TRADITIONAL CULTURE AND MODERNIZATION

TRADITIONAL CULTURE AND MODERNIZATION

India is the Greatest country and Indian culture is one of the richest cultures in the world. It is one of the oldest forms and has held its heritage and flavor right from its birth to the present day. India is well known for its culture and its various diversities in Indian culture. Though Indian culture is rich and great it was bound to undergo reforms and changes. Nothing stays permanent everything changes with time and so did the Indian culture change with time. As time went by slowly the Indian culture kept losing its heritage and richness. Reforms and changes came in. a tough of the western culture also influenced the Indians. Indian culture lost its richness. It was tried immensely to restore some rigidness in the culture but that was not to be. 

The rich Indian culture has finally crumbled. Its rigidness has finally given way to globalization, modernization and urbanization. A few decades back drinking and smoking was considered as ill behavior and today it has become a general trend in the youth. The modern India is no more under its rich culture. 

Modern India is completely under the influence of western culture. Starting from the dressing habits, food habits to the education all has changed. People are no longer interested in learning Sanskrit but are eager to learn languages like English, French and Spanish. Indian culture is under the threat of extinction. If steps are not taken to restore back the rigidity and heritage of Indian culture then soon there could be no existence of Indian culture. Indian culture is in danger in modern India, and if not taken care of the Indian culture could soon give way to the western culture leading to the loss of the rich Indian culture.

BACKGROUND

This paper focuses upon three issues. First, I want to show that the perennial elements in traditional cultures like those of India and China are relevant even today as they play an important role in the achievement, on the one hand, of harmony between the individual and society at the social level, and, on the other hand, of harmony of spirit, mind, and body at the individual level. Second, we should not lose sight of the distinction between knowledge and information, between wisdom and knowledge, and more importantly between life and living. The perennial elements in the traditional culture have helped us to care for life, knowledge, and wisdom, which are essential for spiritual development. Third, modernization as interpreted by the West has a narrow connotation and is, therefore, a distorted concept. Through science, it brings in the colonial attitude, the imperialism of the West. It is possible for one to be modern without accepting all that is implied by modernization.

Culture, which comprises philosophy and religion, art and literature, science and technology, social organization and political administration, is the mirror of the theory and practice of a people. It is originated, developed and sustained by the people over a period of time. In turn, the perennial elements which constitute its core inspire and sustain the posterity to whom it is transmitted from time to time. Traditional cultures like those of China and India are undoubtedly ancient, but not antiquated; their ideals and practices, which are relevant in any situation, help the people to meet the new challenges which surface from time to time. As a result they not only survive, but are admired, adored, and accepted by the people. There cannot be a better explanation of the way a culture is able to hold the people and sustain them than the one given by Sri Aurobindo:

The culture of a people may be roughly described as the expression of a consciousness of life which formulates itself in three aspects. There is a side of thought, of ideal, of upward will and the soul’s aspiration; there is a side of creative self-expression and appreciative aesthesis, intelligence, and imagination; and there is a side of practical and outward formulation. A people’s philosophy and higher thinking give us its mind’s purest, largest, and most general formulation of its consciousness of life and its dynamic view of existence. Its religion formulates the most intense form of its upward will and the soul’s aspirations towards the fulfillment of its highest ideal and impulse. Its art, poetry, literature provide for us the creative expression and impression of its intuition, imagination, vital turn and creative intelligence. Its society and politics provide in their forms an outward frame in which the more external life works out what it can of its inspiring ideal and of its special character and nature under the difficulties of the environment. We can see how much it has taken of the crude material of living, what it has done with it, how it has shaped as much of it as possible into some reflection of its guarding consciousness and deeper spirit. None of them express the whole spirit behind, but they derive from it their main ideas and their cultural character. Together they make up its soul, mind, and body.1 

Of the various components of culture the role of philosophy and religion is significant. Philosophy and religion can never be separated though they can be distinguished. It may be that in a particular culture, philosophy is in the forefront and religion in the background. It can also be the other way with religion at the surface and philosophy in the background. The point to be noted here is that philosophy and religion interact with, and influence each other. Philosophy is made dynamic by religion, and religion is enlightened by philosophy. If it is admitted that there is the need for a unity of theory and practice, philosophy cannot remain merely as a view of life; it must also be a way of life. In other words, philosophy has to become religious if it is to mold, organize and regulate life. Religion is not an untouchable; its need for life can neither be ignored nor underestimated. It will be helpful to contrast the pursuit of philosophy in Europe with that in India and China. Unlike the Europe of the Enlightenment where philosophy did not touch life at all, there was a tremendous impact of philosophy on life both in India and China. In the words of Sri Aurobindo:

Philosophy has been pursued in Europe with great and noble intellectual results by the highest minds, but very much as a pursuit apart from life, a thing high and splendid, but ineffective. It is remarkable that, while in India and China philosophy has seized hold on life, has had an enormous practical effect on the civilization and got into the very bones of current thought and action, it has never at all succeeded in achieving this importance in Europe. In the days of the Stoics and Epicureans it got a grip, but only among the highly cultured; at the present day, too, we have some renewed tendency of the kind. Nietzsche has had his influence, certain French thinkers also in France, the philosophies of James and Bergson have attracted some amount of public interest; but it is a mere nothing compared with the effective power of Asiatic philosophy.2 

There is no doubt that the average European who draws his guidance not from the philosophic, but from positive and practical reason, puts "the philosophical treatises on the highest shelf in the library of civilization." The situation is entirely different in India. Sri Aurobindo says:

The Indian mind holds . . . that the Rishi, the thinker, the seer of spiritual truth is the best guide not only of the religious and moral, but [also of] the practical life. The seer, the Rishi is the natural director of society; to the Rishis he attributes the ideals and guiding intuitions of his civilization. Even today he is very ready to give the name to anyone who can give a spiritual truth which helps his life or a formative idea and inspiration which influences religion, ethics, society, even politics.3 

The phenomenon known as modernization is a product of the one-sided pursuit of both philosophy and science — philosophy purely as an intellectual affair without any bearing on life and science as the most effective instrument for the possession of unlimited power, eliminating the sacred. I shall take up the problem of modernization later. It may be added here that what is said about the Indian mind is equally true of the Chinese mind. Confucius, Mencius, and others are the great Rishis of China, the seers who exhibited the most uncommon insight into men and matters, into the moral and social problems of human beings.

Drawing a distinction between two kinds of philosophers, systematic and edifying, Richard Rorty characterizes Wittgenstein as an edifying philosopher, like Kierkegaard, Heidegger, and others. In a brief analysis of the spirit of Western civilization which is fully manifest in the industry, architecture, and music of our time, in its fascism and socialism, Wittgenstein openly admits that he has "no sympathy for the current of European civilization, that he does not understand its goals, if it has any," and that "it is alien and uncongenial" to him.4 He goes on to say:

A culture is like a big organization which assigns each of its members a place where he can work in the spirit of the whole; and it is perfectly fair for his power to be measured by the contribution he succeeds in making to the whole enterprise.5 

Wittgenstein’s brief explanation of culture requires some elucidation. He says that culture is a whole, that every individual has a place in it, that every individual has to function as a member of the whole, and that what he does is significant socially as well as morally. The two traditional cultures, Chinese and Indian, have recognized the importance of the ideas embedded in Wittgenstein’s explanation of culture. While the Indian culture appears to be predominantly spiritual and religious, the Chinese culture seems to be basically humanistic, with a clear emphasis on the moral and social dimensions of life. It must be pointed out in this connection that the difference between these two traditional cultures is only at the surface. Since the traditional culture comprehends the total life of a person, it provides a place for the different dimensions of life — spiritual, religious, moral, and social — which can be distinguished, but not separated. The spiritual and religious dimension of life presupposes the moral and social realm; and the moral and social sphere of life points to the religious and spiritual goals. That the two realms, ethico-social and religio-spiritual, are complementary, has been recognized by both these cultures, even though the Indian culture lays emphasis on the spiritual and religious side of man while the Chinese culture focusses on the ethical and social side of man. The motif of the two cultures is the harmony of spirit, mind, and body; and it is to achieve this harmony that they take care of both realms of life. Once again what Sri Aurobindo says in this connection is worth quoting:

A true happiness in this world is the right terrestrial aim of man, and true happiness lies in the finding and maintenance of a natural harmony of spirit, mind, and body. A culture is to be valued to the extent to which it has discovered the right key of this harmony and organized its expressive motives and movements. And a civilization must be judged by the manner in which all its principles, ideas, forms, ways of living work to bring that harmony out, manage its rhythmic play, and secure its continuance or the development of its motives.6 

There is need to harmonize the eternal and the temporal, for the spirit works through mind and body, which belong to the temporal; and this is what every great culture has aimed at.

There are four components in the traditional culture associated with India and China. They are: (1) the primal Spirit which is the source and support of the universe may be viewed both as transcendent to, and as immanent in, the universe; (2) this Spirit which is immanent in all human beings can be realized by every human being; (3) it lays down a discipline which is both moral and spiritual for realizing the Spirit; and (4) it has provided an organization of the individual and collective life not only for the sake of the harmony between the individual and society, but also for the sake of the harmony of spirit, mind, and body. Each one of these components needs some explanation in the context of these two cultures.

INDIAN CULTURE

Though Indian culture as it is today is composite in character, comprising Hindu, Jaina, Buddha, Islamic, and Christian elements, it can be characterized as Vedic culture since not only Hinduism, which is predominant, but also Jainism and Buddhism, which originated in protest against Vedic ritualism, have been influenced by the Vedas, the basic and oldest scriptural text in the world. Islam and Christianity entered the Indian soil consequent on the invasion of India by the foreigners — by the Moghuls in the former case, and by the English, French, and Portuguese in the latter case. Though they try to retain their identity, the followers of these two religious traditions have been influenced by the Vedic culture. Kabir (1398-1518 AD), for example, who is a greatly respected personality in the religious history of India, is a product of both Hinduism and Islam. In recent times, Indian Christians talk about and practice inculturization, which is a new and growing phenomenon. The predominant Hindu culture which has a long and continuous history is the Vedic culture; and the Vedic culture, which has its beginning round about 2500 BC, may be characterized as primal culture, since it traces everything in the universe to the primal Spirit, which is variously called Brahman, Ātman, Being, and so on.

