Surya Arghya, Offering Water to Sun

The majesty of the Indian Culture can be evaluated by the fact that the health of the body and mind along with the spiritual illumination of the intellect has been equitably corroborated through the religion. Offering water to the sun god is also considered a significant component of our religion. The modern science has authenticated the fact that the sun is a significant multitude of the life force. Hence it is a powerhouse of positive energy.

During the process of offering water to the sun god, the spectrum of sun-rays refract through the water impacting us positively from head to toe. As a result we automatically gain through ‘the water therapy of sun-rays.’ This process helps us miraculously not only in the intellectual upliftment of the individual but it also reflects enhancement of his acumen in decision making, in eye-sight, digestion, luster as well as splendor. On the whole the physical body remains hale & hearty. This therapy also safeguards the body from the effect of defiled & deformed gases. The sun-rays refracting through the water of libation are a vital source of vigour and beauty. The green, violet or of the sun are considered rich sources of anti-bacterial energy.It is a proven scientific fact that the early morning sun rays are good for the human being, after all human body is also a bundle of energy. The human body is made up of five things, air (vayu), water (jal), earth (prithvi), fire (energy) and space (aakash) and the cure of all the ailments of the body is amongst these five things only and the rays of the rising sun are one of these things. Many diseases can be cured by the use of sun rays e.g. ailments of the heart, eyes, jaundice, leprosy and weak mind. 

Rigveda says, it is sun that wakes one up from sleep. It is due to thesun that all can work and are active. All living beings of the creation depend on the sun. The sun removes physical, mental and spiritual weaknesses and makes one healthy and long lived. The seven colours of the sun are very good and important for the health. If early morning one has a bath and after offering prayers to the Lord one has sun bath and allows the sun rays to fall on one's body then one could free the body of all ailments and increase one's intelligence.

After offering water, the invocation of sun rays focused at the navel and the centre between the eye brows helps in the development of ‘Manipur Chakra’ &‘Agya Chakra’ respectively. It again helps in honing our acumen. So, immediately after the sun-rise, we should offer water (in a brass-jug) to the sun-god. At the time of offering water to the sun-god, one should reverentially pronounce the following ‘Surya Gayatri Mantra.’

‘Aum ÍdityÍy vidmahe bhÍskarÍye dhÐmahi,

tanno bhÍnuÏ pracodayÍt.’

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Mass-Energy Equivalence in Bhagavatgita

Krishna said in Gita...

Soul can neither be created or nor destroyed ..it just transfer from one body to another...that is from one form to another..one body to another...

Modern science says energy can neither be created or nor be destroyed it can only be changed from one form to another....

This shows that soul is nothing but energy...till it is there in our body we are alive...once it goes...we are nothing...so our Lord krishna knew it well before....Gita is nothing but science...science of life ..science of energy.....science of everything..

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Gayatri is not for Women?

Why gals are advised not to chant gayatri mantra???

There is a controversy existing that women should not recite/chant 'Gayatri'. As a matter of fact neither do the Vedic Scripts nor the Sanatana Dharma discriminate women. On the contrary, womanhood is held in the Highest Esteem, and women are respected as Maa, (Mother) irrespective of their age and status. Yes, you can call any woman your mother! In ancient days, women were the leading managers and heading their homes while their counterparts were scouting for daily needs. But why then are they not allowed to take part in the rituals? Why were/are they not allowed to chant some of the Vedic versus?

It is widely known that some of the Vedic Versus vibrations are so powerful in nature. Once a woman starts chanting these versus regularly, she is likely to lose her female-hood character and get manly tendencies developed in physical appearance . In majority of cases, it might cause hormone disturbances in the body's physical mechanism and disturb their menstrual cycle. In rare cases, a woman who chants these slokhas and versus frequently, even develops masculine character which allows growth of hair in their face & mustache! Imagine, if every woman developed such growth!

It is a fact that to keep women in their natural glory and beauty, the ancient scholars did not allow them to chant or recite these versus. They knew precisely all the effects and side effects of what they did. However, they were allowed to do so once they cross their menopause stage, then the chances of disturbances in their body mechanism were minimal. Also the Gland functional in their body stops, at certain age - any further physical growth is minimal. Certainly it was not for any discrimination's but purely on the aforesaid reasons and points.

I hope that this clarification stands valid even in this scientifically developed age. Every ritual and practice of this Great Hindu religion has a valuable hidden meaning. Unfortunately these were not carried on to the next generation that caused some imbalances in the society. Had it been given in full meaning, we very well could have avoided fanatics & half learnt scholars who now dictate and discriminate women on so many counts.

