Examining mythology 2 – The Monk’s Podcast 98 with Shyamananda Prabhu

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Hare Krishna. Welcome back for continuing our discussion today on examining mythology. So I'll just do a quick recap and then we'll talk about the direction where we wanted to go.

So we discussed about the positive and negative connotations of the word mythology. Myth is often associated with, within the tradition, it is thought of as something unreal, but it needn't be unreal. It is, it is, it is more of the stress is not on the empirical or factual historical precision.

It is on moral edification. And then we discussed about how the historicity say of places like Dwarka or the historicity of the Rama Setu, this can bolster or this, how this may or may not bolster the credibility of the Mahabharata or the Ramayana. Then we talked about the six aspects of myths as you discussed from a reference source and how they, their foundational narratives for a tradition, how they are associated with the religion, how often they are centred around some significant person or personages and how to some extent within India, there has been an attempt to see these or within the Western, in the academic approach, Indian, Indian traditions or Eastern traditions were seen to be mythology where there was a theology.

And then we discussed the importance of these for our application. And so today, any other points that we discussed or should I move on? Yeah, you basically covered the six parts. There are just four things from, I quoted one researcher called Laurie Honko that they express and confirm society's religious values.

They provide a pattern of behaviour to be imitated. They testify to the efficacy of ritual and how that ritual can be practised in your particular time frame. And lastly, importantly, they also established sanctity of your faith.

Okay. So these are four things which, what we say mythology in a pejorative way or a derogatory way, but worldwide scholars and researchers, they do not attribute a very negative mindset to that. So our discussion will be balancing.

We are not treating mythology only as imagination and we are not just treating only as a scholarly armchair exercise. We also see how Ramayana Mahabharata affects the Indian population to such an extent. We discussed how 77 million people flocked in front of their TV sets to watch again a rerun of Ramayana, which even the Prasad Bharti officials were sceptical that will people accept it.

So today we are going to see according to your formula, the ethical part of it, the edification part. Hmm. Okay.

So I'll start with the, now why should these stories be so relevant for us or for people in general? So within literature itself, there is a concept of the ladder of abstraction. So I would like to share a illustration for this. So here, basically the idea is that at the bottom of the ladder, there are specifics.

So abstraction basically means one of the characteristics of human beings is said to be abstract thinking. Abstract thinking means that not just things which are related with sensory stimuli, with physical tangible objects, some non-physical, non-tangible principles that can be derived from those specifics. So for example, when Newton observed apple falling, apple falling is a tangible concrete, but the principle of gravity is an abstract principle.

So that's abstract thinking is considered to be a distinctive feature of human beings. So it is by abstraction. So abstraction has many aspects.

One aspect is generalisation that by observations we generalise. So for example, if, if we hear a story, say if I start saying today, I'll speak about the demographic trends in the population of polar bears in Alaska. That might be interesting for somebody who is interested in bears or something like that.

But for most people, those specifics may not seem very interesting, but then you go from the specifics to the universals. The universal is that this is how climate change is affecting the biodiversity in the world is affecting bears in their own habitat. And then, so that when I talk a universal principle, it's like I'm going to the top or from the bottom of the ladder of abstraction to the top of the ladder of abstraction.

And then if I come down now, what does this mean for us living in Mumbai? That is, again, I come down from the top to the bottom. So it's, so for example, if it's, if you only hear news without any analysis, it is information, but it doesn't lead to anything, anything, any without any analysis, it just seems just information, which is raw. So similarly, say for author, if a news report writes about how so-and-so person is living in such poverty, but then, okay, that's, it's a, it could be a moving description, but then if they write based on that, how this person was actually say a middle-class, a middle-class well-educated school teacher, but because the lockdown is there and because of the lockdown, now, even people who have, who were very well-educated with masters or PhD, now they have to work as street labourers, construction labourers, or they have to starve.

So that indicates how the current pandemic and the lockdown because of that has affected people's livelihood and what that might mean for others. So this is, so for any kind of narrative to be relevant, there has to be this active jumping up and down or climbing up and down the ladder of abstraction. We start from specifics or have specifics mentioned because they catch interest, then have universals, which are applicable beyond all specifics.

And then we come down to the specifics for our times. So let me just give another example for this. Say, for example, now, if you consider Ramayana, in the Ramayana, at the bottom specifics of another time is Shurpanakha incited Ravana.