Spirit or Being is the primal reality. It is that from which all beings arise; being supported by it, they exist; and all of them move towards it as their destination. In the language of T.S. Eliot, the beginning is the end. TheUpanisad says:

That, verily, from which these beings are born, that by which, when born, they live, that into which, when departing, they enter. That, seek to know. That is Brahman.7 

Spirit or Brahman is primal in the sense that it is foundational. It is the sole reality; it is one and non-dual; and there is nothing else beside it. It is spoken of as the First Cause, Unmoved Mover, of the entire manifest universe. With a view to bring out the independent nature of the primal Spirit on which the manifest universe is dependent, it is referred to as the Ground. That which is independent is real; what is dependent is an appearance. The ground-grounded relation brings out the reality of Spirit and the appearance of the universe. Ordinarily we distinguish the material cause from the efficient cause; the one is different from the other. The wood from which a table is made is the material cause; and the carpenter who works on the wood and makes a table according to a certain design is the efficient cause. The carpenter is different from the wood. What makes the primal Spirit unique is that it is both the material and efficient cause of the universe, because it alone existed in the beginning and nothing else beside it.

Like wood, it is the material cause of the world; and like a carpenter, it is the efficient cause of the world. So, the Vedic culture traces all beings, living as well as non-living, to one source, viz. Spirit or Being. It may be pointed out here that in recent times quantum physics attempts to trace everything in the manifest universe to one source which is non-material or spiritual. Einstein declared:

Everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the Laws of the Universe — a Spirit vastly superior to that of man, and one in the face of which we, with our modest powers, must feel humble.8 

That Spirit or Brahman is the source, support, and end of everything in the universe, is the major premise of the Vedic culture.

Derived from the major premise are two minor premises, one relating to living beings called jīva and the other, to non-living beings called jagat. Since Spirit or Brahman is immanent in jīva and jagat, neither jīva nor jagatis isolated from the primal Spirit. It means that all living beings, whatever they may be — humans, animals, birds, reptiles, and so on — are spiritual or divine. Non-living beings which are material constitute the physical universe. They are the products of the five elements — ether, air, fire, water and earth — which are material. The divine principle is present not only in living beings, but also in non-living beings, and so they are also divine. Characterizing Brahman as the indwelling Spirit (antaryāmin), the Brhadānrayaka Upanisad says that Brahman is present in all beings — the sun, the moon, and the stars, the elements which constitute the physical universe, and the organs of the jīvas. Just as our body does not know the Spirit inside it, even so the beings, whatever they may be, do not know Brahman, the indwelling Spirit in them. The following text is relevant here:

He [Brahman or Spirit] who dwells in all beings, yet is within all beings, whom no beings know, whose body is all beings, who controls all beings from within, he is your Self, the inner controller, the immortal.9 

That which dwells in material objects and controls them also dwells in all living beings and controls them. Just as all living beings are essentially divine, even so the entire physical universe is essentially divine. Whatever may be the differences among the species and within the individual members of a species, all are essentially one, because one and the same divine Spirit is present in all of them. The message conveyed by these two minor premises of the traditional culture deserves careful consideration. First of all, if the land and the water and the sky of the physical universe are divine, then we should take care of them in the same way as we take care of our body. The claim that human beings are rational, that they are superior to the physical world, and that they are, in the words of Descartes, the "masters and possessors of nature" resulted in the unscrupulous, cruel, and destructive despoliation of nature in the name of the quest for knowledge, scientific development, and technological progress. It is not nature that is red in tooth and claw, but the human being who is unabashedly selfish and blatantly aggressive and makes nature bleed and scorch. Fortunately for us, there is a global awakening to the significance of the earth and the water and the sky as sources of sustenance and nourishment. Secondly, the application of this principle of the oneness to the human realm is of great consequence. The understanding that all human beings are essentially one and that differences of color and caste, of gender and race, of sharpness and dullness of mind, and so on are due to the mind-sense-body adjunct by which the Spirit is enclosed will help us to tackle the universally rampant problem of discrimination of all kinds — social, religious, economic, and political.

Vedāntic philosophy, which is an important component of culture, tells us what a human being is, does, and should do in order to achieve the harmony of spirit, mind, and body. A human being (jīva) is a complex entity consisting of Spirit and matter. The term used in Vedānta for Spirit is the Self or Ātman. Matter which is totally different from the Self is referred to as not-Self, as other-than-the-Self. According to Vedānta, the not-Self, which is the material outfit of the human being, is made up of the mind, the senses, and the body. The Self in the human being requires a physical medium for its involvement in the day-to-day life as the subject of knowledge, the agent of action, and the enjoyer of the consequences of action. The mind and the senses are the cognitive instruments. With the help of the mind, the five senses give us knowledge of the things of the external world. The work of the mind does not stop with the cognitive support it gives to the senses. As the internal organ (antahkaraa), the mind generates the knowledge of the subjective states such as pleasure and pain. It also does something more, which is very important from the moral and spiritual perspectives. It gives us knowledge of the right and the wrong, dharma and adharma as they are called. When chastened by the moral and spiritual discipline, it is the mind which helps us to realize the primal Spirit or Brahman. So the work of the mind is manifold. The mind is the most marvelous instrument that a human being possesses. The emergence of the mind has not only accelerated the evolutionary process in its upward movement, but also has given enormous powers to the human being, making him/her the crown of creation, unique among all living beings. In the course of his commentary on the scriptural account of the creation of the world, Sankara raises the question about the preeminence of the human being among all creatures and answers it by saying that the human being is preeminent because he alone is qualified for knowledge and the performance of prescribed duties (jnāna-karma-adhikārah).10 Why is it that he alone has this competence? Sankara justifies the supremacy of the human on three grounds. First, he has the ability for acquiring knowledge not only of the things of the world, but also of the supreme Being, the primal reality. This is because he is equipped with the mind which, being inspired by the Self or Spirit in him is capable of comprehending everything including the highest reality. Secondly, he has the distinctive quality of desiring certain ends as a result of discrimination, deliberation, and choice. Thirdly, when he has consciously chosen an end, he is earnest about it, finds the right means for achieving the end, and persists in it till he reaches the goal. A scriptural text which is quoted by Sankara in this connection says:

In man alone is the Self most manifest for he is the best endowed with knowledge. He speaks what he knows; he sees what he knows; he knows what will happen tomorrow; he knows the higher and the lower worlds; he aspires to achieve immortality through perishable things. He is thus endowed (with discrimination) while other beings have consciousness of hunger and thirst only.11 

According to Vedānta, the Self in the human being is eternal, whereas his material outfit, the mind-sense-body complex, is temporal. The birth and death of a human being are connected with, and because of, the body. They are illicitly transferred to the Self with the result that we think of it as perishable and finite. The human being is caught in the cycle of birth and death because of ignorance (avidyā) whose beginning is not known. The empirical journey of the Self through its association with the material adjunct is due to avidyā. It is avidyā that pulls down the trans-empirical Self into the empirical realm, superimposes on it, which is non-relational, a relation with matter, and is thus responsible for the "fall" of the Self. What is above categorization is now categorized and made an object of knowledge; what transcends relation is now explained through the logic of relation; and what is beyond the scope of language is now brought within the grammar of language. Thus, just as a tree and a table are known through perception and other means of knowledge, even so Brahman or the Self, we claim, is known through the scriptural text called Sruti. The trans-relational reality is viewed as characterized by omniscience and other qualities and also as the cause of the world. What is trans-linguistic is now spoken of as real, knowledge, infinite, and so on. In other words, we employ the categories of substance and attribute, cause and effect, whole and parts for the purpose of understanding the highest reality. It will be of interest in this connection to refer to the views of two influential thinkers from the West — one belonging to the pre-sixth century and the other our own contemporary. Pseudo-Dionysius, who occupies an important place in the history of Western spirituality, observes:

[The supreme reality] is neither perceived nor is it perceptible. It suffers neither disorder nor disturbance and is overwhelmed by no earthly passion. . . . It endures no deprivation of light. It passes through no change, decay, division, loss, no ebb and flow, nothing of which the senses may be aware. None of all this can either be identified with it nor attributed to it.12 

Again, he says:

It falls neither within the predicate of non-being nor of being. Existing beings do not know it as it actually is and it does not know them as they are. There is no speaking of it, nor name, nor knowledge of it. Darkness and light, error and truth — it is none of these. It is beyond assertion and denial. We make assertions and denials of what is next to it, but never of it, for it is both beyond every assertion, being the perfect and unique cause of all things, and, by virtue of its preeminently simple and absolute nature, free of every limitation, beyond every limitation; it is also beyond every denial.13 

Pseudo-Dionysius conveys in the most unambiguous terms the Vedāntic conception of Brahman or the Self.

Instead of terms such as Brahman or the Self used by the Vedāntin, Wittgenstein uses terms such as the "metaphysical subject," the "I," the "philosophical ‘I’ " and contrasts it with the "body." The human body, he says, is a part of the world among other parts, but the Self or the philosophical "I" is not a part of the world; it is outside the space-time-cause world. In the words of Wittgenstein:

The subject does not belong to the world, but is a border of the world.14 

The philosophical "I" is not the human being, not the human body, or the human soul of which psychology treats, but the metaphysical subject, the border — not a part — of the world.15 

What is obvious from the foregoing account is that we have to make a distinction between two concepts, Brahman-in-itself and Brahman-in-relation-to-the-world, for the purpose of analysis. The latter concept is meaningful only on the presupposition of the fall of Brahman or the Self.

