Impossible rock cut caves: Barabar, India

Finely crafted solid rock entrance to Lomas Rishi Cave, one of the carve outs at Barabar

Ven. Dharma from Penang stands in glassy, polished, granite Lomas Rishi Cave, Barabar

The photo above is looks inside, whereas this is the outside of whale-shaped granite boulder.

Unsolved Mysteries: The Impossible Whale-Shaped Cave of Ancient India at Barabar

(Boxoffice) | (Full Movies) Aug. 22, 2024: Welcome to the heart of ancient India to a forgotten chapter of its history that could very well alter the course of history. ARE WE REALLY THE FIRST ADVANCED CIVILIZATION ON EARTH? No. We are not alone. We were never alone. There are others. And in the past, they left their fingerprints carved in stone all over the world -- from Mexico and Mesoamerica to Peru and Bolivia, from Egypt and Lebanon to Turkey's Karahan Tepe and Gobekli Tepe, from the USA (Mound Builders of Cahokia) to the South Pacific and Easter Island -- but perhaps nowhere in more a spectacular a fashion than ancient India. About 2,300 years ago, in what is now India (which at that time were many smaller kingdoms and republics eventually united by the Buddhist Emperor Ashoka into "India"), five rock cut chambers were carved inside enormous granite rocks. #FullMovieENGLISH #FullMovie

COMMENTARY

While the caves remain a mystery and are in the style of other Buddhist rock cut architecture in India and Afghanistan, some inscriptions say they were a product of Mauryan rulers and were dedicated to the Ajivikas, a wandering ascetic group formed by Makkhali Gosala, a curious figure and close student of Mahavira, the founder of Jainism. Both are said to have developed samadhi and the siddhis (psychic powers, which the Buddha also developed but warned against using. Everyone in India who knows of these powers warns against their use). Makkhali Gosala must not have heard or in any case did not heed the warning. One day, becoming incensed at his erstwhile teacher, he lashed out with his psychic powers, attempting to incinerate him. But Mahavira, who was more powerful, immediately put up a psychic shield. Disciples who saw this unbelievable display were shocked. Jains later explained it as an anomaly that could only happen once in an aeon, which is not much of an explanation, but is only to say it was highly unusual and out of step with the ahimsa all of the seven main wandering ascetic schools advocated. Buddhism was one of these schools (Dharmas) as was Mahavira or the Nigantha Nattaputta's Teaching (Jainism), which are the only two shramana (wandering ascetic) traditions to survive in India, both having been coopted by later Hinduism which did not exist at that time. What did exist was Brahmanism, the old Vedic religion of the Brahmin priests. They were opposed to wandering ascetics but could not ignore their growing popularity. Their solution was to assimilate and neutralize them from the inside and in a nice way by telling their followers that there was really no difference in what was being taught by all these traditions -- indeed, by all disparate spiritual practices, which the British later dubbed "Indus'ism" to give a Western spin to the dizzying diversity of spiritual life in the subcontinent under British rule -- and Sri Shankara later codified the central beliefs and came up with a systematic religion (Hinduism), dating it back thousands of years to the purported time of the Vedas, making it the oldest religion in the world, much as Judaism makes itself ancient by attaching itself to much more ancient Sumerian, Mesopotamian, and Babylonian mythologies and narratives.

• The Ajivikas ["Followers of the Way of Life" or the "Fatalists" who do not believe in freewill but teach that everything is preordained] are frequently mentioned in Buddhist texts and rarely if ever in praise. Rather, the Buddha distinguishes his Dharma (Doctrine, Teaching and Disciplinary Code) from theirs and all other wandering ascetic groups who have it partly right but are missing major pieces of the picture and so cannot lead anyone to actual enlightenment and liberation. They do, however, teach students to their versions of these two things, which the Buddha criticizes and warns against, which would not be a very nice thing to do in polite company except that he is warning his followers and them of erring. The Buddha is so convincing, always offering other to "come and see" for themselves, laying bare his Teaching without a secret doctrine for an elect, that many from other schools do come and see, angering those other teachers for making converts of their students. Of course, we never hear it from their side; we hear it from the side of Buddhist writers, so it is obviously slanted. An Ajivika might be a name for any wandering ascetic one disagreed with over some view or another, much as Christendom used the word "Heretic," for instance, during the Spanish Inquisition, Crusades, Councils, purges, pogroms, while setting up religious communities or going about ordinary clerical affairs to maintain the status quo.

Ajivika (Sanskrit आजीविक, Ājīvika) is one of the nāstika or "heterodox" schools of ancient Indian philosophy [5, 6, 7, 8]. Believed to have been founded in the 5th century BCE by Makkhali Gosāla, it was a Śramaṇa ("wandering ascetic") movement and a major rival of the old temple-based Vedic religion of the Brahmins, early Buddhism, and Jainism [5, 6, 9]. Ājīvikas were organized renunciates who formed discrete communities [5, 6, 10]. The precise identity of the Ājīvikas is not well known, and it is even unclear if they were a divergent sect of Buddhists or the Jains [11]. [Indeed, anyone might have left one wandering ascetic school to join another at any time, finding another teacher or Teaching to their liking, all more or less striving for the same goals -- moksha (liberation from rebirth) and wisdom, gnosis, spiritual knowledge and power -- by different means.] More

• Jayan Films, narrated by Johannah James, Box Office Full Movies, Aug. 22, 2024; Dhr. Seven, Pat Macpherson, Amber Larson (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly