Raaabo said:
If you, yourself say "the best" is "subjective" then who are you to say that what you believe is the "best". Or even more importantly, what others believe is evil. I don't agree with any religion the way it is being preached now, but I only say that. "I" don't believe in it. If someone asks me why, I tell them why, but there is a way to do so. I believe that the vedas were collective knowledge, and are good in many ways, and irrelevant in some ways too, given the world we live in.
Firstly, I don't "believe" for believing is done by unscientific minds. There is a difference between "knowing" and "believing". Sun rises from the east is knowing. Its not a belief. Knowing your own body and its ability after a devoted listening can tell whether you can lift heavier weight today or not. Its not a belief. Similarly, there is a science of consciousness where "knowing" comes into the picture.
Secondly, I don't claim science of consciousness to be the "best", but totally scientific and "higher" than modern science. The context here of "higher" is not to demean the modern science but simply to present that which is beyond materialism, there is an experience which enables the material world to exist, an experience beyond the limitations of the mind and the senses. Just like senses are "higher" than material world and mind higher than the senses, for it is the senses which percieve the material world and mind which control the senses.
Quote one sentence of mine, where I stated it to be the best. Try to read my posts carefully without connecting it to a totally different context. For some Paneer is best, for another Rajma is best. I can create a new fashion out of my limited wardrobe. The context is different!
Raaabo said:
I disagree, yes we Atheists may hate the killing and rubbish that people do in the name of religion, but I for one am attached to other people, and not money, I don't drink, and yes I question science, all the time, and it's the only "belief" I have come across that actually encourages questioning and improvement with Nobel prizes and the like. Perhaps in the Vedas they got everything right in the first time and explained the whole universe in one shot, or perhaps they didn't. I question even that. Is Yoga good? Of course, and I don't know about around India, but for example a church near my home has Yoga classes, taught by a priest, explaining the names in Sankrit, and what the poses mean, and how they help, and then also using the modern names of the muscles and organs, etc. to make it easier to understand for everyone. I have nothing against the "sciences" of ancient times, I think they should be followed and then evaluated - even medical studies done. I am against blindly following rituals, and nothing more.
Also, I cannot speak for all atheists, since the very definition is basically non-believer, and who knows what people believe or don't believe in, but I certainly do not subscribe to the idea of an all powerful god, or millions of them. I do not think it prudent to find the spiritual in everything. I will respect a rock, because it might hurt my toe, or be used to bash my head in, but I also think sitting about wondering if a rock has consciousness or a soul is a waste of my time, and perhaps over romanticising everything. though I have nothing against people wanting to sit around for the rest of their lives doing so. If they're not a problem to the world, why restrict that, so be it.
Then technically you are not an atheist. It seems to me that you do not understand the basic meaning of consciousness.
Let me brief for you since you took the time to discuss. The entire universe is pervading with consciousness. Imagine an infinite ocean with tides all around. Are those tides different from the ocean? Now lets say that those tides have a sense of "I" as well where one tide think I'm rising higher than the rest. The question - Is it because of the tide that it is rising high or perhaps because of the various churning of the forces within the ocean? If you understand the concept of "infinity", then you'd also know that you cannot analyze infinity. You cannot cut it or multiply. There is no way you can create division here. Now try to experience infinity. If you think you can visualize it, then you are lying or ignorant for infinity cannot be visualized either. You can only experience it by surrendering the mind! So who is basically seeing the different categorizations of the world? Who is percieving the colorless sky to be blue in the morning?
The faculties of the mind have a natural tendencies to create these divisions, an illusion of color out of colourless, name out of nameless, form out of formless, manifest out of unmanifest, finite out of infinite etc. You are being called Raaabo because of the sake of convenience put by your mind as well as others. Is it going to change the true essence of your nature if you are called by any other name? If this is temporary (name,form,finite etc), then how are you suppose to understand the nature of the true reality?
There is no such thing as time, but why do we percieve time? Why do during our dreams, we often lose a perception of time and space?
