One of the chapters
that I remember reading in History class is the "Bhakti Movement"
between 8th and 12th centuries in India. During this time, India was at it is
peak of productivity in terms of religious exposition, philosophy, and
spirituality. The movement was made by three great saints, who in turn, founded
three interpretations of Hindu Philosophy - Advaita (monism) propounded by AdiSankara, Vishishtadvaita (qualified
monism) propounded by Ramanuja, and Dvaita (dualism) propounded by
Madhwacharya.
Though there are
numerous Gods depicted and worshipped within the umbrella of Hinduism,
fundamentally the Vedas (scriptures) emphasize that there is only one God and
he is the Creator (interestingly "theory of evolution" seems to be
weaved within the concept of a "Creator", as I mentioned in an
earlier post). With that as a given, various scholars since have tried to
understand the relationship between that one God and us humans by way of
interpreting the vedas and supplementary documents such as the upanishads
(appendix to vedas), ithihasas (epics), and puranas (mythologies).
Personally I feel
that this is the most distinct feature of Hinduism compared to most other
religions, where the focus is not just on how God wants humans to behave, but
more on what the relation between the two is. Rather than taking the "God
is the Creator" concept for granted, it tries to probe further - Who is
He? Is He the same as me? If not, how are He and I related? What makes Him a
Him and me a me?
In programmatic
terms, I would say that Hinduism focuses on the class hierarchy (sub-class,
super-class, abstract class) as well as interfaces (behavior of a class) while
others tend to elaborate only on the interfaces! You need to have a strong
foundation of your class hierarchy first before you can start extending the
behavior by means of interfaces.
While eminent
scholars over time have provided a number of interpretations what the vedas
describe as the relation between God and human, three are the most popular
enough to be in history text books. I have always held a simplistic
summarization of these three philosophies:
- Advaita says God is the same as human (in other words, God lives in humans or when humans die they merge back with God)
- Vishishtadvaita says humans are not the same as God, but by devotion throughout life, they can eventually become one with God after death (moksha)
- Dvaita says God and humans are always distinct and never the 'twain shall meet.
This suited me well
for the last 20 years. However, there is really no pizzazz in this explanation.
It sounds, well, as dull as a history textbook! Recently, I received an email
forwarded to me by my dad that provided a much better, more fun, and a more profound
definition. This was by Sri. Chandrasekharendra Saraswati (fondly called
Periayaval - not to be confused with Periyar - or the Elder One), who I
personally consider to be the last "true" saint that India has seen,
and who himself was the head of an Advaita institution.
He had an inimitable
quality of explaining complex philosophies in a way that commoners can
understand. He was down-to-earth, unassuming, and most importantly focused
purely on spirituality without getting into politics - a quality that no one
else seems to have nowadays.
Here goes his
definition (interpretation from Tamil to English by me) of the three
philosophies in the form of 3rd grade Math!!
According to
Advaita, the relationship between God and Human is like the relationship
between the side and perimeter of a square. Like how the perimeter of a square
is always four times the side, Advaita preaches that if you follow a proper
path, then you WILL reach God (or become one with God). There is no ambiguity
there.
In case of Dvaita,
the relationship between God and Human is like the relationship between
diameter and circumference of a circle. Unlike a square. the circumference is
PI times the diameter. The issue here is that PI is an irrational number and
cannot be accurately defined. Likewise, Dvaita says that no matter how much
humans try to be close to God or be one with God, it will not happen and that
there will always be a difference, however minute. The diameter is a whole
number in itself and the circumference is another whole number by itself, but
the relationship between the two cannot be defined absolutely. With this
established, Dvaita philosophy then goes into the details of the inequality of
the relationship and defines the various intermediary stages between God and
Human (called 'tAratamya'). This can be roughly translated into the precision
of PI.
Lastly,
Vishishtadvaita takes a midway (similar to Aristotle's Golden Mean). It says
that the relationship is like a square being perceived as a circle. By default,
Humans perceive their relationship to God as that of a circle's diameter and
circumference - that the two can never be the same. As they gain enlightenment
by devotion, the confusion is resolved and the "square" nature of the
relationship is revealed at which point, the enlightened person becomes one
with God. The thought here is that humans can become egoistic if they believe
that they are God (Advaita) and can get disillusioned or depressed if they
believe that they can never reach God (Dwaita) and hence a middle path is
proposed.
The analogy here is
that each individual has a distinct identity by default, but when they get into
a train, they all become "passengers" for the conductor, thereby
losing their individual identity and becoming a part of a bigger entity.
A simple, but
powerful explanation! What I love even more about this is that he leaves enough
room for the three schools of thought to claim superiority over others - an
apolitical person but with a perfect political speech!