So Ravana, for example, was initially when he heard that his regiment at Janasthan had been killed, he was angry, but when Akampan told him, and then Maricha told him, don't mess with Ram, he agreed. But when Shurpanakha came and described the beauty of Sita, he just went mad and he threw caution to the winds. So that is, so that Shurpanakha incited Ravana is a specific incident.

The universal principle is that if we have our weaknesses, manipulative people, others can exploit those weaknesses. And then the relevance of today could be that the ad industry, the movies, the porn industry, they exploit our base desires. So these industries are like the modern Shurpanakha.

So this is basically how the story of that time becomes relevant today. That's the going up and down the ladder of abstraction. And we could all do that in our study of what is called as mythology, but what is scriptural narratives, so that these become relevant for us.

So I would say that three questions, so this is with respect to stories, but also applies to other aspects like the ethical guidelines. So what did this particular rule or practise mean at that time? So that is at the bottom of the ladder of abstraction. Then what is the principle underlying this rule, which is not dependent on the context.

That is at the top of the ladder of abstraction. And then how does that principle apply to us today? That is again at the bottom of the ladder of abstraction. So this was a quick overview of this concept.

Any thoughts on this? Wonderful. This means that just at the top of my head, things like, if you do it, if you try to analyse the world according to your own view and you don't take guidance, then even though you are someone like Arjun, you could end in big confused state of mindset. Now, this was true 5000 years ago.

And this is true even today. Can you say something like that? Yes, that's it. Actually, Arjun is a very good example.

And this leads to the next, this may lead to the next part, we'll come back to this part. That say, Arjun was, Arjun heard the Bhagavad Gita and he fought a war. So now, at the, if we don't have this ladder of abstraction, somebody might say that also the Bhagavad Gita is a book, which incites somebody to fight a war.

But so the specific seems to be a war was fought after hearing the Gita. But if you look at the universals, we'll see that in the Gita, there is not even a single expression of what might be today called as hate speech. Oh, those people are so terrible.

They did that. In fact, normally, if somebody has to be incited to violence, one of the easiest ways is to manipulate people's emotions by talking about real or imagined atrocities that the other who is a target of the violence has performed. But throughout the Gita, Krishna doesn't even once mention any of the atrocities that were performed against the Pandavas.

To get Arjuna to fight, Krishna could have just said once. Do you remember how Draupadi was dishonoured by Duryodhana and Dushyasana and Karna? How can you let that go unavenged? That could have incited him. But Krishna, far from inciting emotions, actually repeatedly talks about regulating emotions, staying equipoised.

In fact, one of the most, I find one of the most classic verses which contrasts the consciousness with respect to the action is that, Mahi Sarvani Karmani Sanyasya Adhyatma Chetasa, Nirashir Nirmama Bhutva Yudhyasva Vigata Jvaraha. So, 330. It's saying Yudhyasva, it's fight.

But then Nirashir Nirmama Bhutva, have no craving and have no possessive mentality. And Krishna also says elsewhere that Nirvairaha Sarvabhuteshu, Advaita Sarvabhutana, don't be averse to anyone, be friendly toward everyone. So, the idea is that the Bhagavad Gita is not talking about violence in its content.

But the universal teaching of the Gita is that we should live in harmony with the will of God. That is the whole idea. So, that when each member of the society, we are all parts of God, and when we play our part in a mood of service to God, we contribute to our spiritual evolution and we contribute to the maintenance of order in society.

So, that essentially is the message of the Gita, to live in harmony with the divine. And that is, only the specific context of that will be the Kurukshetra war at that time, fighter war. But we see that in our tradition, most of the, almost all the great traditional commentators, say, we have Ramanuja, we have Madhvacharya, Vishwanatha Thakur, they all lived at times when dharma in India was threatened by Islamist invaders, be they Turks or Mughals or whoever else.

But they know well in their Gita commentaries say that these people are destroying dharma and attack them and destroy them. That is the message of the Gita. But their commentary on the Gita primarily focusses on how we should live in a way to elevate our consciousness.

So, the point is that, so the specific application of that living in harmony with God, living in a mood of transcendence was for Arjuna to fight. But that's at the bottom of the ladder of abstraction. At the top of the ladder is that, I say that the Gita is not a book of violence.

