Host Morgan Freeman searches for the stories of creation as part of his understanding of God and spiritual practices from various religions around the world, in the upcoming episode of “The Story of God,” airing Sunday, April 24 at 9 p.m. ET/PT, on the National Geographic Channel. 

His guide in India, scholar Binda Paranjpe, explains something that most people don’t realize: Hindus don’t have a single story of creation… There is no single scripture that starts with “In the Beginning,” that one can liken to the Book of Genesis that Christians have. During my first assignment when I studied in the Ecumenical Theological Seminary, I had to write about the story of creation. I was so overwhelmed by the various sources and multiple stories of creation that Hindus have, that I almost dropped out of the class! Soon after that, I was asked to write a piece for our local temple magazine to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, and was able to leverage what I learned to explain how the Hindu stories of creation don’t conflict with the scientific theory of evolution. And Dr. Aseem Shukla, my fellow Board member at the Hindu American Foundation, took this particular issue to the mainstream, in the Washington Post/Newsweek’s “On Faith” column, explaining how “ancient Hinduism enlightens the modern notions of [creation and] evolution.”  

It has been interesting that in Christian-majority America, there has been a lot of debate around the compatibility of creation and evolution, in contrast to Hindu-majority India, where it has not been a contentious issue.  Classical Christian doctrine says God creates “ex nihilo, out of nothing,” but literal interpretations of the account of creation in Genesis have given rise to theories of creationism and intelligent design. Those who believe in the literal story of Genesis (which was actually written after other portions of the Bible) have strong objections to accepting Darwin’s theory of evolution. Many Hindu schools of thought do not treat scriptural creation myths/hymns literally. Often the creation stories themselves do not go into specific detail, so there is the possibility of incorporating at least some theories in support of evolution.

The central account of creation in Hinduism – the one that I think of first (“Sahasra sirsha purusha…”) – is found in the Rg Veda: the Purusha Suktam, the hymn of the Cosmic Man, Purusha, who was sacrificed by the Gods to create man. This sixteen-mantra poem is regarded as the oldest work on cosmic anatomy and ecology. It reveals that the universe is an infinite continuum of energy. Yet it describes this energy as a living force, with eyes, ears, arms, legs, hands and feet and heads watching over all of existence. Just as the universe guards the many limbs and energies of its infinite structure, so each of us is meant to become aware of the greater life force within us and its many aspects.

Further elaborations of the story of creation are told in the Puranas, Dharma Shastras, and other Hindu scriptures. The Hindu view of God’s creating the world from Himself is described in the Mundaka Upanishad 1.1.7: “As the spider sends forth and draws in its thread, as plants grow on the earth, as from every man hairs spring forth on the head and the body, thus does everything arise here from the Indestructible.” Manu Dharma Shastra 1.11-119, describes the creation of heaven and earth, of the soul, and of individual creatures. Manu, son of the first being, performed tapas, very difficult austerities, to create ten great sages who then created seven other Manus, who are progenitors of the human race in each age. Many scriptures talk of the creation as leela, a play of the divine. One couplet of the Dakshinamurthy Stotram – a hymn to Siva from the Advaita Vedanta tradition written by revered Hindu guru Adi Shankaracharya – refers to creation (viswam) itself “like a dream existing oneself or like a city seen in a mirror but appearing externally due to maya…” (viswam darpana drisya maana nagari tulyam…).

The conversation between Freeman and Paranjape closes with a dialogue and reference to the Nasadiya Sukta, from the Rg Veda (Ch. 10, Hymn 129, verses 1-7):

1 THEN was not non-existent nor existent: there was no realm of air, no sky beyond it.

What covered in, and where? and what gave shelter? Was water there, unfathomed depth of water?

2 Death was not then, nor was there aught immortal: no sign was there, the day’s and night’s divider.

That One Thing, breathless, breathed by its own nature: apart from it was nothing whatsoever.

