A Practical Indian Philosophy

Introduction

        1. The focus of this Selection is on the value of Sanaatana Dharma and how any individual of any religion can make use of this Selection today. Conversion being not the intent behind this Selection, anyone can benefit from reading this Selection. If one does not subscribe to the ancient Indian heritage one needs an open mind to explore into and experiment with what may appear as beyond the limitation of one’s beliefs. One also needs to treat these four ancient Indian premises as a possibility. Firstly, he can substitute in his mind the words ‘a teacher’ for all gods, goddesses, and Incarnations of God as Shree Raama and Shree Krishna were. This is because no one has the power to insult or hurt God by any name. God is in the name by which a man has called Him from before any religion came into being. As experienced by many, God responds to our attitude towards Him in that name. Second, God teaches His own religion love to all, to practise from our birth and to live in it for life. Therefore, any belief or practice of any religion, including Hinduism, that motivates thought, speech and action otherwise than by benevolence and love is not the true part of that religion. Third, we cannot take away from a man’s mind his concept of God as a human being of majestic attributes in the manner the man loves to visualize Him, to believe in Him with conviction as merciful for his succour. If necessary, he mentally disregards his Holy Book in this direct relationship with God. Yet the science of the mind empowered to its limitlessness is available for learning by followers of every religion if they are interested. The tips and their rationale that Tulsidas offers to receive that mind are for all because the source of power is the only God that there is of all religions. The tips need understanding and self-discipline and after that can be followed by all within the core of every religion in daily life.

Fourth, the rishis had no earlier tradition of beliefs to build upon, or change or reject. The rishis started with a purified heart and intellect and a clean slate. They had no earlier revelations but only what they were blessed with. They had observation and alertness to the repetition of the lesson from variety of other's or their own experiences that they respected. Observation over generations of lessons of others or their own experiences was their tool for research, discovery and verification of truths. For the rishis no religion as we know it today existed to inhibit their free research and experimentation for a life of fulfilment of all human beings across all man made barriers that all religions have become today. Barriers are the result of religious leaders making us believe in them and the followers practising them over time. Religions do not seem to make all God's children into one human family in which each member has his own ideas about and path to God but all based on love for all members of God's family

Sanaatana Dharma began in ancient India. The understanding and living in Sanaatana Dharma was so simple that even the illiterate masses could profit from it. The value of Sanaatana Dharma was demonstrated by the prosperity and enlightenment of the people of the Indian subcontinent for thousands of years. This made the Indian subcontinent one of the richest parts of the world for all the people, including those who came from outside. (See Appendix and Appendix 2.) The principles of Sanaatana Dharma are taken up in the chapter on the Philosophy of the Shree Raamacharita Maanasa and the simple methods for their daily use are in Section III of this Selection.

        2. The long prosperity of the Indian subcontinent  was possible because Indian rishis realized that the mind was greater than its most scintillating product that could ever be produced to overwhelm man. This realization made the rishis concentrate upon the working of the mind as the only equipment man had for his supremacy over his environment and situations. They concentrated on finding out how the mind obstructed the flow of the cosmic energy in us to make us weak, diseased and miserable. They concentrated on how to prevent this. Their discoveries following this search are summed up as Sanaatana Dharma. These discoveries established a methodology for receiving a mind empowered to its limitlessness that was one with God. This practical philosophical concept is called Advaita of Vedanta.

The rishis discovered that a purified mind became one with aatmaa or our reality, and therefore one with God. So, they studied what made the mind impure and in that the role of the five senses and six passions in the power of the mind. What polluted the mind? How to purify it and what were the signs of a purified mind? What gave it strength? How to tap that source of strength? Their research and repetitive experiments showed that the source of the limitless power of the mind was in understanding and living in eternal verities revealed to rishis. Therefore, they left behind for the use of humanity the methodology for receiving a purified and empowered mind.  This mind one with the cosmos ensured freedom from misery in all its forms, secured prosperity through living in amity of oneness of all and elimination of need for violence.  Anyone can advantageously experiment with rishis' simple methodology after understanding its basis. That basis is Sanaatana or eternal and for humanity. It is generally recognized that we do not use our mind to its full potential today. Even though we have made great scientific and technological achievements, billions in the world live in suffering and misery. We can overcome misery by following the eternal verities. This need not retard our scientific progress only for cure of some diseases and a little comfort and control over environment.

