for a 1000 years destroyed countless temples and killed millions of Hindus. The best part is the hindus are blamed if they retaliate at some point when the issue goes out of control. Ridiculous!

Let us wake up and read the most important treasures of our civilization, which is of course, the vedas, itihasas, saatvika puranas, dharmashastras, pasurams of azhwars and sri sookthis of Acharyas. Let us not be ignorant of our shastras. I encourage the Buddhists and Jains also to be thorough with their religions because though there are clear philosophical and ideological differences among all the Indian religions, they all emphasize a common concern for life, peace and freedom. Otherwise how can one expect to see hundreds of sub sects in the subcontinent even two thousand years ago? 

2.Neo-hinduism and NRMs

There is a dangerous group in India from the distortion point of view of classical ideas. It consists of self-declared swamijis. Swamijis includes many 'anandas' who simply start preaching the greatest myth of all times "All religions are same", which is a statement that cannot be more farther than truth. (I will deal with this great myth in a separate post). Hinduism for that matter does not preach that all religions are same. When a religion declares "kill the non-believers" or condemns all non-believers to eternal hell, how can it be ever equal to sanathana dharma, which teaches us a path to moksham via a dharmic life?

The NRMs are the New Religious Movements. Eg, Arya samaj, ISKCON, art of living, Oneness temple(flowering heart) etc. They often have no direct spiritual lineage to relate to right from the time of vedas or leave out important parts of our scriptures. Many join the new-age gurus to propagate the myth"all religions are same" which is a lie. ISKCON, on the other hand has a track record of miserable failure in the America of the '70s due to inherent flaws. It enforces strict near ascetic life for each and everyone irrespective of their backgrounds. This is impossible for the common folks who then start going astray after sometime. This resulted in the sexual abuses in the iskcon gurukulas of the '70s. Also the much debated "Acharya succession" issue reflects the lack of authentic tradition. These gurus and institutions adapt the teaching to market their discourses to suit their audience's tastes. This contrasts with classical works whos authors never knew us and hence are a good source of our true dharma. While Swami Dayananda did the most important work to re-establish the supremacy of vedas and give them a symbolic interpretation, he rejected the archa form of the lord much to everyone's dismay. The Arya Samaj also does not accept any other later scripture as authentic which is akin to discarding a library consisting of lakhs of books while retaining just 4 books(though of supreme importance).

3. Decline of sanskrit studies.

The masses have become so money oriented that anything that improves one's spiritual life has become a mere mockery for most people in the present generation in India. We can safely assume that atleast 75% of hindus today belong to a modified charvaka matham.(the materialistic school of ancient india). Sanskrit study is not encouraged by many people, parents or the academicians. Since sanskrit, deva bhasha is the key to the vedas and all the associated literature and proper understanding of hinduism, without it most of us miss the profound teachings of our rishis and acharyas and get swayed by superstition and ill-informed malign indologists and cheap-gimmick gurus.

The 'spoken sanskrit' has taken on a huge importance these days. I am not against this trend but i feel that this is insufficient for any great purposes. It is the trend now to go to crash courses and learn to speak sanskrit in 10 days or 20 days but no deep analysis of the written texts are possible with such shallow knowledge.

4. The entertainment epidemic.

Obscene,outdated movies and profane songs full to the brim with tamo gunam and rajo gunam including their trash lyrics seem to be the order of the day. I do not quite understand how any civilised person with a good thinking can spend all their leisure time on such junk and waste away their precious human life without some form of pursuit of sprituality. Most of the Indian movies(especially tamil ones, because i was indirectly forced to listen to such trash lyrics, thanks to those, with such pathetic tastes, surrounding me wherever i go) well gel with the foregoing description. People declare proudly that they are about to watch this movie or that and end up paying huge amounts in the state of art theatres, while not spending even one tenth of such amounts to ancient wisdom or national cause. The media is so bad these days that almost any program except a few can be easily said to be trash. Good movies and songs do exist, but get drowned in the ocean of the above said lot. While it is good to relax with these, it is a grave mistake on anyone's part to spend one's life on it.

