Conversational Sanskrit

Here is a well known prayer to Goddess Saraswati. I have written in devanagari, roman transliteration and given the meaning in English. या कुन्देन्दु तुषार हार धवला या शुभ्रवस्त्रावृता  या वीणा वर दण्ड मण्डित करा या श्वेत पद्मासना या ब्रह्म अच्युत शङ्कर प्रभृतिभिः देवैः सदा वन्दिता सा मां पातु सरस्वती भगवती निश्शेष जाड्यापहा yA kundEndu-tuShAra-hAra-dhavalA, yA shubhra-vastrAvRitA | yA vINA-vara-daNDa-maNDita-karA, yA shvEta-padmAsanA| yA brahmA_chyuta-shaGkara-prabhRitibhir_ dEvaiH sadA vanditA | sA mAm pAtu sarasvatI bhagavatI, niHshESha-jADyApahA|| She ( या ) who is fair and lustrous ( धवला ) like the jasmine ( कुन्द), moon ( इन्दु ) or the garland of dew-drops(  तुषार हार  ); She who is draped ( आवृता ) in white  clothes ( शुभ्रवस्त्र);  She whose  hands ( कर) are adorned ( मण्डिता ) with  the boon-bestowing vInA  ( वीणा वर दण्ड); She who sits ( आसना) on the white  lotus ( श्वेत पद्म);  She who  has  always ( सदा)  been praised  ( वन्दिता) by    all  divinities ( देवैः) be

Here is an anecdote from the Kishkindakanda of Ramayana. Rama is worried sick about Sita and dejected because of separation from her. Lakshmana advises him and asks him to keep up his optimism and enthusiasm. I thought these are great words to live by! उत्साहो बलवानार्य   नास्त्युत्साहत्परं    बलम् सोत्साहस्यस्ति   लोके अस्मिन् न किञिदपि   दुर्लभम्   उत्साहः= enthusiasm, resolution, perseverance, fortitude, optimism, strong will, energy, continuous effort   बलवान्= strong आर्य  =o! noble one ( Lakshmana addressing Rama) नास्ति= does not exist उत्साहात्   परम् बलम् = greater  strength than enthusiasm सोत्साहस्य अस्ति लोके   अस्मिन् = for the person with enthusiasm on this earth न किञित्   अपि   दुर्लभम्  = there is nothing that is difficult to achieve.  Enthusiasm is a very strong force, and there is no greater strength than enthusiasm. For the one who is enthusiastic there is nothing on this earth which is difficult to attain.

Do clothes matter? It appears they may!. During the samudra manthan the ocean gave vishnu resplendent in yellow robes his own daughter Lakshmi, poor half naked siva had to drink poison. Indeed clothes make the man वाससा किं इत्यत्र विचारणीयं  वासाः  प्रधानं खलु योग्यतायै पीताम्बरं वीक्ष्य ददौ स्वकन्यां दिगम्बरं वीक्ष्य विषं समुद्रः kim vaasasaa ityatra vichaaraneeyam  vaasaah pradhaanam khalu yogyataayai  peetaambaram veekshya dadau svakanyaam  digambaram veekshya visham samudrah. What of clothes,?, it bears examination here Clothes are a mark of worth having seen the resplendent yellow robes of vishnu, samudra gave his own daughter to him seeing the naked siva, he gave him poison

How many times have your read articles in the press attributing superhuman qualities to individuals who happen to be super rich. This apparently is not a new phenomenon. Here is an ancient aphorism in Sanskrit on how all manners of supreme qualities are attributed to the rich man. यस्यास्ति वित्तं स नरः कुलीनः स पण्डितः श्रुतवान् गुणज्ञः स एव वक्ता स च दर्शनीयः सर्वे गुणाः काञचनमाश्रयन्ति He who has wealth is of noble birth He is a scholar learned in the Srutis( the Vedas) and has knowledge of all good qualities He alone  is the spokesman, and he is the one worth seeing All good qualities seek refuge in gold. Next time you read about the sage of Nebraska ( Buffett), the genius of Washington ( Bill Gates) or the avatar of Boston ( Marc Zuckerberg), it is OK, you are part of an ancient tradition of glorifying and deifying the rich. Maybe that is what keeps the lotteries working.

