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THE FAMILY AND THE NATION
5.
Purana is a corpus of Sanskrit legends and ancient Aryan beliefs. There are a total of eighteen major Puranas, all written largely in verse. These are divided into three groups, each exalting one member of the Hindu Trinity. The Puranas in which ‘rajas' or passion prevails relate chiefly to Brahma (Brahma Purana, Brahmanda Purana, Brahmavayvarta Purana, Markandeya Purana, Bhavishya Purana, and Vamana Purana). The Puranas in which 'satva' or purity is the leitmotif is related to Vishnu (Vishnu Purana, Bhagavata Purana, Naradiya Purana, Garuda Purana, Padma Purana and Varaha Purana). Those in which 'tamas' or gloom and ignorance are dominant are related to Shiva (Shiva Purana, Linga Purana, Skanda Purana, Agni Purana, Matsya Purana, and Kurma Purana). Of the eighteen major Puranas, the Vishnu Purana is the most complete. Acharya Tulsi (1914–1997) took his monk's vows at the age of eleven, and by the time he was sixteen, he had already started attracting acolytes. Acharya Kalugani (1909–1936) appointed him the Terapanth's ninth Acharya when he was just twentytwo. He started his Anuvrat Movement in 1952. He was against sectarianism and a proponent of Jain unity. Acharya Tulsi led many nationwide padyatras, logging over 100,000 km. Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888–1965) was an American-born poet, dramatist, and literary critic, whose works, The Waste Land and Four Quartets, are considered major achievements of twentieth century Modernist poetry. Eliot wrote about people's ambitions being restricted by the mundane, repetitive nature of life and the human condition in general. He saw people living lives of survival, rather than enjoyment, in the new industrial age.
CHAPTER 2
1. Holy Quran 16.3; Sura An-Nahl (The Bee); 'Khalaqa
assamawati walarda bilhaqqi taAAala AAamma yushrikoon.' 2. The parable of the ancient city is given in the Lankavatara
Sutra, one of the most important sutras (sacred texts) of Mahayana Buddhism. The cornerstone of the Chinese Chan and its Japanese version, Zen, the most important doctrine
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