Examining mythology 4 – The Monk’s Podcast 100 with Shyamananda Prabhu
Hare Krishna, welcome back Hare Krishna today we will continue and hopefully conclude our discussion on mythology it has been going on for quite some time and we have a visual here where we can see six aspects which we have discussed or we will discuss now basically our original thrust was to discuss about how much the metaphorical readings of the epics were acceptable or even the word mythology was acceptable or not and then we discussed the ethical lessons to be learned from it then we discussed the historicity how to look at the historical validation, then we discussed about the supernatural aspects and how miracles are they against science but they are not against science, they are about science then we discussed metaphorical aspects themselves metaphorical is acceptable to the extent it is it is it compliments the literal, it doesn't replace the literal sorry, supplements the literal not supplants the literal and then we discussed or we are going to discuss today the aspects of entertainment and the aspects of enlightenment so within entertainment broadly speaking if such stories if the stories from the epics are sources of entertainment for people then that's not a bad thing it could be an entry point that if there are cartoons made of Krishna or if there are cartoons made about Ram then at least by the word cartoon maybe the word cartoon is not an appropriate word animation say then at least it comes in the mental horizon of the kids otherwise they may not even know about it I remember I was in America and I was doing a programme for youth and these were all proper not devoted kids but Hindu kids and none of them knew who was Abhimanyu so I was quite taken aback by that and these were well educated in good American schools but so I realised that there is no way in fact there is one movie director with whom we had been talking about making some documentaries on reincarnation so he said that for the expat community the main introduction the expatriates who live in America and UK if they want to introduce their kids to Indian culture the main resource they have is Bollywood now I was thinking whether is Bollywood really introducing them to Indian culture per se it could be a very sensualized aspect, romanticised aspect of Indian culture but then there are festivals that are depicted there is a broad extended family that is depicted at least in some traditional movies so in that sense if there is some depiction of the epics that is good but then there is any thoughts on this? well as reading as such goes out of fashion or it is not much emphasised in schools and colleges so if you ask someone would you like to read the Mahabharata or would you like to watch the Mahabharata so the preference is to watch the Mahabharata then if the Mahabharata is made with fancy animation then that is more preferred so as the attention span shrinks as more and more products survive for our attention then obviously people prefer like have you ever come across the thing that psychologists use like a pacifier so parents use whatever entertainment is available like a pacifier hmm okay so there are few people who strongly protest that we should give them the whole thing as it is like it is said that parents should read the Mahabharata with the kids so that they get the best experience but that is more like a rarity but what that friend of yours said is correct especially for expats the first introduction is through whatever movies are available like one jarring example Narad Muni as any student of Bhagavatam would understand is a highly evolved and a most respectable preacher of Bhagavat message as far as Bhagavatam is concerned hmm but Bollywood prefers to make a caricature of him and so much so that that's the prevalent image of Narad Muni in almost everybody who sees movies as their primary source of culture so in that sense like a big disservice yeah that's a challenge because in some ways distorting traditional narratives in some way will have a greater appeal than people who say oh this is the same thing I have heard so many times I have watched so many times I want something new so I think there are three distinct aspects to this one is innovation with respect to presentation with presentation you have the special effects the the all that goes into making a high class movie so one is innovation with respect to that second is innovation with respect to the story itself changing the story and third is innovation with respect to analysis of the story that means the same story you could just shift the angle a little bit and then the same character who would appear to be like a villain could appear like a hero in fact nowadays many of the modern movies they prefer moral complexity they say black and white is this is a hero and this is a villain that is too simplistic so then I would say that with respect to the first we have no problems at all in fact we would recommend that presentation innovation with respect to presentation when for entertainment it is made so use special effects use the latest of technology in fact I think that is Prabhupada's interpretation or Prabhupada's explanation of what is realisation to present subject in a way that is interesting to the audience so we have innovative presentations that is wonderful then if we have if we have some unknown or unfamiliar interpretations interpretation can have a negative connotation as long as that interpretation is something which is not contrary to the tradition or something