|
At the outset,
let me thank the organizers (International Center for Cultural Studies,
Nagpur) for having given me this opportunity to have a dialogue
with this learned audience. I am fully aware of my limitations in
terms of academic qualifications and fieldwork to deal with this
subject viz. Indo-Native American Cultural Similarities. My love
and concern for the subject, however, embolden me to stand before
you.
As I have stated
just now, I wish to establish a dialogue with you. Being a privileged
speaker to deliver this keynote address, the dialogue is going to
be one sided - I am going to talk and you are going to listen. This,
however, is not literally true. Neither am I going to say something
which you will not understand, nor are you going to listen to a
speaker whose words are incomprehensible. By this, I do not mean
the language I am going to employ, obviously English, but the set
of rules of idiom and paradigm by which I will have to abide, so
as to make my talk meaningful to you. What do I mean by 'meaningful
to you', or 'the said set of rules'? There is a system, a method
by which we try to understand the laws of nature, who we are, what
our relation with Nature is, from where we have come and to what
destination we are proceeding. These are perennial questions, and
every civilization, during its course of existence, has tried to
address and answer them. Up to the 15th century the Greco-Roman,
South American and Indian civilizations spoke in terms evolved by
their epistemologies based on their own perception, experience and
cumulative wisdom handed down from generation to generation. This
development came about by a definite set of rules, which were employed
by the societies, to understand the complexities of Nature and human
behavior. All these exercises are now termed as the world views
of those respective people. When human activity centers round these
world views, and proliferates in various fields, we arrive at the
concept of their distinct cultures. Up to the 15th century, the
world view of the West was dominated by the influence of Ptolemy
and Aristotle in pre-Christian times and by Christianity later.
In India, it was influenced by the thoughts and insights of Vedic
seers, Upanishadic sages and the founders of various systems of
philosophy.
We call this culture-complex, civilization.
What
are the criteria for calling a culture, a civilization? We ask some
questions. Does it have a language and grammar of it's own? Does
it have it's own ethics, value system and beliefs popularly known
as religion? Does it have it's own social institutions? Does it
have it's own architecture and town planning? Does it have their
revenue and judicial systems? Health system, fine and performing
arts, style of costume, and agricultural system? All these things
have a distinctive stamp of their respective world views on the
civilization. The 15th century saw a turning point, which radically
changed the perspective of looking at Nature and Man. This led to
the emergence of a system, which we understand now as the science
of today. This started with Copernicus, and was further developed
by the efforts of Galileo, Bacon, Descartes and Newton. It influenced
the scientific thinking up to the 20th century, and there was again
a major change with the advent of Max Planck, Einstein, Heisenberg,
Neil's Bohr. The earlier scientific development is known as Classical
or Newtonian Physics, and the latter as Quantum physics. The Newtonian
Physics was responsible for the Industrial revolution in the West,
it gave birth to various inventions and discoveries. This was a
success story in physical science. The crux of Newtonian physics
was essentialism, determinism and reductionism. Every branch of
knowledge, which wanted to qualify as a science, had to model itself
on physics. Those branches of knowledge like biology, sociology,
psychology, anthropology and history, which don't deal with inanimate
matter, adopted the systems of physical science. They started believing
that every science is like any other science and laws of physics
and mathematics could be adopted by them. In the words of Ernst
Mayr,
The classical
philosophers of science tended to agree with the physicists that
everything in the world of living organisms obeys the same laws
as those that apply to inert matter and that there are no other
laws.[1]
The physicists
themselves realized the inadequacies of the classical physics and
changed their approach embracing the new insights, which Quantum
Physics had given. However, humanities still cling to the earlier
view. The biggest casualty of this is the study of ancient civilizations
The scientific
and industrial changes along with material success in Europe, brought
about radical changes in the life-style of Europeans. This change
was not a result of their religion it rather came in opposition
to the organized, church-based religion. The stories of Galileo
and Bruno are too well known to need repetition: Another transformation
was also taking place in Europe. It is a curious coincidence of
history that Vasco-de-Gama reached Indian shores and Columbus wanting
to reach there landed up at the American coast - a coincidence that
changed the course of global history. Britons in the 16t" century,
and almost at the same time, the Dutch and the French came to India
and reached other parts of Asia and Africa. This European expansion
gave- rise to massive colonization of all the continents of the
earth. Like India, Africa, America and Australia also each had its
own indigenous culture with it's own world view, language, customs