The Gita is not a book of silence. The Gita is a book of transcendence. And that, how will it apply in today's world? It would be, we say, it could have the opposite application in terms of say, if we have some conflict or quarrel with someone, we might just decide, this is too small a thing to fight over this.

Let's just forgive and move on. I have better things to do in my life. So, the Gita could actually be a book for peaceful conflict resolution because it focusses on non-possessiveness, on forgiveness, on non-vengefulness.

So, that way, the seeing something in context and seeing something independent of context is very helpful or seeing its trans-contextual application is helpful for making sure that the core message is not obscured. Any thoughts about this? Yeah. So, that was a very interesting understanding that the Gita, Krishna never speaks ill about adversaries.

In fact, I feel sometimes the Gita introduces Arjuna and true Arjuna, us, that the real adversaries are, he says, the biggest enemy is Kama. So, nowhere does he mention Karna as his main enemy or Shakuni as his main enemy or even destiny as his main shatru. He says, it is the lust for material things which burns like fire and is Maha Ashana.

It has a great appetite and if you think that by appeasing it through piety, this is Maha Paapma. It is a very sinful thing. So, first of all, try to conquer that.

So, can I bring that point of which we had discussed before also that a devout doesn't need evidence and an empiricist will not accept anything else. Yeah. Could you give an example of how it might apply here? That's a good point.

In the sense, the same thing, millions of Indians flock glued to their TV screens, actually shedding tears when Sita and Ram, they don the robes of an ascetic and go in the forest and when Sita is kidnapped, like some people said, they could not eat that evening meal that day because, or the morning, it was in the morning, so they could not eat anything during that day because Sita is not there now and Ram is put in so much of distress, although they know the whole story. So, mundane stories, they depend so much upon, like so many of the websites, they say spoiler alert. People complain, if you tell me the ending of a movie, then you have spoiled the entire entertainment value for me.

Why is it that the same story is repeated a million times and people still find there is value in it? So, just to act as a kind of a launchpad for a thought, I am very much attracted by the G.K. Chesterton quote, fairy tales do not tell children that dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children that dragons can be killed.

So, what I gather from this is that almost all the 77 million, they knew that Ravana is going to kidnap Sita and try to kill her or make her forcibly become his wife and Ram is going to kill Sita. But then when they see the experience, it transports them to some other realm, it transplants their thought process with something sublime and this experience I call is a prerogative of the devout. He doesn t need to see floating stones today as a proof that the Ram Sita was actually built.

He doesn t need to see Vishamukha mountain today or he doesn t need to see the boulders used in the Ram Sita today. And on the opposite end of the spectrum is an empiricist who says that I agree it is a beautiful piece of poetry, I agree to the ethos brought about by Valmiki s verses but show me some remnants of Ravana s kingdom, show me some remnants of Ayodhya, then I will try to join the devout. That too as if he is doing a favour on Valmiki.

Yeah, so the Chesterton quote which you mentioned, when you say children already know dragons exist, is he talking about how children don t have a rational aspect or is he saying that that is not the relevant issue for the children? I think it is a mixture of both because the empiricists always say that they are kids, they don t have a developed sense of intelligence, therefore they believe that dragons do exist. Just a small thing, I am right now collecting some material on that, although fairy tales could be seen as an exclusive domain of children or just to entertain kids, Oxford, some in France, some in Sweden, some in America, they all keep on churning out very very scholarly material on fairy tales. What do you mean by scholarly material? That means serious analysis, serious research on fairy tales.

So if it was just a side topic, just meant for kids entertainment that you entertain kids while they are kids and then they grow up to be real people in the real world, whatever they have heard is simply not relevant. In fact, I just read that Alice in Wonderland was the first book which did not have any moral education in it. It was simply made up stories to entertain a small girl named Alice and the writer was a priest, a very intellectual person but the writer was a priest.

So today after so much of research as somebody said in your life, read Alice in Wonderland three times as a kid or just to entertain yourself as an adult to see whether the things mentioned there make sense in your real world and at the very ripe old age to see what wisdom is imparted in that particular literature. So the point relevant to our discussion is we are not even talking of the books which are of the level of Alice in Wonderland or the Wizard of Oz. Here we are talking of serious stuff.

The ability to kind of catapult or launch your mind which is mired in ignorance to the level of transcendence and in that context we are seeing the importance of our epics. Any thoughts on that? Okay, I think this subject is developing quite a bit. So let me try to put it in the analytical framework now.

