Code Breaking: Indus script deciphered?

Breaking the Code: Deciphering the enigma of the Indus script with Yajnadevam

(CNN-News18) Oct. 24, 2024: Unlocking the secrets of one of the world’s oldest civilizations, this cryptanalytic decipherment of the Indus script takes us on a journey through ancient symbols. Through rigorous analysis, we move closer to unraveling the mystery behind the enigmatic script, shedding light on a civilization that has fascinated scholars for centuries. Yajnadevam unpacks insightful wisdom. Join a conversation that sparks thought.

• Breaking the Code: Deciphering the Enigma of the Indus script with Yajnadevam | EXCLUSIVE (News18)

#indusscripts #history #culture #news18 n18oc_india News18. Mobile App: onelink.to/desc-youtube. #news18 #culture #history

Tibet treasury: 84,000 new manuscripts found

Lilly Ravenwood, History Enhanced; Dhr. Seven, Amber Larson (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Tibet used to be a Himalayan empire with many treasures, spiritual/temporal (Richard Mortel)

Just Beyond the Wall of the Buddhist monastery (©Source: Richard Mortel/flickr.com)

Unseen: 84,000 unread manuscripts discovered in Tibetan lamasery (©Richard Mortel/flickr)

The Dalai Lama finishes a sand yantra

In the heart of Tibet stands the Sakya Monastery, a silent witness to centuries gone by. This special place held a secret.

For years, behind old walls, lay a library filled with ancient manuscripts. These papers tell tales from long ago, and they waited patiently, hidden from the world, to share their stories, until now.

Many had walked the Buddhist monastery's halls, unaware of the treasures that lay just out of sight.

JUST BEYOND THE WALLS: The old books and scrolls have seen empires rise and fall. They've captured the wisdom and adventures of people from ages past.

They know about ancient kingdoms and great adventures. When discovered, it was like finding a map to another time.

• More: Unveiling the Unseen: 84,000 unread manuscripts discovered at Tibetan Buddhist monastery

Rewilding Iceland by planting native trees

Rewilding.org; Xochitl, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Rewilding Iceland by replanting native forests

A great project is returning native forest cover to [the green island of] Iceland [unlike the icy island called Greenland] with the goal to raise coverage from the current 2% to its historic 25%-40%.

Notable is the focus on native tree species over non-natives that, while they might suck more carbon from the atmosphere, do not belong in Iceland.

Read about more great rewilding projects from the team at Mossy Earth (mossy.earth).

ABOUT THIS PROJECT

If only the US could restore its lost forests.

“In Autumn 2021, we joined forces with the Iceland Forest Service to restore the native birchwoods of Iceland. Iceland is known for is vast open landscapes shaped by massive volcanos and expansive glaciers, but these woodlands are a vital part of the landscape.

“They are the only woodland type to form in Iceland, and [they] provide food and shelter for biodiversity, help to stabilize soil, provide windbreaks, and sequester carbon. At one point, it is thought that 25-40% of Iceland was covered in birchwoods. Now, it is a mere 1.5%.” More: rewilding.org

Backstory: Bahiya's sudden enlightenment

G.P. Malalasekera, encyclopedia entry in Dictionary of Pali Proper Names (and PTS) derived from the Commentaries; Dhr. Seven, Pat Macpherson, Amber Larson (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

But, Bahiya, this is the time for gathering alms.

Bāhiya Dārucīriya or "Bahiya of the Barkcloth" suddenly reached full enlightenment. How? The Commentaries (tika) give the backstory.

Bahiya was born in a householder's family Bāhiya (identified as Bhārukaccha in AP.ii.476), which led to his name.

He engaged in trade, voyaging by ship. Seven times he sailed down the Indus River and across the sea, and seven time returned home safely.

On his eighth trip, however, while on his way to the "Golden Land," Suvannabhūmi, he was shipwrecked. He saved his life by floating ashore on a plank of wood, reaching what he thought was an island which was in fact peninsular Suppāraka.

Having lost all his clothes, he made himself a bark garment (daruciriya), and went about, alms bowl in hand, in Suppāraka.

People, seeing his austere garment and struck by his ascetic demeanor, paid him great honor. They offered him costly robes and many other luxuries, and when he refused them his fame increased. Because of his bark garment, he was known as Dārucīriya.

