Westernsplaining the scriptures.

[SomeRandom]

Now, there’s a neighbour of mine (as in he’s literally my next door neighbour) who I sometimes converse with. Lovely guy, perhaps a little atypical neurotically speaking.
But he’s constantly giving myself and even my mother on occasion, translations of the Gita and Mahabharata. Praising their insights and how great they are at scripture.
Now I do not claim special insight into our scriptures just because I’m a “bornie.” And this is not really the same as converts who genuinely just want to make a good impression with their brethren by studying fervently.
I don’t think this gentleman is doing this on purpose but he is being the stereotypical “white man explaining foreign culture to the foreigner” whenever he tries to engage me. Usually when I’m at work and have no real choice but to politely brush him off.
I have tried to explain that scripture isn’t that important to me, that I literally grew up with the scriptures with comic variants and even tv serials. And that as a Kali devotee, whilst I hold the utmost respect for our collective scriptures, I have my own traditions. I appreciate his enthusiasm and I do not begrudge him for any of this. But it is so eye roll worthy having a Westerner try to proselytise me on my own religion. And seems genuinely disappointed when I casually explain that I happen to have other reading projects instead of having read his translations.
Anyway sorry for the rant.
Do you have any amusing or not so amusing anecdotes of people trying to preach your own religion to you?

 

[Notthedarkweb]

I have been told online by numerous people (and NRIs are especially susceptible to this) that Carvaka constitutes a Hindu philosophical school. First off, they don't even accept the authority of the Vedas (that is not necessary to achieve moksha or be devoted to Shakti and all, but it does serve the source of all Hindu traditions), and secondly that's really insulting to the people who were actually Carvaka way back when it existed. Hell, the entire thing was intended as a refutation of what they considered the falsity of religion being used to prop up oppressive systems!

 

[Vinayaka]

It's been awhile because I'm retired, and associate primarily with Hindus now, since I no longer work in the 'western' world. But yes it's an odd deal to get lectured by some white guy who has scant knowledge of it other than reading an encyclopedia or an interfaith article explaining it from his religion's perspective.

The typical circumstance that caused it at all to come up is right after introductions and they'd ask about my 'unusual' name. At first I'd say it was Hindu, but eventually I just said 'Irish' to avoid the ensuing discussion altogether. One guy absolutely insisted that I could not be Hindu as Hindus absolutely do not accept converts. I walked away on him, no point in engaging with that. Other times, if they found out I was Saiva, they'd ask about the 'destroyer' God from their encyclopedia version, and lecture me about how stupid that must be.

Always, it seems they had no problem convincing me of their ignorance. I think it comes from the ego idea of always sharing what you know, regardless of how little that is.

 

[SalixIncendium]

Now, there’s a neighbour of mine (as in he’s literally my next door neighbour) who I sometimes converse with. Lovely guy, perhaps a little atypical neurotically speaking.
But he’s constantly giving myself and even my mother on occasion, translations of the Gita and Mahabharata. Praising their insights and how great they are at scripture.
Now I do not claim special insight into our scriptures just because I’m a “bornie.” And this is not really the same as converts who genuinely just want to make a good impression with their brethren by studying fervently.
I don’t think this gentleman is doing this on purpose but he is being the stereotypical “white man explaining foreign culture to the foreigner” whenever he tries to engage me. Usually when I’m at work and have no real choice but to politely brush him off.
I have tried to explain that scripture isn’t that important to me, that I literally grew up with the scriptures with comic variants and even tv serials. And that as a Kali devotee, whilst I hold the utmost respect for our collective scriptures, I have my own traditions. I appreciate his enthusiasm and I do not begrudge him for any of this. But it is so eye roll worthy having a Westerner try to proselytise me on my own religion. And seems genuinely disappointed when I casually explain that I happen to have other reading projects instead of having read his translations.
Anyway sorry for the rant.
Do you have any amusing or not so amusing anecdotes of people trying to preach your own religion to you?

By "bornie" I'm assuming you're of Indian descent.

Just an observation...and you can take it for what it is...