        3. After Great Britain ceased to be an importer of Indian handicrafts and manufacture with the advent of the machine age and became an exporter in the beginning of the nineteenth century, it needed India as a market. In addition, it needed absolute loyalty of the Indian people to strengthen its rule over the subcontinent. For both Great Britain had to wipe out the memory of the above secret of empowering our mind for Indians’ prosperous self-sufficiency and faith in their traditions which brought it about. As an instrument to that end, the British created myths such as that the Aryans from outside invaded India. Another was that there was no evidence of any Indian religion or culture before the Buddha. The only evidence of earlier culture and religion was the archeological ruins at Harappa and Mohenjo Daro in North West of the subcontinent now in Pakistan. The ruins showed that Indian religion believed in phallus worship. Besides other means, the British eliminated Sanskrit from education except in a name. Sanskrit was the link with all that was inwardly empowering and worthwhile in Indian heritage. The British forced the English language and an alien culture and a change in thinking. It was a conversion of the mind that was more disastrous for India than any change of religion could be.

        4.  Without adopting these changes, to earn a living became difficult for the class of people who were traditionally a part of administration, comprised all professions and had to teach and to set an example for the country. This educated leadership of the people forgot, became ignorant of their ancient values and acquired an alien mind-set all round. (See Glossary) The leaders transmitted and disseminated this ignorance and alien mind-set for many generations. In just a century, the British impoverished the Indian people materially and leaders of Indian society mentally and spiritually. A mind-set without faith in practically everything worthwhile in ancient heritage became pervasive in the educated classes.

       5. Even today, many educated Indians question the value of faith and treat Sanaatana Dharma as a fossil and some even take pride in not believing in God or religion. However, the masses of India still live in its principles that strengthen faith by the freedom to think and ask benevolent and purposeful basic questions. They await a leader like Mahatma Gandhi, who was a true example to show what power one received to accomplish when one lived in Sanaatana principles. He achieved what many considered impossible, namely, an India independent of British rule. He showed that Sanaatana Dharma was not lost in ancient India but was very much vibrant today but in the minds unsullied by modern education. Anyone could live by Sanaatana principles to receive the empowered mind to reach the greatness that Mahatma Gandhi did.

        6.  To receive this empowered mind, one need not become a rishi or a saint or observe any of the visible religious practices followed by many Hindus today. In fact, anyone can live by the principles of Sanaatana Dharma without a clash with one's avowed religion or disturbing one's vocation, family, time schedule, or any other aspect of life. This is because, in a nutshell, it is to understand that regardless of one's religion a pure mind is one with God and receives unasked His power. We have to know that passions and adverse memories pollute our mind. We must bury the past and live in the present. The law of Karma teaches us to create our good fortune. That is why this most precious law is the foundation of all religions. We craft our good fortune in this manner. First we  forget the good we did to others and the hurt others did to us. We have to remember the good others did to us and the hurt we did to others. This selective history and positive and healthy memory purifies our mind and helps pursuing our resolve to live in the present free from errors. It gets rid of useless history that so far failed to achieve its purpose of existence that was everlasting peace. For a path free from error, we have to be alert and maintain a benevolent motive and purpose behind our thought, word and deed. As a minimum it is hurt no one, help all, and treat all as one with ourselves. In addition, rishis prescribed practical methods and disciplines for making use of their discoveries.

Tulaseedaasa was a great reformer. He put aside all beliefs, traditions and practices that led from old times to what we see as visible Hinduism today. He gives us simple tips in his Raamaayana to make us fit to receive a mind of limitless power. People benefit unknowingly from using tips in their day-to-day life. That is why Tulaseedasa’s  Raamaayana is the scripture that is being read or heard by the largest number of people for five centuries in India. The focus of the following pages is on practicality. We can benefit from the suggestions that Tulaseedasa’s  Raamaayana or Shree Raamacharita Maanasa offers as a method or we can ourselves devise that method that secures a purified mind.

       7.  A little knowledge of the importance, which ancient India gave to some ideas, helps us. After inventing the numerals, the concept of zero, advance in mathematics and in sciences, the rishis decided that the mind, which produced all, was more important than its products. So, the solution to man’s only problem, misery in its myriad forms, lay not in products but in their producer, namely, the mind empowered to its limitlessness. For the rishis, a mind was semi-scientific if it probed only superficially into things outside us and not deeply into what went on in our mind.  The rishis' research into what empowered and what weakened our mind was unique. Their methodology was simple for all to follow and receive an empowered mind for a life free from fear and discord. Their methodology and its rationale for our conviction need a probe again today for empowering our national mind with which to regain in this age of technology our old world leadership before we yielded this mind to weak alien mind by the British educational system till today.

        8.  Ancient India insisted on the right to basic and limitless but purposeful or right questioning. There is therefore no final authority, a holy book, an arbiter or institution in ancient Indian tradition, except our own purified mind. There were gurus and spiritually advanced persons with divine vision who could demonstrate physically what the limitation of words could not convey. Association with them in voluntary gatherings was known as satyasanga or the company of the truth. Yet this right to question was subject to benevolence of the purpose behind a question. This purpose eliminates trivialities and an uncontrolled or egoistic or malevolent intellect. It shows up the unhealthy mental intent in fruitless arguments. All this retards advancement. For example, rishis discouraged all questions about the dual, good and bad nature of the world that we could not solve or about death and thereafter that could not serve any immediate purpose. The exception was to understand the use of the law of karma as the explanation of dualities in life and consequences in a rebirth on the earth.

