28 Thinkers On Indian Civilization: Swami Vivekananda

Prof.A.K. Kapoor

Contents of this unit

1) Introduction

2) The Vedic Civilization.

3) The Aryan Civilization.

4) The Indus Valley Civilization.

5) History of Swami Vivekananda.

6) Contribution of Swami Vivekananda On Indian Civilization.

7) Summary.

8) Conclusion.

Leaning Objective.

To understand the whole concept about indian civilization.
To understand composition of indian civilization i.e. (indus valley, vedic, aryan civilization).
To know about the contribution of swami vivekananda in the field of indian civilization.
To know the influence of indian civilization among the world.
To estimate the work done by swami vivekananda in the field of ancient indian society.

Thinkers on Indian Civilisation: Swami Vivekananda

Introduction.

Before starting with the contribution of swami Vivekananda in Indian civilization, we first need to know about the Indian civilization. Indian civilization is one of the most ancient civilizations of the world. It is known as the sindhu civilization or the Indus valley civilization or the Aryan civilization. Sometimes it is also referred as Vedic civilization. The Aryans kindled the lights of this civilization on the banks of the river Sindhu (Indus) in the northern India, thousands of years ago. Later, they helped spread it across some other parts of the country. The historians can’t ascertain the precise period when this great civilization flourished. The scholars differ on the period of its development. Even the origin of the Aryan race has been debatable. Some historians believe that the Aryans migrated from the north central Asia and settled in India. Some other historians contend that the Aryans have been the native of India. The story of Indian civilization symbolically represents the very evolution of humanity itself. From its early origins in the mists of time to modern avatar which it is assumed today, the cultural continuity of Indian civilization has never been disrupted. The reason for this unbroken continuity which makes India unique among world’s civilization is that, the eternal value which shaped our attitude to life have been diligently preserved, practical and handed down from generation to generation. Civilization is not to be understood merely as the outer façade of infrastructure and

Thinkers On Indian Civilization : Swami Vivekananda

material development. Culture is the very root of civilization and as long as the core culture is preserved, civilization continues to evolve and prosper. Swami Vivekananda has pointed out that every civilization or culture has a particular life centre, a dominant characteristics or trend. According to him the life centre of Indian culture is spiritually. By spirituality we meant a way of life oriented to the ultimate purpose or goal of life which is the realization of the supreme spirit or god. Indian civilization also deals or we can say depends on Vedic civilization or on Vedas or vedanta.

The Vedic Civilization.

The parts of the Vedic civilization have been composed between 2000b.c and 1000b.c. Vedas may there are four the Vedas are the oldest and most authorities scriptures of Hinduism. Most of the Indian civilization is based on vedas. All other scriptures are subordinate to them. They were not composed by anybody but were “revealed “to the rishis; hence they are also called ‘shruti’ that which is heard. The earlier veda.

Types of Vedas

Each of these has four divisions: Samhita, Brahmans, Aranyaka and Upanishads. Whereas, Samhita-this section is a collection of hymns addressed to various deities. Many of these hymns have deep mystical significance Brahmana-this portion deals with various rituals and also with moral principles. Aranyaka-this portion contains various meditations. Some of these meditations are mental recreations of external rituals. Upanishads-these are the records of the transcendental experiences gained by rishis by following different contemplative techniques. These experiences are actually revelation about atman, Brahman and other eternal, universal truths regarding the ultimate reality.
These eternal truths and principles of the spiritual world, lying scattered in the Upanishads were brought together and collided by Badarayan in the form of sutras or aphorisms in the 5th century B.C. These sutras known as Brahman sutras form the foundation of the system of philosophy known as vedanta-darshan.

Thus the term vedanta stands for three inter related things:

(a) upanishads collectively, which form the last and the most important parts of the vedas;

(b) the eternal truths and principles of the spiritual realm;

It is also called aryan civilization or Indus valley civilization. All these civilizations (Indus valley, sindhu, and aryan and vedic civilization) constitute Indian civilization.

The Aryan Civilization.

The term “Aryan” has had a history filled with controversy. The source of the English word Aryan comes from the Sanskrit word arya, which is the self-designation used by the Vedic Indic people who migrated into the Indian subcontinent about 1500 BCE. The Sanskrit term has a cognate in the Iranian word arya, which is also a self-designation. Both the Sanskrit and the Iranian terms descend from a form arya that was used by the Indo-Iranian tribes to refer to them, a tem which is also connected to the source of the country-name Iran, from a phrase meaning “kingdom of the Aryans”.

