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Friday, March 29, 2024

Mythman Devdutt Strikes Again – More Lies on Bhagwan Ram

One of the sepoys of the gatekeeper’s cabal, Devdutt Pattanaik (DP) strikes again. This time it was an article about Buddha, but interestingly titled to propagate his own lies. The New Year began with the myth manufacturer shedding more of his dark wisdom, or rather peddling his duplicitous perverted distortion as if it were absolute truth.

To his credit, DP has authored many popular books and is popular in the media. Still, he publishes his half-baked ideas only in places where comments are either regulated or not published. This artificial protection, he perhaps feels gives his writings a scholarly touch. Or is it really? He has made a career by writing his own bungled ideas and passing them for mass consumption.

Let us analyze the third-rate gibberish branded by the elite cabal as scholarly. For this analysis we will merely centre the discussion on just the title – ‘Why is Ram misogynist, but not the Buddha?’ The entire article can be proven to be a delusional motivated one.

DP claims of being a scholar: A gross falsification!

Let us first consider the lineage of peddled lies. Wendy Doniger, the guru of Devdutt is ignominious for her Freudian views of misinterpreting Hindu Dharma. She is infamous and very unscholarly for portraying Mother Kali as a prostitute and for making ridiculous comments about Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa as a homosexual. So it is no wonder that as a true disciple and maintaining the traits of a good sepoy, DP resorts to ostentatious methods to cover his lack of real expertise in Bharatiya tradition.

None of these western scholars study our shastras with either Bhakti or Shraddha. Just because one can either read a language or understand certain alphabets, can one interpret with total abandon? Not only do they ignore our traditional scholars or their interpretations of several millennia, but also bring a complete personal slant. Wendy brings a defunct Freudian sex prism to all her Hinduphobic studies. Sheldon casts a political motive, social oppression angle to all his Indology versions. Worst amongst these categories is the one DP represents – the one focused on spreading lies, manufactured delusions.

As a self-certified mythologist, he seems to have misunderstood that generating myths is the role of a mythologist, as he launches into repeated lies, gross misinterpretations and deliberate peddling of bunkum. He can be congratulated on having a long public tenure in this devious role.

Why he is not a true scholar in my eyes:

  • First of all, as a scholar why is he not open to publishing on platforms where comments can be posted or rebutted. Of course, it is easier to peddle lies from safe forts with guarded entries.
  • Analyze the pattern of lies – With such a spurious title, which is a blatant lie, and the contents not related to Bhagwan Rama, he can achieve two objectives – Claim to make two truths (both are in fact lies) and also get away easily as people will not focus beyond the title. It also gives him ammunition to recycle this garbage as a fact as he had published it for future reference.
  • This cheap trick of building layers of fabrications has been perfected by the likes of Sheldon Pollock. Of course DP’s level of cheap understanding and motivated stone throwing can only operate many notches below that of Pollock’s scholarliness, which he most definitely lacks. DP is neither a historian, nor a scholar of Hindu granths. This pop writing with manufactured artificial understanding and a strong proclivity to his Guru parampara is very dangerous, unless questioned.

Is Rama a Misogynist? – A cheap trick to pass a manufactured lie as a fact in the title

“The world is conditioned to see the Ramayana and Manu-Smriti as anti-women, but not the Buddhist lore.” – Devadutt

We will focus the remainder only on exposing the lie that Rama was a misogynist. If we can prove that, DP can be clearly showed to have either very bad motives or absolute lack of scholarly understanding, or both. The title gives an illusory feeling that if Rama is a misogynist, why not Buddha, thereby implying both are.

We will let Valmiki’s writings emasculate the lies of DP. Let us parade the leading women who were in contact with Rama and his attitude towards them and for the sake of authenticity, stick to only Valmiki Ramayana.

Three Queens – Kausalya, Sumitra and Kaikeyi: Rama did not differentiate between his biological mother and the other two queens. Despite Kaikeyi being the reason behind his exile and his father’s death, Rama’s affection, love and respect towards her is unflinching. He sternly reprimands even Lakshmana and Bharata when they even attempted to talk ill about her. Even the lady who does the maximum damage to him by snatching his rightful kingdom, sending him, his wife and brother to the forest to lead an ascetic life only receives respect and love. If there is any claim that Rama is a misogynist, it dies right here.