Fine, now for the matter we need to compare it with human; hormone, the thyroid and other functional glands that produces certain liquid proposition, depending on every individual's body nature is, varying one for male & female. Why, even the Vocal Chord which produces the sound effect in our body too has different functional values for male & female. Apart from the above, the menstrual cycle, the more complicated one in nature, which causes some sort of discharge and with extended period of up to five days; In normal course, this cycle may be regular for every fittest woman. But when compounded with some anxiety, tension, fear and pressure, the period is disturbed with varying fluctuation. This is what the science elaborates. When the aquatic or sound vibrations causes some disturbances in the chemical proposition in mind and body, then the abnormality begins. But it is not just sudden and immediate certain. Where in, the vibrations causes gradual but determined effect in one's analogies of human anatomy!

The reason quoted for women not to recite or chant the versus with stronger power vibrations are thus affects the nerve system to weaken, then the gland functional causes more abnormalities and compounded with menstrual course disturbances. This might cause frequent health set back for a women, if she chants or recites some of the slokhas like Gayatri very often.So gals if you want to recite this mantra u can recite only 5 times a day with low pitch of voice because Gayatri mantra gives you a confident to face this world .But dont chant more than that.

Remember gals one thing, Gayatri maa is goddess and to ask for knowledge, strength and strong determination man has to chant this mantra that too they have to chant for goddess that is female , because we gals are already gifted with all above things except physical strength,which we can easily gain by yoga's and self confident.Gals your health is more important because you are the one who brings new life into this world,healthy women can only give healthy and prosperous future to country..

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Word Gayatri, Absolute Devinity

Why is Gayatri represented as a female deity? 

Ans. Several people say that when masculine words have been used in Gayatri how can it be said Gayatri Mata? It should be understood that the Absolute Divinity it represents, is all pervasive and formless. It is beyond gender. In scriptures both masculine and feminine words are used for fire, air etc. The famous Sanskrit couplet which is a prayer to God says, ‘Oh God, you are mother, you are father (Twameva Mata-cha Pita Twameva).’ Literally, Savita may be called masculine, but its power, Savitri is feminine. These allegorical descriptions in the scriptures should be taken as such, and not used to score declamatory points.Shiva is called masculine but his power shakti is Feminine ...This is great respect give to womanhood in ancient india....

Oh women ..you are only shakti ...you are only savitri..you are only saraswati..you are only Lakshmi.

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Perfumes in Ancient India

Many present day perfumes had existed India since ancient times and perhaps had originated in ancient India

The distillation of scents, perfumes and fragrant liquids and ointments was one area where the knowledge of chemistry was applied in India since ancient times. In fact the very word 'scent' which is of unexplained origin according to the Oxford Dictionary, is possibly derived from the Sanskrit term Sugandha which literally means 'good or aromatic paste'.

This word could have been transmitted to European languages through the Greek language which has borrowed (and lent) many words from Sanskrit. Other instances of such transmission are the English words like 'cotton' which is derived from the Sanskrit Karpasa or the word 'sugar' derived from the Sanskrit Sharkara, etc. 

In ancient times perfumes and fragrant ointments were of two type viz., Teertha (liquids) and Gandha (slurries or ointments). During the coronation Kings or during any auspicious occasion person was sprinkled with aromatic oils. Fragrant ointments based on sandalwood were applied during ceremonial bathing. Even today during some festivals like Diwali aromatic slurries and pastes are prepared out of a powder called Sugandhi, Ubtan and are used during the ceremonial bath which is taken during that festival. Even in other religious rites, Sandalwood, Ochre and Camphor are traditionally used by Hindus.

Sandalwood: Since very early times Sandalwood and Sandalwood oil were items of export. The Greek text of the 1st century A.D., Periplus mentions sandalwood as one of the items being imported from India. The word Sandal (wood) is derived from the Latin terms Santalum Album or Santalacae. These terms used by the Romans to describe sandalwood were, according to the Oxford Dictionary, derived from the Sanskrit term Chandana, for sandalwood.