When did this fall take place? No one knows, and no one can answer. Once there is the fall, the empirical journey of the Self goes on in different forms, conditioned by the space-time-cause framework. However, the promise of Vedānta is that the empirical journey of the līva can be put an end to, that the vicious cycle of birth and death can be broken by destroying avidyā through knowledge of one’s Self. That is why there is the scriptural instruction of "Know thy Self." Not only does scripture say that the Self should be realized or seen, but it also suggests the means for realizing it.

It will be difficult to understand the full significance of the distinction between Brahman-in-itself and Brahman-in-relation-to-the-world without a reference to the principle of standpoints which is enshrined in Indian culture. There are two sets of features, perennial and temporal, in Indian culture which contribute to its continuity as well as its change. While the basic doctrines constitute its perennial dimension, religious practices covering a wide range are temporal and transitory. Decadence sets in when the temporal and transitory features gain importance almost to the point of ignoring or sidetracking the perennial features. Historical, social, and political changes call for modification, sometimes radical, sometimes minor, in the religious practices and social norms of the people, while the basic doctrinal side remains intact. Continuity of the essentials amidst the changing flow of life helps to preserve the cultural tradition.

The essential structure which has endured through the vicissitudes of time contains the basic doctrines as stated in the major premise and the two minor premises to which reference was made earlier. The three basic doctrines are: primal Being or Spirit is the source, support, and end of everything, sentient as well as non-sentient; all living beings are divine; also, the physical universe which has originated from the primal Spirit is spiritual.

The monistic vision, which is pervasive in the Vedic corpus, is a notable feature of Indian culture. The doctrine of levels or standpoints skillfully adopted by Indian culture helps to reconcile monism and polytheism as well as monism and pluralism. Though each pair contains two extremes in the religio-philosophical thinking, they have been accommodated as different standpoints at different levels. They are irreconcilable only when they are placed together at the same level. For example, one of the oft-quoted hymns of the Rg-veda provides a clue for reconciling the problem of one Godhead and many gods and goddesses. It says: "What is but one, wise people call by different names — as Agni, Yama, Mātarisvan."16 Reference to gods, such as, Agni and Yama may be replaced by the well known gods of the Hindu pantheon such as Siva, Visnu, Sakti, and so on. Sankara explains the distinction between the supreme Godhead and its various forms such as Siva, Visnu, and so on, as the distinction between the "unconditioned" reality, what we referred to as Brahman-in-itself, and its "conditioned" forms such as Siva and Visnu, all of which can be brought under Brahman-in-relation-to-the-world. _iva, Viu, and other gods are conditioned beings endowed with a name and a form and other qualities, whereas the One is unconditioned, devoid of name and form, specifications and qualities and is, therefore, trans-empirical, trans-relational, and trans-linguistic.

This mode of drawing the distinction between the supreme Godhead and its many forms for the purpose of worship and other religious practices of the devotees, which is unheard of in other religious traditions of other cultures, is of great consequence in the religious practice of the people. Since it is the one reality that is worshipped in many forms such as Agni, Siva, and so on, one who worships Agni or Siva, should not quarrel with one who worships Yama or Visnu, because Agni, Yama, Siva, and Visnu are the conditioned aspects of the same reality. This significant idea of the Rg-Vedic hymn was accepted, fully elaborated, and further deepened by theUpanisads. It provides a theoretical framework for religious harmony, which is one of the characteristic features of primal culture and which has received special emphasis right from the beginning till this day.

What makes primal culture valid for all times and in all places is its inclusiveness. It includes everything by providing a place for it in the whole. Religious, social, economic, scientific, and political activities are necessary and meaningful; but they must be made subservient to, and must be viewed and judged in the context of the spiritual goal of life. A culture which is mainly concerned with the bare economic necessities of life, social institutions, and political organization will be neither enduring nor elevating; it may look energetic and enterprising, but it is not worth the name, if it is not geared up to the spiritual side of life. Once again, what Sri Aurobindo says is worth quoting here:

A mere intellectual, ethical, and aesthetic culture does not go back to the inmost truth of the spirit; it is still an ignorance, an incomplete, outward, and superficial knowledge. To have made the discovery of our deepest being and hidden spiritual nature is the first necessity and to have erected the living of an inmost spiritual life into the aim of existence is the characteristic sign of a spiritual culture.17 

The Vedānta philosophy solves the problem of monism versus pluralism on the basis of the distinction between two levels or standpoints called pāramārthika and vyāvahārika, or absolute and relative respectively. TheUpanisads make use of this distinction in the explanation of the epistemological, metaphysical, axiological, and soteriological problems. What is true at one level may not be so at another level. A dream-lion which is accepted as real in dream experience loses its reality at the waking level. What is accepted as a value at one time may turn out to be a disvalue at another time. The pluralistic universe which is accepted as real may cease to exist in the state of liberation following the spiritual ascent. The pāramārthika or absolute standpoint is higher, whereas the vyāvahārika or the relative standpoint is lower. It must be borne in mind that the higher standpoint which transcends the lower does not invalidate it. One who has moved from the relative to the absolute standpoint knows the truth of the former; but one who is tied to the relative standpoint cannot understand the truth of the absolute standpoint. Consider the case of two persons who attempt to climb up a mountain in order to reach the highest peak. While one of them reaches the top, the other, due to some disability, is not able to proceed beyond the foothill. The person who has reached the summit knows what kind of experience is available to one at the foothill; but one who is at the foothill does not understand the kind of experience one has at the top.

We have to apply this logic to the different kinds of experience without subverting the pāramārthika-vyāvahārika hierarchy. The Upanisads describe the two levels as signifying higher wisdom and lower knowledge. Experience of plurality is quite common; it is quite natural; we have it in our daily life. No special effort or discipline is required for such an experience. But experience of oneness is uncommon. One does not get it without special effort or appropriate discipline. The transition is from the common to the uncommon. A text of the Brhadārayaka Upanisad describes the two levels of experience as follows:

For, where there is duality as it were, there one sees the other, one smells the other, one knows the other. . . . But, where everything has become just one’s own self, by what and whom should one smell, by what and whom should one know?18

Without disregarding the pragmatic value of day-to-day empirical knowledge, primal culture emphasizes the importance of higher wisdom. It will be of interest to quote Wittgenstein in this connection. He says:

In religion every level of devoutness must have its appropriate form of expression which has no sense at a lower level. This doctrine, which means something at a higher level, is null and void for someone who is still at the lower level; he can only understand it wrongly and so these words are not valid for such a person.

For instance, at my level the Pauline doctrine of predestination is ugly, nonsense, irreligiousness. Hence it is not suitable for me, since the only use I could make of the picture I am offered would be a wrong one. If it is a good and godly picture, then it is so for someone at a quite different level, who must use it in his life in a way completely different from anything that would be possible for me.19 

The teaching of the Vedānta philosophy is positive. According to it, life in this world is meaningful and purposive — meaningful for the reason that it serves as the training ground for one’s spiritual uplifting through the proper use of the objects of the world by the mind-sense-body equipment of which one is in possession, and purposive as one has to achieve freedom or liberation by overcoming the existential predicament. Freedom or liberation which is projected as the goal must be understood in the spiritual sense. It is true that human life is made difficult by economic constraints, political oppression, social hierarchy, and religious discrimination; and a situation of this kind points to, and calls for, freedom of different kinds so that a person can exist and function as a moral agent enjoying economic, political, social and religious freedom. However, the goal of life remains unfulfilled in spite of these different kinds of freedom. Though they are necessary, they are not sufficient. The highest freedom which is eternal and totally satisfying is spiritual freedom, which is called moksa in Indian culture. A socio-political system may ensure political freedom, social justice, economic satisfaction, and unrestricted religious practice; but still there is no guarantee of harmony of spirit, mind, and body which one can achieve only through the teaching of philosophy and religion. The socio-political machinery cannot be a substitute for religion and philosophy, though it can and should maintain a system of rights and obligations in which alone a human being can lead a moral life as formulated in religion and can pursue the goal of liberation as projected by philosophy. Sri Aurobindo says:

The whole aim of a great culture is to lift man up to something which at first he is not, to lead him to knowledge though he starts from an unfathomable ignorance, to teach him to live by reason, though actually he lives much more by his unreason, by the law of good and unity, though he is now full of evil and discord, by a law of beauty and harmony, though his actual life is a repulsive muddle of ugliness and jarring barbarisms, by some law of his spirit, though at present he is egoistic, material, unspiritual, engrossed by the needs and desires of his physical being. If a civilization has not any of these aims, it can hardly at all be said to have a culture and certainly in no sense a great and noble culture. But the last of these aims, as conceived by ancient India, is the highest of all because it includes and surpasses all the others. To have made this attempt is to have ennobled the life of the race; to have failed in it is better than if it had never at all been attempted; to have achieved even a partial success is a great contribution to the future possibilities of the human being.20 

Excepting the Cārvāka, which advocates a thoroughgoing materialism, all other philosophical systems in India accept the ideal of moksa. The Indian mind, right from the beginning, has accepted a hierarchy of values, ranging from the bodily and economic values at the bottom to the spiritual values of which liberation is at the top. The human being leads his life at two levels — organic and hyper-organic. Bodily and economic values which he pursues belong to the organic level. In so far as the pursuit of the organic values is concerned — values which are necessary for life preservation — his life and activities are in no way different from those of animals; at this level, hunger and sleep, shelter and sex are common to man and animals. Endowed as he is not only with the body, but also with the mind, he also lives at another level, pursuing higher values such as truth, beauty, goodness. The life-activity of man which is fully reflective of his cognition, desire, deliberation, and choice cannot stop short of the highest value called moksa. It is not necessary here to discuss the broad scheme of values accepted in the Indian tradition. Suffice it to say that, though artha and kāma, which emphasize the importance of the material and hedonistic side of life, have been accommodated in the scheme of values, the moral and spiritual side of life has received special attention in Indian culture. That is why it has accepted two higher values, dharma and moksa, the former functioning as a moral guide, and also as a regulative principle of artha andkāma pursued in our secular life, for the realization of the latter. All the philosophical systems, Vedic as well as non-Vedic, hold the view that moksa as the highest value is both ultimate and all-satisfying — ultimate since there is nothing else to which it can be the means, and all-satisfying since it comprehends all the higher values. Sankara says that one gets the feeling of the fulfillment of all values when one attains moksa.21 

