On Sanskrit Street, in addition to passages and excerpts, I will be introducing some key concepts from Sanskrit that have come into contemporary life, sometimes incorrectly, as is the case with the word, "karma." For those who know me, this is perhaps one of my biggest "language pet peeves."
The substantive noun, karma, comes from the root Kri (the ri is a retroflexive "r"), which means <<to do>> or <<to make>>. As such, karma means <<the thing done/made>>. Period.
There is no further metaphysical quality to it. When one says that a bad thing happened because "I must have bad karma," actually is a nonsensical utterance, for a few reasons. For one, karma is not immediate justice meted out on a daily basis, but it is merely daily action. Secondly, you cannot HAVE good or bad karma, but you can do something that is considered to be good or bad. Karma is not something that you have, but rather it is that thing that you do.
Within Sanskrit-based philosophy and religion then, karma is used to designate the combined actions that one has done in life, during the entirety of one's lifetime, not just as a one-off happening. In other words, if you do one thing "bad," but one hundred things "good," it is a cumulative amount. You don't get stuck in the slow line at the grocery store because you cut someone off in your car on the way to the store.
On the level of a lifetime, then, it is a balance sheet of good deeds, or lack thereof. Specifically, karma then relates to one lifetime in succession to another one, and that balance sheet is also cumulative.
In the modern world, we like instant results, instant gratification, and the concept for that, instant karma, is likewise appealing to such a society. However, it is not so easy as to help a little old lady across the street in the morning to win the lottery that same evening, for example.
Karma is active participation in your life, throughout your entire life, and similar to the Ancient Greek notion of not saying whether you are "happy" right now or not, for that is not the sum total of your life and is thus premature or ephemeral, but rather, was your life a life lived of good deeds, resulting in a balance sheet of good karma? Karma, itself, however, is neither intrinsically good or evil/bad, but merely is what is done.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
I Am the Salt
The Chandogya Upanishad is perhaps one of the more well-known Upanishadic texts that has made its way into the western traditions of philosophy as well.
Upa-ni-shad, in Sanskrit literally means, to "be seated down in front" of the teacher. It was a face to face, catechism of sorts, in which the teacher, the acharya would face the pupil, the shishya, and they would engage in a dialectic, not unlike the Socratic Method of teaching.
The Upanishadic tradition was a significant movement from the Vedic sacrifice/oblation-based religion in that the kashatriyas, or the warrior/princely class were the main proponents. The Upanishads were an exegesis upon the Vedas, but began to move away from the priest caste of the Brahmins as the spiritual guides towards what would ultimately become Advaita Vedanta, or the non-dualism "end" of the Vedas, removing distinctions in a synthetic process. Before that came the Upanishads as a process of analysis.
The Bhagavad Gita is considered to be a product of this transformation by many, especially since the protagonist is Arjuna, a warrior-prince who engages in a lengthy dialogue with the godhead Krishna, his charioteer.
In the Chandogya, the shishya is Svetaketu, and the acharya is his father who is teaching him about the all-important phrase, "Tat Tvam Asi," which is usually translated as "that thou art" or "thou art that," with the emphasis being on whether "asi" or "art" is the subject or the predicate. That is another philosophical debate for a later time.
At one point, the father asks his son to place salt in water.
The salt "disappears." And, the father asks, "where is the salt?"
You can still taste the salt, but it is not "there."
Svetaketu is instructed to leave the bowl of water, which after Time, evaporates, and behold there is the salt.
The father makes the analogy that the salt was there all along, obviously, just as the Universal Atman, or Soul, has always been with the Individual Atman. It was false perception that there was ever a sundering.
To this, the father says, "Tat Tvam Asi."
I Am the Salt.
Upa-ni-shad, in Sanskrit literally means, to "be seated down in front" of the teacher. It was a face to face, catechism of sorts, in which the teacher, the acharya would face the pupil, the shishya, and they would engage in a dialectic, not unlike the Socratic Method of teaching.
The Upanishadic tradition was a significant movement from the Vedic sacrifice/oblation-based religion in that the kashatriyas, or the warrior/princely class were the main proponents. The Upanishads were an exegesis upon the Vedas, but began to move away from the priest caste of the Brahmins as the spiritual guides towards what would ultimately become Advaita Vedanta, or the non-dualism "end" of the Vedas, removing distinctions in a synthetic process. Before that came the Upanishads as a process of analysis.
