Alain Daniélou - While the Gods Play

[realdemigod]

Hello everyone, has anyone read this book?

While the Gods Play: Shaiva Oracles and Predictions on the Cycles of History and the Destiny of Mankind

This book gives a good account of Shaivism and how Hinduism incorporated concepts and philosophies of Shaivism over the centuries.

From so far I read it's clear that Shaivism is ancient of all religions and Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism are all offshoots..including Darsanas.

[Eastern Mind]

Hello everyone, has anyone read this book?

While the Gods Play: Shaiva Oracles and Predictions on the Cycles of History and the Destiny of Mankind

This book gives a good account of Shaivism and how Hinduism incorporated concepts and philosophies of Shaivism over the centuries.

From so far I read it's clear that Shaivism is ancient of all religions and Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism are all offshoots..including Darsanas.

Vannakkam: I'm personally always skeptical of the scholarly approach by non-Hindus as I always think 'something' may be missing. I read the reviews at amazon. One said Danielou still believes in AIT which in itself should make anyone skeptical.

But who is to say? Maybe one of our more scholarly member has read it. I won't be.

Aum Namasivaya

[Sudas Paijavana]

Pranam-s,

Wait a minute....Shaivism has an "end of times"? Hinduism has an "end of times"?

ps - It seems that Danielou was a big fan of Dravidian, "indigenous" history and culture, and he thought of AIT as a culprit that hindered the liberal progress of the Dravidian civilization. In my opinion, this is a relatively new stance and a highly interesting one, one that I rarely encounter these days, because the ones that I usually encounter are, "They came, they conquered, and they made everything better". But, Danielou says that everything was wonderful and legit in Ancient "India" before AIT, and the civilization was so ripely advanced that the invaders were mere marauding, war-mongering heathens of puritanical orientation and barbarity. So, while most AIT scholars romanticize the "invaders", Danielou despises them for hindering the progress of what he may have viewed as one of the greatest and most civilized civilizations on the planet ("Dravidian"). Or, that's at least what I got from the reviews....I'd buy the book but I can't find it on iBooks. I fancy his theory [because I love South India and the people of the South ], but I'm not sure what to believe in these days.

[Avyaydya]

When I read:

"According to the early writings of the Shaiva tradition--still alive in India and dating back at least 6,000 years--the arbitrary ideologies and moralistic religions of modern society signal the last days of humanity heading toward destruction. "

That is enough to understand an American is projecting biblical "end of time" prophesies on Hinduism. This will sell well as it gives other American believers new conformation. The same way the Mayan calendar was used. When the tsunami hit the far east, I was called by people that wanted to convince me "the end is near". This is a repeating theme. "Repent now sinner, for the end of the world is nigh". The Internet is full of it. Did you know we "now live under the last pope according to Nostradamus"? Yes, the end is near. This kind of cherry pick reasoning is false and manipulative.

[Jaskaran Singh]

Pranam-s,

Wait a minute....Shaivism has an "end of times"? Hinduism has an "end of times"?

ps - It seems that Danielou was a big fan of Dravidian, "indigenous" history and culture, and he thought of AIT as a culprit that hindered the liberal progress of the Dravidian civilization. In my opinion, this is a relatively new stance and a highly interesting one, one that I rarely encounter these days, because the ones that I usually encounter are, "They came, they conquered, and they made everything better". But, Danielou says that everything was wonderful and legit in Ancient "India" before AIT, and the civilization was so ripely advanced that the invaders were mere marauding, war-mongering heathens of puritanical orientation and barbarity. So, while most AIT scholars romanticize the "invaders", Danielou despises them for hindering the progress of what he may have viewed as one of the greatest and most civilized civilizations on the planet ("Dravidian"). Or, that's at least what I got from the reviews....I'd buy the book but I can't find it on iBooks. I fancy his theory [because I love South India and the people of the South ], but I'm not sure what to believe in these days.

I think that Dravidianism is even worse, to an extent, than Indological AIT theories, as there is nothing that can truly be classified as truly "Dravidian" (assuming that dravidian means "non-Aryan," lol) since South Indian culture is far more Vedic than North Indian culture. For example look at the birth locations of the founding AcArya-s of the four main vaiShNava vedAnta sampradAya-s:

rAmAnujAcArya, yAmunAcArya, azhwar-s, etc. (shrI sampradAya) - tamiLakam (i.e. tamiL nAdu)

viShNusvAmi, etc. (rudra sampradAya) - chera kingdom (i.e. kerala)
[vallabhAcArya was from campAraNya (which would be in present day chattIsagaRh), but I digress]

madhvAcArya, hR^iShIkesha tIrtha, etc. (brahmA sampradAya) - karnATaka

nimbArkAcArya (sanakAdi/kumAra/haMsa sampradAya) -Andhra pradesh

PS - I thought that historically, shaivism was generally more common in the North than in the South, as after all:
1) shiva is associated with the mountains (Isha girIsha naresha, etc.)
2) during the time of the nayannar-s (and before the reign of rAjarAja chola), shaiva-s were a minority and were to a degree persecuted by jaina-s
3) although the 18 siddhar-s were all from tamiL nAdu, much of the philosophy of the shaiva siddhAnta tradition was borrowed from kashmIr.

VaiShNavism, to me, is historically much more related to the south (not presently, but in the past); in fact, perumAl/mAyOn (viShNu) is mentioned more in saNgam literature than even muruga. This idiotic Indologist in question probably uses fallacious reasoning like assuming that the dakShiNAmUrti form of shiva is named as such because it was made by people from "dakShiNadesha" (i.e. South India). Pssh...why do so many Indologists come up with the most absurd theories to support their already baseless theories.

[Eastern Mind]

When I read:

That is enough to understand an American is projecting biblical "end of time" prophesies on Hinduism.