There are three questions that we have to consider in connection with the ultimate value. The first one is whether it can be realized at all. There is the view that the ultimate value is only an ideal to inspire and regulate our conduct and that it can never be attained. We can regulate our life so as to come nearer to it from time to time, from stage to stage; but we can never reach it. Such a view is untenable. Also, it goes against the spirit of Indian culture. Realization of one’s true nature is liberation. We have already pointed out that the human being is a complex entity consisting of Spirit and matter. Spirit by its very nature is ever free and never bound. But it appears to be bound because of the material adjunct with which it is associated in the empirical life. Overwhelmed by ignorance, the human being does not realize that he is essentially Spirit and therefore free. When he attains the right knowledge and knows his real nature, he is no more under the limitation or bondage of the psycho-physical material outfit, because ignorance which conceals his real nature is removed by knowledge. It means that the ideal of moksa has a basis in the very constitution of the human being; also, the human being, not being satisfied with the material achievements, what the Upanisad calls preyas, longs for spiritual freedom, which is calledSreyas. The Upanisad says:

Both the good and the pleasant approach a man. The wise man, pondering over them, discriminates. The wise chooses the good in preference to the pleasant. The simple-minded, for the sake of worldly well-being, prefers the pleasant.22 

One cannot have both Sreyas and preyas. The pursuit of the former requires the renunciation of the latter. Spiritual illumination follows purgation. Speaking about the importance of the ideal and its close relation to human nature, Hiriyanna observes:

Ideals are rooted in needs inherent in human nature. It is their reality that constitutes their true charm. Take this charm from them, and they reduce themselves but to pleasant fantasy. The reality of such a value may not be vouched for by common reasoning. But we should remember that neither is there any adequate proof for denying it. Not to admit the ideal would therefore be to be dogmatic in the sense that we deny it without adequate proof for the denial.23

The second question is whether the ideal of moksa can be realized by all. Here also the great philosophical traditions, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, are unanimous in their affirmative answer. There is nothing in human nature which either disqualifies or incapacitates him from attaining this ideal. Whatever may be the differences among human beings at the bodily, vital, and mental levels, everyone has the right and duty to aspire for the highest value by virtue of what he/she is. As every human being is endowed with the mind, the most precious and unequalled instrument through which one can look before and after, know the things given to him, and choose from them after discrimination and deliberation, he is not in any way incapacitated from pursuing the ultimate value. Indian culture looks down on the doctrine of the chosen few. Since ignorance is the obstacle that stands in the way of realizing one’s divine nature, realizing one’s Spirit, which is liberation, it can be removed by knowledge which anyone can acquire through moral and spiritual discipline. The philosophy of Vedānta, according to which every human being is divine, is opposed to the theory of privilege — of birth, intellect, spirituality, etc. It is anti-hierarchical. In everyone there is a sleeping Buddha, a hidden Brahman, to which everyone can have access. That the doors to the spiritual realm do not remain closed to anyone is conveyed in a forthright manner by Sri Aurobindo:

A wider spiritual culture must recognize that the Spirit is not only the highest and inmost thing, but all is manifestation and creation of the Spirit. It must have a wider outlook, a more embracing range of applicability and, even, a more aspiring and ambitious aim of its endeavor. Its aim must be not only to raise to inaccessible heights the few elect, but to draw all men and all life and the whole human being upward, to spiritualize life and in the end to divinize human nature. Not only must it be able to lay hold on his deepest individual being, but to inspire, too, his communal existence. It must turn, by a spiritual change, all the members of his ignorance into members of the knowledge; it must transmute all the instruments of the human into instruments of a divine living. The total movement of Indian spirituality is towards this aim.24 

The third question, whether the ultimate value can be realized here in this life or only hereafter, is answered in two different ways. Some philosophical systems maintain that the proper preparation that a person undertakes for achieving this end will help him to realize it only after death, whereas some other systems hold the view that it can be realized in this life itself, if one follows the prescribed moral and spiritual discipline. The former view is called the eschatological conception of moksa while the latter is known as līvan-mukti. "Līvan-mukti" means liberation-in-life. The person who has attained enlightenment or wisdom is free even while he is in the embodied condition. It is not necessary to discuss these two views of moksa in detail. It may be pointed out here that the view that it is possible to overcome bondage and attain liberation here and now deepens the significance of the present life. A līvan-mukta does not run away from society. He lives in society for the benefit of others; when he is engaged in activities, he has no sense of "I" and "mine"; his activities, that is to say, are impersonal. Also, he imparts spiritual instruction to others, for, having realized the truth, he alone is competent to do this. The life of a līvan-mukta, as portrayed in the Hindu tradition, is comparable to that of a Bodhi-sattva as explained in the Mahāyāna tradition. The ideal of life goes beyond self-perfection; it also includes work for the universal good.

According to the Indian tradition, knowledge is different from information, and wisdom is different from knowledge. We may say that information, knowledge, and wisdom constitute a hierarchy. To know a thing is to know it in a determinate way, as such-and-such — as a substance possessing qualities, as a whole consisting of parts, as the cause or effect of something, and so on. Every object has two kinds of relations, internal and external. A lump of clay, for example, is internally related to its color, its parts of which it is made. It is also externally related to the ground on which it is placed, its immediate surroundings, and so on. No object remains isolated from other things; on the contrary, it has a network of relations with other things in such a way that it is what it is because of other things. When the poet says that, to know a flower seen in a crannied wall, one must know the plant, root and all, and also the wall, its location, and so on, he draws our attention to the fact that every object is an integral part of the cosmic system and that, to get an insight into the nature of a thing, one must know the whole of which it is an integral part. Bits of information do not constitute knowledge. Piecemeal information about the roots, the trunk, and the branches of a tree cannot be viewed as the knowledge of a tree.

Just as knowledge is different from information, even so wisdom is different from knowledge. Though knowledge is superior to information, it cannot be a substitute for wisdom. The Vedic tradition draws a distinction between two kinds of knowledge, higher (parā) and lower (aparā). Saunaka, the great householder, requested A_giras to teach him the supreme reality by knowing which everything is known. To him Angiras said: "Two kinds of knowledge are to be known, as indeed the knowers of Brahman declare — the higher as well as the lower."25 The higher knowledge, otherwise known as wisdom, is the knowledge of the eternal Brahman or Spirit, the source or ground of everything. The lower knowledge deals with things perishable, with everything other than Brahman, with the disciplines relating to instrumental values. It should not be thought that the lower knowledge is of no value. It may be noted that scripture insists on the acquisition of the lower knowledge; but one should not stop with it. One should acquire the lower knowledge, which is undoubtedly helpful to the attainment of spiritual wisdom. However useful and important the lower knowledge may be, it cannot liberate a person from the bondage of empirical life. The Upanisad narrates an episode in the life of Nārada, who approached Sanatkumāra and requested him to teach the higher knowledge. Nārada was learned. He was proficient in the scriptural lore; he knew the Vedas and the epics, logic, ethics, and politics, etc. After giving a long list of the subjects he knew, he confessed to Sanakumāra:

Sir, I am only the knower of the text (mantra-vit), but not the knower of the Self (ātma-vit). I have heard from those like you that a person who knows the Self crosses over sorrow. Such a sorrowing person I am. Venerable Sir, please help me to cross over to the other side of sorrow.26 

What the Upanisad conveys through this story of Nārada is that wisdom alone can save a person from the existential predicament and not mere knowledge, however profound and extensive it may be.

The hierarchy among information, knowledge, and wisdom suggests that we have to make a distinction between life and living. The life that a human being leads should reflect the level he has reached in the evolutionary scheme. As stated earlier, because what is distinctive of the human being is the mind one possesses one’s life-activity should take place at the mental level and not merely at the bodily and sensuous level. According to the Greeks, "What a thing is when its growth is completed, that is what we call its nature."27 Only when what is potential in a thing becomes actual can we say that its nature (svabhāva) is fully manifest. It is well known that the nature of a seed, e.g. that of the banyan tree, can be known only when the seed is allowed to grow into a mighty tree with its hanging roots from the branches scattered far and wide. What is potential in a seed becomes actual, revealing its nature. The same principle holds good in the case of the human being. What is potential in the human being must be allowed to become actual through the full and proper exercise of the mind. The purpose of the moral and spiritual discipline which fully utilizes the mind is to help man realize the hidden divinity in him. Life is judged by its quality, whereas living is commonly understood in terms of the basic organic needs, such as food, water, clothes, shelter, and sex. The fulfillment of the basic needs takes place at the bodily and sensuous level. But the harmony of spirit, mind, and body can be achieved only at the mental level, through reason and will, through knowledge and purposive action. Sri Aurobindo in his own characteristic way, brings out the distinction between life and living. To the question, "What is meant after all by life, and when is it that we most fully and greatly live?" his answer is:

Life is surely nothing but the creation and active self-expression of man’s spirit, powers, capacities, his will to be and think and create and love and do and achieve. When that is wanting or, since it cannot be absolutely wanting, depressed, held under, discouraged or inert, whether by internal or external causes, then we may say that there is a lack of life.28 

He points out that religion, philosophy, and science, art, drama, and song, war and peace, the thoughts, emotions, words, deeds, joys, and sorrows which make up the existence of man — all these constitute life in its largest sense. What, then, is mere living? It is restricted to the day-to-day things required for survival. One who does not rise above the "ordinary materials and circumstances of mere living" does not live at all as a human being. Sri Aurobindo observes:

If life is not uplifted by great hopes, aspirations, and ideals, then we may well say that the community does not really live; it is defective in the characteristic greatness of the human spirit.29 

When T.S. Eliot asks,

Where is the life we have lost in living

Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge

Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?

he is concerned about the importance of life, whose quality and worth must be judged in terms of knowledge and wisdom.

