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K A Krishnaswamy Iyer: Vedantin and Violinist

As instructed by K Ramachandra Rao, I went to meet K A Krishnaswamy Iyer. During those days, he lived in his own house on 5th Cross, Basavanagudi (behind the house named ‘Chidvilaasa’). I went to his house at around three in the afternoon. Soon after I knocked the door, he opened it himself and ushered me inside. The room was sparsely furnished without a hint of ostentation. A bookshelf, two floor mats, a couple of cushions, and a violin – this is all I saw.

The New ‘Aṣṭādhyāyī’ – A 21st Century Approach to Sanskrit Learning (Part 1)

This paper by Shashi Kiran B N and Hari Ravikumar was presented at the international conference New Frontiers in Sanskrit and Indic Knowledge in June 2017 organized by the Chinmaya International Foundation.

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Abstract

Sanskrit, one of the greatest gifts of India to the world, is unique in many ways. The Pāṇinian system of grammar, logical in its structure and exhaustive in its delineation, gave the language great strength in terms of word-generation ability, brevity, and freedom from ambiguity.

Vairāgya Pañcakam: Five Verses on Detachment

There is a beautiful poem ascribed to Vedānta-deśika (born Veṅkaṭanātha) that deals with the topic of vairāgya (detachment from worldly indulgences).

क्षोणी-कोण-शतांश-पालन-कला-दुर्वार-गर्वानल-
क्षुभ्यत्-क्षुद्र-नरेन्द्र-चाटु-रचना-धन्यान्-न मन्यामहे।
देवं सेवितुम्-एव निश्चिनुमहे योऽसौ दयालुः पुरा
धाना-मुष्टिमुचे कुचेल-मुनये दत्ते स्म वित्तेशताम्॥ 1
(Meter: Śārdūlavikrīḍitam)

Chinmaya Summer School 2017 - Day 8

The day began with Shashi Kiran's session on appreciating Sanskrit through subhashitas and ended with a wonderful dance performance by Ramaa Bharadvaj titled Mitra, which dealt with the friendship between Krishna and Sudhama. This was followed by a creative appreciation of the dance with the artist having a discussion with Arjun Bharadwaj.

Day 8, Session 1: Mahabharata

Shatavadhani Dr. R Ganesh

Chinmaya Summer School 2017 - Day 7

Day 7

The day began with a trip to Fort Kochi, followed by a visit to the Paradesi Synagogue, the oldest active synagogue in India, which was built in the 16th century. After some shopping on Jew’s street, the participants visited Hill Palace in Tripunithura, which is the largest archeological museum in Kerala. At one point, it was the official palace of the Cochin maharajas. It was built in the middle of the 19th century. After a traditional Kerala lunch, the participants returned to the Chinmaya Eswar Gurukula campus.

Chinmaya Summer School 2017 - Day 6

Arjun Bharadwaj started off the day’s proceeding with the fourth session of kavya-samskrtam, which has been a regular morning activity of the summer school. In this session, Shashi and Arjun have helping understand and appreciate the beauty of a few Sanskrit verses. In today’s session, Arjun covered five verses from Lilashuka’s Krishnakarnamrtam. While explaining the nuances of the verse with respect to grammar, prosody, etc. he also brought out the various suggestions (dhvani) in those verses.