Mixing faith and history

The debate on Ayodhya has reached center-stage again. While there are political moves afoot, aimed at reaching some kind of satisfactory via media, the court-ordered digs have generated much news, although the work itself is progressing at a glacial pace.

The Ayodhya Dispute

An interim Archaeological Survey of India report that said they had so far failed to find a temple has been given far more publicity than it deserved. Simple logic suggests that failing to find evidence of something doesn't necessarily mean that the thing doesn't exist: the seekers may just not have looked hard enough. Nevertheless, the usual suspects, 'eminent historians' of Marxist bent, leapt to conclusions. These worthies would not be satisfied even if an entire temple were to be dug up: they would demand a time machine to take them back to the time when a Mughal general is said to have razed it.

Furthermore, 'secular progressives' continue to allege that Lord Rama is a mythical personage, and therefore the question of His birthplace is not historically meaningful. I would like to contest these statements.

First of all, matters of faith are not necessarily historically verifiable. 'Secular progressives' readily accept Christian, Muslim and Marxist beliefs, as it were, on faith. So why not Hindu beliefs? Second, Indian itihasam or historical tradition has been denigrated as pure myth, whereas it apparently has significant elements of embedded history.

Providing a liberal Muslim perspective on Ayodhya, Saeed Naqvi says in the Indian Express of June 13, ('Muslims must be generous'): 'The Muslim case is reasonable and logical, but it runs into this irresistible incantation of "faith," which is as much beyond reason as is the Virgin Birth, or the Prophet's journey on a winged horse.' I am not sure I agree with the first part about 'reasonable and logical,' but Naqvi clearly is right in the second part: faith is not about reason. If enough people believe something is true, lo and behold, it becomes true. This is the case regarding Ayodhya and the Ramajanmabhoomi.

Any archaeological evidence at Ayodhya may or may not validate the historicity of Lord Rama. But this is beside the point.

The point is double standards: 'secular progressives' do not impose the same strict burden of proof on other beliefs. For example, there is the assumed crucifixion site of Jesus Christ. There is no particular evidence that Jesus died there (indeed, there is practically no evidence a person named Jesus Christ ever lived. This may just mean they haven't looked hard enough. But in 2,000 years and with the Church's vast resources in hand, I have to believe they have looked quite diligently.) The location of Jesus' crucifixion was 'divined' in a dream by the mother of the converted Roman emperor Constantine, who promptly demolished a temple to Athena that stood on the spot.

There is no physical evidence of the life of Jesus: no reliable relic like a tooth or bones, as in the case of the Buddha or Mohammed. The famous Shroud of Turin has been proven by the Vatican itself to be a fake from about a thousand years ago. So, naturally, there was a fuss in November 2002 about the apparent discovery of an ossuary (a casket for holding the bones of a dead person) of ancient vintage that had the name 'James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus' inscribed on it.

A major news agency ran the story, in which they mentioned in passing, 'Most scholars do not doubt the story of the life of Jesus.' I happened to see the same item, credited to the same agency, in an Indian newspaper; only the line had now become: 'Scholars do not doubt the story of the life of Jesus.' The omission of the word 'most' is significant, and must have been deliberate: another example of the Indian media's eagerness to accept certain assertions uncritically.

Unfortunately, soon enough there was bad news. ABC News ran a story, 'Experts Call Biblical Artifact a Fake' (June 18), datelined Jerusalem, in which they quoted the Israeli Antiquities Authority as saying the ossuary is a fake. 'The inscription appears new, written in modernity by someone attempting to reproduce ancient written characters,' the officials said. They called the inscriptions 'forgeries.'

Somehow, this news was not carried by the Indian media with any enthusiasm. In fact, it was not carried at all by the Indian media: it was quietly buried. Enquiring minds would like to know why.

Based on the lack of evidence, why doesn't the Indian 'secular progressive' shout from the rooftops that Jesus and Rama were both equally mythical or equally historical?