and beliefs. Asian civilizations survived this onslaught, but the
civilizations in the other continents were totally wiped out. Such
massive destruction of culture was never witnessed during the last
2000 years, either by natural calamities or internal warfare. The
inspiration behind this unprecedented destruction was, by and large,
religious. This shows the insensitivity, intolerance and brutality
of the culture then existing in Europe. This insensitivity coupled
with lust for power and pelf destroyed not only some living, vibrant
cultures, but have also endangered many a species of birds and animals
and ecology in general. Scientific and technological development
in Europe was seen as a symbol of progress and enlightenment. This
gave rise to racial and cultural superiority complex. Non Western
cultures were looked down upon as barbaric, primitive, superstitious
and irrational. Miss Mayo's 'Mother India' and Archer's 'JEU DESPRIT'
are typical of this supercilious attitude. James Mill's 6-volume
'History of British India' is another example of this arrogant attitude
that disparaged all non European cultures. H.H. Wilson, who edited
the later edition has this to say,".. .. as missionaries .. .. they
see the errors and vices of a heathen people through a medium by
which they are exaggerated beyond their natural dimensions and assume
an enormity which would not be assigned to the very same defects
in Christianity. "
The European
superiority complex viewed the American Indian and Indian cultures
as comparably barbaric. The best example of this can be found in
the writings of James Mill who argued that the conditions were similar
among these 'rude nations'. Hindu beliefs of the divinity reminded
Mill of those held by the "rude tribes of America wandering naked
in the woods."
What a wonderful
similarity in the eyes of the European !
Mill dismisses
the European admirers of these civilizations by saying,
The nations of Europe became acquainted nearly about the same period,
with the people of America, and the people of Hindustan. Having
contemplated in the one, a people without fixed habitations, without
political institutions, and with hardly any other arts than those
indispensably necessary for the preservation of existence, they
hastily concluded, upon the sight of another people, inhabiting
great cities, cultivating the soil, connected together by an artificial
system of subordination, exhibiting monuments of great antiquity,
cultivating a species of literature, exercising arts, and obeying
a monarch whose sway was extensive, and his court magnificent, that
they had suddenly past from the one extreme of civilization to the
other. The Hindus were compared with the savages of America; the
circumstances in which they differed from that barbarous people,
were the circumstances in which they corresponded with the most
cultivated nations; other circumstances were overlooked; and it
seems to have been little suspected that conclusions too favorable
could possibly be drawn. [2]
In
the footnote, he further says,
The account
which Robertson gives of the causes which led to exaggerated conceptions
in the mind of the Spaniards, respecting the civilization of the
Mexicans, applies in almost every particular to those of the English
and French, respecting the Hindus. The Spaniards, he says "when
they first touched on the Mexican coast, were so much struck with
the appearance of attainments in policy and in the arts of life,
far superior to those of the rude tribes with which they were hitherto
acquainted, that they fancied that they had at length discovered
a civilized people in the New World. This comparison between the
people of Mexico
and their uncultivated neighbors, they appear to have kept constantly
in view, and observing with admiration many things which marked
the preeminence of the former, they employed, in describing their
imperfect policy and infant arts, such terms as are applicable to
the institutions of men far beyond them in improvement. Both these
circumstances concur in detracting from the credit due to the descriptions
of Mexican manners by the Spanish writers. By drawing a parallel
between them and those of people so much less civilized, they raised
their own ideas too high. By their mode of describing them, they
conveyed ideas to others no less exalted above truth. Later writers
have adopted the style of the original historians, and improved
upon it." Hist. of America, iii 320. [3]
I
personally believe that Mill's viewpoint and the finding of similarities
between the cultures of Indians and American Indians have a deeper
meaning. Mill was a product of the contemporary Western philosophical,
religious, scientific environment and upbringing. I do not condemn
Mill for this. He was honest to his upbringing which led him to
sincerely believe that European culture was by far the superior
one, and all the non-European cultures were primitive, inferior
and barbarous. Mill was only a typical representative of the European
mind-set, world view and culture. The next inevitable step was an
honest feeling of responsibility to free the non-European barbarians
of the primitiveness, and educate them. This feeling was strengthened
by their faith that Christianity of all denominations was a superior,
a true religion which ultimately all mankind must embrace. So, all
the non European religions and cultures were categorized and labeled
as pagan, heathen etc. The practitioners of this culture became,
in the eyes of the European, superstitious, irrational devil-worshippers.
