Saturday, May 20, 2017

On (Hindu) Mythology

Mythologies are not only tales of ancient humans but carry deeper meaning inside them. It was two years back when I was visiting Tulip Garden (Keukenhof) in Amsterdam. Guide was telling us that white tulips have a mythological tale that while mother of Hercules was feeding milk from her breast to him, few drops of milk dropped on the earth and seeds of white tulip were sown. This represents strong (as hercules was) emotional bonding and that's why white tulips are a norm in weddings and funerals.

We had an Indian gentleman in our party and as our discussion revolved around mythologies that day, he told me that "Ten Avatars" (incarnation of deity on earth) in hindu mythology actually represents ten phases of human evolution. It argues that God's divine intervention stayed all along human evolution. I jolted down his brief narration on my smartphone. I am sure if you google, you will find tons and tons of material on this subject but mention of  awaited last avatar and his description was interesting to me (see below).

Today I was watching an interesting video with my son "History of the Entire World, I guess" (here) and it came back to my mind. I opened my writing from that day.

The first avatar was called Matsya and it means the fish - as  life began in the water.

The second avatar was called Kurma and it means the tortoise - it represents life to the land (like an amphibian)

The third avatar was called Varaha and it means the wild boar - it represents wild early animals like Dinosaurs.

The fourth avatar was called Narasimha and it means the half man and half animal - it represents early intelligent beings just before Hominids, probably apes

The fifth avatar was called Waman and it means the midget or dwarf - it represents shorter hominids, who were first to get on two limbs from four - forefathers of homo erectus and sapiens.

The sixth avatar was called  Parshuram and it means the Axe - it represents human history when they learned to mold tools and rocks and lived in the caves - probably homo erectus.

The seventh avatar was called  Ram and it means the intellect and civilized - it represents human history when they first formed the community and society (and stories of human relationships in Ramayan).

The eighth avatar was called  Balarama and it means the God of water - it represents human history when they gained control over land with agriculture like Nile in Egypt and sacred valley of South America.

The ninth avatar was called Krishna and it means the statesman - it represents human history when they formed governments and countries.

The tenth avatar is called Kalki and it means the  saviour - Every religion claims him. He is described to be coming on a white horse with wings. He is called Kalki as he will finish Kala yug or Kal jug (black period) - and humans will start a new order.

- You can throw as many explanations to last Avatar !!! 

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Brother Diary :: I liked your this writing. One of my muslim friend forward the link to me. I am Hindu but our muslim teacher in school believed that their prophet was tenth avtar. Other Shia friend thinthat their imam Ali is 10th avtar as description fits with his personality. My father said that when Messiah will come, he will end last period on this earth and will take humans to new planet, as a start of cosmic age.

bsc said...

Yes I remember reading about Kalki Avatar, the description is much more than given here and yes perfectly fits the prophet SAWS because another Hindoo scholar of vedas stated it so even giving the names of his father Bhagwan Das (Abdullah in Arabic) and yes he would be in Arabia etc. I thought it was very well-known I think I read it about three years ago. Shias always bring Ali RA name for everything but more educated Shias do not.

Anonymous said...

agree with bsc ...scholars of shia sect have somewhat different view of Ali (RA) and its not the main stream shias talk about it . I wonder why?

Books and Stilettos said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
mystic-soul said...

Bhai Anonymous:: Keep coming. As I said, every religion or sect claims 10th avatar to their ideology.

Uncle: Now I remember Bhagwan Das theory. Our Islamiat teacher (Sir Aleem - I blogged about him previously many times) used to say same about Prophet Muhammad.

Anonymous said...

Nice article as always! Have been a quiet reader of your blog for a while and really like your writings. Thanks so much for sharing it with everyone.

I just want to add here that 'Kal' in 'kal yug' means machine (as in kal-purje). So I guess 'Kal yug' refers to the age of machines.

mystic-soul said...

Anony bhai::: I never hear kal as machine age but who knows !! (it make sense). Please keep coming.

bsc said...

Kal Yug in Hindi means bura zamana but kal in persian means machine that is correct and Anon may be very right in this kind of interpretation which I am seeing like you Mystic, for the first time

Anonymous said...

@mystic-soul, and @bsc:

Thanks for the comments! Actually this is the only interpretation I heard while growing up in India :-)

I just inquired Google and looks like the interpretation you mentioned in your post is the one held by the majority while my own one is followed by the (significant??) minority.