Hindu Spirituality is slowly transforming the West

As Hindus living in the United States of America, we have the unique privilege of living simultaneously in two different paradigms, consciously or not. The American or Western paradigm more generally can be called ‘progressivism’, where every generation is continually standing on the shoulders of the previous one, where science and technology are marching relentlessly towards the future, leaving the past behind.

Modernity is a moving target, and the relentless flow of time, rendering everything that is new and exciting today, into the inexorable obsolescence of yesterday. When viewed from the lens of modernity, Hindu thought belongs to the world of the ancients, old, archaic, and clearly superseded long ago. There is an unyielding force that time exerts upon our consciousness. If we stand still even for a moment, we will be run over by the current of time. This inexorable movement of time may suggest that Hindu thought has once and for all been decisively superseded.

On the other hand, Hindu thought, in its own conception, is beyond time, situated in the realm of the timeless, i.e., Sanatana. The Veda may speak in a language that we do not fully comprehend today, but its message is not bound by time. Its timelessness bursts forth and re-emerges again and again, in era after era, yuga after yuga, as the Veda might itself say.

The central revelation of the Veda is that as a human being, we have one foot in time, and another in the timeless, one part of our lives submerged in the frenetic activity of our everyday lives, while there is another part of our self, that abides in the timeless, witnessing, watching, observing the drama of existence, untouched by all this ephemeral and transient play. 

Modernity defines itself in opposition to the old, consigning the ancient to the museum and by denying the traditional. The argument of progressivism is within time and stands on the ground of its repudiation of that which it dismisses as old and obsolete. The timeless on the other hand, does not stand in opposition to that which is time-bound and finds new expression time after time. Just when we think that it has been submerged once and for all, it emerges once more, in a new form, in a new language, and with renewed relevance. In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna tells Arjuna, ‘This Yoga was lost due to the eons of passage of time – so I am restoring it by instructing you in it (B.G. IV.2).’ That was already a few thousand years ago.

Adi Shankara says in his introduction to his commentary on the Gita, that he is restating its import, because time has clouded its message, and he sees his task of being primarily one of clarification of an ancient teaching for a new age. It seems that the timeless and the timebound are caught up in some kind of cosmic hide and seek game, where for a time, the timeless seems to be lost, obscured by the modernity of its age, once and for all, never to return. And then, the timeless returns, once again to our wonderment.

Contemporary Re-Emergence of the “Timeless”

We are witnessing one such epoch right now. A fascinating reemergence of the Hindu thought is taking place in front of our own eyes, in an alien land and culture – the contemporary West in general, and America in particular. Without any central organizing agency, without any grand overarching vision or plan, without any initiating authority or power, without any semblance of violence or force, Hindu thought has emerged, slowly but inexorably, and seeped into the consciousness of the Western society.

Like a spark, it has rekindled all over again, the fire of knowledge and transformation reignited once more, unbeknownst to us Hindus ourselves, unaided by our will or desire. Where this will go, and how it will live and what may yet come of it, remains unknown.

(Text Courtesy: Hindu Post)

Image courtesy of (Image: eSamskriti)

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