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Raja Ram Mohan Roy

Raja Ram Mohan Roy (22 May 1772 – 27 September 1833) was an Indian reformer who was one of the founders of the Brahmo Sabha in 1828, the precursor of the Brahmo Samaj, a social-religious reform movement in the Indian subcontinent. He was given the title of Raja by Akbar II, the Mughal emperor.

His influence was apparent in the fields of politics, public administration, education and religion. He was known for his efforts to abolish the practices of sati and child marriage.

Roy wrote Gaudiya Vyakaran which was the first complete Bangla grammar written book. He is considered to be the "Father of Indian Renaissance" by many historians.

In 2004, Roy was ranked number 10 in BBC's poll of the Greatest Bengali of All Time.

Early life and education (1772–1796)
Ram Mohan Roy was born in Radhanagar, Hooghly District, Bengal Presidency. His great grandfather Krishnakanta Bandyopadhyay was a Rarhi Kulin (noble) Brahmin. Among Kulin Brahmins – descendants of the six families of Brahmins imported from Kannauj by Ballal Sen in the 12th century – those from the Rarhi district of West Bengal were notorious in the 19th century for living off dowries by marrying several women. Kulinism was a synonym for polygamy and the dowry system, both of which Rammohan campaigned against. His father, Ramkanta, was a Vaishnavite, while his mother, Tarini Devi, was from a Shaivite family. He was a great scholar of Sanskrit, Persian and English languages and also knew Arabic, Latin and Greek. One parent prepared him for the occupation of a scholar, the Shastri, while the other secured for him all the worldly advantages needed to launch a career in the laukik or worldly sphere of public administration. Torn between these two parental ideals from early childhood, Ram Mohan vacillated between the two for the rest of his life.

During his childhood Ram Mohan Roy witnessed the death of his sister-in-law through sati. The seventeen-year-old girl was dragged towards the pyre where Ram Mohan Roy witnessed her terrified state. He tried to protest but to no avail. She was burned alive. The people chanted "Maha Sati! Maha Sati! Maha Sati!" (great wife) over her painful screams.

Ram Mohan Roy was married three times. His first wife died early. He had two sons, Radhaprasad in 1800, and Ramaprasad in 1812 with his second wife, who died in 1824. Roy's third wife outlived him.

The nature and content of Ram Mohan Roy's early education is disputed. One view is that Ram Mohan started his formal education in the village pathshala where he learned Bengali and some Sanskrit and Persian. Later he is said to have studied Persian and Arabic in a madrasa in Patna and after that he was sent to Benares to learn the intricacies of Sanskrit and Hindu scripture, including the Vedas and Upanishads. The dates of his time in both these places are uncertain. However, it is believed that he was sent to Patna when he was nine years old and two years later he went to Benares.

Ram Mohan Roy's impact on modern Indian history was his revival of the pure and ethical principles of the Vedanta school of philosophy as found in the Upanishads. He preached the unity of God, made early translations of Vedic scriptures into English, co-founded the Calcutta Unitarian Society and founded the Brahmo Samaj. The Brahmo Samaj played a major role in reforming and modernizing the Indian society. He successfully campaigned against sati, the practice of burning widows. He sought to integrate Western culture with the best features of his own country's traditions. He established a number of schools to popularize a modern system of education in India. He promoted a rational, ethical, non-authoritarian, this-worldly, and social-reform Hinduism. His writings also sparked interest among British and American Unitarians.

Christianity and the early rule of the East India Company (1795–1828)
During the early years of East India Company rule, Ram Mohan Roy acted as a political agitator while employed by the company.

In 1792, the British Baptist shoemaker William Carey published his influential missionary tract, An Enquiry of the Obligations of Christians to Use Means for the Conversion of Heathens.

In 1793, William Carey landed in India to settle. His objective was to translate, publish and distribute the Bible in Indian languages and propagate Christianity to the Indian peoples. He realised the "mobile" (i.e. service classes) Brahmins and Pandits were most able to help him in this endeavour, and he began gathering them. He learnt the Buddhist and Jain religious works to better argue the case for Christianity in a cultural context.

In 1795, Carey made contact with a Sanskrit scholar, the Tantric Saihardana Vidyavagish, who later introduced him to Ram Mohan Roy, who wished to learn English.

While there are rumors that between 1796 and 1797, the trio of Carey, Vidyavagish, and Roy created a religious work known as the "Maha Nirvana Tantra" (or "Book of the Great Liberation") scholars like John Duncan Derrett are skeptical of this claim calling it "highly improbable" and Hugh Urban argues that "It is probable that we will never know the true author and date of the Maha Nirvana Tantra". Carey's involvement is not recorded in his very detailed records and he reports only learning to read Sanskrit in 1796 and only completed a grammar in 1797, the same year he translated part of The Bible (from Joshua to Job), a massive task. For the next two decades Maha Nirvana Tantra was regularly augmented. Its judicial sections were used in the law courts of the English Settlement in Bengal as Hindu Law for adjudicating upon property disputes of the zamindari. However, a few British magistrates and collectors began to suspect and its usage (as well as the reliance on pandits as sources of Hindu Law) was quickly deprecated. Vidyavagish had a brief falling out with Carey and separated from the group, but maintained ties to Ram Mohan Roy.

In 1797, Raja Ram Mohan reached Calcutta and became a bania (moneylender), mainly to lend to the Englishmen of the Company living beyond their means. Ram Mohan also continued his vocation as pandit in the English courts and started to make a living for himself. He began learning Greek and Latin.

In 1799, Carey was joined by missionary Joshua Marshman and the printer William Ward at the Danish settlement of Serampore.

From 1803 until 1815, Ram Mohan served the East India Company's "Writing Service", commencing as private clerk "Munshi" to Thomas Woodroffe, Registrar of the Appellate Court at Murshidabad (whose distant nephew, John Woodroffe—also a magistrate—and later lived off the Maha Nirvana Tantra under the pseudonym Arthur Avalon). Roy resigned from Woodroffe's service and later secured employment with John Digby, a Company collector, and Ram Mohan spent many years at Rangpur and elsewhere with Digby, where he renewed his contacts with Hariharananda. William Carey had by this time settled at Serampore and the old trio renewed their profitable association. William Carey was also aligned now with the English Company, then head-quartered at Fort William, and his religious and political ambitions were increasingly intertwined.

While in Murshidabad, in 1804 Raja Ram Mohan Roy wrote Tuhfat-ul-Muwahhidin (A Gift to Monotheists) in Persian with an introduction in Arabic. Bengali had not yet become the language of intellectual discourse. The importance of Tuhfat-ul-muwahhidin lies only in its being the first known theological statement of one who achieved later fame and notoriety as a Vedantin. On its own, it is unremarkable, perhaps of interest only to a social historian because of its amateurish eclecticism. Tuhfat was, after all, available as early as 1884 in the English translation of Maulavi Obaidullah EI Obaid, published by the Adi Brahmo Samaj. Raja Ram Mohan Roy did not know the Upanishad at this stage in his intellectual development.

In 1814, he started Atmiya Sabha (i.e. Society of Friends) a philosophical discussion circle in Kolkata (then Calcutta) to propagate the monotheistic ideals of the vedanta and to campaign against idolatry, caste rigidities, meaningless rituals and other social ills.

The East India Company was draining money from India at a rate of three million pounds a year by 1838. Ram Mohan Roy was one of the first to try to estimate how much money was being taken out of India and to where it was disappearing. He estimated that around one-half of all total revenue collected in India was sent out to England, leaving India, with a considerably larger population, to use the remaining money to maintain social well-being. Ram Mohan Roy saw this and believed that the unrestricted settlement of Europeans in India governing under free trade would help ease the economic drain crisis.

