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Key Role of Indian Culture in the Holistic Revolution Needed Today
Indian Culture (Bh³ratºya Sa®sk•ti) is referred in the ancient texts as “S³ Pratham³ Sa®sk•ti Viïvav³r³” — the first and the supreme culture (Sa®sk•ti) in the world. Is it just a rhetoric way of ancient descriptions, a kind of ‘self-praise’, or is there some substance in it? Else, if it is true, then why we don’t see its greatness today? Whatever the case may be, a more important query, which is our focus in this article, is — why should we discuss the Indian Culture? What is its relevance and importance in today’s world? A discussion concerning this query would clarify the other doubts as well.
Before proceeding with the discussions, we must keep in mind that the word “Culture” is used in English as a translation of the Sanskrit (and also, Hindi) word “Sa®sk•ti” (Sanskriti). In this article we shall use the words “Sa®sk•ti” and “culture” synonymously.
As its word-meaning suggests, “sanskriti” is associated with Sa®sk³ras (intrinsic tendencies). So the level and nature of one’s sanskriti is reflected in one’s values, character, overall personality, and deeds. We often associate culture only with creative expression of feelings and intrinsic artistic talents. However, more importantly, sanskriti, and hence true cultural development, of a person is inherently associated with nurturing and elegant grooming of his/her values, inner beauty, and emotional character.
Sanskriti of society or nation defines the collective spirit, ideals, conduct, and prominent way of life of its people. Greater the virtues and values of (the members of) a society, the more evolved is its sanskriti. Similarly, the nature or standard of a sanskriti is judged according to the values and trends of development it nurtures. The superiority of Indian Culture (Bhartiya Sanskriti) lies in the fact that it has originated from saintly wisdom, science of spirituality, and inner quest for ultimate evolution. By and large, the basis of other cultures and civilizations prevalent in the (modern) world is dogmatic faith and its literal revival and imposition on the present-day humanity.
Indian Culture is built on the idea of supreme development of humankind by awakening the divine qualities and powers indwelling in the inner self. Therefore, it not only encourages the refined expression of creativity and hidden talents of individuals, but also aims at holistic progress of all in complete harmony with Nature.
The philosophy, principles, and system of life, and the methods and modes of living guided and practiced under this sanskriti inspire — a culture of spirituality, a culture of devotional spirit, a culture of love, a culture of selfless service, a culture of sharing and caring, a culture of positive thinking and seeing the good that is pervading everywhere, a culture of simple living and high-thinking, a culture of nurturing vigor and radiance in life by self-awareness and self-discipline. It nurtures a perfect art of living with joy in all circumstances. It can thus provide solutions to many of the complex challenges that the world is facing todayincluding those concerning health, security, environment, and sustainability.
In the Vedic Age, the sanskriti of India used to be honored as a Dev Sanskriti — A Culture of Divinity. It was this sanskriti of ancient India that had shown the light of wisdom, divine humane values, and spiritual emotional sensitivity to the entire globe[1].
Today again it is this sanskriti that will revive in its original form and show the righteous path to usher in bright and blissful future. Reasoned justification behind this belief is the universally accepted fact that — this is the culture (sanskriti) that endorses the Vedic wisdom of “Vasudhaiva Kutu®baka®” (Entire world is like a family) and “Âtmavata Sarvabh¿teÌu” (Every being is like one’s own self). Reawakening after the Meandering Tides of Cultural Civilization:
People often wonder, as to why the divine culture of India did not continue to guide the world in the later years as it used to in the Vedic Age? How it could disappear from the very land where it had originated? Here, we should first understand the fact that elements of culture (sanskriti) are like seeds; they germinate, grow and blossom in fertile land (of people’s heart and mind) at appropriate season. So, the manifestation of culture varies with the trends of time and alters its influence in different phases of civilizations.
Natural tendencies of most people are driven by ego, avarice and selfish attachments. As a result, often the cultural values in every civilization tend to decline in the absence of an equally powerful force that can reawaken and guide the mass mentality towards nobility. Ancient and modern history of the world has witnessed that from time to time saints and reformers have appeared on this earth, inspired people towards the righteous path and saved humanity from the risk of disappearance.
The impact of these phases of reawakening is more prominent and lasting than the socio-political revolutions. Because of utter blind faith and wild-type outlook of the masses at large, there was cultural darkness in entire Europe until medieval times. Dreaded inhuman punishments by the so-called courts-oflaw of religious clergies to anyone not following their (fundamentalist) dogmatic principles; incidents of burning people as part of ‘faith’, etc, were common in that society until the 15th century. Rest of the western world was almost a tribal land at that time.
