Sanskrit to be an elective subject in schools

[Michael J. Sweet]

In Message Sun,  9 Oct 1994 21:19:13 BST,
  Aditya Mishra <z900672a at bcfreenet.seflin.lib.fl.us> writes:

> Relation of Sanskrit to the modern day languages is like Latin
>to Italian. Sanskrit is essentially a dead language and the only country
>that has revived a dead language is Israel to make it an official
>language but Israel is a theocratic state with only one religion.
    Needless to say, none of these statements is true.  Sanskrit has a
continuous living tradition, and remains a spoken language among pandits and
others.  Hebrew also remained a living language of scholarship and religion,
and was revived as an everyday language by *secular* Zionists--religious
Jews opposed this profane use of the holy tongue.  Israel is a democratic
state with equal rights for Islam, Christianity, and other non-Jewish
religions; it is no more a "theocracy" than India.
                                                 Michael Sweet

Michael Sweet
University of Wisconsin--Madison
msweet at facstaff.wisc.edu