HISTORICAL RETROSPECT
Hindu Sanskrti or Hindu Spiritual System, has evolved as a part of the
Sanskrit culture of ancient India. Having evolved from its beginnings in the
Vedic civilization, it has evolved through centuries of the history of India India are the
descendents of the proto-Aryan people who lived in India
“Breath of
life, your form is dearer to me than any physical form. I yearn for your
healing touch, knowing that when you touch me, I am whole.” Atharva Veda, 11:4-
7.
Sanatana literally means eternal, that
which has no beginning or end. That which is timeless cannot have a beginning
or end. Therefore, by definition, it is beyond the constraints of time, and
that is why it is said to be the oldest living religion in the world. The Hindu religion is a process in time,
which is not divided between what is believed to be divine and what is believed
pagan. Hindu religious culture does not have pagan past. It has continuity,
which is its most characteristic feature. The spiritual quest for the
realization of Parmatman is original
to the Hindu spiritual system, which underlines the essential unity between the
universal and the essential. The aim of the Hindu religion is Self-realization
(Atma-jnana) by each individual (jiva): to seek the Truth, to know the
Truth, to be the Truth, to be a liberated soul (jivanamukta) here and now .Over the ages there have been several Acharyas and Rishis who have expounded on the timeless Truth in their own way. “Truth is one; many are its names.”-
Rigveda
David Frawley considers that
breaking away between the West and the East is totally artificial and was
created by Europe to prove its material and
intellectual superiority.“Everything that then came from the East,” he
writes,“took an inferior, or pagan value.” And yet, the European scientific
spirit found its roots in Greece India
Civilization is a social
phenomenon. The Sanskrit civilization constitutes the great heritage of our
country. It flourished in different regions, mainly on the banks of the rivers,
by socio-religious and cultural bonds till today. It was on the banks of the
lost sacred river Saraswati, that the Vedic Rishis
perceived the hymns of the Vedas, in Sanskrit. Almost all ancient scriptures of
Vedic India were written in Sanskrit only. These written records are the kernel
of Hindu sacred literature.Vedic culture spread over the banks of Indus and other rivers and became integral part of Aryan
culture. In mythology the prominence of Saraswati has taken over by Ganga . The waters of sacred Ganga ,
has purified Indian life in all ages by washing out the dirt of time.
Rishi is a word of multi-dimensional shades. Besides a sage and
seer this word means Jaratri (singer),
Karu (artist in words), Vipra (Inspired one), Dhira (one in whom the intellect has
been aroused), Manishi (Intellectual,
Powerful) and Veda, the wise one. There are three categories of Rishis. First category, which saw the
Veda or Dharma in their hearts with
the help of Pratibha (Intuition), are Paramarsi or Maharishi, the others who got it through Upadesa (Communication) were second, Srutarsi and the third that practiced and wrote it for the others,
are Rishis. George Clifford White Worth writes; “Rishi (Sanskrit) a holy sage, one who
has heard the eternal voice, or seen the eternal words of revelation and
through whom Divine knowledge has been transmitted to the Brahmins.”
Swami Vivekananda said about
Hinduism at the ‘World Parliament of Religion’ during Septmember1893 at Chicago
Sri
Aurobindo writes in ‘Foundations of Indian Culture’ (p.255); “The ancient and
classical literature of the Sanskrit tongue shows both in quality and in body
an abundance of excellence, in their potent originality and force and beauty,
in their substance and art and structure, in grandeur and justice and charm of
speech, and in the heightened width of the reach of their spirit which stands
very evidently in the front rank among the world’s greatest literatures.”
T.S.Eliot has defined culture as the
“way of life of a particular people living together in one place: that which
makes life worth living; that which makes a society---It includes Arts,
Manners, Religion and ideas.”
Professor Childe writes; “I stood on
a mound of Mohenjodaro in the Indus valley in
the North-West of India, and all around me lay the houses and streets of this
ancient city that is said to have existed over five thousand years ago; and
even then it was an old and well developed civilization---The Indus
Civilization.”
