“Mythology is a subjective truth. Every culture imagines life a certain way.”
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Articles
From ‘makhan-chor’ to rebel icon, MP’s recasting of Krishna echoes Gujarat’s warrior tradition
Many Sanatani Hindus do not like the idea of Krishna, the beloved of women. They prefer Krishna, the warrior, admired by men. Krishna allows such interpretations because we are looking at a deity who has evolved over at least 2,000 years. …
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Articles
Legacy of Brahmi in Modern Languages
Why is the Ashokan script called the Brahmi script? Was it known so in Mauryan times? We do not know. Early scholars referred to it as “pin-man” script, then “Lat” script (from lathi, or staff, as the Ashokan pillars were known), “Indian Pali” and “Mauryan” scripts. …
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Articles
Stories Behind Diverse Calendars of India
India has many calendars; different communities use different calendars in different regions. Therefore, it is very difficult to create a single Indian calendar, even if it follows traditional rules…
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Articles
The Head On the Temple
On the top of many Hindu temples, one finds the image of a head looking down on the people below — his eyes protruding from its sockets, his mouth wide open, his tongue out. This is called the Kirtimukha, the Head of Glory, or Vajramukha, the Eternal Head…
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Articles
The Hindu Idea of Pilgrimage
Temples are becoming tourist spots. Festivals are becoming experience centres. Local priests are eager to provide customer delight. Politicians are figuring out ways to make profit by ensuring their people get lucrative contracts for hotels and restaurants. …
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Articles
The Mysterious Deaths of Bhakti Saints
The recurring motif of saints who challenge orthodoxy dying mysterious deaths, performing samadhi (voluntarily leaving their lives at a young age, as in the case of Gyandev), raises questions. …
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Articles
Dravidian Iron for the Aryan Horse
Colonial historians argued the ‘Aryan invasion theory’ that light-skinned chariot-riding people destroyed Harappan cities, conquered India, enslaved local dark-skinned people and created the caste system. To counter this, there was the ‘out of India’ theory popularised by many Brahmins, that Harappa was Vedic, that Aryans were originally Indians who migrated out of India, taking civilization to the world…
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Articles
Coil of Endless Serpents
Coiled serpents and inter-twined conjugal serpent pairs appear as sacred symbols on Hindu temple walls. They reflect sacred ideas from beyond the Vedic world, where communities venerated serpent groves, filled with termite mounds, which served as entrances to a subterranean world of magical beings — the Naga, serpents with hoods, multiple heads, and the magical ability to appear as humans…
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Articles
Why historians misunderstand myths — and why it matters
Most historians do not understand myths. They confuse it with fiction. Myths need to be distinguished from other kind of stories that shapes human culture…
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Articles
Myth-making in History Departments
Historians who refer to myth as ‘fiction’ do a great disservice to humanity. It reveals their inability to separate faith from different types of fiction: parables, propaganda, and fantasy. …
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Articles
Dalai Lama: Politics of reincarnation
The Dalai Lama plans to declare where he will be reincarnated in his next life. In other words, where his successor will be born. To the rational mind, this may sound like a bizarre proposition, but it has annoyed the Communist authorities in China…
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Articles
Ashoka’s Afterlife
Historians amplify the rational and secular aspects of Ashoka’s inscriptions, and play down the mythical elements, use of words like paraloka and swarga. These would indicate Ashoka’s need to perform ritual acts to ensure a positive fate in the afterlife…
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Articles
Cultural Significance of the Buffalo
Buffaloes are found in ponds, rivers, marshes, and wetlands meant for rice cultivation. Cows, on the other hand, prefer drier jungle areas. India has both dry jungles and wet river basins…
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Articles
I think of my Muslim lesbian and gay friends who are torn between faith, citizenship and sexual orientation. Who speaks for them? Why do activists who speak of Islamophobia not have problems with Islamic homophobia?…
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Articles
Vegetarianism Is Not About the Environment, But About Caste
You start deluding yourself that you are a kind person because you build a zoo to house animals that have been displaced by your industries, that destroyed their natural habitat, in the first place…