Raaabo said:
I assume nothing, however you assume that I live and breathe technology and have no other interests in life. I also love music, play guitar, the arts, and have read a little of all religions and texts. I will admit that they bore me, and I haven't made it my life's passion to read the Vedas or any or all ancient texts of various faiths, but then who says I need to in order to learn and experience life? There was nothing special about the people who wrote the Bible, and neither was there anything special about the people who wrote the Vedas, it was a collective wisdom, brought forth via thinking and pondering, and I can do the same, as can anyone else here, if they really want to. This discussion forum could theoretically be used to come up with collective wisdom as well, but I certainly don't want people deifying TDF!
Isn't variety needed? New ideas, new ways of thinking, and does that ever come from blindly following what someone else said? Regardless of whether it was said 12,000 years ago or 12 minutes ago. I absorb what I can, ponder and arrive at my own decision, and then maybe share the logic of why I did that and let the world decide to call me ignorant or wise or just an average individual. For example, you may think me idiotic, or vice versa, but it doesn't make either of us idiots, just different. I still believe that its the recognition of differences of opinions that really helps us evolve, but then again, maybe I'm just ignorant to you.
Collective knowledge is best suited for sciences of course, and 2 + 2 = 4, no matter what language, and 2 x 2 also = 4, and thus we arrive at mathematics, the other language after music that everyone can appreciate. However, yes, some people are best suited towards thinking of possibilities where 2 + 2 does not = 4, and thus the variety of thought, and more power to them.
Of course you may assume that evolution is nonsense (though I don't know your reasons), and it may or may not be, I certainly will not just disregard it, especially since fossil findings and carbon dating show how humanoids evolved over millions of years, or how mammoths were cousins of today's elephants, or a billion more examples that a little Googling will get anyone.
Assuming that the evolution theory is sound - didn't the cave men, a million years ago realise that their bodies were capable of more and more? Didn't they improve and become better hunters and more successful? Archaeology certainly suggests it, and they outdate the vedas and written word and all known history itself.
Now of course there are stories about ancient aliens, and how Krishna was actually an extra terrestrial, and the logic they put forth is pretty sound (even if there are chinks in the armour, as any theory has), but until some sort of proof is found I am forever sceptical. Listen to everything, try and understand it all, but just "believe" nothing unless scientifically and logically provable. Thus the bettering of ones thinking is evolution, in a sense, but it requires openness, sadly not something the world is ready for yet. However, even physically, mankind has changed - we've grown taller, have less body hair, live longer (age slower actually, because of less physical stresses - and yes modern medicine). This is an evolution of sorts. Some say that actually we've devolved, into a weaker species, etc. But for me that's proof enough that evolution (forwards or backwards) occurs, and thus hopefully we can evolve forwards to the next step, using whatever path that is.
When we talk of the world history we usually ignore the Indian history. Earlier we thought the civilization is 4000 yr old, then 5000 and then 10000 etc.
Watch -> *www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQZFS9Hij0M
With this discovery, it is being said that if India is explored and scientific techniques like dating used, it can change a perception of the entire world's history. Earlier it was said that everyone believed that earth is flat. Wh proposed such a theory? Did Indians "believed" that also? You have mentioned about cavemen, but did they exist in India also? The Indian history speaks of yuga cycles where currently we in Kaliyug of which 5000 yrs have already been spent. Before this, we have see the dvapar yug- 432000x2 yrs, treta yug - 432000x3 years, satyuga - 432000x4 years.
Satyuga is an age which is categorized by men of perfect intellgence, perfect intuition, perfect memory, perfect patience and understanding, perfect body and strength. This deteriorates as yugas deteriorates. Kaliyuga is characterised by men of weak morales, low character, low memory, low intelligence, weak bodies and strength. For this matter, I'm happy that the science of military and warfare has been lost for men in this age cannot control anger or have patience to listen to others and weapons becoming a tool for adharma and evil acts instead of controlling adharma. Before Kaliyug started Veda were passed in oral fashion.
It is similar to case where a newborn babies cell regeneration/division is highest and gradually decreases as he grows old. The memory and intelligence (not experience with the external) are highest when he is young and fades into memory loss when he grows old. This is the reason why is it said that you learn faster when you are young. How can we retain that cell regeneration/division, high memory and intelligence? This is a part of Yoga and Ayurveda! Another example can be the flow of water from the mountain peaks to ocean, where it slowly steadily gets polluted and stagnated. But apart from Yugas, it goes beyond to the cyclic nature of time contrary to the linear nature of time as presented by modern science. This cycle does not mean that the same history will repeat. Again the example of an infinite ocean with tides rising and merging can be applied here.
