Hari om everyone,
We started the class with a few minutes of meditation. In our chanting segment, we learnt 'geetaa dhyaanam' 2 verses and 'chapter 2' verses 39 - 46. This will be our routine and will keep learning new verses every time.
During our lesson time, we continued with the Mahaabhaarata story and got up to the birth of Paandavas and Kauravas; death of King Pandu. Incidentally, this brought us to one of the tabooed topics - Sati (wife burning alive in the pyre of her deceased husband). We saw that Maadri committed sati whereas Kunti, the first wife, took charge of the upbringing of all the 5 Paandavas. So, sati wasn't a forced practice (as it is believed to be) but a choice that was consciously made by the wife.
During our quiz/poll segment, we raised questions about different religions, their founders and their holy book. We saw that students gave definitive answers to these questions when it came to other religions, whereas for Hinduism, the answers were varied! Why so? The next question was 'who is the founder of Physics?' As if to maintain the trend, students didn't come up with a definitive answer to this question either! This showed us that there is NO one authority or author of Hinduism. It is a science that has developed over generations that is applicable to everyone! Just as gravity works in India as well as America, the principles of Hinduism are relevant to everyone at all times, eras and generations!
We asked them, 'what does it mean to be a Hindu?' As anticipated, answers were - going to temple, chanting shlokas, putting bindi, doing pooja... This is another misnomer! These are all rituals. Rituals are only a part of the religion. Religion itself is far deeper and all-encompassing than that! It teaches us about ourselves and how to conduct ourselves on a day-to-day basis. It gives us an insight into our basic nature and inherent tendencies.
At this time, we learnt about the vastness of expertise that our ancestors had, in all streams of knowledge. When other civilizations were learning to build a society, our predecessors had accomplished leaps and bounds in all areas! Just to get an idea of the knowledge that was lost, we spoke about the library at Nalanda University that housed ancient manuscripts. When invaders attacked, ransacked and burnt the place, the fire blazed on for months!! That's how many scripts/expertise we have lost...
Leading into the topic of the year, we asked a few tidbits about Bhagavadgeeta - number of verses, chapters, characters, etc. It was impressive to know that most of them knew the answers to these questions.
We wrapped up the class with ending prayers and wishing everyone a Happy Navaratri.
Enjoy the festivities. See you in two weeks.
Regards,
Rashmi and Raghav.