- Praveen Mohan discusses his interest in temples and temple architecture, which started during his childhood spent in temples in Tamil Nadu.
- He became deeply fascinated by the carvings, statues, and rituals in the temples, and wanted to understand their meanings.
- After living in the United States for 15 years, Praveen Mohan returned to India and began researching temples full-time due to his growing addiction to them.
- He emphasizes that ancient temples were not just places of worship but served as repositories of knowledge, containing carvings and information about various subjects such as animals, science, war, and love.
- Praveen Mohan highlights the differences between the Dravidian and Nagara styles of temple architecture and suggests that the temple layout is aligned with the chakras, promoting a positive effect on the mind and body. He also mentions unique structures like the Qutub Minar and Taj Mahal, raising questions about their origins and hidden features.
Introduction:
In a captivating interview with The Jaipur Dialogues, renowned explorer and researcher Praveen Mohan shared his lifelong fascination with temples, their architecture, and the untold stories behind them. From his childhood experiences to his full-time dedication to temple research, Mohan's journey sheds light on the profound significance and hidden depths of these ancient structures.
Childhood Intrigue and the Temple's Allure:
Growing up in Tamil Nadu, Mohan's upbringing revolved around temples. Spending countless hours wandering amidst the intricate carvings and statues, he found himself captivated by the enigmatic stories they seemed to tell. Being locked inside the temples during the afternoon closure allowed him to observe devotees' distinct rituals and interactions with various statues, igniting a quest to unravel the meanings behind them.
From the US to India: A Compelling Attraction:
After residing in the United States for 15 years, Mohan's deep-rooted connection with temples beckoned him back to his homeland. What began as brief visits to historical sites gradually transformed into an addictive passion. The temples' rich details and profound impact on his psyche compelled him to permanently return to India, embarking on a full-time journey of exploration and research.
Temples as Living Encyclopedias:
Contrary to common misconceptions, Mohan emphasizes that ancient temples were more than mere places of worship. They served as repositories of knowledge, akin to town museums or living encyclopedias. Intricate carvings showcased a vast range of subjects, including animals, science, war, love, and even erotica. Temples were intelligently designed to cater to different age groups, offering a progressive educational experience.
The Architectural Distinction: Dravidian vs. Nagara Styles:
Mohan highlights the stark differences between the Dravidian and Nagara styles of temple architecture. These variations were influenced by pragmatic considerations, such as soil conditions and structural feasibility. While each style had its own advantages and innovations, some temples showcased a combination of both, known as the Visara style. Monolithic wonders like the Kailasa Temple exemplify the monumental achievements of ancient Indian architecture.
The Temple's Spiritual Essence and Cosmic Order:
Mohan delves into the profound spiritual and cosmic significance of temples. He points out the alignment between the temple's layout and the human body's chakras, suggesting a deep connection between physical and spiritual well-being. Temples are believed to harmonize the individual with the cosmic order, with their design promoting positive vibrations that can even have a healing effect on visitors.
Conclusion:
Praveen Mohan's extraordinary journey into the heart of temples unravels the hidden secrets and profound symbolism enshrined within these architectural marvels. His exploration of temples as repositories of knowledge, the distinct architectural styles, and their impact on the human mind and body offers a fresh perspective on these ancient structures. Through his research and dedication, Mohan continues to shed light on the awe-inspiring legacy of temples, inviting us all to embark on our own journeys of discovery.