Yoga (perfection), FYI, is not a physical exercise but a concept. Like I have stated before it is applicable to knowledge, surrender of ego-sense, actions, the various asanas whose aim is to further perfect the mind and body unity! If you do not understand meditation, then the next best example I can give is music. The more perfect the technique is, the better is the vessel to contain the flow. Music, as you might know, is presented the best when it is spontaneous or when you don't think much. It just happens when suddenly a chord strikes your empty head and you let it flow. With the technique or the vesself being perfect, it is manifested into the physical world perfectly. This perfection of technique implies the fingers of guitarist to move without his head working. This is called Yoga or perfection.
If the theory of cavemen is discussed, then they exist today also in remote parts and people even in urban areas to be using primitive tools for cooking, cleaning, fixing etc. Perhaps, the fossils of these tools and cavemen will be found some 10000 yrs in the future where people will be discussing that there was an age where the "religion" of modern science was practiced by the "nomads". Try to move beyond the words to the context I'm presenting here.
Coming back and as I have discussed before, The Indian thought is neither about some religion or god or atheists or theists. It is much beyond these limited and childish taggings, the fancies of an immature mind which people have not graduated from. The Indian thought is neither about the impressions you recieve from the TV shows and serials where the devi-devtas are busy conspiring, marrying and leading a life like that of humans. If you are speaking about secularism, then do understand where, how and why it came into being in Europe.
The Quran speaks about attachment to a name Allah : la ilaha il-alaha, mohammed urrasool allah, whereas the Indian texts speak about nameless : Ekam satviprabahuda vadanti, where the infinite is nameless yet called by various names like brahman, purusha (not purush i.e guy if you think) etc, formless yet manifests into various forms like different waves from the same ocean, where that "ideal ocean" is infinite and its essence, the central binding force, immutable, whereas the waves are finite and mutable some marked with a sense of "I" and some not! To be explicit, I hope you understand the metaphor. Many people I discuss this, esp. atheists, think I'm talking about oceans literally. No wonder, they cannot understand the Indian shrutis.
bhagvad-gita said:
When a man liberated, free from attachment, with his mind, heart and spirit firmly founded in self-knowledge, does works as sacrifice, all his work is dissolved. Brahman is the giving, Brahman is the food-offering, by Brahman it is offered into the Brahman fire, Brahman is that which is to be attained by samadhi in Brahman-action. ( BG 4.23-24)
From the lower/limited perspective of modern science it means, matter and energy (various manifestations) are risen from matter and energy, use matter and energy to exist and become matter and energy during their end. e.g A person (made up of matter and energy), is born from matter and energy, uses matter and energy as food and becomes matter and energy after his death.
Can you say that "Allah is the eaten, the eater and the process of eating"? Is yes, then it would make sense as everything in this universe is matter and energy as per modern science and even matter is energy (Refer Quantum Theory).
If you understand any of the above distinctions, then proceed to this for further details : *www.chakranews.com/theism-and-vedas/1540
If you understand that, do read Aurobindo's : The secret of Vedas. It is available freely with pdf format. Trust me, you'll laugh yourself at the average understanding of the Indian philosophies which we see in this thread alone which is not even intellectual in nature, let alone being intelligent! Like Zakir Naik speaks in inferior words : "In Islam everything is "God's" (with an apostrophe s, which gives rise to words like theism and atheism, who is actually Abrahamic and not Indian devi or Devta) where as in Hinduism everything is God" (In Hindi it means divya and divya is not the same as God. These devi-devta are the different powers of the infinite, like air/wind, water, intellect, mind, supermind which are called by terminologies like vayu, varuna, indra, Vishnu etc in the Vedas, Shakti and Shiva in the Tantras, purusha and prakriti in the Gita etc . From divya comes the sanskrit offsprings like deva and even Maya is a devi. There is a similar analogy to the Greek philosophy as well).
