Materialism in Indian Philosophy

S.K.Belvalkar

R.D.Ranade

“Materialism” metaphysically denotes that system of thought which refuses to recognize, as the source of the created manifold, a First Cause other and higher than the mere working out of the forces and tendencies inherent in the non-sentient matter qua matter, unsupervised by any non­material power or principle like the Atman or the Deity. And as a consequence it recognizes for the human being no ethical goal higher than a life of pleasure or happiness to the end of his period. Materialism is accordingly a tendency of thinking which can appear almost at any stage of social or religio­philosophical evolution; and as we saw (See: Chapter Third: Transition from the Brahmana to the Upanishad Period), even the Rigveda is not without it. But from a mere tendency it can develop into a regular system of thought, as it apparently seems to have done towards the end of the Upanishadic period. As forerunners of it we already meet in the earlier Upanishads those Elemental Cosmologies with Water or Ether as the First Principle, from which, the texts* tell us, all the creation was produced; and that this First Principle might not be a sort of an eternal self-subsistent entity, it was actually conceived of as the Asat or non-existing. Chhandogya vi. 2. 1 mentions (and controverts) a definite set of thinkers who made the world evolve from Non-existence; while at the other end of the process we have, in texts like Chha. viii. 11-12 and Brihad. ii. 4.12, the nega­tivistic conclusions about everything knowable and namable being reduced to non-existence, from the clutches of which Yajnavalkya is almost frantically endeavouring to exclude the “Atman” in those darkly enigmatic stanzas with which he drops the curtain down upon the great "symposium" at the court of Janaka in the third Chapter of the Brihadaranyaka., - stanzas which distinctly foreshadow the "Ajati-vada" or the acosmic absolutism of Gaudapada. - For an Upanishadic expression of "Materialism" on the ethical side we have to turn to Chha. viii. 8. 4, where a powerful body of Epicurean non-believers is in­troduced under the opprobrious nickname of the "Asuras." The Upanishads of course were not by themselves expected to go out of their way and detail the tenets of these "Materialistic" systems, which later claimed as their founder no less a name than that of Brihaspati, the Teacher of the Gods.* But the animus which the Bhagavad-Gita shows towards them in Chapter xvi of the poem, as also the several "heretic" doctrines strongly tinged with "Atheism" and "Materialism" that came to be preached in the pre-Buddhistic period, may be safely taken as evidence for the existence, outside the "orthodox" circle of Upanishadic speculation, of a definite school of philosophy for the apostles of which the Maitrayani Up. uses such select epithets as "unheavenly," "robbers," and the like. It is also worth noting here that certain tendencies of Upanishadic speculation such as (1) the denial of Atman's liability and power of doing or suffer­ing anything ( p. 399), and (2) insistence upon the inexorable character of the Law of Karman as revealed by Yajnavalkya to Artabhaga (Brihad. iii. 13, and elsewhere ) - which are both jointly capable of a one-sided development towards passive fatalism - as also (3) belief in the impermanence and mutability of things of which Brihadratha in Maitra. i. 3-4 gives perhaps, if not the earliest, at any rate the most pathetic, expression on the Brahmanic side, together with (4) the doctrine of the unknow­ability of the Real in which Upanishadic philosophy in its most transcendent flights culminated, may have conceivably accentuated the move towards philosophical Materialism and Agnosticism, of which the next age is to afford us such a be­wildering array of illustrations.

