Friday, January 25, 2008

What were we like in 4th Century BC?

The other day I stumbled upon a nice blog that goes through some ancient Greek and Latin writings to tell us how we Indians used to perceive ourselves and what the world thought of us, way back in the 4th century BC just before and after the invasion of Alexander.

Here is the link:

http://arvindsharma.wordpress.com/2008/01/25/18-the-indian-self-image-in-the-fourth-century-bc/

The writings clearly show that even 2500 years back, we Indians had values that will do any civilisation proud. Also, Indians of that time had no civilisational memory that their ancestors had come from anywhere outside India. They and the Greeks considered ancient Indians as thoroughly indigenous, the salt of the land. This flies in the face of the controversial and now-debunked Aryan Invasion Theory popularised by some missionaries and Indian communist historians.

Even that time, the sources tell us, Indian kings refused to invade territories outside India because "it will be unjust." The sense of "dharma" was quite strong at that time and it seems the society had a keen sense of what is just and what is unjust. Seems like today's India again needs a strong dose of our ancient dharma.

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