He came to believe that he had attained full enlightenment, but a devata (a "shining one," said to be a brahma from the Pure Abodes or Suddhāvāsa, who had been a celibate companion in the supreme life during the time of Kassapa Buddha, according to the Commentary, MA.i.340), reading his thoughts and wishing him well, pointed out to him his error.

What is the road to nirvana? (NG)

The devata advised him to go see the Buddha in Sāvatthi. By the power of that devatā, Bāhiya reached Sāvatthi in one night, a distance of 120 leagues. But he was told that the Buddha was in the city on alms round.

Bāhiya followed him and pleaded to be taught something for gaining enlightenment. Twice he asked, and twice the Buddha refused, saying that it was not the time for teaching. But Bāhiya insisted, saying that life is uncertain and that the Buddha or he might pass away before it was time for teaching.

The Commentaries say that Bāhiya was too excited by his meeting with the Buddha and that the Buddha wished to give him time to regain his composure, hence his refusal.

But then the Buddha came to know of Bahiya's impending death and also of his potential (upanissaya) for full enlightenment. He was to attain in this very life due to his past karma (a pacchimabhavika).

Map showing ancient western trade routes serviced by this historical ancient Indian port. The gateway city of Bharakuccha is named on the map as Barigaza on the Gulf of Khambhat. The inhospitable mountains and deserts to the north of the Erythraean Sea suggests its importance in trade with ancient Axum, Egypt, Arabia, and the sea-land trade routes via the Tigris-Euphrates Valley and Ancient Rome. More

.

.

Oh yeah, first to reach...eat my dust, ladies!

The Buddha then taught him the optimal method of regarding all sen
se experiences -- namely, as mere (impersonal, disappointing, impermanent) experiences and nothing more.

Even as he listened, Bāhiya became an arhat, and the Buddha seeing this went on his way. Shortly after, Bāhiya was gored to death by a cow with a calf (like the story of Pukkusāti and the others*).

The Buddha on his way back, seeing Bahiya's body lying on the dung heap, directed the monastics to prepare it, cremate it, and erect a sacred burial mound (tope, thūpa, stupa) over the relics.

In the assembly he declared Bāhiya to be "foremost among those who instantly comprehend the truth" (khippābhiññānam) (A.i.24; Ud.i.10).

Let's climb this rock to practice or die trying.

Bāhiya's resolution to attain to this eminence was made in the time of Padumuttara Buddha when he heard the Buddha declare a wandering ascetic foremost in instantaneous comprehension.

In the time of Kassapa Buddha, when the Buddha's teachings were fading from the minds of humans, Bāhiya was one of seven wandering ascetics who climbed a massive rock and determined not to leave it until they had attained their goal of spiritual liberation.

Their leader became an arhat, and the second a non-returner (anāgāmī) -- passing away to rebirth in the Pure Abodes (Suddhāvāsa). The rest were reborn in this age as Pukkusāti, Kumāra Kassapa, Dabba-Mallaputta, Sabhiya, and Bāhiya.

Although Bāhiya had kept the precepts in previous rebirths, he had never given a bowl or a robe to a monk. For this reason the Buddha did not, at the end of his instruction, ordain Bahiya by saying "ehi bhikkhu pabbajā" to him.

The Buddha knew that Bāhiya had insufficient merit to obtain divine robes (from devas). Some say that he was once a brigand and had shot a non-teaching fully self-enlightened one (pacceka buddha) with an arrow and had taken possession of that pacceka buddha's alms bowl and robe.

Bāhiya was killed while searching for a proper robe to receive ordination (UdA.77ff.; AA.i.156ff.; DhA.ii.209ff.; Ap.ii.475ff).

*The violent cow that gored Bāhiya was the same one that murdered Pukkusāti, Tambadāthika the Public Executioner, and Suppabuddha (2). (It is said that the cow was possessed by a yakkhini or yakshi, a female-ogre or inimical spirit; see her story at DhA.ii.35f). Source

• The Fast Way to Enlightenment: Bahiya of the Barkcloth

The Fast Way to Enlightenment: Bahiya Sutra

John D. Ireland translation, Bahiya Sutra: "About Bahiya" (Verses of Uplift, Udana 1.10, PTS: Ud 6); G.P. Malalasekera; Pat Macpherson, Dhr. Seven, Amber Larson (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Samsara is long and wearisome. Wake up.