One is the stories themselves which have a strong emotional connect. Like you said Ramayan was watched by millions and millions of people. 37 million? 77.

77 million. That's stunning. So the emotional connect is one aspect of it.

Then the other aspect is the lessons that are learned from it. And as I said if you read it in adulthood then you look at the lessons learned and the other aspect is the rational aspect of it. Is this believable? So we could call it as, is this entertaining? Is this educational? Is this believable? You could have three different aspects of it.

Now entertaining might not be the best word. We could say is it engaging? Is it absorbing? Is it captivating? So what is the value of the story in its story form itself? How gripping is the story? So gripping, educating and believable or rational. So now, you could include edifying somewhere.

Educating is also same as edifying. Okay, and enlightening will be the wisdom part or the transcendental part. Okay, that was the fourth part.

There's one more important aspect, especially with respect to the scriptural narratives, that there is philosophy often articulated explicitly in it. And now there is an underlying philosophy or world view for every narrative. That's different.

But there are some books which are explicitly talking about philosophical reality. So for example, the Bhagavad Gita is not itself containing any stories. The Bhagavad Gita doesn't even refer to any stories.

The Bhagavad Gita and we could say the Bhagavad Gita is not only talking about ethics. There is a definite discussion of ethics. But there is also discussion of philosophy over there.

So you could call about enlightening. So, so is it gripping? Is it morally edifying? Is it metaphysically enlightening? And then is it rationally acceptable or rationally believable? Or no, we could call it empirically verifiable, empirically verifiable, rationally believable, that part of it. So, do you have any thoughts on these four points or go ahead.

Yes, with respect to the emotionally engaging or gripping part, there is the idea that we humans need stories, that we learn through stories, we communicate through stories, we are innately story creating beings. In fact, one of the earliest artefacts of ancient humans that we have, they are connected with how we depicted stories. For example, people made art on the walls of the caves or whatever.

So now, of course, that approach to history of primitive and modern might not be literally relevant. But even from an empirical perspective, the point is that stories have enormous value. And people take those stories very seriously.

Say in today's world, for example, if somebody takes Harry Potter, now, when they write, when the Harry Potter stories came out and the movies came out, when people take it so seriously, that they have a whole paraphernalia about it. And quite often the paraphernalia earns more than the actual books or the actual movies, isn't it? So there is a lot that is, so we could say that this is just a human need that has to be fulfilled. And then some way or the other, this need will be fulfilled.

So every culture, every civilisation throughout history, across history and geography, will have some narratives, some stories, which will be emotionally gripping, which they will not just maybe watch once and forget. Just like say even in movies, some movies become classics, which people watch again and again and again. Some novels people read again and again.

Like Shakespeare said that you read again, so that you learn something, find something new about it. So I would say that quite often, the story, if it's only emotionally gripping, then it's like a whodunit fiction or something like that. Then you get the conclusion and it's over.

And if the other aspects are not there within it, then the spoiler alert kind of thing would be very important. And if you come to know the end, what is the use of it? But what gives a story enduring value would be some of the other aspects. Now, what is it that we can learn from it in terms of ethical conduct? What is that we can learn in terms of philosophical truths? And what does it tell us about other worlds? Any thoughts on this? No, I will wait till you come to the point where we discuss the clash between literal and metaphorical understanding.

So we can go to that. So now, when we talk about the literal stories, now there could be many stories that are entertaining. Now, I think even in this fourth, I have not included one point, we might have to include is that some stories are considered sacred, because they're associated with something divine within the tradition of those people.

So now, for example, the Ramayana, the Ramayana, especially it is said that ek ek aksharam kumsa maha paataka nashana. Just the literal narration of the story itself is immensely purifying. So, one level of understanding scripture is the literal aspect, literal level.

Now, the word scripture is used when it is associated with something sacred, especially something religious. The other, the Madhavacharya talks about this in multiple places, in Brahmachutra Bhashya, in Mahabharata Atmanyanaya. He talks about how scripture can be understood at various levels.

So, literal is one, ethical is the second. Ethical would be, it is a guide for living. And as a guide for living, it gives us time-tested principles that we can all imbibe in our lives.

And quite often to learn those ethical principles, we may have to go up and down the ladder of abstraction. Some principles might just be straightforward, like say, for example, in Ramayana, many traditional families might tell, they say, if there are two brothers, the younger brother might be told, no, you should obey your older brother like, like Lakshman obeyed Ram, you follow your older brother. So that is just straightforward application.