A conference held in Florence, Italy in the year 1439 AD initiated religious awakening in Europe. Some European texts of 16-17th Century refer this as renaissance of the occidental world. While it was the first (re) awakening in the rest of the world in the medieval times, in India, it marked the fifth reawakening. This 5th phase of cycle of reawakening is known in the history of India as “Bhakti K³la” (the period of devotional renaissance).
Altruistic lives and devotional songs of saintly poets like Ramanuj in the South, and Ramanand, Tulasidas, Kabir, Mira, and Dadu, etc in the Central and Northern parts of India generated a wave of inspirational devotion in the hearts of the masses in this Age. Ravidas and Kabir conveyed the mystic teachings of ancient sages like Rishi Kapil, Rishi Kanad, and Adi Shankaracharya via lucid songs and poems in the local dialects to enlighten the masses. Saint Ravidas was like a pole-star in the cluster of devotional lamps.
These saintly poets destroyed all barriers of saguna (worshiping a ‘deity form’ of God),including those concerning health, security, environment, and sustainability. In the Vedic Age, the sanskriti of India used to be honored as a Dev Sanskriti — A Culture of Divinity. It was this sanskriti of ancient India that had shown the light of wisdom, divine humane values, and spiritual emotional sensitivity to the entire globe[1]. Today again it is this sanskriti that will revive in its original form and show the righteous path to usher in bright and blissful future. Reasoned justification behind this belief is the universally accepted fact that — this is the culture (sanskriti) that endorses the Vedic wisdom of “Vasudhaiva Kutu®baka®” (Entire world is like a family) and “Âtmavata Sarvabh¿teÌu” (Every being is like one’s own self). Reawakening after the Meandering Tides of Cultural Civilization:
People often wonder, as to why the divine culture of India did not continue to guide the world in the later years as it used to in the Vedic Age? How it could disappear from the very land where it had originated? Here, we should first understand the fact that elements of culture (sanskriti) are like seeds; they germinate, grow and blossom in fertile land (of people’s heart and mind) at appropriate season. So, the manifestation of culture varies with the trends of time and alters its influence in different phases of civilizations.
Natural tendencies of most people are driven by ego, avarice and selfish attachments. As a result, often the cultural values in every civilization tend to decline in the absence of an equally powerful force that can reawaken and guide the mass mentality towards nobility. Ancient and modern history of the world has witnessed that from time to time saints and reformers have appeared on this earth, inspired people towards the righteous path and saved humanity from the risk of disappearance. The impact of these phases of reawakening is more prominent and lasting than the socio-political revolutions.
Because of utter blind faith and wild-type outlook of the masses at large, there was cultural darkness in entire Europe until medieval times. Dreaded inhuman punishments by the so-called courts-oflaw of religious clergies to anyone not following their (fundamentalist) dogmatic principles; incidents of burning people as part of ‘faith’, etc, were common in that society until the 15th century. Rest of the western world was almost a tribal land at that time.
A conference held in Florence, Italy in the year 1439 AD initiated religious awakening in Europe. Some European texts of 16-17th Century refer this as renaissance of the occidental world. While it was the first (re) awakening in the rest of the world in the medieval times, in India, it marked the fifth reawakening. This 5th phase of cycle of reawakening is known in the history of India as “Bhakti K³la” (the period of devotional renaissance).
Altruistic lives and devotional songs of saintly poets like Ramanuj in the South, and Ramanand, Tulasidas, Kabir, Mira, and Dadu, etc in the Central and Northern parts of India generated a wave of inspirational devotion in the hearts of the masses in this Age. Ravidas and Kabir conveyed the mystic teachings of ancient sages like Rishi Kapil, Rishi Kanad, and Adi Shankaracharya via lucid songs and poems in the local dialects to enlighten the masses. Saint Ravidas was like a pole-star in the cluster of devotional lamps. These saintly poets destroyed all barriers of saguna (worshiping a ‘deity form’ of God),nirguna (considering formless God), and savarna (upper caste), avarna (lower caste) that were prevalent in the society at that time. Beyond all the boundaries of ‘religious customs’, they generated a nectar-flow of inner devotion and pure knowledge (Vedanta).