The Bhagavad Gita is considered to be a product of this transformation by many, especially since the protagonist is Arjuna, a warrior-prince who engages in a lengthy dialogue with the godhead Krishna, his charioteer.
In the Chandogya, the shishya is Svetaketu, and the acharya is his father who is teaching him about the all-important phrase, "Tat Tvam Asi," which is usually translated as "that thou art" or "thou art that," with the emphasis being on whether "asi" or "art" is the subject or the predicate. That is another philosophical debate for a later time.
At one point, the father asks his son to place salt in water.
The salt "disappears." And, the father asks, "where is the salt?"
You can still taste the salt, but it is not "there."
Svetaketu is instructed to leave the bowl of water, which after Time, evaporates, and behold there is the salt.
The father makes the analogy that the salt was there all along, obviously, just as the Universal Atman, or Soul, has always been with the Individual Atman. It was false perception that there was ever a sundering.
To this, the father says, "Tat Tvam Asi."
I Am the Salt.
Friday, July 15, 2011
Like a Ship upon the Waters
Without going into too much detail, I have a contraption installed in my apartment that allows me to hang upside down on a bar, from the waist. If you have done Iyengar Yoga, you will know what I mean. If not, just bear with me.
The other day, there I was, hanging upside down like a bat in a belfry, and my young daughter comes into the room, and as kids do, bent over, put her head down on the yoga mat and looked at me through her legs and we had a "yoga-bonding" moment. As also the case with Iyengar Yoga, we use "props" such as wooden blocks, cloth belts, etc. to help get into the asanas, or postures more correctly.
On my wooden block, I have a verse from the Bhagavad Gita written in felt marker in Devanagari, the "Indian" script, so to be course about it.
My daughter asked me, "Papa, what do all these funny squiggles mean?"
I told her it was Sanskrit, read it and then translated it for her.
Transliterated, it is:
meaning:
When the mind is lead by the wandering senses,
Then one's understanding is borne away, as a ship blown about upon the waters.
"Ahhh," she said, "Sanskrit, I see, that sounds funny," as she giggled and rolled around on the yoga mat, during a rather good version of an adhomukhashvasana.
The other day, there I was, hanging upside down like a bat in a belfry, and my young daughter comes into the room, and as kids do, bent over, put her head down on the yoga mat and looked at me through her legs and we had a "yoga-bonding" moment. As also the case with Iyengar Yoga, we use "props" such as wooden blocks, cloth belts, etc. to help get into the asanas, or postures more correctly.
On my wooden block, I have a verse from the Bhagavad Gita written in felt marker in Devanagari, the "Indian" script, so to be course about it.
My daughter asked me, "Papa, what do all these funny squiggles mean?"
I told her it was Sanskrit, read it and then translated it for her.
Transliterated, it is:
indriyãnãm hi caratãm
yan mano 'nuvidhiyate
tadasya harati prajñãm
vãyur nãvam ivãmbhasi (2/67)
meaning:
When the mind is lead by the wandering senses,
Then one's understanding is borne away, as a ship blown about upon the waters.
"Ahhh," she said, "Sanskrit, I see, that sounds funny," as she giggled and rolled around on the yoga mat, during a rather good version of an adhomukhashvasana.
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Cessation of the Mind
atha yogãnushãsanam /1/
yogashcittavrttinirodah /2/
Now begins the exposition on Yoga /1/
Yoga is the cessation of the fluctuations of the Mind /2/
The first word "atha" should give one pause. Atha denotes a continuation, not an ex nihilo beginning. In other words, one does not jump into Yoga as he or she must be ready for it, mentally and physically. It is not merely something to pick up on a Sunday afternoon because you have nothing better to do, or you want to loose weight, or be seen carrying around a rolled-up yoga mat under your oxter (fancy Joyce word for armpit). Yoga is not a cure, it is a continued practice, a philosophy, a journey of a spiritual, physical, and mental discipline. Only after such preparation can Yoga begin to be a part of one's life.
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