        Thanks to the ignorance about all religions that our educational system continues for the last over seven generations and our alien culture, in a land of the tradition of satyasanga, or open forum discussion, religion is not a topic for conversation in polite society for over a century. Where it is talked about, it is exchange of thought without knowing any religion. It is based on western information that is often misunderstood. It is mere words because it is without experience and so does not convey the faith and spirit behind ancient knowledge. For example in India, dharma, Sanaatana  Dharma, religion, follower of a religion, the way of his life and the philosophy of a religion are known for millenniums as six distinct and definable entities. Very few among the educated today know this basic distinquishing premise and very few have a clear concept of God before they talk about religion. Again elementary concepts such as aatmaa as distinct from the western concept of soul are not known to many. Does aatmaa that is God in us as an expression of his nature of omnipresence (or sarvavyaapaktaa) need shaanti or peace? If not, one wonders why one prays for shaanti for the aatmaa of a departed loved one. We were made to lose by the British the habit to ask basic but purposeful questions that was our heritage. This was because the Christian missionaries were not equipped to answer the simple question by a rustic why they worshipped the Son of God and not God Himself because their books showed the picture of Jesus but not that of God. For example, what was Mahatma Gandhi’s source of power? Why all the Indian people did not become Muslims or Christians? Why alien Muslims adopted India as their homeland to prosper with infidel Hindus and the British did not The British lost their eminence by not becoming equal with Indians as alien Muslims became. The only aliens ever to leave India were the British to become a second rate country in the West instead of leading it.

We sometimes forget that merely remembering the text is not knowledge of our religion. Knowledge comes from living by the text. So, in our ignorance we defend indefensible misguided followers, particularly in our past, as if we are defending their religions. We are hurt if one criticizes the incorrect conduct of our historical co-religionists because we are blind to the reality that a true follower of a religion is a rarity in all religions. A misguided follower is, however, a common feature of all religions. We are not taught the ABC of any religion or its universal principles that give value to all virtues, in our schools and colleges. Without living by the text or by oral tradition verifiable for truth, our ignorance is colossal. This ignorance caused the havoc that we see in in social and political aspects in our life today that we cannot defend. 

        9.  Indian rishis concentrated on man as the center of his universe. Rishis discovered that human society and the individual had only one common problem - misery in its myriad forms. Rishis discovered that the solution to this problem was knowing man as man first. This search led them to the discovery of man's reality. This reality could be only intangible. This is because this was something basic and common to all men though each man was different from the other in his name, form and individuality. So, the ancient Indians gave pre-eminence to intangibility. In short, they discovered that there was knowledge beyond that which we receive through our five senses. The five senses could only tell us about the tangible and nothing about the intangible. So, rishis reached the knowledge, which is beyond and found it limitless and more powerful and materially productive than anything tangible was. They discovered the method for making use of that knowledge for human good. That was an ancient Indian discovery. In a way it was putting metaphysics to concrete use.

        10.  Apart from revelations, a method for discovery was simple yet needed trust in others' experience. This trust became the basis for respect of the knowledgeable, elders and for worthwhile oral tradition to make society humble and civilized. The method was this. A man's experience taught him a worthwhile lesson. He passed it to his son or his disciple. The son experienced the lesson but through a different set of circumstances. He passed it on to his son or disciple. The lesson was experienced by the third generation. This repetitive experience of the lesson made the lesson into a belief or a law. This methodology and the law became the basis for worthwhile oral traditions in ancient India. Some ancient Indians’ discoveries of science and of the spirit rested on the proof of observation. To test a discovery we had to experiment with it by living in it. Our experience confirmed the truth of the discovery. The lesson and not the circumstances, which varied for each individual, which led to the lesson, was important. That explains why in Indian tradition the credibility of the messenger, the details of facts and events and the dates of occurrences are not as important as historical evidence in the modern age is. It was the lesson in the oral tradition and not what led to it, its benefit for all and not for a few that was worthwhile to remember. These lessons became proverbs to test by experience. This respect for the lesson explains why St. Thomas, one of the disciples of Lord Jesus Christ was able to convert the learned class of Brahmins of Kerala to Christianity. Jesus’ message in the four Gospels and not the rest of the Bible that was written much later, that St. Thomas put across was a confirmation of the Sanaatana basic beliefs. The Brahmins could therefore believe that God had incarnated in Jesus Christ. 