Indian Culture has always nurtured this trend of search for ultimate truth against blind faith. The first awakening period in India commenced in the Rig-Vedic Age. It began with the quest of the rishis (Sages of Vedic Age) to find the origin and ‘structure’ of Nature, existence of its Creator, origin of gods, origin of time, ultimate end of all that exists, and so on ….. They were indeed the absolute scientists who deciphered the deepest depth of consciousness and transcendent knowledge as easily as they understood the cosmic expansion of Nature.
Tens of thousands of years after the Vedic Age, (as per the cycle of sublime Nature) the nature of people and trends of time gradually got changed. There emerged a period named as the “Brahman1 Age” in which, gradually the rituals and customary practices (described in some parts of Vedas too) replaced mystic knowledge. Then there was a second phase of cultural renaissance in India. This reawakening period was the “Age of Upanishads” when the essence of pure knowledge (extracted from the Vedas) was rediscovered, explained, and advocated by sagacious spiritual scientists. Following the great tradition of the divine sanskriti propounded by the Vedic Rishis, in their quest for absolute truth, the Upanishads even classified the ritualistic part of the Vedas as non-knowledge.
The cycle of natural change in mass-mentality continued; gradually the light of spiritual knowledge dimmed in people’s life; the sociocultural principles based on karma (deeds) got linked with janma (birth, creed) and there grew the misconceptions like casteism, socialdiscrimination, excessive reliance on fate, etc, in the Indian society. After which there was the third period of reawakening. This was the period of The Buddha.
Buddha’s teachings conveyed four ‘Aryasatyas’ (Noble Truths). The light of Buddhism expanded across Asia. In fact, what he realized and preached was the message of wisdom hidden in the Vedas only. However, his approach was different, as per the need to change the prevailing negativity and blind faith in the name of ‘Vedic’ religion in Indian society at that time. This divergence widened significantly after him.
Misconceptions and distortions of the Vedas were on the rise. The pure wisdom component of the Vedas had somewhat diminished even from scholarly studies. Then in the 8th Centuries AD, there emerged preeminent sagacious saint Adi Shankaracharya, who rediscovered the philosophy of Advait Vedanta and established centers in the North, South, East and West of India for dissemination of this pure knowledge. His epochal endeavors thus resurrected the light of the Upanishads. (The treasure of knowledge rediscovered by him during this 4th cycle of cultural renaissance continues to attract mystics and spiritual scholars from all around the world.) Before this knowledge could reach the entire masses and guide them on different fronts of life, the predominant rivalries between different emperors and dynasties, the aftermaths of blind faith and superstitions in the society, religious divide between the Buddhists and Hindus, etc, had weakened the country. The invaders fromWest Asia attacked, looted, destroyed precious cultural heritage and treatises of ancient texts, conquered and ruled over this land. The phase of decline and distractions after Islamic invasion further darkened in the medieval times.
Then there was an emergence of several saintly poets and reformers during 15th and 16th Century, who motivated the much needed awakening of the masses. This was the 5th cycle of reawakening in India. The wave of devotion triggered this time had re-vitalized the soul of the country. But complete re-emergence of true Indian Culture was further blocked by the deceptive attacks of the British. Their colonial rule of over three centuries suppressed and distracted several successive generations of Indians from the real path of their sanskriti. Influence of rapid industrialization and technological advancement, though it helped materialistic development, the efforts required for enlightenment and rise on the cultural front got widely neglected except for some superficial attempts on encouragement and propagation of indigenous art.
Today the world is undergoing haywire transformations on cultural front and facing cultural delusions, adulteration, and devolution. Influence of materialism and commercialization has become so powerful that it seems to have engulfed even the social norms and principles of humanity. It has over-shadowed the way-of-life of even those who boast about the great cultural heritage of India. The fundamentalists who shout against the occidental culture do not seem to have substantial and sound grounds to inspire and justify anything in favor of Indian Culture except loud slogans.
The extent and complexity of the problem is so vast that only few saints and handful of their genuine followers may not be able to accomplish the revival of Indian Culture in feasible time sans the support of more and more people across the globe.
It, therefore, appears essential to review the original form of the sanskriti of India and research its foundational principles in scientific light. It is also important to analyze its social aspects and relevance in the modern circumstances, and identify the elements that could be adopted in practice and inspire righteous progress. We shall attempt to address these points and discuss related aspects of Indian Culture in some successive issues of this magazine.

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