During the next two decades, Ram Mohan along with William Carey, launched his attack against the bastions of Hinduism of Bengal, namely his own Kulin Brahmin priestly clan (then in control of the many temples of Bengal) and their priestly excesses. The Kulin excesses targeted include sati (the co-cremation of widows), polygamy, child marriage and dowry.

From 1819, Ram Mohan's battery increasingly turned against William Carey, a Baptist Missionary settled in Serampore, and the Serampore missionaries. With Dwarkanath's munificence, he launched a series of attacks against Trinitarian Christianity and was now considerably assisted in his theological debates by the Unitarian faction of Christianity.

He wrote Gaudiya Vyakaran which was the first complete Bangla grammar written book. It was published in 1826.

In 1828, he launched Brahmo Sabha with Devendranath Tagore. By 1828, he had become a well known figure in India. In 1830, he had gone to England as an envoy of the Mughal Emperor, Akbar Shah II, who invested him with the title of Raja to the court of King William IV.

Middle "Brahmo" period (1820–1830)
This was Ram Mohan's most controversial period. Commenting on his published works Sivanath Sastri writes:

"The period between 1820 and 1830 was also eventful from a literary point of view, as will be manifest from the following list of his publications during that period:

 * Second Appeal to the Christian Public, Brahmanical Magazine – Parts I, II and III, with Bengali translation and a new Bengali newspaper called Samvad Kaumudi in 1821;
 * A Persian paper called Mirat-ul-Akbar contained a tract entitled Brief Remarks on Ancient Female Rights and a book in Bengali called Answers to Four Questions in 1822;
 * Third and final appeal to the Christian public, a memorial to the King of England on the subject of the liberty of the press, Ramdoss papers relating to Christian controversy, Brahmanical Magazine, No. IV, letter to Lord Arnherst on the subject of English education, a tract called "Humble Suggestions" and a book in Bengali called "Pathyapradan or Medicine for the Sick," all in 1823;
 * A letter to Rev. H. Ware on the "Prospects of Christianity in India" and an "Appeal for famine-smitten Natives in Southern India" in 1824;
 * A tract on the different modes of worship, in 1825;
 * A Bengali tract on the qualifications of a God-loving householder, a tract in Bengali on a controversy with a Kayastha and a Grammar of the Bengali language in English in 1826;
 * A Sanskrit tract on "Divine worship by Gayatri" with an English translation of the same, the edition of a Sanskrit treatise against caste and the previously noticed tract called "Answer of a Hindu to the Question &c." in 1827;
 * A form of divine worship and a collection of hymns composed by him and his friends, in 1828;
 * "Religious Instructions Founded on Sacred Authorities" in English and Sanskrit, a Bengali tract called "Anusthan", and a petition against sati, in 1829;

He publicly declared that he would emigrate from the British Empire if Parliament failed to pass the Reform Bill.

In 1830, Ram Mohan Roy travelled to the United Kingdom as an ambassador of the Mughal Empire to ensure that Lord William Bentinck's Bengal Sati Regulation, 1829 banning the practice of sati was not overturned. In addition, Roy petitioned the King to increase the Mughal Emperor's allowance and perquisites. He was successful in persuading the British government to increase the stipend of the Mughal Emperor by £30,000. He also visited France. While in England, he embarked on cultural exchanges, meeting with members of Parliament and publishing books on Indian economics and law. Sophia Dobson Collet was his biographer at the time.

Religious reforms

The religious reforms of Roy contained in some beliefs of the Brahmo Samaj expounded by Rajnarayan Basu are:

 * Brahmo Samaj believe that the most fundamental doctrines of Brahmoism are at the basis of every religion followed by a man.
 * Brahmo Samaj believe in the existence of One Supreme God—"God, endowed with a distinct personality & moral attributes equal to His nature, and intelligence befitting the Author and Preserver of the Universe," and worship Him alone.
 * Brahmo Samaj believe that worship of Him needs no fixed place or time. "We can adore Him at any time and at any place, provided that time and that place are calculated to compose and direct the mind towards Him."

Having studied the Qur’an, the Vedas and the Upanishads, Roy's beliefs were derived from a combination of monastic elements of Hinduism, Islam, eighteenth-century Deism, Unitarianism, and the ideas of the Freemasons.

Social reforms
Roy founded the Atmiya Sabha and the Unitarian Community to fight the social evils, and to propagate social and educational reforms in India. He was the man who fought against superstitions, a pioneer in Indian education, and a trend setter in Bengali prose and Indian press.

 * Crusaded against Hindu customs such as sati, polygamy, child marriage and the caste system.
 * Demanded property inheritance rights for women.
 * In 1828, he set up the Brahmo Sabha, a movement of reformist Bengali Brahmins to fight against social evils.

Roy's political background and Devandra's Christian influence influenced his social and religious views regarding reforms of Hinduism. He writes,

"The present system of Hindus is not well calculated to promote their political interests… It is necessary that some change should take place in their religion, at least for the sake of their political advantage and social comfort."

Roy's experience working with the British government taught him that Hindu traditions were often not credible or respected by western standards and this no doubt affected his religious reforms. He wanted to legitimise Hindu traditions to his European acquaintances by proving that "superstitious practices which deform the Hindu religion have nothing to do with the pure spirit of its dictates!" The "superstitious practices", to which Ram Mohan Roy objected, included sati, caste rigidity, polygamy and child marriages. These practices were often the reasons British officials claimed moral superiority over the Indian nation. Ram Mohan Roy's ideas of religion actively sought to create a fair and just society by implementing humanitarian practices similar to the Christian ideals professed by the British and thus seeking to legitimise Hinduism in the eyes of the Christian world.

Educational reforms

 * Roy believed education to be an implement for social reform.
 * In 1817, in collaboration with David Hare, he set up the Hindu College at Calcutta.
 * In 1822, Roy founded the Anglo-Hindu School, followed four years later (1826) by the Vedanta College; where he insisted that his teachings of monotheistic doctrines be incorporated with "modern, western curriculum."
 * In 1830, he helped Rev. Alexander Duff in establishing the General Assembly's Institution (now known as Scottish Church College), by providing him with the venue vacated by Brahma Sabha and getting the first batch of students.
 * He supported induction of western learning into Indian education.
 * He also set up the Vedanta College, offering courses as a synthesis of Western and Indian learning.
 * His most popular journal was the Sambad Kaumudi. It covered topics like freedom of the press, induction of Indians into high ranks of service, and separation of the executive and judiciary.
 * When the English East India Company muzzled the press, Ram Mohan composed two memorials against this in 1829 and 1830 respectively.

Death
In early September 1833 Roy came to Bristol to visit his Unitarian friend, Dr Lant Carpenter, where he made a deep impression on Lant's daughter and future social reformer, Mary Carpenter. While in Bristol Roy preached at the Lewins Mead Meeting House. In mid September he became ill and was diagnosed with meningitis. He died at Stapleton, then a village to the north-east of Bristol (now a suburb), on 27 September 1833 of meningitis or a chronic respiratory ailment.

Mausoleum at Arnos Vale
Ram Mohan Roy was originally buried on 18 October 1833, in the grounds of Stapleton Grove, where he had lived as an ambassador of the Mughal Empire and died of meningitis on 27 September 1833. Nine years later he was reburied on 29 May 1843 in a grave at the new Arnos Vale Cemetery, in Brislington, East Bristol. A large plot on The Ceremonial Way there had been bought by William Carr and William Prinsep, and the body in its lac and a lead coffin was placed later in a deep brick-built vault, over seven feet underground. Two years after this, Dwarkanath Tagore helped pay for the chhatri raised above this vault, although there is no record of his ever visiting Bristol. The chhatri was designed by the artist William Prinsep, who had known Ram Mohan in Calcutta.

