I'm surprised and a little embarrassed to see my site here, but I'll take the opportunity to address some of the things y'all have mentioned.
To people proposing language alternatives: a totally fair point, and more power to you. I made this site back in college when I was studying Sanskrit for the first time, and I was disappointed by the lack of resources available online. The site started as a series of study notes and sort of mutated into a "course" ... but that course is incomplete and has been in desperate need of repair for some time.
About the PHP errors: yeah, sorry about that! I started out with PHP because I knew pretty much nothing about web programming and needed something that "just worked." The new version of the site, which has been in development hell for a year, is in Flask (Python). I haven't touched the PHP stuff in two years, and I usually need gloves and a whole lot of disinfectant to do so.
Why learn online: because the books are usually disappointing or expensive.
Why Sanskrit: I just find it particularly beautiful. The statement that r0h1n took issue with is stated grandiosely, but I stand by it.
On "Hindutva nonsense": I empathize strongly with their motivations, but I agree that most of the ink spilled in the name of Sanskrit is vacuous and hyperbolic.
For those wondering about the fuss: I particularly enjoy kāvya [1], usually because it's just beautiful poetry [2] but also because it shows off some fancy linguistic acrobatics, the likes of which I haven't seen in any other language [3].
The point is what would you do after learning or may be spending real good amount of time with it, what is the real need.
I learnt sanskrit for more than 6 years and have passed upto threeeteeya(an exam to test your sanskrit skill).
When i learn something i should be able to converse about it with many people as i can and help spread the knowledge or information. But learning an old language like sanskrit.
What i found after learning the language is there is a lot of history which doesn't fetch any real world gain to my career, my social life, my finances or even recognition from a worldwide community.
Listen to this man. Anyone who studies a dead language for “real-world gain” will probably end up disappointed.
The only real reason to learn is so you can read old books in that language. And you might get a few points of social prestige, but that alone generally won't make up for the hours and years you put into it.
For the sheer joy of it. I learnt Sanskrit in middle school formally yet superficially. About a year ago I decided I wanted to get rid of the 'superficial' part and devoured several Sanskrit grammar books including this website. It has been a very joyful journey and I feel very happy when I am able to read and understand the only Sanskrit newspaper in the world. I don't know about you but for me that's a good enough reason. Sometimes one makes the journey because the path is so much fun even though the destination may be uninteresting.
"Its importance is plain: Sanskrit was once the most influential literary language in India, and texts written in the language could be understood by millions of people throughout the South Asian world. These texts contain profound meditations on every point on the spectrum of human concern: existence, reality, God, love, duty, marriage, war, sex, death, violence, laughter, beauty, perception, nature, anatomy, urbanity, ritual, desire, food, purpose, meaning, and language, among hundreds of others. Moreover, Sanskrit texts are the repository of non-modern modes of thought, and they present distinct conceptions of the world that are often at odds with the understanding we have today. By learning how people used to think, we better understand both ourselves and the world we have inherited.
"By learning this language, you open the door to more than three thousand years of intellectual history, both in India and beyond."
>isn't being held captive behind closed doors waiting for Sanskrit-speaking liberators
Over-dramatizing the other guy's statement does not constitute a response.
Even ignoring the religious angle, Sanskrit was the primary language of literature, science and philosophy in India for over a millennium. Surely a person might want to read some of that without being employed as a researcher.
Again, what HN reader (or otherwise), do you think is interested in reading ancient literature written in Sanskrit? A researcher or linguist I'm guessing. And maybe 3 other people.
I'm afraid your arguments in favour of learning Sanskrit are as generic and theoretical as most other comments.
I am interested. Not a researcher, not a linguist. Just some asshole who wants to know a new skill that may come in handy when exploring Indian mythology. You really need to just concede that your interests are your own and that your rather harsh view of Sanskrit is one that isn't universally shared.
I am with you - as someone who was forced to learn Latin in school for four years. The reason given to us was exactly the same, just replace "India and beyond" with "Europe and beyond".
I'll repeat: it has zero value unless you happen to be a researcher or a linguist.
I only took a year of Latin but I found it very useful in understanding my own language, English, as well as helping me in learning French (almost bilingual) and Spanish (competent). But the biggest benefit was that when I learned Russian, the whole idea of a case system was something that I was already used to, and the rest of Russian grammar (the verb) is incredibly simple in comparison to any other European language. Latin is an ideal stepping stone to fluency in Russian, and that is a very useful language to know in the modern world.