Thus have I heard. At one time the Blessed One (the Buddha) was staying near Savatthi in the Jeta Wood at Anathapindika's monastery.

At that time Bahiya of the Barkcloth (Bahiya Daruciriya) was living by the seashore at Supparaka. He was respected, revered, honored, venerated, given homage, and provided with the requisites of a wandering ascetic.

Now while he was in seclusion, this reflection arose in the mind of Bahiya of the Barkcloth: "Am I one of those in the world who are arhats (full enlightenment) or who have entered the path to arhatship?"

Then a deva who was a former blood relative of Bahiya of the Barkcloth understood that reflection in Bahiya's mind. Being compassionate and wishing to benefit him, he approached and said:

"Bahiya, you are neither an arhat nor have you entered the path to arhatship. You do not follow that practice whereby you could be an arhat or enter the path to arhatship."

"Then who in the world, including the devas, are arhats or have entered the path to arhatship?"

"There is, Bahiya, in a far country a town called Savatthi. There the Blessed One now lives who is the Arhat, the Fully Enlightened One. That venerable, Bahiya, is indeed an arhat and teaches Dharma for the realization of arhatship."

Bahiya of the Barkcloth, profoundly stirred by the words of that deva, then and there departed from Supparaka. Stopping only for one night everywhere (along the way), he made it to Savatthi where the Blessed One was staying in the Jeta Wood.

At that time a number of wandering ascetics were walking up and down in the open air. Bahiya of the Barkcloth approached them and said: "Where, reverend sirs, is the Blessed One now living, the Arhat, the Fully Enlightened One? We wish to see that venerable who is the Arhat, the Fully Enlightened One."

"The Blessed One, Bahiya, has gone for almsfood among the houses."

The Buddha had golden skin and a bright aura

Then Bahiya hurriedly left Jeta Wood. Entering Savatthi, he saw the Blessed One on alms round [with a company of monks] in Savatthi — pleasing, lovely to see, with serene senses and tranquil mind, attained to perfect poise and calm, controlled, a perfected one, watchful with restrained senses.

On seeing the Blessed One, Bahiya approached, fell down with his head at the Blessed One's feet, and said:

"Teach me Dharma, venerable sir! Teach me Dharma, Sugata, for my good and happiness for a long time."

Upon being spoken to in this way, the Buddha responded: "It is an unsuitable time, Bahiya. We have entered among the houses for almsfood."

But a second time Bahiya said: "It is difficult to know for certain, revered sir, how long the Blessed One will live or how long I will live. Teach me Dharma, venerable sir! Teach me Dharma, Sugata, so that it will be for my good and happiness for a long time!"

A second time the Buddha responded: "It is an unsuitable time, Bahiya. We have entered among the houses for almsfood."

But a third time Bahiya insisted: "It is difficult to know for certain... Teach me Dharma, Sugata, so that it will be for my good and happiness for a long time!"

[The Buddha relented and for the only time in his 45 year teaching career deviated from his schedule to instruct someone on alms round:] "Herein [here within this Teaching], Bahiya, train yourself thus:

• 'In the seen will be merely what is seen;
• in the heard will be merely what is heard;
• in the sensed will be merely what is sensed;
• in the cognized will be merely what is cognized.'

In the seen, Bahiya, let there be only the seen.

"In this way train yourself. When, Bahiya, for you in the seen is merely what is seen, in the heard merely what is heard, in the sensed merely what is sensed, in the cognized is merely what is cognized then, Bahiya, you will not be 'with that.'

"When, Bahiya, you are not 'with that' then you will not be 'in that.' When, Bahiya, you are not 'in that' then you will be neither here nor there (beyond) nor in between the two. Just this is the end of all suffering."

Now through this brief teaching of the Dharma of the Blessed One, the mind of Bahiya of the Barkcloth was immediately freed from the taints without grasping. Then the Buddha, having taught Bahiya with this brief instruction, went on his way.

Not long after the Blessed One's departure, a mother cow with a young calf mauled Bahiya of the Barkcloth and killed him. When the Blessed One, having walked in Savatthi, was departing the town and returning from alms round with a number of monastics, he saw Bahiya of the Barkcloth dead on the road.