        11.  Before writing was invented, all Indian discoveries, lessons and incidents were transmitted by voice. The Vedas are called Shrutis, or that which is heard. So, everything worthwhile became oral tradition. Many scriptures, including Raamaayana and Mahaabhaarata  were a part of this. Dates, authors, events became less important. Over time chaff could be added to tradition. Any tradition was chaff if it was contrary to one of the Sanaatana verities revealed to the rishis. This verity was Satchidaananda and Praymswaroopa nature of God that rishis attributed to Him. That is, Sat-ta or the Truth or the Reality, chit-ta or awareness or Knowledge and
aananda or bliss and the personification of love. It is doubtful if any religion would exclude any of these four elements from its concept of the nature of God. It is also doubtful if any man does not feel that he is real, he is aware or seeks knowledge, bliss and love. Common sense showed that any thought, belief, motivation, action or any word in any sacrosanct scripture that could run contrary to these four universal elements was not godly. It  should be rejected as chaff or incorrect accretion to the original truth. So the differentiation of caste, lowering the status of women and treating non observance of some religious practice or ritual or discipline as a sin, are all chaff. Hence, the ancient sages prescribed the use of a purified mind to apply this immutable yardstick for deciding right and wrong in a belief and its practice regardless of their scriptures or any other authority. This prescription ensures constant review and reform of beliefs for their restoration to their original purity, and secondly, it destroys bigotry that rests on chaff and not on the pure truth. This continuous rejection of chaff from its scriptures later than the Vedas is variously called evolution of Sanaatana Dharma or its vibrancy, or its perennial nature, or its freedom from orthodoxy or it not being a fixed religion but relevant to modern times. This prescription is repeated in the Geetaa 18:63.

        12.   Rishis never thought of their discoveries as their religion as we understand religion today. The discoveries were perennial verities or Sanaatana Dharma. They were for the experience of all men for their benefit. They were not the monopoly of any region or people. A man of any religion could experiment with them at any time or place because they were for all times and for all men. They were universal and completely scientific because they could be verified by the experiment of living in them. This experiment required certain qualifications. Those qualifications were basically control over oneself and one's mind to purify the mind. The discoveries relied on the intangible as the source of our limitless power of the mind. The experiment could not be a command performance as the experiments in physical sciences are. Experiments were not fruitful by one reluctant to self-discipline to purify the mind. With this reluctance the precious heritage remained untapped for our beneficial use. Self-control denies any quarter to selfishness, hence the reluctance today. Modern economics needs more than minimum selfishness. Moderns cannot imagine economics to rest on a little sacrifice in compassion by all that the rishis prescribed and generations of the masses practised for the continual prosperity of the Indian subcontinent. 

        13.  Our present Indian educational system continuing from pre independence and from almost a century and a half is cut off from the above heritage of trust and experience in the worthwhile because this education for earning a living eliminated Sanskrit language and teaching of the lessons the rishis left for our empowerment. Without Sanskrit we broke our link with the heritage. In the last few years, Sanskrit is being taught by opening colleges and universities. It needs to be integrated with Sanaatana Dharma in local language and English for its knowledge by all as the knowledge of seven other religions for exchange of informed thought for integration of all followers into one  single spirituality in all true religions by their knowledge of all religions. So, the present educational system creates a mind-set, which is alien to our innate nature. (See Glossary) It is wholly directed towards the standard of living and not that of thinking. It provides us with physical sciences but not a completely scientific mind. Without this completely scientific mind we may get comfort but not continual bliss and also tend to become selfish and the society becomes divisive. Also, we are unable to harness our total mental potential for our fulfilment and a peaceful harmonious society. This alien mind-set rests on pure reason bereft of compassion for all. Reason puts aside faith in God on which all virtues rest, because the value of faith cannot be visually proved. So, reason makes "we" and “they" as its yardstick of values for its morality. It limits morality to "we." So, it interprets religions today to make them barriers and not as vehicles to bring people together in harmony. We secure harmony by concentrating on the core of all religions in humanness, compassion and love for all in God's creation. 

        14.  The other defect of this system of education is that it makes many of us educated rely only on tangible proof. It makes us rely on pure reason to the exclusion of experiment with the self. It excludes an experience of any person just because the person was not credible. We do not care to assess the value of the lesson from that experience to benefit from it. It makes us lose faith in the intangible as a reality worth attaining. It makes this mind reject the worthwhile oral tradition of India because without self-discipline and self-control, practically no ancient lesson could be shown to be fruitful. It makes us reject Raamaayana and  Mahaabhaarata and all scriptures because all were without historical basis. For this mind, they were only oral tradition or a collection of ideal characters for stories. This mind makes recorded history the basis of our knowledge of the past. It never asks basic questions to show that in the absence of the proof of the credibility of its author for testing by questioning, no history could prove that whatever it recorded in fact happened or that it contains the truth and nothing but the truth. It is invariably biased by not presenting the perspective of the vanquished. It can never be comprehensive. It cannot prove that nothing happened other than what it recorded. It cannot prove that all oral traditions were not true. 