I'm a regular HN reader, and IT professional, and I'm currently learning Latin, have been for the past few months. Why? To gain access to classical, Medieval and Renaissance literature, and more importantly, to the mindset of the Romans. A similar reasoning would apply to Greek or Sanskrit.
Serious question, how many languages do you know and actively use?
As someone who grew up bilingual I've found that there is a certain untranslatable element in any language, particular when it comes to poetry and humor.
Why do you learn multiple programming languages? Why are there several types of text-editing systems? Put it to you this way: learning a new language can be as enlightening as learning functional programming for the first time in your life.
Edit: I also want to add that I came across this website in the past http://www.vedicsciences.net/articles/sanskrit-nasa.html where the idea of a highly unambiguous natural language struck me as interesting. Sadly, I've subsequently read a lot of negative comments regarding "vedic" sciences here on HN. Something akin go what the Creationists have tried to do with the bible. But I nevertheless would like to spend a few months looking at Sanskrit grammar and making an opinion about it myself.
Okay, serious answer: I can read and write proficiently in English and Hindi. I can speak proficiently in Malayalam. I can understand or business-converse in Kannada. I can understand about 75% of Tamil conversations. I learned Sanskrit in school. I've tried at various points to learn both French and Spanish using Rosetta Stone, but I gave up after the initial few weeks, probably because I was doing it alone.
Does that make me "qualified" to comment on this HN thread?
From your comments, this is like asking "Why would someone, programmer or not, want to learn Lisp online?". The answer: because they want to, because they might find it interesting. They don't have to ask you. You may not like something, but that is your preference. Don't impose it on us.
The parent has been commenting asking people why they want to learn Sanskrit when there is "infinitely many other" things to learn about. I bet that you can not learn Lisp and sail through a great programming career. And I really don't think Sanskrit is a "dead" language - it is important to far too many people to be called dead.
If you look around and read their comments, they are asking people for a justification why people would want to learn Sanskrit in spite of "infinitely many other" interesting things that are supposedly out there to learn. I call this imposition. If you don't, that's a boundary issue :)
I imagine people like you breezing through life maximizing some objective function, never waiting to admire poetry or relish a moment, only to die at the end. Hyper-practical no-nonsense men questioning the value of everything for everyone. (The funny thing is Sanskrit is incredibly practical for lots of reasons.)
>>Sanskrit is incredibly practical for lots of reasons.
Well forget Sanskrit for just one minute. The utility of any language in the modern world today, apart from day-to-day conversation(Which happens only because that's the only language accessible to kids at birth through their parents) by and large depends on what scientific, economic, art and other kind of growth happens in that language.
Nearly all Indian languages lack vocabulary for most common objects. We don't have words for mobile phones, cars, buses, microwave ovens etc.. the list is endless. By and large any Indian language today looks like English words connected through that language's grammar.
Nearly all Indian languages are practically useless for any kind of serious work. You can't do any scientific work in it, no serious text books on any topic are ever written in it, You can't use these languages to get any kind of serious work done. In short these language only work for local communication with the help of English vocabulary added to local language.
I'd completely missed this one. Now that I think of it, my day to day Hindi and Marathi derive heavily from Western vocabulary - in cases even when there is a word for a concept/object we prefer to use the more popular Western words. e.g., no one says संगणक - they stick to "Computer".
(1) You are defusing a bomb, but the wires are tucked behind a casing on which there is a label written in Sanskrit and underlined in red. With only 2 minutes left before the bomb explodes, don't you wish you started the language earlier?
(2) Women love Sanskrit.
(3) You have a dream one day that seems more real than real. In it, you are standing in a desert and are approached by a man who seems intensely familiar. With a shock, you realize this is a flashback from a past life. And you know you would have something incredible to tell yourself... if only both of you spoke Sanskrit.
(4) Academic research.
(5) On a business trip to China, a question emerges about the etymological origins of certain Chinese characters, and whether they entered the language through Middle Indo-Aryan speakers. Flush with the answer from your knowledge of ancient Sanskrit, you are able to impress your hosts and secure the contract.
(6) "Attention passengers, this is the captain speaking. While there is no need to worry, we do have to ask: is there anyone on this plane who happens to be a doctor, and also speaks Sanskrit?"
(7) Your boss has outsourced development work on a new software platform to a team in Uttarakhand. The project was a disaster as predicted, but it is now essential to find someone - anyone - who is both local and able to read the commit log as well as Sanskrit-commented source code.
(8) A software malfunction switches your phone's display and input languages to Sanskrit. Now how exactly are you planning to switch it back? And if you read Sanskrit, why would you ever want to?
(9) You are working for Google, and tasked with organizing ALL of the world's information.