3 Darkness there was: at first concealed in darkness this All was indiscriminated chaos.

All that existed then was void and form less: by the great power of Warmth was born that Unit.

4 Thereafter rose Desire in the beginning, Desire, the primal seed and germ of Spirit.

Sages who searched with their heart’s thought discovered the existent’s kinship in the non-existent.

5 Transversely was their severing line extended: what was above it then, and what below it?

There were begetters, there were mighty forces, free action here and energy up yonder

6 Who verily knows and who can here declare it, whence it was born and whence comes this creation?

The Gods are later than this world’s production. Who knows then whence it first came into being?

7 He, the first origin of this creation, whether he formed it all or did not form it,

Whose eye controls this world in highest heaven, he verily knows it, or perhaps he knows not.

The questions and the contrasting pronouncements that it contains allude to what Paranjape points out, that the story of Creation“is difficult to comprehend … [it’s] beyond us.” And Freeman takes it further: “Hindu philosophy is not to solve the riddle of creation that happened long ago – it’s to give thanks every day for the forces that allow us to be here, and continue to sustain us…. [Hindus believe that] the Gods weren’t even around at the original creation… even we if don’t share a common story of creation, all of us can share in one thing. The wonder and gratitude that we are here at all. Our beliefs have the power to unite us.”  

For more information regarding the National Geographic mini series The Story of God with Morgan Freeman be sure to check out the following links:

Website: http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/the-story-of-god-with-morgan-freeman/

What other Patheos Bloggers are saying about it: http://www.patheos.com/Topics/The-Story-of-God  

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Are We A Hindu Rashtra?

By Samuel Dhar

16 April, 2016
Countercurrents.org

Hinduism is not a religion. For that matter neither are Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Jainism, Sikkhism and so on.

These are all COMMUNITIES.

Literal meaning of the Word, ‘Hindu’, coined by the Persians of the 7th century, is ‘universal’. By this definition, most of us who firmly believe in one Universal God, commonness of human kind and unity of social order, are true Hindus.

If screaming, ‘Bharat Mata ki Jae’ is the test of nationalism, many of us are not. India has always been a Patriarchal Community. Vedic folklore supposes Bharat, a male, to be the founder of the Nation known by his name.

A million dollar question is : “From where does the word ‘Mata’ get attached to Bharat?”

Our Bharat shall not become a Hindu Rashtra, simply by contorting and perverting its meaning and establishing an association with a so called religion.

As Guru Nanak said, “There is neither Hindu nor Mussulman (Muslim), but only man. So whose path shall I follow? I shall follow God’s path. God is neither Hindu nor Mussulman and the path which I follow is God’s.”

This is our heritage.

Many Holy Names for God, from many different traditions, are present in Sri Guru Granth Sahib. To name a few, ‘Hari’ appears 8344 times, ‘Ram’ 2533 times, Gopal 491 times, Gobind 475 times, Prabhu 1371 times and so on.

This is our heritage.

In the words of the Upanishads :

“Bala, darpa, kamam, moham, krodham, parigraham,
Nirmamah, Shanto Bhuae Kalpate.”

This is the true path of/to God; “Rid of the five sinful ways, born out of the five human indriyas, we can roam the entire ethereal space of the Universe, in peace; one with God”; I AM THAT I AM.

This too is our heritage.

By accepting the Rakhi sent by Rani Karnavati, Humayun gave birth to a new social order of a mixed culture.

This is our Heritage.

Are the ten Commandments only a Christian faith. Barring three of the first four, the other seven commandments are universal in nature :

Shall not take the LORD’s name in vain (Not swear).

Shall honour thy father and mother.

Shall not kill.

Shalt not commit adultery.

Shalt not steal.

Shalt not bear false witness.

Shalt not covet thy neighbor’s property, wife or servant.

Can all this too not be a part our heritage?