which is maybe makes the tradition's wisdom more popular then that is also acceptable but when some new angles are brought into it which are not actually historically which are not traditionally justifiable then it could become a problem and as far as small thing there is a nice sentence used by I don't know who said that he said as long as it doesn't pollute the conclusion beautiful doesn't pollute the conclusion now as far as the story is concerned there is there was a group there is a certain amount of artistic licence that is available whenever any narrative is to be depicted so for example when we perform a drama whether the drama of Sudama, Krishna or whoever else whatever we take it now everything that those characters say would not literally be necessarily what is said in the scripture because when you want to build a drama you have to in English the word is flesh out flesh out the characters in the story so in our tradition also there is there is Rupa Goswami has commented on and he has himself written a book called Natak Chandrika and there he has broadly drawn out rules that can be used for or guidelines can be used for dramaturgy for depicting dramas now if you consider there is a Chaitanya Chandrodaya Natak which is written by Kavi Karnapur and it depicts Kali it actually in a sense represents the whole story of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu's life as various ways in which Kali is attacking Lord Chaitanya and so for example when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu wins over Keshav Kashmiri so that is shown as Kali attacking him through pride but he resists that then when he goes to travels out of Bengal he goes to Bangladesh and those parts of the world on a preaching tour and is victorious so he is given a lot of Dakshina so that is Kali attacking him through greed then when he is married to a beautiful wife once twice that is Kali attacking him through lust and he is actually depicting a conversation between Kali and lust, anger, greed and pride.
Kali sends them to attack and then Kali is frustrated because Lord Chaitanya is not affected by them at all. So now the point here is that actually in this discussion so he talks about three kinds of characters over there he says Aithihasik Kalpanik and Aithihasik Kalpanik that means when you have to do drama it can be based on fully historical characters it can be based on historical characters and the word Kalpanik is imaginary somehow we have a negative annotation with the word imaginary imaginary means not real but even the word imaginary imagination also has a positivity associated with it there is rich imagination in the depiction of this so we could use the word non-historical so there are scriptural characters and non-historical characters so non-historical and scriptural can interact with each other in and sometimes there can be non-historical characters entirely. So there is a tradition which allows this kind of things you know when Prabhupada departs from the world based on that Tamal Krishna Maharaj has written a book called Prabhupada Antya Leela and there it is a depiction of between Bhakti Devi and other characters in Vrindavan how they are churning how they are orchestrating events in such a way that there is a conversation between Bhakti Devi and other Bhakti Devi and other characters in the Bhakti tradition and they are discussing how events in the life of Sri Prabhupada's last days are playing out so that the Bhakti in the hearts of his disciples will be churned to the maximum so now is this was this his visualisation? Did he see Bhakti Devi doing this? He said no this is based on that so he says that this is a very good introduction and then he says this is done in the tradition In our TV Mahabharata in India they had used I am time so he would introduce concepts, he would explain things, he would analyse so every episode would begin with some analysis so Sanskrit drama science or whatever has something called omniscient observer yes so throughout the performance this character can come on stage and sometimes the the stage curtains are drawn and he comes out and explains to the audience and then he goes away and then the curtains part and then the next episode begins so it is like a device of introducing the main thing to the audience that's true and if you look at the depictions also so this I was talking about how interpretive devices could be used for explaining things but taking it further the point is that among these things the representation is fine interpretation and you could say rendition of the storyline itself so if it's only a fleshing out like embellishing of the story then that is fine as long as it doesn't contradict the original storyline and if you consider at least to my knowledge among the various depictions that have been done in the mainstream of the Indian epics I think the original Ramayan which was done by Ramanand Sagar which was recently rebroadcast that has been the most popular there was Mahabharata done after that then there was Jai Veer Hanuman and so many other things done but none of them really caught as much the attention caught the watching public as much as the original one and one characteristic of the original one was that it kept the devotional mood very much there so here we may not necessarily say that the makers were were purely in a tradition explaining things but still to some extent within the tradition also it is said that hearing the epics from those who are devoted has special potency to it so I think that can take us to the