Similarly, many Muslims believe that the Al Aqsa in Jerusalem is the 'Far Mosque' where their Prophet is supposed to have descended to after visiting heaven. But there is no particular evidence that Jerusalem is the site of the 'Far Mosque.' It appears that the Koran mentions Mecca and Medina innumerable times, but Jerusalem, not at all. The American scholar Daniel Pipes -- admittedly someone who is not sympathetic to Islam -- claims that the identification of Al Aqsa as the third most sacred spot in Islam is a recent and possibly political phenomenon.

There are also articles of faith in the Marxist religion: about the State withering away, the benign rule of the proletariat, the millennium ushered in by providing 'to each according to his needs.' Historically speaking, none of these dogmas have any basis in fact; in general, the very opposite of Marx's predictions have come true.

Nevertheless the 'secular progressives' of India accept all these beliefs. So why not Hindu beliefs? The answer that we all know: bigotry.

Secondly, there is increasing physical evidence about the historical truth of the itihasam. F E Pargiter in his Ancient Indian Historical Traditions collected lists of rulers and dynasties based on traditional Sanskrit sources. The chronology went back thousands of years but was rejected as myth, because conventional wisdom, the Aryan Invasion Mythology, held that Indian civilisation only began when the alleged Aryans allegedly invaded India in 1500 BCE! Everybody conveniently forgot that the Aryan Invasion fairy-tale was later disowned even by its creator Max Mueller, and the basis for his chronology was the Christian mythology that the world was created in 4004 BCE.

The story of Krishna and of his beloved Dwaraka being submerged under the waves may yet turn out to be factual: the National Institute of Ocean Technology has found in the Gulf of Cambay what appears to be the remains of a city, complete with artifacts, pottery, figurines, household objects, and jewelry. Archaeologist S R Rao, in excavations off the coast near Dwaraka, has found pottery dated at 1520 BCE.

Similarly, there are persistent stories about man-made structures off the coast of Mahabalipuram near Chennai, as well as of the legendary Kumarikandam which sank into the Indian Ocean. Improved marine archaeology may give us many more insights into ancient Indian history.

Excavated arrows and spearheads in Kurukshetra have been dated back to 2800 BCE. The earliest known Indus-Sarasvati valley settlement, at Mehrgarh in Baluchistan, has been dated to 6500 BCE.

Now we're talking a span of several thousand years: it is entirely possible that the Indian epic heroes in fact were real people millennia ago, who were later lionised or deified. There is precedent: the Greek epics, complete with superhuman heroes, were held to be pure myth until Schliemann's excavations at Troy provided undeniable archaeological evidence. Much as the Sarasvati river itself was considered mythical until satellite imagery identified its now dried-up course and mighty flood-plain.

Thus, it is still possible that the ASI will dig up incontrovertible evidence at Ayodhya about a pre-existing temple to Rama. Even if they do not, it is only fair that a belief so fondly held by millions of Hindus be honoured and not denigrated by others.

Finally, the project of converting Indian history into myth continues. A certain 'eminent historian' was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters from a British university, and the citation was for 'reducing Indian myth into history;' whereas this person did, and they meant, the opposite. How telling: the British know that this 'eminent historian' is an excellent sepoy in their mission of continuing mental colonisation. They quoted Roman poet Horace: whoever makes an aim of historical truth 'must walk through deceptive ashes, thinly spread over the fires that burn beneath.' Indeed, sifting through the ashes of deception and self-serving dissimulation as practiced by the 'eminent historians', it is up to the modern Indian to reach the true fires that illuminate the nation's history.

In terms of separating myth from history, I am pleased to recommend the following play (based on classical dance) being organised by Heritage and Harlequin in Bangalore on July 11, 2003.

In an effort to highlight unknown facts of history and little known information about our heritage and culture we at Heritage with the assistance of Harlequin Entertainments, will be staging a play about the ancient River Saraswathi and the Vedic Age besides a peep into the British Age and into contemporary India.

Shiva Subramaniam & Vijayalakshmi Vijayakumar                               

Directed and Produced by                                                

Contact: heritage@yes2yoga.com, Phone: +91-80-660-4741 and +91-80-660-4742