Travel back to Nalanda with Ai - History of Nalanda University historyvideoai 216K subscribers Subscribe 1.6K Share

600 years ago, no one had heard of Harvard. But in a small village in Bihar, there was a university where students from all over the world came to study. Its name was Nalanda. Not just a university, Nalanda was a whole civilization. Today, through this video, we will go back about 1000 years and understand the history of Nalanda. Let's start today's video. This story begins in the 5th century CE, when the Gupta Empire was at its peak. And the king of that time, Kumar Gupta I, had laid the foundation of this city of knowledge. Friends, Nalanda means Na Alam Da, which means such a donation that never ends. It was a donation of knowledge. Nalanda was not just a building, it was a city of knowledge. Such a place where you used to find temples, lecture halls, science labs and libraries as big as 8 floors. Nalanda had three main libraries, which were its pride. Ratnasagar, Ratnaranjak and Ratnodadi. Here you used to find books of every subject and there were also many rare Buddhist texts. And Ratnodadi was so big that people say that it was as high as 9 floors. Their books were not only of India, but also of Greece, Rome, Tibet, China, and other countries. Very few people know that Nalanda was a residential university. Where more than 10,000 students and more than 2,000 teachers used to live. And admission here was not in the form of today. There was an oral entrance exam here. There were debates outside the gate. If you could think, then you would get the entry. The subjects here were Buddhist philosophy, mathematics, Ayurveda and medicine, astronomy, astrology, grammar and logic. Foreign languages ​​were also taught here, such as Chinese, Persian and even Greek. Nalanda was not only for India, it was the first global campus in the world. Famous Chinese monk Huan Shang studied in Nalanda for 7 years. He wrote that Nalanda's scholars were one of the most profound thinkers in the world. Another monk was Ai Qing, who learned Sanskrit and Pali from here and took it to his country. Students used to come here, China, Japan, Korea, Tibet, Indonesia, Iran. Imagine, in those days, all these people used to come to India to study. Nalanda's campus was so big that 10,000 students used to live together here. There were 300 plus lecture halls, meditation spaces, ponds, research labs and even an observatory here. This was an ancient version of a modern-day university. Then came the year 1193 and a black part was written in the pages of history. Iqtiyaruddin Muhammad Bakhtiyar Khilji was a commander of the Mamluk dynasty who had seized Bengal. He ascended to Bihar with his small army. But why did he do this? Because Bihar was the epicenter of Buddhist learning at that time. And this place, Nalanda, was a thriving knowledge center from where India's thought and knowledge was going abroad. And Bakhtiyar Khilji did not like this. A place where thousands of people did not fight with swords but with thoughts. Where the things of meditation, debate and scriptures could be changed. And with this useless thought, he attacked Nalanda with his companions. He burned Nalanda. Buddhist monks were mass executed. And Nalanda's three libraries, which were Ratnasagar, Ratnaranjak and Ratnodadi, were handed over to the fire. It is said that there was so much knowledge in those libraries, there were so many books that his fire burned for three months. Not only a world library was burned with Nalanda, India's intellectual legacy and a whole knowledge tradition was destroyed that day. Friends, if we summarize this, then Bakhtiyar Khilji, who was a military general in Mohammad Ghori, he captured around 1200 CE in Bengal. And he attacked Nalanda in 1193. Because at that time, the Buddhist institution was seen as a symbolic power center. Not only Nalanda, Vikramshila and Odantapuri were also destroyed in the same wave. After 700 years, in 2010, the Indian government saw a dream to revive Nalanda again. This idea was first given by Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam. Today, Nalanda has been revived once again. A new campus, new students, but the legacy is the same. Thinking, learning and understanding. So friends, this was a small story of Nalanda University. When the world talks about knowledge, Nalanda should come first. It is our identity, our heritage and our pride. Even today, we can learn from Nalanda that there is no limit to knowledge and a book, a thought can change the world. So friends, if you have learned something new today, then join our channel, subscribe to it and share this video with more people. Thank you.