Path: ultra.sonic.net!bug.rahul.net!rahul.net!a2i!news.kjsl.com!news.new-york.net!newshub.northeast.verio.net!newsfeed1.earthlink.net!nntp.earthlink.net!posted-from-earthlink!not-for-mail From: los@wmblake.com (Leslie O. Segar) Newsgroups: alt.magick.tantra,alt.religion.universal-life,alt.mythology,talk.religion.misc,talk.religion.newage,alt.fan.kali.astarte.inanna Subject: Re: Indian God[desse]s (was Siva ...) Date: Sun, 14 Mar 1999 21:17:37 -0500 X-ELN-Insert-Date: Sun Mar 14 18:25:05 1999 References: <36D44BE4.865301BC@earthlink.net> <36d5b628.2453859@news.pacifier.com> <7bmo0o$s8n@bolt.sonic.net> <36E03317.368F@luckymojo.com> <36E05AFA.932C0C7E@earthlink.net> <7bq46f$ebl$1@nnrp9.crl.com> <7btkdu$jug@news.voyager.net> <7bu8ie$2dss$1@nnrp9.crl.com> <36E8194B.1FA7AB20@earthlink.net> <36E99DC0.7F407F03@earthlink.net> <36EAB20E.90DE6BFF@earthlink.net> <36EC0047.DDD1925E@earthlink.net> X-Newsreader: MicroPlanet Gravity v2.10.940 Organization: Wm. Blake Fabricators X-Posted-Path-Was: not-for-mail Lines: 196 NNTP-Posting-Host: sdn-ar-003ohcincp259.dialsprint.net X-ELN-Date: 15 Mar 1999 02:17:37 GMT Message-ID: Xref: ultra.sonic.net alt.magick.tantra:8471 alt.religion.universal-life:7749 alt.mythology:48337 talk.religion.misc:280959 talk.religion.newage:97759 alt.fan.kali.astarte.inanna:1859 > >Would you mind posting your condensed version of the story of the Eternal >Boy, and how he used an >idol to teach him to be such a great bowman that Arjuna was jealous of him? > Happily. The story that Lani refers to is the story of Ekavalya, a prince of the Nisadas, an outcaste tribe of hunters, who inhabited the remote forests of Northern India; to the Aryans who are the main protagonists of the Mahabharata, the Nisadas would have had a position similar to the position that the forest Indians had to the European settlers of America's East Coast in the 18th & 17th century - barbarians, but with some essential nobility that even the settlers' blindered Christianity could not keep them from glimpsing. The background of the story, in brief: Drona was the greatest teacher of weapons in the Three Worlds, and he had been brought to the court of Hastinapura to teach the five Pandava brothers, who are the heros of the Mahabharata, the art of archery; Arjuna was Drona's favorite among the Pandavas, and Drona had promised Arjuna that he would make him into the world's greatest bowman. Many others came to learn of Drona, among them "a certain Ekalavya, the son of Hiranyadhanus, the chief of the Nisadas. But Drona, who knew the Law, declined to accept him for archery, our of consideration for the others, reflecting that he was the son of a Nisada. Ekalavya ... touched Drona's feet with his head and went out into the forest. He fashioned a likeness of Drona out of clay.This image he treated religiously as his teacher, while he spent all his efforts on archery, observing the proper disciplines. And so great was his faith, and so sublime his discipline, that he acquired a duperb deftness at fixing arrow to bowstring, aiming it, and releasing it." (This quotation, as those which will follow, are from the first volume of Jacob van Buitenen's superb and tragically unfinished translation of the Mahabharata, University of Chicago Press.) One day, when the Pandavas were released from their studies, they went out to the forest to go hunting, with their dogs. One of the dogs wandered off and discovered the sleeping Ekalavya, and began barking; Ekalavya, without even thinking, "shot almost simultaneously seven arrows into its mouth". When the dog found its way back to its masters, they recognized that only a very great archer could have accomplished such a feat; they tracked Ekalavya down, and demanded to know who he was. Ekalavya answered "Know me for the son of Hiranyadhanus, chieftain of the Nisadas, and also for a pupil of Drona, who toils on mastering archery." When they went back to court, they told Drona of their meeting, and Arjuna complained bitterly to him: "Didn't you once embrace me... and tell me fondly that no pupil of yours would ever excel me? Then how is it that you have another powerful pupil who excels me, who excels all the world - the son of the Nisada chief?" Drona went to the forest. "He found Ekalavya, his body caked with dirt, hair braided, dressed in tatters, bow in hand, ceaselessly shooting arrows. When Ekalavya saw Drona approaching, he went up; to him, embraced his feet, and touched the ground with is head. After honoring Drona duly, the Nisada-born boy declared himself to be his pupil and stood before him with folded hands. Thereupon Drona said to Ekalavya, 'If you are my pupil, then give me at once my fee!' Hearing this, Ekalavya said happily, 'What can I offer