Tataka: This is perhaps the first time Rama had to take a dharmic stand. He hesitates to raise a weapon against the attacking rakshasa, Tataka, because she is a woman. Maharishi Vishwamitra had to convince him that she was a Yakshi who got cursed by Maharishi Agastya to become a rakshasa. Vishwamitra had to guide the perplexed Rama that his duty is to first protect the ones who need his protection before getting mired in unwanted questions like if the aggressor is a rakshasi. We see the same theme in Bhagavad Gita with Krishna’s message. So for doing the dharmic activity, there are no hurdles like gender, jati, status, relationship and the like. Does that sound like misogyny?

Ahalya: Rama’s grace was the antidote, suggested by Gautama Rishi, to his wife Ahalya’s curse. Again, self-appointed experts who specialize in twisting up facts with motivated opinions under the garb of being a scholar, will showcase Ahalya as a case of patriarchal domination and misogyny. The same Sarga ends with Gautama Rishi appearing when Ahalya resumes her original form and accepting her as his rightful wife. If we corner them with the correct story, they will ask the next question – how can a stone become a person? Couldn’t that have been a metaphor of her repenting? No one in their senses will claim that helping a lady is misogyny.

Shurpanaka: Panchavati is perhaps the turning point in Ramayana, next only to Kaikeyi’s
episode of sending Rama to exile. Shurpanaka falls into deep lust for Rama, at a mere glance. Rama patiently explains his married state to her. Rama points that Lakshmana is the one who is not having a wife around and Shurpanaka finds this a wonderful compromise only to get informed that he is a mere daasa of Rama. Seeing her obstacle as Sita, she menacingly moves to kill and eat Sita, at which point Lakshmana chops off her nose and ears.

Firstly, she was a Rakshasi and no offense was meted to her as long as she did not become a threat to Sita. Yet the same Shurpanaka when asked by Khara, behind the cause of her sad plight, sings several verses of slokas in praise of Rama-Lakshmana. (Valmiki Ramayana slokas- 3:19: 14 -17) Unlike Tataka who was far more powerful and dangerous to society, Rama-Lakshmana deemed her not a major threat to society. So they spared her life after teaching her a lesson. One must remember this was the same solution given by Vibhishana to spare Hanuman’s life by setting fire to his tail. We are again seeing extreme restraint on part of Rama- Lakshmana and only mirroring the same level of response as the threat. Is that misogyny, DP?

Sabhari: Perhaps the best example in Ramayana to prove all the critics wrong is Sabhari’s episode – an aged ascetic from a tribal society and her guru Matanga Rishi, both from Shudra varna, something which most critics are ignorant about. Rama partakes the food she offers, despite knowing pretty well that she has partly eaten the same fruit offered. In those times, one could only eat food that has been eaten by Father, Guru, elder brother and I assume wife. But Rama cared less for such societal prescriptions as he could only see the huge bhakti of Sabhari. So misogynist mythology propagators fall flat on their face.

Tara: We have dealt about the case of Vaali vadha in detail elsewhere. But the case of Tara, the wife of the fallen warrior, Vaali, provides ample insight about Rama’s grace. (In Valmiki Ramayana, she doesn’t get remarried, atleast explicitly, like in the more popular versions like Tulsi or Kamba Ramayana). In spite of variance, we find Tara morphing from seething rage at Rama to praising his glory, at his mere sight. This is not due to fear of the opponent, but due to her clarity of mind. Being a pious and intelligent lady, the one who counseled Vaali not to confront Sugriva on account of Rama, she was able to see the divinity in Rama. We also see Rama comfort Vaali on the future of Angada and Tara. Again, DP is caught lying.

Mandodari: The primary queen of Ravana, laments and finds the flaws in her fallen husband, yet when she sees Rama, she is not able to find one fault. Rama reprimands Vibhishana who refuses to perform obsequies to Ravana, thereby according respect to even the departed enemy. Following Dharma was critical rather than taking revenge on a fallen warrior’s family. Does that sound like misogyny? Irrespective of Mandodari’s post Ravana period, she holds Rama in high esteem and only faulted Ravana for not reining in his senses. DP’s pants on fire again?

Sita: Sita is the most central figure in Ramayana and in fact Ramayana is also called as Sitaya’s charitam mahat. Rama lets her convince him with her logic on why she must accompany him to the forest. We see numerous glimpses of an ideal householder relationship between Rama and Sita throughout their stay in the forest. Ravana kidnapping Sita brings to us the human side of Rama. He is unconsolable, and many sargas are filled with only his weeping. Unlike his father Dasaratha, who weds many, Rama is setting the role model to all of us by being eka patni vrta. We find Rama so overwhelmed when Sugriva shows the jewelry which may possibly have been from Sita. The episodes of lamentation continue throughout Kishkinda Kanda.

