HISTORICAL MYTHS
Various Thoughts on Christo-Islamic and Hindu Historicity

If you've read our articles on the gospels, and the concept of a Messiah, you know that the Freethought Mecca is a wee bit skeptical about the very existence of Jesus. Still, we are assured every day that he was a historical character, and that Christianity is the truth. Whatever.

It is ironic that the people who assure us that all the miracles of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic folklore are reasonable, are the same people who laugh at the stories found in Hinduism. It seems odd that these people will laugh at the story of how Ganesh got his elephant head after Siva cut off his previous head, yet they will have a perfectly straight face when they say that Jesus was born of a virgin, healed the blind, raised the dead, et cetera. When is a fantastic a story a myth, and when is it a miracle? the duplicitous Monotheists are not prepared to answer this question. This double standard is so blatant that it motivated A. Ghosh to write his famous article If Jesus Could Walk On Water, Why Could Not Hanuman Overfly It?

Surely Desi people (that is, people of Indian descent) should step away from their beliefs in the Christo-Islamic mythology. Islam is the second largest religion in India, and Christianity is a distant third, but that might change. There is actually a small number of Desi Muslims who abandon Islam and Christianity in favor of their Hindu roots. Anwar Shaikh is the most famous. This is similar to African American Christians leaving Christianity after learning the role the religion played in the African Slave Trade. Now some African Americans are speaking out against Sunni Islam for it's role in the slave trade, and also in Morocco and Algeria some Berbers are abandoning Islam because it is a "religion that promotes Arab imperialism".

The numbers right now are small, but I think as time goes on, there will be growing numbers of Desi Muslims who will realize Islam's barbaric invasion of India, and Christianity's vulgar and intolerant missionary campaigns. Believe it or not, secularism is in one sense something that will help Hinduism win back a few souls from Islam. As secular thought takes root, there will be more scholars such as Ibn Warraq, Randolph Trumbach, Athur Schopenhauer, Jed Ervand Abrahamian, Gore Vidal, and Francois Gautier, who talk about how Monotheism is in no way more "logical" than Polytheism or Pantheism. I think this kind of thought will take root, and many Desi Muslims will see that the invasion of India by the Muslims was quite barbaric. When the Arabs rolled into India, they started smashing idols, destroying temples, burning great libraries, and slaughtering polytheist idol worshippers. They were able to do this with a clear conscious because their barbaric religion teaches them that their one angry male God hates polytheists, and hates idol worshippers. Once you remove all this dogmatic nonsense from your mind regarding divine prejudices towards idol worship, you suddenly realize just how barbaric the invasion of India really was. As more and more Desi Muslims realize this, some will become Atheists, while others will want to learn about, or help restore Vedic culture, and thus become Hindus.

This senseless ranting aside, the Atheists here at the Freethought Mecca agree that there is no set logic within the realm of Theism from which we can come to an intellectual conclusion with regard to the alleged superiority of Monotheism over Polytheism. It was during a study of Hinduism that I myself became an Atheist. I laughed at the stories I considered absurd, but then wondered how one could claim that the colorful aspects of Hinduism were any more illogical than the fantastic myths of Christianity and Islam. How does Islam or Christianity even compare with Upanishad based Monism? Surely Upanishad based Monism paints a superior picture of divinity to what you find in Islamic tawheed, or Pauline tri-theism. Consider the following excerpts from the Upanishads:

With this in mind, I would like to continue this random rant, by offering three different looks at historicity and/or myth in these three religions (Hinduism, Christianity, Islam).

Historical Jesus

I wrote this essay about a for a class on the historical Jesus. It is a review of John Dominic Crossan and E.P. Sanders' respective books on "The Historical Jesus."

Introduction

The search for the Historical Jesus has resulted in various scholars coming to very different conclusions. Biographers of Jesus have come forth with such characters as Jesus the Jewish guerrilla opposition to Rome (read "Zealot"), Jesus the Essene, Jesus the servant of Allah and preacher of true Islam, Jesus the socialist reformer, and much more. More radical types, who are not deserving of the title of "scholar," have come forth with biographies, of an obviously tendentious nature, that give us Jesus the Neo-Nazi, and Jesus the Black Nationalist.

