Many things went wrong with SANAATANA DHARMA, which was the way life of ancient India.
Hinduism is a relatively new name given by people residing the other side of Sindhu river to the Sanaata Dharma, being followed by the people residing in ancient India.
Hence, let us stick to the original name SANAATANA DHARMA.
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This original name SANAATANA DHARMA can be found in Oldest Epic Srimad Ramayana.
कृते च प्रतिकर्तव्यमेष धर्मः सनातनः |
सोऽयं तत्प्रतिकारार्थी त्वत्तः संमानमर्हति || (Sundara Kanda 1st Sarga 114th Sloka)
"When a service is done, a return service needs to be rendered. This is an ancient tradition. Such this ocean who wants to do a return service to the Raghu dynasty, is suitable for respect by you."
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Let us consider the following points:
1. Till Mahabharata period, i.e, around 3102 B.C., the Gods from Vedic Pantheon were worshiped.
Lord Brahma is the Ruler of of all Worlds. - ब्रह्मा लोकाधिपो यथा (Srimad Ramayana, Bala Kanda). Indra's status was held next to him.
The Who is Who of Kings of Mahabharata Era, except a few, fought and got eliminated in the Mahabharata war. After the Rule of Pandavas that lasted for 36 years, no strong administration, directing the people in General in adhering to Vedic Way of life, in the entire country was in place. This lead to decadence in Human values and grouping among various petty rulers.
Dominant rulers aided by selfish scholars created new Gods and started created own groups.
(i) As a result, Vishnu, who was one among 33 Gods, had been elevated to the status of God of Gods.
(ii) Shiva could not found in Vedic Pantheon. The Vedic God Rudra's structure, appearance, status,etc, were altered and named Shiva, and was elevated to the staus of MAHAADEVA.
(iii) No mention can be found about Shakti or Rajarajeswari in Vedic Pantheon. Even Sri Krishna did not mention about her in his Bhagavad Gita.
(iv) The present day prominent God, Ganapati did not find place in Vedic Pantheon.
In order to elevate Vishnu, Shiva, Shakti , naturally the status of Lord Brahma has to be degraded, without which Vishnu, Shiva, Shakti cannot be marketed as God/ of Gods.
So all the Puranas were written inventing stories that show Lord Brahma in bad light and elevate Vishnu, Shiva, Shakti.
Same is the case with Indra. He was degraded from the status of पुरु हूतस्य(Chief Invitee in Vedic rituals) - Srimad Ramayana, Aranya Kanda - to the status of a low level God. Vishnu was described in Puranas asपुरु हूतस्य.
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a) In this process, Vishnu was made the father of Lord Brahma!
b) The original Vedic Story of Prajapati (Brahma?) taking the shape big fish and saving the Manu was rewritten to Vishnu's incarnation.
c) The original story of Lord Brahma taking the shape of Boar and bringing out Earth from water, was rewritten to vishnu's incarnation.
d) Parasurama, Rama and Krishna were not the incarnations of Vishnu.
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What a strategy! It worked excellently. Hats off to those selfish scholars!
Everybody forgot the original status of Lord Brahma and Indra.
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2) The myth of Aryan Invasion
Many present day scholars proved that this theory is MYTH. Still our universities teach us this fabricated/ill-conceived MYTH.
Has anybody tried to study Srimad Ramayana, original Text?
In many areas, the word ARYA was used to indicate a noble personality but not a sect.
3) Out Indian scholars with western bent of mind, have no patience, and interest to look into the EPICS, Vedic Literature with an independent thinking.
4. No self pride. Demeaning our own literature.
5. New/prejudiced practices were introduced in contravention to the Vedic way of life.
The name Ganapati is the epithet of Vedic Brahmanaspati, lord of the prayers. (Also known as Brhaspati, Great lord, or lord of the Great)
ReplyDelete(Vide : Ganaanaam tvA ganapati'm havAmahE....)
Vishnu is not mentioned independently of Indra in the Rig Veda, and the Vishnu (meaning God of the whole world (vish-), or God of masses (vish-))
is just said as a friend of Indra "who created and overstrode the three regions (actually, earth, atmosphere and sky) with just three steps (myth of Vamana was created to satisfy this). By his dust was the world created.
(sa mUDhamasya pA'msurE)
By the time of Yajur Veda, the status of deity of Vishnu had elevated from a minor deity, since Yajur Veda was more polytheistic than Rig Veda.
A mantra of Yajur Veda tells, "Of the Devas, Agni is the nearest (or lowest), Vishnu is the farthest (or highest)".
There are many praises for Vishnu and Rudra in Yajur Veda, but the grandest
are still the Rudra hymns of Taittiriya Samhita.
But none of these deities still preside over Indra concept.
By the time of Brahmanas, the religion was almost a polytheism, comparable to Hellenic Classical Greek religion. All proto myths of epics and Puranas could be traced to the careless Brahmanical stories.
In epic period, the religion becomes sheer polytheism, with fate overtaking gods, a concept probably induced from the Greek Homeric developments. This is the reason why people have to date the epics to a later period, coinciding with Greek arrival in India. Greeks are mentioned by "Yavana" corresponding to "Ionian" in the epics and later Puranas, whereas in Rig Veda, only their older name "Alina" (Hellene) is attested, as one of the Aryan and dasyu tribes who participated in dasarajna war. (That's a long story)
Interestingly, Vishnu was equated with the pantheistic Narayana of Vedas, and hence Narayana sukta, creating the equation Vishnu = narayana.
Later Puranas even go to the extent of identifying the all pervading Purusha as Vishnu.
The real losers were Indra, the God, and Varuna, the name of God as an omniscient omnipresent Monarch, and other Vedic names of God.
Indra, is in many verses described poetically as releasing the cows of light from the cave of hills in the dawn, creating dawn, whereby He is called Govinda, the finder of kine. This was later applied to the cowboy Krishna, for absurd reasons.
Indra is described as a mighty dancer in Rig Veda, which later, was adopted by Shaiva sect as "Nataraja Shiva".
The name and the "mantra" Namah Shivaya does occur in Yajur Veda, in context of Rudra, as an epithet of Rudra. But in the exhaustive hymn to Rudra, rthere is no mention of a snake garland, moon in head, damaru, ganga, Parvati, Nandi or other paraphernalia "that marks Shiva".
Nor is there snake bed, conch, discus, gada, lotus, shArnga, blue colour, Vaikuntha, Lakshmi, or other paraphernalia associated with Vishnu. All these are artificial and belong to later culture.
In fact, Vaikuntha is the name given to Indra in Rig Veda! (Indra Vaikuntha is praised in Mandala 10), Vedic Sri, Lakshmi, Durga the names for Agni as "provider of treasures" and "destroyer of hurdles" respectively.
The Vedic Sarasvati, although not carrying Veena or Vedas, nor associated with writing, is almost the concept of new Sarasvati as a goddess of knowledge, though is associated with ocean of knowledge and river of knowledge, and associated with a Vedic river.
Brahma had, but nothing to lose. Brahma as a separate deity is ABSENT in Rig Veda. (Yes, it is true!!)
The Rig Vedic prajApati, tvaShtA etc. inspired the Brahma of the epics.
But still, non Vedic elements were absent in Brahma.
The Shakti, of Hinduism, is actually the derivate of shaci, portrayed as Indrani in Rig Veda. (Indra's wife is symbolically said as power)
Again, Indra lost the battle.... no.. how can God lose?
"He sacrificed himself for the happiness of his creation".