When Hanuman meets Sita after his long ordeal, the information exchanged to validate his authenticity and also the incidents narrated by Sita to be relayed back to Rama, confirm the deep love and respect Rama had for Sita. Even the best of romances written cannot match a fraction of the love Rama expresses for Sita over and over. Yet he shocks everyone, including Sita by abandoning her and giving her freedom to go anywhere. One must remember that Rama does not ask her to jump into fire to prove her chastity, which was Sita’s choice. The last words by Rama in this regard gives us ample clue as to slighting himself for not being able to see her chastity. Refer sloka 6:115:17 of Valmiki Ramayana.

Whenever pious people of impeccable character resort to making an odd choice, it shocks the Sages and Devatas, who rush to the scene to make amends to restore Dharma. We find a similar incident in the Mahabharata on Day 15 of the war. Drona starts violating every agreed upon code of conduct in the war. He uses Brahmastra on defenseless foot soldiers. He uses all sorts of divyastras to attack the Pandava army. We find great sages appear to confront and advise him.

Similarly, when Rama created a situation which forced Sita herself to jump into a fire, all Devas and Brahma and Siva appear. Agni brings her and vouches for her chastity. Rama never doubted it, but used this as an opportunity to compel his departed father Dasaratha to revoke his words. Rama wanted Kaikeyi and Bharata to be accepted back by Dasaratha, which he obliges. Dasaratha pleads and advises Sita never to repudiate Rama for the Agnipariksha episode (Sloka 6:119:35), as it was done to prove her chastity to the world.

Misogyny propagandists immediately resort to their last salvo – why did Rama abandon pregnant Sita? While this needs an elaborate discussion, it must be sufficient that when the Devatas, Brahma, Siva and his own departed father have given a strong statement about Sita, it must be remembered that Rama has no reason to doubt Sita again based on some ill-informed citizen. Rama bites the bullet for the sake of his citizens, yet makes the personal sacrifice. Even today, we slight only Rama and do not question Sita.

We have taken a quick look at the different woman characters and the way Rama interacted with each one of them with love and respect. So which version of Ramayana are these mindless motivated characters talking about – the one they wrote? Or the one written by their sex frenzied Guru Wendy? Or the super scholar who knows good Sanskrit, to bend and twist it to his narrative, Sheldon?

Mythman DP, if you like myths, the one you should worry about is that of Pinocchio. If that story were to be true, you could end up with the longest nose ever in the history of the universe.

From a simple exercise of walking through Valmiki Ramayana, we have proved that all these myth creators revel in our ignorance. Can we crack open our own Itihasas and study it periodically? Can we do more Svadhyaya daily? Fair warning, you may grow spiritually over time, if you do so.

The only reasons why such cheap interpretations can even exist are-

  • Motivated authors pursuing selfish gains – Question them on every platform.
  • Tamas of the masses not to read itihasas – Read. Daily svadhyaya will evolve us spiritually.
  • Lack of enough education to rebut the motivated misinterpretations – I am hopeful more are coming along to counter. Watch out for Swadeshi Indology Conferences.

Om Tat Sat

Satchitananda is a Sanatana Dharmist. You can read more of his thoughts at:

Facebook: https:/facebook.com/SatchitanandaReflections/

Blog: https://satchitanandareflections.blogspot.com/

References:

Valmiki Ramayana

(Disclaimer: This article represents the opinions of the Author, and the Author is responsible for ensuring the factual veracity of the content. HinduPost will not be responsible for the accuracy, completeness, suitability, or validity of any information, contained herein.)


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Satchitananda
Satchitananda
Sanatana Dharmist. Endeavor is to share the little I have learnt along this Cosmic journey with my fellow travelers. Sincerely interested in raising awareness of Hindu Dharma, especially to Hindus.

12 COMMENTS

  1. Wonderful feeling, after reading it. I had read them as a kid, the stories, but this re-take is important: it instantly washes out the manufactured blemishes that professional liars like D Pattnaik would like others to focus on. Why this ludicrous grubby pseudo-writer needs the leftist-jihad-evangelist combine to add to his income, I wish i had another reason to attribute to, other than the pure glutinous deadly moral decay that he consistently displays.

  2. Go ahead and ask me what’s the most ridiculous thing that Dedutt has said about Hindus and Hinduism- but you have to promise not to laugh.
    Here it comes: Devdutt says Donald Trump is the avatar Kalki!
    Trump is the 10th avadar of Lord Vishnu, already here on this earth!
    I told you not to laugh, and look how you are rolling on the ground laughing!

