ИГПЗС учебный год 2023 / лекция игпз

there is a fundamental difference between the Indic worldview and the Western worldview all the Abrahamic religions believe that we are human beings with a spiritual life and depending on how we behave on this planet someone sitting up there will either send us to heaven or hell – John you are not in Nick religions on the other hand believe that there are spiritual beings with a temporary human life and we keep coming back on this planet as long as we don’t realize the divinity inside us and connect with it this fundamental principle that we are spiritual beings with a human life is the bedrock of an entire civilization and nowhere is this principle more clearly Illustrated than our civilization epic Mahabharat I was first exposed to the Mahabharata when like most most of the people in my generation I watched it as a child on tour – and when BR Chopra’s Mahabharat was a big hit I’ve read it several times later in school at law school and even today I regularly lecture about the Mahabharata at several institutions but every time I read the Mahabharata there are three big questions that I struggle with and in course of this talk I’d like to share these three big questions with you and explain this enduring fascination from our heart that I have the first question that bothers me when I read the Mahabharata is that is it possible to clearly define moral ideas good and bad right and wrong boons and

curses good and evil can be clearly delineate them in Maha there are no heroes or villains everyone is equally justified in their actions if you look at the story from their perspective for example the most hated character in the Mahabharata even more than Duryodhan is his maternal uncle Shakuni Shakuni is the person who cheats at the game of dice due to which the pandavas lose their kingdom they are sent on a one verse Draupadi is molested in the open court and essentially the entire war of mahabharata of kuruksetra happens is that is the reason but do you know his backstory Shakuni is gandhari’s brother when there is britain’s mother and he’s also the son of Subin the king of modern-day Afghanistan his primary purpose in life is to take vengeance against Bhishma tawa he does not love Duryodhan or hate the pandas his primary rivalry is a Vishwa Dharma you see when they were

younger a bitch pitama invaded modern-day Afghanistan he defeated su ball and he forcibly took away his beautiful and virtuous sister Gandhari and forced her to marry with a blind man called via Trust who was rich Bahamas nephew and if this was not enough the trust was a very cruel man after marriage he found out that Gunnar he was technically a widow see when she was born her stars are aligned in a way that her husband would die the moment she would marry you so her family caught America a goat and they killed the good so all that was just a good the trust could not tolerate the fact that this this was hidden from him and so he conquered su ball again and he put his entire family behind prison and said that I will slowly start you to death he he said that everyone will get one mouth full of rice and I will take the pleasure of watching all of you starve to death slowly for having hidden this one little fact from inside the prison su vile said that this is unacceptable if each of us eats our mouthful of rice our entire family will finish and there will be no one left to take vengeance so he decides that I will create a test whoever can solve this test will get the entire food allocated to us and will then go on to take vengeance on behalf of her family and the test was that anyone who could make trade pass through a grain of rice is the wisest and the most intelligent person in the family that person will go on to will deserves to live and will go on to avenges so everyone tries and fails incidentally Shakuni who’s a youngest in the family the youngest son he has the idea of tying the thread to an aunt and then aunt finds its way through a grain of resin that so it’s decided that all the food that they get will be given to Shaku can you imagine the drama of a young boy eating his meals daily while his entire family starves to death in front of him at the end when everyone else has died and there is a snowball and chuckling subala calls his son and says you know i understand the power of pile as time goes by you’ll forget all of this tragedy and drama and you will go on to live with your life so I will do something to you which will always remind you of your life’s mission and so then he breaks his son’s leg remember every depiction of Mahabharat Shakuni has an evil span any walks with a limp and the limp is because his father broke his leg before dying so that with every step Shakuni was reminded the fact that he has to take vengeance is he is he still the epitome of evil is he not more of an antihero than than a complete villain similarly in Mahabharat there are no rules and curses there are no good or bad decisions they are interchangeable when the pandas go on one was our Jim decides to take a detour and visit his father in there who’s the king of Devas in his portrait and because in race meeting or John for the first time they have a grand celebration where his favorite observe Urvashi who’s

also said to be the most beautiful being in the universe is performing a dance in course of that performance she looks at Arjuna and she falls in love with him

she lusts after him and so she decides that she she has to have that night no she goes to audience chamber and openly propositions to says that I saw the where you were looking at me in the quote I also have the same feelings about you and I’d like to sleep with you Arjuna shocked he says that I was looking at you because I was reminded of how one of my ancestors who wrote of us had a great romance with you and we are all his succeeding generation so I was looking at you like a mother I’d never seen before – which other way she says

that what what is this argument you’re making we are we are dancers we are dancers in an open court and we don’t belong to anyone you will not break any moral code or commit a transgression if you sleep with me because you know the rules that apply to human beings don’t apply to divine beings like as we are observers but Arjun says no you know I it is not Darmok that V indulge in this in this act because you are also my father’s favorite of Sara and so for me you are like Kunti Madri and such egos in the res life so that is how I look at you up Sarah so or what she tells him that you were talking about Dharma don’t you know that it is a man’s Virna to oblige a woman when she openly propositions to him despite societal