It is impossible to realize the ideal of liberation without a rigorous pursuit of discipline, moral as well as spiritual. A few remarks about the background of this discipline will be helpful to understand it in the correct perspective. First, this discipline will not be meaningful to one who is satisfied with the fulfillment of the bodily needs without any thought of the higher side of life. One who is interested in living and not in life will not come anywhere near this discipline. Second, it takes into consideration the differences among the spiritual aspirants in their abilities and aptitudes. Third, there is a built-in order, as well as freedom, in the scheme of discipline. It is the same, age-old discipline that every spiritual aspirant desirous of liberation should follow. If we examine the content of the discipline as formulated in the different religio-philosophical traditions, we find that it is substantively the same. At the same time, taking into consideration the attainments and attitudes of the individuals, the discipline has provided variations in the practices to suit the individual needs; it recognizes what the tradition calls adhikāri-bheda. The "firm spiritual order as well as the untrammeled spiritual freedom" has contributed, on the one hand, to the continuity of the cultural tradition and, on the other hand, to additions and modifications in the practices without any detriment to the essentials of the discipline. Fourth, there is a sequence, chronological as well as logical, in the discipline. Moral discipline is the sine qua non for spiritual discipline; one should, that is to say, start with the moral discipline and then proceed to the spiritual discipline in order to reap the benefit of the discipline. It is said that no one who has not studied geometry could get into Plato’s Academy; the curriculum and academic set up were such that knowledge of geometry was considered to be a prerequisite for entry into the Academy. Spiritual discipline will not be fruitful for one who has not successfully completed the moral discipline. Indian culture has always emphasized the need for a gradual ascent from the lower to the higher stages accommodating diversity of paths and practices all leading to the same goal. To quote Sri Aurobindo:

At first he [the spiritual aspirant] needs lower supports and stages of ascent; he asks for some scaffolding of dogma, worship, image, sign, form, symbol, some indulgence and permission of mixed half-natural motive on which he can stand while he builds up in him the temple of the spirit. Only when the temple is completed can the supports be removed, the scaffolding disappear. The religious culture which now goes by the name of Hinduism not only fulfilled this purpose, but, unlike certain other credal religions, it knew its purpose. It gave itself no name, because it set itself no sectarian limits; it claimed no universal adhesion, asserted no sole infallible dogma, set up no single narrow path or gate of salvation; it was less a creed or cult than a continuously enlarging tradition of the Godward endeavor of the human spirit. An immense many-sided and many-staged provision for a spiritual self-building and self-finding, it had some right to speak of itself by the only name it knew, the eternal religion, san_tana dharma. It is only if we have a just and right appreciation of this sense and spirit of Indian religion that we can come to an understanding of the true sense and spirit of Indian culture.30 

The moral discipline, which is preliminary, consists of four stages or steps known as sādhana-catustaya. They are: discrimination between the eternal and the ephemeral, non-attachment to the enjoyment of fruits, here in this life and hereafter, possession of virtues like control of the senses, control of the mind, etc., and an intense longing for liberation. The entire discipline is progressive in character. A person who is capable of discriminating the eternal from the ephemeral develops dispassion or non-attachment towards the things of the world. This again will help him to acquire control of the mind and the senses and to cultivate certain virtues such as endurance. Having acquired these qualifications, he develops an intense longing for liberation. Thus we can see how the preceding step in the discipline is the cause of the succeeding one. The successful completion of the moral discipline makes a person eligible for the spiritual discipline consisting of the study of the scriptural text (sravana) under the guidance of a competent teacher, rational reflection on the teaching (manana), and contemplation (nididhyāsana) on it.

Hinduism adopts a comprehensive view of man’s life in such a way that the individual, social, and spiritual aspects of his life are taken care of, and his entire life is a preparation for the attainment of the final goal of liberation. Consider, for example, the detailed instruction regarding the duties to be performed when a student completes his formal education. Besides learning and teaching, one should practice righteousness, austerity, control of the senses, one’s own duty, entertaining guests, socially good conduct, and begetting children after marriage. These duties are comprehensive. They are, according to Sankara, contributory to the attainment of human goals.31 

The four stages of a man’s life as envisaged by Hinduism must also be taken into account in understanding the life-activity of man. Hinduism divides the ideal life of a man into four successive stages (āsramas) — the stage of a student, that of a householder, that of a recluse, and finally that of a monk. It is not necessary to go into the details regarding the duties as well as the values assigned to man at each of these four stages of life. However, a few observations about the nature and purpose of this scheme are relevant in this context. First of all, this scheme of the four stages of life shows that "the way to a higher life is normally through the world." The stage of a householder which follows that of a student is considered to be the mainstay of social life. Man’s life at one stage is necessarily this-worldly. Family, which is not only the earliest but also the most important of all the social institutions, provides opportunities for the pursuit of pleasure and wealth, for the development of social and communal life, and above all for the development of the spiritual side of man through a gradual and progressive conquest of spirit over flesh. Secondly, it affirms the Hindu belief in the principle of spiritual progression. Thirdly, it should not be thought that one has to go to the last stage of life by passing through the stages of a householder and a recluse. Hinduism provides the option to become a monk even from the state of a student. The Upanisad says: "After completing the life of a recluse, let one renounce; otherwise, let one renounce even from the state of a student."32 It all depends upon one’s mental frame and spiritual maturity. Also, one can even remain a life-long student. Fourthly, this scheme of the four stages of life is only an ideal for the guidance of man. It does not mean that everyone goes through all the four stages of life.

The Hindu ethics lays emphasis on the system of duties rather than on the system of rights of man. The reason for this is not far to seek. Ethics is ultimately concerned with social harmony. The needs and claims of one person have to be adjusted and reconciled with those of others in society. Certain types of conduct which would contribute to the harmony and solidarity of society have to be enforced, and those which would endanger them have to be forbidden. It is for this reason that in every society there are moral codes and principles, the system of duties, which must be carried out with moral earnestness. Duty is that which, when properly discharged, upholds society, sustains it, and nourishes it. That is why it is called dharma in Hinduism.

The classification of the duties of man, which are ethico-social, has a bearing on the value system, as well as on the vara-āsrama system. These duties are intended to help man achieve three kinds of integration — self-integration, social integration, and integration with God. The classification of duties comprises common duties (sādhārana-dharmas), which everyone has to perform, irrespective of the class (vara) he belongs to and the stage of life (āsrama) he is in, and special duties (visea-dharmas), which are relative to the social class and the stage of life. The list of common duties prescribed by Manu includes the following: (i) steadfastness, (ii) forgiveness, (iii) application, (iv) non-appropriation (v) cleanliness, (vi) control over the appetites, (vii) wisdom, (viii) learning, (ix) veracity, and (x) restraint of anger. The common and special duties, which are both self-regarding and other-regarding, are intended to help man achieve self-integration and social integration. Practices which are designed to achieve self-control are conducive to self-integration; and conduct which calls forth the cultivation of virtues such as compassion, practice of charity, and social service, contributes to social integration. What is called integration or communion with God must follow self-integration and social integration. It means that one cannot attain God-realization without achieving self-integration and helping social-integration. Love of God is possible only for a person who has achieved harmony in his life-in-society. In the language of theBhagavad-gītā, a person who has achieved this harmony is one "by whom the world is not afflicted and who is not afflicted by the world."33 

III CHINESE CULTURE

Chinese philosophy is concerned with human beings on the one hand and the universe which they encounter on the other. It is impossible to think of humans outside the universe; the universe in its turn is enriched by the humans. The humans and the universe cannot be separated because they are parts of a spiritual whole. A passage which is attributed to Wang Shou-Jen is worth quoting here:

In Heaven and Earth there is one spirituality or consciousness. But because of his bodily form, man has separated himself from the whole. My spirituality or consciousness is the ruler of Heaven and Earth, spirits and things. . . . If Heaven, Earth, spirits, and things are separated from my spirituality or consciousness, they cease to be. And if my spirituality or consciousness is separated from them, it ceases to be also. Thus, they are all actually one body, so how can they be separated?34

So, the Chinese way of thinking is both anthropocentric and cosmocentric.

Unlike scientific/naturalistic humanism, Chinese humanism is ethico-spiritualistic. Its moralistic orientation is supported by its spiritualistic basis. Whatever be the role that a human being plays in society — that of an artisan or an agriculturist, that of a scholar or a politician — he/she must function as a human being. In every specialized role that a human being plays, he/she aims at the best — the best as an artisan, as an agriculturist, as a statesman, and so on. In the same way he/she must aim at the best as a human being. Confucius’ doctrine of the "rectification of names" is relevant in this context. According to this doctrine, every name stands for the essence of the class of things to which it refers. For example, the name "ruler" suggests an ideal "ruler," what the ruler ideally ought to be. The situation connected with a ruler, i.e. what a "ruler" does, should accord with what is implied by the name "ruler." We must extend this logic to other cases such as father, son, and so on. That is why Confucius said, "Let the ruler be ruler, the minister, minister, the father, father, and the son, son."35 If there is accord between the name and the situation connected with it, then we can say that a ruler, for example, is a ruler in fact as well as in name. Applying the same reasoning, we have to say that a human being, true to the name, must be a human being in name as well as in fact. If so, what is it that is expected of a human being? The answer is jen, which means human-heartedness. Confucius has provided a simple guidance for the practice of jen:

The man of jen is one who, desiring to sustain himself, sustains others, and desiring to develop himself develops others. To be able from one’s own self to draw a parallel for the treatment of others, that may be called the way to practice jen.36 

According to Confucianism, one should regulate one’s conduct by using oneself as a standard, as "a measuring square." This regulatory principle of applying a measuring square can be stated in two ways. Positively it says: "Do to others what you wish yourself." When negatively stated, it will be: "Do not do to others what you do not wish yourself." The principle of chung and shu, the positive and negative formulation of the principle of applying a measuring square, is the way to practice jen.