(10) As a member of the TSA working to ensure aviation safety, you are responsible for screening Sanskrit speaking passengers, and conversing with them as part of general counter-terrorism screening measures. Can you really do that with only Pimsleur-level fluency?
Wow, I'm glad I didn't ask for non-practical reasons. IHMO none of these make any sense whatsoever for anyone other than a minority of a minority of people. Those 20 people should go ahead and learn Sanskrit - for the rest of the world its pointless.
1. For the same reason as solving sudoku online i.e. for the joy of it.
2. Some interesting literature was written in Sanskrit. I may want to read that.
3. To be able to judge when a hindu preacher is bullshitting me.
4. To be able to critically analyze some of the religious stuff e.g. does the age of Sun god tally with what the modern physics tells us.
5. Its grammar expands my view of what is possible to express in a language.
6. For the same reason as pursuing archaeology. The words in a dead language can tell you a lot about the life when it was in common use.
I see that you substantiate some of your views with a "P.S." that you were forced to learn it for 3 years. That means nothing. I learnt it for 5 years purely to pass exams but that hardly makes me qualified enough to start judging whether others should learn it or not.
Nopes I don't know Sanskrit and it is not on my radar right now. But a while ago when I tried to learn German, faint memories from Sanskrit classes came quite handy(see #5 above).
"For the joy of it" is probably the most important motive. For archeology is also good, though I assume a serious student of ancient languages won't learn from online guides.
Long time back I was interested in Indian Tantric stuff and found that most English translations (except those by Arthur Avalon) contained too many interpretations by the translator -some of them skewed :).So I got some original Sanskrit texts and tried to translate word by word .I couldn't progress much becoz you cannot understand the meaning of a sentence by just adding up the words- you need to learn the grammer.At that time I wished I had learned the language
I am a ployglot and know several indian and foreign languages. My favourite is Sanskrit. Why? Once I learnt Sanskrit, esp. the grammar, learning other languages was really easy. You easy almost all languages have their roots from Sanskrit. The grammar rules for German and Finnish, for example, are a subset of Sanskrit.
How do you practice or make yourself not forget the several languages you know? I find it really hard to be proficient in a language unless you live among native speakers?
Derived from Sanskrit is probably wrong, but German, Finnish and Sanskrit belong to the Indo-European language family (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indo-european). Sanskrit is a very old language in this family tree (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Indo-European_language) and thus very close to the common ancestor. Being close to the ancestor probably means that it shares many traits with it that were inherited by other Indo-European languages.
Many Hindus chant in Sanskrit for religious/ceremonial purposes, e.g. Chapter 15 of the Bhagavad Gita is often chanted before eating a meal (http://www.asitis.com/15/). It's useful to understand what the Sanskrit words mean, although there are English translations for virtually all Sanskrit texts.
If you're talking about the shlokas most commonly recited by average people, they may amount to maybe 10-20 lines. Learning their meaning will take at best one hour of research/effort.
Learning Sanskrit to understand the meaning of a shloka is like learning Latin because you came across 'Cogito, Ergo Sum' or 'Veni, Vidi, Vici' on some blog. Both are pointless overkill.
This average people comment isn't consistent with what I am familiar with. I regularly come across people, especially in the older generations, who have memorized literally pages of verse that they may not necessarily understand fully. The older generations in general in India seem to be multilingual as a rule and deeply interested in Vedic philosophy and ancient Indian history. Case in point the recent success of those Shivva books.
Because it is an enjoyable pursuit. I would agree that it is not the most practical thing to do; but not everything need be practical. Incidentally - this course seems to be one of the better ones I've seen; it actually uses modern phonetic and segmental terminology instead of throwing people straight into sandhi with no explanation of why this happens.
Because they say the knowledge of the whole universe is written in sanskrit in the vedas. Thousands of years the Indian sages researched about almost every topic and wrote this vedas. We would have been many years ahead if we could decode those teachings. Many lost, many still to be decoded. If people learn sanskrit, maybe someone will find its life purpose in this and do a big research on the old knowledge. Just saying. Anything is possible. knowledge is never in vain.
>>>>>>>Why would someone, Indian or not, want to learn Sanskrit online?
>>>>>>>>There's nearly an infinite amount of knowledge in the world. And each of us has a finite amount of time. Why not is not an answer.
You can apply that flawed reasoning to pretty much everything. It would've been a perfectly valid question if you had said "Why would I want to learn Sanskrit?". Please don't universalize your opinion by saying things like why would anyone want to learn Sanskrit online or offline.