pressures it’s a man’s thermal probe laser which arjuna again refuses so then she gets angry and she curses him she says that this manhood of which you are so proud you even lose that manhood for the rest of your life so how john is shot and he goes back to his father and says that what did i do i was i was cursed for showing restraint so then in the console cement tells and that what you’ve been able to do is something that even the greatest Rishi’s have not been able to manage you’ve you’ve been able to say no to Urvashi I will talk to her and I will reduce this curse to a period of one year and use it in the thirteenth year of your one verse you know when they lost the game of dice the terms were that you will go for one mass for 12 years and then going on yeah it was for one year which me that you have to remain in hiding and if any of the chorus find the pandas in that one last year then they have to repeat the twelve year one verse again so in the retail system that you use this would use this curse as a boon in the final year of Raven verse and become a eunuch so that move will be if no one will be able to find you a great example of how moons become curses and curse has become cones the second important question that I’ve always struggled with when I read the Marva right is how much control do they really have over our lives how much of what did what we do is free will and how much of it is destiny for example all of us know that Krishna gave the began of gita to Arjuna on the first day of the war but you know that Arjun was not the first person to whom Krishna made this offer before the war started both sides were trying negotiations and diplomacy to avert this this great Cardinal at kuruksetra and as a last resort Krishna went to the Ravens quote to have a word with him and try to convince him to resign refers refused to oblige Christian open quote so Krishna tells him let’s let’s talk in private let’s go for a walk and when they’re alone Krishna tells Duryodhan that all of this that you see around yourself all of this this is Billy I am the God of the universe let me teach you the wisdom of the Gita and once you understand its wisdom you will do what is right and avert this war in Kurukshetra do you know what Duryodhan says the reason looks at Krishna and smiles and says Krishna you think I don’t know what is right and wrong the thing I don’t understand that something inside me makes me do the wrong thing maybe probability I see Akeem a color come kind of a much bore another my nature makes me do the wrong the story of the Mahabharat actually starts when Bishop Adama takes the oath of celibacy and that’s given it as an example of a free will exercised by a character in Mahara because no external motivation no pressure he says decides to remain a celibate for that his father Shantanu can married this fisher woman’s activity but if you loo go back and read the original epic you again see the role of destiny their bitch pitama was one of the eight vasus

elemental gods who were cursed to be born on earth by sage Vashisht and so then when they went to ganga asked him to be born as a children they told Conrad that since we will be born as cursed beings we will ensure that we don’t continue a lineage on earth so even this great act of free will by Bhishma Tama is actually distinct but if that is the case then why is the entire Gita about the philosophy of action about doing the right thing about karma and so that is the second question that has always bothered me how much control do we really have over our lives the third question that bothers me that I struggle with when I read the Mahabharata is what is Dharma what is

the right thing to do when faced with complicated choices and no story illustrates that better than the birth of Dhritarashtra and Pandu the thrust is the father of Korus Pandu is the father of condors and the story of mahabharata

is essentially a war between a chorus and impartial so knowing their birth is critical to understanding a maverick Dhritarashtra and Pandu are sons of Ambika and Ambalika who were the wives of which trivia which through video was a foster brother of Bhishma Dhamma he was born out of the union of subtlety and Shantanu and when vichitravirya needed to be married sir Timothy asked Bhishma Tama to go and win wives for him so he went to Kashi modern-day Banaras and he kidnapped the princesses of Kashi for his brother like he had to do again for his nephew with Gandhari so he kidnapped the princesses of Kashi and got them married to which it revealed but before which the video could consume it his marriage he died and so subcommittee

asked Bishop Adama to sleep with Ambika and Ambalika and produce royal heirs but Bishop atomic told his his mother that no I can’t do that because I have taken a vow of celibacy and that’s my Dharma a promise I’ve made to myself – which certainty says no the greater thermal is to listen to your elder specially your parents even if it goes against your personal personal vows but Bhishma Thomas adamant he refuses so then SATA methi tells him that I’ll tell you a secret before I was married to Shan through your father I had an illegitimate child with sage Perisher his name is Wade the US before he went for his penance he promised that he would help me whenever I needed his help so go and call vedras so then Vedas comes and then she makes makes the same offer to him again Vedas is short he said that this is incest I can’t do this – which sucked empathy again makes the same argument that you should listen to your elders because that is your Dharma irrespective of how pleasant or unpleasant it is for you but various agrees with the argument made by cetera then he then sighs Dhritarashtra and Pandu a number kind of Malaga so the same situation the same choices to be made one great man reached pitama chooses one one one route and they theist chooses a completely different route to solve the problem so what is Dharma both of them gave the argument of Dharma justifying their actions so then what is the right thing to do you would have noticed in course of my talk that I presented my learnings from Mahabharat as questions not answers because that is the nature of the ethic everyone who reads the epic will have their own set of questions but I would strongly urge you to read the ethic if not to get inspiration at least to get some soul is that men and women far greater than you had to face the same kind of choices they made the same kind of mistakes and despite that we continue to celebrate and worship them and finally the reason you should read the Marmara because ultimately it is a story of flawed beings trying to create meaningful lives in an imperfect world and isn’t that what all of us are trying to do thank you [Applause] you