#Ancient Culture ( Samskaram ) of Bharatham-2.5 : Swami Krishnananda
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#OPINION : 20/01/2020 : 2032.
##Chapter 2: The Evolution of Culture (SAMSKARAM)-5.
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1.
Now, having taken note of the roots of human culture being connected with human needs, we have also to go a little deep into what these needs are. Cultures arise on account of the needs of people. The basic needs, of course, are very clear, as I mentioned: hunger and thirst, and security. You have to eat in order that you may live, and you have also to be protected from any kind of onslaught from outside.
Towards this end cultures move, but this is not a refined form of culture because this definition of culture limiting itself to bodily needs, physical survival, does not take into consideration the other needs of people, such as mind, feeling, understanding, and spirit. You may be happy when you are granted the freedom to physically live comfortably with all security that is required, but physical comfort and security does not touch the whole of human nature because we have other needs like self-respect, as I mentioned yesterday, which is not a physical necessity.
##You require to be recognised.
The asking for recognition is not a physical need, it is a need from the mental state of the person. The mind has a hunger, as the body also has a hunger. The mind asks for a peculiar diet of its own, as the physical body also asks for it. It aspires. The body has a need, but the mind has an aspiration. It longs for certain things in a realm which is not necessarily physical.
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2.
So culture becomes more and more refined when it becomes more and more psychological and rational. Tribal culture confines itself to purely physical needs, but higher culture takes into consideration the needs of the psyche because human aspiration, human longing, when it rises to a certain stage in evolution, begins to dream of possibilities, expectations, realisations, etc., beyond merely the physical level.
##These people are the philosophers.
Yesterday I touched this subject. A philosopher is a dreamer of the higher realms of experience rising above the limitations of the subject and the object, visualising some vast domain of attainment and achievement which rises above the circumscribed location of the perceiving subject and the world outside.
The world which is physical and social is also limited to that particular aspect only, and the human individual, the perceiver of the world, is limited in a different way. There is a possibility of rising above both these conditioning factors, subjective and objective. The mind dreams of universal possibility. It hopes to achieve a condition of living which may rise not only above the subjective and the objective sides of ordinary living, but may positively achieve a super-physical and super-individual reality above this world of physical and individual nature.
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3.
#In Bharatham, culture is said to have started from the time of the Vedas.
We must have heard that there is a group of scriptures called the Vedas. The Vedas, which are the scripture of the fundamental religion of Bharatham, consist of records left by persons who dreamt of realms above the Earth, visualised possibilities of experience and attainment far above the limitations of the human person.
Philosophically, there is the need to look above. I am mentioning again what I said yesterday that there are three ways of looking at things. We look within and look without and look above. We look within into our own selves as individuals, we look without at the world of society and nature, but we also look above into the starry heavens and wonder at the firmament of far-reaching potentialities and profundities. We would like to touch the stars and rise above the conditions of the world and of our own physical personality.
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4.
#It is said that there are two great wonders in this world: the starry heavens above and the moral law within.
##We cannot understand what the starry heavens are. They remain a mystery for us. What exactly is it that we are gazing at in a clear night sky?
###What are these that are twinkling before us? How are they hung up in mid-sky? How do they exist at all in that manner?
####That is a wonder for us. The other wonder is our own conscience saying that we must do the right thing. It may not be easy for us to know what exactly is the right thing, but we know very well that it is necessary to do the right thing.
#####The conscience will not tell us that the wrong thing should be done. Whether or not we know what is right and wrong, we at least know that it is good to be right.
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JAY HIND
JAY BHARATHAM
VANDHE MATHARAM
BHARAT MATHA KI JAY.
========================================================================
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
#OPINION : 20/01/2020 : 2032.
##Chapter 2: The Evolution of Culture (SAMSKARAM)-5.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1.
Now, having taken note of the roots of human culture being connected with human needs, we have also to go a little deep into what these needs are. Cultures arise on account of the needs of people. The basic needs, of course, are very clear, as I mentioned: hunger and thirst, and security. You have to eat in order that you may live, and you have also to be protected from any kind of onslaught from outside.
Towards this end cultures move, but this is not a refined form of culture because this definition of culture limiting itself to bodily needs, physical survival, does not take into consideration the other needs of people, such as mind, feeling, understanding, and spirit. You may be happy when you are granted the freedom to physically live comfortably with all security that is required, but physical comfort and security does not touch the whole of human nature because we have other needs like self-respect, as I mentioned yesterday, which is not a physical necessity.
##You require to be recognised.
The asking for recognition is not a physical need, it is a need from the mental state of the person. The mind has a hunger, as the body also has a hunger. The mind asks for a peculiar diet of its own, as the physical body also asks for it. It aspires. The body has a need, but the mind has an aspiration. It longs for certain things in a realm which is not necessarily physical.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2.
So culture becomes more and more refined when it becomes more and more psychological and rational. Tribal culture confines itself to purely physical needs, but higher culture takes into consideration the needs of the psyche because human aspiration, human longing, when it rises to a certain stage in evolution, begins to dream of possibilities, expectations, realisations, etc., beyond merely the physical level.
##These people are the philosophers.
Yesterday I touched this subject. A philosopher is a dreamer of the higher realms of experience rising above the limitations of the subject and the object, visualising some vast domain of attainment and achievement which rises above the circumscribed location of the perceiving subject and the world outside.
The world which is physical and social is also limited to that particular aspect only, and the human individual, the perceiver of the world, is limited in a different way. There is a possibility of rising above both these conditioning factors, subjective and objective. The mind dreams of universal possibility. It hopes to achieve a condition of living which may rise not only above the subjective and the objective sides of ordinary living, but may positively achieve a super-physical and super-individual reality above this world of physical and individual nature.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3.
#In Bharatham, culture is said to have started from the time of the Vedas.
We must have heard that there is a group of scriptures called the Vedas. The Vedas, which are the scripture of the fundamental religion of Bharatham, consist of records left by persons who dreamt of realms above the Earth, visualised possibilities of experience and attainment far above the limitations of the human person.
Philosophically, there is the need to look above. I am mentioning again what I said yesterday that there are three ways of looking at things. We look within and look without and look above. We look within into our own selves as individuals, we look without at the world of society and nature, but we also look above into the starry heavens and wonder at the firmament of far-reaching potentialities and profundities. We would like to touch the stars and rise above the conditions of the world and of our own physical personality.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4.
#It is said that there are two great wonders in this world: the starry heavens above and the moral law within.
##We cannot understand what the starry heavens are. They remain a mystery for us. What exactly is it that we are gazing at in a clear night sky?
###What are these that are twinkling before us? How are they hung up in mid-sky? How do they exist at all in that manner?
####That is a wonder for us. The other wonder is our own conscience saying that we must do the right thing. It may not be easy for us to know what exactly is the right thing, but we know very well that it is necessary to do the right thing.
#####The conscience will not tell us that the wrong thing should be done. Whether or not we know what is right and wrong, we at least know that it is good to be right.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
JAY HIND
JAY BHARATHAM
VANDHE MATHARAM
BHARAT MATHA KI JAY.
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