last part of the enlightenment aspect you want to add something more? I have a small point about entertainment one positive and one otherwise so positive is even western observers who have come to Braj and they have like a few real really good scholars have shown interest in life in Braj Krishna's Brindavan or Krishna's Braj and they have always mentioned the performance of Rasalila now people don't really have an idea Rasalila doesn't mean only Krishna and Gopis dancing Rasalila could be so many pastimes and there they have seen young boys many times it is boys who are dressed as both Radha and Krishna so that sanctity is maintained and after the performance the entire crowd comes and touches the feet of the performers so they are so immersed as such it is Brajalila, they are in Brindavan so their lives are kind of immersed in Krishnalila all throughout and then there is this reverential healing so psychologists or social observers or ethologists they are quick to understand that even though there is so much of social media TV and other things these things like we are just talking from a clearly entertainment point of view but this thing is understood as going beyond entertainment now the other point was when Prabhupada started encouraging devotees to chant Hare Krishna and many many devotees had hippie backgrounds and hippies were associated with marijuana, hashish culture so one very opportunistic Indian Bollywood film director decided to use that to cash on and then the famous Dhammarudam kind of music all that Hare Krishna was doing was only Dhammarudam and of course later he came to Prabhupada and apologised and of course Prabhupada seen from his angle said that no no no at least in this occasion Prabhupada used the adage that there is nothing like bad publicity any publicity is good publicity but still for decades like when I joined the movement one acquaintance of ours asked my father does he do the Dhammarudam thing you know same thing happened with me also I joined probably 10 years after you but still so cultural stereotypes do persist across time once something goes into the people's and we also should know the power of entertainment business today how much it has to it can kind of embed like embedding a software it can embed some ideas in people's minds and then it is hard to take them away from that we will move on one point over here one response to both points with respect to that there is this Ramlila I read once academic book on Hinduism where it was talking about living Hinduism so they had this interview this boy who becomes a who becomes Ram like we have Raslila in Vrindavan they have Ramlila in Ayodhya and it is quite a big tradition over there so then even in Varanasi it is there so it was shown that the boy's father comes and touches his feet when he is depicting Ram that is quite radical in a traditional culture so then they were asked why do you do this? their understanding is when he is depicting that particular character he is no longer my son so the idea is especially often they perform some puja to start the drama and through that puja I read a book on deity worship again an academic book so there they had this idea that for that period it is as if that character enters into the that spiritual character enters into the person who is depicting and it is somewhere like Avesh we have the word Avesh in our tradition so in that sense they have the idea that it is no longer my son that I am respecting, it is Ram that I am respecting so we talk about deity worship in various ways normally we talk only about how we invoke the deity and then the stone image we consider that as manifestation of God but there are various levels of invocation like we have Ganesh puja so in it it is called as Astahi Pranapratishta or Astahi they have the word Arohan and Tirubhav so now most Hindus or most Maharashtrians don't do this but the idea is when you get an image of Ganesh from the market before we start worshipping invoke him and if somebody is not in the position where they can worship that deity for throughout the year then worship for a week, worship for 10 days worship for 15 days and then before the Visarjan you actually have to request the deity to depart and then the Visarjan is to be done so something similar like that over there so at the beginning and the end they do the Aarti now in Shila Prabhupada it happened in LA that some devotees had gone to Vrindavan and they saw the Rastila being performed over there, Krishna Leela and then they came back and they did a drama and when there were devotees dressed as Radha and Krishna and everybody else was told to respect and bow down to them and then Prabhupada watched the drama but the next morning in the Bhagavatam class he disapproved of that he said don't treat the people like Radha Krishna because what happened was the Sahajiyas those who take spirituality at a sentimental level they started exploiting this whole rich tradition, devotional tradition for doing illicit activities they would say that we are actually Radha Krishna and what we are doing when we are imitating the Rastila is actually Radha Krishna doing through us and that polluted the idea that's why our tradition has been a little cautious about, our tradition is Bhakta Sanskrit, Aapushala, Prabhupada have been cautious especially with respect to Krishna Leela to invoke the idea that the divine manifests over there but that is a part of the tradition yeah and the second point about the depictions I would like your comment on this also see within Christianity there