I maintain that very few people have a reason to learn Sanskrit. It is a dead/dying language that will add zero value besides the esoteric joy of knowing a language for the sake of knowing it.
If you feel that is not the case, please elucidate your reasons. I'll be happy to be proven wrong.
And very few people have reason to learn LISP or programming languages, for that matter. (If we are generalizing, we might as well go the full length and include the entire world population)
You seem to be mistaken that folks would learn a language for just the sake of knowing it. Far from it. Language is just a tool for communication of ideas. There have been some brilliant treatises, thoughts, ideas, and philosophies expressed in Sanskrit. Folks are more interested in accessing the thoughts and works in Sanskrit as opposed being infatuated with the technical aspects of the language.
As someone whose comparative religion BA was mostly spent comparing flavors of Indian religions, it was very helpful to have a basic understanding of Sanskrit. I don't "use" it now, but knowing it during the research phase of my life sure made the learning process smoother.
As someone that has been meaning to learn, its a beautiful language and beautiful script. My motivation comes from a love of ancient history, so being able to read original texts make me happy.
Oh, gosh, the usual Hindutva nonsense. Let me first of all dispel any notion that I don't like learning languages "for fun." See my Hacker News user profile for more details on what languages I have learned. I have learned enough facts about Sanskrit and the various languages that are written in the Devanagari alphabet to know
1) The written history of Sanskrit is much less that 3,000 years long. (The historiography of India is hard, because most of the writing materials used in ancient India were perishable, and thus much less preserved than the written records of other parts of the world that are equally old, but plainly the Vedas and other texts from ancient India are less than 3,000 years old.)
2) Yes, Sanskrit is an Indo-European language, which means it brings to mind features of other Indo-European languages. Each cognate language makes it easier to learn other cognate languages in turn. So you could gain an advantage in learning Sanskrit, for example, by learning German, Russian, and Greek first (as I have). Or you could learn Sanskrit first, as many secondary school students in India have done. But while learning each language, you might still ask yourself, "What texts am I going to read, or what conversations will I have, now that I know this language?" Sanskrit doesn't have a particularly high degree of utility, if that is what you are looking for in a new language, for day-by-day communication today.
3) Finnish is not an Indo-European language, so it is not cognate to Sanskrit, and therefore learning Sanskrit doesn't provide much advantage for learning Finnish. Come on, get the basis facts right. Learning Estonian would provide a huge boost for learning Finnish, of course. Learning Hungarian, Turkish, or even Mongolian would provide more remote advantages for learning Finnish.
4) Learning Tamil, Malayalam, or other languages of south India usually categorized as Dravidian (not cognate with Indo-European) languages just might give you a deeper understanding of India and its cultural heritage than the same effort spent learning Sanskrit. That's something to think about if you like India and its culture, as I do.
5) If you would like to learn a language that maps well in its linguistic structure to first-order logic notation, I strongly recommend Chinese (Modern Standard Chinese or some other Sinitic language) over any Indo-European language, including Sanskrit. All languages have arbitrary grammatical rules. Strictly speaking, no language is more "logical" than any other. But if you like a one-to-one correspondence between spoken language sentence structure and the usual first-order logic notation, Chinese is a good place to start.
I know nothing about Sanskrit to verify or refute what you claim, but why the negative attitude? This resource seems good. Maybe people are interested in Sanskrit just for the sake of learning it? Maybe some people want to learn Sanskrit and not other languages of south India, or Estonian, or Modern Standard Chinese.
I'm not aware of what the "usual Hindutva nonsense" is. I'm going to guess there's a group of people in India who think Sanskrit and/or Hindu culture are the best thing since sliced bread. Who cares? When fans of a language, culture (or technology! :P ) are trying to convince you to learn it, they will sometimes make highly biased claims. This is to be expected.
The only thing that would matter to me is if someone claimed this particular resource for learning Sanskrit is not very good, is hard to follow, or has many mistakes.
There is large body of ancient Sanskrit literature that is very interesting and ubique. Some of the poetry and prose like Kalidasa, Jayadeva etc. are exquisite.
If you are interested in Yoga, Meditation - you will appreciate the ability study the original texts. Yoga is now a global phenomenon and I personally know many people in the west and elsewhere study Patanjali and other texts.
There is great body of ancient knowledge (like Upanishads) on philosophy, the nature of mind, ego and the true nature one's self which is very unique.
The original texts for the ancient science of Ayurveda are in Sanskrit. There are many good universities in India that offer degrees in Ayurveda and Sanskrit is a prerequisite for studying Ayurveda.
