India in the eyes of the greatest western scholars
It
all started a few months ago. Someone had posted on my Face Book
wall a link of a page from a book titled “What is India?".
Mr.SalilGewali is its compiler. The page instantly caught my attention; for it
showed a smiling photo of Noble Physicist and co-founder of Quantum Mechanics
Werner Heisenberg and this sentence below it: "After the conversations about Indian philosophy, some of the
ideas of Quantum Physics that had seemed so crazy suddenly made much more
sense."
Immediately, I remembered that only a few months ago I had written an article
about Heisenberg, Tagore and Vivekananda. Werner Heisenberg was a Germany and
recipient of the 1932 Physics Nobel Prize. He is best known for the Uncertainty
Principle of Quantum Mechanics. When he came to India he visited Tagore as
a guest. This great scientist was awestruck when Tagore had given him a glimpse
of Indian metaphysics and co-relation between spiritualism and cosmic creation.
Salil’s compilation has a good deal to offer in this regards. The quotes of
renowned Western intellectuals like Voltaire, Friedrich Hegel, Albert Einstein, Aldus Huxley, Arthur
Schopenhauer, Schrodinger, David Henry Thoreau, Ralph Emerson, TS Eliot,
Oppenheimer, Mark Twain and so on and so forth and what they said about India, about her
civilization, about her culture, and about her contribution to the world and to
the Modern Science.
To most of these greats India was an alien country -- not only an alien but a
dominated country, a subjugated country. What most of these scholars said about
India in the 18th, 19th, and 20th century that's what India was then -- a
British colony, a Jewel in the Crown of the mighty British Empire. A poor
country, a famine stricken country, a malaria, typhoid, cholera, and other
disease infested country, an overpopulated, and a starving country with
strange customs in the eyes of a Westerner. Then, why were these intellectuals
so impressed with India and praised her with such lofty words? Most of them had
never travelled to India, not to mention never lived there. All they learned
about her was from translations of India’s age-old scriptures and literature,
and from books written by others. Many of these people wrote volumes of books
themselves in her praise. Why?
Not because what India was in the 18th, 19th, and 20th century when they wrote
those words of praise, but for what India was three to five thousand years ago.
Or, perhaps even before that. They praised India for what she contributed
to the world civilization and culture in the diverse areas of religion,
philosophy, psychology, science, mathematics, astronomy, language,
medicine, management, economics, trade, and so forth since time
immemorial. Considering this wide time scale of 5000+ years the modern and
industrial civilization of Europe and the USA only a few days ago! So that's
what Salilcaptured, the praise of so many Western intellectuals as result of
his research and compiled his findings in this book. His work is highly
commendable and the greatest pride of INDIA.
Lastly, let me recall what a great German philosopher August Schlegel said about the Indian
wisdom:
‘Even the loftiest philosophy of the
Europeans
appears like a feeble spark before the
Vedanta.’
The book may be visited at URL: http://what-is-india.blogspot.com/2011/05/what-is-india.html
--- Amal Gupta,