Ever wonder how the elders would come up with a Sanskrit couplet in blessing when someone asks for their blessing. Do you wish you were able to come up with a short blessing in Sanskrit for various occasions? Here are some phrases of benediction or blessing in Sanskrit. Most of these are from Kalidasa's Abhigyana Shakuntalam. दीर्घायुष्मा न् भव May you have a long life. दीर्घसुमङगली भव May your remain a married woman for very long! ययातेरिव र्शर्मिष्ठा भर्तुः बहुमता भव Like Sharmishtha was for Yayati, may you be the beloved of your husband To a pregnant woman: वीर प्रसविनी भव May you give birth to a child who will be a warrior To a young and illustrious  man: वत्स चिरं जीव | पृथ्वीं पालय | Son may you live long and rule the world. वत्स अप्रतिरथो भव Son be an unrivaled warrior To a young woman who seeks  blessings along with her husband and son: वत्से, आखण्डल समो  भर्ता,  जयन्त प्रतिमः सुतः आशिरन्या न ते योग्या पौलोमी  

Kalidasa's Abhigyana Shakuntalam is one of the greatest dramatic works ever were written and is a testimony to Kalidasa's poetic genius and acute observation of the human condition. Here are a couple of verses as a small sample of this tender love story. (Please note that I have broken the sandhis to make it easier to understand).  Sage Kanva who has brought up Shakuntala as his own daughter, pours his heart out as he bids her farewell as she heads to the home of her husband. यास्यति अद्य शकुन्तला इति हृदयं संस्पृष्टम् उत्कण्ठया कण्ठः स्तंभित बाष्प वृत्ति कलुष चिन्ताजडं दर्शनम्| वैकल्व्यं मम तावत् ईदृशं अहो स्नेहात् अरण्यौकसः पीड्यन्ते गृहिणः कथं नु तनायविशलेष दुखैः नवैः || At the thought that Shakuntala will go today, my heart is deeply touched with anxiety. My throat is choked with the flow of tears. My perception is paralyzed with grief. If such, oh! is the affliction, because of affection for even me whose abode is in the forest, how bitterly might house- holders

1. ब्रह्मन्   (Brahman).  the ultimate reality, pure consciousness ( jnAnasvarUpa),  attributeless निर्गुण (nirguNa)  and beyond intellect निर्विशेष ( nirviSeSa). 2. ईश्वर (Isvara).  Brahman conditioned by माया (mAyA) or अविद्या (avidyA). Isvara is Sat, Cit, Ananda ( existence, consciousness and  bliss). 3. जीव  (Jiva), the subject-object complex as an appaearance of Brahman. Jiva is diferent from isvara in that it is the agent and the enjoyer. It acquires merit and demirit , experiences pleasure and pain , while Isvara is not touched at all by these. When avidya is destroyed both Isvara and Jiva are identified as one and the same as Brahman. 4. माया (Maya) or अविद्या (avidyA) is not only illusion, not only absence of  knwoledge but presence of wrong knowledge and a mixture of the real and the unreal, and the neither real nor unreal. 5. Knowledge is the only means of liberation. Knowledge that Jiva is Brahman will destroy माया (mAyA) or अविद्या ( avidyA). Knowledge rather th

Vedanta is the essence of the teaching of the vedas. The foundation of Vedanta rests on three sources  also referred to as the three points of departure or  प्रस्थानत्रय 1. उपनिषद ्     sruti prasthana, the revealed texts (sruti - that which is heard). The Upanishads are an extraordinary collection of philosophical texts that are considered  by many to be among the most influenctial texts in the human experience . 2. भगवद्गीता     smriti prasthana, composed by sages, is based on their understanding of the Vedas (smriti - that which is remembered). It is a part of the महाभारत and contains the essence of the उपनिषद्. It is rightly said of भगवद्गीता  that सर्वोपनिषदो गावो दोग्धा गोपालनन्दन|  all upanishads are cows, milked by Nandagopal 3. वेदान्तसूत्र   of बादरायण  or  nyaya prasthana, the logical text that sets forth the philosophy systematically and logically  in a set of 555 aphorisms