With the strikingly different accounts lined up against one another, one gets the impression that we know nothing about one of the most talked about figures in all of human history. The reality is, in all the above cases, the biographer modeled their Jesus after their own preconceived notions. While it was usually a subconscious action, the biographer kept and discarded "evidence" from the Bible based on how well it supported their stance.

The character of the historical Jesus depends on which stories about his life are regarded as reliable by the biographer. Some more skeptical scholars would argue that none of the sources about Jesus' life are the least bit reliable or historical. If this is in fact the case, most scholars who have attempted to discuss the Historical Jesus come off as being intellectually dishonest.

This essay will focus on two biographers of Jesus: E. P. Sanders, and John Dominic Crossan. Their conclusions, and the methods by which they came to their conclusions, will be discussed individually, and then the two will be compared. From there the essay will discuss the possibility that Jesus was not a historical character, and what this means for the likes of Sanders and Crossan. Finally, the essay will end with examples of constructing a Jesus-type, and how various conclusions can be reached.

Jesus via E.P. Sanders

The Jesus as put forth by E.P. Sanders is a very Jewish Jesus. He was a man who steered clear of the urban areas and remained among his fellow Jewish peasants in Galilee. Everything he said and did could only be understood within the context of the Judaism of first century Palestine.

In a manner that makes a skeptic such as myself quite apoplectic, Sanders accepts the vast majority of the information put forth in the four gospels. His goal was undoubtedly to form a picture of the Historical Jesus by using as much of the available material as he possibly could. Sanders sought to read the gospels, almost in their entirety, within the context of the time frame they discuss.

While Sanders' skepticism is microscopic, it does exist in this book, although it is admittedly buried under many paragraphs of a slightly more spineless nature. The sixth chapter of his book is, by far, the most skeptical, with Sanders discussing the problems that arise from using the gospels. However, this is following the previous chapter which has Sanders writing that there is "no really substantial doubts about when and where Jesus lived" (Sanders, p. 53). That alone is enough to show that Sanders has been somewhat seduced by the biblical narrative, and is willing to accept the vast majority of it.

So many of Jesus' actions, as told to us by the gospels, are accepted by Sanders. The author argues that Jesus really did these acts, and did so to intentionally invoke thoughts of old testament prophecies regarding the Messianic period. According to Sanders, Jews in first century Palestine would have fully understood the meaning of such things as Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey.

In the end, Jesus is executed for his troubling remarks in Jerusalem, including his threatening of the temple. Sanders mentions other Jews arrested for verbally threatening the temple (including another man by the name of Jesus), and how some such characters were released as they were considered crazy. Jesus, on the other hand, was not crazy in the eyes of Caiaphas, and thus he was handed over to Pilate to prevent an uprising that would only cause more Jewish lives.

Jesus via Crossan

John Dominic Crossan's Jesus is, as he puts it, a "peasant Jewish Cynic." The Greco-Roman Cynics were a bunch that preached equality and social reform. Crossan draws parallels to such teachings with those of Jesus, and creates the image of a Jewish version, who preached in small villages rather than city-market places. Jesus was a Jew influenced by towns like Sepphoris (a place, Sanders argued, Jesus never visited).

Crossan spends a great deal comparing Jesus to his relative contemporaries, such as Hanina and Honi of Rabbinic folklore, as well as a handful of "bandits" who opposed Rome. Crossan also compares Jesus to the Jewish model of the miracle-working prophet, such as Elisha or Elijah. All of this insinuates that the character of Jesus as found in the gospels is a literary creation, rather than a 100% historical figure.

The Gospels of Sanders and Crossan

One strikingly interesting fact is realized while reading Sanders' and Crossan's respective information on how the gospels came to be written. Both men agree, as would any honest historian, that the Gospels are not biographies; rather they are literary creations pieced together by authors who had limited information at their disposal. The Gospel writers took information, and rearranged it as they saw fit, adding narratives to the final collage to make it all come together. This is no different from what Sanders and Crossan did.

The only difference between the Canonical Gospels and the books of Crossan and Sanders is that the books by Crossan and Sanders have never been backed by any Roman emperor (such as Constantine), thus they are not regarded as divinely inspired. Other than that, the premise is relatively the same, with the exception of the modern authors having a better understanding of putting together historical information.