Recently, a circulated study report, painstakingly prepared by an esteemed fellow Indian, under the banner of Virat Hindu Sangam, found its way in my mail box, kind courtesy a fellow Veteran. The report lists thousands of Muslim shrines, mosques, mazars and dargahs, which were either built upon the ruins of or built with the materials of Hindu temples/shrines.

Even if the above report is taken on face value, most true Indians would not understand its purpose. What has the compiler tried to achieve?

How far in History do we go back? How much of distortion of History do we accept? At which point of time in History do we stop taking stock of edifices of a new order built on the ruins of an existing culture?

Extensive archaeological excavations have proved that before the Aryan migration into the ancient Indian subcontinent, IVC was a highly developed civilization on its frontiers, on the fertile flood plains of the Indus River and its vicinity. This civilization was attacked and annihilated. As the Vedic group advanced rapidly to the rest of the Indian Sub-Continent, the Dravidians retreated further East and South, till they had no were else to go. Poor Chaps!

The earliest evidence of religious practices of IVC date back approximately to 5500 BC; evidence suggests that the IVC had social conditions comparable to Sumeria and even superior to the contemporary Babylonians and Egyptians.

Whatever be the origin of the Aryans, it is an incontrovertible fact of history that the Aryans were not indigenous to India, were totally a different race than the Dravidians of IVC and that they completely destroyed the towns and cities of the latter civilization and established themselves atop its ruins.

Flying in the face of facts of both Archaeology and modern science, it has become fashionable for the Hindutva Brigade to state on authority, with the support of unverified arguments, that the Aryans were none other than those of IVC and were the original inhabitants of India,

Cristian Violatti, one of the editors of Ancient History Encyclopedia, has written, “Unlike the peace loving Dravidians of the IVC, Aryans in antiquity, were a nomadic war like tribe of cattle herders”.

This is borne by many an ancient account, a few of which are :

A number of key battles of Dasarajna’ or the ‘Dashradnya Yuddha’ or the Battle of the ten kings, spanning many years, described in the Rig Veda, resulted in the total destruction of the pre-Vedic culture and settlements.

Rig Veda also mentions the battles fought by the earlier Aryan King Devdosa, with non Aryan Dasa King Sambara, the death of the latter and the complete annihilation of 99 non Aryan cities.

Then of course, if any further proofs were required, we have our very own Mahabharat, through which the Vedic Philosophy was propounded in the Bhagwat Gita, the Upanishads and the Vedanta.

Who was the non-Aryan King Dasa and what was the non-Aryan civilization of the 99 cities completely destroyed by the Aryan King Devedosa?

Archaeological excavations of the IVC till date, carried out over almost 100 years, establish IVC’s flourishing and advanced nature, much beyond the competence of the nomadic Aryans of that period.

Some of us, who still wonder how such an advanced civilization like the IVC, suddenly vanished, have to look no further than the accounts in the Rig Veda, of wars waged by the Aryan King Devdosa as also the war of the ten Kings.

Archaeological excavations have uncovered a culture that had nothing in common with the culture of the Vedic Aryans. IVC people, unlike the Vedic Aryans of later years, were largely city bound and peaceful, followed no rituals but believed in philosophy, meditated, practised Yoga, reared or used no horses, had no iron tools/weapons, fought no wars, at least till the ones thrust upon them by the latter, had a language other than Sanskrit and had a script for writing on seals.

Much is made of by some private archaeologists and a handful of historians who have been trying to debunk the erstwhile established fact of the transmigration of the Aryans. I will recommend to these skeptics, the relevant web site of ASI for these latter day excavations http://asi.nic.in/asi_exca_imp_gujarat.asp. ASI which makes no such claims.

Whereas, copious written and Archaeological proofs of the existence of IVC spanning over three millenniums exist even today, there is not even a shred of similar proof of the legendary Vedic Aryan civilization which flourished thereafter; the unscripted literature, (For lack of a written script), is supposed to have survived orally for a millennium, before being reduced to writing around 600 BC.

