a THOUGHT

[Vishal Agarwal]

There is no proof that rice grains were absent in the Vedic period. They are
distinctly mentioned in the AV and YV texts. If rice is not mentioned in the
RV, so is salt not mentioned. But nobody will deny that it is the Western
Punjab where natural salt is most plentiful in India. The RV is not an
encyclopedia which should mention each and everything. Anyway, domesticated
rice is attested in IVC sites, to my knowledge. Since the RV is now
considered an 'INDIAN' texts even by IVC = non IA believers, there is no
reason why rice should not be mentioned by the post IVC RV, except if by an
oversight.

Similar arguments are also made with respect to the purported absence of
other things. For instance, some say that only wool is mentioned in the RV
and so the incomming IA speakers were still fond of wearing their woolen
clothes even in N India. This argument is too falacious considering that the
contexts where Urna is mentioned are that of Soma filters etc, which
employed wool and not cotton or other things.

The Taittiriya Upanishad is for that matter considered by the mainstream
Indologists as a late Vedic texts (later than the Samhitas, Brahmanas)
although an early Upanishad. And Rice is certainly mentioned in
pre-Taittiriya Upanishad texts like the Atharvaveda (Shaunakiya as well as
Paippalada).

I do not know if anna is used interchangeably with the word rice in S India
but there is no such equation in North India, to my knowledge. In fact, the
word would probably conjure images of wheat in Haryana, Punjab etc. For
instance, I would think of wheat if the word anna is mentioned to me because
I eat rice 1-2 times a week whereas eat wheat everyday.


----Original Message Follows----
From: Vidyasankar Sundaresan <vsundaresan at HOTMAIL.COM>
Reply-To: List for advaita vedanta as taught by Shri Shankara
<ADVAITA-L at braincells.com>
To: ADVAITA-L at LISTS.ADVAITA-VEDANTA.ORG
Subject: Re: a THOUGHT
Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2000 23:33:37 +0000

T Swaminarayan <tvswaminarayan at YAHOO.COM> wrote:

 >Is this because in the vedic period  rice grains were
 >not existent? Was the word ,'Annam', essentially
 >representing all edible food which comprised of fruits
 >and vegetables?

anna comes from a verb root that means "to eat", and so
generally means food. Other words that derive from the
same root are attA - eater, annAda - eater of food, admi
- I eat, etc. We end up calling rice anna, because rice
is the staple food in most of India! The word for grain
is vrIhi, which is also used in TU.

In TU, anna stands for the element called pRthvi elsewhere.
It is common to find such things - tejas and agni are both
used to denote the fire element, AkASa and antariksha are
both used to denote the space element, etc.

Vidyasankar

--
bhava shankara deshikame sharaNam

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>From ADVAITA-L at LISTS.ADVAITA-VEDANTA.ORG Fri Jul 21 23:20:35 2000
Message-Id: <FRI.21.JUL.2000.232035.GMT.ADVAITAL at LISTS.ADVAITAVEDANTA.ORG>
Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2000 23:20:35 GMT
Reply-To: List for advaita vedanta as taught by Shri Shankara
        <ADVAITA-L at LISTS.ADVAITA-VEDANTA.ORG>
To: List for advaita vedanta as taught by Shri Shankara
        <ADVAITA-L at LISTS.ADVAITA-VEDANTA.ORG>
From: Vishal Agarwal <vishalagarwal at HOTMAIL.COM>
Subject: Ishavasya Upanishad  mantra 1
Comments: To: ADVAITA-L at braincells.com
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Since there was some interesting discussion on the first mantra of Isha
Upanishad (= Shukla Yajurveda 40.1), I take the liberty of adding another
interpretation with humility

Sincerely,

Vishal
_____________________________
Mantra 1

Context: This verse gives the essence of all the spiritual teaching
Hinduism- that God is the the Ruler, and the Immanent Controller of the
Universe and the Ultimate Reality while this world is subject to change and
destruction subject to His Will.

Commentary:
“ OM! All sentinent and insentinent objects in this ever changing Universe
are ephermal and pass away with time.
But the Lord Who is immanent in everything (and envelops everything), and
controls it in multifarious ways, is Eternal and Imperishable.
Seek to realize this Eternal Truth and do not get entangled in this world.
Enjoy the bounties of Nature, but with a sense of reunuciation.
Do not hanker too much after riches and do not get obsessed with them.
To whom does all this belong?
Certainly not to any man, for we do not bring anything with us, nor do we
take anything along.
But He, the Underlying Reality, owns all this,and we are mere guardians of
His Divine riches.” || 1 ||

Notes: Mahatma Gandhi once remarked that if all the sacred lore of Hindus
were to be consigned to flames with the exception of this verse, Hinduism
would still have survived in all its beauty. Thus, according to him, this
verse represents the essence of Hindu spirituality. Note that this verse
does not forbid the enjoyment of mundane things, rather it enjoins that we
should not get unduly obsessed with them.
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