श्लोकार्धेन प्रवक्ष्यामि यदुक्तं ग्रन्थकोटिभिः| ब्रह्म सत्यं जगन् मिथ्या जीवो ब्रह्मैव नापरः || shlokaardhena pravakshyami yaduktam granthakotibhi.h | brahma satyam jaganmithyaa jiivo brahmaiva naapara.h || In half a shloka I will say what has been said in crores of books; Brahman is real and the world unreal, the individual self and brahman are the same and not different

At the other end of the spectrum from the Caravaka school is the philosophy of Adi Sankara i.e. Advaita. Should we call him a renaiassance man, or perhaps the renaissance superman. By the time of his death at age 32 he had not only written epic commentaries on 10 upanishads, bhagavadgita and vedantasutra but also walked on foot from Kerala to Kashmir, Nepal, Assam, Andhra, Tamil nadu, Karnataka, Gujarat and Odisha and trounced all the renowned scholars in Buddhism and Jainism and other schools of thought in debate and established Advaita vedanta as the dominant school of thought. What a guy! Advaita put quite simply says that the ultimate reality ( Brahman) is pure consciousness which is formless and without attributes and all categories of intellect ( nirguna), that Atman the individual soul is but a part ( not separate, not two but one) of Brahman just like the space in a jar is part of space at large, that it is only ignorance that limits Jiva from Brahman and that knowledge is t

In their criticism of the excesses of the brahminical ritualism, the materialistic views of the caravakas lost because they went too far. They negated not only the existence of god but all that is noble in the human condition, of the concept of right and wrong, of the role of inference in thought and the existence of the soul. It still has a place as a school of thought because it was the first protest movement that culminated in the self examination, intellectual debate and ultimately the reformation and renaissance of vedic hinduism.

Among the philosophical schools of the Indian tradition, there is one, which is so contrary that it's very acceptance as a school of thought appears incomprehensible. This is the Caravaka or lokayata philosophy. It negates not only the primacy of the Vedas, but also the existence of a supreme being, the very existence of the soul or its transmigration from one birth to other, the concept of r ight and wrong, all Vedic rituals, the testimony of the sages and anything that cannot be perceived by the senses. The purpose of life is described as nothing but the enjoyment of the senses!. The preceptor of this school was Brhaspati. They quote shlokas from the Rgveda, BrhadAranyaka Upanishad, Mahabharata and Ramayana as authority for their viewpoint. Here are some doozies of shlokas from this system: न स्वर्गो न अपवर्गो वा नैव आत्मा पारलौकिकः | न एव वर्णाश्रमादीनां क्रियाश्च फलदायिकाः || There is no heaven, no final liberation, nor any soul in another world nor do the rituals o

‎ Samskrita Bharati has pioneered the spread of samskritam as spoken language.With the focus on speaking the language.Freed from the focus on memorizing the rules of grammar you begin to enjoy the beauty of the language. Very soon a window opens up for you to the vast treasure of Indian thought, literature and heritage. Over the last 32 years Samskrita Bharati has taught spoken samskritam to 100, 0 00, 000 people in 13 countries ( http:// www.samskritabharati.org/ ). My wife Uma, and I have been learning samskritam through Samskrita Bharati for the last 6 years and are currently doing our MA final in Samskritam. This has been a defining moment in our lives and I cannot say enough, how about how much our lives have been enriched by learning samskritam. We have been teaching samskritam since the last 4 years, beginning at the Sri Venkateshwara temple in Pittsburgh. Having learnt samskritam while pursuing our extremely busy careers in academic medicine, we reached out to busy motivat