The Sandalwood tree is native to India and is found mainly in South-western India in the state of Karnataka. Sandalwood has been a known item of export from India since ancient times. Authors of Sanskrit texts on botany which in Sanskrit is called Vanaspati-Shastra had classified Sandalwood into three types viz. white sandalwood Shrikanda (which perhaps is an abbreviation of the term Shewta-Chandana ), the second is yellow sandalwood or Pitta-Chandana and the last is red sandalwood or RaktaChandana

The reference to Sandalwood in the Periplus is perhaps the earliest available western reference to Sandalwood. It has been mentioned in later times by Comas Indiwpleustes in the 6th century A.D. as Tzandana and thereafter it is frequently referred to by Arab traders. Oil was also extracted from Sandalwood. This oil which was a thick but refined liquid was extracted in specially constructed oil mills called Teyl-Peshani and Teylena-Lip. The oil extracted from these mills was a thick, dark yellow liquid. Alongwith Sandalwood, the Sandalwood oil was also an item of export from India during ancient times. Sandalwood oil was mainly bought by the Romans between the 1st and 3rd centuries A.D.*

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Ship Building, Navigation in ancient India

India has had a maritime history dating back to around 4,500 years, since the Indus Valley Civilization. There are many references of the maritime trade activities of India in ancient Sanskrit and Pali scriptures. India had trade with several nations like Cambodia, Java, Sumatra, Borneo, China, South American 

countries and Mesopotamia (Greece). Excavations undertaken in Mohenjodero (an Ancient archaeological site, now in Pakistan) refer to sailing ships and references to sea ships are also found in the paintings at the world famous caves in Ajanta. 

Some of the prime examples of Indian contribution to the science of Navigation and the technique of ship building include:

• The word Navigation is derived from the Sanskrit word Navgath. Navigation, as a science originated during the Indus valley civilization some 5000 years ago.

• The world’s first tidal dock was built in Lothal around 2500 BC during the Harappan civilisation at Lothal near the present day Mangrol harbour on the Gujarat coast. 

• Emperor Chandragupta Maurya (4th century BC) had an entire state department for sailing activities and appointed Navadhyaksha (Sailing Superintendent) for the same.

• Images of ships are observed to be carved on the Sanchi stupa at Bodhgaya suggests the use of huge ships for overseas trade during those times.

• Ancient Indians were also probably the first to use maritime instruments like Sextants (used to measure angles of elevation above the horizon) and the Mariners compass (known as the Maccha Yantra in Sanskrit).

All these evidences clearly point to the fact that the science of Navigation and Ship Building progressed in India thousands of years ago and made maritime trade possible. Indians pioneered the science of Navigation that has helped develop modern trade and transport activities by sea. The trade which India carried on since ancient times with different countries around the world through ocean routes also helped to introduce items like cotton, pepper and other spices to the world.

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Cosmology in hinduism

Nancy Wilson Ross (1901 -1986) made her first trip to Japan, China, Korea and India in 1939. She was the author of several books including The World of Zen and Time's Left Corner. Miss Ross lectured on Zen Buddhism at the Jungian Institute in Zurich. She served on the board of the Asia Society of New York which was founded by John D. Rockefeller III since its founding in 1956 and was on the governing board of the India Council. In private life she was known as Mrs. Stanley Young.

She has written:

"Anachronistic as this labyrinthine mythology may appear to the foreign mind, many of India's ancient theories about the universe are startlingly modern in scope and worthy of a people who are credited with the invention of the zero, as well as algebra and its application of astronomy and geometry; a people who so carefully observed the heavens that, in the opinion of Monier-Williams, they determined the moon’s synodical revolution much more correctly than the Greeks."

" Many hundreds of years before those great European pioneers, Galileo and Copernicus, had to pay heavy prices in ridicule and excommunication for their daring theories, a section of the Vedas known as the Brahmanas contained this astounding statement: 

“The sun never sets or rises. When people think the sun is setting, he only changes about after reaching the end of the day and makes night below and day to what is on the other side. Then, when people think he rises in the morning, he only shifts himself about after reaching the end of the day night, and makes day below and night to what is on the other side. In truth, he does not see at all.” 

"The Indians, whose theory of time, is not linear like ours – that is, not proceeding consecutively from past to present to future – have always been able to accept, seemingly without anxiety, the notion of an alternately expanding and contracting universe, an idea recently advanced by certain Western scientists. In Hindu cosmology, immutable Brahman, at fixed intervals, draws back into his beginning less, endless Being the whole substance of the living world. There then takes place the long “sleep” of Brahaman from which, in course of countless aeons, there is an awakening, and another universe or “dream” emerges. " 

"This notion of the sleeping and waking, or contracting and expanding, of the Life Force, so long a part of Hindu cosmology, has recently been expressed in relevant terms in an article written for a British scientific journal by Professor Fred Hoyle, Britain’s foremost astronomer. " 

Lord Vishnu is said to rest in the coils of Ananta, the Cosmic couch, the great serpent of Infinity, while he waits for the universe to recreate itself. 

***

"Plainly, contemporary Western sciences description of an astronomical universe of such vast magnitude that distances must be measured in terms as abstract as light-years is not new to Hinduism whose wise men, millennia ago, came up with the term kalpa to signify the inconceivable duration of the period elapsing between the beginning and end of a world system. 

