How important is convincing people about Rama’s historicity?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
So, if when we study the scriptures and we explain some practical lessons from them, some people take that the scriptures told are just for those lessons and they don’t take them as a historical reality, they don’t accept the existence of Ram.
So, how do we deal with that? We will answer your question later separately. So, now we have to decide which battle we are fighting when. We cannot fight 100 battles at the same time.
So, that means that for certain people, if they are people of scientific disposition, we start first with the rationale for the existence of God, for the existence of soul and we take things systematically from there. For other people who are already brought up in the culture and for them Ram’s historicity is not really an issue. And for them, they have already most of the time said, you know the Ramayan, but then they like to hear the Ram Katha and if they get some moral lessons from that, that is fine.
So, Madhavacharya talks about how in his Vedanta, Brahma Sutra Bhashya, he says that scripture can be understood at three levels. He says this is literal, ethical and metaphorical. So, literal means these are just the pastimes of the Lord and hearing those pastimes itself purifies us.
It is said in the Ramayana Stuti that one more letter can purify us. Just hear the pastime that is purifying. The second is ethical.
Ethical means we learn lessons about right and wrong from these pastimes. So, in the literal, it is understanding that this actually happened and just hearing what happened over there. In the ethical, we focus on the principles that we can learn from it.
And metaphorical means that it means that they symbolize something. So, just like we say that when Lakshman, river Lakshman Rekha around Sita, that represents the regulative principle, the instructions that we get from Guru Sadashastra. As long as we are within them, the Ravana of wicked desires cannot take us away.
These are symbolic. And now what Madhavacharya says is that the metaphorical should not be at the expense of the literal. Prabhupada often strongly spoke against the metaphorical because that was used against the literal, as a substitute for the literal.
Prabhupada, some people would say that Kurukshetra war did not take place only. That actually it simply symbolizes, the Kurukshetra is the body, it symbolizes the battle between the lower and the higher desires. So, that symbolism is valid.
But a symbolism is not a substitute for the literal. Now, so different people may approach scripture in different ways. And whatever way they approach, we should kindle their interest and we can bring them closer.
So, if somebody is approaching scripture for moral instruction, at that time to try to bring in an argument about the historicity of scripture, that may be irrelevant for most people. And we also have to know where people are coming from. Say for example, somebody is coming from a rational, logical background, for them to accept that Krishna lifted Govardhan Hill or Ram built a bridge across Lanka, across the ocean, these are things which are going to take some time.
So, if we demand that they approach scripture with an attitude of absolute faith and everything is literally historically true, then we are making too much of a demand on their faith. So, one of the offenses to the Holy Name is to instruct faithless people about the glories of the Holy Name. Now, often we think of this in terms of these people are faithless, they should not hear about the glories of the Holy Name.
But the other way is the responsibility of the teachers that they should not speak those things which people cannot be expected to have faith in. It is our responsibility also that we don’t make people offensive by forcing them to believe in things which they can’t believe. There is a conversation of Srila Prabhupada where one day one disciple asked him that in the Bhagavatam it is said that Maharaja Ugrasen had some millions of bodyguards.
So, some scholars, when we tell the scholars that they had millions of bodyguards, they ask, now how could they have that many bodyguards? Where were they staying? Where were their toilets? So, now Prabhupada said that among all the thousands of verses in Bhagavatam, was that the only thing you found to tell the scholars? Krishna is omnipotent and Krishna can do anything. But that is not the forum to talk to people about that. So, we don’t have to necessarily bring forth controversial points of scripture and demand people to have faith in them.
So, if they consider some things within scripture as exaggeration, as poetic ornaments, scripture also has poetic ornaments. It is, say Ramayana or the Mahabharata, they are not literal history in the sense of a linear historical account of things. They are actually the whole idea of literal history.
As we understand it, it is a post-Newtonian western conception of history. Whether we look at, whether in Greek, in Greece also if you see, the way Homer was a famous historian. Homer wrote some history of the ancient Greeks.
Even Augustine wrote some history. So, now there is, in the past, history was not a tool for factual, for recording facts. History was a tool for moral instruction.
