Egyptian

Published on 14th July, 2019, in Mid-day An ancient Egyptian tale, almost 3,000 years ago, tells the story of two brothers—Anpu and Bata. Anpu's wife was sexually attracted to Bata, who was young and handsome. But, Bata refused her sexual advances, which angered the wife, who told Anpu that his younger brother tried to rape her. In his anger, Anpu chases his brother, intent on killing him. Bata runs and prays to the sun god, Ra, to protect him. Because he is innocent, Ra diverts the river Nile, filled with crocodiles, to separate the two brothers. Bata, to prove his innocence, castrates himself and throws ..

Published on 12th August, 2017, on OutlookIndia.com . Sex is a natural reality. Marriage is a cultural requirement. And celibacy is simply an assumption. We have to keep these three ideas in mind while exploring the mythology of singlehood. In most mythologies around the world, the sky copulates with the earth to give rise to all living creatures. The firstborn, usually male, separates the two, and establishes dominion over the earth. We find this theme in Greek, Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Vedic and even Maori mythology. However, monotheistic mythologies have a problem with this theme. For, it suggests that creation needs two entities, not just the one. ..

Published on 4th May, 2017, on www.dailyo.in . The simple answer is, we can either be reborn (punar-janma) and experience life once again, or be liberated (moksha) from the cycle of rebirth (samsara). However, the answer is a bit more complex if we see it geographically and historically. Around the world, what happens after death can be divided into two schools. Those who believe you live only once and those who believe you live multiple lives. Those who believe you live only once have broadly three schools – those who believe death is the end, nothing else after that; those who believe after death you ..

Published on 15th March, 2017, on www.dailyo.in. While it is fashionable to say that all religions are the same, and so are all prayers, the fact is that Hindu prayers are very different from Christian and Muslim prayers, and also from Sikh, Buddhist and Jain. This is because prayers exist in a mythic worldview, and depending on the worldview, the nature of the prayer is different. For example, Buddhists and Jains do not have the concept of a single all-powerful God, that is found in Islam, Christianity and Sikhism, so naturally a Buddhist prayer is bound to be different from a Muslim or Sikh prayer. ..

Published on 22nd October, 2016, in Hindustan Times. Fact is everybody’s truth. Fiction is nobody’s truth. Myth is somebody’s truth. It’s a cultural truth, a religious truth, a nation’s truth, one that binds a community together by giving them a common worldview to function within. Science can tell you how the world functions, but only myth can tell you why it functions the way it does. The idea of God, for example, is a cultural truth: it is not part of Buddhism, Jainism, or secularism. Likewise, the idea of prophets makes no sense in the Hindu worldview. The idea of hero, villain and victim is ..

Published on 18th September, 2016, in Mid-day. In Greek mythology, there are many stories of homosexual love: where men love men, and women love women. Apollo falls in love with Hyacinthus, while his sister Artemis drives Callisto away when she lets a man make her pregnant. In Hindu mythology, we don’t find such stories. But we do find tales of transgenders: men turning into women, women turning into men. Vishnu becomes a damsel and Shiva becomes half-woman. So while Greek mythology reveals a comfort with queer sexuality (invisible feelings), Hindu mythology reveals a comfort with queer gender (visible body). There are Greek myths of transgenders, ..

Published on 17th May, 2015, in Mid-Day. In most courtrooms built in the colonial period, we see the image of a woman with a blindfold balancing scales in her arms. This is Lady Justice based on a Greek goddess described in Hesiod’s Theogony called Dike, daughter of Zeus, who is associated with human while her mother Themis is associated with divine justice. In art, she was shown bearing scales. Her Roman form, Justitia, was blindfolded. She was imagined as innocent looking, throttling the ugly Adikia (injustice) and beating her with a stick, or killing her with a sword. The story goes that she lived with ..