A stupa for the Buddha, Topdara, Afghanistan

Seeing this he said to them: "Monastics, take Bahiya's body, put it on a litter, carry it away, cremate it, and make a sacred mound (stupa) for it. Your companion in the supreme life has passed away."

"Very well, revered sir," they replied to the Blessed One. And taking Bahiya's body, they put it on a litter, carried it away, cremated it, and made a sacred mound for it.

Then they returned to the Blessed One, bowed, sat respectfully to one side, and said: "Bahiya's body has been cremated, revered sir, and a sacred mound has been made for it. What is his destiny, what is his future birth?"

"Monastics, Bahiya of the Barkcloth was wise. He practiced according to Dharma and did not trouble me by disputing about Dharma. Monastics, Bahiya of the Barkcloth has attained final nirvana [final liberation following full enlightenment]."

Then, on realizing its significance, the Buddha pronounced this inspired utterance:

Where neither water nor earth

Nor fire nor air can gain a foothold,

There gleam no stars, no sun sheds light,

There shines no moon, yet there no darkness reigns.

When one, a sage, has come to know this

With certainty through one's own wisdom, one is

Freed from [worlds of] form and formlessness and is

Freed from pleasure and from pain.

This inspired utterance was spoken by the Blessed One, so I did hear.

Mysterious Manuscript: Voynich Code (video)

The Secrets of Nature; Pat Macpherson, Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Voynich Code: The world's most mysterious manuscript
The Secrets of Nature, May 9, 2014

It is the world's most mysterious manuscript. A book written by an unknown author, illustrated with pictures that are as bizarre as they are puzzling -- composed in a language that even the best cryptographers have been unable to decode. No wonder this script even has a part in Dan Brown's (of DiVinci Code fame) bestseller The Lost Symbol.

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Oldest Buddhist texts come from Afghanistan

Dhr. Seven, Amber Larson, Wisdom Quarterly Wikipedia edit birch bark manuscript

Birch bark manuscripts are documents written on pieces of the inner layer of birch bark, which was commonly used for writing before the advent of mass production paper.

Evidence of birch bark for writing goes back many centuries in various cultures.

The oldest dated birch bark manuscripts are numerous Gandhāran Buddhist texts from approximately the 1st century CE, believed to have originated in Afghanistan, likely by the Dharmaguptaka sect.
 

Translations of the texts, mostly in Kharoṣṭhī, have produced the earliest known versions of significant Buddhist scriptures, including a Dhammapada, sutras of the Buddha that include the Rhinoceros Sutra, Avadanas, and [commentarial] Abhidharma texts.

• The Buddha was born in Afghanistan (RanajitPal.com)

Sanskrit birch bark manuscripts written with Brahmi script have been dated to the first few centuries CE. Several early Sanskrit writers such as Kālidāsa (circa 4th century CE), Sushruta (c. 3rd century CE), and Varāhamihira (6th century CE) mention the use of birch bark for manuscripts.

The bark of Betula utilis (Himalayan Birch) is still used today in India and Nepal for writing sacred mantras.

 

 
Gandhāran Buddhist manuscripts

Buddhist manuscripts written in the Gāndhārī language of Gandhara (northwest Indian frontier) are likely the oldest extant Indic texts, dating to approximately the 1st century CE.

The birch bark texts were stored in clay jars and acquired by the British Library in 1994.

They were written in Kharoṣṭhī and believed to be originally from Buddhist Afghanistan due to similar birch bark manuscripts that were discovered in eastern Afghanistan.^[1] 

Since 1994, a similar collection of Gāndhārī texts from the same era, called the Senior Collection, has also surfaced.^[2]

The British Library birch bark manuscripts were in the form of scrolls, which were very fragile and already damaged. They were five to nine inches wide and consisted of 12 to 18 inch long overlapping rolls that had been glued together to form longer scrolls.

A thread sewn through the edges also helped hold them together. (They were kept in baskets, or pitakas, which gave rise to the collection of Buddhist texts collectively referred to as the Tripitaka or "Three Baskets," the discourses or sutras, the Disciplinary Code or Vinaya, and the "Higher Teachings" or Abhidharma).

