"Bagger Vance" & Doniger on the Gita

[Aditya, the Cheerful HIndu Skeptic]

Since this my second post of the day therefore I will not be able to respond
any  more on this issue but here is my take.

Bhadraiah Mallampalli <vaidix at HOTMAIL.COM> has written as follows without
referring to  my earlier message:

>4. As for censorship, government of any society has its reason to limit
>social unrest. Just because Rushdie and some book distributors want to make
>a quick buck, India doesn't have to suffer damage to life and property.
You cannot have a cake and eat it too.
My point was to state that India is one of the most repressive and
reprehensible  state as far as freedom of speech is concerned and to claim
otherwise and try to compare with US is hypocritical at best.  Record of
India is no better than that of Iran or Afghanistan in this matter.

Any writer has a right to make money as well as to freedom of speech. It is
people who damage property should be censored and controlled and not the
artists and writers. Maintenance of law of order has been the standard
excuse of all dictators including Hitler, Mussolini and Indira Gandhi.

>That was my favorite joint. As scholars we think everybody in the society
>reads our works and knows everything we do. It is far from true.

No rational scholar has that illusion and if you had one better get back to
real life.

>As for violence, has any US president apologized sitting on his knees at
>Hiroshima? I know Wendy Doniger will say Oppenhiemer is a gIta enthusiast.

That is where I disagree with Wendy since I am not a pacifist utopian like
her. Whether Oppenhiemer or some one else is gita enthusiast has to
relevance to the value of gita itself to any scholar.

No one has to apologize for any past acts of violence since the evolution of
human race is based on the survival of species which is mostly a  result of
violence and control of territories. No one remembers the vanquished in the
war howsoever just he/sahe may have been. Victors always write history and
demonize the losers. Even Ramayan was written to demonize Ravan who was in
fact more justified to fight against the invading forces of Ram.  A unbiased
study of Ramayan shows Ravan to have been a person of much higher moral
values than Ram who killed a Sudra and banished his flawless wife but we do
not give up worshiping Ram and building temples for him whether in Ayodhya
or other cities.
Has Ram or worshippers of Ram ever apologized to Ravan or his descendants?
Of course this question is only rhetorical since Ram and Ravan both are
fictional characters but my point is that an outdated apology does not serve
any purpose and cannot undo the past injustices.

As I had said in my earlier post, skepticism is the hallmark of Hinduism as
I see it since it does not have any established code book or unchallengeable
authority. Vedas were known as Shruti because if they were to be written
down they would become static and it is only the western Scholars who
resorted to writing down Vedas and in process destroyed the uniqueness of
Hinduism.  They distorted the character of Gita too by advertising  it as a
book attributed to god like the books of Kitabi religions.

I see no reason to get upset if some one challenges the writings in Gita or
Vedas or Ramayan or whatever else.




---
Yours sincerely,
Aditya Mishra
Please note my new Primary email: aditya at cheerful.com
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Random thought of the day:
        Spark's Sixth Rule for Managers: If a subordinate asks you a pertinent question, look at him as if he had lost his senses. When he looks down, paraphrase the question back at him.