RMF Summary: Week of December 5 - 11, 2011

December 6

Review of BEING DIFFERENT by a Mumbai scholar I am forwarding herewith the remarks of Prof.Dr.(Mrs) K. Sankaranarayanan, Director, K.J. Somaiya Centre for Buddhist Studies, Mumbai. She Chaired the...

December 8 16 US media outlets carry our press release A standard press release emailed in bulk has been carried by the following media: WPSD Local 6 - NBC (Kentucky) KY view ... December 9 Lankaweb on release of Rajiv Malhotra’s ‘Breaking India’ by Dr Rajiv Malhotra’s ‘Breaking India’, listing conspiracies to split the country, released by Dr. Swamy ... December 10 Important research report undermines the Aryan/Dravidian divide http://www.scribd.com/doc/75164625/Indian-Diversity-genetic-study-Metspa\ lu-Gyaneshwer-Chaubey-et-al-AJHG-Dec-9-2011... December 10 Re: on debate with Mark Tully-- good point NS Rajaram posts: "....We must first set our own house in order before we go out to change the world. It must begin with our so-called 'spiritual' leaders who seem more intent on impressing our enemies of their 'broadmindedness' than lead the Hindus. This is due to a combination of ignorance and cowardice. We must be prepared to stand up and be counted-- and face brickbats sometimes. Most of the rigorous critique of Abrahamaic religions has come from secular Hindu thinkers like Ram Swarup, Sita Ram Goel and now Rajiv Malhotra. Our 'spiritual' leaders just mouth platitudes. It is also incorrect to say that Western thinkers have not criticized Christianity. Some of the best critics have been Western thinkers going back at least to Voltaire. We should do our homework before we charge others." " Subroto responds: "The purposes of our Dharmic and Philosophical traditions and that of Abrahmic traditions are different and thereby the training and spiritual practices are bound to be different.Our best spiritual masters undertake rigorous Sadhana and devote their time,instincts and training to achieve spiritual goals.This is also the reason that through a much higher level of cultivation of faculties they have been instrumental in creating a vast body of knowledge that is applicable at different planes of existence.They are not sales persons of institutionalized "faiths" -should we try to retrain them we shall assuredly fail.Therefore we have to adopt a different paradigm which accommodates the continuity of our spiritual practices while avoiding an invalid comparison of Clergy and Monks and seminaries and Mathas. We simply do not have the cadre of people that are seen as "representatives of faith" who are or will be "well versed with a deep study of western faiths" to make the discourse even. We create spiritual masters not theologians from seminaries or PhD's from universities. The PhD's in religion and the Theologians have set the parameters for the debate and we have accepted the rules of their game on their terms.It is not surprising that we find ourselves ill prepared. A monkey can challenge a lion and claim that one who wins a game of jumping is superior- but does it mean lions need to become monkeys! We have two choices: # 1 : To say that a billion people find no interest in your game - if pushed say that we are not interested in degrading ourselves to play with unworthy opponents just to sanctify them. OR # 2 : We accept a playing field that is not level with the understanding of our handicaps - here we cannot be frustrated by the prospect of loosing.I vote for this..."