I accept that personal tastes vary among the populace but I feel that at least some portion of each one's leisure time should be spent on contemplating about spiritual problems and consulting the solutions of our Ancients. I am pretty sure that there will be guilt in these people for wasting away their youth years in such paltry entertainments. Here is a short article about how we support vulgarity in the media:

http://www.satyavidya.org/component/content/article/52-miscellaneous/1-how-we-support-the-growth-of-vulgarity

5.The rat-race.

Many of us have given up almost all of the nitya karmanushtanams like sandhyavandhanam, aradhanam etc. which do not take huge amounts of time. While we seem to have time for gossip and all the utterly useless things in our life we "do not have time" for such karmas which are the prescriptions of bhagawan krishna.(Remember that it has been repeatedly emphasised that one is unfit for any further karmas if he does not perform sandhya daily. So there is no meaning in these people doing 'pooja' to deities on every occasion). The rat-race for money, comforts and 'hep' lifestyle which were the things precisely avoided by our ancestors (for excessive money leads to attachement and all related evil) , has assumed huge importance. The peer pressure rules our decision regarding any minute thing we do and we are all slowly getting burned out at younger ages due to work pressure. Michel Danino states aptly,

"Western civilisation, not even three centuries after the industrial Revolution, is now running out of breath. It has no direction, no healthy foundations, no value left except selfishness and greed, nothing to fill one's heart with. India alone has preserved something of the deeper values that can make a man human and the world will surely be turning to them in search of a remedy to its advanced malady"

The only thing that differentiates a man from any other animal is his adherence to dharma.

"Aharanidrabhayamaithunam ca samanyametat pasubhirnaranam
Dharmo hi tesamadhiko visesah dharmena hina pasubhissamanah"

(Meaning: Human beings and animals have the same urges. They eat and sleep and copulate and besides, the feelings of fear are common to both. What, then, is the difference between the two? It is adherence to Dharma that distinguishes human beings from animals. Without Dharma to guide him man would be no better than an animal.)

6. The NRI myth.

A common myth about the NRIs is that they are culturally and religiously more pious than their Indian counterparts. While this may accurately describe a few, the general case is not so. The NRIs contribute to erosion of Indian knowledge and heritage in their own unique way. Most of them in their student phases do not even care for what their parents had to say, leave alone what Ancient India had to say. Let me take America for instance. They try to mimic what they consider 'fashionable'. This happens in various ways. Their language,behaviour and body language changes altogether in a few years. Many Brahmins start eating non-vegetarian foods, including beef, become at least half drunkards and consider it to be "modern", "fashionable" etc. This denouncement, which also exists among the Indian college students(discussed later in this essay) is a very etchy problem. Francois Gautier,a Paris-born political analyst who lived in India for 30 years, mocks India's elite intelligentsia's obsession with the west and all things western and asks them:

" O members of the Indian intelligentsia! You think that reading the latest New York times best seller, speaking polished english and putting down your own countrymen, especially anybody who has a hindu connection, makes you an intellectual. But in the process you have not only lost your roots, you have turned your back on a culture and civilisation that is thousands of years old and has given so much to the world. You are forgetting what a privilege it is to be born an Indian-and a hindu at that-inheritors of a spirituality that accepts that God manifests himself under different names, at different times, when today the world's two biggest monotheistic religions still think their god is the only true one and it is their duty to convert everybody by guile or force."

When they settle down and start having children, suddenly knowledge "dawns" upon them and they start behaving slightly better. I have personally spoken with ABCDs(i.e., children of the NRIs) and feel that they are not responsible for the terrible accents when they speak their mother tongues. How does anyone expect them to know deep facets of Indian culture?.(Infact I am not implying here that the Indians are not plagued by these problems, but am trying to analyse the NRI situation). Progressively, as generations go, they can declare proudly that they belong to "Indian" lineage but they have not even seen India . If they expect to learn about India and her culture from their text books, it is just the distortions that they will learn.(Eg, California textbook case where Hinduism was portrayed in a very negative manner due to the bias of the writers towards judeo-christian traditions.).

