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by Jayaram VMany followers of
Hinduism believe that Hinduism is an eternal religion (Sanatana
Dharma). Now for many writers, scholars and historians of Hinduism, who
prefer to follow the historical timeline to discuss the origin
and growth of Hinduism, this poses many problems. For example
when someone writes that Hinduism evolved over a period of time
through a complex historical process, those who
faithfully adhere to the Puranic timeline and view every modern
interpretation with doubt and derision raise their eye brows
and accuse one of diluting the meaning and value of Hinduism.
They wonder how a religion can be eternal and evolve at the
same time. According to them either the religion is eternal and
permanent or it is evolutionary and ephemeral. Both cannot possibly
be in the same space, they argue.
It is true that Hinduism is a very ancient religion. It is
difficult to locate its origin in the annals of human history,
especially when we consider the fact that it is not a dogmatic
religion based on the teaching of one founder, but formed out of the amalgamation of many traditions
and streams of thought. We do not know which of its traditions is the
most ancient, whether it is the Vedic tradition, the tradition
of the Saivas, the ideas of Sangam era, the practices of Sindhu
Saraswathi civilization or a combination of all these and even
more emanating from the wandering communities of the Himalayas, central Asia, Mesopotamia and beyond
from the heart of Africa and the Arctic. All these are believed
to be part of its ancient history as debated by many scholars
while putting forward their own hypothesis to locate its origin
and the source of the Vedas.
So on the one hand we have this traditional and puritanical
argument that Hinduism is an eternal religion and its tenets are
unchangeable and inviolable, and on the other we have a strong
body of
evidence that the native traditions of India were never the same
all the time and they underwent a great deal of churning and
metamorphosis. It is even difficult to push away the nagging
feeling that perhaps the teachings of Kapila, Gosala, the Budha, Mahavira
and countless other sects that were lost in history were versions of the same tradition that introduced
us the concepts of karma, rebirth, salvation of the soul,
reproductive energy and
even a skeptical attitude towards the role and the presence of
an omnipresent creator God.
To those who are familiar with the multidimensional aspects
of Hinduism, this is another contradiction within its folds,
which, like many other, is difficult to reconcile for the people
accustomed to rigid thinking and fixed set of beliefs. If you
believe in the Puranic timeline and dispute all academic
research done on the subject and are like one of those impatient and
intolerant people who want to rewrite history to correct all the
past injustices of colonial era, it is difficult to convince you that Hinduism
underwent an organic growth over a period of time.
But the truth is both arguments are correct. There are some
aspects of Hinduism which are eternal. They are the core concepts,
which remain unchanged and perhaps will remain so for centuries
to come. The Vedas for example are eternal,
especially their end parts, the Upanishads. They contain eternal
knowledge. Even if the whole world is withdrawn by God, the
truth contained in them will never change. They will remain
eternal in all planes of consciousness and in all sphere of
existence for all the time.
Then there are some aspects of Hinduism, especially the
rituals, some practices and divinities, the ethics and the laws
governing our social and religious conduct, which undergo change from
time to time. If this is not so, Hindu women would be still
committing sati and young girls would be still getting married
as a matter of rule. We
have come a long way from the time of human sacrifices to
the present day of sacrificing our egos and energies in the service
of God. We have learned to reconcile the differences between the
Vaishnavas and the Saivas and also accepted the Buddha as a part
of our pantheon. Even the Vedic rites and rituals are not spared from
this fate. Of the thousands of rituals and samskaras we now
perform just a few. Horse sacrifice is now simply unthinkable.
So is untouchability or polygamy.
The concept of Hinduism as an organized religion is an
invention of the modern mind. That was not how our ancients saw
the religious traditions of India. For them each tradition that
existed in their time was different and separate with its own
merits and demerits. They argued and quarreled about them and
used their intellectual knowledge to support or dispute the
various ideas and thoughts that attracted their religious
fervor, according to a set of beliefs and principles which they
held as the standard (pramana) and part of God's eternal law
(dharma). They believed in the mysterious ways of God to
manifest truth in innumerable forms. It was only in the
last few hundred years that the Hindu scholars began to bring
together the native traditions under the umbrellas of what we
now call Hinduism, partly because there was no other convincing
alternative and partly because it helped in the process of
India's unification, uniting the people to stand against the
colonial power under a common leadership. Instead of seeing them as disparate
traditions, we now consider them to be parts of the same
ancient holistic tradition.