The Aryans were semi nomadic Nordic whites perhaps located originally on the steppes of southern Russia and central Asia, who spoke the parent language of the various indo European languages. Indo European people traditionally used “Aryan” both to denote a people, understood racially or ethnically, and the language group itself. The civilization introduced by Aryan people is called Aryan civilization.

Before the time of the Aryan migration into the Indian subcontinent, there was a highly developed civilization in ancient India known as the Indus valley civilization, which was located in what is Pakistan and northwest India today, on the fertile flood plain of the Indus River and its vicinity. By 1500 BC the Aryans migrated into the Indian subcontinent. Coming from central Asia, this large group of nomadic cattle herders crossed the Hindu kush mountains and came in contact with the Indus valley civilization. This was a large migration and used to be seen as an invasion, which was believed by some scholars to be behind the collapse of the Indus valley civilization; this hypothesis is not unanimously accepted today. The civilization introduced by Aryan people is called Aryan civilization and it is a part of Indian civilization. Then next is Indus valley civilization.

The Indus Valley Civilization

The Indus valley civilization (IVC) was a bronze age civilization (3300–1300 BC; mature period 2600–1900 BC, pre-Harappa cultures starting c.7500 BC;) in northwest Indian subcontinent (including present day Pakistan, northwest India) and also in some regions in northeast Afghanistan. Along with ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, it was one of three early civilizations of the old world, and the most widespread among them, covering an area of 1.25 million km2. It flourished in the basins of the Indus river, one of the major rivers of Asia, and the now dried up river, which once coursed through northwest India and eastern Pakistan together with its tributaries flowed along a channel, presently identified as that of the ghaggar-hakra river on the basis of various scientific studies. Due to the spread of the civilization along both the river valleys, some scholars use the term Indus-Sarasvati civilization.

At its peak, the Indus civilization may have had a population of over five million. Inhabitants of the ancient Indus river valley developed new techniques in handicraft (carnelian products, seal carving) and metallurgy (copper, bronze, lead, and tin). The Indus cities are noted for their urban planning, baked brick houses, elaborate drainage systems, water supply systems, and clusters of large non-residential buildings.

The Indus valley civilization is also known as the Harappa civilization, after Harappa, the first of its sites to be excavated in the 1920s, in what was then the Punjab province of British India, and is now in Pakistan. The discovery of Harappa, and soon afterwards, Mohenjo-Daro, was the culmination of work beginning in 1861 with the founding of the archaeological survey of India in the British raj.

As we talk about the different characteristics of Indian civilization, so its quite easy for us to understand what is Indian civilization and for what swami Vivekananda devoted whole of his life. Swami Vivekananda is a key feature of spreading Indian civilization.

History of Swami Vivekananda.

Vivekananda was born Narendra Nath Datta (shortened to Narendra or Naren) in India, on 12 January 1863 during the Makar sankranti festival. He belonged to a traditional Bengali kayastha family and was one of nine siblings. His father, Vishwanath Datta, was an attorney at the Calcutta high court Durgacharan Datta, narendra grandfather, was a Sanskrit and Persian scholar who left his family and became a monk at age twenty-five. His mother, Bhubaneswari devi, was a devout housewife. The progressive, rational attitude of Narendra father and the religious temperament of his mother helped shape his thinking and personality.

Narendra Nath ancestral home at 3 gourmohan Mukherjee street in Calcutta, the capital of British was interested spiritually from a young age, and used to meditate before the images of deities such as Shiva, Rama, and Sita. He was fascinated by wandering ascetics and monks. Narendra was naughty and restless as a child, and his parents often had difficulty controlling him

Contribution of Swami Vivekananda on Indian Civilization.

Swami Vivekanand’s life and work is an important turning point in the history of Indian civilization. It is in fact a paradigm shift marking an epochal change-from western modernity to Indian classicism. Though him, the ancient ideals and core values of our civilization and revived in modern themes. To put it in his own words, swami ji is “condensed India “and his profound ideas on various facets of Indian civilization are waiting to be expressed in the current of our national life. Swami Vivekananda is one of those Indian leaders of modern India who have touched upon the diverse facets of Indian civilization ranging from society, science, spirituality, politics, religion, etc right from the origin of the Indian civilization to our present times.

