Atlantis

A recent corporate honcho has built himself a modern-day citadel, christened, Atlantis. So what is with the name and where does it come from?

According to some writings of Plato, Greek philosopher, Atlantis was a mythical country in the middle of the modern day Atlantic Ocean. Atlantis comprised of intelligent people and was mineral rich country, of the size of a continent, which had it all – fame, wealth, and the wherewithal of a dream nation. They were supposed to be advanced in their agricultural processes, whereby, they had two harvests a year, as against one, in later times.

According to a myth, Poseidon, the God of Oceans, fell in love with a mortal, Cleito, who bore him sons (five sets of twins), and the eldest of them, Atlas, was the king of Atlantis. Atlantis rose in its stature till it followed the rules laid down by their ruling deity, Poseidon. But soon, the kings started living by their own rules and the success of the nation’s health had started to yield fruits of corruption. People were becoming greedy and corrupt by the day. All this angered the gods at Mount Olympus, headed by Zeus. Zeus and his gods decided to teach them a lesson, and sent in series of calamities, in the form of a volcanic eruption and huge tidal waves, to submerge the whole nation of Atlantis.

Atlantis is referred to as the forgotten civilisation and also stands for all things that began well, but was destined to be doomed, due to pride and corruption. This incident or the myth has led to many an expedition to find the remnants of the lost city, in the Atlantic, even today.

It is not known if Plato really believed in the myth or wove a tale as a lesson for the people, but it has a long lasting impression on people of Greece. Many scholars feel that Plato was painting an idea of an Ideal state and what happens when falls from grace due to slipping ideals.

With such a background of Atlantis, I wonder which aspect of Atlantis was behind the naming of a residence. I would think it must be the dream nation and its prosperity that it once stood for. What else?

Hanukkah

Hanukkah is a Jewish festival of lamps, celebrated for eight days and nights. It commemorates the miracle of oil, which is part of the Jewish lore.

The incident is supposed to have taken place around 165 BCE, a place near Jerusalem, which was taken over by the Syrians, under Alexander the Great. Accordingly all places of worship were converted to Greek temples. During once such incident, a Jewish temple was converted to a temple of Zeus, and to hurt the Jewish sentiments, pigs were sacrificed at the temple, which was a sacrilege for the Jews.

This continued till one day, a Jewish High Priest, by the name of Mattathias, and his five sons decided to revolt against the Greeks. They did not rest till they managed to get back the control and drive out the Syrian-Greeks. As a part of the ritual cleansing of the Jewish temple in Jerusalem, they decided to burn the ritual oil at the Temple for eight days. But they found that they had stock of oil for only one day. They nevertheless went ahead and started the ritual only to find that the small quantity of the oil, miraculously burnt for eight days. Since then Hanukkah is being celebrated to mark this miracle and the regaining of the Jewish temple.

During this festival, the traditional Hanukkiyah which is a candelabrum with eight candleholders in a row, with the ninth one being slightly elevated, is lit. The Hanukkiyah is lit for eight days, one on the first day, two on the second, till all eight are lit on the eighth day. As a part of the celebration, the children play the dreidel, which is a four-sided spinning top with Hebrew letters on each side. Children usually play the dreidel for chocolates, candies or just about anything.

Hanukkah is an important festival of the Jews and coming close to Christmas holidays, its importance is all the more great. However, there is no significance of the fact that Hanukkah is so close to Christmas, and it is purely coincidental. Hanukkah in Hebrew means ‘dedication’, which is a reminder to people that the festival is for the re-dedication of the Jewish temple after taking it back from the Syrian-Greeks.

Gods of Love

Greek mythology has Eros and sometimes better known as Cupid as god of Love. Eros is a handsome man (the word "erotic", meaning sexual love, comes from his name), who is the son of Aphrodite, who had fallen in love with Psyche. However, it is as Cupid that he is better known. Cupid is a small winged child, who is both very good looking and extremely mischievous, with a penchant for shooting love arrows blindly (thus giving the phrase – love is blind). The ‘victim’ of his arrows is supposed to fall in love with the very person they see after being hit by the arrows. Cupid is sometimes shown riding a dolphin.

