Talk:Hinduism
The world's oldest extant religion? I would imagine Japan's Shintoh might contest that assertion. PoorEd 13:29, 11 February 2008 (EST)
- Looking into the "oldest religion" topic a bit more, I find that no one really knows how old religions like Shintoh and Zoroasterism really are, as they probably originated in ancient shamanic animist religions way before written records existed to document them. Looks like Hinudism may be the oldest extant documented religion. PoorEd 13:37, 11 February 2008 (EST)
Contents |
[edit] Information
This is all we could find out about the faith of hundreds of millions of people? I'm doing a course on eastern religions this (southern) summer, so we'll see if I can find stuff out... Wazza (Not Wazzock, Wazza)Approach the Presence 00:08, 21 November 2008 (EST)
- SOmeone stopped by the library where I work yesterday and droped off 4 shopping bags full of books on Hinduism and related stuff - Yoga, TM, etc. However, having just sworn off adding referneces . . ..... I'm . . . . . . . . . . ....conflicted. Testy too. Carptrash 00:15, 21 November 2008 (EST)
- Adding refs is so much harder when they's books. It's so easy to link to some crap on the tubes, but a book requires finding the title page, formatting, typing, etc. Hope you got some good stuff in those 4 bags! I loves me books I'll never get a chance to read! ħuman
02:45, 21 November 2008 (EST)
- Adding refs is so much harder when they's books. It's so easy to link to some crap on the tubes, but a book requires finding the title page, formatting, typing, etc. Hope you got some good stuff in those 4 bags! I loves me books I'll never get a chance to read! ħuman
- SOmeone stopped by the library where I work yesterday and droped off 4 shopping bags full of books on Hinduism and related stuff - Yoga, TM, etc. However, having just sworn off adding referneces . . ..... I'm . . . . . . . . . . ....conflicted. Testy too. Carptrash 00:15, 21 November 2008 (EST)
[edit] "gods and goddesses that all are facets of one God"?
Hinduism makes sense if you stop looking at its metaphysics system via the lenses of Western religious discourse. A deva/i ("god/goddess") is not the same as "Brahma" (God), so Hinduism is neither monotheistic nor polytheistic. It is simply pan-theistic. Hindus, unlike Christians, as a result of this understand that worship is irrelevant, but adherence to universal justice and "works uninvolved" (meaning sincerity and generosity) In fact, a lot of Asian religion makes sense the moment you stop assuming that they claim they are scientific truths or claim to represent how the universe works. Asian religion and philosophy does not work the same way as Judaeo-Christian religion. I believe that your approach to religion is as wrong as Conservapedia's approach to science. Have a nice day. Signed, JanusGenio (not logged in) 60.49.156.38 01:59, 19 February 2009 (EST)
- It would be nice to respond to this, but sentences along the lines of : Hindus, unlike Christians, as a result of this understand that worship is irrelevant, but adherence to universal justice and "works uninvolved" (meaning sincerity and generosity) Make it a little difficult.--Bobbing up 02:10, 19 February 2009 (EST)
- People worry too much about labels. Hinduism does not fit into monotheistic, polytheistic, pantheistic, etc. Instead Hinduism is more about the experience of God on the person. There is no wrong way to experience God in Hinduism due to how it came into being from the Vedic religions. To some followers this might mean that they feel a more personal God and to others they might feel that God is more like nature itself and others feel more inclined to align themselves with one of the main ideologies of God. If no one has any issues I would love to include this in the article and remove the information about being both monotheistic and polytheistic. Quazywabbit (talk) 18:35, 9 June 2010 (UTC)
- Sounds like a good idea. If Hinduism is anything like Christianity it's likely a bit subjective and open to interpretation. Would be useful to include some references for that. ConcernedResident Fightin' round the world 18:44, 9 June 2010 (UTC)
- People worry too much about labels. Hinduism does not fit into monotheistic, polytheistic, pantheistic, etc. Instead Hinduism is more about the experience of God on the person. There is no wrong way to experience God in Hinduism due to how it came into being from the Vedic religions. To some followers this might mean that they feel a more personal God and to others they might feel that God is more like nature itself and others feel more inclined to align themselves with one of the main ideologies of God. If no one has any issues I would love to include this in the article and remove the information about being both monotheistic and polytheistic. Quazywabbit (talk) 18:35, 9 June 2010 (UTC)