A detailed study of the findings of the Archaeological sites will lead to the following conclusions :

(a) The IVC were not conversant with iron technology even as late as 1500 BC and were still using copper and bronze tools and making artifacts from these metals.

(b) The seals of the period were still being written in the same script as before.

(c) Carbon dating, firmly establishes the dating of excavated artifacts as between 3000 to 1500 BC.

(d) No mention of these sites are found in the Vedas or the Upanishads.

(e) IVC seals depict a creature we call unicorn bulls, mistaken as horses by some eager diggers, out to prove that Aryans were indigenous to India.

The word ‘Arya’ was used by the Indic people of the Vedic period in India. to refer to a geographic location known as Aryavarta, where Indo-Aryan culture flourished.
(Gopal Madan, 1990, ‘India through the ages’, Publication Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India. p. 70.).

The closely related Persian people used the same term as an ethnic label for themselves in the Avesta scriptures, and the word forms the etymological source of the country Iran. (Mallory 1991, p. 125).

It is difficult to understand how the word Hindu, coined by Persians in the 7th century BC, got hitched to a culture and oral literature at least a thousand years older ! Even if the existence of a Dravidian IVC culture is ignored, there is no Hindu connection to the origin of the Vedic Culture.

Given the mass of evidence, only a small part of which has been enumerated above, should one ask for the restoration of the Dravidian Institutions and culture of the IVC after destroying everything Vedic-Aryan? Preposterous? Yes, most definitely.

How logical is, then, the painstaking efforts of the Hindu Brigade under the encouragement of the Parivar, to reverse History, by listing destroyed so called Hindu shrines, with shrill calls for rebuilding all real or imaginary Hindu temples/shrines after destruction of the present Muslim monuments?

Samuel Dhar is an Army Engineer officer, who took premature retirement 28 years ago to practise as an engineering consultant, specialising in use of polymers in constructions. He has authored scores of Articles and book on philosophy, theology and Nationalism. He also has a collection of poetry. His Blog site, “Samuel’s World” as well as Sainik Darpan, has over 120 articles.

By Pallava Bagla

NEW DELHI: What makes the Kailash Parbat, the Ram Setu and the Kedarnath temple such hallowed places? Scientists, believe it is the unique geological locations where they are situated that makes them stunning and worthy of veneration.

Kailash Parbat made of shale rocks resembles a Shiva Lingam; Ram Setu connects India to Sri Lanka and visible from space is a unique set of coral islands; while Kedarnath temple that withstood the 2013 flash floods sits on an unstable glacial moraine, where usually nothing would survive.

Interestingly scientists now also believe that pilgrimages to such diverse regions are a way of unification of the highly diverse cultures of India, which they think has ‘brought about a cross-fertilisation of thoughts’.

Writing about these unique sites, Kharag Singh Valdiya, a highly-regarded geologist and former vice chancellor of Kumoun University, Nanital, says, “Wandering sages and saints in ancient India (who) were unable to unravel the mystery of their origin and regarding them to be nature’s singular rather fantastic handiwork, imparted to them an altogether new meaning by investing them with the aura of divinity.”

When it is difficult to explain certain natural phenomenon with the existing knowledge humans often try to associate with divinity.

The much-venerated Om Parbat situated on the tri-junction of India-Tibet and Nepal when viewed from a distance gives the perfect impression of the letter ‘OM’ including the rightly placed dot.

Valdiya explains the Om Parbat is made up of “rocks folded twice in manner that the depressions within the arms of the overturned folds are filled round the year with ice and snow”, giving rise to geological calligraphy depicting the venerated Hindu word ‘OM’.

Incidentally, the 6,191-m-high peak, on whose face the letter ‘OM’ is etched, is made of rocks that bear lots of fossils, scientifically that means that millions of years ago the rocks were submerged under the sea, like most of the Himalayas were when the Indian plate was still drifting northwards.