Bristol Arnos Vale cemetery have been holding remembrance services for Raja Ram Mohan Roy every year on a Sunday close to his death anniversary date of 27 September. The Indian High Commission at London often come to Raja's annual commemoration and Bristol's Lord Mayor is also regularly in attendance. The commemoration is a joint Brahmo-Unitarian service, in which, prayers and hymns are sung, flowers laid at the tomb, and the life of the Raja is celebrated via talks and visual presentations. In 2013, a recently discovered ivory bust of Ram Mohan was displayed. In 2014, his original death mask at Edinburgh was filmed and its history was discussed. In 2017, Raja's commemoration was held on 24 September.

Legacy
Roy's commitment to English education and thought sparked debate between Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore. Gandhi, objecting to Roy's devotion to English education and thought and disallowing independent thinking by being overly supportive of the Western philosophical discourses. Tagore wrote a letter rejecting Gandhi's view, saying "[Roy] had the full inheritance of Indian wisdom. He was never a school boy of the West, and therefore had the dignity to be a friend of the West."

In 1983, a full-scale Exhibition on Ram Mohan Roy was held in Bristol's Museum and Art Gallery. His enormous 1831 portrait by Henry Perronet Briggs still hangs there and was the subject of a talk by Max Muller in 1873. At Bristol's centre, on College Green, is a full-size bronze statue of the Raja by the modern Kolkata sculptor Niranjan Pradhan. Another bust by Pradhan, gifted to Bristol by Jyoti Basu, sits inside the main foyer of Bristol's City Hall.

A pedestrian path at Stapleton has been named "Rajah Rammohun Walk". There is a 1933 Brahmo plaque on the outside west wall of Stapleton Grove, and his first burial place in the garden is marked by railings and a granite memorial stone. His tomb and chhatri at Arnos Vale are listed as a Grade II* historic site by English Heritage and attract many visitors today.

In popular culture
A 1965 Indian Bengali-language film Raja Rammohan about  Roy's reforms, directed by Bijoy Bose and starring Basanta Chowdhury in the title role.

In 1988 Doordarshan Serial Bharat Ek Khoj produced and directed by Shyam Benegal also Picturised a Full One Episode on Raja Ram Mohan Roy. The title role was played by Noted TV actor Anang Desai with Urmila Bhatt, Tom Alter and Ravi Jhankal as Supporting Cast.

In 1984 Films Division of India created a documentary Raja Rammohan Roy directed by P. C. Sharma.

title: Raja Ram Mohan Roy


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Dayananda Saraswati

Dayanand Saraswati (born Mool Shankar Tiwari; 12 February 1824 – 30 October 1883), was a Hindu philosopher, social leader and founder of the Arya Samaj, a reform movement of Hinduism. His book Satyarth Prakash has remained one of the influential texts on the philosophy of the Vedas and clarifications of various ideas and duties of human beings. He was the first to give the call for Swaraj as "India for Indians" in 1876, a call later taken up by Lokmanya Tilak. Denouncing the idolatry and ritualistic worship, he worked towards reviving Vedic ideologies. Subsequently, the philosopher and President of India, S. Radhakrishnan, called him one of the "makers of Modern India", as did Sri Aurobindo.

Those who were influenced by and followed Dayananda included Madam Cama, Pandit Lekh Ram, Swami Shraddhanand, Shyamji Krishna Varma, Kishan Singh, Bhagat Singh, Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, Bhai Parmanand, Lala Hardayal, Madan Lal Dhingra, Ram Prasad Bismil, Mahadev Govind Ranade, Ashfaqullah Khan, Mahatma Hansraj, Lala Lajpat Rai, Yogmaya Neupane, Vallabhbhai Patel and others.

He was a sanyasi (ascetic) from boyhood and a scholar. He believed in the infallible authority of the Vedas. Dayananda advocated the doctrines of karma and reincarnation. He emphasized the Vedic ideals of brahmacharya, including celibacy and devotion to God.

Among Dayananda's contributions were his opposition to untouchability, promotion of the equal rights for women and his commentary on the Vedas from Vedic Sanskrit in Sanskrit as well as in Hindi.

Early life
Dayananda Saraswati was born on the 10th day of waning moon in the month of Purnimanta Phalguna (12 February 1824) on the tithi to an Indian Hindu Brahmin family in Tankara, Kathiawad region (now Morbi district of Gujarat). He belonged to the Audichya sub-division of brahmin. His original name was Mool Shankar Tiwari (Trivedi, in its original form), because he was born in Dhanu Rashi and Mul Nakshatra. His father was Karshanji Lalji Trivedi, and his mother was Yashodabai.

When he was eight years old, his Yajnopavita Sanskara ceremony was performed, marking his entry into formal education. His father was a follower of Shiva and taught him the ways to worship Shiva. He was also taught the importance of keeping fasts. On the occasion of Shivratri, Dayananda sat awake the whole night in obedience to Shiva. During one of these fasts, he saw a mouse eating the offerings and running over the idol's body. After seeing this, he questioned that if Shiva could not defend himself against a mouse, then how could he be the saviour of the world.

The deaths of his younger sister and his uncle from cholera led Dayananda to ponder the meaning of life and death. He began asking questions which worried his parents. He was engaged in his early teens, but he decided marriage was not for him and ran away from home in 1846.

Dayanand Saraswati spent nearly twenty-five years, from 1845 to 1869, as a wandering ascetic, searching for religious truth. He found out that the joy from material goods was not enough, therefore he decided to devot himself to spiritual pursuits in forests, retreats in the Himalayan Mountains, and pilgrimage sites in northern India. During these years he practised various forms of yoga and became a disciple of a teacher named Virajanand Dandeesha. Virajanand believed that Hinduism had strayed from its historical roots and that many of its practices had become impure. Dayananda Sarasvati promised Virajanand that he would devote his life to restoring the rightful place of the Vedas in the Hindu faith.

Teachings of Dayananda
Maharshi Dayanand advocated that all human beings are equally capable of achieving anything. He said all the creatures are the eternal Praja or citizens of the Supreme Lord. He said the four Vedas which are Rigveda, Yajurveda, Samaveda, and Atharvaveda are the only true uncorrupted sources of Dharma, revealed by the Supreme Lord, at the beginning of every creation, also because they are the only perfectly preserved knowledge without alterations using Sanskrit prosody or Chhandas and different techniques of counting the number of verses with different Vedic chanting techniques. He says, that confusion regarding the Vedas arose due to the misinterpretations of the Vedas, and Vedas promote Science and ask Humans to discover the Ultimate Truth, which he has emphasized throughout his Commentary on the Vedas.

He accepted the teachings of the first ten Principal Upanishads also with Shvetashvatara Upanishad, which explains the Adhyatma part of the Vedas. He further said, that any source, including Upanishads, should be considered and accepted to only that extent as they are in conformity with the teachings of the Vedas.

He accepted the 6 Vedanga texts which include grammar and the like required for the correct interpretation of the Vedas. Among Sanskrit grammatical texts, he says, Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī and its commentary, Mahabhashya by Maharshi Patanjali are the current surviving valid texts and all other surviving modern-grammatical texts should not be accepted as they are confusing, dishonest and will not help people in learning the Vedas easily.

He accepted the six Darshana Shastras which includes Samkhya, Vaisheshika, Nyaya, Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, Purva Mimamsa Sutras, Vedanta Sutras. Unlike other medieval Sanskrit scholars, Dayanand said all the six Darshanas are not opponents but each throws light on different aspects required by the Creation. Hence they are all independent in their own right and all of them conform with the teachings of the Vedas. He says Acharya Kapila of Sankhya Darshan was not an atheist but it is the scholars who misinterpreted his sutras.

