Kurukshetra War — 'The historicity of the Kurukshetra War is unclear.' According to Wikipedia that battle, if it was fought at all, would have been somewhere between 6000 BCE to 500 BCE. In a novel you can mention historical events to give a more realistic feel, and in religious apologetics, one can do the same thing. For the purposes of 'spiritual guidance' one can create a fictional setting in which to discuss various ideas. If the war actually took place, the most widely accepted date is 10th century BCE or 950 BCE, according to matching scanty archaeological evidence with things mentioned in the text. I do not think they ever found any real evidence of a war. Considering the supposed numbers of combatants, the lack of evidence is a point in favour of its not having happened.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <mjackson74@...> wrote : "the battle was an historical battle" By what proof other than your willingness to believe it as a part of your larger need to be Marshy's patsy? From: danfriedman2002 <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Friday, September 12, 2014 7:18 AM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: Why MMY's Bhagavad Gita will never be a classic. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <jr_esq@...> wrote : I have a copy of Chapter 7 of MMy's commentary. I got it from MUM Press a few years ago. They were supposed to publish incrementally the remaining chapters of the Gita, but they never did. IMO, one can probably read the other translations of the Gita and understand the message in the context of the ideas written by MMY about the beginning six chapters of the Gita. Dear jr_esq, I have Chapter 7. Chapter 8 has already been published and distributed mostly to Purusha. The remaining Chapters of English Translation AND Commentary are complete. Those later Chapter Translations and Commentaries are an upcoming MUM Course. The reason is that they were not carefully proofed and revised, so better to have them presented by a Professor. As for WMG's Post at the bottom of yours: In short I can say the entire first paragraph is false. The second paragraph is confused; the battle was an historical battle AND the allegory is told in that historical context. No, it is not a documentary. As to the statements made in paragraph 3: The Gita can be perceived from many perspectives (128)...think ffl - how many perspectives are here, not multiply by the number of States that consciousness assumes,,,and that number is...anybody? ...7. Thank you. As for WMG;s 'Thirdly' point: Hindus. originated in the Vedic tradition of knowledge. As I mentioned in my Post to Michael, who'd written his support of WBG's wrong-headed critiques, there are many quality scholarly works on this topic. Read one. ---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> wrote : Firstly, it was never completed as far as we know. We do know MMY did some translation sand commentarys of chapters 7-18 but we don't know which ones for sure and they were never published. The missing chapters of MMY's Gita were left in the hands of Charles Lutes and were mysteriously 'stolen' from him and have disappeared, presumably at least one person knows where they are (if you know let us all know). Secondly, and more importantly, MMY never really unfolds the allegory that the Bhagavad Gita IS. MMY suggests in his translation that when Krishna advised Arjuna to "...rise and fight", it was talking about an actual war that occurred in India in long gone days. (Think about how silly that sounds, a dialogue on an actual battlefield where Arjuna becomes self-realized and Krishna has a class on Indian philosophy, really??) That is incorrect, Vyasa's classic only uses that historical reference loosely to tell a more subtle esoteric battle, that is, the battle between good and evil waged on the field (kurushetra) of the body, mind and soul. Understanding the Sanskrit meanings of the words and characters in the script unfolds the esoteric meaning, only a really intuitive realized soul can properly understand Vyasa's meaning since Sanskrit words can have different meanings. MMY only refers to this connection, BUT HE NEVER UNFOLDS IT! Why? probably because he had an *agenda* in writing the book and never intended to do a comprehensive analysis of it. He also said if *time permitted*, (what, he was 93 when he died) in order to do justice to the subject he'd have to do a commentary on the Gita in light of ALL six systems of Indian philosophy (Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Sankhya, Yoga...etc.) which would equal 24 commentaries.......it never happened! Which is Absurd, IMO. Thirdly, even though TM is not taught in the context of Religion, is used to be! MMY said that TM is, I quote, "....the greatest blessing of the Vedas", (The Vedas MMY) and that "all Religions come from the *eternal Religion* of the Vedas". (MMY The Vedas). The TM technique may not be a Religion, and like a steering wheel may not be called a car, it certainly is central to the functioning of a car. That is the relationship of the TM technique to Religion. The advanced chapters of the Gita were too Religious sounding for MMY, IMHO. For instance the title of Chapter 16v21 is, "The Threefold Gate of Hell", I wonder why MMY didn't bless us with his commentary of this chapter...hummm?