So Warren Hastings, William Jones, Duff, Mill, Wilberforce, and
that great intellectual giant T.B.Macaulay - all shared this viewpoint,
and tried to 'civilize' non European primitive cultures. The famous
speech of Macaulay in the House of Commons in 1833 speaks volumes
in confirmation of what have just now outlined, and needs no farther
elaboration. Says Macaulay -
It may be the public mind of India may expand under our system till
it has outgrown that system; that by good Government we may educate
our subjects into a capacity for better Government; that, having
become instructed in European knowledge, they may, in some future
age, demand European institutions. Whether such a day will ever
come I know not. But never will I attempt to avert or retard it.
Whenever it comes, it will be the proudest day in English history.
To have found a great people sunk in the lowest
depths of slavery and superstition, to have so ruled them as to
have made them desirous and capable of all the privileges of citizens,
would indeed be a title to glory all our own. The sceptre may pass
away from us. Unforeseen accidents may derange our most profound
schemes of policy. Victory may be inconstant to our arm. But there
are triumphs which are followed by no reverse. There is an empire
exempt from all natural causes of decay. Those triumphs are the
pacific triumphs of reason over barbarism; that empire is the imperishable
empire of our arts and our morals, our literature and our laws [4]
Two
other towering personalities that shaped and still shape European
and Modern Indian public opinion about India, are Max Muller and Vincent
Smith. I sincerely respect their scholarship and devotion. They were
also the product of science and philosophy that had shaped the mind-set
and viewpoint of looking at the non-European cultures, like Macualay
and Mill. With all their condescending appreciation of some aspects
of Indian and other non-European cultures, their task was to liberate
them from their primitiveness!! However every admirer of Max Muller,
should become conversant with the mind-set and viewpoint of this great
scholar. Writings and publications of him are the visible outcomes
of invisible motives and drives. We must get at them.
Max Muller wrote
to Chevalier Bunsen on 25th August 1856.
... After the
last annexation (i.e. of Oudh) the territorial conquest of India
ceases
What follows next is the struggle in the realm of religion and spirit
... India is much riper for Christianity than Rome or Greece were
at the time of St. Paul. The rotten tree has for some time had artificial
supports because its fall would have been inconvenient for the Government.
But if the Englishman comes to see that the tree must fall sooner
or later, then the thing is done, and he will mind no sacrifice
either of blood or of land. For the good of this struggle, I should
like to lay down my life .[5]
Max
Muller wrote to his wife on 9th December 1866. In the letter he
says,
I hepe I shall finish that work, and I feel convinced, though I
shall not live to see it, yet this edition of mine and the translation
of the Veda will hereafter tell to a great extent on the fate of
India, and on the growth of millions of souls in that country. It
is the root of their religion, and to show them what that root is,
is, I feel sure, the only way of uprooting all that sprung from
it during the last 3000 years ... [6]
Referring
to the events of 1867, Max Muller's wife wrote,
... As max Muller
was intimately acquainted later with Keshub Chunder Sen and Mozoomdar,
leaders of the Samaj and always took the deepest interest in the
whole movement, as being, he felt, the real stepping-stone to Christianity
in India. ... [7]
Max
Muller wrote a letter to Duke of Argyll, secretary of State for
India, on 16th December 1868. In the letter Max Muller said :
India
has been conquered once but India must be conquered again and the
second conquest should be the conquest by education.[8]
Max Muller wrote
to Mr. B. Malabari on 5th September 1884
...
what would happen of India if there were a second mutiny and a successful
one, it is fearful to contemplate. You will have civil war, plunder,
utter barbarism [9]
Max Muller wrote
to Sir Henry Acland on 23rd November 1898
...