Most of the NRIs are not prepared to leave their big materialistic life styles to go back and take care of their ageing parents. I know of atleast three elderly women in my extended family who are loners just because their sons choose to visit them only once every two or three years. Sending back money is not the be all and end all of this issue.

I am able to observe the thinking and interests of the general NRI group since I am myself a temporary NRI until I return for good. While I am not targeting someone just for living outside India, what I am really targeting here is the myth that NRIs are somehow closer to their culture. My conviction has been strengthened after observing the people around me. The attitude and goals of most of the NRIs are no different than an average Indian. Only that they happen to live elsewhere. They are as materialistic(if not more) as Indians living in India and arrange a get together for festivals and parties. An additional feature of a NRI family is that the children usually after five years of age, are out of touch with their ancestral land, culture, language and their kinsmen.( Arguiung that culture is something that is in constant flux and hence cannot be defined etc just hints at escapism. While we know that time changes everything, we can definitely ensure that we do not go too far from what we have inherited from the previous generation. Inspite of knowing this, the present generation just seems to give excuses to carry on their easy life).

7.Political manoeuvring.

Caste and religious play is a common feature in Indian politics. More so in Tamilnadu, where the asuric forces(as of 2009) have taken over the government and interfere in many aspects of Sanathana dharma. They try to give wrong facts about the basic texts and also interfere in temple activities,which have an already well-established agama shastra and needs no one's attention. There is absolutely no need for reservation for minority religions because if they have talent then they can compete with others and establish their positions. All these factors turn some hindus against their own religion. They view their own dharma as inferior or sometimes convert to other religions for gaining entry into educational institutions etc.
Update: The New chief minister Jayalalitha was elected in 2011 and hopefully the situation should improve.

8 Self-declared 'Indologists' and their Indian pet-dogs.

Starting with Max Mueller and his "(mis)interpretations" of Rig Veda, this group of so-called scholars have done more damage to Indian and hindu literature and culture than everyone else put together. They worked hard with colonial and christian missionary work in their minds to degrade Indian culture and deem it as primitive and foreign. The Aryan Invasion theory for eg, has been decisively proven to be false. There was no invasion whatsoever and Our great rishis were the original inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent. for a thorough arguement, see:

http://www.archaeologyonline.net/artifacts/aryan-harappan-myth.html
http://folks.co.in/2009/09/harappan-civilization-is-vedic-civilization/

The damage they have done is so deep that it will take a long time to heal. Schools in India still teach this outdated and false invasion theory. The indologists also belittled the vedas and other scriptures and tried to instill a negative image into the Indian mind. Their straight descendents still exist for eg, Michael Witzel, a Harvard professor in indology. He holds on to his pet theories with no basis and was given the right treatment by Indian scholars when he could not answer their questions. Frits Staal, Wendy Doniger, Jeffrey Kripal are some more examples in this category. However there is the other lot of westernised and marxist historians like Romila Thapar, writer Meera Nanda who wag their tail to people like Witzel and denounce their own culture. The ineffeciency of these indologists to interpret any vedic scripture ia aptly discussed along with some myths about vedas here:

http://agniveer.com/vedas/myths_vedas/

The other important source of misinformation is popular sites like the wikipedia. While it is true that wikipedia might give reliable information on scientific facts, it is not so for religion or history. The group of "specialists" behind wikipedia is so rigid and hopeless that they do not welcome any suggesions or alternative readings of certain facts and theories in history and religion. They still give outdated information on for eg, Rig Veda but have no scope for improvement. So, my advise to whoever reads this post is "do not rely on wikipedia for sanathana dharma and indian history"

9. The pathetic Indian student.

The 'college culture' if there is anything like that in Indian colleges are as incorrigible as it can be. Students waste away their precious years on computer games that are of null value towards anything one can imagine(health,spiritual growth,material growth,knowledge etc.). In fact it is damaging to each of these. I am from BITS,Pilani. So I will put down what I have gleaned about this corrosive counter-culture from this place. "Oasis" is supposed to be a cultural festival of BITS. In my opinion, parts of it can be better termed as 'acultural festival' as it has no culture whatsoever in it. Some Students lose their inhibitions and freely give themselves away to drugs, sex and other vices. Others who are more sensible, restrain from these but are addicted to rock and third rate music. While taking a break in the form of a fest is perfectly fine, the song-mania almost never ceases and continues through all other times too. None of these reflect even an iota of concern for Indian culture, tradition or values. Drinking and smoking become a part and parcel of their lives for many.