While the Vedas and other important texts remained the same
over the centuries, our interpretation and understanding of them
underwent profound change. In the last few thousand years, the same Upanishads, the Bhagavadgita
and the Brahmasutras were interpreted differently by different
scholars. Sri Shankaracharya saw in them the principles of
monism (advaita). Sri Ramanuja interpreted the same
scriptures to justify the philosophy of qualified monism (vishishtadvaita),
while Madhava relied upon the same scriptures to substantiate
his view of dualism (dvaita).
Our current knowledge and interpretation of the Bhagavadgita is
also very different from what people thought about it a few centuries ago.
Sri Aurobindo saw profound symbolism hidden in the depths of the
Vedas. Others saw the structure of the entire human personality
hidden in the composition and organization of the hymns and
invocations to various deities. New revelations about the Vedas
and the scientific truths they contain keep coming up frequently
in discussions and academic circles.
Now what is happening? The books have not changed! They
contain the same hymns. Some of the verses are so esoteric and
couched in such symbolism that they may even sound vulgar or
superstitious to a sensitive mind. They are the same as they
were thousands of years ago. But what changed was our attitude
towards them and our understanding of them. We may now pick up a
copy of the Vedas from a book seller on the footpaths of Mumbai or
from the dusty
racks of a bookstore in Delhi that may also be selling pornographic
materials or
crime novels. A few thousand years ago it would have been a
sacrilege to violate the sanctity of a sacred scripture like the
Vedas by putting them in the vicinity of impure things.
But it has all changed now. Our consciousness has flowered.
Our minds are stretched. Our capacity to extend our thinking and
imagination to grand new levels has increased. We now do not
have to spend 20 or so years to remember and master each and
every word of a scripture and memorize it by heart. Our lives do
not depend upon it anymore. We can store an entire scripture and
its related works online or in our computers and refer to them
whenever we want. Freed from the rigors of memorizing and toeing
the guru's line of thought to secure his patronage and teaching,
we have now the freedom to focus on the meaning of the text
rather than its syntax, on its substance rather than its content
and on its essential truths rather than its confusing details.
It is not that they are unimportant or irrelevant. But that is
what the general public would like to focus.
We have the freedom to think in our own creative ways,
independent of any Guru Tradition (parampara) and
previous scholars.
We don't have to know even Sanskrit. If we can decipher the
meaning of the words, we can make sense of them both intellectually and intuitively.
It will be much more helpful if you are born in Hinduism and
brought up in the traditional Hindu way. But if you are born
elsewhere, it does not deter you from exploring its truths and
becoming a pious Hindu.
As the time went by, our attitude and devotion towards various
Hindu divinities also underwent profound change. The Vedic gods
like Indra, Varuna and Agni were subsequently replaced, in terms
of importance and veneration, by other gods like by Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.
With the emergence of the epics and the Puranas, divinities like Ganesha,
Skanda and Hanumantha assumed more prominence among the masses for their
personal appeal and religious significance.
Siva enjoyed immense popularity throughout the length and
breadth of the Indian subcontinent for several centuries, before
Vishnu took over. Today Vaishnavism dominates every other Hindu
sect in terms of popularity and mass following.
Many of our practices and rituals also underwent change. The
Vedic people worshipped devas (gods) through rituals, invoking their
support and extolling their virtues by chanting various mantras. Some
rural and remote communities indulged in sacrificial rituals,
killing animals and sometime humans, to appease their mysterious gods. Old people
went to the forests, as a part of their religious duty, to undergo penances and slow starvation to waste away their bodies and release their souls. Then
came the domestic and temple worship of divinities through
flowers, incense and offerings. The esoteric and strange
practices of the tantric sects gained momentum, as people lost
faith in the efficacy of the Vedic rituals. People built places of worship like
temples, first with wood and then with stone, to house the
divinities
and worship them regularly in a systematic way to foster the
feelings of religious duty and brotherhood in society and
fulfill their social, moral
and religious obligations.
