Culture

If Krishnadevaraya enjoyed a whole range of exalted honorifics like Sahitya Sangita Samarangana Sarvabhouma, Mooru Rayara Ganda, Hindu Samrajya Suratrana, Kannada Rajya Ramaa Ramana, and Andhra Bhoja, it was because he had earned them literally by his blood and sweat—not for him were tears. He was endowed with manliness in the truest sense of the word and thereby inspired it throughout his kingdom. He equally earned material wealth on an unprecedented scale and shared his munificence through his jaw-dropping generosity.

Some years ago, a reader wrote to me with an experience that he said vexed him. The relevant portion of his email is produced below:

…during a talk with a liberal friend of mine, regarding the MF Hussain episode…friend talked on the lines of what liberals usually speak i.e. Kamasutra, Khajuraho…But…his explanation that Brahma marrying his creation (daughter) Saraswati amounted to incest which according to him means Hinduism sanctifies such relationships…made me quite uncomfortable and disturbed.

Khajuraho, Raneh Falls, Madkhera, Deogarh

It was time to head to Khajuraho (from Bheda Ghat).

Kosambi finally gives his homemade add-salt-to-taste philosophy of how we should view ancient texts:

Kosambi launches into a polemic against Krishna, considering him as a real person, forgetting that he himself had cast doubts on the existence of Krishna in the first place. Kosambi spews venom against the acharya of the Gita (emphasis is mine):

Through the ages, in the writings of great thinkers and social commentators, we find a certain weakness for nostalgia. We often find passages that bemoan the fall in moral values in the present generation (as it applied to them) and how the days of the past were so much better.

After casting aspersions on the authenticity of the Great War, Kosambi goes on to examine the ethics of the Gita as if the war happened exactly as narrated by the Mahabharata (emphasis is mine):

A popular prayer from the Upanishads implores a movement from lies to truth, from darkness to brightness, and from death to eternal life (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 1.3.28). The second line of this prayer – तमसो मा ज्योतिर्गमय – is no doubt a metaphor, the darkness representing ignorance and brightness representing wisdom. Ignorance often results from laziness, and the word ‘tamas’ in Sanskrit captures all these shades of meaning – darkness, lethargy, ignorance, error, illusion, etc. Deepavali, in some sense, is victory over tamas.