If I'm correct in my assumption, perhaps your neighbor is trying to impress a born Hindu with his learned knowledge of Hinduism? Perhaps he's just trying to get you to accept him as a Hindu (which, it would appear, you have not, given you make a distinction referring to him as a "white man" and "Westerner").

I know that this didn't address the question in your OP, but I don't have anyone that preaches my religion to me because relatively few people, primarily those close to me and those here, know what my religion is. I don't advertise it.

 

[Aupmanyav]

But he’s constantly giving myself and even my mother on occasion, translations of the Gita and Mahabharata. Praising their insights and how great they are at scripture.

He is being unfair to you and your mother. You can be any type of Hindu that you will like to be - accept Gita or Mahabharata or reject them. But some people do not realize that.

There are Westerners who have good knowledge of Hinduism. In our forum, we have Vinayaka, Jai and Sirona, Salix, and others too; and their views differ. As I posted somewhere - if there are no differences, then it is not Hinduism.

 

[Aupmanyav]

I have been told online by numerous people (and NRIs are especially susceptible to this) that Carvaka constitutes a Hindu philosophical school. First off, they don't even accept the authority of the Vedas (that is not necessary to achieve moksha or be devoted to Shakti and all, but it does serve the source of all Hindu traditions), and secondly that's really insulting to the people who were actually Carvaka way back when it existed. Hell, the entire thing was intended as a refutation of what they considered the falsity of religion being used to prop up oppressive systems!

Yes, Charvaks were not orthodox Hindus but they still were Hindus (Nastikas, like Buddhist and Jains, not accepting the authority of Vedas). Vedas are an import in Hinduism. The Indo-Iranian Aryans brought them to India. It is good that the Aryans and the indigenous people were able to reach a compromise without any blood-shed and the Indo-Aryans were assimilated in Hinduism. Vedas were accepted by Hindus at that time. Charvak, Buddhists, Jains and even Hinduism had conflicts with the Aryan beliefs which is reflected in our mythological stories. It is mostly the indigenous Gods and Goddesses that the Hindus worship today and the Aryan Gods have been pushed to secondary positions. I am an atheist Hindu. Many people like to call me a Charvakist. The charvakists sure said some interesting things.

 

[Notthedarkweb]

I am an atheist Hindu. Many people like to call me a Charvakist. The charvakists sure said some interesting things.

The essential problem I have with classifying the Carvaka as Hindus is that it is 1) historical revisionism of a sort, since the Carvaka considered themselves a reaction to Brahmanism and Vedic religion, both politically and epistemelogically and 2) it completely any and all philosophical presuppositions that even the Buddhists and the Jains have, namely karma, reincarnation (or rebirth if you are a Mahayana Buddhist) and so forth. Its materialist metaphysics negates the possibility of 1) God, 2) Liberation since there is nothing to be liberated from, and 3) Vedic authority, since they are lack any divine content. Moreover, they reject any and all notions of "dharma", misused word that it is, and assume an explicitly anti-Dharmic stance that associates itself with the satisfaction of desire to maximise happiness, which is hedonism proper. Like, Epicurean, Benthamite hedonism.

So, we don't even have the dharmic content that a lot of Neo-Vedantins (and dare I say Hindutvadis) use to turn Buddhism and Jainism into dharmic religions. We only have some cultural origin in reaction to proto-Hinduism, subjected to attack and in turn subjecting to attack astika schools of Indian philosophy (nebulous term indeed). It lacks any coherent connection or commonality except the fact that it accepts perception as a valid pramana. But then again, if we use pramanas as a means to ascertain what's Hinduism, we are having a major problem with considering the Madhyamika Buddhists like Nagarjuna who reject the existence of epistemology altogether as Hindus. So yeah, there is really no coherent way we can consider the Carvaka Hindus. However, the Samkhya were an atheistic Hindu school of thought, and a lot of the Mimamsikas were as well. Rather than glorify the dead school of the Carvakas, I would think we need to reassess these two schools.