Here, I Am Listing His Contributions Thinking And Viewpoints On Indian Civilization Are As Follows:

He was the first cultural ambassador to the west. He showed that India has much to contribute to world culture.
He also showed that science and religion is not contradictory but complimentary.
He gave an identity of who we are and what is Hinduism. He showed the common bases in different sections of Hinduism. He played a major role in unification of Hinduism. In words of sister Nivedita: “..it may be said that when he began to speak it was of ‘the religious ideas of the hindus’, but when he ended, Hinduism had been created.”
Defending Hinduism was one of the important works of his life. Missionaries of west and pseudo-intellectuals propagated their own understanding of Hinduism which were mostly negative in nature. He raised his voice against this and clarified the concepts of Hinduism thereby, giving self-pride to followers of Hinduism.
He founded Ramakrishna mission to propagate the teachings of his guru (teacher) Sri Ramakrishna Paramhans and interpreted many ancient Hindu scriptures in context of the modern world.

Preserving Of Diversity:

Hinduism is a diverse religion with different philosophies. Like: worshipping different gods , different life styles, different scriptures, different school of thoughts like adventism and dualism. By accepting all the diversities, he helped in preserving the same.

He played an important role in popularizing the yoga.
Sense of pride among indians:

He used to take pride in our ancient advancement in science, arts and other areas and at the same time he used to quote them. That time the world looked on us as a country of snake-charmers. He was the first to raise these issues on international platform. In his own words:

” (India) where stood the earliest cradle of ethics, arts, sciences, and literature, and the integrity of whose sons and the virtue of whose daughters have been sung by all travelers.”

Whether he was a prophet or not, it depends on your way of thinking. For me, yes, he was a prophet.

Swami Vivekananda and Indian renaissance.

Swami Vivekananda is in fact the first true Indian renaissance man. It is his teaching and endeavors that we find the rebirths of Indian civilization, of the wisdom of ancient Indian it was only with swami Vivekanand’s arrival on the national science and hi clarion call back to the Upanishads that India and Indians started experiencing true renaissance; a revival of the classical spirit of the ancient Indian civilization took form and shape under the kindness of swami Vivekananda and his movement

Swami Vivekananda views on ancient Indian science.

He does a lot for Indian civilization and Indian science is a part of it. He promoted a lot ancient Indian science. Our ancient science describes a lot about natural medicines like herbs, small plants, leaves etc and describes yoga by which we can cure many of the diseases but all this ancient Indian science .in a lecture are lost somewhere due to the modernization and westernization. Swami Vivekananda promoted Indian civilization and he is a key person in the spreading of Indian civilization. He promoted it on the world view level.

Vivekananda on Aryan invasion theory.

He was a pioneer in recognizing how historiography is often used as a tool to shape a nation identity and aspiration. Swami ji was the first Indian leader to forcefully challenge the theory of the aryan invasion on India. With his vast knowledge of world history, he questioned the basis of the invasion theory propounded by western scholar like Max Muller and other. Though in his lectures we find that swami ji makes passing references to the theory of an Aryan invasion. We have to kept in mind that swami ideas on Indian history and society kept evolving over time as new evidences presented itself to him. It would be enormous to think that swami ji carried a rigid picture of Indian society in his mind. The theory of Aryan invasion had become an important ideological weapon in the hands of the British to drive a wedge between the north and south and between the upper and the lower caste in india-a classic example of their divide and rule strategy. Swami ji was quick to recognize the mischief in the USA he thundered, “and what your European pandit said about the Aryan swooping down from some foreign land snatching away the land of aborigines and setting in India by exterminating them is a pure nonsense, foolish talk. Strange that our Indian scholar too say amen to them”. It is clear from above that that swami ji was exhorting the Indian scholar not to trust the views of foreign scholar but to develop an independent approach to study India’s past.

Swami ji On Ancient Indian Society.

Swami ji views on Indian society continue to debate even today among scholar and laymen. Many an academician and social reformers has committed the blunder of trying to reconstruct Indian society based on their limited understand of customs, traditions, and practices of the land. In contrast, swami ji vision of their future India society was based on his understands stemming out of a panoramic view of the entire antiquity of Indian civilization.

Major transformation brought about by swami Vivekananda for spreading of Indian civilization.

Rejuvention.

Basically this was done by shri Ramakrishna lord guru of swami ji. He is the real link between ancient India and modern India. Through stupendous spiritual efforts shri Krishnan relieved the entire range of spiritual experiences of sages and saints of the past from vedic times to his times. He brought about the purification of spiritual changes by emphasizing its moral foundation, and rejecting occulitism, esosterism and miracle mongering. He made god realization possible for all even in the midst of the distractions of the modern world.

Modernization.

The swamiji was done great work to make ancient vedanta concepts acceptable to modern minds by interpretating the eternal truth in the lights of modern rational thoughts and science this modernized version in what most of the present day educated Hindus understand by vedanta.

Integration of Philosophical Schools.