But there could be more nuanced applications where we have to, like I talked about going up with respect to Sripankar's application, what it means today. Or do you have any other examples of ethical lessons drawn by going up and down the ladder of abstraction? Yeah, just like this Ramayan Chopai in Awadhi language, which became, which has become famous throughout North India. So, how Lord Ram fulfils the promise given.

So, similarly, one should also keep one's word in life. So, this was true millions of years ago. It's true today.

And basically, everybody will agree that in order to have a proper, well-oiled, civic machinery, people should stick to their word. So, this is not exactly true, because today's law says it. It is also true because it is there in the Ramayana.

Yes. So, even at great personal cost, one has to honour their words, like Dashrath did. Yeah.

And this is the basis of any functioning society. I was reading about how, when e-marketing started. Now, if people had been basically dishonest, somebody sends money from here, and somebody sends a product from there.

Now, they could send a faulty product, or this person could send a check that bounces. If both of them had done it like that, then the whole e-marketing would have just not sustained itself. Yeah.

So, what do you say, honouring one's word is important. So, that's a good example. So, the ethical aspect we discussed.

Yeah. Now, the another aspect could be, so, with respect to literal, one reason why these narratives are considered sacred is because it is said that the divine manifests through them. And that's why these narratives fall in a category entirely different from other narratives, because it is the divine description of the divine description of Krishna, of Ram, and their presence can be experienced through these narratives.

So, even the literal level is not to be undermined. The literal level is also glorious. If somebody just reads and hears them.

Now, beyond that, there's the ethical level, wherein the understanding is how we learn some codes of conduct. And for most of humanity, their ethical lessons were learned much more through stories, than through simply rules, do this and don't do this. And then the sacred stories.

And the third part was the metaphorical. Now, for the metaphorical, why is that needed? Now, even the metaphorical could be applied, could be analysed using the ladder of abstraction. So, the difference, however, is that when the metaphorical is used, it is considered, there are two ways of looking at it.

The metaphorical supplements the literal, or the metaphorical supplants the literal. Supplants when it replaces. So, for some people, for example, now, would you like to discuss about how this applies to the context of the Gita supplement and supplant, especially with respect to Prabhupada's position on Kurukshetra war? No, you continue.

I will add something later. Okay. So, one of Prabhupada's, Prabhupada was often against metaphorical readings, but especially when they were used to replace the literal readings.

So, for example, if somebody says Kurukshetra was not actually a historical war, but it was simply a symbolism of the war between the good noble desires and the ignoble desire that goes on inside our heart. So, Kurukshetra represents our body and there are many ignoble desires, so hundred Kauravas, and there are a few noble desires, that is the five Pandavas. It's a war.

Now, this interpretation, Prabhupada rejected it. However, what he rejected was, this was used to replace the literal, the fact that the Kurukshetra war took place. But if we understand that, actually the metaphorical can be used in addition to literal.

There is an occasion where Prabhupada also did that, where he said that when devotees were committing themselves to the practise of Bhakti by taking initiation, he said, now you have handed the reins of your chariot to Krishna. Now, do not lament whatever happens in your life. Krishna is in charge of your life.

He will take care of you. So, this is an idea where actually the metaphorical is accepted that the body is like a chariot and Krishna is our charioteer, but it is without rejecting the literal. So, if it's seen as supplementing, not supplanting, then the metaphorical are acceptable for us.

Prabhupada also talks about how the six children who were born to Devaki before Krishna, they represent the six anarthas in our heart, lust, anger, greed, envy, pride and illusion, and how they need to be removed, our heart needs to be purified before Balram and Krishna, who Balram represents the Guru and Krishna represents, Krishna is God himself, before they will manifest in the heart. So, these kind of metaphorical readings are also given, but it's only when they are, when they don't supplement, they supplement, but not supplant the original the literal readings. I just wanted to add a small point that the tussle or the battle in between, you cannot understand these things because they are inconceivable.

So, that is what Prabhupada would emphasise. And the other extreme is, you cannot understand them because they are imaginary. We cannot prove anything because it is inconceivable or you cannot prove something because it didn't happen.