Crossan and Sanders took second and third hand sources, stripped them of their narratives, and added their own. They took the actions and sayings of Jesus, and applied their own context to them. The differences between the writings of Sanders and the writings of Crossan are analogous to the differences between the various gospels. Different authors will offer different arrangements due to the fact that the respective understandings they have differ.

The Christ Myth

It has not been proven that Jesus existed, rather Crossan and Sanders have decided to accept that possibility on faith. While the stance that Jesus did not exist is a radical one, it is not totally out of the question. Scholars who concluded that Jesus was not an historical character include John Remsberg, David Straus, Michael Martin, Guy Fau, Prosper Alfaric, John Allegro, Bruno Bauer, G.A. Wells, Ibn Warraq, and a few others.

First, on the nature of miracles, it is absurd to believe that Jesus performed such acts. Such fantastic tales should be stricken from the record, and not considered at all. A man feeding thousands of people with a few loaves of bread is simply impossible. The story is appealing to peasants, but it is far from a reality. Furthermore the story is an obvious plagiarism of the Old Testament folklore which reports similar acts being performed by previous prophets.

Sanders, unfortunately, sacrifices a bit of his integrity in an attempt to consider the "ancient perspective" on miracles. Sanders argues that Jesus "saw his miracles as an indication that the new age was at hand" (p. 168). Sanders retells stories that are obvious instances of plagiarism in an attempt to present Jesus as a sort of ancient David Copperfield, reproducing miracles of great men of the past.

Another unfortunate part of Sanders' book is his gullibility with regards to external sources. Sanders considers the mentionings of Jesus in Josephus to be reliable, when many scholars have argued that these are blatant forgeries and obvious interpolations. He cites the ridiculous passage in Josephus' Antiquities that mentions Pilate, the execution, and other unsupported drivel.

It is Sanders' willingness to mention, or even consider such a passage that has drawn such a scornful criticism. The passage in question (which appears in book 18, chapter 3, of Antiquities) talks of Jesus rising from the dead, and being foretold by previous prophets. This is absurd to consider the possibility that Josephus, a Jew, wrote numerous chapters devoted to certain individuals, but would dismiss one who is allegedly the greatest product of the Jewish tribe.

Furthermore, as John Remsberg points out, "[t]he early Christian fathers were not acquainted with it. Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen all would have quoted this passage had it existed in their time. The failure of even one of these fathers to notice it would be sufficient to throw doubt upon its genuineness; the failure of all of them to notice it proves conclusively that it is spurious, that it was not in existence during the second and third centuries." (Remsberg, The Christ, p. 22)

In a slightly more forgivable instance of a similar nature, Sanders also cites the famous verse of Tacitus, in his Annals, that makes a vague mention of "Christus." Some have argued that the sentence that mentions "Cristus" is a forgery. It is conceivable, as John Resmberg points out, because both Clement of Alexandria and the known forger Eusebius compiled records of all Pagan mentionings of their Messiah, yet neither one knew about that put forth by Tacitus (Christ, pp. 28-29).

The reality is the contemporary writers are silent about this man named Jesus, who came from Galilee, and was executed by Pontius Pilate. All there is to offer are either Christian forgeries inserted into the texts of contemporary writers, or accounts of the claims of obscure Christians who speak of their leader, some odd Jew who was killed many years ago.

As for the Gospels, they contradict each other badly. Such contradictions should be enough to render them totally unreliable as any sort of proof of Jesus' existence. Much of the information, as has already been mentioned, is either a regurgitation of an earlier folklore, or is a story of a nature far too fantastic to consider as having really happened. If we remove all the parts that are ridiculously fantastic or a carbon-copy of a popular story found in ancient folklore, we are left with almost nothing.

The sayings attributed to Jesus, their respective narratives aside, are the only constant among the four Gospels. It is agreed that the Gospel writers had a common source; a type of sayings Gospel (something similar to the Gospel of Thomas found at Nag Hamadi). Unfortunately, we know nothing of the source from which this sayings Gospel was derived. As Joseph McCabe showed in his Parallels to the Teaching of Christ, the vast majority of Jesus' alleged sayings closely resemble teachings found in the Old Testament, Talmud, and various Greek and Roman writings (McCabe's work is currently in Gordon Stein's A Second Anthology of Atheism and Rationalism, pp 97-139).

