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Welcome to this space of creation.
One of the things that come to our
mind when we speak of creation
is the book of Genesis.
that speaks about the creation of universe.
The Genesis starts with the words
"In the beginning there was the word".
Sound and language are the
first forms of creation.
With the language we recreate
and invent continuously the world.
The world rejoices in language.
For this reason, in order to
inaugurate, to baptise symbollically
this space of creation,
we invited someone who has dedicated
himself to sound and language.
He started with mathematics,
then music, and finally
sanscrit, one of the older
languages known to us.
Please, let us welcome
Thank you very much.
Good evening. I would like to start singing
a mantra so that we can hear how it sounds.
And then I will say some sentences
in sanscrit. Do not panic, they wil be short.
The objective of the mantra is to create
a good armosphere.
It creates a body of sound.
that propitiates certain thoughts
certain movements
both internal and external movements.
Only a few words to give you
a warm welcome to this event.
I am sure it will be a success
I would like to explain what sanscrit is.
And why the sanscrit can be of interest
for everybody, and especially for the creators.
And I will explain our project in Barcelona.
Sanscrit is the classical language in India.
This means it is not a usual language.
That means in sanscrit you cannot go
and buy bread nowhere in India.
It means that it is a language
that has been always preserved
only for philosophy, mantras...
the poems to the gods...
and for intellectual subjects.
The result is that this language
has not been worn out.
that is has stayed the same
all over the centuries.
The languages we speak now
are very different from those we spoke
some centuries years ago.
But sanscrit has remained the same
along two thousand years.
This allows us to see the process.
The words don't get erased, as in a
language used for the everyday life.
In sanscrit you can see clearly the process.
This is a wonderful thing, because
you can see the way language works
in a very clear way.
Why sanscrit? Sanscrit is the vertex
from a big old tradition.
intellectual, philosophical, artistic...
A tradition that was been undervalued
and little known in the Western world.
This tradition does not forget reason,
but it has to do with many other things.
In this sense,
Sanscrit is also a key.
A key to different processes,
not only rational.
It has achieved to create a tradition
which, altough being rational,
sometimes even very much so...
sanscrit offers other possibilities
and creates a path, an alternative path
where it is a lot easier
to find other keys to open
a way to see differently
the things that we usually have
fixed in our heads.
And finally, about the school
I want to say that when I started
studying sanscrit, it was very
difficult for me, because sanscrit
is a complicated language.
Most of all, the vocabulary is difficult.
Language does not change,
but during so many centuries
there's a lot of vocabulary.
Studying sanscrit seems like
studying five languages at the same time.
Even the simplest words have many synonyms.
Each one with a different shade.
"Suprit", friend, when he has a good heart
"Mitram", when it's warm,
"Avasia", when he has our same age...
The variations are so subtle.
But you have to learn a lot of vocabulary.
This complicates everything.
And the didactics of sanscrit is quite bad.
It is not teached in an easy way.
In India you learn it in a wild way, so to speak.
You are simply left in a sanscrit environment
and you have to learn by yourself.
What you don't understan now,
you will learn in some years.
But we cannot allow ourselves to do so.
For the people who have interest
in the language, we looked for a way
to make it easier
in all possible way.
That is, we tried our best
to solve the difficulties
with clear explanations.
During all those years,
many, many people have come to the school.
I would say about ten people have learned
sanscrit well, so that they can read texts.
Texts many people want to read,
as the Bhagavad Gita, the Yoga Sutras...
They are able to read these texts
in the original language.
This opens a new path. It is difficult to get
near this tradition if you don't know
the language. People interested in India
feel sometimes stuck. Sanscrit gives them
a real road. They can see things as they are
They don't need other translations
that sometimes can be too distant
from the real roots.
Sanscrit has sometimes much to do
with the sound. So, learning the language
does not necessarily mean
learning every word.
It can also lead to a world of sound.
Thank you very much, Miquel.
Now I would like you to explain.
How did you go from mathematics
to music, and then to sanscrit.
Is there any relation between these
three subjects that we cannot see?
Yes, of course. For me, this is very personal.
For example, I don't see much a relation between
music and mathematics, although
there is one, of course.
With mathematics, I tried to...
I considered mathematics as the nucleus
the essence of the way of thinking in
our Western world.
I wanted to know well this way of thinking.
And I felt there was someting else...
There had to be an alternative to that.
This way of thinking was very well, but
I felt there had to be an alternative.
The sanscrit collected my interest
for this alternative and for the music
and the sounds. Because in the sanscrit
tradition, as you said before, sound is very
important. It moves everything.
Not only the outer sound, but the inner
sound too. In this sense, it helped me
to understand my relation to music
And it also gave me the key
to this new way of seeing the world.
But let's not be mistaken... some people
believe Indian tradition is not rational.
They are angry with logical thinking.
But Indian tradition is in fact very rational
Only, they do not exclude everything else,
and they create ways to arrive there.
Like mantras. Mantra is not only words.
It's also what is generates.
Through this, other possibilities open up,
not only the rational, but the non rational too.
So, we could say sanscrit is half way
between rationality and music?
A middle point between
the two hemispheres of the brain?
More than a middle point, I would say
sanscrit is a synthesis. It does not
forget rational thinking. For instance,
The first sanscrit grammar was not written.
It was made 500 years before Christ.
And it is a monument to rational thinking.
Even though our rationality
is very different to ours, different to what
we think today a grammar should be.
