Class 6 Social Science Chapter 7: India's Cultural Roots Notes

Many roots, one trunk

The chapter opens with a saying that true knowledge is the greatest wealth, since it cannot be stolen and grows the more it is used. Indian culture is several millenniums old, and like an ancient tree it has many roots that nurture a common trunk, from which grow many branches: art, literature, science, medicine, religion, governance, martial arts and many schools of thought, groups of thinkers or seekers who share similar ideas. Some roots go all the way back to the Harappan civilisation of Chapter 6.

The Vedas

‘Veda’ comes from the Sanskrit vid, ‘knowledge’. The four Vedas, the Ṛig Veda, Yajur Veda, Sāma Veda and Atharva Veda, are India’s most ancient texts and among the oldest in the world. They hold thousands of hymns, prayers in the form of poems and songs, composed in the Sapta Sindhava region by rishis and rishikas, male and female seers, in an early form of Sanskrit. Experts’ dates for the Ṛig Veda range from the 5th to the 2nd millennium BCE. For 100 to 200 generations the hymns were memorised and passed on orally with hardly any change, which is why UNESCO recognised Vedic chanting in 2008.

The hymns address deities such as Indra, Agni, Varuṇa, Mitra, Sarasvatī and Uṣhas, who with the seers sustained ṛitam, truth and order. Yet the seers saw them as one: ekam sat viprā bahudhā vadanti, the Existent is one, but sages give it many names. Truth was a central value, and the last mantras of the Ṛig Veda call on people to come together with one mind and one purpose.

Vedic society

Early Vedic society lived in janas or clans; the Ṛig Veda alone lists over 30, such as the Bharatas, Purus, Kurus, Yadus and Turvaśhas, each linked to a region of the northwest. Little is known of their government, but the words rājā (king or ruler), sabhā and samiti (assemblies) give clues. The texts mention many professions, such as agriculturist, weaver, potter, builder, carpenter, healer, dancer, barber and priest.

Vedic schools of thought

Rituals called yajña were offered to deities, especially Agni, and grew more complex over time. The Upaniṣhads built on the Vedas and introduced rebirth and karma. In the school called Vedanta, everything is one divine essence, brahman, and the ātman, the Self in every being, is one with it: aham brahmāsmi, ‘I am brahman’, and tat tvam asi, ‘You are That’. So everything is connected, which explains the prayer sarve bhavantu sukhinah, ‘May all creatures be happy’. Early in the 1st millennium BCE more schools grew from the Vedas, such as Yoga; together they became the foundations of what we call Hinduism today. Upaniṣhad stories, of Śhvetaketu, Nachiketa, and Gārgī and Yājñavalkya, show the value of asking questions. Read more in what are the Vedas.

Buddhism and Jainism

Some schools did not accept the authority of the Vedas. Siddhārtha Gautama, a prince born in Lumbini (now Nepal), saw old age, sickness and death, left the palace at 29, and after meditating under a pipal tree at Bodh Gaya realised that avidyā (ignorance) and attachment cause suffering. As the Buddha, the ‘awakened’ one, he taught ahimsa, ‘non-hurting’, and sincere inner discipline, and founded the Sangha of monks and, later, nuns.

Vardhamāna, born near Vaiśhālī (Bihar) in the early 6th century BCE, left home at 30 and after 12 years of discipline became Mahāvīra, the ‘great hero’. Jainism, whose roots are said to be much older, teaches ahimsa towards all creatures, anekāntavāda (truth has many sides) and aparigraha (non-possession). The Jātaka tales and Jain stories teach these values simply. Monks and nuns of both schools travelled far, building monasteries and living in rock-cut caves, as at Ellora, where Hindu, Buddhist and Jain caves were cut between the 6th and 10th centuries CE. Read more in Buddhism and Jainism.

There were other schools too, such as the Chārvāka or Lokāyata, which held that only the material world exists; it did not last. The book calls all these schools of thought rather than religions, because they have philosophical, spiritual, religious, ethical and social sides. They differed, but they shared a common trunk: dharma, karma, rebirth and the search for an end to suffering and ignorance.

Folk and tribal roots

India also has rich oral traditions: folk traditions passed on by common people and tribal traditions passed on by tribes. Ancient India had no word for ‘tribe’; tribes were simply janas living in forests or mountains, and the Constitution says ‘tribes’ or janjāti. In 2011, India had 705 tribes, about 104 million people. Deities, ideas, legends and rituals moved both ways: Jagannath of Puri was originally a tribal deity, while some tribes have their own versions of the Mahābhārata and the Rāmāyaṇa. Folk, tribal and Hindu traditions see nature as sacred, and many tribes worship a supreme being, such as Donyipolo, Khandoba or Singbonga. The sociologist André Béteille noted that they have influenced each other since before history; the result is mutual enrichment.

Answers to every question are in the NCERT solutions for Chapter 7.