He said the books called Brahamana-Granthas such as Aitareya Brahmana, Shatapatha Brahmana, Sāma Brahamana, Gopatha Brahmana, etc. which are authored by the seers to explain the meaning of the Vedas are also valid but again only to that extent as they agree with four Vedas because these texts are prone to interpolations by others. He said it is these books which are called by the names "Itihasa, Purana, Narashamsa, Kalpa, Gatha" since they contain information about the life of Seers and incidents, they inform about the creation of the World, etc...

He stated that the eighteen Puranas and the eighteen Upapuranas, are not the authentic Puranas and these are not authored by sage Vyasa, and they violate the teachings of the Vedas and therefore should not be accepted. The eighteen Puranas and Upapuranas are filled with contradictions, idol worship, incarnations and personification of God, temples, rituals, and practices that are against the Vedas. In his book Satyarth Prakash, he says whatever 'good' is present in these eighteen Puranas and Upapuranas, are already present in the Vedas and since they contain too many false pieces of information that can mislead people, they should be rejected.

He points that the sage Vyasa was called so by the name "Vyasa" not because he divided the Vedas but indicates the "diameter or breadth" which means sage Veda Vyasa had studied the Vedas in great depth.

He lists out various texts that should not be treated as honest texts to develop one's understanding of the World and the Lord. He rejected "all" of the Tantric texts including Pancharatra. He said that these texts are not valid as they teach different customs, rituals, and practices which are against the Vedas.

Dayanand based his teachings on the Vedas which can be summarised as follows: These, he said, are according to the Vedas and Upanishads and quotes verses from the Vedas.
 * 1) There are three entities that are eternal: 1. The Supreme Lord or Paramatma, 2. The Individual Souls or Jivatmas, which are vast in number but not infinite, 3. Prakriti or Nature.
 * 2) Prakṛti or Nature, which is the material cause of the Creation, is eternal and is characterized by Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas, which tend to be in equilibrium. In every cycle of creation, the conscious Supreme Lord will disturb its equilibrium and make it useful for the creation of the World and its forces and to manufacture the bodies required by the individual souls. After a specific time called the day of the Brahma (Brahma means great, lengthy, etc.), the creation would be dissolved and nature would be restored to its equilibrium. After a period called the Night of Brahma, which is equal to the length of the day of the Brahma, the Creation would set forth again. This cycle of creation and dissolution is eternal.
 * 3) Jiva or Jivatma or Individual Eternal Soul or Self, are many who are different from one another yet have similar characteristics and can reach the 'same level' of Happiness in the state of Moksha or Liberation. They are not made out of Natural particles and are bodiless, beyond all genders and all other characteristics as seen in the World, but they acquire a body made out of Nature and it is known as taking 'birth'. These souls are subtler than Nature itself but take birth through the body as per the creative principles set by the Supreme Lord based on their past Karma, and they put effort into improving themselves. By realizing oneself, Nature, and the Supreme Lord, Individual Souls are Liberated. But this realization depends on their efforts and knowledge. They keep coming to the World, use Nature, obtain the fruits of their actions, and appear taking myriads of lives of different animals (Those who have attained higher intellectual bodies can also go back to lower forms based on their Karma or actions), they redo their actions, and are free to choose their actions, learn and relearn, attain Liberation. After the long duration of Moksha or Liberation, would come back again into the world. Since this period of Moksha or Liberation is  long, it appears as though they never return or they never take birth again, by the other beings who are still in the World. Since they are eternal and capable of working, these characteristics cannot be destroyed. They are timeless, eternal but are not omniscients and hence cannot be the pervaders of entire Space.
 * 4) The Supreme Lord who is One without second like him, whose name is Om, is the efficient cause of the Universe. Lord's Chief characteristics are - Sat, Chit, and Ananda i.e., "Exists", has "Supreme Consciousness" and is "Eternally Blissful". The Lord and his characteristics are the same. The Supreme Lord is ever present everywhere, whose characteristics are beyond Nature or Prakriti, and pervades all the individual souls and the Nature. It is not characteristic of the Supreme Lord to take birth or incarnate. He is ever pure i.e., unmixed by the characteristics of Nature and the individual souls. The Supreme Lord is bodiless, infinite, hence has no form and hence cannot be worshipped through idols but can only be reached by any being through Yogic Samadhi as advocated in the Vedas which is summarised in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. Since the Lord is bodiless and hence beyond all genders, the Vedas address him as Father, Mother, Friend, Cause of the Worlds, Maker, etc... He is the subtlest entity which is subtler than Nature, Pervading and Filling the entire existence and Space. It is due to his subtlety that he could take hold of  Nature to create the Worlds and he proposes no difficulty for the motion of the Worlds in Space. Hence he is called Paramatman, which means 'Ultimate Pervader". There exists neither who is equal to him nor completely opposed to him. The ideas of Satans, Ghosts, etc. are foreign to the Vedas.
 * 5) He said the names Agni, Shiva, Vishnu, Brahma, Prajapati, Paramatma, Vishva, Vayu, etc. are the different characteristics of the Supreme Lord, and the meaning of each of the names should be obtained by Dhatupatha or Root. And these names do not refer to any Puranic Deities. Also, certain names may also refer to the worldly elements which should be distinguished from their contexts.
 * 6) Regarding the notion of Saguna and Nirguna in explaining the nature of the Lord. Saguna, he says, refers to characteristics of the Lord such as Pervasiveness, Omnipotency, Bliss, Ultimate Consciousness, etc. and, Nirguna, he says, refers to those characteristics which do not characterize the Lord, for example: of Nature and the Individual Souls such as different states of existence, taking birth, etc.
 * 7) Moksha or State of Liberation does not refer to any characteristic place but it is the state of Individual Souls who have achieved Liberation. The Jivas or Individual Souls are characterized by four different states of existence which are: 1. Jagrat (Wakefulness), 2. Swapna (Dreaming), 3. Sushupti (Deep Sleep) and 4. Turiya. It is in the fourth Turiya state, that the Individual Souls exist without contact with Nature but are conscious of their own selves, other Individual Souls, and the Supreme Lord (or Eternal Truth). This state of Moksha or Turiya is not seen in the World hence incomparable but can only be realized. In this state they are free of every tinge of Nature and possess their own minds and experience bliss, the pleasure of their freedom, and the like, which are incomparable with any form of pleasure in the world. They are bodiless in that state and can attain any form of pleasure by their own will without requiring any external agent such as, for example, they can perform the function of ears on their ownself without requiring material ears, etc. In that state they are capable fulfilling of all their wishes, can go anywhere they want right then and there, witness the creation, maintenance, and dissolution of the worlds, they also come in contact with other individuals who are liberated. But in that state, the creative powers remain with the Supreme Lord because the powers of the Lord and the Lord himself are not different things. In Moksha, the individual souls remain distinct from one another and from the Supreme Lord. And, by means of their own capability and with the Supreme Lord as their means, they enjoy the bliss. After the period of Moksha, they pass on to this World again, in support of which, he quotes Veda Mantras and Mundaka Upanishad, in his book Satyarth Prakash and Rigvedadi Bhashya Bhumika.
 * 8) Again, it is the mark of Maharshi Dayanand's wit that he reconciles the notion of unending or Eternal Moksha.  He says, the 'Eternal Moksha' or 'Ananta Moksha', refers to the 'permanency of pleasures of Moksha' unlike the momentary pleasures of the World, and does not necessarily mean the individual souls will remain in Moksha permanently. He clarifies it by saying that the individual souls are permanent and hence their characteristics also, and it is 'illogical' to consider that an individual soul would get trapped in one of the moments of the beginningless time, and escape the World for eternity by using the finite time period of his lives in different creature forms. Even if the illogical is accepted then also it means that even before he got trapped in Creation, he was in Moksha, and hence his Moksha period may fail at times is the conclusion that is contradictory to the assumption that Moksha is an infinite period of time. Hence, the Vedic teaching that the individual souls should come back after liberation should be considered valid. In a different point of view, he clarifies the same idea by saying that all actions whatever, are done for a finite time period cannot yield infinite results or fruit-of-actions, and after the period of Moksha, the jivas or individual should not have the capability to enjoy the bliss of Moksha further.