The birth day celebration is another big joke. The birthday person is beaten up and he cannot even move his limbs the next day. Some groups take it to the level of breaking eggs on the person against his own desire. If one successfully puts up with all these uncouth behaviour, then he is acknowledged as "cool dude". Else he is banished from the group.!! Students often have booze parties and go to the level of puking,singing and dancing while drunk and brag later that they have had the best times in their lives(so called memories....huh!) little realizing how much time they have wasted . (It was surpising to me how much time and effort youngsters spend in uploading videos of their friends taken while they are blabbering after getting drunk).

This list of college behaviour is endless. Ragging and continuous watching of pornography are other instances for example. These self-declared free-thinking and modern youth are in fact more stubborn and biased regarding their ill-informed views that they are totally unfit to question traditional wisdom(because they do not even know what their scriptures say). In summary, students care least about other fellow human beings, their parents' feelings, Indian culture and their religion and contribute so effectively for degradation of our dharma.

10. the ubiquitous materialism in educational institutions.

The educational institutions are no less worse. They do not impart any proper moral education from a young age. While students are taught 'about' religion, they are never offered even electives on religious topics(schools as well as colleges). The management is after money and nothing else is important for the administrators. Students are encouraged to study just science for material benefits and other fields of creativity are ignored. Hence they share the role in the widespread guilottine of culture. The result of this as well as neglect on the part of the masses themselves to know their religion is best expressed by the following anecdote from the book Hindu Dharma.

The following is a part of translator's note:

"More than 20 years ago, I said in an article in The Illustrated Weekly of India that "Hindus know less about their religion than Christians and Muslims know about theirs". Wanting to verify the statement, my editor Sardar Khushwant Singh asked my colleagues (most of them were Hindus), in schoolmasterly fashion, to name any four Upanishads. For moments there was silence and it was a Muslim lady member of the staff who eventually responded to the editor's question by "reeling off" the names of six or seven Upanishads""

. 

Hwal' Bay Nyu Wa- A land to inspire our Spirit
(Home of the hualapai)

(painting of the canyon by Bruce aiken)

Grand canyon- one of the earth's most powerful inspiring landscapes-overwhelms our senses. Its story tells of geological processes played out over unimaginable time spans as a unique combination of size, colour and dazzling erosional forms: 446 km long, upto 29 km wide and 1.6 km deep. Its rugged landscape hosts a fascinating variety of plant and animal communities, from the desert next to the colorado river deep in the canyon to montane forests atop its north rim.

Humans have also played their part in the history of the canyon as evident from the archaeological discoveries.

The journey

I live in Tempe, Arizona presently. This belongs to the phoenix area, which is the capital of arizona state, known for its distinct Native indian population. We reached grand canyon through flagstaff, a town which is a 2 hour drive from here.

(USA-Arizona highlighted)
Grand canyon shown on google map (click to enlarge)

Our first trip was to the West rim of the canyon.

(The group)

This place is best known for its skywalk, a major attraction from couple of years back.

This is the best we could capture the skywalk(side view in the background) as we were not allowed cameras there. They had a system of capturing our picture while on the skywalk but charge us a humongous 30 dollars. So, we opted out of it. For a sake of feel of the skywalk I borrowed a couple of pictures from elsewhere in the web.

This is basically a glass bottomed, horse shoe shaped cantilever bridge which has been engineered using the state of art techniques. As you walk on it you can see through the bottom of the bridge to what is 4000 to 5000 feet of the depths of the canyon's wilderness. It is a scintillating experience. You are just a glass plate away from 4000 feet of free fall!

