vedabhASya - Vedic Studies

Philosophy comes up when science is in-adequate. They are just part of the same circle. Humans have been observing and explaining various natural phenomena due to their 'intellect'. They see patterns that repeat and use that in their daily life. Probably everything was philosophical at the start. As the human capabilities improved, things that get defined, measured and predicted very well, pass onto the realm of science. The rest is termed philosophy. As the light of knowledge (various types of jnAna) illuminates the circle more and more, the definition, measurement, predictability becomes more and more, and those parts pass into realm of science (vi-jnAna - that we certainly know) from philosophy (saMjnana, sajjnana etc - the whole or true knowledge). As vaidika maarg got interpreted into a life of pure rituals, siddhartha started questioning it and came up with shunya tattva, saying there's nothing (shunya) beyond this life and human life is result of our own karma. With

Agnihotram rAmAnuja tattacharyar’s book ‘Hindu matham enge pogirathu’ was discussed in U2Brutus channel. The idea it propagated was in a vedic marriage ceremony, the priest wants to have a sexual relationship with the bride.. First point is in his book Agnihotram rAmAnuja tattacharyar highlighted how priests who have no idea of the meaning of mantras blabber something and used the Rg veda Mandala 10 Hymn 85 verse 37 as an example. Rgveda Mandala 10 hymn 85 talks about savitar sending his daughter surya as bride to soma, in the ‘car’ of asvin, with asvin as the bridesmen and this marriage of soma and surya producing all the beings of the earth, resting on the ‘dharma’. In science we can visualize it as Sun, a Main sequence star (savitar) emitting its solar energy (surya) transported through the electromagnetic field (asvin), which reaches the moon (soma), whose reflection on the earth, produces all the beings of the earth, based on the laws of the Universe (dharma). In some grhya sutras

Dao or Tao is an ancient chinese philosophy, which means 'path', but which actually indicates the underlying law and order of the Universe. It's like 'Rta' (rhythm/order) and 'dharma' (law) of this Universe. The philosophy says one must live in accordance Dao (rta /order and dharma/law which is the nature of Universe). To live like that, one must detach from the desires that spur human action and align actions to the underlying Dao (nature) of the Universe (the rta and dharma). How similar is Dao to vedantic thoughts..? 1. Dao/Tao is about detachment (human desire) to make humans act in sync with Dao/Tao with the belief that spontaneity or natural human action is the best to live in sync with Dao/Tao. 2. Vedantic thought is also about detachment from one’s own ‘self’ which appears similar to Dao/Tao. But that detachment from ‘self’ is to observe like a witness or sAksi, our ‘self’ and all other ‘self’. This detached witnessing of our thoughts and actions as

The Shiva-Vishnu paradigm Across our vedic scriptures, Shiva refers to the unmanifest, detached witness of something and Vishnu refers to the unmanifest, detached witness that makes that something out of Shiva.  It's like what we call as Energy, which we do not understand but know that it makes the Universe and Mass, which is holding the energy in a specific region of space that becomes the foundation of all Universe (be it Higgs or Strong).  As the witness, it is Shiva,  As the action initiator it is Vishnu. Hence every new beginning is associated with Vishnu and what exists just before it is Shiva. Since new things arise after destruction in karmic cycles, Shiva got referred to destruction. Our new year is in the month of Chaitra. Our new month beginning is the day of amavasya. Our new day beginning is dawn at 5:30 to 6am. All these are associated with Vishnu. Hence the month before the new year, the month of phalguna, the day before amayasya, the time before the dawn, is usually

AI is going to impact the domain of spirituality, as it's going to impact other domains. Spiritual LLMs can spit out great spiritual answers that seem extremely attractive in comparison to the discourse of gurujis. They can do discourses like modern day self-acclaimed spiritual gurus and answer questions of disciples in extremely attractive ways. This could mean we will have chatguruji apps in plenty coming up on different shades of philosophies from osho to advaita. These app discourses can heal/steal the heart and mind much more powerfully than any human beings. Maybe each guruji will build their own LLMs or may use off-the-shelf LLMs and customize answers suited to their taste for their bhaktas. What they need is to just feed all their discourses and talks that they delivered to their audience. Combine with it the books written in the name of gurujis, guruji LLMs can revolutionize the voice of gurujis and answer like guruji years after they are gone too. Due to different spiritu

Often these verses in Chandogya Upanishad are quoted to claim that chandogya upanishad says varNa is by birth. Let's see these slokas of Chapter 5.10, as I translate and interpret it. Executive Summary of Chandogya Upanishad Chapter 10 Due to Sun and Moon's effect on Earth, day, night, summer and winter solstices, years etc happen in cycles. Due to effect of moon, ancestral worlds of life is formed in Earth which also follow the cyclic pattern, releasing gases to sky, changing the atmospheric contents, forming clouds, bringing rain to distant lands and bringing out advanced life forms that devas eat (plants, trees, wood). Being that eat these plants and their products, evolve into 2 kinds, based on the work they do.  Those species said to do attractive work (produce something) called brahmana, ksatriya, vaizyas and those species said to be stinking work of scavenging like dogs, pigs, candalas.But then there's a third kind who are just born and die without any evolution call

Jati and varNa are not same. They are actually opposites.  Ja means birth. Jati is that comes from birth. All people of a jAti are related by birth. They have 1 common ancestor somewhere.  Its an inborn characteristics. VarNa means paint. Its an external application. People adopt a profession to contribute to society and thats an external paint they wear. Unlike jAti thats inborn, varNa is something that people choose. Bhagavad gita is not casteist by any yardstick of imagination.  It does not talk of jAti. It talks of varNa.  In this sloka 4.13 chātur-varṇyaṁ (four varnas) mayā sṛiṣhṭaṁ (my creation) guṇa-karma-vibhāgaśhaḥ (by guna karma divisions) tasya kartāram api  māṁ (though i am the doer of this)  viddhya (do understand) akartāram avyayam ( i am eternal non-doer). Krishna says he creates 4 professions for all his creations including living and non-living by their guna and karma divisions. Though he creates them he is not responsible for their guna or karma, as he is eternal nond