have been lot of depictions of Jesus say for example the latest the Passion of the Christ was probably the most well known so now if you look at it from orthodox perspective it's not so well known I mean it's not necessarily entirely according to the biblical understanding of Jesus but it has kept to some extent the Christ figure or Jesus figure in the public eye, in the public thought, in the cultural imagination and in contrast with that the Islamic tradition has the idea that you cannot even depict Muhammad depict him basically even through art what to speak of through movies so there is a well known movie on Muhammad and it is all about the activity that he inspired, in the whole movie he is not shown at all so you know it's a little dicey so what I am asking through this is that in today's world of where there is a lot of emphasis on freedom of expression freedom of speech so if we try to legislate or agitate this is a this is a non bona fide interpretation or this is a malified interpretation this is a depiction that hurts the religious sentiments or that offends the sacred, now often we come out as right wing extremists so one is with respect to our own tradition we would make sure that in our classes, we could say in our podiums our classes in other places, we would make sure that things are depicted in a way that is in harmony with the tradition but in the mainstream when some things are depicted which are not exactly according to the tradition for the purpose of entertainment what would be your idea of how much should we take issue with the whether it is proper or not proper well I won't specifically talk about film media only any presentation like for example a world view of religions so I have seen that some good publishers they say that this particular thing which we have printed has been compiled with the assistance or under the supervision of they may say some religious scholars or religious scholars within that tradition so that kind of adds authenticity to that so even if sensitive things have to be mentioned every faith will have something to consider that this has to be done very properly so once you take help of someone within that tradition then at least your goals are clear to everybody that you are not trying to cash on something or you are not trying to mainly what people are fearing is that whether there is an agenda behind doing something and now agenda also has taken a jurative kind of sense whether somebody wants to malign or somebody wants to make a quick buck so as long as these things are not overtly seen then people seem to have some out of trust in that particular presentation whether it is entertainment orientated or not that is not the main point okay so at least some deference to the traditional authority is shown by consulting them and making sure while preparing itself so that it is not militantly against traditional depiction I think that is basic human courtesy also isn't it? correct if you are depicting a tradition you cannot just depict it the way you think it is you also have to consider how people who live it see it yeah in fact there has been this is a whole big subject but there has been academic study of Hinduism often being accused of depicting Hinduism in a way that is quite offensive to the Hindu tradition Hindus and then when there are some mainstream Hindus in America they objected to such depictions at that time it was they acknowledged when this was depicted they acknowledged that when we wrote this there was no there was no how should we put it there was no voice of the tradition that was intelligible to the academia that means there was nobody from the tradition who would discourse with us who would dialogue with us because traditionalist will present everything in a very traditional perspective alone and that is not very suited for us so yes I think consulting would be a simple solution and especially if something is militantly against the mainstream main understanding then objection is then objection is reasonably valid but when something are there are some minor differences like Prabhupada talk about essentials and details or the principles in the details so with respect to details if there is some artistic licence used then that should be ok but when some core principles are misrepresented then it would become problematic isn't it yeah now that brings us to the last part of enlightening that the purpose of these descriptions of the depictions especially given in scripture now here also we could talk about multiple levels not all the narratives that are given in the sacred texts are directly about God they may be about wise characters so for example the Bhagavatam says in the Mahabharata the whole story of Naldamayanti and that is a story more of more of piety rather than spirituality so even in scripture everything may not be explicitly teaching a spiritual lesson and everything need not be depicted based on need not be a depiction of the Lord itself but Krishna in the Bhagavata says that when he comes and performs his pastimes the purpose is janma karma chame divyam evam yo vittapatah tyaktva deham punar janma naiti mam eti swarjuna and then he says bahavo jnana tapasa manmaya mamupashita bahavo jnana tapasa putamad bhavamagata jnana tapasa he uses the word there which is a very interesting compound word so this knowledge so Krishna's pastimes when they are depicted the purpose is not to be entertained by them but it is to enter into them mam eti so the idea is that this is not just some imaginary depiction but there is a material