Buddhist Pakistan, stupa stamp

The script was written in black ink. The manuscripts were written on both sides of the scrolls, beginning at the top on one side, continuing with the scroll turned over and upside down, so that the text concluded at the top and back of the scroll. The longest intact scroll from the British Library collection is 84 inches long.^[1]

.

Street scene, Taxila, A.D. 260

The texts were likely compiled by the Dharmaguptaka sect and probably "represent a random but reasonably representative fraction of what was probably a much larger set of texts preserved in the library of a monastery of the Dharmaguptaka sect in Nagarāhāra," according to leading scholar Richard Salomon.^[3] 

The collection includes a variety of known commentaries and sutras, including a Dhammapada, discourses of the Buddha that include the Rhinoceros Sutra, Avadānas, and Abhidharma texts.^[4]

The condition of the scrolls indicates that they were already in poor condition and fragments by the time they were stored in the clay jars. Scholars concluded that the fragmented scrolls were given a ritual interment, much like Jewish texts stored in a genizah.^[1]

  
Sanskrit and Brāhmī manuscripts

Himalayan birch bark has been used for centuries in India for writing scriptures and texts in various scripts.

Its use was especially prevalent in historical Kashmir.

Use of bark as paper has been mentioned by early Sanskrit writers. In Kashmir, early scholars recounted that all of their books were written on Himalayan birch bark until the 16th century.^[5]

A fragment of a birch bark scroll in Sanskrit, using Brāhmī script, was part of the British Library Gandhara scroll collection. It is presumed to be from North India, dating to sometime during the first few centuries CE.^[6] 

Birch bark manuscripts in Brāhmī script were discovered in an ancient Buddhist monastery in Jaulian, near Taxila (Takkasila, the ancient capital of Gandhara) in the Punjab in Pakistan, dated to the 5th century CE.^[7]

Jaulian silver Buddhist reliquary, with gold contents (British Museum/wiki)

 

Bower Manuscript on birch bark (c. 450 CE)

The Bakhshali manuscript consists of 70 birch bark fragments written in Sanskrit and Prakrit [Pali-Sanskrit hybrid language], using Śāradā script.

Based on the language and content, it is estimated to be from the 2nd to 3rd century CE. The text discusses various mathematical techniques.^[8][9]

 

A large collection of birch bark scrolls were discovered in Afghanistan during the civil war in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, possible from the Bamiyan Caves [at the foothills of the Himalayan range known as the Hindu Kush next to the world's largest Buddha statues].

The approximately 3,000 scroll fragments are in Sanskrit or Buddhist Sanskrit, using Brāhmī script, and date to a period from the 2nd to 8th century CE.^[6] More
 

FOOTNOTES

1. Salomon, Richard (April 1, 1997). "A preliminary survey of some early Buddhist manuscripts recently acquired by the British Library". The Journal of the American Oriental Society (American Oriental Society).
2. Richard Salomon; Andrew Glass (2000). A Gāndhārī Version of the Rhinoceros Sūtra: British Library Kharoṣṭhī Fragment 5B. University of Washington Press. p. xi.
3. Richard Salomon. Ancient Buddhist Scrolls from Gandhāra: The British Library Kharosthī Fragments, with contributions by Raymond Allchin and Mark Barnard. Seattle: University of Washington Press; London: The British Library, 1999. pg 181
4. Salomon, Richard (1999). Ancient Buddhist Scrolls from Gandhāra. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
5. Müller, Friedrich Max (1881). Selected essays on language, mythology and religion, Volume 2. Longmans, Green, and Co. pp. 335–336fn.
6. Patrick Olivelle (13 July 2006). Between the Empires: Society in India 300 Bce to 400 Ce. Oxford University Press. pp. 356–7.
7. Kurt A. Behrendt (2003). Handbuch Der Orientalistik: India. The Buddhist architecture of Gandhāra. BRILL. pp. 35–36.
8. John Newsome Crossley, Anthony Wah-Cheung Lun, Kangshen Shen, Shen Kangsheng (1999). The Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art: Companion and Commentary. Oxford Univ. Press.

9. "The Bakhshali Manuscript". Treasures of the Bodleian. Univ. of Oxford Bodleian Library.

• Buddhist pilgrimage to Afghanistan...
• Mes Aynak
• Buddhas of Bamiyan, Afghanistan
• Buddhism in Iran 
• Buddhism in Pakistan