Sanskrit Quotes

“...The spiritual Oriental teachers say a person has three forms of mind,'' Beatrice was explaining to him once, while they were on break between one lesson and another at university, ''which are the dense mind, the subtle level and the ultra-subtle mind. Primary Consciousness, or the dense mind, is that existential, Sartrean mind which is related to our senses and so it is guided directly by human primitive instincts; in Sanskrit, this is referred to as ālaya-vijñāna which is directly tied to the brain. The subtle mind comes into effect when we begin to be aware of our true nature or that which in Sanskrit is called Ātman or self-existent essence that eventually leads us to the spiritual dimension. Ultimately there is the Consciousness-Only or the Vijñapti-Mātra, an ultra-subtle mind which goes beyond what the other two levels of mind can fabricate, precisely because this particular mind is not a by-product of the human brain but a part of the Cosmic Consciousness of the Absolute, known in Sanskrit as Tathāgatagarbha, and it is at this profound level of Consciousness that we are able to achieve access to the Divine Wisdom and become one with it in an Enlightened State.''

''This spiritual subject really fascinates me,'' the Professor would declare, amazed at the extraordinary knowledge that Beatrice possessed.''

''In other words, a human being recognises itself from its eternal essence and not from its existence,'' Beatrice replied, smiling, as she gently touched the tip of his nose with the tip of her finger, as if she was making a symbolic gesture like when children are corrected by their teachers. ''See, here,'' she had said once, pulling at the sleeve of his t-shirt to make him look at her book. ''For example, in the Preface to the 1960 Notes on Dhamma, the Buddhist philosopher from the University of Cambridge, Ñāṇavīra Thera, maintains those that have understood Buddhist teachings have gone way beyond Existential Thought. And on this same theme, the German scholar of Buddhist texts, Edward Conze, said that the possible similarity that exists between Buddhist and Existential Thought lies only on the preliminary level. He said that in terms of the Four Noble Truths, or in Sanskrit Catvāri Āryasatyāni, the Existentialists have only the first, which teaches everything is ill. Of the second - which assigns the origin of ill to craving - they have a very imperfect grasp. As for the third and fourth, which consist of letting go of craving, and the Noble Eightfold Path that leads to liberation from the cycle of rebirth in the form of Nirvāṇa - these are unheard of. Knowing no way out, the Existentialists are manufacturers of their own woes...”
― Anton Sammut, Paceville and Metanoia

“In Sanskrit, there exists no word for ‘The Individual’ (L’Individu). En Grèce antique, il n’y avait aucun mot pour dire ‘Devoir’ (Duty). In French, the word for ‘Wife’ is the same as the word for ‘Woman.’ En anglais, nous n’avons aucun mot semblable à l’exquise ‘Jouissance!”
― Roman Payne

“Sanskrit is a beautiful contextual language. It is called “Dev Bhasha” the language of the soul. Here, meanings of the words must come from the heart, from direct experience – dictionary meanings or static meanings have not much value. Meanings of the words vary depending on mind-set, time, location and culture. The words are made to expand the possibilities of the mind.”
― Amit Ray, Yoga The Science of Well-Being

“प्रेम गली अति संकरी, तामें दाऊ न समाई |
जब में था तब हरी नहीं, अब हरी है में नाहीं ||

The street of love is very narrow, two can’t pass through it at the same time

When I was, there was no God (Hari), now there is God but I am not.”
― Kabir

“In Sanskrit words are like living beings; depending on context, circumstance and environment their mood varies and meaning differs.”
― Amit Ray, Walking the Path of Compassion

“Each today, well-lived, makes yesterday a dream of happiness and each tomorrow a vision of hope. Look, therefore, to this one day, for it and it alone is life.”
—Sanskrit poem”
― Robin Craig Clark, The Garden

“I don't have a choice sahib. Artho hi kanya parakeeya eva father used to say"
"What does it mean?"
"It means a girl is another man's property and she is held in trust by her parents.”
― Ranjani Ramachandran, Fourteen Urban Folklore