A nice video of the skywalk from national geographic

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/03/070328-skywalk-video.html

60 dollars is what puts off people who go to the west rim. On the other hand what i suggest is that it is worth the trip if you consider that you pay 20 dollars for the skywalk and 40 more to enter the area to see the grand views of the grand canyon. The eagle point is the same place as the skywalk but the eagle formation in the the rocks is a natural wonder.

If you observe closely the background in the above picture, you can see the dip in the rock formation and there it resembles the eagle's body and the sides resemble its wings spread out.

(An oblique view of the eagle)
(The edge of the canyon facing the eagle)

The other good view point in the west rim is the guano point. The colarado river cuts its way meandering all over the place.

The above view shows a small hill on the other side of which the canyon turns around from the left side to the right side. The grandness of the canyon is infinite to be captured by the tiny camera!

Near the earlier mentioned skywalk we also saw some model Native american huts. It was an interesting view.

These settlements belong to the hualapai tribe, which also privately owns the grand canyon. The hualapai along with a dozen other Indian tribes especially the yavapai and the havasupai descend from the ancient anasazi tribe who inhabited the ancient southwest america more than 4000 years. They speak the languages belonging to Yuman-Cochimí language family.

The europeans directed by the hopi(another famous tribe of arizona) first had a glimpse of the canyon in 1540. It was not until 1775 that fransiscan friar fransisco garces explored upto the colorado river on foot and horseback. 'colorado' meaning "rusty-red" in spanish is the name that caught on. After some minor explorations, a major undertaking was in 1869 by Major john wesley powell and his crew of eight. He encountered the wilderness of the canyon on its face and gives us a graphic description.

"The cyclopean forms which result from the sculpture of tempests through ages too long for man to compute, are wrought into endless details, to describe which would be a task equal in magnitude to that of describing the stars of the heavens or the multitudinous beauties of the forest..."

(.....A testimony of time)

South rim

Our next day trip was to the south rim which is generally a busier outpost compared to the west or the north rim. The first point there was the manther point.

This view is curious for a different reason. The peaks in the background here are named after Hindu and other ancient deities. For eg, there is the vishnu temple,shiva temple, buddha temple, Isis temple(ancient egyptian goddess). 'Temple' means a peak here.

Interestingly enough, the basement rocks of the canyon are called as vishnu basement rocks, which i premise to be a tribute to the almighty whose shariram(or the cosmic body) forms all of the manifested worlds.

Yaki point is another important view point in the south rim. We felt that here a more wider view(about 180 degree) is available.

(A view from yaki point)

Now on to some geographical information..........

The canyon is the old world marvel consisting of several layers of rock formation.

Five broad stages can be recognised in the ultimate formation that we witness at the moment. They are as follows:

Stage 1: Vishnu basement rocks

Tectonic plates move slowly across the earth's surface. Almost 2 billion years ago a plate carrying island arcs and the plate that became North America collided. Heat and pressure from this process changed those existing rock layers into dark metamorphic rock, the basement of the canyon. Molten rock then squeezed into cracks and hardened as light bands of granite.

Stage 2: Grand canyon supergroup

The red shale, fossil-algae bearing limestone and dark lava of the grand canyon supergroup are revealed only in a few areas. The many strata of the supergroup accumulated in basins formed a s the landmass pulled apart. The expansion caused blocks to rotate, tilting the supergroup layers.

Stage 3:Paleozoic Sedimentary rocks

Nearly horizontal layers of sedimentary rocks comprise the upper two-thirds of the canyon walls. These rocks formed near sea level and at the edge of a continent. The remains of marine life accumulated on the ocean floor to form limestone. Rivers deposited sediments in swamps and deltas that then became mudstones. Dunes solidified into sandstone.

Stage 4:The colorado plateau rises

About 70 million years ago the rocky mountains began to form, pushed up as the North American plate overrode the pacific plate. In the process a large section of what is now Utah, northern arizona, western colorado and a corner of new mexico rose from sea level to elevations of thousands of feet, forming the colorado plateau. This uplift occured with remarkably little tilting or deformation of the sedimentary layers. The stage was set for the carving of the canyon.

