Education in Ancient India c13.s1.5

c13.s1.5

Reason not held at a Discount in early Times :— A greater defect produced by the hold of religion over the Hindu mind was the tendency to hold reason at a discount, which became prominent a few centuries after the Christian era. Such was not the case in earlier times, when society used to value intellectual freedom highly. Upanishadic thinkers have, for example, advocated bold and original theories of philosophy without showing any anxiety whatever to prove that their views were in consonance with those of the Vedic sages. In the days of the Buddha there were as many as sixty three systems of philosophy, very few of which cared to rely on Vedic authority for their premises or conclusions. Systems of philosophy like the Sāmkhya and the Mīmānsā, which did not recognise a Creator-God, were admitted within the fold of orthodoxy. Buddhism and Jainism were not summarily dismissed as athiestic or heterodox; their scriptures were carefully studied in order to prove that their theories were unsound. For a long time society was successful in reconciling its reverence for the past with its regard for the advance of knowledge; it used to silently abandon exploded views and quietly accept new theories and doctrines.