        15.   The insistence on statistical proof and reliance only on the tangible in the present educational system destroyed the immensely precious knowledge of the cure of many diseases by herbs and mantra which even ordinary householders learnt with ease and dispensed gratis. For example, a disease was endemic in many parts of India long before the Englishman named it malaria. One almond steeped by mantra freed the Author from it for life in the endemic area of Delhi. The Author saw the bleeding haemorrhoids of his father and two uncles cured for life by a pill a day for forty days given gratis by a Muslim seller of crockery in Delhi. We can imagine the immensity of this loss when we think of the savings on hospitals and on research, and cruelty to animals in laboratories for many diseases curable in the past by herbs and mantra. These savings could provide food clothing and shelter to millions in India. 

        16.  The present system of education is based on incomplete knowledge of the working of the human mind. The rishis researched into the mind and discovered the role of the five senses and six passions in the mind. The six passions are Kaama (desire, particularly lust), Krodha (anger), Lobha (greed), Moha (the feeling of mine), Ahamkaara (pride) and Matsara (envy). The rishis realized the potential for danger in the overwhelming power of the senses and passions. These passions singly or in combination make the intellect perverse. Every incorrect thought, word or act and so all crimes can be directly traced to the intellect submitting to their power. So, the rishis prescribed for all students the brahmacharya discipline for the control of the mind over senses and passions for life. The overwhelming power of the senses and passions in a mind, which is not alert to control over them, among many other evils, makes the intellect diabolic to explode the atomic bomb. Such a mind makes economics a sophisticated science for satisfaction of excessive greed at the cost of the needy and poor. Such an uncontrolled mind asks questions to demolish benevolent beliefs in intangible truths. Its questions often have no constructive purpose or benevolent and selfless motivation of love of all for their happiness and peace for a harmonious society. This mind often ignores the human aspect of our life. For an uncontrolled mind, life is profit for the self and no one else. This mind today leads the powerful into crafting some malevolent aspects of globalization. 

        17.   We have each to probe into our mind or research into its working for us to gain from it. This probe has nothing to do with religion but everything to do with Dharma or our inalienable nature as a human being. We can do this probe only if we are convinced of the value of this research. In the absence of gurus of divine vision to demonstrate today the power of a purified mind, we have to fall back upon ancient Indian discoveries about the role of senses and passions. One of the discoveries is that a mind, which is in our control and free from the insidious overwhelming power of senses and passions is objective and empowered limitlessly. Having lost faith in ancient discoveries, the present system of education has no well known curriculum for this control. Therefore, at present no research is being done in the science of the mind with the awareness of these basics that is not inhibited by any particular religious concept. In the absence of the experience gained by a purified mind, some modern thinkers treat the mind as an instrument to aid the natural flow of cosmic energy. Contrary to this, the rishis discovered that the mind had to be eliminated for that flow to continue uninterrupted. When the ‘I’ or the mind ceases to be, it is God and His power that remain. Today therefore there is no training for receiving an empowered mind for benevolent pursuits of public good for all. A curriculum for mind control as well known as physics, mathematics and chemistry is not compulsory in any university today. 

        Some modern books on the science of the mind confuse aatmaa (soul) with the mind. (See Glossary) These books do not treat aatmaa as completely separate from the mind. The aatmaa is unaffected by what the mind thinks, does, suffers and enjoys. Without knowledge of how a mind is purified, without experience of a purified mind, and in addition, inhibited by beliefs in a particular religion, these modern thinkers do not attempt to go beyond the limitation of their Holy Book. A few books do not treat the soul as aatmaa or our reality one with Brahman that is the only Reality that there is and is called God with a million names. These books do not show the distinction of a mind from the aatmaa and how the intellect can align itself with the aatmaa to tap the limitless power of God through His miniature aspect in the aatmaa. The present system of education therefore does not appreciate the value of Sanaatana Dharma or perennial verities for man today. 

Incidentally, the concept of the use of faith for curing disease is known to modern West. The limitless prophylactic and curative capacity of the mind is not yet available to the west. This is because how the mind works is not known. Secondly, our mind is inhibited by some beliefs of religion. By an introspective life to link it with God, authors are able to suggest cures by meditating on prescribed affirmations. Perforce these affirmations have to be confined to the limit of the author’s understanding of his avowed faith. These tips work only for those who have reached somewhere near the level of the author himself. For others, they do not work. Against this, the understanding of the working of the mind frees us from all limitations of religious beliefs by our direct relationship with the one who cures all. We design this relationship with the one who cures all by faith in a pure mind through goodness and godliness that works for us.  This goodness is in the core of all religions and does not need any of the obligatory practices of all. So any man can live in goodness and receive a cure of disease and prevention of others and also a purified mind empowered to its limitlessness without giving up his avowed religion. The minions of his religion, however, make non-observance of visible religious practices sin to prevent him from living in universal goodness and receiving an empowered mind. This is the tragedy. 