The sayings, the actions, and the contemporary mentionings of Jesus are all highly suspicious. If he in fact never existed, the writings of Sanders, and to a lesser degree, Crossan, become rather questionable. These men assumed Jesus was a historical character (possibly due to a subconscious ad-numerum fallacy floating in their mind), and made many assumptions that amount to nothing more than conjecture.

The Not-so-Historical Jesus

If Jesus didn't really exist, how could anyone come to write a single paragraph, much less an entire book, on his alleged life? The answer is, the author took what information he had, and arranged it as he saw fit. This can be done in any manner. It is already evident that any stance can be proven if the folklore is smudged the right way, as can be seen by the differing accounts of Sanders and Crossan. It is in this section that I would like to demonstrate how easy it is to establish Jesus in a certain light by accepting certain verses from the gospel, and turning one's own interpretation into narrative.

Jesus the Muslim: Jesus, or Isa Ibn Maryam, as the Holy Qur'an refers to him, was a prophet sent by Allah, subhana wa T'ala, to teach true Islam. Unfortunately the New Testament writers tried to obfuscate this fact. If one reads the Gospels, there is not a single instance where Jesus refers to himself as God, as that would be a sin in Islam, known as shirk. Jesus taught that the greatest commandment was the acknowledgment that the Lord our God is one, and love him (Matthew 22:37).1 Timothy 2:5 says there is only one God, and the mediator between man and God is Jesus. He sought to do nothing more than serve God, as any true Muslim would.

Jesus the Hin-Jew: Though more conservative Christians will not acknowledge it, Jesus was indeed a Hindu, and an Avatar; a reincarnation of Krishna. Though modern Christians deny reincarnation, it is a reality, as the great Avatar Jesus taught that John the Baptist was a reincarnation of Elijah (Mathhew 11:14). Jesus said "it is hard for a rich man to enter heaven," and it is no accident that this is the 23rd verse of the 19th chapter of Matthew, as the 23rd verse of the 5th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita teaches that one must give up his material desires. Jesus was a Jewish Hindu, an Avatar, and the Gita teaches us that Krishna comes down during every millennium, whenever there is a decline in religious practice (Gita 4:7).

Conclusion

The effort to concoct a story about the Historical Jesus can be fun, and can be a showcase of one's creative abilities. However, it should be noted that no such biography can ever be considered authoritative. What Crossan and Sanders did is no different from what Luke claims to have done at the beginning of his gospel (1:1-4): take the various accounts, discard what is considered unreliable, and reorganize what is considered reliable. Any Gospel that seeks to write about the life of Jesus should first prove that he existed at all. Biographies that presuppose his alleged existence with out any proof are highly suspicious.

The Qur'an is logical and free of myth?

The following is a letter one of the Freethought Mecca staff writers wrote to Guardian Unlimited.

AN Wilson in The Poisoned Chalice (Nov. 25) errs when he says, "increasing numbers of people turn to the Koran and find in this book what they have always craved: a moral and an intellectual acknowledgement of the lordship of God without the encumbrance of Christian mythological baggage in which almost no one really believes." Whether from the desire to have a provocative if indefensible thesis, or a sheer nescience of the contents of the Koran, this statement completely ignores the “eincumbrances Islam shares with Christianity. Islam's baggage is no less weighty.

The Koran unequivocally agrees that Jesus was born of a virgin (3:47), and contains its own miracle equivalent of the Resurrection story, what I call the 'Master of Illusions' "That they [Jews] said (in boast), 'we killed Christ Jesus the son of Mary, the Messenger of Allah,' but they killed him not, nor crucified him, but so it was made to appear to them, and those who differ therein are full of doubts, with no (certain) knowledge, but only conjecture to follow, for of a surety they killed him not."(4:157) The Sunni Ahadith- narrations attributed to the Prophet Muhammad- go on to make the claim that Jesus will return again to earth and convert the entire world to Islam.

