Sibnarayan Ray

From Philosopedia

Note: Because of his recent death, the present page is tentative and will be updated.

Sibda, When Contributing Editor in India of Radical Humanist

Ray, Sibnarayan (20 January 1921– 26 February 2008)

Ray, once one of the editors of The Radical Humanist along with Ellen Roy, edited the writings of M. N. Roy, which Oxford University Press published.

At the Third International Humanist and Ethical Union World Congress held in Oslo (1962), Ray addressed the group and was acclaimed as one of India’s leading intellectuals,

From 1963 to 1981, Ray was chairman of the departement of Indian Studies at the University of Melbourne, Australia.

In A New Renaissance (1998), he describes his concerns as to how the social group known as the intelligentsia has developed or failed to develop in different periods and different Asian societies. A global renaissance is needed, he argues, to address the problems of global pollution, global cretinization, global inequality, and the amassing of destructive weapons.

Ray signed Humanist Manifesto 2000.

Rekha, the present managing editor of Radical Humanist, has provided the following information about Ray's death:

His body was handed over to a medical college in Kolkata as per his will. No religious last rights were performed.

He has left behind his wife, Gita; his son Amitav, who writes poems; and his daughter-in-law, Mita, who runs a school in Shantiniketan. His daughter Maitraaive, who has married an Australian artist and poet and lives with him in Australia, runs a school there for the native Australians.

Sibda (as we fondly called him, for 'da' means elder brother) was planning to write his memoirs, and that is why he had gone to settle in Shantiniketan, a quieter place than Kolkata. But he went with his wish unfulfilled. He was the sole motivation behind my editing this journal. Now, I have to go on with him in my mind.

Works By or Edited By

M. N. Roy, Philosopher-Revolutionary: A Symposium (1959)

Vietnam Seen From East and West: An International Symposium (Editor, 1966)

Gandhi, India, and the World (1970)

Autumnal Equinox (1973)

Apartheid in Shakespeare and Other Reflections (1977)

Ganatantra, Samskrti O Abakshaya (1981)

Rabindranatha, Seksapiyara, O Nakshatrasamketa (1983)

Srotera Biruddhe (1984)

Selected Works of M. N. Roy, Volume I: 1917-1922 (1988))

Selected Works of M. N. Roy, Volume II: 1923-1927 (1989)

Selected Works of M. N. Roy: Volume III: 1927-1932 (1991)

Selected Works of M.N. Roy: Volume IV: 1932-1936 (1997)

For A Revolution From Below: An M. N. Roy Commemorative Volume (1989)

Selected Works of M. N. Roy, 1927-1932) (by M. N. Roy and Sibnarayan Ray. 1991)

Universality of Man: Message of Romain Rolland (1993)

A New Renaissance and Allied Essays (1998)

In Freedom's Quest: Life of M. N. Roy, Vol. 1: 1887-1922 (1998)

In Freedom's Quest: A Study of the Life and Works of M. N. Roy, 1887-1954 (1998)

Svadesa, Svakala, Svajana (1998)

Snow-capped Peaks and Darkening Shadows: Essays in Literary Criticism (1999)

Bibeki Bidrohera Parampara (2000)

Bengal Renaissance (2001)

Pratyaya, Ambesha O Anucintana (2001)

Correspondence

Ray on 2 July 1949 wrote to Warren Allen Smith concerning humanism - Smith responded by subscribing to Radical Humanist. In 1999, he included Ray in his Who's Who in Hell, the book which is the foundation for Philosopedia. Upon hearing of his correspondent's death in 2008, Smith wrote to the editor of Radical Humanist:

Mann and Ray are greatly to blame for my decades-long obsession with humanism. Often, we blame individuals for having faulted us in some respect. In the present case, I blame both, along with Bertrand Russell and others, for having so rationally and inspiringly helped me move from believing a supernaturally based religion to developing a philosophic outlook that is humanities- naturalism-, and rationalism-based. In short, Sibnarayan Ray is every bit as much alive to me today as he was the moment I read his obituary.

The letter was sent from Ray's address at Calcutta University and was in response to Smith's query about humanism:

To most Humanists in India the question whether Nehru believes in a soul or not is rather unexciting if not irrelevant. Personally I know that his mind is a queer ensemble of scientific ideas and primitive beliefs; he lives in the Western style, speaks and writes excellent English, talks rationalism and democracy, and he observes all the ancient superannuated rituals of Hindu society. Take for example the custom of Sradh, of offering sacrifices to the dead. Nehru observed it when his father died some years back. He comes of a Kashmir Brahmin family and is quite openly fanatical about preserving the blood-purity of his caste. Most journalists and admirers from the West do not seem to have any guess about this facet of his personality. But what is more surprising is that they refuse to recognise by common consent what is patent and obvious—his insufferable arrogance, his messy thinking and wooliness, his fondness for self-exhibition, and his dictatorial temper. Quite recently an American journalist, Mr. Martin Ebon of McGraw Hill Co., interviewed him and had some taste of his “greatness”—if you chance to meet him, ask him for his impression. . . . There has not been much of a humanist movement in India during the present century. Apart from the publications of Renaissance Publishing, Tagore’s latter-day writings are the only considerable literature on the subject. Humanism in India has been mostly of a religious orientation. Its chief content was social reform with God’s fatherhood and man’s inherent divinity as the chief moral mainsprings. Nanak, Dadu, Chaitanya, Kabir, and all our medieval social reformers preached varieties of religious humanism comparable to the work and ideas of St. Francis. In the 19th century, due largely to the impact of Western ideas, a secular social reform movement started in Bengal, Maharashtra, and certain parts of South India. But the rise of Nationalism and Gandhi’s influence in the present century completely swamped that process. The two most outstanding secular humanists of the 19th century are Jyotirao Phule and Isvar Chandra Vidyasager. Unfortunately, no English translations of their works have so far been made; they wrote exclusively in their mother languages, the former in Maharashtrian, the latter in Bengali. . . . Our own movement is expressly secular. It started as a political movement with the Radical Democratic Party as its central organisation. In our 1948 Conference, however, we decided to dissolve the Party organisation and transform our activities into a more flexible and comprehensive socio-cultural movement. The chief research centre of our movement is the Indian Renaissance Institute (13 Mohini Road, Dehradun). The Renaissance Publishers (15 Bankim Chatterji Street, Calcutta) publish our The Humanist Way (quarterly; previously, it was called The Marxian Way) and The Radical Humanist (weekly, 8 Parekh St., Ratilal Mansions, Bombay). For a comprehensive idea of our philosophy, read M. N. Roy’s New Humanism, his Beyond Communism, his New Orientation, and his Science and Philosophy. Also my own Radicalism. And with Ellen Roy I wrote In Man’s Own Image.

{Jim Herrick, International Humanist News, October 1998; WAS, 2 July 1949; WAS, Rekha, 1 Mar 2008}