The Hindu Culture: As Originally Founded

By Mrinal Bali

This book is for youngsters high school and up. For younger ages, see by the same author: The Swami and the Children, a fictional explanation of the Hindu culture narrated as a gripping story.

In the 4,000-plus years of the Hindu culture, humankind’s knowledge has advanced. Today’s high school student has more knowledge than all the founding sages of the Hindu culture combined.

For the culture to be accepted by the young, it must make rational sense to their knowledge. The Hindu culture does make rational sense to the modern young—if the culture is explained the way it was originally founded or, rather, discovered.

The Hindu culture was not founded but discovered. It was discovered by the same process by which our young learn science: observe nature, explain, test the explanation, and if the test fails, repeat the cycle. The young understand this process well, and will, therefore, understand the Hindu culture well because this is precisely the process that the sages of the Hindu culture followed.

What the sages sought was immortality, and that remains the paramount objective of the Hindu culture, but instead of beseeching unknown gods for immortality, as the rest of the world was doing and still does, the sages did something novel: they observed nature. The sages reasoned that If immortality was possible, nature must have created something immortal. If they could find it, perhaps they could emulate it and themselves become immortal.

The sages defined immortality as a state of no change—a state without a beginning, without an end, no birth, no death. They called the state Brahman (pronounced Bruhm-aa, n nasal). Atmaan and Om are the other two names for it.

Everywhere the sages looked, however, they found that the universe suffers ceaseless change. Today’s high school student, knowing the atom, would conclude this nature of the material universe in a minute. The sages took centuries.

When they didn’t find something that never changed, the sages then observed nature for something that changes but can be controlled and made unchanging. That brought them to the mind, the consciousness—the only creation without atoms and hence possible to make unchanging. The rest of the Hindu culture is the discovery of methods to make the mind unchanging and merge in Brahman. The book describes Patanjali's Yoga, the most popular of the methods for achieving Brahman.

Instead of teaching our young how the Hindu culture was discovered, we teach our young deity worship. The fact is that first came the culture. Our many deities came later. For example, Rama and Krishna were practitioners of a culture that already existed. The culture as originally founded has no deities. "Which is that one God? He is Brahman. They call him tyat (that)." (Brhad-arnyaka Upanisad)

The discovery of the Hindu culture is recorded in the original texts of the culture, the Vedas and their ancillaries such as the Upanisads. The texts are vast. The Rg Veda Samhita, one of the four Vedas, alone has 10,589 verses or mantras, and the process of discovery is scattered throughout the vast texts.

This book extracts the discovery of the culture from the vast texts and in short, to the point, simple yet captivating language, with extensive quotes from the original texts, narrates the Hindu culture for the modern young.

There is no finer legacy that a Hindu parent can bequeath to our children. This book is a must gift from every Hindu parent to his or her child.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mrinal Bali
• Release date: Mar 13, 2017
• ISBN: 9781532337055

Book preview

Copyright © 2017 by Neha Bali.

ISBN: 978-1-5323-3705-5

Thank you for downloading this East Rock book.

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Address queries on rights and permissions to the publisher East Rock, USA.

Digital edition published worldwide by East Rock, sole proprietor Neha Bali, Las Vegas, NV, USA.

Digital edition derived from the hardcover The Hindu Culture: A Clear and Concise Summary by Mrinal Bali, Copyright © 1997 by Mrinal Bali, ISBN 81-900850-0-X.

Also by Mrinal Bali

The Swami and the Children: A fictional explanation of the Hindu culture for youngsters.

For my daughter

Neha

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

Knowledge

Divine origins

Texts

Age

Challenges

QUEST FOR IMMORTALITY

Brahman

The Search

Ultimate destination

Only humans

Summary

HOW TO ACHIEVE BRAHMAN

Atmaan

Methods for achieving Brahman

Yoga

Common objective

Patanjali's yoga

Yama

Niyama

Asana

Pranayama

Pratyahara

Dharana

Dhyana

Samadhi

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

CLOSURE

SOURCES

AUTHOR

INTRODUCTION

The Hindu culture is just that—a culture. It is a way of life, not a religion.

First came the culture. Later came all the deities that Hindus today worship, such as Rama and Krishna. We will not debate their divinity. In this treatise, we stick to the facts. The fact is that Rama and Krishna were practitioners of a culture already existing. Repeat: first came the culture. Therefore, to really know the Hindu culture, we must study it as originally founded by the founding sages and recorded in the founding texts—the Vedas and their subtexts such as the Upanisads.

The texts are vast. The foremost Veda, the Rg Veda Samhita, alone has 10,589 mantras or verses. The basics of the Hindu culture are scattered all over the texts. That’s because the Hindu culture was not founded by any one sage but by many sages across many generations. The sages observed nature, contemplated on the observations, then experimented with methods by which to achieve the one paramount objective that the sages called Brahman, pronounced Brahmaa ending with the nasal sound of the n. Most Hindus ritually repeat the words Om and Atmaan without realizing, as you will see shortly, that Om and Atmaan are but different names for the same paramount objective—Brahman. By trial and error spanning generations, the sages honed their observations and perfected the methods by which to achieve Brahman. Read the texts and you can actually sense the maturing of the thinking as one generation built upon the experience of the generations past. The basics of the culture are thus scattered all over the vast texts.

From the vast texts, this short treatise extracts the basics of the culture and presents them in succinct form.

KNOWLEDGE

Humankind’s knowledge of nature has advanced over time. For a culture to continue to survive, it must make rational sense that fits our present knowledge. If it doesn’t, discard the culture. This book is for ages high school and up, by when you have sufficient knowledge to decide if the Hindu culture makes rational sense. If it doesn’t, discard the Hindu culture, delete this book, and send the author an e-mail for your money back.

DIVINE ORIGINS

Some ardent followers of the culture emphatically state that the Vedas were revealed to the founding sages of the culture by some God. Do not believe this. If you do, read no further and throw away this book, for it will not enlighten you.

Writes Jawaharlal