I would further turn Wilson’s attention to the literal belief in a Prophet named Adam, the Noachian flood, the destruction of the people of Lot? the drowning of Moses' pursuers, talking ants, Sabbath-breakers turned into swine, Prophet Solomon's Genii transportation system, the use of meteors to keep Geniis from listening in on the secrets of heaven, and the Rip Van Winkle legend of saints sleeping for a few hundred odd years. If people are, in fact, turning to the Koran in search of a demythologized religion, it’s only by a selective reading and interpretation that they will find Islam even a smidgeon more rational than Christianity.

Atheist Interpretation of Violence in the Gita

This was an article I wrote back when I first became an Atheist, for that class on Hinduism which was the home of my conversion to blasphemy.

Roughly 3,000 years ago, a Jew in the deserts of West Asia took out a scroll, and wrote Lo Tirzach, which is Hebrew for "Thou shall not kill". Since that fateful day, this rule, although interpreted differently by different people, has become "common sense". This rule has drastically changed the way we think, and the way we judge others. Killing someone is a major taboo.

One might wonder what a commandment from ancient Jewish folklore has to do with the Gita, and Hinduism in general. The reality is that this rule is so widely accepted, it has altered the thought process of people all over the world. Now people are willing to use creative means to explain things that contradict this rule. Any mention of killing, even in Hindu scripture, is interpreted to mean something completely different from what is stated. Modern scholars want us to believe that when Krishna says "gird up thy loins and prepare for battle"1, he is not pushing Arjuna to fight and kill his brethren, but is actually speaking of something quite peaceful.

This paper will seek to explore instances of violence within the Gita, and how such things are interpreted by different commentators. Then, themes of violence as found in the Gita will be considered in both an ancient and modern context. What did "kill" mean then, and what does it mean now? Of course, before any of this can be done, a short introduction to the Gita is in order.

The Bhagavad Gita literally means "Song of the Lord". It is a discussion between Krishna and Arjuna in regards to a battle that is taking place. Some (admittedly less knowledgeable) people have referred to the Gita as "The Hindu Bible". While this is a badly misleading description, it shows how well the Gita is known compared with other Hindu scriptures (such as the various Upanishads, et cetera). The first of many English translations was done in 1785 by Charles Wilkins, and since then the Gita has come to represent Hinduism to the novice Western reader.

The Gita is actually part of a much larger work known as the Mahabharata, a great Hindu epic, allegedly written by a sage named Vyasa. The Gita begins on the battlefield where the Pandavas and Kauravas are preparing for a bloody war over the Bharata kingdom. It turns out that the Pandavas and Kauravas are related, both descendants of Vyasa.

Leading the Pandavas is Arjuna, who seeks to get one last glimpse at the enemy before the battle begins. As Arjuna rides past the enemy, it dawns on him that the very men he is about to slaughter are his cousins. Upon this realization, Arjuna loses his nerve, and refuses to fight. He literally sits down and says "I will not fight."

In a rare stroke of luck, the man driving Arjuna's chariot happens to be none other than Krishna himself, an incarnation of the God Vishnu. Although Arjuna has lost his taste for war, he will soon be persuaded by an actual God in human form. From this point onward, Krishna begins teaching Arjuna about life and death in relation to the war at hand. Thus, Krishna begins his "song" (gita).

"The Historical Gita"

Are the characters within the Gita historical? Was there really a man named Arjuna, or a man named Krishna? Such questions are highly difficult to answer in the affirmative. Most rational thinkers would agree that the Gita is nothing more than a myth. A person could make (or break) a career trying to "find the historical Krishna".

While it is generally agreed that the Gita is fiction, some noted scholars feel that it is indeed historical. Dr. N.S. Rajaram, an Indian born NASA consultant, and expert in fields such as Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, has written articles on the "search for the historical Krishna" for various right-wing Hindu nationalist newsletters, such as "The Sword of Truth."2

Highly regarded translators of the Gita, such as Eknath Easwaran, and A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada also feel that this book is historical. Easwaran is a Western Scholar who has written numerous books on the Gita after falling in love with Hindu literature many decades ago.

It should be noted that if the Gita is a historical work, the battle was real, and so was the blood shed by those who lost their life there. This would explode the myth that the Gita's pro-war stance is metaphorical and that the book is actually about peace.

