Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Chanakya

en.wikipedia.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 78 posts

Re: Chanakya

#61

Post by skywave1 »

humility wrote: post #14
actuator wrote: post #12

Other than his works, he was the prime minister in Maurya empire, credited with its rise. Maurya empire is considered to be one of the greatest Indian empires along with Guptas(known for progress in science, medicine) and Cholas(mercantile empire crossing oceans). It spread west upto present day Afghanistan at its peak. Maurya king Ashoka is quite famous because of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashoka#Kalinga_w…

Interestingly enough he became politically active after India's defeat at the hands of Alexander the Great, and aided in creating an empire that unified the whole of India, which was unprecedented until then.

> aided in creating an empire that unified the whole of India.

The geographical area under present day India was never under a single kingdom/government/flag until 1950s. During the Maurya Empire, the present day Kerala, Tamil Nadu and parts of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana were not a part of the empire.

Even when major parts of India was a British colony, some territories were controlled by the French (Pondichery), Portuguese (Goa) and the Nizams.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurya_Empire#/media/File:Maur...

Re: Chanakya

#62

Post by pratik661 »

dr_dshiv wrote: post #34

Socrates reportedly met an Indian philosopher in Athens, according to Aristoxenus, student of Aristotle [1]. Some of Ashoka's pillars had Greek inscriptions [2] Greece and India used to share borders. A Greek king became Buddhist. [2] [1] https://www.researchgate.net/publication/249942188_Some_Rema... [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Buddhism

There were lots of Greek speakers in India at the time. There was an Indo-Bactrian Greek kingdom in modern day Afghanistan and Pakistan long after the Greeks were conquered by the Romans (around 300 CE). A lot of early Buddhists were Greek. Lots of Indian statues have Greek style columns. I'm still mind blown by how connected the ancient world was.

Re: Chanakya

#63

Post by jbgud »

deepglacier wrote: post #55
dr_dshiv wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> actual classical philology is dying. Not only are the manuscripts not being adequately studied, but deep practical knowledge of Sanskrit is dying out, too. I've also heard that there is anger when non-Indian scholars study Sanskrit. Cambridge shut down their Sanskrit program, after 150 years. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/04/12/scholars-who-...

The reason for this anger is the fear of losing control of the narrative. By keeping the Sanskrit scriptures arcane, they can build their own narratives around it. But when scholars start studying those text, the cat will be out of the bag. They may feel that it is harmful to the Hindutva interests when scholars write about the procedure for cow sacrifice mentioned in Yajur Veda or the racism and misogyny perpetuated…

Scholars studying Hindu texts is not offensive to Hindus. What is though, is the racist perversion that some of them like Doniger make.

Doniger's book is not "banned". It was withdrawn by the publisher - because it was offensive. Details in same wiki link.

Another such "scholar" wrote extremely offensive passage on Lord Ganesha and got away with it.[1] Hindus have tolerated abuse for so long and they continue to do so. Try letting cats out of the bag on Abrahmic religions.

[1] https://hwpi.harvard.edu/pluralismarchive/news/hindu-student...

Re: Chanakya

#64

Post by jbgud »

bluetreeroot wrote: post #60
truth_be_told wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your post is disingenuous and ignorant. Like most people who have not studied the subject, you have gone with "sound bites" highlighting the negatives without any context thus distorting the whole discourse. In the interest of "personal edification" i suggest a study of the following; Do you know that there are many texts called "Dharmasutras" (your cherry-picked quote is from Gautama's)? Do you know how the concept…

> you have gone with "sound bites" highlighting the negatives without any context thus distorting the whole discourse. Please provide some context around the following texts from Dharmasutra. 1) Criminal and Civil Law: "If he (Sudra) has sex with an Arya woman, his penis should be cut off and all his property should be confiscated." (Verse 12.1) 2) Contact with Impure Persons: "When a man touches an outcaste, a Canda…

Selective reading of texts that are thousands of years old - to bash modern Hindus that do not believe in any of these.