        18.  The damage the educational system causes is that the educated mind often does not see reality and is lost in the attractions of the unreal. For example, virtues are valuable. Yet proof of the the value of any virtue is beyond the limit of our educational system that is almost wholly based upon reason and science. So it does not provide a course in values and their rationale for developing our conviction in them.for testing their usefulness for the benefit of society and us. Logic and science, the two pillars of our education, and tangible proof have no place in this course on values. This is because the value of any virtue cannot be proved tangibly by logic and science. Secondly, logic, science, laws and the state cannot protect the virtuous. These only punish the  offender. Without this convincing course in values, modern society educated in everything except values accepts incorrect means as inescapable and therefore normal to go ahead in life. So, excessive greed and lust are increasing in the most advanced sections of the modern Indian society. 

The British educational system made the educated in India ignorant of Sanaatana universal ethos of humanism that governed society of eight religions that included Sikhism in amity and brotherliness in lanes and by-lanes of India for at least three centuries when the British became powerful in 1857.Religions were intermingled in harmony for centuries in the soil and blood of India. This amity was the Indian base with a common objective of the welfare of all. The leadership of the Indian political movement at the time of independence comprised this ignorant but educated alien mind-set. The exceptions were Mahatma Gandhi, Abdul Kalam Azad, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan and his elder brother, Dr.Kahan Sahib and a few voiceless others. The effect of this ignorance of leadership was that on India’s independence the status quo ante bellum was not restored. In other words, the governance of Indian society of eight religions in amity with a single objective of the good of the followers of all religions by respect for each religion was taken away by introducing secularism in article 28(1) in the Indian Constitution. The State was made to treat all religions as irrelevant to state policy. And matters of the spirit and heart resting on God ceased to have relevance in governance. These educated constitution makers were blind to the reality of the all pervasive church in the secular West to teach character, virtues and morals that could stand only on faith in God through religion. Leaders did not see that in India this educational duty traditionally rested on the king or the state. These ignorant constitution makers ensured that it was not the duty of the state to provide facility for acquiring knowledge of one’s own and his neighbour’s religion for character building and better mutual understanding. The state could not revive the ancient royal patronage of religious discussions re-established by Akbar to spread knowledge of our heritage that brought prosperity to the sub continent. The ancient respect for worship of God in one’s own way and choice and the freedom of it became irrelevant to state policy. The spirit of Sanaatana universality in humanness and in godliness was denied state patronage for its encouragement because it was not understood as the base for the ethics, morality, spirituality and power of the subcontinent.

Aware of the need of the continuation of amity among followers of eight religions in India throughout his life, Mahatma Gandhi had insisted upon universal Sanaatana principles of humanness. This base of humanness treated all Indians as human beings first and last and never as divided by religions. Mahatma Gandhi lived in the Advaitic oneness of all religions. Instead of restoration of principles, the ignorant educated alien mind of leaders rejected Mahatma Gandhi along with his cherished Sanaatana principles on the eve of independence, divided the country and introduced the secular concept in the Constitution in its article 28(1). This alien mind-set denied society universal principle of faith in God and His worship by choice and the choice respected by the State because the state was nothing but the organized form of Indian society. The alien mind-set perpetuated its British-infused ignorance of Indian’s heritage in the generations of leadership to come. Secondly, this ignorant mind-set made society governed by the alien concept of political democracy where human beings ceased to be personification of love and compassion with faith in God. They became mere electoral statistics or just vote banks. Their human needs were disdainfully ignored by rulers as secondary to their selfish aim of securing political power for themselves.

Thirdly, secularism denied the state its duty to inculcate morals and ethics that arise invariably in each individual from his beliefs in his relationship with God. This is because that I should be good and loving is because I know that God will see to it that I am not harmed. No secular state can and has so far framed and enforced any law to protect the good. It can punish the criminal that hurts me but cannot prevent anyone from hurting me. Only God protects me. For securing God’s protection, I live in godliness. Thus this alien mind-set, took away the security of an Indian and the human quality from him in which he lived for millenniums. In the process, this ignorance destroyed in most of the educated value of all virtues as a necessity that millenniums had developed in Indians.

Today the country is full of these educated individuals with a million ideas of how to solve the problems we are facing. No one cares to realize that almost all problems are continuously arising because virtues prevent these problems from arising. Virtue is removed from us by our educated ignorance that obstinately refuses to restore its base. This universal base of virtue prevents problems from arising.  The source of virtue is our faith in God as the protector of the virtuous in the form of his religion. The educated refuse to accept it by continuing to swear by continuing to swear by article 28(1) of the Indian Constitution. This source of the virtue of universal oneness in universal humanness across all religions and yet common to all was India’s gift to humanity. It was called selflessness, non-violence, care and compassion, without any distinction of religions that numbered eight in India for centuries. This base was possible only by the firm faith based on knowledge of all religions that all religions were good and necessary for their followers and there was no such thing as the only religion or the superior religion. This Indian lesson that honoured followers of all religions was accepted by all the followers of eight religions for centuries. 