Courtesy:

S.K.Belvalkar & R.D.Ranade, 1927, History of Indian Philosophy: The Creative Period (Chapter Ninth: An Evaluation of Upanishadic Philosophy, Section: 30: The Inchoate Philosophical Systems (1) Materialism)

About the authors:

Shripad Krishna Belvalkar (1880-1967) was born at Kolhapur, Maharashtra and was educated at Bombay and Harvard universities. He was Honorary Secretary of All India Oriental Conference in1926-27. He was elected as Honorary Fellow, Royal Asiatic Society, London in 1947. He was co-founder and Honorary Secretary of Bhardarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune in 1915-18 and 1927-33. His publications include: Systems of Sanskrit Grammar (1915), Rama’s Later Hisotry (1925), Dandin’s Kavyadarsa (1924), and Bhagavadgita (1941)

Ramachandra Dattatraya Ranade (1886-1957) was born at Jamkhandi in Karnataka. He was Emiritus Professor of Philosophy and Vice-Chancellor, Allahabad University.  His important publications are: Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy (1926), Mysticism in Maharashtra (1930), Philosophical Essays (1956), and Shri Bhagavat Gita (1958)

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Promoting Scientific Temper – A Letter to the Chairman, ISRO

Nikhil Joshi

We reproduce an email Dr. Nikhil Joshi sent (on 17 September 2012) to the Chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) after witnessing the nauseating spectacle of none other than the ISRO Chairman himself carrying a replica of PSLV-C21 (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle - C21) to a hill shrine at Tirupati and placing it in front of the presiding deity of the temple praying for its successful launch! : carvaka4india

Sir,

I protest against ISRO Chairman K Radhakrishnan and Directer of Vikram Sarabhai Space Center, S Veeraraghavan for their actions against the constitutional duty of Article 51Ah according to which, every Indian citizen is expected to promote scientific temper.

It is a petty matter when an ailing patient or a failing student prays god. However, it is a grave national disgrace when persons of elite stature such as yours stoop to the level of commoners to pray at Saibaba Temple or Lord Venkateswara Temple for professional success. I wonder if you spent for the travel and worship expenses from your own pockets. I also wonder if your absence from duty for a purpose that is against your fundamental duty should be considered as 'a break in service' and those leaves of absence should be considered as 'un-paid leaves' and all consequent dues should be recovered from you. It is also disgrace to the global community of engineers and scientists on whose behalf you (S Veeraraghavan) have audaciously claimed that "We scientists and engineers do our best and leave rest to the God".

Scientific temper is a greater, more important and independent skill than tech savviness or science literacy. God has no place in science. It is part of your professional responsibility to guide India out of the superstitions, gullibility and faiths that have riddled our country, especially with greater penetration after 1990.

In these actions, you have caused more damage to India than the monetary benefits from the success of PSLV-C21, by setting a wrong example to follow for people, regarding desired attitude towards faith. I wish that you repent your actions and strive to undo the damage done by you to the public psyche.

By the way, as an aside, have you ever considered blaming your gods (and claiming damage recovery from the temple trust authorities) when some of the earlier Indian rockets failed?

  

ISRO chief offers worship at shrine ahead of PSLV-C21 launch

Tirupati, Sept 7, 2012, (PTI):

PSLV
Courtesy: Wikipedia

Ahead of India's landmark 100th space mission, ISRO Chairman K Radhakrishanan today offered worship at the hill shrine of Lord Venkateswara near here praying for its successful launch.

Radhakrishanan is a frequent visitor to the over 2000-year-old shrine before every mission, temple sources said.

The mission, in which a 720-kg SPOT-6 remote sensing satellite from France (built by ASTRIUM SAS) and a 15-kg Japanese spacecraft PROITERES would be placed in orbit by ISRO's PSLV-C21 on Sunday from Sriharikota, will be witnessed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

A replica of PSLV-C21 carried in a bag by the ISRO Chief was placed at the feet of the presiding deity for a while by temple priests, the sources said.