Vannakkam: I though Danileau was French. Certainly he passed away in '94 or so. Perhaps the refuting of the AIT wasn't so accepted then. It was 20 years ago.

Aum Namasivaya

[ShivaFan]

Namaste

I am not really familiar with Alain Danielou, despite almost 50 years of Hinduism and a collection of a rather large library of books related to Hinduism and scriptures. So perhaps his importance or impact in the overall scheme of this is being over exaggerated here. I mean, perhaps some of us may have heard mention of him, but most of us (well, speaking for myself) quickly forgot who he was.

So again, I am not so sure why this is relevant very much.

But now that his name has been raised in this discussion, I took a quick look at his background. Yes, he is French, but not "French" in his mindset, he apparently fell in love with India at some point early in his life and in no way was typical in his ideations as were fellow Europeans of his time. Coming from Royal Norman blood (remember, today's royalty in UK is from France, the Normans of France invading England in 1066 AD), he must have been under a lot of peer pressure and family stress from those who objected to his flirtations with India, it's music, art and religion.


At some point he came under the influence of a Guru from the Dashanami Sampradaya within the Advaita Vedanta tradition.

I went through his list of books he has authored, to me he seems to be too fascinated with the "erotic" side of various India art, books (Kama Sutra and stuff like that) and incorrect misconceptions of Linga he seemed to become focused on. I didn't recognize any of the titles, but this erotica flirtation probably explains a lot of why I do not connect his name with much importance within Hindu circles in the West.

Having said that, however, I think the guy was brave for his time, and I may just read one of his works but one that does not waste my time with all this Kama this or that erotica garbage. I think if I knew him personally, overall he was probably a fine gent.

But he's dead, and over time will probably sort of "fade away". I wouldn't make too much of his "importance".

I am curious to see some of those old black and white photos his Swiss side-kick and photographer took of India. Those might be interesting.

Om Namah Sivaya

[Sudas Paijavana]

why do so many Indologists come up with the most absurd theories to support their already baseless theories.

Pranam-s,

I don't remember the full quote, but a Swedish fella [or I think he was Danish or German, I don't remember....and no...it wasn't Elst] a few years ago poked fun at Western Indologists through satire, stating that a majority of them, deep down, believe that they are descendants of those mystical "marauding, puritanical invaders". That, wherever you look, there is bound to be a deeply rooted context of either subconscious racism or eugenics. And, they are striving to either return to the days of old through appropriating those texts through a European-centric racial paradigm or honestly feel as if they are the sole, rightful authorities on translating those scriptures, especially the Rig Veda. Even Kazanas, who called them "comparativists", points to the fact that many modern Western Indologists, be it from either America or Europe, almost completely [barring a relatively few] disregard native, Indian historians and Sanskritists, seeing them as either "quacks" or "Hindutvadins". Unfortunately, Indologists are prone to attacking each other through ad hominem all the time (e.g., George Thomson called Elst a Hindutvadin and Elst called George Thomson a racist; Kazanas calls out Witzel all the freakin' time; Witzel literally insults David Frawley as if it's his mission from God [whose God? I don't know..]). So, credibility is one of their biggest worries, I'm guessing, especially when one of them, Doniger, is obsessed with using a sex-related perspective when it comes to analyzing anything and everything that is Indic. <---- Don't forget, it's later published as unquestionable fact. To question them would mean to be labelled as a Hindutvadin.

As a side note: the department of Indology, especially in the USA, is a poor one, not heavily funded, and at times decried as less important. Yet, whatever they dictate in the I-E-Journal or I-I Journal gets sent to high school and college textbooks as facts, and very few question the material, not questioning either out of "yeah, I trust you" or "I don't have time for this".

It still doesn't take away the fact and daily observance that whenever an American hears the word, "Aryan", the first thing he/she most likely is to think of will either be Hitler, Nazis, and blond hair and blue eyed. <--- That thinking is so persuasively ingrained in the American psyche that it is mind bafflingly mind-boggeling. What is even worse is that the linguistic community still continues to refer to the North Indian language family as Indo-Aryan, while Irano-Aryan/Iranian-Aryan was transformed to just Iranic. The racialist undertones dealing with Indology are still so vividly alive that it, to me, comes off as a joke, and just sad....just plain freakin' sad.

No matter how one should approach this concern, there are two important books that address these worries:

1. Aryans and British India by Thomas R. Trautmann
2. Invading the Sacred: An Analysis of Hinduism Studies in America by Krishnan Ramaswamy and Antonio de Nicolas

And, I literally....literally....wouldn't be surprised if Ramaswamy has been already called out by mainstream Western Indologists as a Hindutvadin.

[ShivaFan]

Quote Sudas "... whenever an American hears the word, "Aryan", the first thing he/she most likely is to think of will either be Hitler, Nazis..."

You are absolutely right on that. I do not speak for Europeans from which, within the German circles came the National Socialist (NAZI - Nationalsozialist ) German Workers Party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei) branch of socialism (also see however the roots of the socialist Baath Party(s) in the Middle East). But as far as Americans, to 99 percent of them the word "Aryan" only brings to mind the Nazi's and Hitler, and not at all "India", and this association is due to the rather horrific struggles and death involved in America's involvement in WWII and the war against Fascism and nationalist Socialism.

So Americans do not think in terms of India when they hear the word Arya or Aryan, but when that word is heard there is almost an immediate suspicion the one using it is a racialist.

Om Namah Sivaya

[realdemigod]

To all your points the author was biased towards Dravidianism and even drew parallels between Christianity and later Hinduism but he quotes a book 'History and Philosophy of Lingayat Religion' by M R Sakhare. I can't get my hands on that book anyone read that either? This is only an informative book but not an authoritative by means on Hinduism. Hope all here take it with pinch of salt