What is the dominant pattern of Indian cultural history? India’s Heroic Age What is the dominant pattern of Indian cultural history?

India’s heroic age The dominant pattern of Indian cultural history is a many-layered pluralism in which numerous subcultures defined by ethnic, religious, and linguistic differences coexist This pluralism pervades the vast body of literature that India has produced over 3,500 years in more than 20 languages

What are India’s languages?

Languages The Aryans originated in central Asia and entered India around 1500 B.C They brought with them Sanskrit, a language that, along with nearly all the major languages of Europe and many in Asia, belongs to the Indo-European family In India, Sanskrit has become the principal language of classical literature up to the 19th c. Sanskrit's primary association is with Hinduism, India’s dominant religious tradition, a direct descendant of the Vedic religion of the Aryans

Languages Gautama Buddha (563-483 B.C.) who founded the Buddhist religious paths as a radical alternative to the Vedic religion preached his message in Pali, popular dialect related to Sanskrit Hindi descended from this and other dialects Classical Tamil, the language of the ancient literature of south India (100-300 A.D.) is the oldest example of Dravidian, a family of languages to which all the modern languages in south India belong 12th c. – A.D. conquering Muslim dynasties brought to Indian literature and civilization –not only the sensibility of Islam but also the heritage of the Arabic and Persian languages and literatures 17th c. -British colonial rule: it led to the establishment of Western-style education

What is the legacy of the Vedas and Upanisads? The Aryans settled in the Indus valley and left as their legacy the Vedas, four books of sacred hymns that accompanied the worship of gods who were personifications of nature Preserved in an unbroken oral tradition of memorization and recitation, the Vedas are Hinduism’s primary scripture Hindus regard the hymns as divine revelation: poet-seers recited them in the form of sacred utterance (mantra) Brahmans, priestly transmitters of the Vedic hymns, have commanded the highest status in the Hindu class hierarchy The Vedas were followed by the Upanisads (Mystic Doctrines) 900 B.C. which teach that a single divine essence pervades the universe, and that the human soul is a manifestation of this divine essence -the concepts of the personal spiritual quest, the wise teacher, the guru, and the transforming power of knowledge remain enduring motifs of Indian civilization

What is karma?

Karma

Karma

Karma Karma is the premise on which the ancient religions of India build their doctrines of the ultimate goal of religion According to the theory of karma, all creatures are ultimately responsible for their own existential conditions, and existence is invariably bound up with suffering To exist is to be perpetually engaged in action (the basic meaning of the word karma is “a deed, that which is done’) All deeds, good and bad, have inevitable results, which must be borne by the doer in an existential state. The soul is trapped in an endless cycle of birth and death

karma The thinkers of the Upanisads put forward a theory that the soul or self is a pure entity, untouched by karma, and the liberation from the cycle of rebirth can be achieved by identifying oneself with this pure self Buddha rejected the concept of the immortal soul, concentrating instead on the suffering that was thought to result from karma and on the urgent need of all creatures to be freed from this burden of suffering In the form of animal fables, the Jataka stories illustrate the Buddha’s teaching regarding the path to liberation from rebirth -a unique combination of radical detachment from desire, the root cause of karma, and an ethic of action directed only toward the welfare of one's fellow creatures. Every person could follow the Buddha’s path (the Dharma) with the ultimate aim of becoming liberated from karma rebirth by becoming a buddha, or ‘an enlightened one’

Dharma

Buddha in Dharma

The Jataka

Bodhisattva

Buddha

Jataka

Jataka

Jataka tales

Jataka