Seeking my spiritual roots...

In my quest for my spiritual roots, I have been digging into what is understood to be ancient wisdom. But is all ancient wisdom correct or appropriate? Is something new to be rejected if it runs contrary established viewpoints? And in a quaintly ironic way, what if we were to look to this ancient wisdom, and see what it has to say about the validity of well, ancient wisdom?   Let us turn to a person we celebrate as arguably India’s greatest ever poet & dramatist. We hold him up as an example of how great our ancients were and bemoan how there has been a steady degradation in quality across all fields, particluarly literature.  We turn to mahAkavi Kalidasa. What does Kalidasa himself say about this blind celebration of all things old and disparaging of anything new? But before we go there, what does the word kavi mean, since we call Kalidasa a mahAkavi , or a great kavi ? Of course, the most common meaning of the word kavi is poet. Someone of boundless imagination, who c...

We come back to the last part of this beautiful and deeply meaningful verse from the taittiriya upaniSad . In fact, I started my journey of exploring the verse with this last part, and now when I come back to it complete the cycle it feels like I’m seeing it from a different perspective. The meaning of this part of the verse, as commonly stated, is “may there be no enmity between” us, encouraging the teacher and student to be of one mind. This entreaty to be of one mind is stated in an even older text. In the final set of verses in the rg vEda , we see a verse that talks about very similar sentiments. The first line of rg vEda X:191-2 says: संगच्छध्वं   संवदध्वं  ( samgaCChadhvam samvadadhvam ) सं   वो   मनांसि   जानताम्  ( sam vO manAmsi jAnatAm ) “May we move (progress) together May we be of one voice May we be of one mind” At first blush, it looks like it espouses no difference of opinion. I believe it is not so. When we look at the second part of the s...

The value of knowledge (here specifically “ adhItam ” - that which is learnt) has been elaborated upon in several places, and is intuitively also something that rings true. My school (Birla Vidya Niketan in New Delhi) had the following motto, taken from verse 11 of the ISa upaniSad विद्ययाऽमृतमश्नुते  -  vidyayA amrutam aSnutE  (“They gain immortality through knowledge”) What is immortality here? It certainly does not mean freedom from death in the physical sense. For the person who has acquired true knowledge of the self,    it implies freedom from the cycle of births.  But what about the impact of one’s knowledge on others? The knowledgeable ones’ name, earned through the impact they make on others, remains long after their physical death - that is their immortality.  The respect and name a scholar earns is unique. Saint Tiruvalluvar has again captured this beautifully is one of his kuraLs (adhikAram 7, kuraL 69) ஈன்ற   பொழுதின்   பெரிதுவக்...

In this the third part of the verse commencing saha nA vavatu , we see the focus shift from asking for something for the self (protection, material objects) to asking for enablement to do something with the knowledge gained. This verse is translated in many places as “may we do our studies with vigour or energy”. I humbly believe this can mean more than just asking for enthusiasm / vigour / energy for our studies, and to go deeper in to the meaning and import of the same. What is the purpose of education, or seeking? For most of us for most part, it is a means to a livelihood. At some point, maybe it goads us as we strive to understand ourselves and our place in this cosmos. Even for evolved and detached souls like Adi Sankara, or Ramanujacharya, or in more modern times Swami Vivekananda or Swami Chinmayananda, the fruition of knowledge is in its application and in transferring it further to other people; in short, in making the world a better place. Study or knowledge is not an end in...

In the first part of this verse, there is a prayer for protection. Once this basic need for survival is assured, we move on to asking for things which we want - maybe material objects, maybe name and fame - for a better life; we have moved on from mere existing to living life. A common opinion seems to be that worldy objects or material gains are to be shunned, if one wants to progress spriritually. I believe there is a fine nuance here, between desire for worldly objects or objectives ( अर्थ  - artha ) as a means to an end, as against a desire for material objects as an end in themselves. That to me makes all the    difference in how we approach this philosphy. In the Bhagavad Gita (BG 7.16), the Lord talks about four types of devotees who pray to him(“ caturvidhA bhajantE mAm janAh ”  - the first type being people in distress (“ ArtA ”) and the second being those desirous of material objectives (“ arthArthI ”). The first part of the verse (“ saha nAvavatu ”) addres...