- I made some minor edits on the section and put in a reference as well and will try to add some more information when I can. Quazywabbit (talk) 01:54, 10 June 2010 (UTC)
- I found your edits to be of a humanly-acceptable quality and have been marking them as "patrolled" (that's a good thing). ħuman
01:57, 10 June 2010 (UTC)
- I found your edits to be of a humanly-acceptable quality and have been marking them as "patrolled" (that's a good thing). ħuman
- I made some minor edits on the section and put in a reference as well and will try to add some more information when I can. Quazywabbit (talk) 01:54, 10 June 2010 (UTC)
[edit] Atheism and Hinduism
The curious thing about Hinduism(and with other religions of Indian origin such as Buddhism and Jainism) is that they treat atheism also as a "religiously valid" doctrine. There are "influential" schools of thought in the Hindu tradition which simply reject the notion of a God/Goddess cretaing and administering the Universe. I am adding this to the article, with a reference to Wikipedia. Circe (talk) 06:10, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
[edit] Preposterous and Oppressive
"Hinduism is the most preposterous and oppressive of all religions". Wow. I am not a fan of Hinduism either, but is this really a proper statement to put in an article. Mr. Anon (talk) 03:32, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
[edit] Connections to "indo european myths"
For what it's worth, this paragraph is very weasel and flimsy. It may well be facutal, but as presented, it sounds like someone once read a myth and said "oh, look it has men in it -- and this one has men... they are somehow linked". Gods fight all the time, world wide, cause
En attendant Godot 14:59, 16 August 2011 (UTC) humans fight. So we should, if we ever have time to care, look into specifics.
[edit] The Suttee/Sati section and its problems
I've rewritten the claims as they sounded like both blatant Hindu apologetics and Hindu nationalistic "It's all because of the Muslim"-guilt shifting. First off, the quote is from ISKCON and I find it about as solid a ground for the "un-Hinduistic" character of sati as the "convenient" Mormon revelations that reversed societally reviled practices such as polygamy or the view of black people. Add to that the ridiculousness of sourcing this claim to a time before Hinduism even existed and I think it's obvious that this is an unholy mix of the bad kind of historical revisionism, No True Scotsman, and of course Hare Krishna creationism. While I couldn't immediately check the Encyclopaedia Indica, I could easily source The Danger of Gender: Caste, Class and Gender in Contemporary Indian Women's Writing and the cited page (p. 9) most emphatically lays the blame for the increased prevalence of sati during the Muslim invasion at the feet of re-entrenchment of the caste system, not Muslim rape or abduction: "Around 1000 AD the prohibition of remarriage for widows among the top castes was extended to child widows for fear of intermarriage with Muslims and the subsequent conversion. The incidence of sati increased particularly in the warring regions of the North. The widows were often forced onto the pyre by their husband's relatives or by their sons. During this time, widows were considered as an ill omen and they were reduced to beggars or prostitutes". In sum, while there were sources they were really bad and the conclusions drawn were seriously flawed. ScepticWombat (talk) 22:27, 13 February 2015 (UTC)
- That's totally fair. Ikanreed (talk) 23:01, 13 February 2015 (UTC)
- I think it is a common view, that the practice is forbidden since Kaliyuga.[1] There are traces of Hinduism since mesolithic. See [2] Contractor (talk) 05:09, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
- First, I've already pointed out the problematic nature of the claim about the religious-based ban on sati, both in terms of provenance, chronology and No True Scotsman elements. There's probably a reason why the Wikipedia article on sati[wp] never mentions the Kali Yuga prohibition, and contrary to your source, it actually remarks: "Within the dharmashastric tradition espousing sati as a justified, and even recommended, option to ascetic widowhood, there remained a curious conception worth noting the achieved status for a woman committing sati." Now, this is hardly conclusive evidence either, but opinions seem rather divided on the subject of sati and the Dharmaśāstrasas as indicated by this source from the University of texas (note that the suffix .pdf is missing): "Visṇụ (20.39; 25.14) is also the first to mention a widow following her husband onto the funeral pyre (→ satī). These are the only places that widow burning is recorded in any of the early Dharmaśāstras; this custom should be seen as a somewhat late introduction into the Dharmashastric tradition."
