Hindu Philosophy- A Rational Life

  Reasoning is to understand, cause is explanation What is difference between reason and cause? Looking to a lightening in dark sky and in heavy clouds- ‘B’ said that lightning is caused because god is angry. ‘B’ added that whenever god is angry (cause) thunder and lightning started (effect). But ‘C’ on other hand said that to understand the phenomena of lightning it is important to understand the essential requirement of clouds and rattling of clouds. The reason for lightning is there is some charge electric in clouds. The difference between ‘B’ and ‘C’ is not only the process of thinking but also the way they came out. Mostly we take both reason and cause as synonyms and that make great fallacy of judgement. These two words ‘reason’ and ‘cause’ is treated in Hindu philosophy as different but mistakenly taken as same and therefore collapsing the meaningful treatise of Indian Philosophy. Reason is generally taken as thinking, understanding and logically reaching a conclus

  Mostly in Hindu context, when one talk about Brahman then it is taken as Brahma - the creator of this world as per Hindu mythology. The Brahma is the one that created the world, the first cause and the ontological argument of creation. The Puranas describe the religious creation through Brhma. But philosophically, as per Hindu rationality, Brahman is a concept of Advaita (One, single, singular, sole and only) Vedanta that describes a single reality. This reality is attribute less, shapeless, colourless and only the reality of the universe. The concept of Brahman is transcendental and without Brahman nothing exists. Shanker Acharya described Brahman as the stem of the only reality and it is neuter gender and only the ultimate reality. The Brahman is the singularity and there is no duality except Brahman, Brahman is translated as the universe, the cosmos the one and only reality. Shanker while building the oneness philosophy on Hindu soil cleared that there is nothing except Brahman

  Materialism preached that this world is real and other then this world, things are secondary. Hindus by nature practice this materialism but this thought which flourished many times within this civilization was crushed by the idealistic thoughts by showing fear of god and curses of priests. Invention of materialism were interpreted as gift of spiritualism for example the pushp vahana (flower vehicle) described in Ramayana was possible by materialistic approach but it is described as the spiritual vehicle. The Charvaka philosophy school is the oldest materialistic stream of India and even in the epics like Mahabharata, there are quotes of this school and even the name of philosopher Charvaka mentioned. The original text of this school is unfortunately lost but principles of this school are found in references in other schools and in other books. The major setback of this school is that it is largely made to believe that they believe in only one thing which is ‘eat drink and marr

For Hindus, there were no ten commandments and no religious compulsion for hundreds of years. The touch stone of moral life of Hindus was Karma (actions), the only criteria of fruits, if one does good actions, he get good results or vice verse. The theory of karma is the only matrix for morals in Hindus. These karmas are very much  and clearly defined in Surtis and also in Upnisads. The man reaps what he sown. This concept influenced so much that even other religions residing on this land accepted that actions should reap fruits. And these codes of action was prepared according to the concept of right knowledge which philosophies advanced ahead to clear the reality. Katha Upnisad, chapter II-5 illustrated says,   “ Those who are wrapped up in imperfect knowledge, fancy themselves alone wise and learned, they wandered about floundering and deceived, like the blind led by a man who is himself blind. ”   The basic aim of philosophy in leading a life in accordance to the true knowledge was

  Interestingly comparing the philosophy of Hindu race with other parts of the world, we found no trace of the concept of good and evil struggling to overpower. The Hindus had never maintained the work of evil for wrong deeds. There is no evil for original Hindu religion that lures the Adam and Eve to do something wrong and against the divine because good or bad is the outcome of one’s own action. In Christianity and also in Islam and even in other religions, fight between divine and devil still continues and the main work of devil is to work against the divinity and the divine power works to bring the man again on right path. The fight between these two positive and negative powers remained working since the episode of Satan. But for Hindus there is no evil, even the Ravana- the villain in the  Ramayana epic was not an evil power. The Ravana was praised as the wise man and a pundit who knows even more than any other seer. Even the epic describes that the Hero of the Ramayana, Lord Ram