That means what? Not that the historical facts were not there, but that was not the primary purpose of history. That’s why the primary focus was on what we can learn from history. This is not to say that it was not historical, but that was not the primary purpose of keeping historical records.
It was only after Newton, when science started focusing on numbers, and numbers became very important in the language of mathematics and science, then history also started adopting a scientific approach. And that’s why facts started becoming more important. If you look at the way history is kept today, most of the study of history is actually without any moral lessons in it.
So, then history simply becomes a record of the lives of dead successful people. They were successful in some way and they died. And what is the real learning through that? So, if somebody demands that we take the post-Newtonian standard of history and evaluate the itihasas through that, it is not only the itihasas, no ancient scripture, even the Bible will not stand as scrutiny.
What to speak of religious books, even non-religious books, like the books of Greek philosophers, they will also not stand as scrutiny. Because it’s a different way of looking at things. That’s the first point.
So, we can’t insist that scriptures are literal itihas. And at the same time, when we talk about… Now, within scripture, there are certain things which are difficult for people to understand. As I said that, how Krishna could have lifted Govardhana? Somebody may ask, how did Krishna, if he lifted Govardhana on his little finger, how did he find the center of gravity of Govardhana? He put his finger rightly at that point so that he could balance everything.
Now, Krishna doesn’t have to find the center of gravity because he is the source of gravity. By his will, gravity acts. And by his will, if he wants, he can suspend gravity.
But this is something which people will take time to understand. So, therefore, if we are doing a cultural outreach or where the focus is more on giving moral instruction, then focus on that. If we are doing of a more philosophical, scientific kind of outreach, then we shouldn’t introduce Krishna’s past tense first.
First, understand the definition of God, understand the position of God, and then move forwards. And then when we, after understanding the position of God, then we say, oh, how could he have done this? Yes, he can do it. He is omnipotent.
And then we mix these two. So, then it becomes a problem. Now, it is quite likely that things will get mixed because we can’t judge who is going to come where.
But in principle, we shouldn’t hold people who can’t accept the historicity of some of Ram’s or Krishna’s activities. They may say an exaggeration. We should not think automatically that they are envious or they are malicious, they are faithless.
No, that is their level right now. So, it is our responsibility to present things in a way that their faith can be elevated. Now, if we want to know about the past, how can we know about it? How can we be sure that something happened in the past? Broadly, there are four ways.
One is that do we have some direct artifacts from that time? Some archaeological remains, some artifacts, which show that okay, there was a person Ram and he ruled over here and this was his palace or this is what it is. That is one way. The second way is books.
Books, if they describe those things, and not only they describe those things, they describe it in a, not in a glorificatory way necessarily, but in an objective way as far as possible. The third is that are there any, so the first is archaeological remains, the second is more of circumstantial remains. That means not exactly directly that event, but the events associated with that event.
I will explain what I mean by this. And the last is a sophisticated field is called archaeoastronomy. Archaeoastronomy means that, say the Ramayana and Mahabharata describe that there was an eclipse like this and the stars were formed like this.
So, with archaeoastronomy we can go back and, when was this sort of star formation there? So, for example, the Mahabharata says that there was an eclipse at this time and after that there was another eclipse at this time. So, within 13 days if two eclipses are occurring, when did it happen in the past? So, there are mathematicians who have done that and they have found that it happened around 5000 years ago. There is a documentary called Krishna, Fact or Fiction.
Krishna, History or Myth rather. It is there on YouTube, quite a good documentary, which gives various evidences for Krishna’s historicity. While doing this also, similar things can be applied to Ram.
And basically it is important to know that when we are talking about the historicity of Ram, we need to talk, historicity means historically was he existing? And secondly, whether he performed supernatural activities? That is something which you cannot prove by any historical record. Even if you say there is Govardhan, somebody may say, how can you prove that Krishna lifted Govardhan? The supernatural activities, to understand, to get people to accept them, they need philosophical education. That is a separate thing.
We cannot prove them historically. But their existence itself, can we prove? Yes, we definitely can. One of the strongest evidences for this is, if you look in the Indian tradition, Jains.