Re: Chanakya

#65

Post by truth_be_told »

bluetreeroot wrote: post #60
truth_be_told wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your post is disingenuous and ignorant. Like most people who have not studied the subject, you have gone with "sound bites" highlighting the negatives without any context thus distorting the whole discourse. In the interest of "personal edification" i suggest a study of the following; Do you know that there are many texts called "Dharmasutras" (your cherry-picked quote is from Gautama's)? Do you know how the concept…

> you have gone with "sound bites" highlighting the negatives without any context thus distorting the whole discourse. Please provide some context around the following texts from Dharmasutra. 1) Criminal and Civil Law: "If he (Sudra) has sex with an Arya woman, his penis should be cut off and all his property should be confiscated." (Verse 12.1) 2) Contact with Impure Persons: "When a man touches an outcaste, a Canda…

[flagged]

Re: Chanakya

#66

Post by rudiv »

jbgud wrote: post #63
deepglacier wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason for this anger is the fear of losing control of the narrative. By keeping the Sanskrit scriptures arcane, they can build their own narratives around it. But when scholars start studying those text, the cat will be out of the bag. They may feel that it is harmful to the Hindutva interests when scholars write about the procedure for cow sacrifice mentioned in Yajur Veda or the racism and misogyny perpetuated…

Scholars studying Hindu texts is not offensive to Hindus. What is though, is the racist perversion that some of them like Doniger make. Doniger's book is not "banned". It was withdrawn by the publisher - because it was offensive. Details in same wiki link. Another such "scholar" wrote extremely offensive passage on Lord Ganesha and got away with it.[1] Hindus have tolerated abuse for so long and they continue to do s…

I guess the withdrawal of Doniger's book had nothing to do with violent threats and protests against the publisher? Dark western forces at work in false flag attacks, I presume.

Re: Chanakya

#67

Post by rudiv »

jbgud wrote: post #64
bluetreeroot wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you have gone with "sound bites" highlighting the negatives without any context thus distorting the whole discourse. Please provide some context around the following texts from Dharmasutra. 1) Criminal and Civil Law: "If he (Sudra) has sex with an Arya woman, his penis should be cut off and all his property should be confiscated." (Verse 12.1) 2) Contact with Impure Persons: "When a man touches an outcaste, a Canda…

Selective reading of texts that are thousands of years old - to bash modern Hindus that do not believe in any of these.

Jai hind ji! May I get a handout from the IT cell?

Re: Chanakya

#68

Post by jbgud »

rudiv wrote: post #66
jbgud wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scholars studying Hindu texts is not offensive to Hindus. What is though, is the racist perversion that some of them like Doniger make. Doniger's book is not "banned". It was withdrawn by the publisher - because it was offensive. Details in same wiki link. Another such "scholar" wrote extremely offensive passage on Lord Ganesha and got away with it.[1] Hindus have tolerated abuse for so long and they continue to do s…

I guess the withdrawal of Doniger's book had nothing to do with violent threats and protests against the publisher? Dark western forces at work in false flag attacks, I presume.

Doniger and the publisher were taken to court like any civil society would. Publisher chose to drop the book instead of facing legal consequences.

By the way, another publisher did publish the same book in India. Any neutral sources for the so called "violent threats"?

One of her book titles literally is "Eroticism in the Mythology of Siva" [1] And yet, there were no riots or burning down the publisher or the cancel culture that Hindu-phobes routinely engage in.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendy_Doniger

Re: Chanakya

#69

Post by jbgud »

rudiv wrote: post #67
jbgud wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Selective reading of texts that are thousands of years old - to bash modern Hindus that do not believe in any of these.

Jai hind ji! May I get a handout from the IT cell?

Right, resort to personal attacks when you have nothing left to argue.

Re: Chanakya

#70

Post by yumraj »

srean wrote: post #58
yumraj wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

India was not defeated by Alexander, only some border states. He never really entered today's India. Nandas would have obliterated Alexander had he dared to face them.

Speculations (about and outcome of a war between Nanadas and Alexander) are best done with some statistics on their respective military prowess, rather than vapid saber rattling.

per Wikipedia[0] According to the Greek sources, the Nanda army was supposedly five times larger than the Macedonian army.

Nandas were obviously familiar with their own terrain, while Macedonians were not.

The battle with Porus, who was ruling a tiny border state had an army at least in the same order of magnitude as Alexander, who was aided by some of the other local rulers.

If Alexander had a hard time wining against Porus, we can simply make some logical assumptions about how he would have fared against a much much superior force, no vapid sable rattling is required.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_campaign_of_Alexander_t...

Post reply on HN