Praveen Mohan Shares His Life Journey For the First Time | Experiences of Temples
Transcript: "namaste I am Sanjay likshit and you are watching the Jaipur dialogues and today I have a very very special guest for you and he is going to talk about you guys right temples and who that can be the one and only Praveen Mohan welcome Praveen welcome thank you dialogues thank you for having me so I just wanted to know what evoked your interest in the temples and the temple architectures and the temple stories and the carvings I grew up watching you know um I grew up in temples I spent a lot of tim e in temples and as a child I used to walk around all these carvings and statues talking to them I saw yeah um because the temples usually in Tamil Nadu the temples usually closed around 12 o'clock in the noon and then they reopened the temples around five o'clock in the evening but I was actually locked inside the temples because I would be inside the temple and they would lock it outside so I spent a long time looking at each and every statue and the carvings and also observe the people how th ey prayed to each statue and every statue has its own little twist in it in some statue in front of some statues the devotees would clap this statue is called chandigeswara um in front of the nine statues or navagraha they would circle around in front of other statues they would do different things so I wanted to understand what was the meaning behind them so I spent a lot of my childhood thinking about the temples the statues and the meaning behind them So eventually I guess when I grew up I re alized that okay let me try to find out what I really can is this just a meaningless set of rituals as some people would like to say or does it really have deep meaning you know behind all these rituals and statues OK and then you went away to the United States for some time and then right now you're full time into researching the temples is it yeah so I went to the U.S around 2001 and I was there for 15 years so only in 2015 um I came back I mean I started very slowly I used to come back in the 2010 I will take a month off and I'll say let me go to Elora caves or let me go to brahhadisura Temple but as I looked more and more into these temples I kind of became addicted to the temples it's very hard because I was not myself when I went back to the US so I started to go back to the US because you know I was there but then I would keep thinking about the temples in India so the next year I took two months off the next year I took three months off like that so eventually it became time fo r me to um just come back permanently to India because the temples have some kind of a force that's going to pull you towards them I mean they have so many details that you know it's it has a magical effect on you you're quite right and as you said that a lot of people think that it's a place for doing meaningless rituals who what is the philosophy behind Temple architecture um today is if we say let's build a temple mostly it's considered as a almost as a place of business right they they would find a location in a prime area they would say how many people worship Shiva let's put a Shiva statue there and they will put a huge donation box a hundi in a prominent place so it's treated as a business where people can come basically pray to God and give their money away this is the uh the mindset that we have today but when we look at ancient temples we realize that something is not quite right when we actually go into ancient temples you see carvings and things that don't belong there you see a bunch of different animals you see people wrestling you see people singing and dancing you see carvings of a variety of things that don't belong there so it turns out that we have a system or we had an ancient system when the builders were building the temples they had something else in mind when you look at the bottom of the temples You'll Always Find animals and you will find many interesting details about animals you will see um a baby elephant drinking milk from its mother this is not the site that anybody could see in real life so imagine if you're a five-year-old child going into a temple you would be this high and then you would only look at those carvings okay and what is a five-year-old interested in if you have a five-year-old child then that that kid is only interested in watching Animal Planet because the kids are naturally attracted to animals so they put all the animal carvings for the kids at the bottom level and then there is another level which I say this is suit able for kids from six to ten year old and then it only has a dancing singing and all the fun activities like tug of war and all those interesting things and above that you have science like you will see sundials there you'll see various types of knots there and between 15 to 20 year old you will see carvings about war you'll actually see War politics you'll see Administration you'll see how people are punished you will see all all those things and above that level you'll see and this is what I say this is suitable for age group between 20 and 25 you will see erotica you'll see various forms of Love Making only Above This level you start to see gods yes so that's a happy evolutionary kind of uh setup yes it because you have to go through all those basic levels when you're a child you're only interested in all these animals and then when you keep growing up you have this natural process of I'm interested in Social things I'm interested in dancing and I'm interested in science but only w hen you reach a certain level then your mind becomes open to the gods but the temples were not built just as a place of worship they were built almost as a Wikipedia or like a town Museum where you can learn about everything where you can learn about all the animals you will see amazing information about animals you will see a goat uh you'll see a monkey riding on a goat like how a man rides on a horse actually monkeys do that okay monkeys actually do this my if a monkey spots a goat it'll just jump on the goat and go for some distance we don't know this in real life but this is carved in ancient temples so the temples are a great Souls of all kinds of information that's why we find everything in the temples I think this is the purpose of every Ancient Temple and this is why they're full of these rich carvings you know but the temples also are different in South India what we call the dravidian Style and what we have uh north of the vindhyas which is called the nagara style yes yes wha t is that difference I think there are many such differences actually largely depends on how they wanted to build it whenever they built a particular style obviously every style would have had its own advantages and disadvantages and then it also depends on the place how the soil condition was if the soil condition was suitable for a pyramid-like structure