Hindu mythology has Kamdev as the god of love, and he too is handsome, moves around with bow made of sugarcane, strung with a line of bees and his arrows are flower-tipped with desire. His wife is Rati (passion) and together they create love, desire and passion. Kamdev’s is shown riding a parrot. Kamdev is supposed to have been born from Lord Brahma’s heart and his main supporter is Vasanta (Lord of Springs).

According to a myth, Lord Shiva was engrossed in deep meditation after the death of Sati and a mighty asura needed to be killed by Shiva’s offspring. Shiva needed to be disturbed from his meditation to even look at Parvati. All the gods requested Kamdev to wake him up by shooting his desire-filled darts. Kamdev knew the risk on hand, but complied with the request. When Shiva was disturbed, he was angry and when he found out the god responsible for this, he opened his third eye, and reduced Kamdev to ashes. But by then Shiva was very agitated and was being overcome with desire and love for Parvati, whom he had seen on opening his eyes. Later, on seeing the sad state of Rati who could not come to terms with the outcome of such a noble act by her husband, Shiva agreed to restore Kamdev, but only in spirit, which implied that Kamdev did not represent only physical love, but also true love and affection. Thus Kamdev is also known as Ananga, the bodiless! His other names are Madan (one who intoxicates with love) and Manmatha (one who agitates the mind with love)

We can see that both Cupid/Eros and Kamdev have similarities. Besides being handsome and evoking love by shooting arrows, they too have their own love stories. Eros with Psyche and Kamdev with Rati. Overtime, the love they evoke has gone through a metamorphosis in its implications, but the original response of their arrows continue to be carnal love, as we see in the case of Eros himself and Lord Shiva and Parvati. Mythology has never looked down on carnal love; rather there are numerous instances of such love in all mythologies. However, with the rise of man establishing moral standards, such examples were given a coating of philosophical interpretation.

The Gift of Fire

According to a Greek Myth, Zeus, the King of all gods got bored with all the creation, and so decided to create living beings to inhabit the earth. So he gave the task of creating living beings to two brothers by the name of Prometheus and Epimetheus. Prometheus meant foresight and Epimetheus meant hindsight.

On earth, both started their creations. Prometheus made man, in the shape of the gods and Epimetheus made animals. On creation, Epinetheus expended all the gifts to be given, on the animals, without much left for man. Thus the animals were endowed with swiftness, cunningness, physical strength and protective fur. This left Prometheus literally nothing to be given to man as endowment. So Prometheus decided to teach man, the art of fire, which was known only to the gods in Mount Olympus. This angered Zeus to no end.

To show his gratitude for creation, Zeus sent a beautiful maiden by the name of Pandora, along with a box, with an instruction that the box should not be opened. Prometheus knew that Zeus was up to something and so he declined the gift, but Epimetheus not only accepted Pandora, but even got married to her not heeding to Prometheus’s warning.

Zeus was further offended by Prometheus’s refusal of the gift from the gods, and so he decided to punish him by chaining him to a rock in the Caucasus Mountains where every day and eagle would come and eat his liver, leaving only at night, when the liver would begin to grow again, only to be eaten again the next day. (Modern science tells us, that amongst all the body parts, liver is the only organ which has regenerative powers, seems as if the ancient Greeks knew about this aspect!)

On the other hand, Pandora got very curious to know what was in the box that she was not supposed to open. One day, the curiosity got the better of her and no sooner she opened the box, out came all the miseries – vice, labour, old age, insanity, illness and death. Pandora however, managed to shut the box, just before ‘hope’ could escape, and thus today amidst all the miseries, it is hope that sees man through. (It is from this act, that we get the phrase ‘opening a Pandora’s box’).