    Check it for yourself at the link and full article below.
    Devdutt gives his own description of what avatar Kalki should be like, and then names Donald Kalki Trump as the one!

    Ram

    http://devdutt.com/articles/applied-mythology/society/has-kalki-arrived.html
    Has Kalki arrived?
    Published on 23rd October, 2016, in Mid-Day

    Donald Trump fits the idea of what Vishnu’s last avatar epitomises — an invasive, violent, disruptive force that redefines old ideas. I have always maintained that the horse-riding Kalki, the final avatar of Vishnu, is not a saviour who brings back old ideas, but rather an invader, whose violent disruption forces old ideas to redefine, reframe and rejuvenate themselves. For the idea of Kalki emerged with the arrival of Greek, Huns, Muslims and European warlords who forced Hinduism and Indic civilisation to restructure itself.

    To me, Trump fits this understanding of Kalki. Such qualifications may be alarming, especially to those who wish to dehumanise Trump because of his foul language. I even risk being branded Right Wing Hindu radical with such a suggestion. But, hey, isn’t God inside everyone? Trump is no saviour of the Republican Party, or America; he is the one who is going to change Western discourse forever.

    In the years following the Second World War, and especially after the Cold War, the West saw itself as the leader of the global village, champion of equality, justice and democracy. Then Brexit happened: many people in Britain realised that joining Europe meant losing British identity, and superiority.

    Superiority complex

    The desire to be superior is embedded in individuals, and communities. We want to be alpha, and those who cannot do it individually, do so by joining a pack or a herd or a hive. We see this in Russia, too. Shirtless, homophobic Putin is a classic pack leader: when he stood up to Europe and America, he earned the love of his people, who felt a global loss of prestige following the fall of the Soviet Union.

    It is not so much about justice as it is about power. If the justice discourse meant disrupting old hegemonies through regulation, then this is clearly a global pushback. A commentator noted how Trump gives voice to the marginalised in America: the rural folk who feel overwhelmed by city politics and undermined by arrogant intellectuals who mock Jesus, and proclaim the superiority of their rational and atheist discourse, who use political correctness to stifle freedom of speech. Putin, and now Trump, speak the language of patriarchy, to the horror of the liberal who assumed his or her views were moral and ethical, and so right, and so beyond challenge. They who had cleansed all universities of opposing ‘un-enlightened’ points of view, and had reduced education to indoctrination, are now facing the wrath of the rejected.

    On the defensive

    Whether Trump wins or not, his rise has stripped the West of all its moral snobbery, their strategic use of social justice frameworks to put other countries and cultures on the defensive. Now with Europe and America shutting its doors to immigrants, the essential Brahminism of ‘developed’ nations cannot be ignored. And, the spotlight on men who abuse women has expanded from India’s alleged rape culture to the American presidential candidates and their normative ‘locker room’ talk.

    This is what Kalki does. He saves, or rather enlightens, by causing rupture. We have seen what is revealed in the tear, discovered how liberals and intellectuals have reduced democracy to a tool meant to domesticate the other, and homogenise culture, through regulation. In their primal essence, the extreme Left and the extreme Right, the activist and the politician, are very similar: yearning to dominate and control the opponent. Wisdom lies not in winning in argument, but in understanding and outgrowing the desire to win.

  3. I did not know about Epic Channel is pet project of DP. Many of my friends and general public are in awe of DP and his work. His recent book ‘My Gita’ is bestseller and people use his book for quotation. In airport, DP’s books always occupy prominent place. I think we must support Hindu Post and author like Shri Satchitananda for initiation of Hindu Post channel.

  4. I already wrote a rebuttal to this article and published in two blog sites. I gave a ppp to a group of kids in Tamil school on Devdutt Patnaik having written four rebuttals so far. The kids knew more Ramayana and Mahabharata than Patnaik I told them I challenged Devdutt for a debate but he has not agreed so far. They asked me to tell them when the debate will be held. We started the job of rebuttals to this guy in December. A group of three of us are involved in this project. I hope to drag this self proclaimed mythologist to a debating table soon. Score supports him. My rebuttals to score went ignored. I pointed out to them that this was antiHindu propaganda. They couldn’t careless. I was told by a journalist in Hyderabad that meida would never publish proHindu articles. How far is this true? I had written a rebuttal to a famous Telugu writer on Dharma Raju. No Telugu newspaper would publish it. One of the editors even laughed at me for suggesting he publish the article. So that is the lack of impartiality of Indian news papers, English or Telugu. Will the playing field be ever level in reporting proHindu articles. I came across an Israeli report on a protest meeting of 100000 Hibdus agianst Jihadists not reported in India. Very sad state of affairs.