(Deccan Herald. Bangalore

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/277108/isro-chief-offers-worship-shrine.html 

Accessed on September 18, 2012)

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Ajita Kesa-Kambalin

S.K.Belvalkar

R.D.Ranade

In the Samannaphala Sutta and elsewhere the following doctrine is ascribed to the philosopher Ajita, nicknamed[1] “of the Hair-garment,” very probably because he and his followers affected that mode of dress –

“There is no such thing as alms or sacrifice or offering. There is neither fruit nor result of good or evil deeds. There is no such thing as this world or the next. There is neither father nor mother, nor beings springing into life without them (opapatika). There are in the world no Recluses or Brahmins who have reached the highest point, who walk perfectly, and who, having understood and realised, by themselves alone, both this world and the next, make their wisdom known to others. A human being is built up of the four Elements. When he dies, the earthy in him returns and relapses to the earth, the fluid to the water, the heat to the fire, the windy to the air, and his indriyas or faculties pass into space. The four bearers, he on the bier as a fifth, take his dead body away. Till they reach the burn­ing ground men utter forth eulogies: but there his bones are bleached, and his offerings end in ashes! It is a doctrine of fools, this talk of gifts. It is an empty lie, mere idle talk, when men say there is profit therein. Fools and wise alike, on the dissolution of the body, are cut off, are annihilated; and after death they are not.”

As is evident, this doctrine of Kesa-kambalin is a violent denun­ciation of both the Brahmanic ritualism and the Upanishadic doctrine of the Atman. With evident allusion to texts like Kaushitaki Upanishad. iv. 19, or the anupravesa texts from the Aitareya or Chhandogya Upanishads, Ajita declares that nothing is real that is not corporeal: “As a man drawing a sword from the scabbard can say, ‘This is the sword and that is the scabbard,’ not so are we able to separate the soul from the body, pointing out, ‘this is the soul and that is the body.’” Ajita's view comes nearest to the view of the Materialists like Charvaka, whose (or whose teacher’s) obiter dicta are familiar to us in the opening pages of the Sarvadarsanasamgraha.

---

[1] His opponents characterized his teaching also - like a hair-garment­ - as amongst the most disagreeable of things:  cold in the cold weather, hot in the hot, and always unpleasant to touch.

Courtesy: History of Indian Philosophy: The Creative Period – First Published in 1927

About the authors:

Shripad Krishna Belvalkar (1880-1967) was born at Kolhapur, Maharashtra and was educated at Bombay and Harvard universities. He was Honorary Secretary of All India Oriental Conference in1926-27. He was elected as Honorary Fellow, Royal Asiatic Society, London in 1947. He was co-founder and Honorary Secretary of Bhardarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune in 1915-18 and 1927-33. His publications include: Systems of Sanskrit Grammar (1915), Rama’s Later Hisotry (1925), Dandin’s Kavyadarsa (1924), and Bhagavadgita (1941)

Ramachandra Dattatraya Ranade (1886-1957) was born at Jamkhandi in Karnataka. He was Emiritus Professor of Philosophy and Vice-Chancellor, Allahabad University.  His important publications are: Constructive Survey of Upanishadic Philosophy (1926), Mysticism in Maharashtra (1930), Philosophical Essays (1956), and Shri Bhagavat Gita (1958)

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Producing Vibhuti on Satya Sai Baba's Photographs 'miraculously'!

B Premanand

Satya Sai Baba's paternal uncle (father's younger brother, Chinna Venkappa Raju) was a magician and it was he who taught him magic tricks. The first trick which Satya Sai Baba performed at his school was to take out pencils, rubber, sweets etc., from an empty bag and surprise his class-fellows and teachers. Then since he did not have the idea of acting as an avatar of god, he explained these tricks as done by nature gods like other magicians. The fact that one needs a bag to produce things is because it is a trick bag. He also collected double value for these materials from his class-mates.

Experiment - 58

Effect: Creating things out of an empty bag.

Props:  Trick-bag and the objects you want to produce.

Method: Hide the objects you want to produce in the second part of the bag and close it. Then show the bag to the audience by pulling out the inside to prove that it is empty. Then chant incantations, while pulling the centre partition to the other side and start producing things.

Experiment - 59

Effect:  Throwing flowers on the ground which forms into letters "Sai Baba".