Social Causes: He opposed caste system, Sati practice, Murti worship, child marriage, etc. which are against the spirit of the Vedas and advocated that all evils of society should be thoroughly investigated and should be removed. The Varnashrama is based on education and profession and in his book Satyarth Prakash, he quotes passages from Manusmriti, Grihya Sutras, and Vedas which support his claims. He advocated the notion of One Government Throughout the World, also known as Chakradhipatya.

Dayanand's mission
He believed that Hinduism had been corrupted by divergence from the founding principles of the Vedas and that Hindus had been misled by the priesthood for the priests' self-aggrandizement. For this mission, he founded the Arya Samaj, enunciating the Ten Universal Principles as a code for Universalism, called Krinvanto Vishwaryam. With these principles, he intended the whole world to be an abode for Aryas (Nobles).

His next step was to reform Hinduism with a new dedication to God. He travelled the country challenging religious scholars and priests to discussions, winning repeatedly through the strength of his arguments and knowledge of Sanskrit and Vedas. Hindu priests discouraged the laity from reading Vedic scriptures, and encouraged rituals, such as bathing in the Ganges River and feeding of priests on anniversaries, which Dayananda pronounced as superstitions or self-serving practices. By exhorting the nation to reject such superstitious notions, his aim was to educate the nation to return to the teachings of the Vedas, and to follow the Vedic way of life. He also exhorted Hindus to accept social reforms, including the importance of cows for national prosperity as well as the adoption of Hindi as the national language for national integration. Through his daily life and practice of yoga and asanas, teachings, preaching, sermons and writings, he inspired Hindus to aspire for Swarajya (self-governance), nationalism, and spiritualism. He advocated the equal rights and respects to women and advocated for the education of all children, regardless of gender.

Dayanand also made critical analyses of faiths including Christianity and Islam, as well as of other Indian faiths like Jainism, Buddhism and Sikhism. In addition to discouraging idolatry in Hinduism, he was also against what he considered to be the corruption of the true and pure faith in his own country. Unlike many other reform movements of his times within Hinduism, the Arya Samaj's appeal was addressed not only to the educated few in India, but to the world as a whole as evidenced in the sixth principle of the Arya Samaj. As a result, his teachings professed universalism for all the living beings and not for any particular sect, faith, community or nation.

Arya Samaj allows and encourages converts to Hinduism. Dayananda's concept of Dharma is stated in the "Beliefs and Disbeliefs" section of Satyartha Prakash, he says:

Dayananda's Vedic message emphasized respect and reverence for other human beings, supported by the Vedic notion of the divine nature of the individual. In the Ten Principles of the Arya Samaj, he enshrined the idea that "All actions should be performed with the prime objective of benefiting mankind", as opposed to following dogmatic rituals or revering idols and symbols. The first five principles speak of Truth, while the last five speak of a society with nobility, civics, co-living, and disciplined life. In his own life, he interpreted Moksha to be a lower calling, as it argued for benefits to the individual, rather than calling to emancipate others.

Dayananda's "back to the Vedas" message influenced many thinkers and philosophers the world over.

Activities
Dayanand Saraswati is recorded to have been active since he was 14, which time he was able to recite religious verses and teach about them. He was respected at the time for taking part in religious debates. His debates were attended by large crowds.

On 22 October 1869 in Varanasi he lost a debate against 27 scholars and 12 expert pandits. The debate was said to have been attended by over 50,000 people. The main topic was "Do the Vedas uphold deity worship ?"

Arya Samaj
Dayananda Saraswati's creation, the Arya Samaj, condemned practices of several different religions and communities, including such practices as idol worship, animal sacrifice, pilgrimages, priest craft, offerings made in temples, the castes, child marriage, meat eating and discrimination against women. He argued that all of these practices ran contrary to good sense and the wisdom of the Vedas.

Views on superstitions
He severely criticized practices which he considered to be superstitions, including sorcery, and astrology, which were prevalent in India at the time. Below are several quotes from his book, Sathyarth Prakash: ""

On Astrology, he wrote:

He makes a clear distinction between Jyotisha Shaastra and astrology, calling astrology a fraud.

Views on other religions
He considered the prevalent religions to have either immoral stories, or badly practised, or some of them have sufficiently moved away from the Vedas. In his book Satyarth Prakash, Maharshi Dayanand has analysed critically current form of Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, Christianity and Islam.

Islam
He viewed Islam to be waging wars and immorality. He doubted that Islam had anything to do with the God, and questioned why a God would hate every non-believer, allowing the slaughter of animals, and command Muhammad to slaughter innocent people.

He further described Muhammad as "imposter", and one who held out "a bait to men and women, in the name of God, to compass his own selfish needs." He regarded Quran as "Not the Word of God. It is a human work. Hence it cannot be believed in."

Christianity
His analysis of the Bible was based on an attempt to compare it with scientific evidence, morality, and other properties. His analysis claimed that the Bible contains many stories and precepts that are immoral, praising cruelty, deceit and that encourage sin. One commentary notes many alleged discrepancies and fallacies of logic in the Bible e.g. that God fearing Adam eating the fruit of life and becoming his equal displays jealousy. His critique attempts to show logical fallacies in the Bible, and throughout he asserts that the events depicted in the Bible portray God as a man rather than an omniscient, omnipotent or complete being.

He opposed the perpetual virginity of Mary, adding that such doctrines are simply against the nature of law, and that God would never break his own law because God is omniscient and infallible.

Sikhism
He regarded Guru Nanak as "rogue", who was quite ignorant about Vedas, Sanskrit, Shashtra, and otherwise Nanak wouldn't be mistaken with words.

He further said that followers of Sikhism are to be blamed for making up stories that Nanak possessed miraculous powers and met God. He criticized Guru Gobind Singh and other Gurus, saying they "invented fictitious stories", although he also recognized Gobind Singh to be "indeed a very brave man."

Jainism
He regarded Jainism as "a most dreadful religion", writing that Jains were intolerant and hostile towards the non-Jains.

Buddhism
Dayanand described Buddhism as "anti-vedic" and "atheistic." He noted that the type of "salvation" Buddhism prescribes, is attainable even to dogs and donkeys. He further criticized the Buddhist cosmology which says that earth was not created.

Assassination attempts
Dayananda was subjected to many unsuccessful assassination attempts on his life.

According to his supporters, he was poisoned on a few occasions, but due to his regular practice of Hatha Yoga he survived all such attempts. One story tells that attackers once attempted to drown him in a river, but Dayananda dragged the assailants into the river instead, though he released them before they drowned.

Another account claims that he was attacked by Muslims who were offended by his criticism of Islam while meditating on the Ganges. They threw him into the water but he is claimed to have saved himself because his pranayama practice allowed him to stay under water until the attackers left.

