Perhaps the entire thing with the Gods and Godless and the 101 years was just to establish the fact that something is difficult to learn. Then perhaps, this fact stated so clearly will not be taken so lightly. Or, perhaps that was the reasoning behind it.
According to Menen, the people who wrote the Upanishads basically did not believe in God and communicated their knowledge through folklore.
Why does this happen in mathematics? There is infinity between two fixed points.
Consider, 1.01, 1.001, 1.001, 1.0001… All these numbers still come between 1 and 2. However can you say that there will only be these many numbers between 1 and 2?
Since I am only beginning, my interpretation of things is supposed to be bad. Anyway, I needed a point to begin. Aubrey Menen, gave me that point and so I have begun. The whole thing is under a title “Gods and the Godless”
Prajapati is an interesting teacher that the Gods and the Godless ( basically referring to devas and asuras) approach to understand the self. That is why we go into things like spirituality and stuff and so I think that is why Menen wanted us to start here!
Prajapati puts these two leaders of the Gods and the Godless to work. At the end of their services, he provides them with the knowledge that _they_ desire. It’s almost like what you might observe in modern PhD programmes. Advisors extract the maximum work of their candidates and then finally give them their PhD. A wicked comparison, for Prajapati was a wise man but something that came to the mind while reading these lines.
Prajapati never gives straight forward answers and answers only those questions that the student puts to him. Nothing more. Nothing less.
The leaders of the Gods and the Godless – Indira and Virochana – ask him what is the self. Prajapati asks them to look in their eyes and what they see is the self. Ditto for looking at water and mirrors. Virochana is quite happy with this ‘wisdom’ and propogates it among the Godless. This according to the Upanishads is why the Godless are more interested in bodily sin et. all. This I think is a bit of exageration on the part of the interpreter. This is the basis, perhaps of condemning sex as an act of the weak.
Anyway, Virochana is happy and so the Godless are now cursed to living their lives in good bodies with bad minds (aka sex et. all)
However, Indira is doubtful. He returns to Prajapati with a good doubt. If the body is the self, then shouldn’t the self change according to the strength in the body. This is not so. Whys that? Prajapati asked Indira to work under him some more time. In this way Indira works under Prajapati for about 101 years which leads to a common saying in India of why the self is valuable. Even Indira took 101 years to master it!
The final cut-short story is this wonderful quote from Prajapati:
“Like the wind, like clouds, like thunder
and lightning, which rise from space without physical shape and reach the transcendent
light in their own form, those who rise above body-consciousness ascend to the transcendent
lightin their real form, the Self.”
The self is not such an easy thing to understand and yet it’s been so beautifully expressed. Reading those lines and imaging how clouds are formed or how thunder falls from the sky – from the formless to that of form, seem to attain the true form of the Self.
I have been thinking for quite some time on what I have just written. I am tired for today. Maybe tomorrow. When I clear out the message and read this part again. And then on with the rest of the Upanishads.
It is normally at the time of exams that one seeks God in order to try and increase the grade in a subject that you have not learnt all semester. I have been doing that for the past 17 years. Last year after my incompetency was proved in examination, I decided to take a different approach.
I decided to take to atheism and it has not disappointed me so far. Why? In theism, you expect God to rescue you. Therefore the effort that you put in is generally reduced. When depending on no one but oneself then you reach a point where you are giving in your maximum.
I have however, given every point of view a chance but none have attracted me so far. During this exam I plan to cut down on a lot of activities that I do – some of which you are witness to through this weblog. This gives me one quantity – time.
So, far about 1 hour everyday I shall read and summarise here a section of the Upanishads. I seek to follow the words of one, Aubrey Menen in my pursuit. Some of his books have been banned – which is generally, in relation to religion – a good place to start. I shall then apply my own knife and see how it cuts.
Menen’s advice with regards to the Upanishad is quite straight forward –
“The Western reader has a wide variety of translations to choose from in several languages. The translators are often very gifted, but when they come to the word atman most of them fall flat on their faces. They call it “the soul”, which it is not. The reader should be more wary. He is much in the position of Adam when he named the animals in the Garden of Eden. To call a tiger a ‘tiger’ Adam had first to see the beast. So is is with the atman. You cannot really know what it is until you have found it, and that can only be done by going off alone and looking for it. Once you have found it, you really do not care what it is called, because it is so much your own private business.