you, sir? Let my guru command me! For, great scholar of the Brahman, there is nothing I shall withhold from my guru!' "Drona replied, 'Give me your right thumb!' And hearing Drona's harsh command, Ekalavya kept his promise; forever devoted to the truth, with a happy face and unburdened mind, he cut off his thumb without a moment's hesitation and gave it to Drona. When thereafter the Nisada shot with his fingers, he was no longer as fast as he had been before. Arjuna's fever was gone and his heart was happy; and Drona's word was proved true: no one bested Arjuna." That's the story; three or four paragraphs from an epic that is three times longer than the Iliad and the Odyssey combined! That is all the evidence that Lani can muster for her claim that "the Mahabharata teaches idol worship". There was no "idol worship" involved in the story; Ekalavya was using his image of Drona as very many Hindus, today, use photos of their gurus, to help them focus on their task and remember the guru's teachings. The image of the crucified Christ in many Catholic homes, or the holy cards that used to be passed out in church school, or the images of Jesus painted on black velvet, are very much closer to "idols" in the sense that Lani used the word than was the image of his guru that Ekalavya fashioned out of clay. That the story demonstrates wicked racism at work in the culture that the Mahabharata deals with is undeniable; so is the fact that that same culture is able to see nobility wherever it appears. There is no doubt at all that Ekalavya is the hero of the tale, and that Arjuna's whining appeal to Drona is less than noble; in fact, it is one of a number of ignoble acts that Arjuna and his brothers perpetrate and that cause them, at the very end of the epic, to have their entrance to Indra's heaven delayed until they have spent some time in the epic's equivalent of Hell. I'm sorry if that was not condensed enough, but it's a good story, and I had to tell it at length to completely dispel Lani's misrepresentation of its meaning. > Your idea of what "worship" is quite simplistic and limited, But if you will read the story once > again, from the POV that the Eternal Boy is actually wroshiping his idol, I'm sure you'll see it > the same way as I do. Remember that when you take a particulat stance concerning what a religion > believes in, and then use that asumption to reject it, then you will always be wrong. > Same to ya, kid! I rest my case. LOS In article <36EC0047.DDD1925E@earthlink.net>, kahunalani@earthlink.net says... > > > Leslie O. Segar wrote: > > > In article <36EAB20E.90DE6BFF@earthlink.net>, > > kahunalani@earthlink.net says... > > > > > > Of course, the Mahabarata teaches Idol worship too, but you ignore that fact, as it doesn't > > > suit your infamous purposes here! Eh? > > > > > > > I am pretty intimately familiar with the Mahabharata - as > > familiar as one can be, I think, without Sanskrit - and > > nowhere in the Mahabharata I know is there any teaching > > that explicitly or implicitly "teaches Idol worship". > > It's true that there are many gods in the Mahabharata, as > > there are many gods in this world, and it is true that > > the relationship between humankind and gods presented in > > the Mahabharata is more subtle and complex, and more > > ennobling of humankind, than the simple-minded fearful > > "worship" that prevails in the Yahwist creeds, but "Idol > > worship"? That is a provocative charge, based on > > ignorance and monotheist arrogance; you can provide no > > evidence to support it. > > > > LOS > > > > -- > > Leslie O. Segar > > First Instigator, Church of the Open Hand > > http://www.wmblake.com/ohc > > > > For a summary treatment of the Mahabharata, check out > > http://www.wmblake.com/stories/mahabharata > > Aloha, > > I see you have not been following the dialog in alt.religion.universal-life. I usually try to > limit the cross postings, except in certain cases. > > Now it sounds like to me that you have some familiarity with the Mahabarata. > > Would you mind posting your condensed version of the story of the Eternal Boy, and how he used an > idol to teach him to be such a great bowman that Arjuna was jelous of him? > > Please don't forget to keep in about how he made an idol of his teacher, and how he used his > idol. > > Your idea of what "worship" is quite simplistic and limited, But if you will read the story once > again, from the POV that the Eternal Boy is actually wroshiping his idol, I'm sure you'll see it > the same way as I do. Remember that when you take a particulat stance concerning what a religion > believes in, and then use that asumption to reject it, then you will always be wrong. > > Aloha, > > Lani > > > > >