The Amarnath cave in Jammu Kashmir, another big pilgrimage spot, houses a Shiva lingam made of ice, Valdiya says it is nothing but a “spectacular ice stalagmite”. This is very rare formation since water has to drip down from the roof and then freeze and the temperature has to be just right for a ‘lingam’ like structure to be formed. For most part of the year, the cave entrance is covered with snow.

Valdiya says “how can one not be impressed, if not awed by this geological marvel”. About 600,000 people visit this sacred site for the Hindus situated at an altitude of 3888 m even though the trek is arduous. It mesmerises the young and the old.

In southern India, the Ram Setu and the associated Rameshwaram Temple both are scared sites. The presence of a ‘Ram Setu’ which suggests a unified geology of India and the island of Sri Lanka. It is nothing but a unique set of coral islands that connect the two neighbours.

Legend has it that Lord Rama used this coral formation to cross over with his army when he invaded Lanka in search of his wife Sita who was abducted by Ravana.

Valdiya says this region is geologically singular, as “it is well known that corals grow in warm waters, shallow enough to be illuminated by sunlight. The sea-level rise brought submergence of the coral islands that once were close to the surface of sea and exposed to atmosphere”.

The Mount Kailash an imposing dome considered to be the abode of Lord Shiva is situated just north of the point where the massive Indian continental plate collides into the Eurasian plate.

The home of Lord Shiva has been formed it seems because the Indian plate has buckled up says Valdiya who adds that the lingam in the centre surrounded by the circular depression with a ring of hills resembling a ‘yoni’.

This constant pulling and tugging through plate tectonics or the movement of continents over geological times give this region a unique geological past and may be that is why sages of ancient times gave it a venerated status. The scenic beauty here is also stunning especially on a full moon night.

Writing in the latest issue of the best known Indian science journal Current Science Valdiya says “perusing through the map showing the locations of the 12 jyotirlings established in the ‘Purana’ times, two facts emerge, they are located in all parts of the Indian sub-continent, reaching out to all ethnic groups living in the country ‘Bharatvarsh’. Their situations happen to be of great geodynamic significance, particularly related to the Indian landmass”.

Valdiya summarises that the “leading lights of the society must have realised that only spectacular features, particularly located in in picturesque places can attract people, even those who are non-believers and agnostics. The geological marvels or wonders were thus chosen as seats (dham) of Lord Shiva, the most loved god of those times and even now”. From Somnath in the west to Badrinath in the north to Rameshwaram in the south, all are located at unique geological locations.

Unique flood plain geology is home to the Kumbh mela that takes place in Allahabad at the Sangam. It is believed the Kumbh mela is the single largest congregation of human beings on earth to take place at a single location.

In 2013 it was estimated that 120 million people gathered on the sandy banks where two mighty rivers Ganga and Yamuna meet, while legend has it that the mythical river Saraswati also mingles here making the waters highly venerated.

The Kumbh mela in times gone by offered people a specific venue at a time pre-decided 12 years ahead to plan their travel congregate, network and learn from each other. A modern day conference one could say.

Valdiya who now works at the top scientific institution the Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Bengaluru, says “one may dismiss the ‘Puranas’ and the epics such as Mahabharat as works of fiction. But one cannot deny that geological marvels regarded or designated as shrines are indeed located precisely where these ancient texts describe, the narratives perfectly matching with the reality”.

The role of undertaking pilgrimages has also been given a modern scientific rational by Valdiya in his analysis he says, “The idea behind the practice of visiting shrines was to persuade and spur pilgrims and travellers to know people who live in different terrains, have different lifestyles… who observed different socio-cultural practices. The pilgrims as they criss-crossed the country… presumably may have been a movement to promote the idea of one nation-one India.”

Indeed this mapping of spectacular geology with locations of scared Hindu sites offers a new understanding of what makes India so very accommodative and inclusive.