"How the Gita is Interpreted"

There have been literally hundreds of commentaries written on the teachings of the Gita. The number of oral (i.e. non-recorded) commentaries and discussions on the Gita (by Brahmins, et cetera) is probably in the hundred-thousands. It would be impossible to list how everyone interprets the Gita, so instead, only a few people will be mentioned.

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi had said much regarding the Gita. While he did not consider the battle to be historical, he had praised the Gita numerous times throughout his life. Gandhi ascribed great virtues to it. "When doubts haunt me, when disappointments stare me in the face, and I see not one ray of light on the horizon," Gandhi wrote in the August 6, 1925, issue of Young India magazine3, "I turn to the Bhagavad Gita, and find a verse to comfort me; and I immediately begin to smile in the midst of overwhelming sorrow. My life has been full of external tragedies and if they had not left any visible or invisible effect on me, I owe it to the teaching of the Bhagavad Gita."

Gandhi is a man who was called by his peers 'Mahatma' (great soul), and indeed the title serves him well. Unfortunately however, Gandhi seemed to have an overactive imagination in his numerous commentaries on the Gita. Gandhi's explanations of the Gita are very beautiful, yet still somewhat obtuse.

Gandhi was a man who tried to live his life by the principle of Ahisma (non-violence towards all living things). Because of this, he could not reconcile the possibility of the war in the Gita literally being a war, thus, he offered extremely abstract interpretations of the verses that seem to be saying the opposite, if read verbatim. Gandhi stated that Krishna was simply a character used to "describe the duel that perpetually went on in the hearts of mankind." For Gandhi the war was not physical, but merely a metaphor representing the battles within one's soul.

Unlike Gandhi, Eknath Easwaran feels that the battle was indeed historical and real. Easwaran has even supported the idea that Kurukshetra is indeed the place where the battle was fought (as some Hindu scholars have theorized). Thus, if Kurukshetra is where the war took place, the war must have been real.

While Easwaran disagrees with Gandhi on whether or not the battle was historical, he seems to agree that there is a hidden message written into the story. Easwaran tries to show a double meaning in the battle and discusses the "battle within". Although his writings are not as abstract as those of Gandhi, Easwaran tries to hint that the killing is more metaphorical than physical in some respect.

"To Kill or Not to Kill?"

Is the violence, warfare, and killing mentioned in the Gita merely a metaphor? Whether the story is fiction or not, is irrelevant. The question is in regards to the author. When words like "battle" and "kill" were written, did they literally mean warfare and loss of life, or is it all simply a metaphor?

First, we should consider the time frame that this was written in. Was the author influenced at all by Judeo-Christian law? Of course not. The author did not judge using the same set of standards established by modern Western societies. To kill the enemy was to some degree normal. Warfare literally meant warfare, and nothing more. The issue here was in regards to killing family.

Whether Arjuna was a fictional character, or a historical character, he was still troubled by the thought of murdering his brethren. If this was merely a metaphor, or an exercise in spirituality, why was he so distressed? Arjuna says: The words "to slay our kinsmen" were translated from hantum sva-janam5. Hantum is literally the verb "to kill", so this was indeed a real war at hand. Arjuna describes this killing of one's kinsmen as "mahat papam" (great sin).

Obviously, for Arjuna, this war is very real. As was stated before, Krishna challenges Arjuna to prepare for battle. Krishna is not preaching any sort of message that is related to Ahisma, as Gandhi might have asserted. Instead, to ease Arjuna's distress, Krishna begins to explain the travel of the soul from one body to the next. It is almost as if Krishna is educating Arjuna on the finer points of the Atman and the circle of Samsar(a).

Krishna tries to explain that an intelligent person should not mourn for the living or the dead. Krishna tells Arjuna, "You grieve for those who are not worthy of grief, and yet speak the words of wisdom. The wise grieve neither for the living nor for the dead."6 Krishna literally means living and dead, which was translated from "gatasun" (lost life) and "agatasums" (current life). While Krishna is explaining principals or reincarnation, he is also revealing that indeed people are going to die. "Gatasun" literally means "lost life". Krishna is not saying that nobody is going to die. Rather he is urging Arjuna to kill them, but not to worry, as the soul will live on.