The second trick which Satya Sai Baba demonstrated was to throw a bas­ket of Jasmine flowers on the floor which formed into the Telugu letters "Sai Baba" to prove that he was the incarnation of Shirdi Sai Baba. The humour of this is that while Shirdi Sai Saba knew only Marathi and Hindi, Satya Sai Baba knows only Telugu. So he could manifest only Telugu words.

Props: Colourless adhesive, a brush, Jasmine flowers and a fan. 

Method: Prior to the show, draw the words on the floor or carpet with the adhesive. Put on the fan and throw Jasmine flowers on that part. The Jasmine will stick to the adhesive and form the words. The other flowers get blown aside by the fan.

Experiment - 60

Effect: Creating necklace from no where. (Satya Sai Baba moves his empty hands in a circle and produces necklaces.)

Props: Necklace.

Method: Keep the necklace under the armpit inside the sleeves. Show the hand empty, move the hands in a circle two or three times, just hold the fingers towards the palm and release the necklace from the arm-pit. It will fall into your palm and thus enable you to produce it.

Experiment - 61

Effect:  Producing lockets, talismans, medals, rings etc.

Props: Lockets, talismans, medals, rings etc., which you can palm.

Method: Palm them before hand, wave your hand in circles and produce them as you produce vibhuti.

Experiment - 62

Effect: Producing Akshata (coloured rice). [Satya Sai Baba waves his hands in circles and sprinkles the rice on the head of the devotee]

Props: Coloured rice and thumb tip; paraffin wax.

Method: Place the thumb tip with rice on your thumb, circle your hands two or three times, release the thumb tip to your palm and sprinkle the rice on the head of the volunteer.

Another Method: Melt paraffin wax and soak the rice in it and take out and dry. Make a ball of this rice and because of wax coating it will stick together.

Palm it and after circling the hand two or three times bring the ball to your fingers and crush it and sprinkle it on the head of the volunteer.

Experiment - 63

Effect: Flower petals transformed into lockets, toffee etc.

Props: Flower petals, lockets, toffee etc.

Method: Cover the materials to be produced with flower petals. As if throwing the flower petals, also throw the materials hidden among the flower petals.

Experiment - 64

Effect: Nectar, honey, oil, etc., flowing from the photographs of Satya Sai Baba in the homes of his devotees.

Props: A bottle with one of the liquids, a framed photograph, a mantap, tube connection from the bottle to the frame with a tap.

Method: The bottle with honey, nectar or oil etc., is hidden in the frame or mantap with a tube at the back of the framed photo leading to the front of the glass. When the tap is opened, honey, nectar, oil etc., flows down the glass.

To expose this miracle, watch carefully to see how much honey is forming and falling into the plate kept below the photograph and find out if it is just some honey etc., poured on the glass. If honey is flowing down from the pho­tograph, remove the photograph from its place and you can find the source of the flow.

Experiment – 65

Effect: Holy Ash forming on the photographs of Satya Sai Baba in the home of his devotees. Vibhuti is seen formed on framed photographs.

Props: Perfumed vibhuti, framed photograph, Kanji water (rice water) fresh water and a plate.

Method: Make a dough of vibhuti in Kanji water (starch water from rice porridge - Congee) and spray it on the glass of the photo. Allow it to dry. Once it is dried repeat this once again, spraying the vibhuti on the first coat. Allow it to dry.

When a fan is working, the ash on the photographs sprayed with water flies in the air which makes people believe that ash is forming on the photo and falling down. Also keep some dry vibhuti below to make people believe that it is the ash that is forming and falling.

            .

To examine whether vibhuti is really forming on the glass of the framed photograph, remove the portion of the ash which has already formed on the photograph and you will see that it does not form again on the scraped portion.

Experiment – 66

Effect: Producing larger objects from sand.

