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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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Siddhas

From Hindupedia, the Hindu Encyclopedia

By Swami Harshananda

Siddhas literally means ‘the perfected ones’.

Definition of Siddhis[edit]

The word siddha has been used in several senses. Literally, it means anyone who has attained perfection. The siddhas, like the gandharvas, are a group of demigods endowed with certain miraculous powers. Those of the human beings who have attained the aṣṭasiddhis,[1][2] are called siddhas.

Siddhas as Other References[edit]

  • Alchemists who tried to convert base metals into gold or transform the internal body-chemistry to make an old body into a young one by the process known as kāyakalpa, were also called siddhas.
  • Some physicians who broke away from the traditional Ayurveda and formed the school of Siddha System of Medicine wherein only the products of plants, roots and trees were used for preparing medicines, came to be known as siddhas.
  • Some Tamil poets of the seventh and eighth centuries like Tirumular and Śiva-vakkiyar who were heterodox in their attitudes and rebels against the hierarchy

of the caste system were also known as the siddhas.


References[edit]

  1. ↑ Aṣṭasiddhis means eight miraculous powers.
  2. ↑ Yogasutras 3.45
  • The Concise Encyclopedia of Hinduism, Swami Harshananda, Ram Krishna Math, Bangalore

Contributors to this article

Deval Sancheti

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