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upsydownyupsy mv ss
29 March 2011, 10:07 PM
The languages we use, the words that we speak and the sounds that we come across all help us in our quest for knowledge. I took up sanskrith to understand mantras in my high school, but still did not learn it. It is bad to neglect our language skills, especially if one wants to learn philosophy, I can see yajvanji and many others making good use of these forums for discussions regarding words and language. I hope more and more users get interested in, I hope that this would make the administrators think about creating a new sub forum, 'language forum' complete with links to sanskrith, english and other languages' dictionary and discussions on words. :D

I hope, I'm not hoping for too much :p. My ideas usually sound silly don't they?:o

Adhvagat
30 March 2011, 03:13 AM
I posted an articled about sanskrit chants and wave genetics. This field of science pretty much proves that language is not a construct of man, but something found at celular level.

http://www.hindudharmaforums.com/showthread.php?t=7223

Jainarayan
13 July 2011, 09:56 AM
Just browing the forums and resurrecting old threads. :o

There is a gene called FOXP2 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FOXP2) that is responsible for human speech. Interestingly, other animals also have versions of it, but it doesn't express as speech as we know it in these animals.

saidevo
14 July 2011, 12:00 AM
namaste everyone.

The import of language and speech

Language comprises four things: shabda--sound, dhvani--sound of utterance, varNa--phoneme, and artha--meaning.

• shabdas--sounds, are independent of languages. Being all-pervasive in space, they are eternal, and so have no origin or destruction.

• dhvani, as a specific form of shabda has both origin and destruction. The role of dhvani is to manifest varNa through its shabda.

• varNas, like shabdas are all-pervasive and eternal, but they can be heard only when they are manifest by dhvani.

• artha as cognition, is the meaning of a specific varNa--word, which depends on both varNa and dhvani in context.

*****

These laws of Nature, which are divine, give rise to several phenomena of saMsAra--World Process, which include the following:

• shabdas and varNas, being all-pervasive and eternal, have order or arrangement, either in space or time.

• But then, a word or sentence is a group of varNas arranged in a specific order. For example, only when the varNas related to jakAra, akAra, lakAra, akAra and makAra are arranged in a specific order and manifest with dhvani, then the listener can grasp the word jalam--water, and understand its meaning.

• This order and arrangement of varNas, as in the word jalam, belongs to the cognition and not to the varNas themselves. The sequence did not exist prior to its creation by an author by his will. This is the reason, laukika vachanaM--worldly speech, is called pauruSheya--of human origination.

• But in the case of a Vedic sentence such as agnimIle prohitam, it is not so. The Vedic seer who realized this sentence with the phonemes in such a sequence, did not will that such should be the sequence. In other words, he did not have any freedom to create the order of the phonemes or words, unlike, say, the poet KALidAsa.

• The divine sequence of Vedic utterances exists in the infinite, beginningless sequence of Creations until now, and nobody ever has had the freedom to create the sequence, other than what previously existed.

• Even the Brahman whose 'breathing' is described as the Vedas-—nishvasitam etad-—does not change the sequence of the Vedic phonemes. He just follows the sequence of phonemes as they were in the previous Creation, and teaches the same in the next Creation also. This unchanging sequencing of the phonemes of the Vedic sentences is the apauruSheyatvam--non-human origin, of the Vedas.

• This would explain the rigours and methods of the oral tradition of teaching the Vedas through various pada-pAThas--methods of chanting, and the reason they are known as shruti--head. The Vedic sequence of phonemes are pauruSheya--man-made, only so long as they are chanted.

*****

• The first impression we get is that smRti--memory by writing it down, is much better and flawless than shruti--hearing it. A word or sentence printed is there for all to see, read and understand.

• If we think about it, we would realize that it is not so: shruti is a surer way of preservation of true knowledge. Do we write down and memorize a film song to sing it or just learn it from hearing? Don't we often mispronounce the name of a person when reading it in writing until we learn the right way to utter the name by hearing it?

• Thus, while shruti improves our memory power, smRti only dilutes it. This is the reason we are forced to memorize our maths tables, forumulas, mantras and such other things by reading and self-listening. Poetry is terser and more elagant than prose, when it comes to be remembered.

• This is also the reason that the sequence is more important in formulas and Veda mantras than the meaning. Although, knowing the meaning helps our memory and chanting of mantras, since the meaning has different levels, we cannot be pondering over it in prayer, whereas we should contemplate it in meditation.

• Since we cannot remember verbatim, the voluminous contents of worldly knowledge, we digest it into our memory as abstract ideas that can be expanded by intution and association.

*****

The primitive man discovered the sun and felt its light and heat. Eventually, he learnt to create miniature suns in the form of fire. When he snuggled with his mate in the hut, he understood the personal warmth of the body and the light of the mind. The modern man, using his scientific intellect, has harnessed the power of sun to make his world of lights and shadows, heat and cold, and love and passion.

It was the Vedic RShis, who as mantra-dRShTa--seers of mantras, have explained the divine connection: that the sun and fire are both gross and subtle, and are only manifestations of the divine.