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In this book, we analyze the psycho-social consequences faced by Indian American children after exposure to the school textbook discourse on Hinduism and ancient India. We demonstrate that there is an intimate connection—an almost exact correspondence—between James Mill’s colonial-racist discourse (Mill was the head of the British East India Company) and the current school textbook discourse. This racist discourse, camouflaged under the cover of political correctness, produces the same psychological impacts on Indian American children that racism typically causes: shame, inferiority, embarrassment, identity confusion, assimilation, and a phenomenon akin to racelessness, where children dissociate from the traditions and culture of their ancestors.


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Rāmagitā

From Hindupedia, the Hindu Encyclopedia

By Swami Harshananda

Rāmagitā literally means ‘the song of Rāma.

Teachings of Rāma[edit]

Unlike the Rāmāyaṇa of Vālmīki, the Adhyātma Rāmāyaṇa pictures Rāma not only as an incarnation of Mahāviṣṇu but also as a perfect spiritual preceptor. The teachings given by him to his younger brother Lakṣmaṇa are found in three places:

  1. Aranyakānda[1]
  2. Kiṣkindhākānda[2]
  3. Uttarakānda[3]

Rāmagitā, A Discourse[edit]

However, it is the third discourse that is normally considered as the Rāmagitā. It is full of the usual teachings on the Advaita Vedānta as propounded by Śaṅkara[4] and his followers.

Teachings of Rāmagitā[edit]

The following are some of the topics dealt with:

  • Lakṣmaṇa’s surrender to Rāma and his request for spiritual wisdom by which he can cross over transmigratory existence
  • Need to purify one’s mind by the performance of one’s duties as per the varṇa and the āśrama
  • Ajñāna being the root cause of bondage, it has to be eliminated only by jñāna or ātmajñāna
  • Defects accruing to Vedic rituals
  • Need to renounce karma or actions altogether
  • Need to get jñāna by approaching a competent guru and get the teaching of a mahāvākya like tat tvam asi by applying the principle of bhāga-lakṣaṇā or jahadajahal-lakṣaṇā
  • Description of three kinds of śarīras
  • Ātman is free from all kinds of changes
  • Adhyāsa or superimposition
  • Different schools of Advaita Vedānta
  • Methods of nididhyāsana or meditation on the ātman leading to its realization
  • How to associate the three syllables of the Praṇava or Om with the meditation
  • Inevitability of prārabdha karma
  • Final dissolution into the Ātman or Brahman
  • Rāma is Brahman

Other Rāmagitā[edit]

There is another Rāmagitā consisting of about a thousand verses spread over eighteen chapters in a less-known work called Gurujñāna-vāsisthatattva-sārāyana. It deals with the subject in a slightly different way. It also deals with:

  • Sixteen vidyās or modes of upāsanā like the ones in the Upaniṣads
  • Cakras or yogic centers in the body
  • Siddhis or miraculous powers of the yogins
  • Practical aspects of sādhanas


References[edit]

  1. ↑ Aranyakānda 4.19-55
  2. ↑ Kiṣkindhākānda 4.11-40
  3. ↑ Uttarakānda 5.3-62
  4. ↑ He lived in A. D. 788-820.
  • The Concise Encyclopedia of Hinduism, Swami Harshananda, Ram Krishna Math, Bangalore

Contributors to this article

Deval Sancheti

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