“The Sanskrit texts make it clear that a cataclysm on this scale, though a relatively rare event, is expected to wash away all traces of the former world and that the slate will be wiped clean again for the new age of the earth to begin. In order to ensure that the Vedas can be repromulgated for future mankind after each pralaya the gods have therefore designed an institution to preserve them -- the institution of the Seven Sages, a brotherhood of adepts possessed of unerring memories and supernatural powers, practitioners of yoga, performers of the ancient rituals and sacrifices, ascetics, spiritual visionaries, vigilant in the battle against evil, great teachers, knowledgeable beyond all imagining, who reincarnate from age to age as the guides of civilization and the guardians of cosmic justice.”
― Graham Hancock, Underworld: The Mysterious Origins of Civilization

“Justru sesungguhnya akibat konsep yang singkat mengenai tinjauan dan luasan pengkajian bahasa, kesusasteraan dan kebudayaan Melayu itu, sehingga disamarkan hanya sebagai “Pengajian Melayu”, telah pula membawa akibat2 yang mempengaruhi penyingkiran bidang ilmiah tertentu dari pengajian Melayu, seperti pengkajian2 bahasa dan kesusasteraan Arab, bahasa dan kesusasteraan Farsi, bahasa dan kesusasteraan Sanskrit, yang kesemuanya telah memberi sumbangan yang berkesan dalam perkembangan bahasa dan kesusasteraan Melayu. Tambahan pula, bidang2 seperti sejarah pemikiran, falsafah, dan ilmu2 yang berkaitan dengan metodoloji penyelidikan ilmiah, kajian2 mengenai teori2 yang memang berkembang dengan pesatnya di Eropa, dewasa itu dan sekarang, semua ini diabaikan dalam pengkajian bidang2 kechil tertentu saja.”
― Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas, Buku Panduan Jabatan Bahasa dan Kesusasteraan Melayu

“...if we were to associate the genius of a place with one particular thing – the Russians with literature, say, or the Germans with music, the Dutch and Spanish with painting – we would have to say that the true genius of Ancient India was language.”
― Aatish Taseer, The Way Things Were

“Classical Sanskrit prose writers made very long sentences like this: "Lost in the forest and in thought, bent upon death and at the root of a tree, fallen upon calamity and her nurse's bosom, parted from her husband and happiness, burnt with the fierce sunshine and the woes of widowhood, her mouth closed with silence as well as by her hand, held fast by her companions as well as by grief, I saw her with her kindred and her graces all gone, her ears and her soul left bare, her ornaments and her aims abandoned, her bracelets and her hopes broken, her companions and the needle-like grass-spears clinging round her feet, her eyes and her beloved fixed within her bosom, her sighs and her hair long, her limbs and her merits exhausted, her aged attendants and her streams of tears falling down at her feet...." and it goes on.”
― Abraham Eraly, The First Spring Part 2: Culture in the Golden Age of India

“The most unnecessary lesson however, in my memory as I realize it now, was a Sanskrit lyric, not in praise of God, but defining the perfect woman - it said the perfect woman must work like a slave, advise like a Mantri (Minister), look like Goddess Lakshmi, be patient like Mother Earth and courtesan-like in the bed chamber - this I had to recite on certain days of the week. After the lessons she released me and served food.
(Book: Grandmother's Tale in Antaeus #70: Special Fiction Issue)”
― RK Narayan

“In a grandiose sweep that demolished history itself, Sanskrit was put forward as the ancestor of not just this brand new ‘Shuddh’ Hindi, but the ‘Mother of all languages’. We still find otherwise thoughtful Indians asking: Well, if not Hindi, which other modern Indian language came directly from Sanskrit? It is hard to let go of a crutch we have grown up with—one every bit as powerful as the myth that all of us mixed people in the north are actually Ārya, or, more crudely put, The Master Race.”
― Peggy Mohan, Wanderers, Kings, Merchants: The Story of India through Its Languages

“Seeing the lovely red
of your lips, darling
the cherries hang themselves
from a tree in despair.”
― Suhas Mahesh, How to Love in Sanskrit

“She does every little thing I like,’ he gushes.
Little does he know
he likes every little thing she does.”
― Suhas Mahesh, How to Love in Sanskrit

“54. Every time you touch me

It teeters on that edge
between pleasure and pain.
Is it a daze? A dream?
Poison swirling in my veins?
Or is it madness?
Your every touch
blurs my senses
with a numbing cold
and a searing heat
all at once.

What Rama Did Next, Bhavabhuti, 700 CE, Kanyakubja”
― Anusha Rao, How to Love in Sanskrit

“87. Just maybe

These cool Himalayan winds
that burst open
the tender shoots of the deodar
and drink the fragrance of its sap
hurry southwards to me.
I embrace them, my love
for what if
by the tiniest chance
they had touched you?

