There was a wild outrage in India when this book was pulped in 2013 on grounds of offending the religious feeling of Hindus. That time i did scan some website on this book and read some excerpts and i did found those offensive. To cause selective offense is a sacred task of Indian intellectuals and for them it is a one way street, nevertheless i consider that all books contain some degree of divinity and truth and should be respected not pulped.
Rig Ved says "Let the noble ideas come from all directions" but Rig Ved is clueless about "not so noble ideas" and Rig Ved was composed about 3500 years back. Have we graduated from 'noble ideas' to 'ideas' in these 3500 years and if not then whats the point?
So i started reading this book last Monday with an open mind. Wendy Doniger starts this book with 'Egg' controversy (Some Hindu threw an egg on her during a lecture in London in 2003 chaired by William Dalrymple) and claims with self righteous arrogance that "Because of her efforts people who would otherwise go on thinking that Hinduism is nothing but a caste system that mistreats untouchables have come to learn about it and to admire the beauty, complexity and wisdom of the Hindu texts". Its like Hinduism is a handicapped religion or Hindus are an uneducated or an inarticulate lot.
There have been many materialistic interpretations of Indian history from D D Koshambi to Romila Thapar, adding to this glorious tradition of materialistic history this book introduces sexual interpretation of Hinduism through western eyes and lens.There is an over emphasis on sex/incest/rape in this book and she does not leave out even Ram, Shiva, Sita, Parvati, Durga from her focus but this is understandable. She is a western writer with no emotional or religious attachment to Hinduism. For her its very easy to say that Aryans were like Nazis without any evidence. It is a Freudian slip or i don't know.
I will first mention the factual errors and twisted interpretations (definitely not an exhaustive list) that i caught with little effort:
She mentions (chapter 6) that in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad (1.4.3-4) father God rapes his daughter. This is one of the many erroneous interpretations she would make in this book. Do your own research to find out the meaning of those hymns.
She writes (chapter 10) that Mahabharat is a tale of grotesque, sanctioned violence. It is far from truth. Pandavas and Krishn tried almost every resort before participating in the war. She writes that Satyavati gave birth to only son, everybody knows that Chitrangada and Vichitravirya were her sons from Shantanu.
She writes (chapter 16) that Khwaja Muinuddin Chisti settled in Pushkar, world knows that Ajmer was his place (bit far from Pushkar).
She writes (chapter 16) that in Vijaynagar temples were the least destroyed buildings by the confederacy of Muslim Kingdom after the gory battle of Talikota (1565). I myself have seen Hampi, almost all the temples are destroyed except one or two. It does not need super intelligent brain to see it.
She writes (chapter 19) that Guru Gobind Singh was assassinated in 1708 while attending the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb. It is a blatant untruth. Aurangzeb died in 1707. Muazzam (aka Bahadur Shah) was Mughal Emperor when Guru was assassinated.
She writes (chapter 21) that Rani Laxmi Bai was shot to death, again gross untruth. She committed suicide after suffering serious wounds.
I will not comment on her interpretations of Ramayan and Mahabharat (though i am qualified enough), neither i will comment on interpretations of Veds, Upanishads, Puranas etc (here i am not qualified enough).
She defends gory destruction of Hindu temples in a clever way by invoking the typical argument of Romila Thapar (that dominant religion appropriates the religious places of defeated religion. Hindus had done the same with Jains and Buddhists according to Wendy and Thapar both though there is little material evidence to confirm this). As usual she blames Hindu Right for all the ills propagating the cult of Dalrymple and Thapar.
Overall this book is a sexual overlay on the seminal work of Thapar on Ancient India. Almost all the concepts are same or similar and Wendy quotes Thapar very frequently. Its a kind of mutual admiration group (Wendy, Romila and Dalrymple). This book in totality is still a very good book. There are many alternative
interpretations that people should read and give a serious thought but too much
sex is indeed too much sex. I will still rate Thapar's book much higher than this sexual trash. But i again say that this book should not have been banned and i don't need Voltaire to defend my argument, my Veds and Upanishads are just fine.
Recommended (7/10)
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