Assassination
In 1883, the Maharaja of Jodhpur, Jaswant Singh II, invited Dayananda to stay at his palace. The Maharaja was eager to become Dayananda's disciple and to learn his teachings. Dayananda went to the Maharaja's restroom during his stay and saw him with a dancing girl named Nanhi Jaan. Dayananda asked the Maharaja to forsake the girl and all unethical acts and to follow the Dharma like a true Arya (noble). Dayananda's suggestion offended Nanhi, who decided to take revenge.

On 29 September 1883, Nanhi Jaan bribed Dayananda's cook, Jagannath, to mix small pieces of glass in his nightly milk. Dayananda was served glass-laden milk before bed, which he promptly drank, becoming bedridden for several days, and suffering excruciating pain. The Maharaja quickly arranged doctor's services for him. However, by the time doctors arrived, his condition had worsened, and he had developed large bleeding sores. Upon seeing Dayananda's suffering, Jagannath was overwhelmed with guilt and confessed his crime to Dayananda. On his deathbed, Dayananda forgave him, and gave him a bag of money, telling him to flee the kingdom before he was found and executed by the Maharaja's men.

Later, the Maharaja arranged for him to be sent to Mount Abu as per the advice of Residency, however, after staying for some time in Abu, on 26 October 1883, he was sent to Ajmer for better medical care. There was no improvement in his health and he died on the morning of the Hindu festival of Diwali on 30 October 1883 chanting mantras.

Cremation and commemoration

He breathed his last at Bhinai Kothi at Bhinai 54 km south of Ajmer, and his ashes were scattered at Ajmer in Rishi Udyan as per his wishes. Rishi Udyan, which has a functional Arya Samaj temple with daily morning and evening yajna homa, is located on the banks of Ana Sagar Lake off the NH58 Ajmer-Pushkar Highway. An annual 3 day Arya Samaj melā is held every year at Rishi Udyan on Rishi Dayanand's death anniversary at the end of October, which also entails vedic seminars, vedas memorisation competition, yajna, and Dhavaja Rohan flag march. It is organized by the Paropkarini Sabha, which was founded by Swami Dayanand Saraswati on 16 August 1880 in Meerut, registered in Ajmer on 27 February 1883, and since 1893 has been operating from its office in Ajmer.

Every year on Maha Shivaratri, Arya Samajis celebrate Rishi Bodh Utsav during the 2 days mela at Tankara organized by Tankara Trust, during which Shobha Yatra procession and Maha Yajna is held; event is also attended by the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi and Chief Minister of Gujarat Vijay Rupani.

Navlakha Mahal inside Gulab Bagh and Zoo at Udaipur is also associated with him where he wrote the second edition of his seminal work, Satyarth Prakash, in Samvat 1939 (1882-83 CE).

Legacy
Maharshi Dayanand University in Rohtak, Maharshi Dayanand Saraswati University in Ajmer, DAV University (Dayanand Anglo-Vedic Schools System) in Jalandhar are named after him. So are over 800 schools and colleges under D.A.V. College Managing Committee, including Dayanand College at Ajmer. Industrialist Nanji Kalidas Mehta built the Maharshi Dayanand Science College and donated it to the Education Society of Porbandar, after naming it after Dayananda Saraswati.

Dayananda Saraswati is most notable for influencing the freedom movement of India. His views and writings have been used by various individuals, including Shyamji Krishna Varma, Subhas Chandra Bose, Lala Lajpat Rai, Madam Cama, Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, Lala Hardayal, Madan Lal Dhingra, Ram Prasad Bismil, Mahadev Govind Ranade, Swami Shraddhanand, S. Satyamurti, Pandit Lekh Ram, Mahatma Hansraj and others.

He also had a notable influence on Bhagat Singh. Singh, after finishing primary school, had joined the Dayanand Anglo Vedic Middle School, of Mohan Lal Road, in Lahore. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, on Shivratri day, 24 February 1964, wrote about Dayananda:

The places Dayanand visited during his life were often changed culturally as a result. Jodhpur adopted Hindi as main language, and later the present day Rajasthan did the same. Other admirers included Swami Vivekananda, Ramakrishna, Bipin Chandra Pal, Vallabhbhai Patel, Syama Prasad Mukherjee, and Romain Rolland, who regarded Dayananda as a remarkable and unique figure.

American Spiritualist Andrew Jackson Davis described Dayanand's influence on him, calling Dayanand a "Son of God", and applauding him for restoring the status of the Nation. Sten Konow, a Swedish scholar noted that Dayanand revived the history of India.

Others who were notably influenced by him include Ninian Smart, and Benjamin Walker.

Works
Dayananda Saraswati wrote more than 60 works. This includes a 16-volume explanation of the Vedangas, an incomplete commentary on the Ashtadhyayi (Panini's grammar), several small tracts on ethics and morality, Vedic rituals and sacraments, and a piece on the analysis of rival doctrines (such as Advaita Vedanta, Islam and Christianity). Some of his major works include the Satyarth Prakash, Satyarth Bhumika, Sanskarvidhi, Rigvedadi Bhashya Bhumika, Rigved Bhashyam (up to 7/61/2) and Yajurved Bhashyam. The Paropakarini Sabha located in the Indian city of Ajmer was founded by Saraswati to publish and preach his works and Vedic texts.

Complete list of works

 * 1) Sandhya (Unavailable) (1863)
 * 2) Bhagwat Khandan OR Paakhand Khandan OR Vaishnavmat Khandan (1866) which criticised the Srimad Bhagavatam
 * 3) Advaitmat Khandan which criticised Advaita Vedanta
 * 4) Panchmahayajya Vidhi (1874 & 1877)
 * 5) Satyarth Prakash (1875 & 1884)
 * 6) Vedanti Dhwant Nivaran (1875) which criticised Vedanta philosophy
 * 7) Vedviruddh mat Khandan OR Vallabhacharya mat Khandan (1875) which criticised Shuddhadvaita philosophy
 * 8) ShikshaPatri Dhwant Nivaran OR Swaminarayan mat Khandan (1875) which criticised the Shikshapatri
 * 9) Ved Bhashyam Namune ka PRATHAM Ank (1875)
 * 10) Ved Bhashyam Namune ka DWITIYA Ank (1876)
 * 11) Aryabhivinaya (Incomplete) (1876)
 * 12) Sanskarvidhi (1877 & 1884)
 * 13) Aaryoddeshya Ratna Maala (1877)
 * 14) RigvedAadi Bhasya Bhumika (1878) which is a foreword on his commentary on the Vedas
 * 15) Rigved Bhashyam (7/61/1, 2 only) (Incomplete) (1877 to 1899) which is a commentary on the Rigveda according to his interpretation
 * 16) Yajurved Bhashyam (Complete) (1878 to 1889) which is a commentary on the Yajurveda according to his interpretation
 * 17) Asthadhyayi Bhashya (2 Parts) (Incomplete) (1878 to 1879) which is a commentary on Panini's Astadhyayi according to his interpretation

 * 1) Vedang Prakash (Set of 16 Books)
 * 2) Varnoccharan Shiksha (1879)
 * 3) Sanskrit Vakyaprabodhini (1879)
 * 4) VyavaharBhanu (1879)
 * 5) Sandhi Vishay
 * 6) Naamik
 * 7) Kaarak
 * 8) Saamaasik
 * 9) Taddhit
 * 10) Avyayaarth
 * 11) Aakhyatik
 * 12) Sauvar
 * 13) PaariBhaasik
 * 14) Dhatupath
 * 15) Ganpaath
 * 16) Unaadikosh
 * 17) Nighantu