- Secondly, "traces of Hinduism since mesolithic" is not what the source actually says. Instead, it uses the extremely vague and cautious phrase (I've added the emphases) that "Much of what we now call Hinduism may have had roots in cultures that thrived in South Asia long before the creation of textual evidence that we can decipher with any confidence. Remarkable cave paintings have been preserved from Mesolithic sites dating from c. 30,000 BCE [...]." Then it says that paintings of local animal life and a mythological figure may be such traces, but this is conjecture so tenuous that it verges on PIDOOMA, since such figures are well known from all over the world[wp]. Indeed, the argument sounds pretty much like the pseudohistorical claims for their religion's antiquity found in various strains of Neopaganism (e.g. the Goddess movement). ScepticWombat (talk) 08:41, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
- Wikipedia's article present the argument about total prohibition. I am sure of one thing that Dharmasastra is known to have condemn the practice.
- Anways, cave paintings must match with a religious figure then only they can be considered as related with the religion, much of the rock cave art is just made up of anything, for example, there are also paintings in the Sanghao Caves (of Pakistan), but they are not reported to have depicted any god, there is no connection.
- I think it would be better if we can trim some part of that section. Contractor (talk) 10:31, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
- "Anways, cave paintings must match with a religious figure then only they can be considered as related with the religion, much of the rock cave art is just made up of anything, for example, there are also paintings in the Sanghao Caves (of Pakistan), but they are not reported to have depicted any god, there is no connection." And that's exactly why the claim of even a tenuous conclusion that the Bhimbetka paintings are any sort of indication of a Hindu precursor is so ridiculous. The author herself can't make any explicit connection between Hindu deities and the paintings. It's similar to how Neopagans use such images as "The Sorcerer"[wp] from the Tris Frères cave paintings as "evidence" of their religion's ancient lineage (they see it as an image of The Horned God[wp]).
- As for trimming the section, that's fine by me. I only rewrote a recently added expansion which contained those rather silly "sati is not really Hindu"-claims. Sure, sati is not a major part of Hinduism and seems to (have) be(en) a largely high-caste phenomenon, but pretending that it's practically unrelated to Hinduism is similar to certain Christians claiming the crusades were not really Christian, or Muslims claiming that Islamist terrorists are not really Muslims: The epitome of No True Scotsman. ScepticWombat (talk) 10:58, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
- No deadline, and I have changed a little bit. Contractor (talk) 11:34, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
- The new version seems quite fair, though I removed "social" as I don't think it added anything. I would even agree that sati has arguably been overemphasised as somehow the sign of Indian/Hindu barbarism by British colonialism (this has been pointed out by scholars involved in Subaltern Studies[wp]), and that a discussion of this element might be an interesting addition. The concerted campaign of the British Raj devoted to stamping out sati, while it had a sympathetic objective in my eyes, also had more than a little whiff of mission civilisatrice[wp] about it. As I've already said, my main concern was the "hand washing" elements in the version prior to my edits. ScepticWombat (talk) 11:52, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
- No deadline, and I have changed a little bit. Contractor (talk) 11:34, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
- I think it is a common view, that the practice is forbidden since Kaliyuga.[1] There are traces of Hinduism since mesolithic. See [2] Contractor (talk) 05:09, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
[edit] Wikipedia+Lack of Information
Could we use Wikipedia to improve this article, because right now it is pretty shitty. Nothing on the tri-fold, Bhoomi (the Devi (female god) of the Earth) who is depicted as a cow, nothing on Vedas, Hindu nationalism, Ayurveda, caste, etc. While the Wikipedia isn't the best, it's much better than this. I'm too lazy to sign in as myself, so I'll put my name here (Qwed117) 96.225.89.127 (talk) 01:47, 15 April 2015 (UTC)
- Pls do. FrizzyCatPotato (talk/stalk) 01:49, 15 April 2015 (UTC)