          19.  Thanks are due to the brilliance of the British mind. It converted the educated in India to make them what they are today -- a leadership ignorant of its base for that greatness that the country enjoyed for millenniums. The education that we are left with has now to be oriented to regaining the wealth left by our ancient ancestors for us. It has to be used for advance in communication in the country for its unity in universal principles underlying all religions, advance in science and technology and treating  every problem as a human problem from first to last. It is time the educated turned to regain what the British destroyed in him in just one century to impoverish the country -- the ancient Indian heritage.

This ignorant leadership did not provide in the Constitution for equal respect for all religions by knowing them first. The rejection of all religions, to be shunned by the State was provided in article 28(1) of the Constitution that did not allow study or knowledge of any religion and therefore not of comparative religions in any wholly or partly state financed institution. Thus ignorance that caused disharmony, poverty and powerlessness was enshrined in the Constitution. The educated Constitution makers were ignorant that spirituality was also our reach near God and the practical effort for it. So, this spirituality could be only one in all religions throuh following in practice God's religion love that is the only knowledge that He gave to every child that was born. That is why there is no religion that is not based on love as the common spirituality in all. The knowledge was made the Vedic ethos of commoners in India. Aliens reaching India found it exhilerating to jump into it. This was the basis for sub-continental harmony in the masse. Knowledge of the universal in the core of all religions by all also led to spirituality to make them one through virtue was banished for ever. No blame attaches to the Constitution makers because their minds ware unconsciously converted to blindness to reality by their generations of British education. This blindness unfortunately persists in all political parties and all fields of activity by the educated in acute and milder degrees because of continuation of the faithless British educational system. This alien mind-set broke up society. The broken society revolted against the misuse of secularism by the educated who were ignorant and therefore mean rulers of the day. The rulers ruled by western politics. They did not rule by Indian universal dharma that made the ruler and the ruled as one. This dharma the people knew and lived by. Politics separated the rulers from the ruled that was an antithesis of ancient oneness of both. The rulers used politics heartlessly and misused secularism in the animalistic game of power that made communities into vote banks. Unable to handle the aftermath of its own folly, this alien mind-set shrewdly misused secularism. Rejection by secularists of eight religions and their heritage of amity was the cause of revolt against misuse of secularism. This misuse led to burning of some members of communities in Gujrat in February 2002.

        A classic example of a mind alien to the universal or Sanaatana tradition not seeing the reality is this. It is an axiom of the age of reason that the State and the Church should be separate. This is translated as the State and Religion should be separate. In the context of India, it is incorrect because it is ignorance to treat Sanaatana Dharma as not more than a mere religion as religion is understood by the world today as a divisive institution. Only some of the beliefs of Sanaatana Dharma are practised by Hindus as religion today. The principles of Sanaatana Dharma are, however, the innate nature of man as man in his reality, such as oneness of the reality of all in all-inclusive God. This oneness results from love, which is the common precept of all religions. The earliest Sanaatana law is of karma on which the concept of sin and punishment is based in all religions. On this law too is based the Sanaatana concept of God as the personification of love for all His children that is common to all religions. Oneness is the basis for live and let live in all religions and so, for non-violence and for acceptance of all religions as good for their followers. No man can ever alienate himself except temporarily as an aberration from this Sanaatana nature of oneness, regardless of his avowed religion. So, no man can exist in any aspect of his life without living in his innate nature or Sanaatana Dharma. If one does not live in it continuously, at least he does some time, and if not in his dealings with many at least with his nearest and dearest ones. Just as misery is the consequence of not knowing our innate nature and not living in it, a people's politics becomes unscrupulous, bereft of values and corrupt when we alienate it from our innate human nature of oneness of Sanaatana Dharma. In India, therefore, to treat Sanaatana Dharma as separate from the State is ignorance and ruinous. So this ignorance  set a part of Gujrat in flames in early 2002.

        20.  There are many examples of the educated leadership not seeing reality in the country. One is the continuing British slavery that prevents a victim of a crime to pray for and receive timely justice. Police do not record his complaint and civil suits remain undecided for generations. Another is the construction of dams without first making arrangements for settling millions of people uprooted by the expanse of water. Another is surplus food in the country but food not reaching the poorest. Yet we import cheaper food from countries where agriculture is heavily subsidized. Another is insufficient resistance to the pressure of rich countries to override local interests, to cause misery to the people. It is only in the year 2002 that the Supreme Court freed its mind from the British divine sanctity of ‘innocent till proved guilty by evidence of witnesses.’ The court realized that for rape in India, the accused is guilty unless he can prove his innocence. For more than half a century the courts were ignorant of the significance of rape in our cultural heritage. The realization has still to dawn on the alien mind-set of the courts that self-immolation of a bride makes her in-laws guilty of demanding a dowry or mal-treatment of the bride unless they can prove their innocence. These examples show the power of the alien mind-set of the educated in India today. It is tied up in principles of economics, justice and law that are in many ways alien to India.