However, a distinguished Indian and scholar S. Radhakrishnan, faced up to the problem. He dismissed out of hand the word ’soul’. Instead he chose the word ’self’. It was the best that could be done, and that is why the Western reader, whatever the translation he is reading, should keep Radhakrishnan’s the Principal Upanishads beside him for checking. Parts of Radhakrishnan’s English translation are eminently readable, parts not. The Western reader should begin with the seventh section of the eigth chapter of the Chandyoga Upanishad.
Then he should shut himself alone in some quite place and think.”
I shall take Menen’s advice of being wary. I shall not do what he suggests – shutting myself in a room and thinking. I like to walk in the crowds, observe and think. I shall follow his advice on where to start reading the Upanishads. I have with me Eknath Easwaran’s The Upanishads. I shall only read the translations and create the meaning for myself by taking into consideration everything I have learnt till now.
These notes will become part of my notebook. I shall post them on the blog whenever I can!!
It has been an unusually long and eventful weekend. And I have a lot to say. I cannot say all here and so some of them are on my space weblog.
The exam dates are out. This means lower net presence over the next 3 weeks. I am looking forward to this small hiatus. After that, I believe I will be going to my native place. Tickets are booked.
At the same time, the plan for studying is ready. Everything is set for the exam mode. I also plan to have a small school reunion next week that may be pull-pushed.
This is the man you read about if you are into the field of black holes. He’s the man who found out the Chandrashekhar limit, beyond which the star’s mass causes it to collapse into a black hole.
I found a really interesting snippet on Chandrashekhar‘s life at a place where I wouldn’t think of. Dilip D’Souza has a write-up on Chanrashekhar’s life. His work with Sir Eddington, his quarrels with him over the black hole, why he thought scientists were not productive beyond their 30s.
But, the best part (and, I liked this especially because I finished reading Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintainence) was this wonderful quote:
“Nature has shown over and over again that the kinds of truth which underlie nature transcend the most powerful minds.”
And so, I enter another adventure. I have decided to help Kirk with the SEDS IHY/IPY blog humourously (according to me) called Frozen Sun. I have just sent out a mail to the SEDS-Earth and SG Talk list with respect to this. So, thought I should post a snippet of it here too:
hi all,
We have started a blog called Frozen Sun to celebrate the International
Heliophysical and Polar Years. You can find the blog here -
http://blogs.seds.org/frozensun/
We'd like people working in fields related to these fields to share
they're work with students like me so that we know more about what you do.
We don't want exact technical details of your project. We'd like to know
how you spend your time there, how's the pay and maybe a sketch of what
you're doing there technically. You're free to write in proportions of
what you do in the way you like.
You can do this using plain old text, images or even videos.
Oh! and just so that you know what you're getting into, you won't be let
off the hook after you post. Students will read your post, ask you
questions and we would be greatful if you could answer them.
expecting a good response,
Pradeep
Help in anyway is appreciated.
A seemingly recurring theme. There is an obscure link to this in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. There is a direct reference to it in Issac Asimov’s “I, Robot”. There is also an anime flick called Ghost in the Shell, but I don’t know if it relates to this concept.
Over the past six-months I have been reading articles of creating new architectures of the Internet to make it better, safer and more accessible to people around the world. These seemed to have been running around at the back of my head. Reading the second part of Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintainence sort of brought it back into the realms of thinking.
So, I ask this question, if a network as vast as the Internet can be changed, why not Science. Heck, why not Philosophy?
And, in the next second that sounds odd if you don’t follow it through a series of thought-process. Think: What’s the problem with science? and end at “If its not right..why not change it?”
I posted a snippet on Unniyarcha yesterday. That’s because Asianet ( the first malayalam private cable channel – am i right? ) is beaming a programme related to her. She’s been made famous before in a movie staring Mammooty called Oru Vadakan Veeragatha (A Northern Story of Bravery) but there the focus was lateral not direct.
Mammooty plays the role of Chandu who is blamed for the death of Unniyarcha’s husband. The plot runs deeper because Unniyarcha was destined to be married to Chandu but was married to the man who Chandu allegedly killed.
Unniyarcha prepares her children to kill Chandu. He beats them in a straight fight. However they refuse to give up until they or Chandu die. At this point, Chandu commits suicide with the last words that Unniyarcha’s children should never loose. The story is actually more romantic action.
All of this is supposedly the next set of tales after the story of Unniyarcha herself.
If I got the story wrong, feel free to correct it! If you have an online snippet of the story feel free to post it!
Parallel Spirals 