Swami Sankarananda, the author of
‘Rig Vedic Culture of the Pre-Historic Indus’ writes; “Those people went with
the script and culture as well as the language from the Indus Valley Greece
and Rome
(Vol.1 Chap1, P50).
Long before the Egyptian or Sumerian
cultures, there flourished Indus Valley Civilization in India Harappa was post Vaidika or Sanatana Dharma. In early sixties, Dr.
Waddel wrote a book on the culture discovered at Mohenjodaro and Harappa, “that these cities
were post Vedic date and that the seal and other objects of interest were
completely Aryan in character and that the language impressed on the seals was
Sanskrit” Aryatarangini, P13.
Australian historian, Auther
Basham notes; “The ancient civilization of India
differs from Egypt ,
Mesopotania and Greece
Artabhatta in 5th
century stated that the earth revolves around the sun. In his treatise Aryabhatteam, he clearly states that
earth is round; it rotates on its axis, orbits the sun and is suspended in
space. And explains that lunar and solar eclipses occur by the interplay of the
sun, the moon and the earth. In his Surya
Sidhanta, the ancient Indian astronomer Bhaskar Acharya notes; “Objects
fall on earth due to a force of attraction by the earth. Therefore, the earth,
planets, constellations, moon and sun are held in orbit due to this
attraction.” Newton
“What is that
by being known, everything is known?” -Mundaka Upanishad
Seal of Pashupati Seal from Mohenjodaro
Yoga the
spiritual aspect in Sanatana Dharma
is a way to Godhood. It is discipline of mind and body ultimately leading to
self-realization. Yoga was practiced during ancient times. It is evident from
the terracotta figurines from Mohenjodaro depicting Yogic Asans. The famous Pasupati seal is pictorial representation of the
Atharva Vedic hymn (II.34). The presiding deity of the hymn being Pasupati, the
lord of beasts, who is described in the hymn as the lord of both biped and
quadrupeds and is united with his creation through mind and vision. This union
is possible only through the Yogic trance. The deity on the seal Pasupati is
seen to be sitting in a Yogic posture. It is evident that people living during
those times were not only familiar but were practicing Yoga as spiritual
discipline. Other Indus
Valley Indus Valley
culture, argues that other artifacts and fire sites of the Indus Valley
Some
practices of Hinduism must have originated in Neolithic times (4000 B.C). The
worship of certain plants and animals as sacred, for instance, could very
likely have very great antiquity. The worship of Goddesses, too, a part of
Hinduism today, may be a feature that originated in the Neolithic. At Boghaz Koy , Turkey
(1350 BC), stone inscription of the
treaty with Mitanni
Recently, Indus
seals have been reportedly deciphered by Dr. Rajaram and Dr. Jha and according
to them; “the Harappan civilization, of which the seals are product, belong to
later part of the Vedic Age. It had close connections with Vedantic works like Sutras and the Upanishads. The style of
writing reflects the short aphorisms found in Sutra works. The imagery and symbolism are strongly Vedic. The
vocabulary depends heavily on the Vedic glossary Nighantu and its commentary by
Yaska known as the Nirukta.The name
of Yaska is found on at least two
seals, possibly three. There are references to Vedic kings and Sages as well as
place names. Of particular interest are
references to Plakshagra, the birth place of Saraswati River
Dr. Subash Kak
adds; “There is evidence of temple structures in the Harappan period in
addition to iconography that recalls the goddess. Structures dating to 2000 BC,
built in the design of Yantras, have
been unearthed in northern Afghanistan. There is ample evidence for continuity
in the religious and artistic tradition of India Mohenjo-Daro
According to the
Sthapatya Veda (the Indian tradition of architecture), the temple and the town
should mirror the cosmos. The temple architecture and the city plan are, therefore,
related in their conception. In the basic Vedic
scheme the circle represents the earth and the square represents the heavens or
the deity. Volwahsen (2001) has remarked on the continuity in the Indian
architectural tradition. “The Harappan cities have a grid plan, just as is
recommended in the Vedic manuals. The square shape represents the heavens, with
the four directions representing the cardinal directions as well as the two
solstices and the equinoxes of the sun’s orbit.”
