To understand Upanishads or any work of literature for that matter, it needs to adhere to certain norms and rules of literary representation.
Since the Upanishads violate most of those rules, they are a challenge to comprehension at one level.
But there is something worse than that with them.
To quote again the person, Lala Hardayal, who has perhaps best understood the Upanishads for what they are, they are nothing more than absurd treatises that represent spurious metaphysics of ancient India.
The early Buddhists and the Carvakas rightly pointed out the chief defects of the Vedas and Upanishads:
- They are tautological and use circular arguments (statements about Atman, Brahman etc.)
- They abound in inconsistencies and contradictions
- They are incoherent and needlessly repetitive
because of which these schools rejected the contents and philosophy of the Vedas and Upanishads
To add to these woes of the Upanishads, they are too vague and allegorical in narration, opening the door to all sorts of interpretations.
So people who go with reason, logic and and inquiring spirit, and would also like to hold works to a high intellectual standard, find nothing very deep or of high significance in the Upanishads.
No amounts of wish-washy and vapid lectures on the Upanishads does anything of note to change this reality
Sir, Your depth analysis is wonder to read, I have read the comments of krishnandhu at nirmukta. One thing is cleared, these kind of people (k.nandhu) first unscrew their consciousness and start their arguments if they are about to defend their Veda Upanishads, which is their secret means of fooling continuously of 1.2billion population. Further to worsen, Street by street, temple by temple, a open and legal method of blunting the awareness of common ignorant mass is staged daily in india. All media is corrupted by them.
ReplyDeleteHi Balan,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments and time you take to go thru my posts. The battle against this irrationality is a long and hard one.
Anything we do not comprehend is irrational!!!
DeleteWhat appears irrational to one is rational to another!
DeleteProblem is that there are more who cannot comprehend than otherwise
Not the normal 80:20 ratio but in this case 99:01
Rather than accept the fact, want to fight against it
You are quoting someone else to criticize something which you yourself can’t fathom. At the same time you are hyper defensive in receiving criticisms.
ReplyDeleteWhat should I think of you? A maniac!!!!!!
World is full of jokers !!!!
Raj,
DeleteDo not post meaningless and irrelevant comments. This is just one of my blog posts referring to the Vedas and Upanishads. There are quite a few others on this blog.
I try to respond to criticism and am not defensive about my views. But even to respond, the criticism should be framed properly and written in a way that it can be understood.
Rambling loose talk like the one by you cannot be really responded to.
The irrationality in the world is Abrahamic religions (Christianity, Islam and Judaism). They are violent by nature, inconsistent with each other, and absurd in their very core. They make believe that God is some angry old man with white beard lashing a whip. And man they keep fighting and fighting, wars after wars... dang!!!
ReplyDeleteUpanishads on the other hand explore the true nature of Brahman. The elegant principals of Dharma i.e. Karma, Punarjanma and Moksha were laid down by the Upanishads - any literate man will be able to tell you that. All Dharmic religions i.e. Sanatana Dharma, Jainism, Buddhism and Sikhism build on this.
I certainly don't blame you for being an intolerant Christian or Muslim because that's in the core teachings of Abraham. Dang one of the 10 commandments state that your God is a jealous God. How ridiculous can that get??? God save these people...
This logic has already been refuted athttp://nirmukta.com/2013/06/20/upanishads-and-the-poor-calibre-of-hindu-apologists/
DeleteAt least whatever you spoke above is better than worshipping snakes,cows,rats,trees etc.
DeleteInstead, you should have quoted here few eminent contradictions inherent in Upnishadas. Whether they are contradictory or it is the lack of comprehension on the part of people of your sort can only then be decided.
ReplyDeleteI understand you are a rationalist. I appreciate and admire your intention to point out 'Major faults of the Vedas and the Upanishads'.
ReplyDeleteRationally speaking, you most definitely should be able to write similar topics on:
'Major faults of the Bible, Old and New Testaments'
'Major faults of the Quran and Hadiths'
'Major faults of the Torah' etc.
Pure empirical analysis necessitates that your rational mind should be able to write just as eloquently and question the inherent irrationalities on these topics also. Looking forward to seeing them on your blog.
The day he publishes them he will be eliminiated by those religous bigots. Such is the tolerance of those people unlike our eastern religions. At least we are open to criticism ( ... there are religous bigots here also). Either way the worst infuence on the so called Hindu religion is Brahmins. They made all the religious edifices according to their whims and fancies. We should watch the firm "Water" by Deepa Mehta.
DeleteThanks for your appreciation of my work. Regarding your point about questioning other religions, while your question is valid, point is that this is already being done in many informed parts of the world. Responding to a similar comment by another responder I mentioned that I am reading some critical reviews of Islam and even offered to provide the sources of such critiques.
DeleteIn the West, there is a strong movement both critical and polemical, of attacking the Judaic religions (including Islam) and opposing its prejudices.
As an ex-Hindu and writing on an India-focused blog, I will not be adding much to that debate and initiative.
Despite the tolerance of Hindu intelligentsia to criticism of their religion and beliefs (which is a good thing), there is still a lot of bigotry in Hinduism to be exposed.
Many manifestations of Islam are surely more bigoted and repressive than Hinduism. But for India superstition-ridden Hinduism and its bigotry are a bigger problem.
I cannot say that I disagree with the point that Islam is more unforgiving of its opponents than any other faith. Each person has his or her own methods of outreach and there are always risks associated with it which every prudent and responsible person has to weigh and respond accordingly.
vedas are full of soma panam (drinking)and sacrifice ,these are all harm to humankind
ReplyDeletei try to veda as a historical sourses for us.for it gives a large amout of hisory
ReplyDeletei fully endorse the views of the author.upanishads are written in turgid incomprehensible language.they confuse the common man with abstract words like atma,parmatma, moksha,kaivalya which do not have any existence.
ReplyDeletevedas are not apouresheya,they are written by people for benediction of the cows,their agriculture, amin in war with asuras & of course for a liberal drinking of soma(wine) in every other verse of rigveda.
dayanand fooled & nisguided common folk by saying that vedas were repository of wisdom & knowledge,they were god written & infallible.
rigveda is neither history nor sociology but songs of the herdkeepers & warriors.
many of ideas(like evolution) given in the vedas are foolish & in direct conflict of science)