Stage 5:Canyon carving

By five or six million years ago, the colorado river flowed across the colorado plateau on its way from the rocky mountains to the gulf of california. Each rain washed sparsely vegetated desert soils into the river. A steep gradient and heavy sediment loads created a powerful tool for erosion. The river's volume varied seasonally and over time. As the las tice age ended 12000 years ago, the volume may have been 10 times today's volume.

As the river cuts down, the canyon deepens. Tributaries erode into the canyon's sides, increasing its width. Erosion carves faster into the softer rock layers, undermining harder layers above. With no foundation these layers collapse, forming the cliffs and slopes profile of the canyon. Erosion wears away the ridges separating adjacent side canyons, leaving buttes and pinnacles.

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(Another elegant mark of the river)

Yavapai observatory point is a point that was chosen by geological and other experts to be one of the points where we can have the grandest view of this nature's wonder. Therefore the point has an observatory. The formation process of the canyon is explained there with various models similar to musuems. There is also a book shop available at the place.

(Yavapai observation station)

Exciting things to do at south rim

Helicopter ride, rafting and various trails are the different things you can engage yourself in, at this place. The helicopter ride seems costly at 150 dollars per person for just 25 to 30 minutes of the ride. We had a glimpse of how rafting would be at the yavapai observation station. Since we went as a group which had a small child, we could not attempt rafting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8wXSmzIAKg

This is an informative video on the first explorers and white water rafting.

There is an Imax theatre which hosts a short movie of about half an hour on the grand canyon. It was an amazing one which took us to the depths of the canyon upto the colorado river as well as gave us the bird's eye view too(the person who had flown in between the canyon walls to take a video of it did a brave and excellent job). We also learnt a bit about the people who had inhabited it and the explorers who discovered it.

Flora and fauna in the canyon

For this grand and colossal a place,the canyon teems with wildlife but it is difficult for a visitor to see most of it. I purchased a coffee table book about the canyon and it had some nice national geographic quality pictures of wildlife of the area.

Some of the fauna......

(Click to zoom in)

Some flora...

The colorado river has done the consistent work of carving the canyon. So it occupies the pivotal position in its history. Some paintings depicting the colorado river...

Grand canyon also has its share in the legends and imaginative accounts of people. What came to my mind immediately is the "Road runner show" which i used to watch in the cartoon network more than 10 years back. The coyote makes repeated tries to catch the road runner but in vain. I thought a snapshot from the cartoon was a nice way of representing it here.

(The coyote hatching another one of its 'would be failure' plots to catch the road runner)
(The coyote has a 90 degree fall into the canyon depths as a result of backfiring of its plans)

The Havasupai Indians have their creation story in relation to the grand canyon.

Before there were any people on earth there were two gods. Tochapa of goodness and Hokomata of evil. Tochapa had a daughter named Pu-keh-eh, whom he hoped would become the mother of all living. Hokomata the evil was determined that no such thing should take place, and he covered the world with a great flood. Tochopa the good felled a great tree and hollowed out the trunk. He placed Pu-keh-eh in the hollowed trunk and when the water rose and flooded the earth she was secure in her improvised boat.

Finally the flood waters fell and mountain peaks emerged. Rivers were created; and one of them cut the great gushing fissure which became the Grand Canyon.

Pu-keh-eh in her log came to rest on the new earth. She stepped forth and beheld an empty world.

When the land became dry, a great golden sun rose in the east and warmed the earth and caused her to conceive. In time, she gave birth to a male child. Later a waterfall caused her to conceive and she gave birth to a girl. From the union of these two mortal children came all the people on the earth. The first were the Havasupai, and the voice of Tochopa spoke to them and told them to live forever in peace in their canyon of good earth and pure water where there would always be plenty for all!’.

We can see that the great floods is nothing but the pralayam from which Lord sriman narayana rescued the vedas and sapta-rishis by taking the matsya avataram. We find that the same story trickles through to the stories of various cultures including the much later written Noahs story.

Some other myths revolving around the place are its possible link with the not-yet-proven atlantis civilization or with the Egyptian civilization.

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"The canyon is its own answer. It fills the soul of all responsive persons with awe. It allures, attracts and holds those who have gazed into its mysterious depths."

--- George wharton James, 1910

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