Applications of Vedic Wisdom in Modern Education

Did you know that one of the names of India is Vedabhoomi – The Land of Knowledge?

If you go back in time around 1000 AD- long before the Islamic invasion and European colonization, people from Western Europe, Persia and China travelled to India to understand and obtain the knowledge system of this land.

If you refer to some of the books written by Megasthenes or Hiuen Tsang and their description of India of that time, you’ll get to know that the knowledge of ancient India seems like one of the most advanced and comprehensive education system of it’s time. I am not referring to the intervention of tech with the word “advanced”, but the very profound thought behind the construct of the same..

There are possibly three ways left to know to some extent what was there in the ancient education system in India.

1.      INSCRIPTIONS ON TEMPLES

2.      MANUSCRIPTS

3.      GURU SHISHYA PARAMPARA

There are six broad categories/scriptures in largely describing the foundation of ancient Indian education system largely contributing in the space of Philosophy, Biology, Mathematics, Physics, Astronomy, Healthcare, Linguistics and many more branches of knowledge.

1. SHRUTI

Shruti is essentially the set of four Vedas written in Vedic Sanskrit and largely describing various aspects of human wellbeing towards spirituality.

Now let’s dive deep and understand the structure of each Vedas to get further sense of how to interpret them. Each of the four vedas are the constructs of four internal blocks and six external blocks.

The 4 internal blocks Aranyaka, Brahmana, Samhita and Upanishads describes the theosophical, philosophical and psychological anatomy of the cosmos largely describing the nature and the fundamentals of human existence.

The 6 External blocks are called as Vedangas and they complement the knowledge framework of Vedas with different and intricate specialization of each..

Now over and above these four vedas and six vedangas – there are four Upavedas also dealing with different Indian education at different level.

2. SMRUTI

Smruti is authored by the sages and saints who mastered all the four Vedas (Shruti) and brought in the their experiences and revelations. For the sake of simplicity, we can consider Smruti as the thesis by the sages on different branches of study like Philosophy, Science, Mathematics, Theology etc.. and it largely serves Shruti like a final authority acting as a “proper subset.

As per the wiki, there are 18 such Smruti’s written by different Rishi’s explaining different branches of knowledge that largely forms the summary of Shruti.

I’ll talk about Puranam, Itihasam, Aagamam and Siddhantam in my upcoming blogs.

So far, I covered two major sections of ancient Indian education system “Shruti and Smruti”.

My objective was to simply help you get a fair idea of the depth and width of ancient Indian education system. How profoundly it was well thought through looking at all the dimensions of human development with the sense of inclusivity. If you go through some of the original “or carefully verified translated” documents and try to understand the thought- you’ll clearly see that ancient wisdom and knowledge was all about “asking questions” and exploring dimensions of human wellbeing.

Keeping the same thought in mind, I asked myself –

HOW CAN WE MAKE USE OF THAT KNOWLEDGE IN TODAY’S CONTEXT?

What you are going to read next is an attempt to address the same..

Imagine the confluence of Vedic knowledge and modern technology to address contemporary management education concerns

I strongly believe that purpose of knowledge is to avoid instilling dread in this vast body of knowledge. We may end up surrounded by an ocean of free knowledge, but not consumable wisdom. As a result, the goal should be to instil confidence in participants in their ability to use information to live a happy life.

For the same reason, the educational system must work in tandem with technological advancements to create a holistic model that encourages the development of all human senses as a way of cognition.

Make it possible for them to instil experiential wisdom in order for them to be able to make use of this vast information ocean. The role of education would be similar to that of a cloud that absorbs water from the sea. ocean and shower drinkable water on us.

Importance of Values and Ethics in elementary education:

I think  Individual personal improvement was the primary goal of ancient education. Some of the Vedic Ethos pertinent to management revealed by ancient scriptures are as follows (I am sure there are many more..)

Conclusion: Since ancient times, teaching and learning methods have changed dramatically. Students viewed their gurus as the ultimate authority throughout the ancient time, and they also served them. Students saw their teachers only as instructors during the mediaeval period, which influenced the teacher-student relationship even more.

Students nowadays regard their teachers to be informal instructors or friends, and I am confident that in the future, both teachers and students will teach and learn from one other in an equal environment.