The basis of moral life for the Chinese, as in the case of the Indians, is spirituality. The Tao, which is eternal and unnameable, is not only the way, but also the source of life. That is why it is spoken of as the beginning of Heaven and earth.

According to Maritain, scientific or naturalistic humanism has paved the way for the triple tragedy that has overtaken the West. They are the tragedy of man, the tragedy of culture, and the tragedy of God. In the present context it is enough to consider the first two tragedies. Maritain is of the view that the tragedy of man is the result of three forces that have dominated the West in the wake of the Enlightenment. Science which makes use of knowledge and power for the purpose of controlling and conquering nature views reason as an instrument. The scientific conception of humans treats them as mere agents, making use of reason as the instrument for acquiring power and attaining progress. The scientific conception of the human being is backed by two other forces — Freudian psychology and the emergence of the collective man. Freudian psychology, with its emphasis on the libido and the unconscious, has reduced humans to the level of animals. Rapid industrialization, which has created a technological society, is responsible for the emergence of the "collective man." Humans have become rootless, homeless, and alienated from the world because of technology. In the words of Martin Heidegger:

The essence of technology only comes slowly to light. This day is the world-night turned into a merely technological day. This day is the shortest day. . . . Now not only is man denied a shelter, but the safety of all beings remains in darkness. The wholeness [das Heile] is withdrawn. The world has become unwhole [heil-los]. Thereby not only does the holy remain hidden as the sign of divinity, but even the sign of the holy, namely wholeness, seems to be obliterated.37 

The tragedy of culture, according to Maritain, has been brought about by three factors — the reversal of the value system, the ruthless subjugation of nature, and the subordination of humans to material forces. Chinese humanism has escaped these two tragedies because of its emphasis on the role of human beings as human beings in society and the preservation of a value system which accords a higher status to moral and super-moral values.

Ethics of human-heartedness is not wanting in the Hindu tradition. One of the Upanisads gives an account of Prajāpati’s instruction to his threefold offspring — gods, men, and demons.38 It highlights the importance of loving others by regulating one’s conduct. At the conclusion of his teaching to them, Prajāpati uttered the syllable "da," which was understood in three different ways by them, reflecting their own nature. The gods who are naturally unruly understood it as "dama" which means self-control. Since humans are by nature avaricious, they thought that "da" means "dāna" and that they were advised to be charitable. The demons who are normally cruel understood it in the sense of "dayā" (compassion) and thought that they were instructed to be compassionate to others. Sankara, in the course of his commentary on the text, remarks that Prajāpati’s instruction is relevant to us even today; and we must practice what Prajāpati taught his threefold offspring. Sankara remarks that the whole episode may be understood in another way.39 There are no gods or demons other than humans. There are gods as well as demons among humans. Those among humans who are wanting in self-control, but who are otherwise endowed with many good qualities, are the gods; those who are particularly greedy are men; and those who are cruel and harm others are the demons. Hence, humans should follow all the three instructions, for they are unruly, greedy, and cruel.

It is not possible to discuss elaborately the various characteristics of Chinese humanism in this paper; and I am, therefore, selective in the choice of my concepts/theories. Three concepts/theories associated with three great masters deserve special attention — Confucius’s concept of "doing for nothing," the principle of extension of graded love enunciated by Mencius, and the theory of transcendence formulated by Lao Tzu. I will also bring in parallels to them from the Hindu tradition.

Confucius makes a distinction between duty-prompted action and profit-motivated action. The former is called yi and the latter, li. All of us are members of the family system and also of society. Five kinds of relationship are identified by Confucius — relationship between the ruler and the ruled, between father and son, between brothers, between husband and wife, and between friends. Of these, three are family relationships. Whatever be the relationship, a person, when placed in a moral situation, must act with a sense of duty or righteousness (yi). One must do one’s duty because it is a duty and not because of any other consideration. If he/she has some other consideration in performing an action, then it is done for (the sake of) something and not for nothing; it is not, then, following a categorical imperative. According to Confucius, it is the sense of duty or righteousness that should regulate a person’s relations with others. It must be borne in mind that yi and jen are closely connected with each other. Their relation is like that between form and matter. As stated earlier, jen is human-heartedness, loving others. The principle that one must do one’s duty is formal like the categorical imperative. However, it becomes concrete in the context of relationship. According to Confucius, one who is guided by yi rather than byli is a superior man. Confucius says, "The superior man comprehends yi; the small man comprehends li."40 

The concept of doing for nothing is comparable to the justly famous concept of nikāma-karma (disinterested action) of the Bhagavad-gītā. It will be helpful to quote the relevant text:

To work alone you have a right and not at all to its fruits. Let not the fruits of work be your motive. Nor should you be tempted to withdraw from work.41 

It is significant that the text enjoins not only disinterested action, but also forbids inaction (akarma) as the alternative to it, which one will be tempted to think of in the context of doing duty without aiming at the results of one’s action.

The success or failure of an action which one performs with the consciousness of duty depends upon the Will of Heaven which is called Ming. According to Confucius, Ming is the purposeful force that controls the whole situation in which a person functions. It is beyond our control; and we have to submit to it. To acknowledge Ming as the supreme force which makes the situation what it is, is to know Ming. In the words of Confucius, "If my principles are to prevail in the world, it is Ming. If they are to fall to the ground, it is also Ming."42 Confucius holds that one who knows Ming is a superior man.

The Hindu tradition identifies five factors involved in the production of an act. Of these five factors, four are human and the fifth one non-human. The Bhagavad-gītā mentions the five factors as follows:

The seat of action and likewise the agent, the various organs, the many kinds of efforts and the divinity (providence) also being the fifth.

Whatever action a person does by the body, speech, and mind, whether it is right or wrong, these five are its causes.43

The body is the seat of the manifestation of desire, hatred, happiness, and so on. The embodied self is the agent possessing the sense of "I." The visual sense, the auditory sense, etc. are the various organs required for performing an action. Again, there is the involvement of various functions performed by the vital breath. Finally, there is the non-human factor, viz. divinity or providence (daivam). The first four factors may be explained in terms of the concept of sheath (kosa). The sheath of food (annamaya) is the seat (adhisthāna); the sheath of vitality (prānamaya) is the source of the vital functions; the sheath of mind (manomaya) is the complex of organs; and the sheath of intellect (vijnāmaya) is the agent. All these four factors are part of the lîva. The fifth one, which is the non-human factor, is called daivam which means divinity or providence. It is this which is comparable to Ming. Commenting on the nature and role of daivam, Radhakrishnan observes:

[It] represents the non-human factor that interferes and disposes of human effort. It is the wise, all-seeing will that is at work in the world. In all human actions, there is an unaccountable element which is called luck, destiny, fate, or the force accumulated by the acts of one’s past lives. It is called here daiva. . . . Daiva or the superpersonal fate is the general cosmic necessity, the resultant of all that has happened in the past, which rules unnoticed. It works in the individual for its own incalculable purposes.44 

There is an important question one may raise with regard to the theory of human-heartedness (jen) advocated by Confucius. Why should a human being, one may ask, practice jen? Confucius did not consider this question at all. It was Mencius who answered this question. According to Mencius, who represents the idealistic side of Confucianism, it is the very nature of a human being to be human-hearted. A brief explanation of Mencius’s view of human nature will be helpful. As against the view that human nature is neither good nor bad, a view associated with Lao Tzu, Mencius holds that human nature is essentially good and that whatever is bad or undesirable in human beings belongs to the "animal" side in them. He identifies four components in human nature — feeling of commiseration, feeling of shame and dislike, sense of modesty and yielding, and sense of right and wrong.45 All these four are distinctly human; they differentiate humans from animals. These four aspects, which may be called human-heartedness, righteousness, propriety, and wisdom, are inherent in human nature; and they have to be developed. A person who does not develop these aspects is no better than an animal.

If human nature is such that it is capable of loving others, then is it possible to love everyone in the same way? There is a difference of opinion on this issue. While the Mohists hold the theory of equality in loving others, Mencius, following Confucius, argues for degrees in love or graded love. The distance from oneself to others decides the gradation in love. The love for one’s family members is stronger than the love for one’s neighbors; the love for one’s neighbors is stronger than the love for one’s villagers, and so on; and the love for living beings is stronger than the love for non-living beings. In the words of Mencius:

The superior man, in his relation to things, loves them, but has no feeling of human-heartedness. In his relation to people, he has human-heartedness, but no deep feeling of family affection. One should have feelings of family affection for the members of one’s family, but human-heartedness for people; human-heartedness for people, but love for things.46 

What Mencius says is based on our day-to-day experience. The principle of graded love has been formulated by him in a realistic way, with a remarkable insight into human nature. But he does not stop with this. Since the ideal is to love everyone, he suggests extension of the principle of graded love to include others. Taking his stand on what human nature is capable of, he supplements his realism by idealism. To quote Mencius:

Treat the aged in your family as they should be treated, and extend this treatment to the aged of other people’s families. Treat the young in your family as they should be treated, and extend this treatment to the young of other people’s families.47 

His idealistic principle of extension of graded love, which is rooted in human nature, is a valuable contribution to the philosophy of humanism.

The spiritualistic philosophy of the Upanisads justifies the principle that one should extend oneself so as to include others on the basis of the oneness of all beings which originated from the same sources, viz. primal Being or Spirit. The Upanisads maintain that, though there is a plurality of beings, all of them are essentially the same. The primal Spirit includes everything; it in-dwells in everything; and all beings, though apparently different from it, are indeed identical with it. The three ideas of inclusion, indwelling, and identity which are inbuilt in the philosophy of oneness are set forth in the following texts of the Upanisad:

He who sees all beings in the very Self and the Self in all beings feels no hatred by virtue of that realization.