Diana Eck puts it in her ground breaking study
of Hindu iconography, Darsan: Seeing the Divine Image in India;“ Long
before people wrote textual treatises, they wrote in images…One must learn to
read these visual texts with the same insight and interpretive skill that is
brought to the reading and interpretation of scriptures, commentaries, and
theologies.” (Eck, 1998: 12-13)
B.B.Lal was the first in the
Indian sub-continent to view the archaeological data against the background of
Puranic and Epics literature and opinioned that a large number of sites
associated with the Mahabharata contain the same ceramic industry, i.e., the
Painted Grey Ware in their lower level (Lal, 1954-55, AI, 10-11). The
excavation at Hastinapura, named after King Hastin of the Puranic dynasty
confirmed the stratigraphy of the Painted Grey Ware in the upper Ganga basin.
He proposed a time bracket of 1100-800B.C. for PGW and associated these
settlers with the early stock of Aryan in India. The Archaeological Survey of
India further excavated Ram Janmabhumi in 2002-2003. To mention in the words of
excavators, “the site (Trench AYD-1—G7) has also proved to be significant for
taking back its antiquarian remains for the first time to 1300BCE.”
North India which were worshiped from
earliest times till today, other earliest instances of Indian temples of which
are the rock-cut and cave temples of Southern and Western India, dating to the 3rd and the 2nd centuries B.C.
which provide some of the first known images of Hindu iconography.
“Shaivism and Shaktism are thought by some scholars to have roots reaching
back to the Indus valley civilization,
although others consider the evidence inconclusive, based as it is on
iconographic similarities rather than textual evidence.” (Flood 2003:
91, 204)
The Indus-Saraswati valley civilization spread over more than 250,000
square miles, and included over 1600 sites. Most of the villages and cities
were laid out on an exact north-south grid on sites west of the river, and were
built with kiln-fired bricks of uniform size. Sites have been found dating from
6500-7000BC.” writes, Kenneth Chandler in ‘Origins of Vedic Civilization.’
Mother
Goddesses from Mohenjodero
Rig Vedic Hindus,
living in the space-time continuum of the Saraswati-Harappan-Sind
Valley cultures, of which Kashmir,
Ghandara in the north-west, the whole expanse of central India in the south and the Hill country of India
Dr.M.K.Teng notes; “that the Rig
Vedic people were perhaps, the first of people among various civilizations, who
were able to
conceptualize force as Parmatman---which
are same but act differently.”
The iconic
manifestation of the divine reality in the Hindu religion or more specifically
the Sanskrit religious culture has a content, which is drawn from the
geographical boundaries of the Hindu India and represents the intellectual
expression of its generations. The Hindu temples and the practice of worship in
them must be differentiated from what idol worship is considered to be as a
Semitic tradition of pagan origin. Idol worship is a concept of the Semitic
civilization and the social prohibition it has been subject to in the later
evolution of the Semitic civilization must be differentiated from temple
worship in the Hindu religious culture. The two civilizations represent two
different world views, two different streams of consciousness, two different
theories of action, and two different views of the real, the apparent and the
relative and two different perspectives of space and time as well as two
different universes of human experience.
For at least two reasons the Hindu tradition
contains the greatest diversity of any world tradition. First, Hinduism spans
the longest stretch of time of the major world religions, with even the more
conservative views setting it as well over 7,000 years old. Throughout this
expanse of time, the Hindu tradition has been extremely conservative about
abandoning elements that have been historically superseded. Instead, these elements
have often been preserved and given new importance, resulting in historical
layers of considerable diversity within the tradition. Second, Hinduism has
organically absorbed hundreds of separate cultural traditions, expressed in as
many as 300 languages.