I have not much faith in missionaries, medical or otherwise. If
we get such men again in India as Ram Mohan Roy or Keshub Chunder
Sen, and if we get an Archbishop at Calcutta who knows what Christianity
really is, India will be Christianized in all that is essential
in the twinkling of an eye. On this too we must be hopeful, but
not too sanguine ... [10]
The vision of
Macualay and Max Muller comes true in the form of Anglicized, 'educated'
Indians, brown in the skin, but Western in their thinking processes
and outlook. We 'educated' Indians honestly feel that but for the
divine intervention by our colonial masters we would have continued
to live our 'primitive barbaric life'. This perception, however,
is far from truth. The non-Western cultures, especially those of
the Indians and American Indians which were dubbed as primitive
and barbaric were in fact far better civilized, gentle and tolerant
than the so called superior culture and religion of the West.
There
is a great similarity between the reception that the. 'barbaric'
cultures of India and America gave to the 'highly civilized' Europeans.
And it is a tragic part of world history, what these superior Europeans,
Spanish conquistadors in South America and the Portuguese in Goa
did to the local populations.
We have talked about how the scientific revolution started in Europe
in the 15th century, which was responsible in shaping the tools
of inquiry broadly termed as the scientific inquiry, till the beginning
of the 20th century. Humanities like anthropology and historiography
borrowed the framework of Physicals of the Newtonian - Cartesian
model, and continue to work within it even after Physics outgrew
its own earlier Physicalism. Humanities have proliferated in many
branches but the 15th century viewpoint has hardly changed.
The mindset behind this obstinacy can be illustrated by recent examples
of treating almost as subhuman, anything that is not white or European.
The biological weapon development program during the white regime
in South Africa, medical experimentation's including radio active
material on prison-inmates in America in the early eighties, and
forcible and stealthy sterilization in some Scandinavian countries
are shocking revelations. All the victims of these experimentation's
were blacks or the mentally retarded. Can we discern any change
in the minds of the inheritors of the so-called superior culture?
Let us turn
back and go to the 15th century again. Similarity of treatment meted
out to the South American Indians by the Spaniards, and to the Hindu
Population of Goa by the Inquisition instituted at the instance
of Xavier, is not a historical accident. The same mind-set was at
work in both the cases. Columbus touched the American shores in
1492, and the 'civilizing' mission started then. It will be quite
instructive to read their own justification and reasoning for this.
Our voyages
to the New World were little more than extensions of the Crusades
to free Jerusalem from the scimitared hand of the Infidel. Moreover,
His Excellency Pope Alexander VI gave us exclusive right to. bring
the New World into Christ's fold in a papal bull issued immediately
after Columbus's return in 1493.
When our Christian brethren in Portugal confirmed our papal privilege
in the Treaty of Tordesillas the following year, we added the force
of International law to the acknowledged right -- indeed duty -
of all civilized nations to convert and to reduce barbarous people
to civility. It was incumbent upon us to wean the West Indians from
their shameless nakedness, lasciviousness, and cannibalism and the
Aztecs from their insufferably proud despots and their bloodthirsty
priests, who cut out the beating hearts of thousands of captives
annually as offerings to their false gods and idols. In turn, we
brought them the priceless blessings of the one holy Catholic Church,
the legal and military protection of the greatest empire on earth,
and the comforts of European technology, society and values.
We did all this with scrupulous regard for law. After an unfortunate
initial period of social experimentation, we abolished the enslavement
of peaceful Indians, prohibited their cruel and unfair treatment
in a series of laws passed in 1512 and 1542, and established a hierarchy
of judges and courts to oversee the colonies, including a special
court for Indian cases. Moreover, we prohibited our conquistadors
from making unjust war on the natives by requiring them to read
to every Indian group encountered a brief history of the Catholic
Church and of the Spanish crown's rights to the New World and to
offer them a dear choice between stubborn resistance and peaceful
acquiescence. If the natives resisted the gentle yoke of civilized
law and true religion, their wives and children would be enslaved,
their property forfeit and just war waged against them. Even a notary
was required to witness the reading of the Requerimiento and to
affix his signature and the date to it. Who among our European imitators
has paid as much attention to the protection and incorporation of
strange and unpredictable peoples? [11]
Millions
were mercilessly massacred or enslaved simply because they were
non-Europeans and non-Christians. Vasco-de-Gama reached Indian shores
in 1497. The same mindset was at work in Goa through Inquisition,
which was established for India in 1560. No less a personality than
Xavier demanded the establishment of this Inquisition in Goa. This
was his letter addressed to D. Joao III, King of Portugal, written
on May 16, 1545.