reality and there is a spiritual reality and remembering the pastimes of Krishna and becoming absorbed in those pastimes is a way to raise one's consciousness from the material reality to the spiritual reality and in that sense these are meant to enlighten so here we are using the word enlighten, enlighten can sometimes be used generically like we have some discussion with someone that was enlightening so enlightening can sometimes just mean that a light is shown, enlightenment has that root light within it, a light was shown on the subject, so we could say illuminating, but here we are using enlightenment in the sense of to go to the level of light tamasoma jyotir gama to go from darkness to light so these pastimes can actually transport one to the spiritual level of reality and it's not just that they offer us another world view but rather they offer us or they transport us, they offer us another world to view and not just to view but to reach so this is considered to be something this is an entirely distinctive or unique characteristic of the pastimes of the lord where they can not only in terms of thought or absorption transport us to higher level of reality but actually even transport our souls to eternal spiritual level of reality and this is the ultimate purpose why these pastimes are narrated and this is the ultimate purpose that those who hear this pastime should at least be prompted toward this purpose at least they should be aware of this purpose and they move toward that purpose and that's why jnana tapasa this pastime is not just understood by just by watching them depicted on movie or something like that these narratives puta puta is to become purified so one becomes tapasized by the fire of knowledge one's consciousness becomes purified and then one understands this as a higher reality which we can enter and that entering into that higher reality in a eternal bond of love that is the ultimate purpose not just of hearing these pastimes but also of life itself any thoughts on this? yeah one very important consideration is that say for example somebody is enamoured by the life of Alexander the Great and this person devotes his or her complete time attention, energy for understanding how and when Alexander took his lessons from Aristotle and when did he begin his world conquering journey and what happened where did he finally took rest? where did he finally die? so some things could be like even today like last few days there was a discovery that a whole what is it? some Roman tiles were discovered in some excavation so that puts people into a kind of a trance, wow look at it we are looking at a piece of history so somebody understanding the personality of Alexander with whatever meagre historical records are available then some archaeological records and it is always the endeavour of the biographer to take his audience into that time in the past like Carl Sandburg who wrote who is Lincoln's biographer wanted people to actually be a part of Lincoln's history when you read that biography now there is a slight issue with this and what is that issue? that from the scriptural point of view that spirit soul who was Alexander has already gone somewhere he is no longer he is no longer accessible as Alexander and he may not even know that he was Alexander so many things could have happened in the third canto second chapter when Vidura asks Uddhava could you tell me something about Krishna? so there it is explained that this kind of enquiry immediately made such a pure enlightened soul like Uddhava go to the spiritual world and then he came back and there it is explained that just like the sun right now we are approaching 7.45 pm half an hour ago it was 7.45 pm to the east of India and half an hour afterwards it will be 7.45 pm to somewhere in the west of India but 7.45 will be there throughout so just like the sun is able to maintain its presence whether it is day or night all over the world similarly Krishna or Rama they are not so called historical personalities so when you read Bhagavad Gita we talked about how Vedic knowledge is state specific your state decides whether you understand it or not so given the right tools and our previous example of somebody having an entry card in a massive office manufacturing facility like our intel example in Arizona Phoenix so if you are the CEO then your card will make every door open for you.
You can go to the labs, you can go to the washroom, you can go to the office everywhere but if you are just a front office receptionist your access is denied so when you have someone like Uddhav or his representative then you say you read Bhagavad Gita you are immediately connected to this particular event happening in some other universe Bhagavatam is very clear on that and that makes it fresh so like the father touching the feet of his son thinking that Lord Ram's pastimes are being enumerated or being exhibited here he is his son at the same time he wants to see him as Ram it is possible because Ram also is eternal and the pastimes of Ramayana are going on eternally hmm yeah I think this is a categorical difference and that is something which has to be understood more in terms of the nature of the character who is being depicted so the character is actually it is divinity who is being depicted it is not just some historical character and the so we could say that now if we go back to everything that we have discussed we discussed about the ethical lessons to be learned historiography associated with it then the metaphorical, non-metaphorical then we