When to one who knows, all beings have, verily, become one with his own Self, then what delusion and what sorrow can be to him who has seen the oneness?48

The Self in me which I love is the same in every other person I encounter; and if I realize this, I cannot but love the other person. _a_kara remarks in his commentary on the text:

One [who realizes the unconditioned Self in all beings] does not hate. This is only a restatement of a known fact. It is a matter of common experience that hatred comes to one who sees something as bad and different from oneself, but for one who sees only the absolutely pure Self as a continuous entity, there is no object to be hated.49 

Chinese humanism, which is based on primal spirituality, has a metaphysical dimension. Primal spirituality holds, as stated earlier, that primal Being or Spirit is the source and support of all beings. The central metaphysical problem of the relation between the primal Spirit and the things of the world has been discussed by Taoism. The Taoists have been described as "recluses," as persons "who despised the world," as individualists "who desired to maintain their personal purity," and so on. They systematized a rigorous philosophy in justification of their way of life. To them, the Tao is the source of everything; it is also the way of life. Chuang Tzu, who represents the third phase of Taoism, speaks of "Fundamentals for the Cultivation of Life." He says:

When you do something good, beware of reputation; when you do something evil, beware of punishment. Follow the middle way and take this to be your constant principle. Then you can guard your person, nourish your parents, and complete your natural term of years.50 

The way of life one leads must reflect one’s understanding of the Tao, that is to say, the way one understands the relation between the Tao and the things of the world.

Lao Tzu, who represents the second phase of Taoism, has discussed at length the nature of the Tao vis-à-vis the nature of the things of the world. According to Lao Tzu, first of all, the things of the world have shapes and features and so they can be named. Normally there is no difficulty in understanding an object which has a shape and possesses qualities. The real difficulty arises only when we try to find out the reality of things characterized by forms and features. Secondly, the things of the world are subject to change; and so they are not eternal. The eternal is what lies behind the ephemeral. If the empirical things can be named and if they are also not eternal, then that which is their source must be both unnameable and eternal; and that "entity" is called the Tao. Using the imagery of a block of wood from which objects such as table, chair, etc. are carved, Lao Tzu characterizes the Tao as the Uncarved Block. Once a block of wood is carved there are objects which are named table, chair, and so on. In the same way, from the Uncarved Block the things of the world are carved; and each one of them having a shape and qualities, has a name. Thus, the things of the world are nameables, whereas their primal source, which is called the Tao, is the Unnameable. It may appear that, when the primal source is called theTao, we are using a name "Tao." Strictly speaking, it is not a name at all. When we call table "table," the object we are talking about has a shape and possesses qualities; and so it is identified as such-and-such by means of a conventional name, viz. "table." When we call the primal source "Tao," we are not using a name at all because the primal source, the Uncarved Block, has no form and features; consequently, it cannot be identified by a name. Everything has a name; but the Tao is not a thing. So it is nameless. It is, for this reason, said to be the Unnameable. What is sought to be conveyed by Taoism is the contrast between the empirical and the trans-empirical, the relational and the trans-relational, the linguistic and the trans-linguistic; the Tao is just the opposite in all these three respects.

Lao Tzu analyses the problem of the origination of the things of the world from the Tao in another way. Every object of our experience, which is nameable, is a being. If every object which exists is a being, then the existence of beings implies that there must, first of all, be Being. We have already said that the Tao is not a thing, i.e. it is not nameable. It is, therefore, Non-being. If the Tao is the source of all beings, then the Tao as Non-being is the source of Being from which all beings have come into existence. In the words of Lao Tzu: "All things in the world come into being from Being; and Being comes into being from Non-being."51 How beings which we experience in our day-to-day life came into existence from Non-being (the Tao) is a mystery; and no metaphysics in its explanation of the origin of becoming, which characterizes all objects, from Being can escape this unavoidable entry of mystery.

It may be stated here that Taoism does not deny the existence of the world of becoming. On the contrary, it insists on the need to transcend it by one who is desirous of attaining absolute happiness. "The happy excursion"52into the infinite, as Chuang Tzu would put it, calls for overcoming the distinction between myself and others, the distinction among things.

Just as the Upanisads make the distinction between lower knowledge (aparā vidyā) and higher knowledge (parā vidyā), even so Chuang Tzu draws a distinction between two levels of knowledge, lower and higher — the former accommodating all kinds of distinctions and the latter transcending the distinctions. The things of the world, which are finite, have a dependent existence. A depends on B, B depends on C, C on D, and so on. One can derive only relative happiness by depending on things which are finite and which have dependent existence. Narrating the story of how a person was able to ride on the wind without resorting to walking as others do, Chuang Tzu remarks that, though the achievement of this man was great, still he had to depend upon something and that his happiness was, therefore, relative. Then, he poses the question:

But suppose there is one who chariots on the normality of the universe, rides on the transformation of the six elements, and thus makes excursion into the infinite, what has he to depend upon? Therefore it is said that the perfect man has no self; the spiritual man has no achievement; and the true sage has no name.53 

To see things in the light of Heaven, i.e. to see things in the light of the Tao, is to transcend the finite, the lower point of view. It is to be with the Tao, the nameless. A perfect man who has become one with the Tao is also nameless: he has nothing to achieve, having overcome the distinction between the me and the non-me. In the language of Vedānta, he is a līvanmukta. It will be appropriate in this connection to refer to Sanatkumāra’s instruction to Nārada which occurs in the seventh chapter of the Chāndogya Upanisad. He tells Nārada that finite objects have a dependent existence and that they do not give us happiness. If finite objects have dependent existence, then what about the infinite? To this question asked by Nārada, Sanatkumāra replies: "On its own greatness" (sve mahimni).54 He also explains in this context the difference between finite experience and the experience of the infinite. He says:

Where one sees nothing else, hears nothing else, understands nothing else, that is the infinite. But where one sees something else, hears something else, understands something else, that is the finite.55 

His final teaching is: "The infinite is happiness. There is no happiness in anything finite."56 Chuang Tzu is in the company of Sanatkum_ra.

MODERNIZATION

The term "modernization" does not admit of a simple and straight definition. Everyone seems to understand what it means, though no one would agree with any definition of it. People generally welcome modernization as an antidote to traditionalism, conservatism, backwardness, and so on. Whenever we say that someone is modern, we seem to suggest that he is not traditional, or conservative, or backward; and for many people what is modern has a value preference, as against what is traditional. Modernization seems to provide a new hope against old ways of thinking and doing; and it is a continuing process; there can be, strictly speaking, no end to it; and from time to time it will always be needed. The process of modernization will be meaningful, purposive, and fruitful only when it functions in the context of tradition. As stated earlier, a traditional culture has two sides, perennial and temporal. While the former cannot be changed, the latter admits of change in accordance with the changes in the socio-political reality. It must be borne in mind that the changes in the temporal structure of culture do not in any way damage the perennial elements. The traditional culture of India, which has spanned nearly four millennia, is still relevant today because of the perennial elements in it. What is true of the Indian culture is equally true of the Chinese culture. What preserves a culture is the combination of the perennial and the temporal. A culture which is rigid and unchanging cannot survive; also, a culture which does not have an in-built perennial structure will become a thing of the past. In other words, there must be scope for conservation as well as change in a culture. Emphasizing the need for both conservation and change, A.N. Whitehead said:

Mere change without conservation is a passage from nothing to nothing. Its final integration yields mere transient non-entity. Mere conservation without change cannot conserve. For, after all, there is a flux of circumstances and the freshness of being evaporates under mere repetition.57 

Modernization as understood in the West has most unfortunately a narrow connotation, and is, therefore, a distorted concept. Both philosophy and science paved the way for the emergence of the phenomenon of modernization in the seventeenth century. The part played by two philosophers, Francis Bacon and Rene Descartes, to usher in this phenomenon was significant. To them, knowledge is not an end in itself, but a means to power. Bacon thought that "the propagator of man’s empire over the universe" would be the benefactor of the human race. Descartes suggested that men should become "the masters and possessors of nature." The scientific-empirical method advocated by Bacon and the analytical-rational method of inquiry formulated by Descartes were useful not only in philosophy, but also in science.

The scientific method, which tests hypothesis through observation, and experiment, which reduces a complex object to its simple components, which insists on the repeatability of an experiment, and which swears by objectivity, separated science from religion by formulating its new cosmology and provided man with powerful tools of engineering and technology for asserting his supremacy over nature. It shaped the development of science in a particular direction for more than two centuries till the quantum physics gave a new direction to science. Scientists today speak of "quantum integration" which has put an end to the four-hundred-year split between science and spirituality.58 Though the achievements of science during the last four hundred years are numerous and remarkable, its concepts and theories have undermined everything connected with the spiritual order.