Some excerpts from Secret of The Vedas -----
The word go means both cow and light and in a number of passages evidently meant light even while putting forward the image of the cow. This is clear enough
when we have to do with the cows of the sun — the Homeric kine of Helios — and the cows of the Dawn. Psychologically, the physical Light might well be used as a symbol of knowledge and especially of the divine knowledge (Page 43) { i.e cow is the metaphor of light or wisdom/knowledge recieved}
Indra is invoked as the maker of perfect forms to drink the wine of Soma; drinking he becomes full of ecstasy and a “giver of cows” .... A study
s of the Vedic horse led me to the conclusion that go and asva represent the two companion ideas of Light and Energy, Consciousness and Force, which to the Vedic and Vedantic mind were the double or twin aspect of all the activities of existence. (Page 44) { i.e mind is illumined when by the sheer amount of knowledge, the eternal bliss, the truth and thus "giver of cows" by which we can act objectively and wisely }
Agni for the ordinary worshipper may have meant simply the god of the Vedic fire, or it may have meant the principle of Heat and Light in physical Nature, or to the most ignorant it may have meant simply a superhuman personage, one of the many “givers of wealth”, satisfiers of human desire. How suggest to those capable of a deeper conception the psychological functions of the God? The word itself fulfilled that service. For Agni meant the Strong, it meant the Bright, or even Force, Brilliance. So it could easily recall to the initiated, wherever it occurred, the idea of the illumined Energy which builds up the worlds and which exalts man to the Highest, the doer of the great work, the Purohit of the human sacrifice. (Page 56) { i.e Agni is the will power, the force which is one the first devtas who is invoked by Indra i.e mind/itelligence. Obviously this is true in any case. If you want to learn guitar, your mind will automatically increase focus. }
This wine of Soma represents, as we have abundant proof in the Veda and especially in the ninth book, a collection of more than a hundred hymns addressed to the deity Soma, the intoxication of the Ananda, the divine delight of being, inflowing upon the mind from the supramental consciousness through the Ritam or Truth. If we accept these interpretations, we can easily translate the hymn into its psychological significance. (Page 74) { i.e The awakening as experienced by the mind, metaphorically written in the form of drinking of soma by Indra. }
What can these rivers be whose wave is full of Soma wine, full of the ghrta, full of urj, the energy? What are these waters that flow to the goal of the gods’ movement, that establish for man the supreme good?....Obviously these are the waters of the Truth and the Bliss that flow from the supreme ocean. These rivers flow not upon earth, but in heaven; they are prevented by Vritra the Besieger, the Coverer from flowing down upon the earth-consciousness in which we mortals live till Indra, the god-mind, smites the Coverer with his flashing lightnings and cuts out a passage on the summits of that earth-consciousness down which they can flow. Such is the only rational, coherent and sensible explanation of the thought and language of the Vedic sages. (Page 113)
This matter of the lost herds is only part of a whole system of connected symbols and images. They are recovered by the sacrifice and the fiery god Agni is the flame, the power and the priest of the sacrifice; — by the Word, and Brihaspati is the father of the Word, the Maruts its singers or Brahmas, brahmano marutah, Saraswati its inspiration; — by the Wine, and Soma is the god of the Wine and the Ashwins its seekers, finders, givers, drinkers. The herds are the herds of Light and the Light comes
by the Dawn and by the Sun of whom Pushan is a form. Finally, Indra is the head of all these gods, lord of the light, king of the luminous heaven called Swar, — he is, we say, the luminous or divine Mind; into him all the gods enter and take part in his unveiling of the hidden light. We see therefore that there is a perfect appropriateness in the attribution of one and the same victory to these different deities and in Madhuchchhandas’ image of the gods entering into Indra for the stroke against Vala. Nothing has been done at random or in obedience to a confused fluidity of ideas. The Veda is perfect and beautiful in its coherence and its unity. (Page 144)
Vedas : Mind is the chief controller of all the senses, of the breaths in the Human being (inhale, exhale, life breath etc) which we see as "devraj Indra". It is the mind which is always wavering with positive and negative thoughts and yields to the self for the guidance which we see as "Swargaloka always wavering and being attacked by Demons and presided over by devtas and Indra running to Vishnu for guidance".