It is simply a figment of somebody's imagination. So, this is the worrisome part and I don't know whether I should bring that point right now, but if Draupadi marrying five princes is a revolutionary thing and it is engrossing reading and it is very nice to see about the plight of a woman who fought back. So, Draupadi is also seen as a heroic princess, a fighter.

But then when you say that it is simply imaginary and if Vyasadev can imagine something, then why can't I? And this is what some authors today, they have taken this licence and they have given their own alternate histories because if entertainment was the sole motive 5000 years ago, it is still the same motive with my book. How would you address this point? Yes, that is why if the first and the second, let me discuss how gripping it is, how ethically edifying it is. If say, the metaphysical part or the sacred part, all that is the sacred or the metaphysical part are not given due importance.

If they just thought of stories for learning something, then two possibilities are there. I can retell the story in an entirely different way just to create an innovative spin and just for entertaining or I can draw a different lesson by shifting the stress of the story. I might not change the story entirely.

I think last time I mentioned about Jain Ramayana. Exactly, that point came in my mind right now. So, there could be agenda driven reading where one uses the narrative simply to entertain by changing the story or to promote one's own ideology again by changing the story or changing the stress of the story.

So, these have to be avoided and within the tradition itself, there has been some kind of, not an official censor, but there is an academic scholar, Philip Legend, he has written a lot on the Ram Leela. So, he wrote a book called Hanuman's Tale, T-A-I-L, T-A-L-E, that is the title of T-A-L-E. But then he talks about how there are hundreds of stories associated with Hanuman, but some have become popular, some have become accepted, and even if these are not a part of the original epic of the Ramayana, but they have become popular and others have not.

And he gives quite an intriguing explanation for this, that imagine somebody is playing an orchestra, performing an orchestra. It begins with some person who starts singing and then there are other people who come with instruments. Now, conceivably, how many instruments you could have in the orchestra, there is no limit to that.

As long as all the instruments add to the original tune, original singing, they enhance the core song that is being sung. So, if somebody starts playing an instrument which doesn't sync with the mood, which overpowers the original singing, or which is out of tune, then the orchestra performs a stop, stop, stop, stop. So, like that, now this is, I just drew this example from it, now I am elaborating further from our perspective, that Valmiki's telling of the Ramayana is like the original, the core song in an orchestra.

Yeah. And then many other writers have either commented on it or have retold it. Commenting is where you take a verse and write an exposition, but retelling is just tell it in a contemporary language or a vernacular language.

And quite often those retellings have become much more popular than the original telling also, like say Ramcharitmanas in North India. Now, these are accepted and treasured to the extent they preserve or enhance the mood of the Valmiki Ramayana. Now, Jain Ramayana is more for academic interest, let us say Ramayana like this, but it has never become a part of the mainstream mind that has been influenced, you could say, if I use the word, for the mainstream, it has had no influence.

And, you know, this struck me, how the lack of the understanding of the rasa. So, I think, so what determines whether something fits in to the orchestra? Two things I have said, that one is, it should agree with the original, it should not explicitly contradict the original narrative. And secondly, it should not militate against the mood of the narrative or the mood of the message of the narrative.

So, there is a little telling of the story. Now, within that, there could be further enhancements. Say, for example, now in the Mahabharata Ramayana, it is said that Jatayu and Dashrath were friends.

Now, when did they become friends? That Valmiki Ramayana might not tell, but some other epic might tell, some other author might tell. So, this is what authors call embellishment or enhancement. But there is something which might just contradict the original storyline.

So, for example, there are some contemporary authors who have depicted how there was a constant quarrel between Kaikeyi and Kaushalya. And there is constant, there used to be a quarrel and Dashrath Maharaj was fed up with those quarrels. And those domestic quarrels which were constantly going on, they erupted finally as Kaikeyi sending Rama for exile.

Now, this is not substantiated anyway in the Valmiki Ramayana. And not only that, after Kaikeyi laments and she apologises to Rama, Kaushalya and others accept her back. She herself comes with Bharat to the forest to meet Rama.

So, this is not acceptable. So, what are your thoughts about this? There is a Sanskrit code, I think, like milk, you can add sugar, acceptable. You can add saffron, acceptable.

You can add dry fruits, acceptable. You can add turmeric, acceptable. Salt, not acceptable.

