Are Hindus Pagan? Poll

[Aupmanyav]

Don't you think that those distinctions between "pagans" and "true believers", "Kafirs" and "ahl-e-kitab" or even "nationals" and "foreigners" are ultimately a bit too arbitrary to have much of a real meaning?

If you ask me, at the Parmarthika level all are one, even Stalin and Osama, Hitler and Polpot, Brahman. Nothing else exists.

 

[Poeticus]

Nothing else exists.

Wrong! 90s Hip-Hop exists!​

'Cause it's always on top, yo!​

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=[youtube]zl2DdUeMggg[/youtube]​

 

[Aupmanyav]

For me it is Bismillah Khan's shehnai at Kashi Vishwanath temple. Or MS Subbulakshmi's bhajan. Both 'Bharat Ratnas' (Jewels of India), the highest Indian civilian award.

[youtube]hveeMDC6Dro[/youtube]
Ustad Bismillah Khan - Raag Malkauns - YouTube
[youtube]Xs1MuUxcH7k[/youtube]
meera bhajans by M S Subbulakshmi - YouTube

 

[atanu]

I consider myself a Hindu. I voted No.

 

[Madhuri]

I consider myself a Hindu. I voted No.

Exactly.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Many people think that being a pagan is something to be ashamed of.

 

[Nyingjé Tso]

Exactly.

I'm thinking the same also.

Many people think that being a pagan is something to be ashamed of.

My man is Pagan, and have been a member of various coven and stuff. It's not something to be ashamed of, it's just a complete different set of belief and practices.

 

[Ravi500]

See, issue over here is that the term pagan is used in the same breath as heathen. It is also used in a derogatory sense by the abrahamics, from what I have observed.

Hinduism , is essentially monist/monotheist in my opinion.

Yes, there is room for polytheism in Hinduism, but the deities themselves have sprung from Brahman , as per the Atharva Veda.

So, I voted no.

 

[StarryNightshade]

I consider myself Hindu, but I also have a reverence and continuousness of nature and the natural world. Based on that (and the rather broad definition of what a "pagan" exactly is), I guess that I'm technically pagan? Or at least have a semi nature-centered aspect of my path.

Of course, I don't wear that particular label, but if we're going by the "non-Abrahamic" definition, then I guess I am.

 

[Aupmanyav]

See, issue over here is that the term pagan is used in the same breath as heathen. It is also used in a derogatory sense by the abrahamics, from what I have observed.

Yes, there is room for polytheism in Hinduism, but the deities themselves have sprung from Brahman, as per the Atharva Veda.

Are we to be guided by what Abrahamics say? Room? Just a room? You need a Versailles Palace to accommodate all Hindu Gods and Goddesses and even then some would be left out. That all Gods and Goddesses arise from Brahman is an advaitist stance. Not all Hindus are advaitists.

 

[Madhuri]

Are we to be guided by what Abrahamics say?

Absolutely not. And since 'pagan' is their word, I personally would not adopt it.
Having said that, I don't mind if other Hindus consider themselves pagan. I just think it's odd.

 

[Poeticus]

Absolutely not. And since 'pagan' is their word, I personally would not adopt it.
Having said that, I don't mind if other Hindus consider themselves pagan. I just think it's odd.

Completely understandable.​

 

[Poeticus]

You need a Versailles Palace to accommodate all Hindu Gods and Goddesses and even then some would be left out.

In my opinion, ten to seventy million universes
would not even be enough. Vishnu would walk
through them in half a step, probably. He would
never make it to three steps. Gods Mitra and
Varuna would be in all places at once, having
"mapped" out the "territories" quite quickly and
sufficiently. Lord Indra would sleep in one corner
and awaken in another, forty universes away.
Not enough moving space, I presume. ​

 

[Philomath]

I went with the third choice because anything outside of the Abrahamic religions could be defined as "pagan".

 

[Pleroma]

I'm a Hindu and I'm a die hard Pagan. In fact I don't see that word as a derogatory at all. I call myself a pagan to distinguish myself from the Judeo-Christian-Islamic religions. If Druids can be considered as pagans why can't we since Druids were the Brahmins of the west. Since I am coming from the Vedas, the Proto Indo-European religion and the Proto Indo-Iranian religion I would appreciate if Hindus too were classified as genuine pagans.

Hinduism is hard polytheism.
Hindus worship nature.
Hindus rely on rituals and give offerings to gods.
Hindus revere female goddesses like Gayatri, Savitri, Saraswati etc.

"Prudence Jones and Nigel Pennick in their A History of Pagan Europe (1995) classify "pagan religions" as characterized by the following traits:

• polytheism: Pagan religions recognise a plurality of divine beings, which may or may not be considered aspects of an underlying unity (the soft and hard polytheism distinction)
• "nature-based": Pagan religions have a concept of the divinity of Nature, which they view as a manifestation of the divine, not as the "fallen" creation found in Dualistic cosmology.
• "sacred feminine": Pagan religions recognize "the female divine principle", identified as "the Goddess" (as opposed to individual goddesses) beside or in place of the male divine principle as expressed in the Abrahamic God."

Hinduism clearly has all those characteristics.

 

[Amrut]

No matter how much similarities are there in Paganism and Hinduism, Still I will not consider myself as a Pagan, because, our religion existed since beginning of time and we did not name it as 'pagan'

Within our sanAtana dharma, elements of all religions can be found and at times the whole religion can be fitted inside our dharma. This does not make us belong to any other 'sect' or 'religion'.

I voted 'No'