ORIGIN OF HINDUISM
What is “Hindu”? What is the origin of the word?
Those were pertinent questions for the time. Mahatma Gandhi was no historian; he laid claim to no learning. But he had read in some authentic book on Hinduism that the word ‘Hindu’ did not occur in the Vedas, but when Alexander the Great invaded India, the inhabitants of the country to the East of the Sindhu, which the English-speaking Indians know as the Indus, were described as Hindus. The letter ‘S’ had become ‘H’ in Greek. The religion of these inhabitants became Hinduism, and as they knew it, it was a most tolerant religion. It gave shelter to the early Christians who had fled from persecution, also to the Jews known as Beni-Israil as also to the Parsis. He was proud to belong to that Hinduism that was all-inclusive and stood for tolerance.
Aryan scholars swore by Vedic religion, and Hindustan was otherwise known as Aryavarta. He had no such aspiration. Hindustan of his conception was all sufficing for him. It certainly included the Vedas, but it also included much more. He could detect no inconsistency in declaring that he could, without in any way whatsoever impairing the dignity of Hinduism, pay equal homage to the best of Islam, Christianity, Zoroastrianism, and Judaism. Such Hinduism will live as long as the sun shines. Tulasidas has summed it up in one doha: “The root of religion is embedded in mercy, where as egotism is rooted in the love of the body. Tulasi says that mercy should never be abandoned, even though the body perishes.”
WHO IS HINDU ?
(A question and answer from the correspondence of Gandhiji with a correspondent, which appeared under the title “Correspondence — A Catechism” is reproduced below.)
Q.: You have always termed yourself a ‘Hindu’. On the other hand, you are not ready to accept the dictates of the Hindu pundits on even their Shastras concerning child marriage, widow-remarriage, untouchability, etc. You say in Young India dated August 26th: “The Smritis bristle with contradictions. Inspiring verses on self-restraint could not be written at the same time and by the same pen that wrote the verses encouraging the brute in man.” The same, I submit, might be said of the many Puranas of the Hindus. Denying the authority of these books, I do not understand how you can call yourself a “Hindu” (as understood at present) who has implicit faith in the absurdities and immoralities (derogatory to common sense) preached by some of the Puranas. If you think a Hindu doesn’t need to believe so, it would be in the service of truth if you were to define the Hindu religion and clear the arguments for your being regarded a Hindu.
A.: I call myself Sanatani Hindu because I believe in the Vedas, Upanishads, the Puranas, and the writings left by the holy reformers. This belief does not require me to accept as authentic everything that passes as Shastras. I reject everything that contradicts the fundamental principles of morality. I am not required to accept the ipse dixit or the interpretations of pundits. Above all, I call myself a Sanatani Hindu, so long as the Hindu society, in general, accepts me as such. In a concrete manner he is a Hindu who believes in God, the immortality of the soul, transmigration, the law of Karma and Moksha, and who tries to practice Truth and Ahimsa in daily life, and therefore practices cow-protection in its broadest sense and understands and tries to act according to the law of Varnashrama.
TWO ASPECTS OF HINDUISM
(From “The Do or Die Mission” by Pyarelal)
Gandhiji, while in detention at Aga Khan Palace, once remarked to Shri Pyarelal as under :
“There are two aspects of Hinduism. There is, on the one hand the historical Hinduism with its untouchability, superstitious worship of stocks and stones, animal sacrifice, and so on. On the other, we have the Hinduism of the Gita, the Upanishads and Patanjali’s Yogasutras which is the acme of Ahimsa and oneness of all creation, pure worship of one immanent, formless, imperishable God. Ahimsa which to me is the chief glory of Hinduism, has been sought to be explained away by our people as being meant for Sannyasis only. I do not share that view. I have held that it is the way of life and India has to show it to the world.”
THE CHIEF VALUE OF HINDUISM
(From “Weekly Letter” by M. D.)
An American professor in Comparative Theology on a visit to India to study Indian religions asked Gandhiji to tell her in a nut-shell the chief value of Hinduism, as she had been told “that Gandhiji was the life and soul of Hinduism”. “It is hardly wise,” she said, “to rest content to teach what you can out of books. One must meet the true representatives of these living religions.”
Replying to her, Gandhiji said: “The chief value of Hinduism lies in holding the actual belief that all life (not only human beings, but all sentient beings) is one, i.e., all life coming from the one universal source, call it Allah, God or Parameshwara. There is in Hinduism a scripture called Vishnusahasranama which simply means ‘one thousand names of God’. These one thousand names do not mean that God is limited to those names, but that He has as many names as you can give Him. You may give Him as many names as you like, provided it is one God without a second, whose name you are invoking. That also means that He is nameless too. “The unity of all life is a peculiarity of Hinduism which confines salvation not to human beings alone but says that it is possible for all God’s creatures. It may be that it is not possible, save through the human form, but that does not make man the lord of creation. It makes him the servant of God’s creation. Now when we talk of the brotherhood of man, we stop there and feel that all other life is there for man to exploit for his purposes. But Hinduism excludes all exploitation.
There is no limit to the measure of sacrifice that one may make to realize this oneness with all life, but certainly, the immensity of the ideal sets a limit to your wants. That you will see is the antithesis of the position of the modern civilization, which says: ‘Increase your wants.’ Those who believe that increasing wants means increasing knowledge to understand the Infinite better. On the contrary, Hinduism rules out indulgence and multiplication of wants as these hamper one’s growth to the ultimate identity with the Universal Self.”
WHY SHOULD A HINDU CLING TO HINDUISM?
(From “True Inwardness”)
Q.: What is the specialty of Hinduism for which a Hindu needs to cling to it?
A.: This is an invidious question. Perhaps it is also profitless. But I must answer it if only to show what I mean by religion. The closest, though very incomplete, an analogy for religion I can find is marriage. It is or used to be an indissoluble tie. Much more so is the tie of religion. And just as a husband does not remain faithful to his wife, or wife to her husband, because either is conscious of some exclusive superiority of the other over the rest of his or her sex but because of some indefinable but irresistible attraction, so does one remain irresistibly faithful to one’s own religion and find full satisfaction in such adhesion. And just as a faithful husband does not need, to sustain his faithfulness, to consider other women as inferior to his wife, so does not a person belonging to one religion need to consider others to be inferior to his own.
Pursuing the analogy further, even as faithfulness to one’s wife does not presuppose blindness to her shortcomings, so does not faithfulness to one’s religion. Indeed faithfulness, not blind adherence, demands a keener perception of shortcomings and, therefore a livelier sense of the proper remedy for their removal. Taking the view I do of religion, it is unnecessary for me to examine the beauties of Hinduism. The reader might rest assured that I am not likely to remain Hindu if I was not conscious of its many beauties. Only for my purpose, they need not be exclusive. My approach to other religions, therefore, is never as a fault-finding critic but as a devotee hoping to find the like beauties in the other religions and wishing to incorporate in my own the good I may find in them and miss in mine.