Cloud Messenger, Kalidasa, 400 CE?”
― Anusha Rao, How to Love in Sanskrit

“नपुंसकम् इति ज्ञात्वा तां प्रति प्रहितं मनः ।

रमते तच् च तत्रैव हताः पाणिनिना वयम् ।। (SRK 478)

Knowing that ‘mind’ is neuter, I sent mine to her; but now it refuses to return; I’ve been ruined by Pāṇini.

(Pāṇini, was a Sanskrit grammarian from ancient India. The word for mind, manas, is of neuter gender in Sanskrit.)”
― Dharmakirti

“Changing the family given name to a Sanskrit based name, doesn't make a person either free or holy - by doing so, one only exchanges one prison for another.”
― Abhijit Naskar

“Devices found in Sanskrit literature, including the use of frame stories and animal fables, have been identified by some scholars as lying at the root of the conception of the One Thousand and One Nights collection. Indian folklore is represented by certain animal stories, reflecting influence from ancient Sanskrit fables, while the influence of the Panchatantra and Baital Pachisi is particularly notable. The Jataka Tales are a collection of 547 Buddhist stories, which are for the most part moral stories with an ethical purpose.”
― testing testing testing, One Thousand and One Nights: Complete Arabian Nights Collection

“People are often surprised to hear that Romani is in fact a fully fledged language just like any other, that it has its origins in India, that it is related to Sanskrit, an ancient language associated with Indian scholarship and religion, and that it has been preserved by the Romani populations through oral traditions and in a variety of dialects for many centuries.”
― Yaron Matras, I Met Lucky People: The Story of the Romani Gypsies

“Yagya is a Sanskrit dialect that is not easily pronounceable by the people who speak English. They don’t have certain syllables in their vocabulary like Ksha, Tra, Gya, etc. So they pronounce Gya as Jna because syllable Gya is a combination of syllables Ja and Na; hence Yagya became Yajna.

Hindi Translation - यज्ञ संस्कृत का शब्द है जिसका अंग्रेजी बोलने वाले लोग आसानी से उच्चारण नहीं कर सकते। उनकी शब्दावली में कुछ शब्दांश नहीं हैं जैसे कि क्ष, त्र, ज्ञ, इत्यादि। इसलिए वे ज्न का उच्चारण करते हैं क्योंकि शब्द ज्ञ शब्दांश ज और न का एक संयोजन है; इसलिए यज्ञ बना यज्न।”
― Vikrmn: CA Vikram Verma, You By You

“She shines brightest at dawn. True to her name as Tara originates from Sanskrit meaning “star.”
― Soroosh Shahrivar, Tajrish

“अहं ब्रह्माण्डस्मि। (Aham Brahmandsmi.)”
― Abhijit Naskar, Insan Himalayanoğlu: It's Time to Defect

“प्रेमसत्यं ब्रह्मसत्यम्।
प्रेम विना अस्तित्वं नास्ति।।
प्रेमदर्शनं ब्रह्मदर्शनम्।
प्रेम विना ब्रह्माण्डं नास्ति।।”
― Abhijit Naskar, Insan Himalayanoğlu: It's Time to Defect

“इजरायल आक्रमणं स्थगयति, युद्धं समाप्तः। प्यालेस्टाइनः प्रतिरोधं स्थगयति, प्यालेस्टाइनः समाप्तः।।”
― Abhijit Naskar, Bulletproof Backbone: Injustice Not Allowed on My Watch

“Dear God,
make him hang out
with other women more.
He does not seem to realize
what a catch I am.”
― Hala, Gāthāsaptaśatī =: Gāhāsattasaī

“Dear God,
make him hang out
with other women more.
He does not seem to realize
what a catch I am.”
― Suhas Mahesh, How to Love in Sanskrit

“74. I’m no hero

They say that Rama,
parted from Sita,
held back the mighty ocean
to build a bridge.
And here I am,
parted from her –
can’t even
hold back
a few tears.

Vidyakara Mishra’s Thousand, 1800 CE”
― Anusha Rao, How to Love in Sanskrit

“निःशब्दं वनम्।
अन्तः पावनं मनः।
शान्तिः सर्वदा॥

My Sanskrit haiku on silence”
― Sunil Kumar