 * 1) Gautam Ahilya ki Katha (Unavailable) (1879)
 * 2) Bhrantinivaran (1880)
 * 3) Bhrmocchedan (1880)
 * 4) AnuBhrmocchedan (1880)
 * 5) Go Karuna Nidhi (1880) which contains his views on cow slaughter in India
 * 6) Chaturved Vishay Suchi (1971)
 * 7) Gadarbh Taapni Upnishad (As per Babu Devendranath Mukhopadhyay) (Unavailable)
 * 8) Hugli Shastrarth Tatha Pratima Pujan Vichar (1873) which is a record of his arguments with orthodox pundits at Bengal & his views regarding validity of idol worship in Hinduism
 * 9) Jaalandhar Shastrarth (1877) which is a record of his arguments with orthodox pundits at Jalandhar
 * 10) Satyasatya Vivek (Bareily Shastrarth) (1879) which is a record of his arguments with orthodox pundits at Bareily
 * 11) Satyadharm Vichar (Mela Chandapur) (1880) which is a record of his arguments with Muslim & Christian theologians at an interfaith dialogue held in Chandapur of Shahjahanpur district
 * 12) Kashi Shastrarth (1880) which is a record of his arguments with orthodox pundits at Varanasi

For other miscellaneous Shastrarth please read: Dayanand Shastrarth Sangrah published by Arsh Sahitya Prachar Trust, Delhi Rishi Dayanand ke Shastrarth Evam Pravachan published by Ramlal Kapoor Trust Sonipat (Haryana). Arya Samaj ke Niyam aur Upniyam (30 November 1874) which deals with code of conduct for the Arya Samaj Updesh Manjari (Puna Pravachan) (4 July 1875) which is a record of his sermons delivered to his followers at Pune Swami Dayanand dwara swakathit Janm Charitra (During Puna pravachan) (4 August 1875) which is a record of his early life spoken by himself to his followers at Pune Maharshi Dayanand Saraswati Jivan Charitra Photo Gallery Swami Dayanand dwara swakathit Janm Charitra, for the Theosophist Society's monthly Journal: Nov & 1 Dec Rishi Dayanand ke Patra aur Vigyapan which is a collection of the letters & pamphlets written by him.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Dayananda Saraswati


text:
Talk:The Era of Russian Palace Revolutions

Moved this sentence here: "Thus, in June 1762 a German princess who had a legitimate claim to the Russian throne as wife of a tsar ,became Catherine II, empress of Russia."

The original sentence had no legitimate claim. OK, someone thinks it was legitimate. I don't want to argue such a trivial point, but the sentence is fairly pointless if the meaning is reversed. There's not much point stating the obvious, so I removed the sentence. The question of legitimacy belongs here, not in the article. Graham Chapman


text:
Talk:Click consonant

word-initial
only word-initial clicks: Not true. Xhosa and Zulu have lots of words with clicks in the middle, such as iqaqa (some stinky mustelid), uqhoqhoqho(Z)/uqhoqhoqha(Xh) (larynx), and esanqoba.

I believe it says that no initial OR FINAL clicks. Since isiZulu and isiXhosa are Bantu languages, all words end either in a vowel or in a nasal consonant, not clicks.

 * Be bold, go correct those errors! :) Dysprosia 10:04, 23 Oct 2003 (UTC)

IPA

 * In IPA transcription, the symbols ʘ, ǀ, ǁ, ǂ, and ! are used to represent bilabial, dental, alveloar lateral, alveolar, and retroflex clicks respectively.

 * Could someone with the appropriate font render these out as graphics?

Why not just use Unicode?

language groups
Hadza and Sandawe are languages, not "language groups", although if they are unrelated to any other language (and many linguists still regard them as Khoisan), they would by default be language _families_.

Kirshenbaum
While the quote about the Kirshenbaum system is verbatim, I have a problem with the section of the quote that says that the clicks are infrequent in the languages most often discussed (more than 50% of all words in !Kung begin with a click). Also, the reference to "IPA diacritics" could be misleading; there are no diacritics, but there are four full characters for clicks. That aside, I don't see how t! in the Kirshenbaum system is any less ambiguous than // in SAMPA. The use of SAMPA // is fine in most languages that use clicks, because two unaspirated voiceless clicks cannot appear next to each other in the Khoisan or the Bantu languages that use them. thefamouseccles

sound samples
Would it be possible for anyone to include a sound samples of these click consonants? I have read Manner_of_articulation, but as a north-american, I must say I am utterly incapable of following these instructions to make any sort of sound. UnHoly 23:22, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * There are samples on bilabial click, dental click, alveolar lateral click, palatal click, and postalveolar click. They are produced by Peter Ladefoged, who deserves a page if he doesn't have one. Nohat 00:09, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * That helped a lot! Thanks. UnHoly 04:51, 9 Feb 2005 (UTC)

 * There are also sound samples at the external link of ‡Hõã. kwami 04:20, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

the accompaniments
i just added the data, will someone please fix it up to table format? Benwing 08:48, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

 * Sure, thanks for putting all that in. I've added a few more languages; except for Damin, they're all from L's articles in the UCLA Working Papers in Phonetics. ǂHõã is worth looking at for more accompaniments, as it's quite rich; I'll see if I can track down my papers. (I think the phonetics was done by Traill, who L relied on for his data.) !Ora might also be worth a look, and certainly N/u if anything is ever published. The Tshu-Khwe languages are pretty impoverished click-wise, so might not give us a lot that's new, but could help show what's more commonly found. kwami 19:53, 2005 July 22 (UTC)

Added some ‡Hõã as well, but it's from one of L's old html pages, and thus ASCII, so the identities really need to be verified. For example, what seemed by its transcription to be a uvular ejective sounds like a uvular followed by glottal stop, so I counted it as that. But my ear isn't good enough to be able to tell with many of them, and the sound quality isn't great. kwami 08:22, 2005 July 23 (UTC)

 * ‡Hõã was actually from a Cornell website, which is now linked. Found a better description in Collins, which also included G|ui. kwami 03:45, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

Yeyi
I am a South African and have never heard of a Southern African language called yeyi. If no one gets back to us soon I suggest we remove the listing.

 * Who said it was South African? Yeyi is spoken by about half an ethnic group of 50,000 in Botswana. 66.27.205.12 04:24, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

tenuis
please do not use "tenuis" as this is an obsolete term. Benwing 04:15, 24 July 2005 (UTC)
 * Yeah, it probably is. But it's so much more convenient than "unvoiced unaspirated"! 66.27.205.12 04:24, 24 July 2005 (UTC)
 * there is usually no need to say "unaspirated". Benwing 05:57, 24 July 2005 (UTC)
 * "Unvoiced" as frequently used includes aspirated. Not important in English, but it is in languages with phonemic aspiration, as here. In the source material Ladefoged spelled it out as "unvoiced unaspirated" -- wording I always found tedious, which is why I changed it to tenuis. Don't blame you for objecting to that, but it's probably best to retain the original precision, especially with sounds as complex as these! kwami 06:07, 2005 July 24 (UTC)

‡Hõã
I had added ‡Hõã some time ago, but my source was not very reliable. (It might not even be the right language!) Can anyone verify? If not, we should probably delete these entries. Seems a shame, though. kwami 21:58, 2005 August 31 (UTC)

 * Confirmed, with a few corrections. kwami 03:47, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

Origins
any info on the origins of click consonants? It seems clear how many consonants in many languages are formed, and how they all are related to easy sounds for a baby to make, "b, p, m, d, t, n, g, k, ng" but how do clicks originate? I've noted among the nonsense cooing of babies some clicks happen, but how were these transferred into language? Does the world proto-language include clicks? How did they arise? etc. etc. Could they be evidence of language evolving indepedently in different parts of the world? --ChadThomson 05:20, 17 October 2005 (UTC)

 * No one knows. However, it seems likely that they're related to doubly articulated consonants. Labial-velars, for example, are easily transformed into implosives (if voiced) and ejectives (if voiceles), so a new airstream mechanism isn't necessarily problematic. In several languages, lateral clicks are easily confused with lateral affricates. kwami 22:18, 17 October 2005 (UTC)

Orthographies
So clicks are represented in IPA like this, and in ASCII renderings of IPA like that, but how do the respective languages' orthographies deal with clicks? I guess most, if not all of them use the Latin alphabet when written, and this would have to have been innovated since the Romans didn't use clicks. My non–South African layman's impression is that the Bantu languages featuring clicks tend to use Latin letters like Q or C, or digraphs as in 'Xhosa', while Khoisan languages tend to use (in addition, since they have more clicks?) 'letters' like //, !, ', etc. (Is // a letter or a digraph? A ligature? How are these strange glyphs collated, eg in a Namibian phone book?) Could anyone enlighten me and other readers on this subject?