Satya Sai Baba has created an 18" gold Krislma idol and a Bhagavad Gita book from sand. He goes near the river bank, selects a place, and sits there with his devotees in a circle around him. He makes a heap of sand, puts his hand inside the sand and brings out objects which are impossible to palm.

Props: The object which you want to produce.

Method: Hide an object in the sand well in advance and mark the place. Walk about as if you are searching for a place to sit and in the end select the marked spot. Make a small mound of sand and insert your hand in it and take out the hidden object as if you have created it

Experiment – 67

Effect: Holy ash from an empty wooden vessel.

On Shivarathri day Satya Sai Baba takes a wooden vessel containing vibhuti and empties it on the head of the Shirdi Sai Baba statue. After showing it empty, he puts his hand through the neck of the vessel and out flows vibhuti for several min­utes. He first uses his right hand, then the left hand, and again the right hand.

Props: A vessel with a big belly and a neck through which the hand can pass easily. Vibhuti, water and a bottle which can also pass through the neck. A robe with double sleeves and some thread or rubber bands

Method:  Mix the vibhuti in water into a dough and fill it in the vessel. Press it with the bottle so that the dough adheres to the sides of the vessel and the centre portion is empty. Allow it to dry. Fill the centre portion with dry vibhuti and tie them with a thread or rubber band so that it does not fall out.

Show the vessel with vibhuti. Turn it over and let the vibhuti fall on the idol or statue. Show it empty. Now hold the vessel with mouth up, put your right arm into the vessel, at the same time releasing the vibhuti from the sleeve into the vessel. Turn the vessel slowly and allow the vibhuti to fall out through your hand. When the flow stops, remove your arm and show the vessel is empty. Now hold the top up and put your left hand in, releasing the vibhuti hidden in the left sleeve. Then turn the vessel over and let the vibhuti slowly fall through your left hand until it is empty. Now remove your left hand, insert your right hand and slowly scrape the vibhuti placed on the sides of the vessel. Thus you can create more vibhuti than the vessel appears to hold .

Since it is very easy to expose this trick, Satya Sai Baba stopped producing vibhuti from a vessel in 1978.      

Reproduced with permission from Indian CSICOP.  For other articles from Science Versus Miracles we have already published please click here (http://www.carvaka4india.com/search/label/Science%20versus%20Miracles) 

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Striving for Just Society

Ram Puniyani

The verdict of magistrate Dr. Jyotsna Yagnik, sentencing Dr. Maya Kodnani, Babu Bajrangi and others to long imprisonment (31 August, 2012) has come as a big relief to the victims of Naroda Patiya, for whom it was like return of Eid to their houses. Naroda Patiya had witnessed horrific carnage and acts of rape in 2002 and this judgment will give a solace to the victims and their near and dear ones’. This judgment came as a culmination of the mammoth efforts of the human rights activists, the victims, the witnesses and the team of legal activists who stood all the opposition form every conceivable quarter to ensure that justice is done in the case. The adage that ‘there can’t be peace without justice’ has been redeemed with this court judgment. 

This judgment also puts right various misconceptions deliberately propagated by communal forces. First and foremost was that the Gujarat violence was a reaction to the Godhra train burning. By now this is believed by most of the sections of society, more so by the communalized sections of society all over and more so in Gujarat. The judge made it clear that “thousands of persons…attacked weaponless and frightened victims with intention, pre planning while sharing common objects”. It was not a spontaneous reaction to burning of train in Godhra. Rather Godhra train burning was used subtly as a justification for the preplanned pogrom. Communal forces tried to pass it off as ‘natural anger’ which the state could not control. Contrary to this perception, now court has ruled that it was a deliberately planned carnage, using the Godhra incident as a mere pretext to consolidate communal polarization in the state of Gujarat.

