Bowing: A Hindu View of Divinity All-Pervasive Part 1 

Bowing: A Hindu View of Divinity All-Pervasive Part 1 

On January 9, 2012 the then Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Mrs Kamla Persad Bissessar, bowed and touch the feet of the President of India, Pratibha Devisingh Patil. This respectful greeting is characteristically Hindu. What is interesting is that this natural outpouring of love, respect and reverence was seen by certain groups in our country as “unacceptable,” and “subservient.” On the radio there were loud voices condemning the Prime Minister’s act.

Touching of the feet— उपसङ्ग्रहणम् upasaṃgrahaṇaṃ in Sanskrit or pada sparśa in Hindi—is purely Hindu and is just one expression in a sequence of steps in bowing (which I will deal with shortly). But this sort of reaction does not surprise me in the least bit because I am well aware of the deeper maladies we have to address as a nation and a world. Fifty years of independence is no guarantee of maturity.

This sort of reaction is symptomatic of some of the deeper deficiencies we have to work on as a nation and indeed as a civilization. The reaction has its rudiments in one of the competing worldview which we encounter. There are two worldviews: one which is exclusive, which is characterised by the “I am right you are wrong” attitude, which says that either you are with us or against, which divides the world into watertight compartments of good and evil and excludes all that is perceived as evil.

The other worldview is overarching and inclusive. It recognizes that we all see the world in our own little way and so no one has the right to exclude any other person’s point of view because we consider it as “wrong” or “evil.” Just as we are supposed to allow someone their physical space we are supposed to allow them their mental space as well.

This is a highly philosophical point that I want you to pay attention to because on it hinges the greatest of global human challenges that we face—challenges which threaten to eradicate the species—like nuclear war, environmental depletion and so on.The former worldview has its foundations in dualism while the latter in the idea of oneness. In the former, God is seen as living in heaven. Man has dominion over the earth. Man is not of this world, his destination is heaven so the earth is not so important. It is only a pit-stop which we pass through once—hence the idea that we can ravage and plunder the earth.

In the latter worldview God is seen as immanent in the world. All things are intricately intertwined. The great Native American Chief, Seattle presented this worldview most lucidly when he wrote to the then American President in 1855: “The white man must treat the beasts of this land as his brothers. I am a savage and I do not understand any other way. I have seen a thousand rotting buffaloes on the prairies left by the white man who shot them from a passing train. I am a savage and I do not understand how the smoking iron horse (train) can be more important than the buffalo that we kill only to stay alive. What is man without the beasts? If all the beasts were gone, men would die from great loneliness of spirit, for whatever happens to the beast also happens to man. All are connected. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of the earth. The earth does not belong to man. Man belongs to the earth. Man did not weave the web of life; he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web he does to himself.”

This idea is echoed in the immortal verse of Tulsidas in the Ramcharitmanas:

सीय राममय सब जग जानी। करउँ प्रनाम जोरि जुग पानी।।

Knowing God to be present in everything, I put my hands together in an attitude of reverence and prostrate to all things in the Universe. (1.7.2)

To be continued… 

Source: Feature address delivered by Pujya Swami Prakashanandaji at Varsha Pratipada Sansad, 2012

Pujya Swami Prakashanandaji is a direct disciple of world renowned Swami Chinmayanandaji. He is the Head of Chinmaya Mission Trinidad & Tobago and Guyana with responsibility for the Chinmaya Mission’s works across the Caribbean and Latin America.