In the course of time, ancient Indians also learned from other religions,
with which they came into contact, and
incorporated many
new practices and beliefs into their own. They assimilated
the
practices of the Greeks, the Persians, the
Babylonians, the Sumerians, the Zoroastrians, the Assyrians, the Christians and the Muslims, while contributing
richly to each of them. There was a time when half of the world
owed its religious knowledge and practices to the Indian subcontinent. They
learned how to worship the divinities with flowers and incense. They
learned how to erect monuments in memory of our gods. They learned
how to organize spiritual communities and ascetic movements
according to a set or rules and code of conduct. They learned the
importance of surrender to God, personal worship and divine
love, which were absent in the Vedic period. They learned how to
liberate the soul through the practice of yoga and inner
purification. They debated various ways in which creation might
have become possible. They probed into the mysteries of human
existence to understand their true identity and the real purpose
of their lives. In a land of the brightest and the best, people
kept pushing themselves to the edge of knowledge to transcend
their limitations and overcome their ignorance.
Our social practices also underwent profound change. We have
moved a long way from the caste conscious Hindu society, which
considered any interaction with outsiders and travelling
abroad as a great sin, to a society that accepts people from all
wakes of life and all nations to join the religion and become
part of the global Hindu community. Many social and religious reformers
worked hard, braving criticism and resistance, to remove caste barriers and injustice to
people in the name of social and caste privileges.
Hinduism acknowledges six different philosophies, which we
call as the six darshanas (perspectives or points of view). Of
them only two, both the Mimansas1,
are based on the Vedas. The
rest are based on the teachings of various philosophers, saints
and seers. Each of the darshanas underwent a profound
transformation over the centuries, including the two Mimansas.
Some of the darshanas do not even acknowledge the existence of
God or His role in creation. Technically, each of the six darshanas
stands in its own right to be considered as a separate
religion, having a history and following of over 2000 to 3000 years.
Those who argue that Hinduism is an eternal religion also
take pride in the fact that Hinduism is not a religion but a way
of life. It is very true. But it also true that, while some of the
basic tenets of Hinduism remain unchanged, the Hindu way of life
changed over the centuries. Present day Hindus now acknowledge the status of
women and the equality of all castes and communities. Their children now go to public schools and acquire education, without
the need to live in the gurukulas and beg for their food. They
do not consider it objectionable to see their women go out of
their homes to study or work. Their eating habits have also
changed. Most Hindus do not mind eating and sharing food with
people of any caste or religion. They regularly visit the restaurants and
fast food joints, seldom worrying about who might be preparing
the food and whether it is sattvic or rajasic
or tamasic. Inter caste, inter racial and inter
religious marriages are on the rise as people migrate and settle
in various parts of the world.
The fact is no matter what, every religion undergoes
transformation. In every religion there are some aspects which
never change and some which undergo change from time to time,
according to the circumstances, perceptions and popular opinion.
Every religion is eternal in its own way, because they all come
from the same source, God, and every religion is vulnerable to
change, decay and decline, as people's perceptions change and
new religious ideas catch their attention.
We have historical records to believe that the Bible more or
less remained the same over the last 1700 or so years and the Old
Testament for much longer. While the contents of the Bible
remained the same over these centuries, Christianity itself
underwent many changes. Christians no more
excommunicate the heretics, or burn the witches or acknowledge
universally the Pope as the supreme commander and leader of the
entire Christian world. Many Christians now believe there is more
than one way to salvation. According to a recent survey
conducted in the US, a majority of the Americans, nearly 70%,
believe in a mixture of religious beliefs rather than one
particular dogmatic religion.
The Quran is preserved in its pristine purity ever since its
revelations were preserved by the early followers. But despite
reprisals and resistance from the clerics and the orthodox
elements, Islamic society underwent a great deal of change over
the centuries and continues to do so till now. In non
Islamic countries Muslims have to be content and adjust to the
local jurisprudence however radically different the laws may be
from their scriptural injunctions. They have to live in harmony
with non believers for the sake of communal amity and peace of
mind. So is the case with any minority religious group in any
part of the world. The Jews suffered a great deal after their
migration out of Israel. So did the Parsis after their
civilization was destroyed.
Both Buddhism and Jainism underwent schisms as time went by.
Many new schools of thoughts emerged to interpret and
reinterpret the teachings of their original masters. The
Mahayanas and Svetambaras took a radical stand and parted their
ways from the orthodox schools. They had their own convictions and justifications to do
so. It does not mean that they changed the teachings of the
founders. They just understood them differently and interpreted
them differently.