  5. The article like this provides we, Hindus, ammunition to fight with these type of bugs like DP, SP, WD etc. What we lack teachers, mentors, guide who will show us the way how to attack these gangs and how to defend their attack. We have no clues where to start, what to read as we do not know which Ramayan and Mahabharat copy to pick from millions in net and market. Many of these copies could be injected with venom. So, author like Shri Sathchitanand has special role to educate us, armored us for ‘Kurukhestra’. Requesting to provide authenticate link or publication house to read Ramayan and Mahabharat.

    • Thank you for your kind thoughts. Sanatana Dharma not only accomodates diverse views, but also the scriptures are multi layered. Depending on the sadak’s eagerness to mine these gems, different understanding opens up. I try to stick with Valmiki Ramayana, but one must understand there is lots of knowledge and refinement that can come by reading Kamba Ramayana or Ramcharitmanas. Listening to traditional scholars who dissect different aspects of our itihas. I know for sure this tradition is still alive in Tamilnadu, Andhra and perhaps Karnataka. This is the easiest way to take a short cut.

      My experience is the more we study (not read).. this means reflecting and assimilating what we study is critical. If we rely on Sony TV or some one doing Sita Kahani to give us an authentic idea, we are in for big trouble. In our country there was a tradition that people used to daily read Ramayana and Mahabharata in the house. Being westernized we think that is silly.

      Vedas are definitely very esoteric. So Upanishads came to our aid, but as our generations got more tamasic, Krishna has given us the best digest Bhagavad Gita. Even that is difficult, so we have itihasas and puranas which are exactly the same teachings. But we believe some motivated idiot and call it myth. Itihasa itself means this is how they lived.. meaning history.

      Reading itihasas and BG (Several great commentaries exist, for a modern mind, I find many like Swami Chinmayananda) atleast weekly and thinking daily will be a great start. The knowledge will come by itself, it reveals as we engage. Svadyaya is a good place to begin. I will continue to share what little I know on the blog.

      Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa used to say that Bhagwan is more eager to meet us. For every step we take HE takes a thousand (in both directions, whether we go towards or against HIM).

      • I have not seen or read the article of DD about Buddha and Rama. What is the substance of the content of the article? Does DD say himself that Rama was mysogenist or he has titled his article to provoke and attract readership?

        • The reason for rebuttal is to put an end to this pattern of myth building by characters like DP. Even Sheldon Pollock, a good scholar with bad ideas, pioneered this. First write something which can be brushed aside. Then build on it as evidence. To me as I wrote in the article, to rebutt the lies in DP’s article will take another article. This one was focused on only his title.

          This pattern has been going on for so long that we have lost being sensitive or sensible when such lies are blatantly spread with strong motives.

          If he has titled to attract readership, that shows his level of scholarship. If he did it to provoke, I think he can be happy for stirring an hornet’s nest for his escape for such lies will become difficult from now on.

          But I believe he is doing it not only for building publicity, but also a cheap narrative that is determined to undermine our society, civilisation and culture.

          His work for several years in mythifying our history, our past and beliefs and that too on flimsy logic which can easily be broken with little or no effort has been damaging. This must be stopped and countered. DP, your time for myths and cock and bull stories is over.

  6. The author needs to be congratulated for putting the time and effort for carefully dissecting Pattanaik’s nonsense. Devdutt who has been cultivated by Wendy Doniger is not a historian and is definitely a Hindu phoebe like his paymaster Ms Doniger.

    Mr Devdutt who might have adopted Christianity, therefore targets Hinduism through his various theories and to a naive onlooker it would appear that Devdutt, a Hindu sounding name, is actually indulging in some kind of scholarship. It is no secret that many crypto Christians have kept Hindu names and I feel that this might be the case here too.

    One should also note that he is a homosexual and in order to look ‘normal’ he lied in bed, figuratively, with Western Academe, so that he could have legitimacy. This is more than inferiroty complex coupled with deep psychosis of a Homosexual mind that did not get it right. There are many other Homosexuals in the world who have contributed constructively, but we see he is a failed human being along with being a cooliee to the west.

    • How can we blame these characters when we do not take time to study our own scriptures? Who asked us to rename them as myths? We cannot fault our lack of sincerity and pin the blame elsewhere. We must do svadyaya and that will give enough ammo to take down these characters. If the archer misses the target, it cannot be the fault of the target.

      Let us correctly study these scriptures and take on the canards of the likes of DP. Dharmo rakshati rakshitah.. which implies that we must also take active role in dharma rakshana if we want dharma to protect us.

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