Jains are now, actually culturally they are very similar to Hindus. But historically, philosophically, they were often at loggerheads. There is a whole history of books which Jains and Buddhists wrote, in which they criticized some of the Vedic values.
And interestingly, there is a whole book called Jain Ramayana. What they do in Jain Ramayana? The main storyline is the same, there is Ram, there is Sita, there is Ravana. But throughout, when Ram goes to the forest, he keeps meeting Jain sages.
And the Jain sages keep giving him wisdom. And finally, when Ram is, when Sita is taken in by the earth, and Ram is left desolate, Jain Ramayana says, at that time, Ram becomes enlightened and becomes a Jain. So basically, it’s a complete distortion of the Ramayana storyline.
But essentially, despite doing such distortion, no Jain thinker has ever accused Ram of being non-existent. No Jain thinker has ever accused Krishna to be just a figment of the imagination. They accept the story and they try to retell the story in their own ways.
The point is, that in the past, some people say that the story of Ram was just created for moral instruction. It is just a figment of imagination. Lalit Vistar is a famous book by Buddhist scholars.
And in Lalit Vistar, they talk about how Krishna’s actions are immoral. But they don’t criticize that Krishna did not exist. They also accept that Krishna existed, but he did not act properly.
That was their question. So here, I’m taking the skeptic’s role. So if Krishna is a figment of imagination, why is it that in the past, that argument was not ever leveled against Krishna? There were opponents of Krishna’s teachings in the past.
There were critics of Krishna’s characters in the past. But they did not level that accusation. Why is that accusation coming up now? Because now we are looking at things from a different filter.
So, for examining any political activity, we need the appropriate apparatus. If I try to measure my weight by putting a temperature in my mouth, putting a thermometer in my mouth, I cannot do that. The apparatus is wrong.
So, as far as the historicity of Krishna or Ram is concerned, there is abundant archaeological evidence, there is abundant literary evidence in terms of literature, which talk about Ram extensively, positively, negatively, ambiguously, both positive and negative. But throughout the history, nobody has raised the accusation that he was non-existent. So that itself is a strong evidence.
And unfortunately, in India, as far as archaeology is concerned, archaeology is a very underfunded enterprise. And because of that, the potential for archaeological evidence for the historicity of many of the ancient things in Indian history, that potential has not been tapped. Now, even 50 to 70 years ago, many of the cities that are talked about in the Bible, they were thought of by historians as mythological.
But excavations in the Middle East have found out many of those cities. They literally have been brought out from mythology to history by excavations. So, like that, archaeological excavations to the extent they have been done.
So, Ram existed much before Krishna. So, around 30 to 50 years ago, most historians considered Krishna himself to be fictional. But the Dwarka findings, the underwater findings by Professor Rao and others of the coast of Dwarka, they have more or less confirmed.
Now, most mainstream historians also accept that Krishna as a person existed. Now, they may not accept Krishna as God. They may not accept that he did supernatural activities.
But the historicity of Krishna is now more or less accepted by all scholars, all mainstream scholars. Similarly, with subsequent research, more and more findings can be made to establish the historicity of Ram also. But at present, the archaeological remains, especially in the area of Ayodhya, and more importantly, the literature, which talks about Ram in various ways, but never considering him mythological, non-historical.
All these are strong pointers to his historicity. And much more potential for further historical research is there, which needs to be tapped. And then the historicity can be proven much stronger.
So, rather than rejecting those who are drawing moral lessons, what we can focus on is, let them accept what they can. And gradually, by that acceptance, they will become more sympathetic. And if they denigrate Ram as non-historical, see the more important thing is, rather than saying that he is historical or he is not historical, the important thing is that we focus on developing a connection.
And that connection itself can be explored and expanded later. So, if people get rational explanations, many of the scholars who say that Ram is not historical, they are intelligent people. They are not necessarily blasphemous people.
But just that they have not been exposed, their exposure to Krishna and Ram, if it has been primarily in terms of stories which seem like fairy tales to them, then they are going to take it in a particular way. So, we need to give them an understanding of the profound philosophy and internal logical coherence of the worldview in which Ram and Krishna are considered to be supreme. Then by that, their attitudes will change.
Does that answer your question? Yes. Thank you.