This is the way life. As time goes by, we adapt and change according to the
challenges and circumstances we face. Our
religions undergo change and evolve, as we evolve mentally,
intellectually and spiritually. We find new truths in the mine of
same knowledge, as our awareness expands and our thinking leaps
into newer orbits. Each day the consciousness of the earth and
of the humanity receives new insights, new inventions and new
discoveries. Flashes of insight descend into us, as our memories
fade and our bodies age. New spiritual masters arrive as the old
ones depart, to continue the work and keep the world aspiring
for new possibilities and new understanding. The world is never
tired of spinning on its own invisible axis. It keeps churning
new dreams and delusions, laughing at those who think they can
control its momentum or direction, as people come and go like the
fireflies on a windy night.
Every religion has a soul and a
body of its own. They are the higher knowledge and the lower
knowledge, to which the Hindu scriptures keep referring
frequently to remind us of what should be our priority. The soul part aims to uplift, purify and
enlighten the individual souls so that they become part of the Light from
which they emerged. The body part aims to deal with our delusions,
feelings, passions, emotions, ignorance and the lower nature.
The soul part is for the guidance and liberation of the soul and
the body part for keeping the ego under control. The soul part
is the axis and the body part is the substance that rotates
around it. In truth the substance is the same, but since it
rotates it appears differently in different time frames.
Simple truths do not
appeal to us. We need distractions. We need rituals, noise, the delusion of being
separate, different, important, devoted, sincere and moral. We
need the illusion of activity to stroke our egos and believe
that we are making progress. We
therefore build a mirage of activity around the central truths
of each religion and keep ourselves looking in the direction of
the world to fulfill our personal agendas. We do the same when we follow a spiritual guru.
Instead of putting his teachings to sincere practice, we elevate
him to God and begin to worship him. We identify God in every
guru, except in ourselves. We organize associations,
community bhajans (singing), reception parties and collection
drives, to prove our involvement with the movement, forgetting
the central purpose for which anyone should seek a guru.
There is no unanimity in any religion. Each of them has
undergone one or more divisions. A great many people, from
various religious backgrounds, get
caught in the superficial aspects of their religions and keep fighting about the details and
the differences they perceive within their own religions and in other religions, ignoring the
eternal truths and values that would liberate them. For them religion becomes a source of
distraction rather than inspiration. They become lost in the web
of fantasy, seeking meaning in the medley of religious drama,
without improving their conduct and cleansing their souls. To
all of them this is the advice: religion is the last of all
illusions. It is the final frontier we need to cross in order to
see the Truth face to face. It is the last barrier God puts up
in front of you before you can experience His universal and
unconditional love. If you do not have proper discrimination (buddhi), you will be
lost in the labyrinth of your religious beliefs and superstition
and never stand face to face with the Truth. Religion does not guarantee salvation or heaven.
It indicates possibilities and alternatives. It points to the
way. It is
your personal conduct and your inner purity which will redeem
you, whether you follow one religion or the other. For a sincere
follower of any religion a few lines of God's core revelation is
sufficient to attain liberation. We do not need tons of
knowledge to open our hearts and purify our consciousness.
Our ancient seers were aware of this fundamental truth. So
they distinguished the religious literature into shrutis and
smritis. The former contained direct revelations of God
and the latter the insights gained by best of the human minds. If
you are interested in your liberation, you should focus on the
eternal values represented in the shrutis and put them into practice.
You can refer the smritis to improve your knowledge and
understanding. But you should not get caught in the intellectual
wrestling of your opinions.
The soul of Hinduism is eternal. The body that we build
around it with our thoughts, practices, beliefs, superstitions
and practices, keep changing from time to time. Part of
Hinduism is evolutionary and part of it is eternal. We need to
know the relative value of each in our spiritual progress and act
accordingly. This, in essence,
is the truth about Hinduism and for that matter all the religions.
Suggested Further Reading
Footnoes
1. The six darshanas are Nyaya,
Vaisheshika, Samkhya, Yoga, Purva Mimamsa and Uttara
Mimansa. Of them the last one is also referred more popularly as
the Vedanta or the end part of the Vedas. Purva Mimansa is
concerned with the Vedic rituals and Vedanta with the philosophy
of the Upanishads
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