Why idea of Dr. Firoz Khan teaching Sanskrit at Banaras Hindu University is Fundamentally Flawed

A language is a tool to convey information of a certain idea of mind and ways of being from one person to another.  A person who does not understand either the language or its roots or acknowledge them as real cannot fully grasp anything that has been spoken.

For example, I do not understand Mandarin.  So, if two people are speaking Mandarin in front of me, even when the ideas are very profound, it would all seem like tongues rattling.

On the other hand, even if I knew Mandarin but came from a background that negated all that the Chinese culture stood for, I would never be able to appreciate, and therefore grasp what is being conveyed in the spoken word.  Even if I know the language and what is spoken, I may not fully understand what is conveyed.

You see – Language is not to understand what is spoken.  But what is conveyed.

If two lovers are talking to each other and I am listening to their conversation – even when it is in Hindi, my natural tongue – I may not fully understand what one is conveying to another.  Between them there is a language within a language.  A culture of the couple, if you will, based on a certain set of experiences.  That shared culture between them, based on their experiences, may make them call each other by expletives, which to them, given their experiences and outlook, may be words of extreme endearment and love.

Language is not about what is spoken, but what is conveyed.

That is why Dr. Firoz Khan’s attempt to teach Sanskrit is flawed.  And, I am not yet discussing the violation of the BHU rules and code, which no one else has the right to comment on.

Sanskrit is not just a language.  It is a cultural and, even more importantly, spiritual foundation of Dharma.

“It was discovered” and not created.

Those who understand the spiritual basis of Sanskrit realize that Sanskrit is not based on the normal rules of languages, it is something deeper.  It touches the very basis of existence – the vibrational structure of existence and then constructs the words and vocabulary based on the nature of every object and experience’s vibrations.  That is why Mantras have been held so dear and powerful.  For they impact the very basis of the existence of a person or emotion or life.

We have seen that when Maha Mrityunjaya mantra is chanted, it can impact people in ways that is not normally explained – Delhi Neurosurgeons studying impact of Mahamrityunjaya Mantra on severe brain injury patients.

What is it that is at the source of the minds and the very understanding that “discovered” Sanskrit?

It is the same understanding that is at the foundation of Dharma.  That there is no Creation.  There is only manifestation.  That is why even when Sanskrit had a word for Creation – Kriti, our Sages used the word Srishti for existence.  Srishti is the manifestation of a tree in a seed and of an ornament in a slab of Gold.  Tree is not “created” by a seed.  It is manifested from all the foundational elements that were present in the seed all along.

That understanding and razor sharp adherence to that one basic understanding of the existence – and non-existence is at the heart of conveying every idea and thought in Sanskrit.

If you lose sight of this one basic and foundational understanding or spiritual realization then Sanskrit loses all meaning.  You will be like those who report that the couple are abusive, when really their expletives were at the heart of their way to express love to each other – in our example of lovers above.

You will no longer understand what was conveyed by the words.  But rather distort it.

Now, let us dig a bit deeper into the understanding of manifestation versus creation paradigms.

The idea of creation comes from a mind that is strictly and fanatically entrenched in Duality.  A Duality that is expressed in dualities of all kinds.  For, how can you have a Creation which at the object level has distinctions at every bit and piece without only physicality as your scope of understanding?

Physicality or matter that even though it seems real at the surface is but a wave at the primordial level.

When the wave of the infinite possibilities at the quantum level manifests in only ONE possibility at the gross level, it is not that this one possibility is false.  The problem is that recognizing only one possibility necessarily negates the existence of “Infinite -1” and renders them as false.

For example, if I were to tell you that the pen in your hand is not just a pen, but also a possible donut, you will call me a loony idiot.  But in the realm of infinite possibilities, pen is as much a possibility of that wave as donut is.  That, the possibility of pen “showed” up at the gross level is because the infinite wave “collapsed” in a certain way and not another.

