英文演讲之“东西方神话”Devdutt Pattanaik East vs. West -- the myths tha

Devdutt Pattanaik: East vs. West -- the myths that mystify

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About this talk

Devdutt Pattanaik takes an eye-opening look at the myths of India and of the West --

and shows how these two fundamentally different sets of beliefs about God, death and

heaven help us consistently misunderstand one another.

About Devdutt Pattanaik

Devdutt Pattanaik looks at business and modern life through the lens of mythology.

Transcript

To understand the business of mythology and what a Chief Belief Officer is supposed

to do, you have to hear a story of Ganesha, the elephant- headed god who is the scribe

of storytellers, and his brother, the athletic warlord of the gods, Kartikeya. The two

brothers

one

day

decided

to

go

on

a

race,

three

times

around

the

world.

Kartikeya

leapt on his peacock and flew around the continents and the mountains and the oceans.

He went around once, he went around twice, he went around thrice. But his brother,

Ganesha,

simply

walked

around

his

parents

once,

twice,

thrice,

and

said,

won.

around 'my world.'

If you understand the difference between 'the world' and 'my world' you understand

the difference between logos and mythos. 'The world' is objective, logical, universal,

factual,

scientific.

'My

world'

is

subjective.

It's

emotional.

It's

personal.

It's

perceptions, thoughts, feelings, dreams.

It is the belief system that we carry. It's the

myth that we live in.

'The world' tells us how the world functions, how the sun rises, how we are born. 'My

world'

tells

us

why

the

sun

rises,

why

we

were

born.

Every

culture

is

trying

to

understand

itself,

do

we

exist?

And

every

culture

comes

up

with

its

own

understanding of life, its own customized version of mythology.

Culture is a reaction to nature, and this understanding of our ancestors is transmitted

generation

from

generation

in

the

form

of

stories,

symbols

and

rituals,

which

are

always indifferent to rationality. And so, when you study it, you realize that different

people of the world have a different understanding of the world. Different people see

things differently: different viewpoints.

There is my world and there is your world, and my world is always better than your

world, because my world, you see, is rational and yours is superstition, yours is faith,

yours is illogical. This is the root of the clash of civilizations. It took place, once, in

326 B.C. on the banks of a river called the Indus, now in Pakistan. This river lends

itself to India's name. India. Indus.

Alexander, a young Macedonian, met there what he called a

means

naked,

wise

man.

We

don't

know

who

he

was.

Perhaps

he

was

a

Jain

monk, like Bahubali, over here, the Gomateshwara Bahubali whose image is not far

from Mysore. Or perhaps he was just a yogi, who was sitting on a rock, staring at the

sky, and the sun, and the moon.

Alexander

asked,

are

you

doing?

and

the

gymnosophist

answered,

experiencing nothingness.

Alexander

said,

am

conquering

the

world.

And

they

both

laughed.

Each

one

thought that the other was a fool. The gymnosophist said,

world?

It's

pointless.

And

Alexander

thought,

is

he

sitting

around,

doing

nothing? What a waste of a life.

To understand this difference in viewpoints we have to understand the subjective truth

of Alexander: his myth, and the mythology that constructed it. Alexander's mother, his

parents, his teacher Aristotle told him the story of Homer's

great hero called Achilles, who, when he participated in battle, victory was assured,

but

when

he

withdrew

from

the

battle,

defeat

was

inevitable.

was

a

man

who could shape history, a man of destiny, and this is what you should be, Alexander.

That's what he heard.

should

you

not

be?

You

should

not

be

Sisyphus,

who

rolls

a

rock

up

a

mountain all day only to find the boulder rolled down at night. Don't live a life which

is monotonous, mediocre, meaningless. Be spectacular! -- like the Greek heroes, like

Jason, who went across the sea with the Argonauts and fetched the golden fleece. Be

spectacular

like

Theseus,

who

entered

the

labyrinth

and

killed

the

bull- headed

Minotaur. When you play in a race, win! -- because when you win, the exhilaration of

victory is the closest you will come to the ambrosia of the gods.

Because, you see, the Greeks believed you live only once and when you die, you have

to

cross

the

River

Styx,

and

if

you

have

lived

an

extraordinary

life,

you

will

be

welcomed to Elysium, or what the French call

lysé

es

heaven of the heroes.

But these are not the stories that the gymnosophist heard. He heard a very different

story.

He

heard

of

a

man

called

Bharat,

after

whom

India

is

called

Bhārata.

Bharat

also

conquered

the

world.

And

then

he

went

to

the

top-most

peak

of

the

greatest

mountain of the center of the world called Meru. And he wanted to hoist his flag to

say,

was here

first.

But

when he reached the mountain

peak, he found the peak

covered with countless flags of world-conquerors before him, each one claiming

was here first' ... that's what I thought until I came here.

of infinity, Bharat felt insignificant. This was the mythology of the gymnosophist.

You see, he had heroes, like Ram -- Raghupati Ram and Krishna, Govinda Hari. But

they were not two characters on two different adventures. They were two lifetimes of

the same hero. When the Ramayana ends the Mahabharata begins. When Ram dies,

Krishna is born. When Krishna dies, eventually he will be back as Ram.

You see, the Indians also had a river that separates the land of the living from the land

of the dead. But you don't cross it once. You go to and fro endlessly. It was called the

Vaitarani. You go again, and again, and again. Because, you see, nothing lasts forever

in India, not even death. And so, you have these grand rituals where great images of

mother goddesses are built and worshiped for 10 days ... And what do you do at the

end of 10 days? You dunk it in the river. Because it has to end. And next year, she will

come back. What goes around always comes around, and this rule applies not just to

man, but also the gods. You see, the gods have to come back again, and again, and

again

as

Ram,

as

Krishna.

Not

only

do

they

live

infinite

lives,

but

the

same

life

is

lived infinite times till you get to the point of it all.

Two different mythologies. Which is right? Two different mythologies, two different

ways of looking at the world. One linear, one cyclical. One believes this is the one and

only

life.

The

other

believes

this

is

one

of

many

lives.

And

so,

the

denominator

of

Alexander's

life

was

one.

So,

the

value

of

his

life

was

the

sum

total

of

his

achievements. The denominator of the gymnosophist's life was infinity. So, no matter

what he did, it was always zero. And I believe it is this mythological paradigm that

inspired Indian mathematicians to discover the number zero. Who knows?

And that brings us to the mythology of business. If Alexander's belief influenced his

behavior,

if

the

gymnosophist's

belief

influences

his

behavior,

then

it

was

bound

to

influence the business they were in. You see, what is business but the result of how

the market behaves

and

how the organization behaves? And if

you look

at

cultures

around the world,

all

you have to

do is

understand

the mythology and

you will see

how they behave, and how they do business.

Take a look. If you live only once, in one-life cultures around the world, you will see

an

obsession

with

binary

logic,

absolute

truth,

standardization,

absoluteness,

linear

patterns

in

design.

But

if

you

look

at

cultures

which

have

cyclical

and

based

on

infinite lives, you will see a comfort with fuzzy logic, with opinion, with contextual

thinking, with everything is relative, sort of -- (Laughter) mostly. (Laughter)

You look at art. Look at the ballerina. How linear she is in her performance. And then

look at the Indian classical dancer, the Kuchipudi dancer, the Bharatanatyam dancer,

curvaceous. (Laughter)