they built a pyramid-like structure if the soil was rather loose and it would not take a long pyramid-like structure they built a flat struct ure so it was more pragmatic than all these Styles and then they also combined the dravida nadra it's called the visara you can see this in some parts where they combine both of them and they tried they tried to many Innovations in many many types of um architecture we can see the monolithic architecture like the kailasa temple yeah Temple yeah that's the real wonder of the world yes it is absolutely I myself have written a number of times about it that uh Taj Mahal could not lift a finger to it yeah yeah that is the kind of monumental architecture it is talking about the temples and how the temples are laid out there is also this alignment between the chakras and the way the temples are laid out from the from the place you enter and to the uh so have you seen this in most of the temples you can if you put um a man in a lying position and then if you put a temple or a Temple's plan nearby you can see that it also has seven chakras or seven month UPS the temple is is built similar to a human body the human body is said to have seven chakras and when you look at the at an ancient Temple I don't know if it's still used in the newer temples but if you look at the Ancient Temple you will see that there are mundabs matching those chakras at this point the way we have understood this is very primitive I will say because we don't understand many of the reasons behind the temple Construction in my opinion I could be wrong uh in in my opinion because what what I would like to do is tha t I would like to take a hundred people right and not tell them and before they enter the temple I would like to check their blood pressure okay and I I wouldn't tell them why I would just tell them it's a regular medical checkup I would just check their blood pressure and let them go to the temple and go into the garbage and as soon as they come out of the garbage I want to check their blood pressure again to see if if it has an effect on them and I would think there is a very good chance that the temples have a positive effect on the human mind and the body and I think this is true even if you're not a devout person even if you're a visitor coming from Australia you just like you're just a visitor to the temple I think the temple was designed in a certain way that it will have a positive effect on your mind and body I think it should work for atheists also because there is something in that architecture they've done I don't know if you notice this the carvings will only be found outs ide on the outer wall of the temple but once we go into the just before the garbage there is one more chamber as soon as we go into the chamber there is nothing it's completely empty there's it should be completely blank and then Inside Outside they will have a lot of metal statues and all that stuff but inside you'll only have one very simple stone statue and that stone statue will not be made of granite it's not a regular Granite statue they make it out of a special stone so I think there is s ome I don't know if it's related to magnetism I don't know what they were trying to do but I think they were trying to heal us when we when we go to the temples I think when we go to the temples you can literally test this you can have all sorts of negative emotions you may you may want to fight with somebody you're angry on somebody but once you go to the temple when you come back you realize that you're coming out with a positive vibration yes I was listening to a talk today by Swami sarva pri t and what you said is very interesting also because there is an evolution top to bottom as you said and there's an evolution from entry to the garbage so both way it is an evolutionary cycle that's wonderful and also the temple it represents the cosmic order I guess the Rhythm and the infinite life cycles what we call the kala chakra yes so all that comes into it and of course you've seen many such temples but there are also some unique ones which I think you've talked about like the kotob Mina ut a drone on top you find something totally different yes yes so um there are there are two parts of this question right one is the structures surrounding the Qutub Minar when we go to the Qutub minor complex you see this tall tower that is the Qutub Minar Tower and then there is a struct there is a bunch of uh structures surrounding the kudub Minar there is no doubt that those structures are all Hindu structures because when we go there you could you you would have to be blind to say that they ture is a is a Hindu complex but the main structure the kudub Minar Tower this is the part that no historian or no archaeologist even wants to open this debate because they've printed in all the books that Qutub Minar is a is not only a Muslim structure it's the first Islamic structure in in India so if they open this for debate then they have to reprint everything right but it has many problems actually because if you look at the tower of Qutub Minar you will see carvings of bells all over the ore so how could he build Asia's tallest tower at that time so when we raised these questions sometimes historians be like no no that's not how it's built Qutub Minar was the only the first one or two stories was built by qurbuddin and then later the Kings kept on building but this is this is a stupid theory in my opinion because can we build a kudubina on top of this building no because we have to start with the foundation right when you when you build the world's tall our Asia's tallest tower inside if they allow us to go because now it's completely locked if they allow us to go inside could open or and then use drone and examine inside kadub Minar I think we can prove this Beyond any doubt that Qutub Minar is also a Hindu structure also the the drones that are flown over it and they have brought a lot of pictures which are there available even on Google have seen even I did a show on the Minar that looks like a sundial from the top why would an Islamic structure be designed like a s st Side Kaaba facing wall yes so that's another point and you've also investigated Taj Mahal haven't you yes we were I mean of course um a lot of because they're making some changes now after a bunch of videos came out there are some um Taj Mahal is full of mysteries where do you start with Taj Mahal Taj Mahal has an underground area and I think it has dual underground areas um there were some people who went through they were just taking a boat in the river yamuna and they spotted some entrance lt by Maharaja of uh yes yes and it's it's very clear so they they must have been something underneath um now they're trying to open it I haven't checked the developments of this but I'm sure you know it probably has many hidden structures underneath right
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