"The Modern Kurukshetra"

Kurukshetra ("the field of the Kurus") is where the epic battle described in the Bhagavad Gita allegedly took place. Historical or fictional, this battle is long gone, a war from thousands of years ago. However, similar battles are fought today in the nation of India, and it would be interesting to explore (via admittedly abstract arguments) the relationship between modern battles in India and the one put forth by the Gita.

For some Hindus, the modern day Kauravas are not fighting for Kurukshetra. Instead these "evil" warriors are fighting for lands such as Kashmir, declaring Jihads, and screaming "God is great," the whole way. Can the modern Hindu-Islamic conflict be compared with the Pandava-Kaurava conflict of 2,500 years ago?

Many right-wing Hindu nationalists seem to take a Krishna-esque attitude toward killing the enemy when the enemy is Muslim. Newsletters, such as the previously mentioned "Sword of Truth," have run numerous headlines that jokingly mention how "Indian Troops are sending Mujahideens in Kashmir to the Islamic Paradise."8

First, it should be noted that Hinduism is a relatively tolerant faith. Great scholars such as Arthur Schopenhauer and Gore Vidal have pointed out that Polytheism by its very nature is more tolerant than Monotheism. Polytheism tolerates and often welcomes the gods of other religions. Many scholars agree that the Hindu pantheon is a mix of Aryan and Indus Valley gods. Monotheist faiths on the other hand usually offer no tolerance.

In the second volume of his book "Parerga and Paralipomena" Arthur Schopenhauer asks people to reflect on In an article written for "The New Statesman Society," Gore Vidal states: Hinduism has shown much tolerance to many other faiths and embraces many other faiths. Many Hindus believe that Buddha was an avatar (an incarnation of Krishna/Vishnu). Some Hindus have even gone as far as to interpret Jesus as a possible avatar, comparing him to Krishna in different ways. However, there is almost no attempt to consider Muhammad (Islam's seal of the prophets) as an Avatar, or as being sent by some deity.

This strong opposition to Islam is rooted in a bitter and bloody conflict that goes back to the tenth century C.E., that reached it's bloody peak under Aurangzeb, a 17th century ruler of India who took pride in making piles out of Hindu skulls. Many modern right-wing Hindus take a disinterested stance on killing Muslims, as if they do not care, or are not effected at all by the death of a Muslim. As was stated previously, some joke about "sending Jihad warriors to the Islamic paradise". I would argue this is because "the wise grieve neither for the living nor for the dead."11

*Conclusion*

Ahisma is one of India's many gifts to the world. However, this aspect of Indian philosophy has nothing to do with the Gita. The Bhagavad Gita, may be fiction, but the author did not intend for the battle to be a metaphor. When Krishna told Arjuna to fight and kill, he meant it literally. It is only a feeble-minded, political correctness, based on Judeo-Christian morals, that causes people to offer silly and abstract interpretations.

NOTES

1. Bhagavad Gita 2:3

2. Rajaram, N.S.. Search for the Historical Krishna. The Sword of Truth 4 September 1999: Revelation Section

3. Young India Magazine, 6 August 1925, as cited in Fischer, p. 29

4. Bhagavad Gita 1:45

5. Translations courtesy of Prabhupada pp. 70-71

6. Bhagavad Gita 2:11

7. Translations courtesy of Prabhupada p. 87

8. Varghese, Vishwas. How Indian Troops are sending Mujahideens in Kashmir to the Islamic Paradise. The Sword of Truth 12 July 1999: "Between the lines" Section

9. Schopenhauer p. 356

10. Vidal, Gore, "Monotheism and its discontents" New Statesman Society 26 June 1992: p. 12

11. Bhagavad Gita 2:11

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bresnan, Patrick S., Awakening, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1999.

Easwaran, Eknath Bhagavad Gita, California: Nilgiri, 1998.

Fischer, Louis, The Life of Mahatma Gandhi, United States: Harper & Brothers, 1950.

Johnson, W.J.. Bhagavad Gita, New York: Oxford, 1994.

Prabhupada, A.C. Bhagavad Gita, United States: Bhaktivedanta, 1986.

Schopenhauer, Arthur, Parerga and Paralipomena, New York: Oxford 1974

Warraq, Ibn, Why I Am Not A Muslim, New York: Prometheus 1995
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