Those who understand that pen is a manifestation find it easy to see that donut is as much a possibility as a pen is.

But, those who see pen as a creation, find the idea that “donut could be a possibility” as the words of a lunatic.

That is why a culture and mind that is seeped and entrenched in Duality can NEVER find complete deliverance of and experience of non-duality.  It may be able to crack equations that point to non-duality, and talk eloquently on the science of it, but will never experience it because that understanding of non-duality is only intellectual.

The genesis of Sanskrit on the other hand, is rooted in the experience of non-duality.  Not a conjecture.  Not an idea.  But experience of it.

Non-duality of the beings who came up with Sanskrit was not hearsay.  It was not an idea they read in a book.  It was how they experienced the existence (theirs and of everything else).

And, that is where Dr. Firoz Khan will fail.  Islam is entrenched and deeply, fanatically and aggressively married to duality.  God and Satan, Believers and Non-believers, Creation and Creator – these are real and foundational ideas of distinction in Islam.  Even when God is said to be “formless’ it is juxtaposed against a Satan, thereby lending a distinct boundary to that God, which by its very distinction ceases to remain formless.

If there is only one, or nothing else, there is a possibility of a formless.  But if there are two, then form is inherent for both.

Because the Abrahamic belief systems are entrenched so deeply in the idea of Duality, the adherents and believers of Abrahamic belief systems have found it remarkably difficult to fully grasp the entire scope and ramifications of non-duality.

That is why they insist on monotheism.  And belittle polytheism.

You see, when every part of material world is a manifestation of the primordial non-dual existence, then every part of the gross carries the inherent qualities of the quantum.  What is true of the quantum sub-stratum is true of the gross.

However, the gross even when it inherits the quantum’s qualities fully, is not the quantum.

Let us liken it to an “infinite curve” in Mathematics, where every point of the curve explains the curve fully, but is not the curve.

Read these articles for better understanding – Observer Creates His Own Reality and Creation is a Vibration.

Every deity (or God, as Abrahamic minds would call it) of Hindus is therefore a point on the infinite curve called Parma-atman.  Every deity expresses the divine in some or all ways fully, but is not the parma-atman or Divine in its totality.

This idea of every deity or being expressing the divinity is inherent to Hinduism and other Dharmic ways of life, as is the understanding that the Divine in its completeness is beyond words, forms, understanding and explanation.

It is ALL!

This is exactly what Krishna conveyed to Arjuna in Chapter 11 of Bhagwad Gita with painstaking detail.

Sanskrit comes from that understanding and experience.

If you negate or dilute the idea of non-dual experience and even dabble just some with duality, you have lost the essence of Sanskrit.

Now, is it that those Hindus who teach Sanskrit at BHU are experienced in non-duality?  Not necessarily.  But they hold that understanding as a matter of faith.  Even though they have not experienced the “Virat roop” or Universal Consciousness manifestation of Krishna, themselves, they hold that idea as a matter of faith.

A Muslim who adheres to even basics of Islam and does not find any foundational incoherence in its theology with respect to the real understanding of existence – will question the non-duality.

And, that question will not be of a seeker, but it will be the cynicism of a believer.

In countless treatises and commentary by Christian translators and commentators of Hindu Scriptures, one can easily sense that cynicism.  None of those commentators posit an idea of fundamental non-duality in all its ramifications.  But rather in the way of a non-believer.

That is why Dr. Firoz Khan will be in an intellectual battle and violence with his own being, as he would have been until now.  You see, if you understand and hold the experience and truth of non-duality above everything else, you cannot, for a moment, have any faith in duality of the Abrahamic belief systems.

I am not saying that they are wrong.  I am saying that Abrahamic beliefs are inconsistent with a non-dual existence and the quantum reality.

And, at Banaras Hindu University, the premier educational institute for Dharmic and Hindu studies, inconsistency with non-dual existence and mere pretense to the contrary will be a death knell to its foundational principles.