Shiva and Shakti : Where Shakti is the individual jiva (when perceived at human level) always trying to achieve the state of perfect knowledge i.e Shiva which we see in serials loosely as Shakti always trying to seek Shiva and how consciousness continues seeking even after death e.g Sati to Parvati where the desires are part of the nature of the body, but one has to control over those desires or detach from those desires. This Shiva is residing on the top of Mount Kailash which is metaphor of the human body itself and the super-mind, the top of Kailash which is beyond all the dualities of life, where space and time cease to exist, where past, present, future all become one, which are nothing more than the division created or perceived by the mind only.
-----------------
Some quotes from Aurobindo's : Kena and other Upanishads's
If God is everywhere, He must be in the food we eat. Not only is God the eaten, but He is the eater and eventually, says the Vedanta, when you come to the bottom fact of existence there is neither eaten or eater, but all is God. (Sri Aurobindo, Kena and Other Upanishads, Page 166)
What is the use of avoiding the word “God” and speaking always of the Supreme as “It” simply because the Sanscrit usually, — but not, be it observed, invariably — employs the neuter gender? The neuter in Sanscrit applies not only to what is inanimate but to what is beyond such terms as animate and inanimate, not only to what is below gender but to what is above gender. In English this is not the case. The use of “It” may therefore lead to far more serious misconceptions than to use the term “God” & the pronoun “He”. (Sri Aurobindo, Kena and Other Upanishads, Page 169)
“Now the Mind in dream revelleth in the glory of his imaginings. All that it hath seen it seemeth to see over again, and of all that it hath heard it repeateth the hearing; yea, all that it hath felt and thought and known in many lands and in various regions, these it liveth over again in its dreaming. What it hath seen and what it hath not seen, what it hath heard and what it hath not heard, what it hath known and what it hath not known, what is and what is not, all, all it seeth; for the Mind is the Universe.
But when he is overwhelmed with light, then Mind, the God, dreameth no longer; then in this body he hath felicity.
(Prashna Upanishad, translated by Sri Aurobindo, Pg 186 of Kena and Other Upanishads)
Therefore as all these flowing rivers move towards the sea, but when they reach the sea they are lost in it and name and form break away from them and all is called only the sea, so all the sixteen members of the silent witnessing Spirit move towards the Being, and when they have attained the Being they are lost in Him and name and form break away from them and all is called only the Being; then is He without members and immortal. Whereof this is the Scripture.
(Prashna Upanishad, translated by Sri Aurobindo, Pg 191 of Kena and Other Upanishads) { i.e the waves merging back into the nameless ocean }
Sat, Chit and Ananda are in this Highest, but He is neither Sat, Chit nor Ananda nor any combination of these. He is All and yet He is neti, neti, He is One and yet He is many. He is Parabrahman and He is Parameswara. He is Male and He is Female. He is Tat and He is Sa. This is the Higher than the Highest. He is the Purusha, the Being in whose image the world and all the Jivas are made, who pervades all and underlies all the workings of Prakriti as its reality and self. It is this Purusha that Aswalayana seeks. (Page 289, Sri Aurobindo, Kena and other Upanishads)
it is in another passage stated to have two sides, obverse & reverse, Vidya and Avidya, Science and Nescience. Nescience eternally tends to envelop Science,
Science eternally tends to displace Nescience. Avidya or Nescience is Parabrahman’s power of creating illusions or images, things which seem but are not in themselves; Vidya or Science is His power of shaking off His own imaginations and returning upon His real and eternal Self. The action and reaction of these
two great Energies doing work upon each other is the secret of Universal activity. (Page 378, KOU) { Essentially talking about Purusha and Prakriti and Maya as one of the powers or forms of Prakriti }
Like I stated, the Indian thought is neither the Vedic rituals you see these days nor the presentation of Indian TV shows. It is neither some reduction into childish terminologies like theists, atheists, religion etc.