Archaeological
evidence is more reliable and authentic than literary evidence. It has been
rightly acknowledged by antiquarians like Marshall, Mackay, Piggot and Wheeler
that some of the basic elements of the historic religious beliefs and practices
of India go back to the Harappan culture or Indus civilization of the third
millennium BCE. A steatite seal from Mohenjodaro, discovered by E. Mackay, and
described by John Marshall as the prototype of historic Śhiva, “Trimurti,” and
“Paśupati,” deserves special mention. Long before the ideas of Śhiva, Mahādeva,
Trimurti and Paśupati had come into existence in historic Hinduism, Another
figure on a seal is supposed to be that of a priest. This human figure shows
only the upper half of the body, the eyes are almost closed, seemingly in
meditation; he wears a beard and long hair; the cloth on his body keeping the
right arm uncovered. There is then a stone figure of a man clearly seated in meditation,
dating from the second millennium BCE. The figure of another ascetic found on a
steatite seal from Mohenjodaro, depicting a man seated in a cross-legged yogic
posture. He is flanked by two human worshippers with raised and folded hands apparently
in adoration: behind each of these worshippers is a snake (nāga) in
half-rearing posture. This clearly shows that origin of worship in Hinduism is
Vedic. In fact, Hinduism rarely declined; it went on growing with the growth of
centuries, and it retained its original Aryan character in some form or another
even when it had been refined and transformed by non-Brāhmanical doctrines and
practices.
B.B.Lal
was the first in the Indian sub-continent to view the archaeological data
against the background of Puranic and Epics literature and opinioned that a
large number of sites associated with the Mahabharata contain the same ceramic
industry, i.e., the Painted Grey Ware in their lower level (Lal, 1954-55, AI,
10-11). The excavation at Hastinapura, named after King Hastin of the Puranic
dynasty confirmed the stratigraphy of the Painted Grey Ware in the upper Ganga
basin. He proposed a time bracket of 1100-800B.C. for PGW and associated these
settlers with the early stock of Aryan in India. The Archaeological Survey of
India further excavated Ram Janmabhumi in 2002-2003. To mention in the words of
excavators, “the site (Trench AYD-1—G7) has also proved to be significant for
taking back its antiquarian remains for the first time to 1300BCE.”
Dikshit, Mani, Pl.7;
structures of Dikshit, Mani,
Pl.8; comparision of Mother
period I, Bhirrana (after
L.S.Rao) Goddess from Bhirrana and Mehrgarh
In their findings K.N.Dikshit and B.R.Mani report; [‘PURATATTVA’ journal
of the Indian Archaeology Society, New Delhi(Number 42—2012)] “For the first
time, on the basis of radio-metric dates from Bhirrana(district Fatehbad,
Haryana), the cultural remains of Pre-Early Harappa horizon go back to the time
bracket of 7380 BCE to 6201 BCE representing the Hakra Ware Culture (plate
7)….It has been found that the clay ‘Mother Goddess’ figurines from the levels
dating back to 6000 BCE from both Mehergarh and Bhirrana have marked similarity
(plate 8)….When the site of Mehrgarh was excavated by a joint team of Pak and
French archaeologists in Baluchistan from 1974 to 1985 and the C14 dates of 8th—7th
millennium BCE were found, the archaeologists were taken aback as civilization
of the sub-continent was pushed almost 3000 years back than what was considered
then.”
The beginning of India’s history
has been pushed back by more than 2000 years, making it oldest history, older
than Egypt and Mesopotamia The finding was announced at the International Conference
on Harappa Archaeology, organized by the ASI (Archaeological Survey of India)
at Chandigarh in November 2012. Hindustan Times dated 4rth Nov.2012, reports; Based
on their research, B.R Mani, ASI Joint Director General and K.N Dikshit, former ASI Joint Director
General “The preliminary results of the data from early sites of the Indo-Pak
subcontinent suggest that Indian civilization emerged in the 8th
millennium BC in Ghaggar-Hakra and Baluichistan area.” “On the basis of
radio-metric dates from Bhirrana (Haryana), the cultural remains of the
pre-early Harappa horizon go back to 7380 BC TO 6201 BC”. In other words
archaeological
evidence has proved beyond doubt that Indian
Civilization, the Sanskrit Civilization, has grown during Vedic period. 