The second necessity
for the Christians is that your Majesty establish the Holy Inquisition,
because there are many who live according to the Jewish law, and
according to the Mahomeden sect, without any fear of God or shame
of the world. And since there are many who are spread all over the
fortresses, there is the need of the Holy Inquisition and of many
preachers. Your Majesty should provide such necessary things for
your loyal and faithful subjects in India .[12]
Something similar
happened in Goa, A.K.Priolkar says in his introduction to his work
"The Goa Inquisition".
'The
Hindus living within the Portuguese dominion, were forbidden to
observe their ancestral rite and customs, even behind the closed
doors, and subjected to many other discriminatory laws. The Inquisition
took a prominent part in enforcing these measures and the resulting
harassment was so great that many of the Hindus also emigrated to
neighboring territories.' [13]
This led to
massive conversions and those who resisted had to pay the price.
Again, in the words of Priolkar -
....the
story of Inquisition is a dismal record of callousness and cruelty,
tyranny and injustice, espionage and blackmail, avarice and corruption,
repression of thought and culture and promotion of obscurantism.
[14]
Do we need
any more elaboration of this European mindset, viewpoint, superiority
complex in dealing with 'other' cultures?
Scholars have
noticed many a point of similarity between Indian and Mayan-Aztec-Inca
cultures. It is a well-known fact that these cultures had existed
for thousands of years and the most important similarity between
these two cultures is definitely their antiquity much beyond 2000
years i.e. the Christian era. Today neither American Indians nor
Indians want to adhere to their traditional calendars. Many scholars
believe that the American Indians had migrated from Asia. So it
would be appropriate for anthropologists, historians, sociologists
to become conversant with Asian cultures, in order to understand
the spirit and dimensions of these South American civilizations,
and vice versa. The Mahabharata war was a major event in human history.
The tradition believes that the momentous event took place somewhere
around 3102 BC. It was also the beginning of the Yugabda Era followed
in Indian traditional calendars. It is said that after the war took
place there were massive migrations of populations. The Mayans are
credited with a very elaborate and precise calendar system. Scholars
have concluded, as per the traditional belief of Mayans, that the
starting point of their calendar, when calculated according to modern
reckoning, was August 12, 3113 BC (the other conclusion is that
it is October 4, 3373 BC). What a striking coincidence of two great
events recorded in world history! Archaeologists, anthropologists
and historians put forward hypotheses as to dates of past events
on slender evidence of a piece of bone or pottery, with a highly
refined creative imagination. However, such a striking similarity
deeply rooted and firmly believed by the two traditions goes largely
unnoticed, ignored and neglected, if at all it is pointed out by
some scholar. Mayans are also credited with mathematical ability
in using the digit zero in compound numerals, even before Indians.
There are striking similarities in mathematics, astronomy, architecture,
belief systems, and mythologies of the two cultures. I am sure,
the purpose of this conference is to throw light on many dark corners
of the history of these two cultures.
When I started
my speech, I expressed my desire to establish a meaningful dialogue
with you. My part of the dialogue is over, it was verbal, now your
response to it should start, which will be initially mental, and
perhaps translate itself into words in subsequent research papers
and conferences of this type. I have deliberately avoided detailing
the similarities and material artifacts found by Archaeologists
and historians. I was more concerned about premises, philosophies
and provenance's, which shaped their science and religious beliefs,
if they have any, from the 15th century up to the advent of the
20th century.
Biologists have
realized the inadequacies of the physical model, so should the practitioners
of Humanities. The need becomes more imperative here, because the
branches of knowledge deal with more complex phenomena than mere
life, like mind, belief systems, and most importantly, human interactions
that give rise to culture! So we have to go beyond and behind the
material similarities, into the reasons and minds that created and
shaped them.
Do we want our
antiquity to be showcased only in museums; or we want it to be acknowledged
as a living tradition, not as a charitable concession made by the
so-called 'superior' culture, but on its own merits?
We hardly have
learnt any lesson from history!
Thank you.
|