        21.  The first principle of Sanaatana Dharma is that all are one in their reality in God. If so, any discrimination, such as that of caste and gender, or religious differentiation in the Constitution and civil laws of any land on any grounds is against our innate nature of oneness of all. It is correct that though the reality may be one, no two men are alike in their personalities, attitudes, capacity and individuality. How can they be treated as one? The answer is to think, speak and act with the motive of the wellbeing of all. If some are wicked, we keep our distance but pray to God for change for their betterment. We punish the wicked by law but we do not take the law in our hands. Our economics has to provide all with work at a little sacrifice of our self-interest. This is because the reality is that every mouth born is with a mind and two hands and two feet to work and feed the mouth. These are the ways of living in Sanaatana Dharma by seeing reality in society. The state has to follow these Sanaatana laws, that is, equal for all, for fulfilling human destiny. 

        22.   If we understand this weakness of our education, we can become a bit free from its hold on us to explore beyond the limitation of the knowledge that we get from this education. For example, we can experiment with the lessons others with a heritage of oneness learnt from their experience. We can try to live for experiment in some Sanaatana verities in valuable oral traditions. We can listen to benefit from experiences of others without demanding a proof of their authenticity. We can have faith in selflessness as an instrument for our own advancement. 

        23.  Knowing the facts brought out in this chapter, the urgent need to regain that unity of 1200 years and its power among the educated Indians cannot be questioned. In national interest for a united society, knowledge must immediately replace ignorance of the core of all religions by a compulsory supplementary subject in all grades in all schools and optionally in colleges of all disciplines. One annual text book of eight chapters not exceeding equal length to each religion authored by scholars elected by each community will suffice. 

There are some apparently insignificant personal instances in the following pages, which show how the mind trained by this defective educational system fails to perceive the valuable lessons from these instances and how the uncontrolled mind of educated leadership of society continues to harm India. The relevance of Sanaatana Dharma and the need for its instant practical use become more pressing if we take into account some happenings in India during the last two centuries. A few incidents brought this aspect to the surface and deserved to be mentioned in the Selection.

        24.  To live in Advaitic Sanaatana Dharma, we have to treat the history of the last two millenniums of India as dead and buried with malice towards none. We need a fresh look that is uninhibited by present-day semi-scientific education, alien influence, prejudices of misinformed minds by distorted history of dates and events round a few on the centre of the stage being given unjustified importance over the living a life of amity in millions and obsession with expertise without a probe into the motivation behind it. Was the mind of the people of the Indian subcontinent static for millenniums for Sanaatana Dharma to survive vibrantly in the people unsullied by the alien culture till today? (See Appendix 2) If Sanaatana Dharma retarded progress, why did not India remain at the level of dark ages? If Sanaatana Dharma made the subcontinent poor why did it survive? Were not many foundations of modern science and technology laid down by the rishis and their successors who articulated Sanaatana Dharma? Is this Dharma averse to advancement through science? The answer is that Sanaatana Dharma is not, and did nothing of the kind. It led the subcontinent to world leadership with hurt to none. We have to think that if the mind empowered by Sanaatana Dharma achieved advancement in the past and sustained it for millenniums, can it not achieve it today? (See Appendix) Once we take stock of our educational system to see what we are learning and what we are missing today, we get ready to make a more intensive use of our mind and probe into our heritage of culture rising from eight religions in our country. We shall then use this system for what it can gain for us and expand it to bring to the surface the wealth that lies ignored and buried in our heritage, to use it to accelerate our advance with its help. For example, I am proud of my Urdu culture of birth in a region in which Delhi is situated. My pride is no different than that of the culture of language of a Punjabi or of any other region, regardless of whether he is a Muslim, Hindu or of another religion. Ignorant of our heritage, the leadership interpreted democracy as majoritarianism to treat Urdu as the language of the minority or Muslims. Urdu culture is a part of Indian diversity of our cultural heritage. 

        For an all-inclusive Indian multi-cultural society that we need, we may find that the subject matter of this Selection is not a fossil for an anthropologist or a pastime for old age but a matter for urgent thought and action today. To raise India to its deserved status, the study of this Selection will alert us early in our life to the practicality of receiving a mind empowered to its limitlessness. For that, we have to practise the universal tips that Tulaseedaasa provides us in the Shree Raamacharita Maanasa.


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