Beautiful, so simple, so profound. So, there are some narratives which are quite, which have come from India itself, but which are quite, I find, really disgusting. I answer questions on Quora, where one of my most read questions when it was there earlier was that, did Draupadi love Karna? Now, Karna was the person who actually suggested that Draupadi be disrobed.

If we go into the original epic, it's quite clear. Karna gave the suggestion to Duryodhana. Now, why would Draupadi love somebody like Karna, who has done something like that to her? So, this is completely ridiculous.

But it seems that there is some retelling like that was there. And that somehow has been, has grabbed people's imagination in the modern times. So, this is completely against, this is like putting salt in the milk.

So, with respect to telling the original story, there has to be some kind of censor, not in the, in other words, censor today has a negative connotation. But even today, there is a certain amount of, you could say, not exactly puritanical, but a certain amount of, say for example, when, say, Harry Potter story, one book has come out, the next book is going to come out. Then sometimes fans write their own version of the next Harry Potter story.

And then there are others who critique, no, no, this is not Harry Potter nature, or this is not that person nature, you would not behave like this. So, there is that idea that something is gels with the character or something is out of character. If there is out of character, then why would that person do like that? There has to be some explanation in terms of the story.

Otherwise, it doesn't fit in. So, it's not simply like somebody trying to do moral policing. It's actually something universal, that characters, if a story is to be developed properly, there is a particular character for each character.

And things have to be in sync with that. Yeah. Any thoughts on this? Okay.

No, we can move on to the Samhita now for the last part. Yeah, the rationally intelligible. Yes.

Yeah, this is now Bhaktivinod Thakur had this challenge that he lived at a time when the Indian literature were being criticised by the British Indologists, and they were criticising it for various reasons for various reasons. And he himself discovered the Bhagavatam, he fell in, he actually fell in, you could say, he became captivated by the Bhagavatam. But then how does he explain this? So, there are two books, one is he wrote a book on the Bhagavatam, the Ethics, and another, the Krishna Samhita.

So, there he tries to address what all obstacles intellectuals might have for accepting it. And what applies to the Bhagavatam can also apply to the Mahabharata or Ramayana. So, he talks about three distinct aspects.

One is the chronological, the chronological cosmological descriptions, they don't seem to be acceptable from the rational perspective today. Then second is the ethical, because Krishna dances with the Gopis, how do I explain that? And then there is the metaphysical, which he says that sometimes the Bhagavatam is a big book, that one section, another section, they don't seem to be, is it personal, is it talking about non-personal, impersonal aspect? What is it talking about? So, with respect to these three, the way he addresses it is very creative. And Bhaktivinoda Thakur begins Krishna Samhita by saying that, if those with a traditional understanding find some of the contents of this book objectionable and he says, I fold my hands to them and offer this to them that the same book can be explained in different ways for different audiences.

And this is not meant to disrespect the traditional understanding. So, what he says is, with respect to ethical and metaphysical, I'll just be brief about it. He says, metaphysical, he says, yes, a book written by a great sage like Vyasadeva, we will need to spend some time and energy to understand in metaphysics.

And rather than some, now this is just my point over there, that contradictions, there are contradictions and there are paradoxes. Contradictions are those two opposite things, paradoxes are those which seem opposite, but there is actually an underlying, correcting, unifying principle. Just a small line to support you, that I read somewhere, I also saw in some documentary movie about metaphysics, no, quantum mechanics.

So, they say, immediately if you do not understand, we understand. Spend some time with us, then you'll be able to understand. So, if they can talk about a thoroughly physical thing and say that, come to us, be sympathetic, spend some time with us, we assure you, you will understand the way we are understanding.

So, the Tharkur saying like that should not be seen as incongruent. Excellent example. In fact, there is one thing, one scientist, if you think you have understood quantum physics, then you have not understood it.

Yeah. So, that's with his metaphysical. Then with the ethical aspect, he talks about, he uses the consequentialist theory, he says that if Krishna's pastimes were actually unethical, then why wouldn't they be worshipped by sages who had voluntarily renounced the world? So, he says, let's give some benefit of doubt or at least we don't just dismiss it as unethical, but then there's three things is unethical, ethical and there is a moral, immoral, immoral and trans-moral.

So, that's a different subject. But the third would be the, it is about the meta, about the rational. How do we understand this rationally? By the way, should we take another session on this or should we try to complete this today? No, if you feel that the rational part merits a small standalone and important discussion of its own, maybe we can just take a roundup of what we did today and can take that as a individual topic.