So just as Pandora weakened man with all the miseries she let loose, fire managed to see mankind through civilisations! In Greek Mythology, Prometheus is regarded as a hero for rebelling against Zeus and giving mankind the gift of Fire at the cost of risking his life.

Euthanasia

Thanatos is the Greek god of death and is the son of Nyx (night) and Erebos (darkness) and is the twin brother of Hypnos (sleep). As god of death, Thanatos’s siblings are Geras (old age), Oizys (suffering), Moros (doom), Apate (deception) and Nemesis (revenge). The association of Thanatos is with all things grim and negative. After all what else is death to a mortal? But, then Thanatos also has lent its name to Euthanasia – where ‘eu’ stands for ‘good’ and Thanatos for death – thus implying ‘good death’. Sometimes Thanatos was associated with peaceful death, as Keres stood for violent deaths!

A recent Hindi movie has fuelled an ongoing debate on Euthanasia, or ‘mercy-killing’ in common parlance. Let us see how the subject is seen in our myths.

Hinduism is aware of Prayopavesa, which stands for starving to death, in Sanskrit, or death by giving up food and water. However, Prayopavesa can be performed only by someone who has no desire to live or no responsibilities left towards the family or society at large and at times in cases of terminal disease. The phrase ‘desire to live’ is quite dubious as a reason, but we will leave this for the time being. According to the scriptures, the Bhagvata Purana was narrated when King Parikshit was observing Prayopavesa. A similar practice is found amongst the Jains, which is known as Santhara.

Another reference to such an act is Mahaprasthana, i.e. great departure, which leads to death. This was undertaken by those who did not believe in taking lives (even if it was their own), and so one proceeded on Mahaprasthana, which would eventually lead to death, due to reasons, not known or not found out ever.

History is witness to such acts by the likes of Veer Savarkar and Vinobha Bhave. Veer Savarkar is supposed to have written in an article, titled - 'Atma-hatya or Deh-tyaag', saying that Suicide was taking one’s own life, but renouncing life when it was not capable of functioning properly was a different matter altogether. Buddha and Mahavira are also supposed to have ended their lives on their own.

Are there any specific references of embracing death (if we simplify the term Euthanasia) in our Mythology? According to Ramayana, Mother Earth parted under Sita’s feet and she merged in the ground. Could this fantastic idea be an euphemism for embracing death? It further states, that Kush tried to save his mother, but failed. Again Valmiki’s Ramayan mentions that Ram took ‘jal samadhi’ by simply walking into the river Sarayu, but when Hanuman decided to join him, Ram stopped him from doing so. This shows that somewhere, embracing death was limited to few people and not people at large.

Another obvious reference to embracing death is that of Bhishmapitamah in Mahabharat. Though he had the power to choose when to die, he chose it after much suffering. A bed of arrows could imply severe bodily trouble, and embracing death, when he could take it no more.

Some compare Euthanasia with Suicide, calling it Legal Suicide. However, it is here that I beg to differ. Suicide is a matter of impulse, which is never a well-thought out decision, by a loser (be it loss of faith, trust, or material). But Euthanasia is a well-thought out decision and at times gives a chance to make a mid-course correction (if it is going the Prayopavesa way for example). But Suicide does not give you such options. Also Euthanasia is taken only under cases of severe or terminal illness. It is important to mention that Euthanasia is carried out by a medical practitioner, which again is a key differentiator from Suicide. Euthanasia is not a stand-alone concept; there are other issues like Voluntary vs. Involuntary Euthanasia, Active vs. Passive Euthanasia, which is beyond the scope of this article.

The subject has moral and ethical connotations and the debate needs to continue. I am not making a case for Euthanasia, but was only trying to see if there are any references available, which is not a justification for the act though. I insist that I am not posturing here, but only putting some facts on the table, or should I say, on your screens!