Apparently, the word pundit derives from “a Hindu versed in the Vedas,” a “wiseman” of sorts, a learned person. Not having grown up Hindu, I have only an outsider’s knowledge of Vedic scholarship and meaning. From that perspective, I understand that the word veda itself derives from “to know,” or “knowledge,” but probably borders on “wisdom” though pundits could cite from memory complete passages from the Vedas. So, a Hindu pundit (so-named in the late seventeenth century), imparts what he has come to know, the sacred texts, early on through oral traditions and later on through written texts.
Part of the Vedic tradition lies in the roots of knowledge about the universe as expressed in mantras, sounds that underlie the meaning of the world. To an outsider, such sounds, like Ommmmm, are meaningless as mesmerizing music in a spa. Sure, they relax through simple vibration, but, also sure, they impart no specific meaning. Repeating a mantra can connect one to some inner feeling and possibly even connect one to insights, but listening is another matter. Hallucinatory sounds produce hallucinations in the hummer, but, frankly and again from an outsider’s perspective, produce no specific and verifiable explanations about why the world is as it is. This is not, of course, a criticism of Hinduism’s core because the idea of connecting a being IN the universe TO the universe in which it lies actually seems rather logical. It is also rather widespread among other cultures, as in the “back-to-Nature” crowd that emanated from English Romanticism and its poets and artists. That kind of connection to the universe continues today: I have recently read articles on walks in the woods and communing with Nature as legitimate therapies for those of us living under the duress of the twenty-first century. One more note on this: Many people are moved to feel a connection to the universe by both the sights and sounds they experience in “Nature”—but not all people, apparently, are so moved or care to be moved.
Hindu pundits can serve as guides to understanding the universe, and mantras can serve as connections to greater, yet nonverbal, understanding of one’s place in the universe—understanding that is not reducible to the level of a freshman essay for a Composition 101 class or even to some Hegelian dialectic. Saying “Ommmmm” is neither précis nor debate.
Hmnnnnn!? After centuries of placing pundits in the context of Vedic wisdom, we place them not in the temples of religion, but rather on the stage of television. And when we hear them utter their sounds, we believe them to be understandable, literally understandable. We listen as TV pundits explain the universe all of us already understand, a universe with which we have our personal connections that we derive from our own mantras. But unlike the sounds hummed or sung in the temples of our minds, the sounds we hear from pundits are repetitions of texts that focus on this or that political point of view and not on connecting us to some all-encompassing wisdom.
Pundits on TV generally spend their precious few moments of air time in reading their Composition 101 essays to us, always predictable by the network, always predictable by the personal history of the pundit. “We turn now to So-n-So. She worked in the Administration of So-n-So as the Secretary of Such-n-Such and is now a contributing editor.” And as the camera swings Right or Left to the pundit, we hear the expected Ommmmm that means more to the pundit than to the listener and that leads to no deep Cosmic meaning, nothing more lasting than the chirps of birds heard in the woods, each generation passing, and each generation still chirping recognizable songs: “That’s a bluejay. And, did you hear that? A mockingbird!”
Unlike those sacred sounds that might connect us to the universe, what we hear is more like the “oompa” of marching bands performing on a football field at halftime. One side of the stadium listening as its band plays and the other side ignoring the performance; and then, the other side of the stadium listening as its band plays and the opposing side ignoring the performance, neither side remembering the song beyond the performance, the entertainment lying in the moment of the sounds, in some brief vibrations with no lasting meaning, and next year’s band, composed of different individuals, primed to play the same tunes.
Already imbued with some understanding we believe is our connection to Universal Meaning, we might consider asking ourselves why we bother to listen. Punditry? Hmnnnnnnn…
Part of the Vedic tradition lies in the roots of knowledge about the universe as expressed in mantras, sounds that underlie the meaning of the world. To an outsider, such sounds, like Ommmmm, are meaningless as mesmerizing music in a spa. Sure, they relax through simple vibration, but, also sure, they impart no specific meaning. Repeating a mantra can connect one to some inner feeling and possibly even connect one to insights, but listening is another matter. Hallucinatory sounds produce hallucinations in the hummer, but, frankly and again from an outsider’s perspective, produce no specific and verifiable explanations about why the world is as it is. This is not, of course, a criticism of Hinduism’s core because the idea of connecting a being IN the universe TO the universe in which it lies actually seems rather logical. It is also rather widespread among other cultures, as in the “back-to-Nature” crowd that emanated from English Romanticism and its poets and artists. That kind of connection to the universe continues today: I have recently read articles on walks in the woods and communing with Nature as legitimate therapies for those of us living under the duress of the twenty-first century. One more note on this: Many people are moved to feel a connection to the universe by both the sights and sounds they experience in “Nature”—but not all people, apparently, are so moved or care to be moved.
Hindu pundits can serve as guides to understanding the universe, and mantras can serve as connections to greater, yet nonverbal, understanding of one’s place in the universe—understanding that is not reducible to the level of a freshman essay for a Composition 101 class or even to some Hegelian dialectic. Saying “Ommmmm” is neither précis nor debate.
Hmnnnnn!? After centuries of placing pundits in the context of Vedic wisdom, we place them not in the temples of religion, but rather on the stage of television. And when we hear them utter their sounds, we believe them to be understandable, literally understandable. We listen as TV pundits explain the universe all of us already understand, a universe with which we have our personal connections that we derive from our own mantras. But unlike the sounds hummed or sung in the temples of our minds, the sounds we hear from pundits are repetitions of texts that focus on this or that political point of view and not on connecting us to some all-encompassing wisdom.
Pundits on TV generally spend their precious few moments of air time in reading their Composition 101 essays to us, always predictable by the network, always predictable by the personal history of the pundit. “We turn now to So-n-So. She worked in the Administration of So-n-So as the Secretary of Such-n-Such and is now a contributing editor.” And as the camera swings Right or Left to the pundit, we hear the expected Ommmmm that means more to the pundit than to the listener and that leads to no deep Cosmic meaning, nothing more lasting than the chirps of birds heard in the woods, each generation passing, and each generation still chirping recognizable songs: “That’s a bluejay. And, did you hear that? A mockingbird!”
Unlike those sacred sounds that might connect us to the universe, what we hear is more like the “oompa” of marching bands performing on a football field at halftime. One side of the stadium listening as its band plays and the other side ignoring the performance; and then, the other side of the stadium listening as its band plays and the opposing side ignoring the performance, neither side remembering the song beyond the performance, the entertainment lying in the moment of the sounds, in some brief vibrations with no lasting meaning, and next year’s band, composed of different individuals, primed to play the same tunes.
Already imbued with some understanding we believe is our connection to Universal Meaning, we might consider asking ourselves why we bother to listen. Punditry? Hmnnnnnnn…
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