 * Good question about Namibian phonebooks. I don't know if there are even entries for these symbols. That's worth checking out. Most of the collation I've seen either places them at the beginning of the alphabet, or ignores them and collates according to the first Latin letter.

 * Few Khoisan languages are written on a regular basis. Nama is, and I believe Sandawe might be as well (I've heard elementary education is conducted in Sandawe), but I think that's about it. Nama at least uses the | || ! # system. || is not a digraph, but a separate letter, although it might have originally been iconically bipartite, representing the two sides. (! was originally | with the retroflex underdot diacritic; and the horizontal lines of the # might have indicated the palate?) The IPA came up with a separate set of symbols, more in keeping with the Latin alphabet, but reverted because the | || ! # system is nearly universal among Khoisanists and Khoisan literature. Bantu, of course, is restricted to the Latin alphabet for clicks. I don't think Yeyi is written, and I believe that is the only Bantu language with the palatal click. kwami 23:28, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

Click consonants in English
Aren't we lucky not to have to use click consonants in everyday speech? They sound hard. 203.167.171.81 09:41, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
 * If you had them and learned them since childhood, you wouldn't find them any more difficult than, say, [k] or . — N-true 12:00, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, maybe a little harder to learn than [k] or, but easier than [θ] or [r] - kids pick them up by the age of three. kwami 01:43, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
 * (Actually, 2-year-olds can differentiate various clicks before they can pronounce [s]! kwami 08:10, 8 October 2007 (UTC))

Revision needed
I don't know if I'll have time to revise this page based on new research into the Nǀu language. See that page and Velaric ingressive for what I think needs doing. kwami 01:43, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Click consonants used to mean "no"
From the article: 'in Persian a click accompanied by tipping the head upwards signifies "no".'

Tipping the head upwards is the gesture used for "no" in Greece as well. My Greek teacher would tut as she did this - I don't know whether it was her habit (maybe showing disapproval that we, her students, had made a mistake) or if it is widespread in Greece (I don't remember hearing it when I've been in Greece), but, if the latter, possibly this is used elsewhere in (or maybe even throughout) south-eastern Europe and the Middle East. Is there any evidence for this? — Paul G 07:37, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
 * An isolated dental click for 'no' is pretty common in the region. kwami 08:09, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Starting to provide references; major rewrite
I'm taking some guidance from WP:CITE. The style is chatty, not right for an academic presentation. Several assertions are dubious. There is redundancy. There is excess detail. The edits I just made just scratch the surface. Hurmata (talk) 08:42, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Please bring up dubious assertions here rather than just deleting them. Most are defensible. kwami (talk) 09:05, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Click's origins
Actually, about there being no evidence to support that clicks are ancient sounds, I found an article in the New York Times called "In Click Languages, an Echo of the Tongues of the Ancients" by Nicholas Wade on March 18, 2003, which says click sounds may be some of the oldest sounds in languages. Perhaps the ideas expressed there are significant enough to warrant noting on the article page? Captain Gamma (talk) 01:16, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

 * It's a common myth. Clicks are found in primitive languages, so they must be primitive too. We know the languages are primitive, because they're spoken by primitive people. Etc. It makes about as much sense as recent BBC reports that Aka-Bo was one of the world's oldest languages, a completely meaningless statement. kwami (talk) 01:21, 21 February 2010 (UTC)

 * This presumes quite a bit about evolution, and that all humans came from Africa. Therefore the argument is pointless, and I would be willing to bet that someone who says this is a new feature is a non-evolutionist, while those who think humans who migrated from Africa think this is an old feature that most other languages have lost, albeit just at point while leaving Africa. This conjecture ("Actually, about there being no evidence to support that clicks are ancient sound...") is pointless at best, and needs to be removed, because of its extreme level of speculation about taboo subjects. --Ryandward (talk) 15:22, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

 * All humans did come from Africa, but that's much too long ago to be relevant. kwami (talk) 06:10, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Difficulty
While what the article currently says is true (click consonants aren't difficult to produce; children pick them up, etc.), I believe the real difficulty with clicks isn't producing them in isolation, but producing them as consonants in between vowels in the regular flow of speech. I wasn't sure if this needed a source to be added, but I feel it's relevant to the Difficulty section. 76.167.253.199 (talk) 21:56, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

 * You're right, that wasn't clear. It is clear in the citation (a clause with both a /ǁ/ and a /s/ in it, the latter mispronounced as /tʃ/). — kwami (talk) 05:15, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Doke's bilabial symbol is not in Unicode
In the Competing orthographies table in the Transcription section, the character  (U+F211) is used for Doke's bilabial click symbol. That character is non standard PUA and it probably not in most people's system fonts. added this character in a modification on 6 May 2008 --Moyogo/ (talk) 18:07, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

 * It's in SIL fonts, which are common for readers who use IPA. I doubt most non-IPA people would be all that interested.  Can you suggest a better solution?  — kwami (talk) 18:25, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * My browser doesn't display it. --JorisvS (talk) 18:30, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I have some SIL fonts installed (Charis SIL, Doulos SIL, Gentium Plus, etc.) I don't see anything for . --Moyogo/ (talk) 19:28, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Mine doesn't display it on this page, but does in the article, where the font is specified. Which browser are you using?  — kwami (talk) 19:39, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * My Chrome neither displays it here, nor in the article. --JorisvS (talk) 19:41, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

So, neither (formatted) nor  (unformatted) display? Perhaps IPA needs to be updated. — kwami (talk) 19:43, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * That's right. --JorisvS (talk) 19:44, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I asked at Template_talk:IPA. Maybe you can give the details there.  — kwami (talk) 20:06, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I will, if I know what details to provide. --JorisvS (talk) 20:09, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Well, are you on a Mac? I don't think the template does anything for Macs.  etc.  If they have questions.  — kwami (talk) 20:27, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Windows 8. And my computer using Windows 7 does not display anything either. Trying Firefox or Internet Explorer does not make it work. Chrome gives white blocks, whereas Firefox gives a block with the text F2 11 in two rows and Internet Explorer white blocks without a border, regardless of the version of Windows. --JorisvS (talk) 20:49, 7 February 2015 (UTC)
 * What symbol is this supposed to be anyway? I don't think using PUA is a good idea. I’d rather use graphics. --Moyogo/ (talk) 18:56, 8 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Above, they still do not display, but the current symbol in the article, /ɋ/, does display for me. --JorisvS (talk) 07:54, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

Doke's palatal doesn't show up
Doke's symbol for the palatal doesn't show for me. What does it look like? And maybe it is a good idea to include an image. --JorisvS (talk) 07:54, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

title: Talk:Click consonant