Veda: The Age of Sacrifice and Rituals

Which is that one day in a year that makes you most happy? Your birthday, right?  Now, tell me this, what exactly makes you happiest on a birthday? Is it the gifts, the fun time, becoming the center of attention for the day or just the love and affection shown by family and friends?  (All answers are right, including 'all of the above'!). The answers will vary, especially depending on your age. As one grows up in life, the latter things in the list are likely to become more important than the former. So, by the time you are my age and reasonably successful in life, the primary factor that makes you happy will most likely be the demonstration of genuine love and affection.

I can completely attest to this having been very fortunate to be touched by such an experience recently, celebrating my fiftieth Birthday! My family and friends had organized this grand birthday party, a total stealth operation, to give me a wonderful surprise. My joy had no bounds that day. But, here is one other thing that I observed. Those who had worked so hard to create this surprise, they actually appeared to have a greater joy in it than I did! So, the next time you receive a gift that you value for your birthday, do remember that the joy of the person who gave it to you is likely to be much greater than yours!

The human nature of finding happiness in doing things for others or even sacrificing oneself to save someone else is extremely puzzling to scientists. You must have heard stories of courageous soldiers who have sacrificed their life to save the lives of their colleagues. If we strictly applied Darwin's theories of evolution to human kind, something like this will not be possible. Instead, we would have all been more focused on self-preservation and never be altruistic at all. The Biologists use a term called 'group  selection' for this behavior and are still trying to know more about it.  The fact that sacrifice is more fulfilling than pleasure is a truth that the Rishis had discovered many centuries ago.

The ancient Hindu civilization, when they moved further from the northwest India towards the central plain, had conquered a lot of land and experienced tremendous success. There was an abundance of food and wealth and great excitement in the society about the material prosperity awaiting them. There were also the perils of migration like deaths in battle and from diseases. The Rishis, who were great thinkers, were not overwhelmed by all this. They had in fact started asking questions like what is that makes people happy or unhappy, what is true joy and how does one get it?

To understand how the Rishi's answered these questions, we need to first look into what makes us unhappy. There are many things that could be on that list but we can put all of them into four buckets:

1. Bad things happening: Physical injury, loss of things or people, accidents, disease etc. and brooding over them
2. Anxiety: Worry and fear of what may happen, what if something happens or doesn't happen etc
3. Disappointments: Defeat, failure, not living up to expectation, not getting what you expected etc.
4. Negative emotionS: Jealousy, arrogance, isolation, delusion, guilt etc.

(These are the BADS of life. Can you think of something outside this? Let me know if you do)

If we can minimize or eliminate these BADS, then we have a better chance of seeking what is joy. For this the Rishis came up with a set of practices that included the following:

1. Yagna (Worshipful action): There are two parts to worshipful action, Prarthana (Prayers) and Prayatna (Effort seeking success).  As you know, there are always a lot of things that are out of our control in everyday life. Prayer is the way to connect with the uncertainties of universe so that we can be less anxious about them. Prayer also helps us to steel our resolve with positive thinking so that one may overcome adverse situations if they happen in life. This is why you will find a number of  prayerful hymns in the RigVeda. Prayatna is a commitment to apply 100% of oneself to achieve life's goals. A life without goals very quickly dwindles into a meaningless meander. Again, you will see a number off hymns in the Veda, celebrating life and calling on the warrior to march forward to bring back success. 
2. Dharma: (Ethical Living) A commitment to live a self-restrained ethical life founded on values and virtues. Unbridled engagement with the world will only lead to disappointments and ruin. A self-restrained, ethical living ensures an avoidance of future suffering as well as creates a sense of fulfillment of a greater purpose. Again, you will find detailed instructions in Veda enumerating the different values and virtues as well as do's and don'ts.
3. Dhaana (Sharing): What should one do when success is achieved? Hoard it for  future, enjoy it mindlessly, foolishly waste it out of arrogance? The Veda advocates that for a greater joy that lasts, share the success. There is more joy to be had being in the position to give and share rather than hoard and enjoy
4. Thapa (Contemplation):  'I think, therefore I am' is a famous quote from the 16th century philosopher Descartes. The Vedas encourage us to always take some time to think about why we do, what we do. Also, many of our sources of unhappiness originate from a lack of understanding or misconception. Contemplation helps to correct these.

If these are the four practices to do to avoid unhappiness, then where is the joy of life? The Rishis answer to this was that the real joy of life is in achieving peace and contentment and not in pleasures. Therefore, you will see the vedic hymns always ending with 'Om Shanti Shanti Shanti', where 'Om' indicates the state of 'poornatha' or perfect contentment and 'Shanti', peace.

You may find these as difficult concepts to understand. You are not alone and the semi-nomadic society of Hindu civilization in the second millennium of BC would have been no different either . Therefore, the Rishis developed a scheme of rituals that encapsulated these concepts. For example, they prescribed prayers that were to be performed 3 times in a day; at day break, after-noon and end of day. These rituals were meant to remind that to reduce anxiety, one should pray before undertaking any task, at the peak of performing it and again when concluding the task .

Other elaborate rituals like Aswamedha (the horse sacrifice) involved letting a war horse run through the country, bringing those parts of the country covered by the horse under the rule of the King owning the horse. When the horse returned to the starting point, it was sacrificed to the Divinities. While this sounds gruesome, the intent was to create a metaphor on seeking success and sharing the results. At the end of sacrifice, everyone partook a drink called Soma that was also offered to Divinities. This drink was a metaphor for the contentment of a person who has achieved the goals and shared the results with others.

However, over the next few centuries the meaning of the metaphors behind the rituals fell off from people's mind and only the mere performance of rituals remained. A kind of darkness fell over the Hindu civilization during this period when rituals were performed devoid of their meaning. But, soon few enlightened people managed to resurrect the original thoughts of the Rishis. Thus was born the age of philosophical enlightenment. We will see more of this next time.Meanwhile, wish you all the happiness in life!

(Image courtesy to sources on Internet including yuvasakthibanaras.wordpress.com for the yaga image)