 

[Notthedarkweb]

The essential problem I have with classifying the Carvaka as Hindus is that it is 1) historical revisionism of a sort, since the Carvaka considered themselves a reaction to Brahmanism and Vedic religion, both politically and epistemelogically and 2) it completely any and all philosophical presuppositions that even the Buddhists and the Jains have, namely karma, reincarnation (or rebirth if you are a Mahayana Buddhist) and so forth. Its materialist metaphysics negates the possibility of 1) God, 2) Liberation since there is nothing to be liberated from, and 3) Vedic authority, since they are lack any divine content. Moreover, they reject any and all notions of "dharma", misused word that it is, and assume an explicitly anti-Dharmic stance that associates itself with the satisfaction of desire to maximise happiness, which is hedonism proper. Like, Epicurean, Benthamite hedonism.

So, we don't even have the dharmic content that a lot of Neo-Vedantins (and dare I say Hindutvadis) use to turn Buddhism and Jainism into dharmic religions. We only have some cultural origin in reaction to proto-Hinduism, subjected to attack and in turn subjecting to attack astika schools of Indian philosophy (nebulous term indeed). It lacks any coherent connection or commonality except the fact that it accepts perception as a valid pramana. But then again, if we use pramanas as a means to ascertain what's Hinduism, we are having a major problem with considering the Madhyamika Buddhists like Nagarjuna who reject the existence of epistemology altogether as Hindus. So yeah, there is really no coherent way we can consider the Carvaka Hindus. However, the Samkhya were an atheistic Hindu school of thought, and a lot of the Mimamsikas were as well. Rather than glorify the dead school of the Carvakas, I would think we need to reassess these two schools.

Also, to preempt an argument that Carvaka's origin in the subcontinent should make it available for consideration as Hindu philosophy, I think we come across another major problem in classifying it as such. If we are using purely geographical origin as an indicator of Hindu philosophy, we might as well include at least two Sufi schools, multiple syncretic traditions, Muslim mystics inspired by the Bhakti movement and those who in turn inspired the Bhakti movement, the original liturgical and theological understandings of the St Thomas Malankara Christians, and the North Eastern Jews who have created a synthetic mix of tribal tradition and Noahide praxis. All of these were brought about by mass invasion-migrations from external bodies (something similar as to the predominant scholarly view of Proto-Indo-European religion's spread) and all of them developed to fullness in India itself. Are these Hindu philosophy? The only thing these orthodox schools accept is the pramana system, and as I showed with the example of the Madhyamikas, this too is iffy. So let's not be hasty in calling the Carvaka Hindus

 

[SomeRandom]

By "bornie" I'm assuming you're of Indian descent.

Just an observation...and you can take it for what it is...

If I'm correct in my assumption, perhaps your neighbor is trying to impress a born Hindu with his learned knowledge of Hinduism? Perhaps he's just trying to get you to accept him as a Hindu (which, it would appear, you have not, given you make a distinction referring to him as a "white man" and "Westerner").

I know that this didn't address the question in your OP, but I don't have anyone that preaches my religion to me because relatively few people, primarily those close to me and those here, know what my religion is. I don't advertise it.

I don’t think that’s the case with this particular gentleman. I have in the past extended an offer to visit Temple. Even offered him a lift, but he politely declined, claiming that he’s merely exploring God and he doesn’t ascribe to any religion. Which is fair enough. Everyone has a right to follow their own path at their own pace. His attitude is mostly condescending. Which again I don’t think is his intent. But the way I grew up, I mean you just don’t casually discuss religion like that. It’s something intimate and personal. At least in my family.

With a lot of “mystic Westerners” they find our scripture and are amazed. Then come to me and extol their virtues as if this is the new dawn of the ages. I find this mostly endearing and found that they have some rather interesting interpretations. You can learn a lot from “Westerners trying to impress you” because they come from a totally different paradigm and thus can see things in scripture that you can’t. And I readily accept anyone who wishes to be Hindu. I mean I grew up among the Sai Baba people. You could be a Satanist and still be welcomed in our temple with open arms. If you call yourself Hindu that’s good enough for me.
No one need impress me anyway. I’m an unconventional Kali rebel.

 

[Jainarayan]

I walked away on him, no point in engaging with that.

Yep, I’d walk away too. Escorted out wearing steel bracelets by the local gendarmes after I punched his lights out. Ahimsā notwithstanding. I must be Kshatriya.

