Week 12 Reading Diary: Ardhanari’s Secret

One of my favorite ways to learn in this class is videos. I think I enjoy this especially because in an online class sometimes it is nice to be able to learn in ways that more resemble a classic learning setting. Although this class has taught me to be proactive in critical reading and analysis, it is still nice to be able to be taught through visuals and audio such as in a video.

For this reason, I decided to continue my study of the 7 Secrets of Hindu Calendar Art videos. I definitely recommend these videos as I have found them to be highly engaging and informative. The main idea of Ardhanari’s Secret is that God is stillness within, goddess is movement around. One thing I found interesting is that the male trinity is associated with verbs, which include creating, sustaining, and destroying (this last one really caught my attention) while the female trinity is associated with nouns, including knowledge, wealth, and power. Because the gods can create, sustain, and destroy, they are doing and, therefore, active. The goddesses, on the other hand, are passive. From this a patriarchal society would see women as passive objects, the one to whom things are done. Their attributes – wealth, knowledge, and power – can be created, sustained, and destroyed.

There is another side to this argument though and that is that the gods and goddesses are dependent on one another. Just as a female holds life within her, she cannot reproduce without the activity that a male provides. Obviously this brings to surface the ever-debatable question of gender superiority. But I don’t think that is the point. I think that the point is that both genders are equally important because whether active or passive is better, does not matter. What matters is that both are necessary for life and progress. This made me think of a quote that I saw earlier this morning: 

"The worst enemy of life is not death but stagnation. Movement will set you free.” – Andrea Balt 

From this, I once again gather that if it is movement that will set us free, we must, both male and female, work together in balance. This idea of balance is important in Eastern cultures. For example, these ancient Hindu ideas of gods and goddesses align perfectly with the Chinese philosophy of yin yang (one of my favorites!):

Yin and Yang. Source: PreventDisease.com.

I also wrote about these ideas of balance in my Week 11 Reading Diary: The Churning of the Ocean. In this story of Vishnu, evil, as in the asuras, and good, as in the devtas, both occupy the earth and thereby bring balance to it as in the yin and yang. This is Vishnu’s concept that detached engagement brings order. I think this encourages toleration – that we shouldn’t feel the need to change others who are different than us but that we should accept them and live peacefully on this earth, a very Eastern concept. I would really like to learn even more about balance and the yin and yang because I truly believe it is essential for a happy life. I think that the source of the above image, PreventDisease.com, says a lot about how essential balance is to a happy life. Another picture on this website made me laugh, so I included it as well:

Source: PreventDisease.com.