आगमे विश्वासटिप्पन्यः

Source: TW

Why do some, under a “śāstriya darśana” pretext, dismiss basic facts such as that the religion of the Vedasam̐hitās was primarily or started off primarily as Aindra? See below: 👇🏾 Even Skandapurāṇa recognizes & alludes to this rather obvious fact, expressly linking the Ṛṣis’ stutis & vākyas (Brāhmaṇas) with Aindra worship.

तस्मात् काल-मुखे सर्वे
पतिता नात्र संशयः॥
सर्वे श्रुतिपरा यूयम्
इन्द्राद्या देवता-गणाः॥ १०.७७ ॥
प्ररोचन-पराः सर्वे
क्षुद्राश् चेन्द्रादयो वृथा॥
नात्मानं च प्रपञ्चेन
वेत्सि त्वं हि शचीपते॥ १०.७८ ॥
कृतः प्रयत्नो हि महान्
अमृतार्थं त्वया शठ॥
अश्वमेध-शतेनैव
यद् राज्यं प्राप्तवान् असि॥
अपि तच् च पराधीनं
तन् न जानासि दुर्मते॥ १०.७९ ॥
यैर् वद-वाक्यैस् त्वं मूढ
संस्तुतोऽसि तपस्विभिः॥
ते मूढास् तोषयन्ति त्वां
तत्-तद्-रागपरायणाः॥ १०.८० ॥

This, of course, does not at all invalidate or render artificial or inauthentic later sampradāyas’ attempts to read Śiva- or Viṣṇu- paratvam into those mantras or Brāhmaṇa vākyas. The words of the Veda are latent with several meanings, waiting to be discovered. The Ṛṣis’ “authorial intent” while seeing/composing that mantra represents just one of those latent meanings (which existed even before that Ṛṣi, waiting to manifest through the Ṛṣi’s mind & voice in the course of ‘real’ time). Those who came later were privileged to see other meanings.

And at the end of the day, there can be no doubt that we attained our civilizational peak under the aegis of the Āgamika forms of the Dharma, primarily the Śaiva & Vaiṣṇava ones. We can accept the obvious fact of Aindra-Para beginnings without resorting to Indra-larping. We can go back to the perfect or near-perfect synthesis of the various strands of our Dharma achieved by the Āgamikas, while according Indra the respect he truly deserves.

@GhorAngirasa

I think across the old IE tradition, including its manifestation in the shruti, we see a certain coexisting diversity – the aindra “mainstream” &various focal systems whose evolutes displaced the former to take the mainstream in different IE successor peoples. I see a place for both new theologies that might resort either to re-interpretive conservatism or innovation today; however, I think in either case they must be grounded in both deep textual study of the expressions of our predecessors & an understanding of the spirit.

The latter is even more difficult than the former& requires a degree of immersion. Taking a leaf from a doyenne among our cultural cousins, emperor Julian, we could also be happy by simultaneously practicing multiple parallel systems going via the shruti & the tantra-s. Many H have been comfortable with such a scheme until not too long ago. We could name examples with rather different theologies but one which immediately comes to my mind is bhAskararAya makhIndra.