@Raaabo - The Sun rays take some 8 minutes to reach earth. It simply means that the rays which reach you had left the Sun some 8 minutes in the past. It further means that you are simply viewing the Sun 8 minutes in the past! When you talk to a friend, you are viewing him some nano-seconds (or even lesser) in the past. Entire infrastructure of your body and its individual components follow an order and the reality of Ritam (Universal dharma) . The individual organs understand their own dharma and limitations and work accordingly, so do the celestial bodies, an order within the chaos, where the entire template of your body changes every nanoseconds chemically (billions of atoms inhaled, exhaled, perspired, excretion, drinking, urinating etc), physically (very slow for senses to register), mentally (emotion,wisdom,thoughts, intelligence, analysis etc)! Thus with all these subtle reasonings you are always percieving the external world in the past!
If you think Indian science is "a belief system" with a reasoning that it is archaic and irrelevant, then so has the modern science become a subject of past now the moment you open a science book and read it. Such a "belief" that Indian science is a belief system because it is archaic is only self-destructive!
Coming back, Why do I still see an order in this extremely chaotic template of yours? Your senses are the ones which analze the external. The mind is the one which analyzes the message passed on by the senses. On whose direction is the mind working? You buy a car, but the thought originated in the past for it (2 days back or 20 years back) before it materializes in the physical world. What all factors were responsible for such a thought - 'buying a car'? From no where a thought might come about your loved ones and you immediately ring them up. It could be random and it could be a result of various forces of nature external as well as internal acting upon you to accumulate into a thought and then your body, a vessel acts to carry that thought forward? Is it really you who are "doing", or your whole life happens to be dance around different thoughts either random, borrowed or accumulated?
Now just like flame does not have a definite shape and the perception of its form keeps on changing (flame reducing, increasing, distorting, flickering etc), similarly how can we say that the shape of Sun is "circular"? With its huge flames coming and going, can we even say that the sun has a definite shape? Moreover, does the Sun exist only in the perception of its flames? Its heat can be felt all over to the Earth and beyond. So my question - Is the Sun limited to its flames only or to its heat beyond as well? Once you understand that and move beyond names, forms, shapes etc, you'd understand that the "essence" of the Sun encompasses the entire Solar System.
Similar is the nature of the supreme consciousness which resides within but distorted by its own lower natures and polluted at the level of material consciousness/lowest where the world becomes "asat" (it does not mean false, but illusory in the sense of being impermanent or dynamic) where the sat, the static, the permanent, the real can be achieved and known with the faculties of Yoga! Hence Sagun to Nirgun, the union of Shakti with Shiva. You may read chapter 7 of Bhagvad-Gita on this.
Raaabo said:
Jokes aside, every time I have heard someone speak of their meditation enlightenments, it's always something totally personal, or something completely weird and irrelevant. Perhaps you are different, and can share your meditation experience with us, however I have yet to meet someone who came up with anything helpful or relevant from meditation personally. The abstract, as far as experience has taught me, may be fun, but it's also totally pointless. Many people get high on drugs just to get exactly that feeling, and we call them addicts and try and fix them.
Meditative experiences are personal indeed and hence I gave the analogy of gym and body types (skin, hari texture ,metabolism, habits etc), but the steps remain the same, a journey from "I" to surrender of "I" and merging with the absolute. It is totally different from the experience of a drug addict. Meditation increases mind control, it is based on detachment from material desires in its holistic meaning as attachment shall remain a burden in the initial process of emptying the mind. Whereas, addiction to drugs as based on attachment to material desires/drugs which destroys mind control and brain cells where the lowest perception is further reducd to smithereens giving even a lower false perception/"feeling" .
Raaabo said:
Am I to understand that you also do not comment about anything you haven't "studied" for 5 years? I certainly haven't spent as much time on some of these as you have, but that doesn't mean I should not have an opinion on them. Who sets these rules? If a Sadhu who has spent all his life pondering the vedas comes here and says spend 45 years and then comment, would you go away only to return after 40 years?
You took it literally. What I really requested is that you need to discuss only if you have any genuine interest. There are mods in the forum who have quoted some distorted verses of Gita and then claiming on the top of that distortion, that Gita present offending verses. The basic steps or a genuine research would simply seek - Who said the verse and what is the meaning of the verse, Gathering the complete verse as the first step and then verify it from 2-3 different sources as well, if one is ignorant of Sanskrit. You won't really understand anything if you do not have a genuine interest. Just like all the knowledge of technology (or guitar or gymming) will come to if you have a genuine interest, similar the higher science will come to you as well if you have genuine interest.