India has witnessed so many communal riots, acts of violence. Lately these riots have been assuming the form of well organized pogroms. This finding of Human Rights groups and the report of Citizens for Justice and peace gets validated through this judgment, for sure. So far the trend has been that the innocents have been killed in the violence and the perpetrators of violence have gone scot free. Now it seems that with the human rights defenders tightening their belts can set right the adverse trend, where guilty were getting away without any punishment. In this case human rights defenders have put in all the efforts to reverse the prevalent trend due to which the perpetrators of crime were more or less sure that they can get away with their crimes and consolidate their politics. 

For once the message is loud and clear that the automatic mechanisms of justice delivery system are not effective and a super human efforts by dedicated human rights defenders like Teesta Setalvad, Gagan Sethi, Harsh Mander, Yusuf Muchala, Mukul Sinha, Govind Parmar and many others like them, working through different angles, supplementing each other’s efforts can ensure that justice is done. They had to plug the leaks in the system to ensure that victims are protected, witnesses are protected, the complaints, FIRs are properly recorded, and to see that all the hurdles to justice are overcome. 

The first question which comes to mind is, will this state of affairs continue like this where nothing short of super human efforts, protecting-sustaining the victims and witnesses against heavy odds will be needed for getting justice. Society and the nation needs to plug the loopholes in the policing system, in the bureaucratic apparatus and in the attitude of political leadership so that the justice delivery becomes a matter of routine rather than an exception. Victims of so many riots, pogroms are still awaiting justice, Bhagalpur, Delhi and Mumbai to name the few, still have not got the justice. 

This brings to our attention another aspect of the violence, those who led it. Dr. Maya Kodnani came up through Rashtra Sevikasamiti, an organization subordinate to Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh, RSS. One notes incidentally that in RSS worldview, women don’t have a swayam (Self) as is manifest in the name of Rashtra Sevikasamiti. Also that Maya Kodnani was sitting MLA, and after the pogrom and her role in it, inciting the mob, distributing fuel and armaments, she was promoted to the level of minister and once she was charged with the role in violence, she was dumped from the ministry and disowned by the state Government. Section of RSS followers in VHP etc. are protesting against the judgment. As such the standard technique for RSS stable is that, once its members-followers undertake the crime, murder of Gandhi, burning of Pastor Stains, or play their part in terror attack, they are declared not to be having any association with the parent organization, whose ideology they are living and breathing through their actions. Kodnani for certain reasons did say that she was victim of politics! What does this mean? While this statement is a mystery, one hopes the meaning of this victimhood comes out one of the days in future. 

Babu Bajrangi is another character, whose revelations in Tehelka were nothing less than shocking. He said they have been given time for three days, and that his team-associates are playing not the test cricket but one day match, where high score is to made in short time. And that after killing the hapless Muslims he felt like Rana Pratap. One wishes he knew that Rana Pratap was not killing in the name of religion, he was fighting other kings for power and that in his army there were Muslims soldiers as well. One of the his army generals who died while fighting for Rana Pratap was Hakim Khan Sur, whose tomb is there in the Haldi Ghati even now. How distortions of medieval history are done deliberately to incite hate becomes clear again. 

And what is happening to the conscience of Narendra Modi, who has been the major beneficiary of the carnage of 2002? Any remorse, any tears for at least those who were reporting to him during the carnage, whom he promoted for their role in the violence and now are being punished by the due process of law? 

One hopes that we recast our laws and system to ensure that the violence is punished in due course and that this punishment acts as a deterrent and ensures that in future such inhuman dastardly acts don’t repeat themselves. This welcome judgment also leaves a few questions, what about those who faulted in the discharge of their duties to protect the innocents, to register their legitimate complains, and to nail the guilty as a matter of their assigned duty? We do need to work towards a system where to begin with such hate crimes don’t take place, and if by chance such a tragedy is engineered by some political forces, we have the system in place which can check it right away and punish those who are either conspiring, or executing or are not controlling those dastardly acts. One hopes that the human rights defenders will be on their tip toes to come forward with such yeomen efforts to have a society with justice and peace.

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