The story of the development of science, which has ended up in the present crisis, is frightening. Science, which started as the pursuit of knowledge in search of truth, was a noble intellectual enterprise worthy of human beings. When there was persecution of scientists, e.g. Bruno, Galileo, for the revolutionary views advocated by them, science became an ideology. When Galileo was on trial, science, it is said, was on trial. To quote Skolimowski:

Science was at that time undercutting the foundations of a decaying civilization. The medieval civilization was coming to an end, unable to sustain itself through its own means. Science was helping man to evolve a new civilization. Science was at that time the torch of light, the agent of progress and liberation. It was put on trial by the agents of the dying epoch.59

Then, science became an integral part of Western civilization. It was no more a body of pure ideas, but became a mighty social phenomenon, influencing and controlling the social institutions by formulating ideals and setting up goals which it sought to realize through the support of state and other agencies. Space program, missile agenda, militarism, institutions of learning — all these, inspired and supported by science, strengthen and support, in their turn, science. The scientific Weltanschauung determines the nature of the world around us. Once again what Skolimowski says is worth quoting:

The nature of knowledge determines the nature of the world around us. We perceive and understand what we are made to perceive and understand through the knowledge we acquire. The dominant position of science in our system of learning assures a further perpetuation of what is called the scientific outlook and what is tantamount to a vision of the world through the spectacles of science. . . . Seen in this context, science does control people; it does control people subtly and indirectly because it furnishes them with the categories of understanding. It acts as a series of filters through which we view reality.60 

In the next stage of its growth, science becomes technology.61 Drawing a distinction between science and technology, it is very often argued that it is technology, not science, that is responsible for the present crisis of society. This argument is untenable. Technology is only an extension of science; and the separation of the one from the other in the present context cannot be justified, because both of them are the promoters of the Western civilization, both of them serve the same purpose — that of perpetuating material progress, and both of them are committed to the preservation of the status quo. The religious-spiritual view and way of life has been replaced by technological consciousness. Skolimowski enumerates the characteristics of technological consciousness — objectivization, atomization, alienation, power domination, de-sacralization, and consumerism. He observes:

When we interact with the world via technology, we never think how to be benign and compassionate and loving, but always how to be efficient, controlling, assertive. This attitude of controlling and manipulating is now a part of the mental make-up of the Western people.62 

Contrasting ecological consciousness with technological consciousness, Skolimowski pleads for concerted efforts for strengthening and supporting the former. Ecological consciousness is wholistic in its outlook; it cares for the quality of life; it emphasizes the importance of spiritual quest; it promotes a reverential attitude to life; it accepts the evolutionary process; and finally it insists on the duty of participation by every individual as a member of the whole. It may be noted that the characteristics of ecological consciousness mentioned above co-define each other. He presents the ecological consciousness with its six characteristics in a mandala as follows:63 

Human beings are both corporeal and spiritual, both rational and mystical. They are rational and moral agents. The universe we live in is transphysical and transbiological; it is, that is to say, spiritual.

Modernization is equated with Westernization, though the term "modernization" does not carry such a connotation. The identification of modernization with Westernization is purely contextual. We have referred to the development of science in the West from the beginning of the seventeenth century and the new consciousness it was able to generate as it moved from stage to stage. It was able to bring about many changes in the modes of thinking and ways of life of the people: in short, since science modernized the people in the West, modernization is equated with Westernization. This identification has a tremendous impact on the outlook of the people in the East. The majority of the people in the East and the South, whose many countries were conquered, controlled, and coerced by Western nations, such as England and France, think that to be "modern" is to be "Western," and the easy way to be "Western" is to imitate the life-style of the Westerners. This kind of mentality and mode of life is most unfortunate, calamitous, and deplorable.

My approach to the problem of modernization is both negative and positive. Let me, first of all, remove some of the wrong notions about modernization by explaining what it is not. Modernization should not be confused with industrialization, urbanization, technocracy, and so on, though it is true that all these bring about changes in the existing socio-economic-political order affecting the life-style of the people. Secondly, modernization should not be confused with the changing economic process at the material level. Thirdly, modernization does not mean Westernization. To dress like the Westerner, to speak English or any other "modern language," i.e. European language, to have the facility to live like a Westerner — these are not the real index of modernism. Fourthly, modernization does not mean a higher standard of living symbolized by automobiles, television sets, sophisticated instruments of information technology, and so on. One who possesses these "status symbols" is certainly not modern, if one’s thinking is primitive and behavior, barbarous.

Very often we hear political leaders talking about improving the standard of living. In the case of those who do not have food, clothing, and shelter, to improve their standard of living is to provide them with all these, in the absence of which they cannot function as human beings. But in the case of those who are already in possession of them, what does it mean to talk about improving their standard of living? Is it, for example, to help a family which has just one automobile to have more than one — one for the husband and one for the wife? Improving the standard of living does not necessarily mean improving the quality of life.

Modernization, as I understand it, consists in modifying the existing institutions which have proved inadequate to meet the demands of life in the context of industrialization and urbanization. It is not the cancellation of everything old. The attempt to modify the existing institutions or to create new institutions and values should not result in a condition where people become "rootless." It is neither desirable nor possible for a community to run away from, or to disown, its past. There is an organic relation between the past and the present, as well as between the present and the future. It is worth remembering, in this context, Edmund Burke’s conception of society: "Society is a contract. . . . It is a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born." So far, the core of Hinduism remains unchallenged, though the traditional social institutions have been questioned and modified, and some of them have even been replaced by new ones. It is worth quoting Radhakrishnan in this context. He says:

The great ideals of our culture cannot be discarded; but their embodiment in forms and institutions we must get beyond. There is no reversing history. We must steer clear of a radical revolution as well as of a return to the past.64 

While it is possible to think of conflict between institutions and modernization, we need not think of any conflict or incompatibility between traditional doctrines and modernization. This means that institutions may change without affecting the essential doctrines of a tradition. If rationality, freedom of expression and conduct, human dignity and creativity are considered to be the criteria of a modern society, then there is no conflict between the universal and eternal doctrines of the Hindu tradition and modernization. The basic principles of the humanism of Confucius, of the mysticism of Mencius, and of the metaphysics of Taoism have not become outmoded. Taken together, they constitute the spiritual culture of China. They are compatible with, and provide room for, modernization.

Indian culture has been significantly affected by Western culture, primarily due to British Colonialism in India for over 300 years. In the 1660s, The British East India Company organized trading posts in India. Gradually, the empire expanded its role in India, eventually controlling Indian industry and commerce. Most scholars and historians blame the British colonists for degrading and dividing Indian society. However, Western culture positively impacted Indian culture, although some of the positive effects were not realized until India achieved its independence in 1947.

Modernization

·         During British occupation, India was modernized and industrialized. British industrialists invested huge amounts of capital in the region. The British East India Company built the world's third-largest railroad network, which connected regions and enabled the country to develop a modern economy. Western culture also improved Indian culture with the development of a road network, telephone and telegraph lines, many dams and bridges and irrigation canals. During British occupation, these developed systems of transportation and communication benefited the British, rather than Indians. But they were put in place for Indian culture to take advantage of when the country finally achieved its independence.

Public Health

·         Due to Western influence, Indian culture benefited from improved sanitation and public health. Many Western doctors emigrated to India and introduced the region to Western medicine. Further, many wealthier Indians were trained and educated abroad in Western medicine and then returned to their home country to practice. Western medicine significantly reduced disease and sickness, in large part because health care became accessible.

Labor

·         The presence of Western traders in India increased the demand for goods and services in India. As a result of the British living in India, Indian artisans, weavers and craftsmen were steadily employed. Although they were deprived of the full profits of their labors, these artisans and craftsman grew in numbers, and the Indian labor force became more skilled and handy. By the time the British left the subcontinent, a greater percentage of Indians had acquired skills to make a living.

Education

·         Indian culture benefited from Western culture in the area of education. During British occupation, many schools and colleges were built throughout India. Literacy increased and, for the first time, the poorest classes of society had access to knowledge.

Political Rest

·         Prior to British colonization, India was ruled by the Mughal Dynasty. In fact, it was only when that empire began to collapse that the British were able to gain control over the subcontinent. India was afflicted by much infighting for and against the dynasty. The British troops cleared India of many bandits and ended local warfare between the country's competing political rules. The British also introduced India to parliamentary democracy, upon which the independent nation was eventually founded.

Indian Culture is time tested and represented the progressively refined way of life, that had unfortunately suffered a set back, a sub culture process as it were, drifting from its salutary ways of living. 

Did not Lord Mecaulay say in the UK parliament how the Indians had such a perfect social harmony and faith in their way of life, that they can not be subdued unless they were weaned from their prestige and made to adore the alien way of life, to feel subordinated to a ''superior culture'', wherefore they could be easily subdued and dominated for the best advantage of the colonial rule! That was perfectly achieved and Indians forgot their own merits in a strange infatuation with alien culture!

Foreign culture was best for them, unique to them, deserved respect, but not fit for absorption into our own way of life! Apart from an initiation into new unfolding findings of secular science and technology - which was absent in our nation under colonial subjugation - we had gained least in other spheres, particularly in the social and ethical qualities. We became divided, in the names of religion and castes losing the force of harmony that united us under the princely states!

The increasing divorce culture, night clubs and pub culture, promiscuity and desertions etc among youth, the divide and rule policy among the politicians, the aggressive conversions (against more benign missionary activities a century ago) are the only major impacts in the social domain. 

So except the technological inputs, even economic exploitations under free trade or repressive regimentation under socialist govts that came from the west, have least served the society to achieve equality. Social impacts have been worse. 

The break down of joint family system due to new life styles, uncontrolled deviancies in the name of liberty etc have made youth defy control of society and family in a big way. In a chapter on ''Consequences of Innovations'' in the book by Rogers and Shoemaker entitled, ''Diffusion and Adoption of Innovations'', it is discussed how any change made in any aspect of social sphere - agriculture or medicine or arts or whatever - may end up in unexpected ''side effects'' as well. The chaos in the aborigins of Australia after replacement of traditional stone tool etc make interesting reading!

In India itself, the introduction of rural TV programme for education of people in modern agricultre, health care etc was studied in UP state when Indiraji was Minister of Broadcasting, in 100 villages. The study revealed significant increase in knowledge and attitude of people in modern techniques and the project was cleared for large scale introdcution across the country. After govt project was ended, many behavioural scientists took up studies in change of life pattern in the villages. They came across many critical adverse changes traceable to exposure of untreated ''entertainment'' programmes given by TV apart from the educatinal inputs!

Like that our adoration for the modern knowledge gained from the west, had made us adopt their other life styles as well to the detriment of society. So the demerits have been devastating as we see from the increase of family courts to deal with increasing divorce cases, the skewed development of trade and industy at the cost of other primary enterprises, policy of social divide by politicians for vote bank advantage etc!

In my opinion, we had paid a heavy price for all the technological good we received from the west, by our own unwise emulation of their social perceptions and political strategies as well!