There are several ancient astronomical and mathematical texts in Sanskrit like Sulaba Sutra etc. which are very interesting.
In the Indian tradition all rituals and rites of passage like birth, naming, marriage etc. are in Sanskrit and used on a daily basis although very few people speak the language.
India has an ancient system of classical music which is actively pursued and enjoyed by millions. Many compositions that people learn and sing are in Sanskrit.
But if you like a one-to-one correspondence between spoken language sentence structure and the usual first-order logic notation, Chinese is a good place to start.
Umm. Wat? Care to elaborate more? Any papers? Also, first-order logic has many grammars and different families of syntax. Postfix, prefix, infix, graphical, linear, controlled English-based Attempto Controlled English. It makes absolutely no sense to say Chinese syntax is more logical than Sanskrit.
A language is logical if it has a controlled syntax (at the least, well-defined semantics is the holy grail for AI). Attempto ACE (http://attempto.ifi.uzh.ch/site/) and http://www.jfsowa.com/clce/specs.htm are logic languages. Chinese has no controlled syntax. Sanskrit is the only natural language to have a controlled syntax. Chomsky even credits his famous notation to a Sanskrit grammarian, Panini. Does any of your other languages have this advantage?
Since you accuse other HN-ers of being Hindutva posters, can I do the same and accuse you of being a paid Chinese shill? Stop with the unsubstantiated intellectually low-grade vacuous negativity.
Once again, please keep your biases at home and keep HN a civil place. I can't believe your glib uncivil FUD-ish comment is top ranked. Ugh.
One wonders what kind of mind would feverishly advocate for any language to go extinct.
thanks for the enlightening suggestions. But thanks I want to learn Sanskrit. I don't have to justify what I do as long as it doesn't cause harm to someone. Please stop the negativity.
BTW, I am from OK and travelled to India in the context of ancient real values. Travelled to many parts of Himalayas and learned bit about the language, quite amazed how such a great language like Sanskrit really has lost its lime light. Many great prescriptions of Medicine, Science, and Astrology are hidden in the great language. I am not trying to convince anyone but just thought of sharing my thoughts. For those of you, who have learnt it at their schools mostly read it as subject, not really learned its real value.
One of the reasons I'd like to, time permitting, learn Sanskrit would be to enjoy the Upanishads, which my favorite philosopher, Arthur Schopenhauer, regarded so highly:
"If the reader has also received the benefit of the Vedas, the access to which by means of the Upanishads is in my eyes the greatest privilege which this still young century (1818) may claim before all previous centuries, if then the reader, I say, has received his initiation in primeval Indian wisdom, and received it with an open heart, he will be prepared in the very best way for hearing what I have to tell him. It will not sound to him strange, as to many others, much less disagreeable; for I might, if it did not sound conceited, contend that every one of the detached statements which constitute the Upanishads, may be deduced as a necessary result from the fundamental thoughts which I have to enunciate, though those deductions themselves are by no means to be found there."
its great that such a resource exists. However when you want to learn a language that is still used and has similar grammar features you might want to opt for something like icelandic or polish.
Then also Turkish (although not indo-european) might be interesting since it has a really logical and regular grammar.
I'm surprised and a little embarrassed to see my site here, but I'll take the opportunity to address some of the things y'all have mentioned.
To people proposing language alternatives: a totally fair point, and more power to you. I made this site back in college when I was studying Sanskrit for the first time, and I was disappointed by the lack of resources available online. The site started as a series of study notes and sort of mutated into a "course" ... but that course is incomplete and has been in desperate need of repair for some time.
About the PHP errors: yeah, sorry about that! I started out with PHP because I knew pretty much nothing about web programming and needed something that "just worked." The new version of the site, which has been in development hell for a year, is in Flask (Python). I haven't touched the PHP stuff in two years, and I usually need gloves and a whole lot of disinfectant to do so.
Why learn online: because the books are usually disappointing or expensive.
Why Sanskrit: I just find it particularly beautiful. The statement that r0h1n took issue with is stated grandiosely, but I stand by it.
On "Hindutva nonsense": I empathize strongly with their motivations, but I agree that most of the ink spilled in the name of Sanskrit is vacuous and hyperbolic.
For those wondering about the fuss: I particularly enjoy kāvya [1], usually because it's just beautiful poetry [2] but also because it shows off some fancy linguistic acrobatics, the likes of which I haven't seen in any other language [3].
[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kavya [2]: Citation needed, but I like Kālidāsa in particular. One of the least horrible translations of one of his most beautiful works: http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/sha/sha17.htm [3]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shishupala_Vadha#Linguistic_ing... for some examples.