 

[Jainarayan]

Seriously, in real life I can’t say I’ve encountered it. Just on the internet.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Its materialist metaphysics negates the possibility of 1) God, 2) Liberation since there is nothing to be liberated from, and 3) Vedic authority, since they are lack any divine content. Moreover, they reject any and all notions of "dharma", misused word that it is, and assume an explicitly anti-Dharmic stance that associates itself with the satisfaction of desire to maximise happiness, which is hedonism proper. Like, Epicurean, Benthamite hedonism.

So yeah, there is really no coherent way we can consider the Carvaka Hindus.

Charvakists were rebels, but being a rebel does not mean a complete break from the tradition. Martin Luther was a rebel, but he never repudiated Christianity. Secondly what we know of Charvaks today is from their opponents. The opponents, like Madhvacharya, must surely have made what Charvaks said into caricatures.

Hinduism has all kinds of people. I am an atheist and advaitist. I do not believe in creation, God, soul, birth, death, heaven, hell or in reincarnation; I do not believe that Vedas or BhagwadGita are the word of any God. But I am still a Hindu, because this is one religion which provides freedom of belief.

The real liberation, nirvana, enlightenment, jnana, moksha, deliverance (whatever you term it) is getting rid of falsehood and ignorance. I have no doubts and feel so light without the baggage. Happiness cannot come without 'dharma' (social responsibilities). It cannot come from hedonism. One would always be against the society and that will lead to conflicts and unhappiness. Sage Valmiki put these words in Lord Rama's mouth in his Ramayana:

"Satyam eva ishwaro loke, satyam padma sadashrita;
satya moolani sarvani, satyen nasti param padam."
(Truth alone is the God in the universe, in truth goodness finds refuge;
all have their base in truth, there is no station higher than truth)

All of these were brought about by mass invasion-migrations from external bodies (something similar as to the predominant scholarly view of Proto-Indo-European religion's spread) and all of them developed to fullness in India itself. Are these Hindu philosophy? The only thing these orthodox schools accept is the pramana system, ..

You are very correct. Mass-invasion or trickle-migration (the jury is out, there is no record of a major Aryan/indigenous conflict) brought Vedic religion to India. But then Hinduism is not just the Vedic religion, which is only a small part of Hinduism. It was whittled down by the indigenous beliefs and philosophy during assimilation. Only a few Aryan Gods and Goddesses survived (Vishnu by being associated with eight regional Hindu Gods, Rudra by associating with Shiva. Saraswati alone was accepted by the indigenous as an independent Goddess), the rest were consigned to secondary positions. Pramana varies in various Hindu philosophical systems .. and I do not think Madhyamikas have any relevance to Hinduism.

 

[Notthedarkweb]

Charvakists were rebels, but being a rebel does not mean a complete break from the tradition. Martin Luther was a rebel, but he never repudiated Christianity. Secondly what we know of Charvaks today is from their opponents. The opponents, like Madhvacharya, must surely have made what Charvaks said into caricatures.

Hinduism has all kinds of people. I am an atheist and advaitist. I do not believe in creation, God, soul, birth, death, heaven, hell or in reincarnation; I do not believe that Vedas or BhagwadGita are the word of any God. But I am still a Hindu, because this is one religion which provides freedom of belief.

The real liberation, nirvana, enlightenment, jnana, moksha, deliverance (whatever you term it) is getting rid of falsehood and ignorance. I have no doubts and feel so light without the baggage. Happiness cannot come without 'dharma' (social responsibilities). It cannot come from hedonism. One would always be against the society and that will lead to conflicts and unhappiness. Sage Valmiki put these words in Lord Rama's mouth in his Ramayana:

"Satyam eva ishwaro loke, satyam padma sadashrita;
satya moolani sarvani, satyen nasti param padam."
(Truth alone is the God in the universe, in truth goodness finds refuge;
all have their base in truth, there is no station higher than truth)You are very correct. Mass-invasion or trickle-migration (the jury is out, there is no record of a major Aryan/indigenous conflict) brought Vedic religion to India. But then Hinduism is not just the Vedic religion, which is only a small part of Hinduism. It was whittled down by the indigenous beliefs and philosophy during assimilation. Only a few Aryan Gods and Goddesses survived (Vishnu by being associated with eight regional Hindu Gods, Rudra by associating with Shiva. Saraswati alone was accepted by the indigenous as an independent Goddess), the rest were consigned to secondary positions. Pramana varies in various Hindu philosophical systems .. and I do not think Madhyamikas have any relevance to Hinduism.

