Nazi Swastika or Ancient Symbol:Time to learn the difference

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Nazi Swastika or

Ancient Symbol?

Time to Learn

the Difference

 

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By Chirag Badlani

 

During a religious holiday of mine, my mother and I went to the

store, Staples, to make color copies of a few Gods to give to our

temple. On one of the pictures, there was a very religious Hindu

symbol, resembling a Nazi swastika, yet the arms faced the opposite

direction.

 

 

 

When we went on line to pay for the copies, the people behind us,

not noticing the differentiation between the two signs, starting

talking to each other, saying that my mother and I were Nazis. Quite

appalled, my mother turned around and calmly explained to them that

it was not a Nazi symbol, that the symbol first belonged to many

different cultures before the Nazis adopted it. She explained the

religious meaning and the people behind us said they were sorry and

stated, "Oh, I never knew that."

 

I have realized that many people, not only in this country, but in

the entire world, do not know about the meaning of the swastika and

that it was not only the symbol of Nazi Germany.

 

The swastika is an equilateral cross with arms bent at right angles,

all in the same direction, usually the right, or clockwise. The

swastika is a symbol of prosperity and good fortune and is widely

dispersed in both the ancient and modern world. It originally

represented the revolving sun, fire, or life. The word swastika is

derived from the Sanskrit swastika which means, "conducive to well-

being". The swastika was widely utilized in ancient Mesopotamian

coinage as well as appearing in early Christian and Byzantium art,

where it was known as the gammadion cross. The swastika also

appeared in South and Central America, widely used in Mayan art

during that time period.

 

In North America, the swastika was a symbol used by the Navajos. The

swastika still continues today to be an extensively used sign in

Buddhism, Jainism, and Hinduism. In Buddhism, a swastika represents

resignation. In Jainism, it delineates their seventh saint, and the

four arms are also used to remind the worshiper of the four possible

places of rebirth; the animal or plant world, in Hell, on Earth, or

in the spirit world. To Hindus, the swastika with the arms bent to

the left is called the sathio or sauvastika, which symbolizes night,

magic, purity, and the destructive goddess Kali. In both Hinduism

and Jainism, the swastika or sathio is used to mark the opening

pages or their account books, thresholds, doors, and offerings.

 

The swastika was a symbol for the Aryan people, a name which, in

Sanskrit means "noble". The Aryans were a group of people who

settled in Iran and Northern India. They believed themselves to be a

pure race, superior to the other surrounding cultures. When the

Germans looked for a symbol, they looked for a symbol which

represented the purity which they believed they contained. The Nazis

regarded themselves as "Aryans" and tried to steal the

accomplishments of these pre-historic people.

 

In Nazi Germany, the swastika with its arms turned clockwise became

the national symbol. In 1910, a poet and nationalist Guido von List

suggested that the swastika as a symbol for all anti-Semitic

organizations. When the National Socialist Party was formed in 1919,

it adopted the ancient symbol, the swastika, giving it the worst

meaning possible, destroying the good symbolism which the swastika

had held for thousands of years prior.

 

In 1935, the black swastika on a white circle with a crimson

background became the national symbol of Germany. The major

difference between the Nazi swastika and the ancient symbol of many

different cultures, is that the Nazi swastika is at a slant, while

the ancient swastika is rested flat.

 

Today, whenever the ancient symbol is used, it is automatically

assumed by most people that it is a Nazi symbol and that the people

who use it are Nazis. When the Nazis took the ancient symbol, they

erased the good meaning of the swastika, the symbol of purity and of

life. The racist people of today further degrade the meaning of the

ancient symbol by spray painting the swastika on people houses,

cars, and even schools.

 

In my eighth grade World of Difference class, we watched a video

about a high school art student who painted the swastika and

displayed it in his school's art gallery. We then had a debate on

whether the painting should come down or not. Because most people

are ignorant to the fact that the swastika was not only a Nazi

symbol, symbolizing death and destruction, the class decided to take

the painting down and in actuality, the boy was forced to take it

down. This is a prime example of how the world delineates the

swastika as a bad symbol, and how the Nazis destroyed the meaning of

the symbol by adopting it as their own.

 

The swastika symbolizes so much more than what the Nazis planned.

The swastika existed as a symbol of good fortune thousands of years

before the Nazis even existed. The symbol is to many cultures an

important one, representing their history and beliefs. The Nazis, by

taking the swastika, annihilated the significance of the ancient

symbol. Today, the swastika is to most people a symbol of evil, a

symbol of demise, and a symbol of ruination. It is extremely

depressing to find that although the swastika is a symbol of life,

and symbol of joy, it has been made a symbol of evil, something the

people of the ancient world never intended it to be.

 

 

 

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