STUDY OF HISTORY

 From Sampath’s Desk:

 HISTORY – A BRIDGE BETWEEN THE PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE!

The other day when I casually asked one of the schoolboys residing near my house about his studies, I was rather perplexed to gauge that while he was enthusiastic about all other subjects, history remained an anathema for him. Appeared vexed he asked, “Uncle, what is the use of studying social science, specifically history. Isn’t it not waste of time, energy and effort studying history at the cost of other useful absolute sciences advancing day by day vital to real knowledge and innovation explosion?” According to him, knowledge explosion on what considered as 'serious subjects' helps bring about revolutions of sorts supporting further myriad advances in those fields, catapulting in mind-blowing inventions and discoveries paving way for sea changes in human lifestyles and comfort levels. As against useful absolute sciences like Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Natural Science, Geology, Zoology, Biology, Anatomy, Space Technology, Medicine and the like - study of history appears to him as trivial. Continued he, “There is absolutely no use knowing - who, whom, what and in a nutshell, ‘WHO’s WHO’, which History is all about”. Though initially taken aback as to how to respond, I took pains to explain to him how absolute sciences and abstract sciences differ in their respective domains, but still they do co-exist. Though representing different scepters wielding respective zone of influence and impact in knowledge enrichment, I explained to him how one usefully complements the other.

 

I gave him a simple definition, “History is a link between the past and the present.” History is study of the past, particularly written records about human race, living-beings and each and everything under the sky. It also includes scientific and archaeological discoveries about the past. Study of history enables one build a bridge between the past and present. In other words, it is something like seeing the past through the present or even vice versa. History enables us to know how the past influences and affects the present and possibly the future as well.

 

History has also been verbally handed down from generation to generation, for example, narrations of elders to youth and children. With advancement of science and technology, history has come to be chronicled or documented with scripts/write-ups. To day we also have photos, motion pictures, fossil archives, stone and wall inscriptions, symbols of pride and events, heritage buildings, writings of historians. Museums and innumerable books that narrate and recount history. History is a field of research producing a continuous, narrative and systematic analyses of past events that have the potential to influence and impact the current human life in several ways!

 

History is like a coin having two sides. On brighter side, we have personalities like Ashoka The Great, Socrates, Confucius, Gautham Buddha, Mahatma Gandhi, etc. On darker side, we have ill famed Adolf Hitler, Czars of Russia, etc. Even past history on bad things imparts us good lessons. History tells us not only what you should be like, but also what you ought not to.

 

History is replete with good and bad events, and precedents. It is for the discerning mind to decipher the apt message from each historical event. Collective wisdom of a society is the end product of its experiences and level of understanding, interpretation and ingenuity.

 

On the war front, history teaches us that durable peace cannot be based on humiliation of either side to a conflict! Kalinga War fought by Ashoka The Great was an eye-opener and watershed event which turned his life. Dazed and taken aback by the human catastrophe in thousands he realized the folly of war and became an apostle of peace shedding the warpath, professing Buddhism that basically preached non-violence. This is a positive lesson.

 

Alexander The Great, had the magnanimity of respecting even his enemies – a lesson for all of us. Greedy Adolf Hitler, in his unquenchable quest for invasion and annexation of world territories, had penetrated deep into Russia with his army shrinking and squirming in freezing cold winter and got trapped in extreme climatic conditions. Clever Russians allowed them to make deep inroads into Russia by making people of one village after another to vacate after putting it on fire leaving nothing to eat for survival of the invaders, making Nazi’s army get deeper and deeper in their territory hunt and made them starve without food and shelter for a long time and finally got them tired, exhausted and vexed. With life becoming miserable, several solders died and many others gave up. Morale of Hitler’s army was razed to ground and what happened thereafter is part of history and today, it is anybody’s knowledge! These past events teach us the moral, “Nature has given you all that you need; so don’t have greed.” Isn’t it?

 

You can perhaps learn more from mistakes committed by people in the past. History is a mirror reflecting contemporary scenarios like geographical contours, regions, religions, political, social and economic life.

 

In the backdrop of the whole world shrinking into a global village, let history be taught to students not as sovereign countries but as a member of a borderless world encompassing and embracing the whole human community!

 

R.SAMPATH