So, they have this logical thinking
but they also have the ability to open up
to other possibilities.
And I think what sanscrit does
is melt both things together.
How interesting!
Now, on a more personal level
how come you became interested in sanscrit?
How did you fall in love with sanscrit?
First thing was translation.
There were a couple of texts I had great interest in
And I noticed that the translations were
so different one from the other.
Then I became interested in sanscrit.
And when I heard sanscrit for the first time
I became absolutely fascinated...
This time, not in a rational way.
I had to learn sanscrit also in a logical way.
For me, it was a kind of calling...
I realized that I had found a tool...
Not only a tool, also a way of living
that would bring me forward.
You said you arrived to sanscrit through some texts...
Which were those texts?
Above all, one that is very interesting
for many, many people, the Bhagavad Gita.
This is a piece of the Mahabharata.
where you find condensed some ideas
of Hinduism, but not only of HInduism.
Many of the ideas you find in the Bhagavad Gita
come from Buddhism. They come from a
long philosophical tradition in India.
This was the text that called me...
as well as many other people.
But this is not only the top of the iceberg.
It is only one more text, one of the many
in a huge tradition, in quite an awe-inspiring
ocean of thinking and creativity.
You told me that sanscrit was the language
used to talk with the gods.
And that apparently it creates some
kind of vibration.
Explain a little bit about that.
Yes. This is why tradition wants
to preserve the language. It wants it
to remain pure.
It doesn't want the language to change.
The first grammar of the sanscrit came
from this desire. The people who were
reciting hymns to the gods could
not do any mistakes. Grammar mistakes.
That is how the first grammar was born.
An interest in describing the language
was born. According to the tradition,
if you sing the hymns with a bad grammar
or a bad pronunciation, the gods will not
understand your prayers.
Oh my God. So there is a high requirement.
You have to speak sanscrit well.
Yes. It's like with the requirements
a priest has with the objects and the place
of the rituals. He has to keep everything
clean, orderly and pure. This same
requirement applies to sanscrit language.
I cannot ask for purity and wash my hands
and use a language that is not pure.
Now it comes to my mind that
nowadays there are many scholars in sanscrit
great experts that do not speak the language.
They only can read it.
How can the language survive?
how can this language which is unique
survive when it's not spoken?
In our center we also have tried to do this...
Sanscrit is a European language.
This means it is of the same family than
Catalan, Spanish... all languages in Europe
except Basque, Finnish and Hungarian.
This does not mean that sanscrit is the mother.
It is more like an older sister.
Sanscrit is the oldest language in Europe
which has been preserved.
From an Academic point of view, this
is very interesting,
Because it allows us to compare...
what we call comparative Linguistics.
In some cases, sanscrit is being
academically kidnapped, so to say
in order to study some specific aspects
but of course a language is much more.
I know that in your school, people learn
the spoken language, whereas in other
universities they learn only written sanscrit.
Why did you decide so?
Why did you give this importance to sound?
When we talked about these two big fields
apart from logical thinking...
that take us to other possibilities...
The main tool to open up to other
possibilities is the sound.
To repeat the mantras, to recite...
The sound, in a certain way,
is touching our different ways
of vibrating and transforming them.
I'm sure that this transformation through
the sound is done in the Western world
through music, classical and other kinds.
Because music also transforms us.
In this sense, I think the sanscrit language
is more precise... It goes straight away
...to the point. To certain points.
In the Western World we have only recently
discovered music therapy, as well as
the power of the sound, which I think will
be part of medicine in the future. The healing
power of sound. It already was in sanscrit.
Of course, this was from the start in the
sanscrit tradition. Everything
has been invented already.
Anyway, it is good to rediscover.
In Barcelona we have the privilege
to have your school. We can go into
this sanscrit school.
What would you tell people
so that they fall in love with sanscrit?
The power of sanscrit is that
it can leak through the holes, the gaps.
When you feel this internal signal,
this small or big call...
this curiosity... This is always a signal.
What I can say is that in our school
our most important mission is to give answer
to anybody who has this curiosity...
even if it is only an intellectual curiosity.
Sometimes it starts as an intellectual
curiosity, but you never know
where it can lead you.
Anybodyour website. can visit
The name of our school is Devavani.
Vani is one of the sanscrit words
for language. Devavani means
"language of the gods".
I also have to say that our school is
completely neutral. We do not try to
convince anybody. We only teach
the language. If somebody wants to study
sanscrit only to read poems...
well, there is no problem.
We do really want to take people anywhere.
We only want that everyone
can decide where to go
through the impulse of the language.
So taht means you are not going to the
rational or the spiritual part.
You simply give them the tool, the key.
Yes, because then you see that the reaction
is different for every person.
Some people go in this direction,
The other goes in other direction...
all this in a natural way.
The language is so plastic...
it gives you different possibilities.
A very artistic person can feel that sanscrit
enhances his creative clarity.
Some other people can come to me and say,
Oh, I have more capacity to concentrate
since I am learning sanscrit.
I didn't have this capacity before.
So, it goes along with their own state
with their own way of doing things.
How wonderful! Now we all will
have a great curiosity to study sanscrit.
We would like to continue this conversation
but unfortunately we have run out of time.
You mentioned transformation, you
mentioned this more than once.
An our next guest came from Brazil,
from Rio de Janeiro in 1998.
When she was very young.
And along these years she has been
transforming objects.
So we say goodbye to Miquel,
with an applause.
Thank you very much.