Vedanta has split in different school in middle ages swami ji brought about the reintegration of this school. He did this by stressing the common grounds of different schools, especially the principle of atman, and by showing that the different school represents different stages of realization of the ultimate reality.

Unification of Religious Sects.

This has given rise to a sense of unity among Hindus sects in modern times, inspite of many differences in customs and traditions.

Meeting Of Challenges.

This is the challenges faced by swami Vivekananda and Ramakrishna during the spreading of Indian civilization.

Challenges faced by Indian society due to western culture are as follows:

1) modern rational thoughts and science.

2) an open society which values freedom and social justice.

3) idea of savior god who identifies himself with the poor, the sick and the fallen.

Swami vivekananda and his guru rama krishna met these western challenges are as follows:

1) by revitalizing vedanta spirituality.

2) by interpretating the eternal truths of vedanta, discovered by the ancient sages, in the light of modern rational thoughts.

3) by introducing social service based on the practical application of vedanta principle.

Practical Vedanta

By “practical vedanta “is meant the basic principles of vedanta in solving the problems of day to day life. Swami ji showed that the highest principle of vedanta can be applied not only in individual life but also in social life. Infact swami ji held that India’s downfall took place mainly because of the eternal spirituality principles were not applied in collective life

Summary

We first need to know about the Indian civilization. Indian civilization is one of the most ancient civilizations of the world. It is known as the sindhu civilization or the Indus valley civilization or the Aryan civilization. Sometimes it is also referred as Vedic civilization. The Aryans kindled the lights of this civilization on the banks of the river sindhu (Indus) in the northern India, thousands of years ago. Later, they helped spread it across some other parts of the country.

The historians can’t ascertain the precise period when this great civilization flourished. The scholars differ on the period of its development. Even the origin of the Aryan race has been debatable. Some historians believe that the Aryans migrated from the north central Asia and settled in India. Some other historians contend that the Aryans have been the native of India. The story of Indian civilization symbolically represents the very evolution of humanity itself. From its early origins in the mists of time to modern avatar which it is assumed today, the cultural continuity of Indian civilization has never been disrupted. The reason for this unbroken continuity which makes India unique among world’s civilization is that, the eternal value which shaped our attitude to life have been diligently preserved, practical and handed down from generation to generation. Civilization is not to be understood merely as the outer façade of infrastructure and material development. Culture is the very root of civilization and as long as the core culture is preserved, civilization continues to evolve and prosper. Swami Vivekananda has pointed out that every civilization or culture has a particular life centre, a dominant characteristics or trend. According to him the life centre of Indian culture is spiritually. By spirituality we meant a way of life oriented to the ultimate purpose or goal of life which is the realization of the supreme spirit or god. Indian civilization also deals or we can say depends on vedic civilization or on vedas or vedanta.

The Vedas are the oldest and most authorities scriptures of Hinduism. Most of the Indian civilization is based on Vedas. All other scriptures are subordinate to them. They were not composed by anybody but were “revealed “to the rishis; hence they are also called ‘shruti’ that which is heard. The earlier Veda.

Types of Vedas

The term “Aryan” has had a history filled with controversy. The source of the English word Aryan comes from the Sanskrit word arya, which is the self-designation used by the Vedic Indic people who migrated into the Indian subcontinent about 1500 bce. The Sanskrit term has a cognate in the Iranian word arya, which is also a self-designation. Both the Sanskrit and the Iranian terms descend from a form ārya that was used by the indo-iranian tribes to refer to them, a tem which is also connected to the source of the country-name Iran, from a phrase meaning “kingdom of the aryans”.

The Aryans were semi nomadic Nordic whites perhaps located originally on the steppes of southern Russia and central Asia, who spoke the parent language of the various indo European languages. Indo European people traditionally used “Aryan “both to denote a people, understood racially or ethnically, and the language group itself. The civilization introduced by Aryan people is called Aryan civilization.

The Indus valley civilization (IVC) was a Bronze Age civilization (3300–1300 BC; mature period 2600–1900 BC pre-Harappa cultures starting c.7500 BC; in northwest Indian subcontinent (including present day Pakistan, northwest India) and also in some regions in northeast Afghanistan. Along with ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, it was one of three early civilizations of the old world, and the most widespread among them, covering an area of 1.25 million km2. Swami Vivekananda is one of those Indian leaders of modern India who have touched upon the diverse facets of Indian civilization ranging from society, science, spirituality, politics, religion, etc right from the origin of the Indian civilization to our present times.

Conclusion

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References

http://www.esamskriti.com/essay-chapters/Questions-and-Answers-Indian-Civilization-1.aspx
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