This isn't really addressing any of my criticisms of considering the Carvaka as Hindus though. As I pointed out, from what we know about the Carvaka (which is admittedly very little and corrupted by critiqued), they denied even the possibility of liberation since such a thing doesn't exist for them. There is a difference between considering Hinduism as a meta-philosophy and diluting it to the point that it is a meaningless and unstructured thing which can include whatever someone wants subjectively. And Carvaka doesn't really conform to these metaphilosophical strands. And to talk about the Madhyamikas, they do play a part! Comparing between two different categories in order to make an argument is perfectly valid, and can oftentimes show a contradiction in someone's argument. The Madhyamika Buddhism of Nagarjuna is also "Dharmic" by your account, yet it fully and totally repudiated all dharmic ideals (similar to Carvaka) and approaches nihilism, although the concept of sunyata does provide a welcome escape. Is this Hinduism? If this is Hinduism then what next? We might as well all Proto-Indo-European religion as Hinduism! Certainly they seem to have much the same Gods and oftentimes the same theological underpinnings.

 

[Aupmanyav]

As I pointed out, from what we know about the Carvaka (which is admittedly very little and corrupted by critiqued), they denied even the possibility of liberation since such a thing doesn't exist for them. There is a difference between considering Hinduism as a meta-philosophy and diluting it to the point that it is a meaningless and unstructured thing which can include whatever someone wants subjectively. And Carvaka doesn't really conform to these metaphilosophical strands. And to talk about the Madhyamikas, they do play a part! Comparing between two different categories in order to make an argument is perfectly valid, and can oftentimes show a contradiction in someone's argument. The Madhyamika Buddhism of Nagarjuna is also "Dharmic" by your account, yet it fully and totally repudiated all dharmic ideals (similar to Carvaka) and approaches nihilism, although the concept of sunyata does provide a welcome escape. Is this Hinduism? If this is Hinduism then what next? We might as well all Proto-Indo-European religion as Hinduism! Certainly they seem to have much the same Gods and oftentimes the same theological underpinnings.

What we know about Charvaks is from its opponents, like what Quran says about the Mohammad's wars in Arabia at that time. Charvaks are not here to defend it. Even if they forked out of Hinduism, how does it matter now? So many others have done the same (Sikhism for example). If they did not believe in any kind of liberation/enlightenment, it was their view, and Hinduism has no problem with that. Hinduism is purposely unstructured and that is its advantage. If it was structured, that may have led to blood-shed. That was the only way to bring peace in a society in which there were many different views. It remains so even today. It is like linux, any one could come out with a new distribution.

Yeah, Madhyamika also is a fork of a fork (forking out of Buddhism which itself was a fork of Hinduism) - Linux Mint (the software that I am working with) is a fork of Ubuntu which is a fork of Debian, etc. I have read about some Buddhist scholars maintaining that they were not 'nastikas'. All that is Hinduism. However, Proto-Indo-European religion was not Hinduism. It was born in a different locale, with clearly different Gods and Goddesses, though it merged with Hinduism in India at later times. It did not have indigenous Gods like Shiva, Rama, Krishna or Mother Goddess Durga.

 

[shivsomashekhar]

The essential problem I have with classifying the Carvaka as Hindus is that it is 1) historical revisionism of a sort, since the Carvaka considered themselves a reaction to Brahmanism and Vedic religion, both politically and epistemelogically and 2) it completely any and all philosophical presuppositions that even the Buddhists and the Jains have, namely karma, reincarnation (or rebirth if you are a Mahayana Buddhist) and so forth. Its materialist metaphysics negates the possibility of 1) God, 2) Liberation since there is nothing to be liberated from, and 3) Vedic authority, since they are lack any divine content. Moreover, they reject any and all notions of "dharma", misused word that it is, and assume an explicitly anti-Dharmic stance that associates itself with the satisfaction of desire to maximise happiness, which is hedonism proper. Like, Epicurean, Benthamite hedonism.