discussed about the entertainment then we discussed about the supernatural aspect and the entertaining and the enlightening so in some ways could we say that the first fayu that somebody who themselves are not spiritually evolved or those who are not enlightened they could also analyse and study this and come up with something useful but the last part is something which only those who are themselves enlightened can provide correct so that means we don't have to have a black and white idea that that nobody can engage with the tradition or engage with these narratives if they are not pure but if we are coming to the tradition for primarily the purpose of enlightenment then we need to know whom we should go to so if we want to if we want to not just get a generic sentiment of Krishna Bhakti or Rama Bhakti but actually become spiritually transformed by it actually become deeply attracted to the lord and become detached from the world then just watching some TV depictions of Ramayana will not help we have to go to the traditional commentators or the contemporary teachers who are coming in a living tradition and learn from them only through that we will get enlightenment otherwise this will become simply like a pious form of entertainment so somebody might watch some Bollywood movies to be entertained and somebody might watch some Ramayana Mahabharata to be entertained and it is better that they are watching Ramayana Mahabharata instead of Bollywood movies but still it is still just a pious form of entertainment it is not necessarily leading to enlightenment and the real mistake or the real serious problem would be if people think that when they are being entertained they are also getting enlightened or those who are I don't need to go to the tradition, I know everything about it so then it for many people the remaining category of analysis ethical, entertaining, metaphorical supernatural all that analysis if it acts like a bridge this is the level of non-engagement with tradition or no awareness, no engagement with the scriptural narratives and any of these become ways of engaging with the narratives and from there they come to the level of enlightenment then at least there is some engagement which makes them receptive to enlightenment but if they start thinking that this is all that is there to the tradition and there is nothing more required then then it could be if it is a stepping stone towards enlightenment that is good, but if it is seen as a as equivalent as if there is nothing more to be got from the engagement with these narratives then it would be a problem isn't it? yes so any other… I think we have covered pretty much actually this subject went on kind of expanding on its own yes, that's true so today we discussed primarily about the entertaining aspects and the enlightenment aspects, so entertainment aspect we discussed that it is good that through the mainstream media if it is available, the scriptural narratives are available so that at least people have some awareness of them now when such depictions are done, we discussed there could be innovation in in presentation innovation in interpretation and innovation in the narration itself, in the narrative itself, so innovation in presentation is something which is wonderful is necessary but with respect to the with respect to the retell with the interpretation or the rendition of the story there has to be some amount of caution because now with respect to drama, artistic licence is there and some of the characters can be fleshed out there can be embellishment but if there is an agenda to misrepresent or to promote a particular ideology using these characters, then that is unhealthy so those who are interpreting such things those who are depicting such things, it's good that they consult some living features of the tradition and then we discussed about the enlightenment aspect that these pastimes are actually meant especially the pastimes of the Lord they are meant to take us to a higher level of consciousness and they transport us not just in terms of our thoughts and absorption but ultimately the spiritual level of reality and that will come only through those who are devoted themselves so the enlightenment is what these are offering it's not another world view but it's actually another world to view and another world to enter into ultimately and if the various approaches to scripture open us ultimately to enlightenment, then that's healthy so whether people use the word mythology or not that's not the important thing but if it opens them toward enlightenment, that's good but if they stay stuck with the other understandings and think that enlightenment is not at all a concern or not required or they start downplaying or denying or deriding enlightenment then it could become a serious problem but overall there could be a healthy engagement from multiple aspects with these narratives that are called mythological and if we know that enlightenment can be got only from the enlightened teachers then the other engagements can be encouraged, say scientists do some more research to verify the historicity of the epics, that's good and these scientists may not be devoted but if they do the research and find out that kind of engagement with tradition is good but that will not lead necessarily to enlightenment so when we understand the purpose and in that purpose with that purpose in mind we engage then there could be the tradition stays alive to the extent people engage with it isn't it? so thank you very much it has been a wonderful discussion.