The whole universe will conspire to make it happen, if you really genuinely want it. Ofcourse you have to act upon it naturally!
Upanishad said:
This Self is not won by exegesis, nor by brain-power, nor by much learning of Scripture. Only by him whom It chooses can It be won; to him this Self unveils its own body. (manduka Upanishad 3.2.3, Page 145)
This inturn related to the chapter on "The Colloquy of Indra and Agastya" from "Secret of Veda by Aurobindo" (Refer page 265) that I request you to read.
Online copy -> *www.sriaurobindoashram.org/ashram/sriauro/downloadpdf.php?id=30
Raaabo said:
I would be with you 100% if you had said, what difference does it make if some Mughal broke a temple or not, there was no need to stoop to their level. There was no need to gain political mileage from that, or to try and incite riots, or to hold any value for a piece of land anyway. Someone suggested a hospital on the site, I suggest a museum of science, religion and artifacts for all faiths. Like you, I also would like all kids to be taught all faiths, and science, and then let them choose their own path, instead of trying to breed one another out as all beliefs have attempted for thousands of years.
There is no point in discussing Quran, if you "personally" do not want to discuss it and then use your admin rights to implement the same. Quran is a doctrine. Had it been just another person who had destroyed an unused temple or by Govt procedures, I wouldn't mind. But like I said, research yourself on the history of Iran, Afganistan, Bangladesh, pakistan etc were all places of creativity and now most of their creativity is destroyed! The Doctrine is simple i.e to spread Islam. This includes killing of infidels, people tagged as Jews and Christian, violating women prisoners with an attchment to something called judgement day. You really need to read Quran, I have given you authentic sources with tanslations of three prominent translators and not just another link to some anti-Islamic site. And hence for this reason I had called you ignorant of ground reality. I apologize if it sounds offending. The same pattern exists with the growing number of muslims in France, Britain, US etc. Again, I'm not against people tagged as muslims here but a doctrine that is driving them to demand sharia, behead soldiers (British Royal Guard) for what happened in Afghanistan, Syria, death to US even though US provides large number of jobs to them.
*www.usc.edu/org/cmje/religious-texts/quran/
I'm not interested in who ridicules the video of Zakir Naik (Ahmaddiya that you pointed out) but simply in discussing Quran, Allah and Mohammed.
Raaabo said:
My only grouse with Modi is his arrogance
This is something I love about him. He is arrogant for the anti-nationals, but loving for his own people. It is a characteristic a leader needs to have. One who seeks truth is often termed as cold and arrogant. It doesn't mean he has perfectly sought the truth before you raise fingers. I would prefer an arrogant leader who administers well anyday over a robot who seldom speaks, or doesn't know what to speak, take orders from others all the time and when speaks, speaks without any motivation where you have to raise the volume of the TV or concentrate all your energy to your ears to listen him well.
Raaabo said:
Also, Mediator. Since I barely passed Sanskrit in school, my only interaction with the Vedas was an old copy of Griffith's translation of the Rig Veda, which, again being honest, bored me pretty quick. Again, it could be my ignorance, or was it because the translation was off?
Griffith, Bloomsfield, Maxmuller were christian missionaries who did major damage to the Indian texts and distorted them (mistranslated) too much. You are bound to get bored. Similarly, stay away from Prabhupad's translations if you don't know Sanskrit.
I would recommend you => *www.bhagavad-gita.org/
Read it in your own frame of understanding first without seeing the commentaries. If you can understand high level English, then I would recommend you Aurobindo's translations!
Evolution will tear this discussion completely. Lets save it for some other time. Like I said, read the God Vs Science debate, I have discussed there in full length and you may find my questions and reasons there only.
dead5 said:
I think that most of Modi's PR is done by the Congress/UPA itself. Due to the endless scams the people will turn to anything that has a chance of getting them out of this mess. The BS slander that goes on against Modi like the 'Rambo' frontpage and P9 clarification also turns people against the current power and makes them curious about Modi. Even if the UPA was good for nothing but didn't participate in so many scams (or at least if they didn't become public) I don't think that Modi would have nearly as much support as he does now.
Very well said!