Yeah, I was thinking that not only the rational part, but even the ethical part, because sometimes even the ethics may not make sense to us. And then that is also one reason why these narratives are critiqued. So, for example, one is earlier, I think we could discuss about some issues, incidents in the Ramayana or in the Mahabharata, the way Karna was treated or the way Vali was killed and what happened after that.

So, there's some ethical issues also that come up. So, it's not simply ethical lessons can be drawn literally. So, we could discuss that in another session then.

Yeah, I have a point that polygamy can be seen as a very desirable, ethical, moral and community support kind of a practise in a bygone age and looking at the way in which marriage as a system could be exploited and irresponsibility on either spouse, but mainly on the male. Historically, I'm speaking like that. So, that has made almost every country in the world except a few Islamic countries have passed laws that bygamy is punishable by law.

So, just because bygamy is punishable doesn't make Ramayana Mahabharata, which doesn't have any qualms about condoning one king marrying so many queens, but then we have our Acharyas of the current ethos telling us, don't do it. It is not practical and it should not be practised because you are not qualified. So, although we have the scripture or the epic as a mythology, today's scholar insists on calling it, we also have its modern interpreters.

Again, interpretation is a word used in a very wrong sense, but like those who clarify, I would say clarifiers other than commentators, commentators, commentators, clarifiers who give a different lens of clarity and tell exactly what we should take and what we should not take. So, that part of the epics is also there. Yes.

So, we will continue this in the next session. Let me try to summarise. Yeah.

So, we started by discussing about how basically, let's take this analytical framework mythology. If you want to use it is entertaining gripping one aspect, then it is edifying in terms of moral, ethical point of view, then it is enlightening in terms of metaphysics. Then we talk in terms of whether it is rationally intelligible.

Yes. Was there a fifth one? Yeah, in terms of, you could say metaphorical would come in the ethical, but yeah. So, rational, metaphysical, ethical and literal.

Broadly four aspects you could have. So, initially I started by talking about the ladder of abstraction. So, how the literal becomes relevant in terms of how every story, it should be going up and down the ladder of abstraction for it to both appeal to our need for specifics to grip us and our need for universals to help us to illuminate us.

And then how our Acharyas have also applied this ladder of abstraction principle implicitly. Let me just give this example, how Prabhupada would apply the ladder of abstraction implicitly. For example, Prabhupada says in the Bhagavatam, the 7th Canto, when Prahlad is saying how a person is dragged by the senses in different directions.

The ears are attracted by beautiful, by melodious songs. So, Prabhupada writes over there, the ears are attracted by radio songs, songs on the radio. So, now nobody might say that at the time of Prahlad there were no radio.

But Prabhupada is making scripture relevant over there. So, it's almost like an implicit ladder of abstraction over there. He's taking the temptation of musical, of mundane music and how that applies today and Prabhupada is giving that.

So, the ladder of abstraction makes scripture, going up and down the ladder of abstraction makes scripture relevant. That is a significant part of the discussion. Then he talked about how if we focus on the ethical aspect only, ethical or the entertaining aspect, then people might come up with their own stories.

And then the idea of an orchestra, how it should add to the orchestra or the idea of if you want to make a milk preparation, salt doesn't work, what items work and what items don't work depend on the context. So, like that, certain narratives will be rejected, certain narratives will be accepted. Then he also talked about metaphorical interpretive explanations.

So, metaphorical would also to some extent come in the ethical or we can talk how they might also come because they don't seem rational. So, then if the non-literal or the metaphorical reading is used to supplement the literal, not supplant the literal, then that's acceptable. The Kurukshetra war can be explained not by explaining it away in metaphorical terms, but can be explained under the ladder of abstraction that in that specific context, the Gita's application was fight a war.

But for the universal message of the Gita is fight an inner war against your inner enemies. It's not so much literally fight a war. So, there is a way to explain the Gita's message without necessarily reducing its contextual metaphorical level.

But we could use the metaphorical explanation also in harmony with the literal. And then toward the end, I introduced the concept of Bhaktivinoda Thakur's reading of the epics and how he addressed various obstacles. So, the metaphysical, he said there's profundity and defer to it and then ethical and fantastical, if something like the chronology and the cosmology seems how that is to be addressed.

We could discuss this and we'll be discussing this in the future session. Okay. Thank you.