It is clear that Indian religious cosmology is sharply at variance with that inherited by Western peoples from the Semites. On the highest level, when stripped of mythological embroidery, Hinduism’s conceptions of space, time and multiple universes approximate in range and abstraction the most advanced scientific thought. 

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Woman according to Sanatana Dharma

- The Wisdom of The Vishnu Purana

The Union of Man and Woman 

She is Language, he is Thought

She is Prudence, he is Law

He is Reason; she is Sense

She is Duty; he is Right

He is Will; she is Wish

He is Pity; she is Gift

He is Song; she is Note

She is Fuel; he is Fire

She is Glory; he is Sun

She is Motion; he is Wind

He is Owner; she is Wealth

He is Battle ; she is Might

He is Lamp; she is Light

He is Day; she is Night

He is Justice; she is Pity

He is Channel; she is River

She is Beauty; he is Strength

She is Body; he is Soul

In Hinduism, all power, shakti, is female. So, the female represents the totality of the power, and the male is imaged as the agent of the female. Also, in Hinduism, the sun is female and the moon is male; he is born of her, dies into her, and is born of her again every month. Shiva, this great power, is the moon god. Parvati, his wife, is the sun power. And although the worship in the masculine-oriented action systems in India is directly to Shiva, it's to the goddess Kali, that the worship finally goes. 

So that, actually, in India, Kali is the great divinity. .....the Hindu goddess Kali...is shown standing on the prostrate form of the god Shiva, her spouse. She brandishes the sword of death, i.e., spiritual discipline. The blood-dripping human head tells the devotee that "he that loseth his life for her sake shall find it." The gestures of "fear not" and "bestowing boon" teach that she protects her children, that the pairs of opposites of the universal agony are not what they seem, and that for one centered in eternity the phantasmagoria of temporal "goods" and "evil" is but a reflex of the mind-as the goddess, herself, though apparently trampling down the god, is actually his blissful dream. 

Girls had upanayana performed for them and carried out the sandhya rites. A young daughter who has observed brahmacarya should be married to a bridegroom who is learned like her." (Yajur Veda VIII.1). 

The Rig Veda too places woman on a high pedestal of sublimity: Yatr nariyastu poojayante ramante tatr devah, where woman is worshipped, Gods preside there.

It is significant to note that only Hindus worship God in the form of Divine Mother. In Hinduism the deities for knowledge, learning and material wealth are female and not male. The past social inconsistencies and injustices that did not arise from Hindu scriptures, but from humans who failed to correctly incorporate the teachings of the scriptures, such as the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita, into their social philosophy. 

This concept of the spiritual equality of souls naturally influenced the status of women on an individual and social level.

"Where women are honored there the gods are pleased; but where they are not honored no sacred rite yields rewards," declares Manu Smriti (III.56) a text on social conduct. 

"Women must be honored and adorned by their fathers, brothers, husbands and brothers-in-law, who desire their own welfare." (Manu Smriti III, 55)

" Where the female relations live in grief, the family soon wholly perishes; but that family where they are not unhappy ever prospers." (Manu Smriti III, 57). 

"The houses on which female relations, not being duly honored, pronounce a curse, perish completely as if destroyed by magic." (Manu Smriti III, 58)

" Hence men who seek their own welfare, should always honor women on holidays and festivals with gifts of ornaments, clothes, and dainty food." (Manu Smriti III, 59)

In an old Shakta hymn it is said - Striyah devah, Striyah pranah "Women are Devas, women are life itself."

(source: Bharata Shakti - By Sir John Woodroffe p. 95).

"If a husband dies, a wife may marry another husband. 

"If a husband deserts his wife, she may marry another." (Manu, chapter IX, verse 77).

(source: Hindu Superiority - By Har Bilas Sarda p. 95).

In the Vedas, she is invited into the family 'as a river enters the sea' and 'to rule there along with her husband, as a queen, over the other members of the family. (source: Atharva Veda xiv. i. 43-44).

"Countries such as France or the United States, who are often preaching India on "women's rights" never had a woman as their top leader (President), whereas India had Indira Gandhi ruling with an iron hand for nearly twenty years;even women president Pratibha patil, and proportionately they have less MP's than India, which is considering earmarking 33 % of seats in Parliament for women, a revolution in human history!" Guys whatever they did is not question but still we are far better than those countries who blame us saying we dont have women rights..even countries like Pakistan,bangladesh,srilanka,Thailand,Mynmar had women on topmost position...we have everything ...whatever we need is just little more respect for women in these present days.

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