The Cultural Exchange

When I was in my Class 5, if I remember right, I learnt in my history that the Aryans were the native Middle East or Farther East ppl. They took over India. Native Indians at that time were Dravidians. The Aryans drove the Dravidians to the southern part of the Nation and they occupied the Northern Part. Full stop the story.

I was really interested in this story and thought I could learn it more... Thats the time I was introduced to Max Muller (whom I would call as Mooksha Moolachariar) and his book on "the Sacred Book of the East", where he clearly states that Aryans had the book - the Rig veda, Indra refers to the God of Destruction, whom they worshipped and they drove away the Dravidians who were living in the Northern part of India.

Good one.

But one more controversial book that I read written by Swami Vivekananda wherein he says that the Mooksha Moolachariar is neither a Historian nor an Indian. How come his theory be accepted and being taught in schools.. His theory is basically intented to divide and rule India and take away the prestige of Vedas and other Scriptures out of India, by dis-associating it from the Home Land.

Following are the facts to support this:
(a) The word "Aryan" is a term coined by Mooksha Moolar and not in Vedas. There was no race called as an aryan race as proposed in vedas. Only once in Ramayana the term has been used to denote Rama (as the word arya means one who is high born or disciplined)

(b) The Aryans called the river Saraswathi (now extinct) and Ganga as the Holiest rivers. Had they been originally from middle-east or still farther, why would their scriptures refer to a place in India as being holy.

(c) Remember Mohenjo-daro and Harappa..The earliest civilisations in India.. Indus valley civilisations. Mooksha Moolar says that it belongs to India and has been devastated by the invaded Aryans. If so, how come that the city is originally constructed according to vedic principles. If Aryans brought in Vedas to India and Harappa was there at that time, then its clearly a contradiction to say that the existing Indus valley civilisation confirms with Vedic Principles.

and on and on.. Swami Vivekananda concludes that the Vedic tradition has its roots in India.

Still I want to know further on this and am reading.

Recently I came across a great cultural exchange.. around 1200 BC a battle being fought in the city of Kadesh (in Syria) between two Egyptian kings. The battle ended with a peace treaty and that treaty has been documented in a stone tablet... in that stone it is inscribed that 100 male and female gods of Iran are the witness to the treaty along with Yama, Varuna and Aswins.

I was stumped to hear that translation as it makes me very clear that there has been a cultural exchange (could be from there to here or from here to there).

Cannot conclude anything now on this.. but i am continuing my pursuit of seeking.

A Kick Start

Indian... Hindu... Punjabi... Sikh... Seth...Brahman... All these words are words for Identification. To locate a particular person.

But how far these words are relevant in current day's context? I really dont know the answer.

My cousin lives in Dubai and he is there for the past 30+ years. He went there when he was 23. He has no plans to return to India. All the more I would call him a Dubai citizen rather than an Indian. But whenever he visits my home, he doesnt seems to me like a foreigner. Like, I dont treat him like a foreigner. Not becoz hes my cousin. I hardly saw him 4 times in my life. Still he is born and brought up in India. This makes me feel that he still belong to the clan to which I belong.

So does it means that the place of birth matters? So if someone is born of a particular place, religion, caste, he belong to that? Or is that any kind of embracement that we do, which decides who we are? A cat is always a cat no matter how loud it tries to roar.

India is a country where every religion, caste is fixed upon birth. Even I was told that the so called Vedas speaks of the same thing.

The first qn that I need to answer myself, is that "who am I". I dont mean any philosophical qn. here. By default am I structured any way, am I configured already or am I too flexible enough to take the form that I want.

This blog of mine is an attempt to understand the History of India (I mean the cultural history), the mind-set of people, who are my so-called ancestors, what did they achieve, that they tried to communicate to us, to pass on the next generation, etc.

Any piece of info abt the Indian culture, that I feel attractive and not so normal, I am presenting it here.

Lets seek.