So, we don't even have the dharmic content that a lot of Neo-Vedantins (and dare I say Hindutvadis) use to turn Buddhism and Jainism into dharmic religions. We only have some cultural origin in reaction to proto-Hinduism, subjected to attack and in turn subjecting to attack astika schools of Indian philosophy (nebulous term indeed). It lacks any coherent connection or commonality except the fact that it accepts perception as a valid pramana. But then again, if we use pramanas as a means to ascertain what's Hinduism, we are having a major problem with considering the Madhyamika Buddhists like Nagarjuna who reject the existence of epistemology altogether as Hindus. So yeah, there is really no coherent way we can consider the Carvaka Hindus. However, the Samkhya were an atheistic Hindu school of thought, and a lot of the Mimamsikas were as well. Rather than glorify the dead school of the Carvakas, I would think we need to reassess these two schools.

There is no historically verifiable person who labelled himself or herself as a Carvaka. The label is only to be found in texts which criticize Carvakas - always as fictitious opponents. These descriptions are dubious, biased and unreliable.

The question is, can an atheist be a Hindu? The simple answer is yes, if one of these conditions is met -

1. Born as a Hindu and does not explicitly give up the affiliation
2. Not born as Hindu, but accepts one or more Hindu beliefs.

For the first category, birth alone is sufficient. No action, belief is necessary to retain the label of Hindu. There are millions of such Hindus in India.

 

[ajay0]

All of these were brought about by mass invasion-migrations from external bodies (something similar as to the predominant scholarly view of Proto-Indo-European religion's spread) and all of them developed to fullness in India itself.

This is predominantly a western scholarly view, not the eastern one. There has been many recent archaeological discoveries that have also refuted this old theory.

 

[Notthedarkweb]

This is predominantly a western scholarly view, not the eastern one. There has been many recent archaeological discoveries that have also refuted this old theory.

I am not aware of any such except from fringe revisionists with not academic credo. The Kurgan hypothesis remains valid.

 

[ajay0]

I am not aware of any such except from fringe revisionists with not academic credo. The Kurgan hypothesis remains valid.

You can update yourself.

Swastika

Rakhigarhi DNA study questions Aryan invasion theory, claims author

The philosophical understanding of the term Aryan as per eastern philosophy is also obviously markedly different from the western interpretation of the term...

' Arya is not a race; Arya means a noble-minded person. The word Arya is often confused with a race. In the beginning, western historians propounded this theory of the Aryan race. That developed into Hitler's Aryan superiority. And when Hitler died, the Aryan race theory also died ! But the word Arya is used in sanskrit always for the noble-minded person. Take any sanskrit drama. The person will address another character as 'My dear Arya,noble-minded person'. And Buddha spoke of his teachings as Arya-satyani, Noble Truths. Noble is the word for Arya there. The four Noble truths, Arya Satyani. So, the word Arya was used by Buddha, as also by earlier Vedic literature. And this word, Arya is, therefore, a very great word in Sanskrit. Be an Aryan means, be noble-minded. Don't be petty, don't be small. 'Swami Ranganathananda, commentary of the Bhagavad gita ( Volume 1,Chapter 2.88)

 

[Notthedarkweb]

You can update yourself.

Swastika

Rakhigarhi DNA study questions Aryan invasion theory, claims author

The philosophical understanding of the term Aryan as per eastern philosophy is also obviously markedly different from the western interpretation of the term...

' Arya is not a race; Arya means a noble-minded person. The word Arya is often confused with a race. In the beginning, western historians propounded this theory of the Aryan race. That developed into Hitler's Aryan superiority. And when Hitler died, the Aryan race theory also died ! But the word Arya is used in sanskrit always for the noble-minded person. Take any sanskrit drama. The person will address another character as 'My dear Arya,noble-minded person'. And Buddha spoke of his teachings as Arya-satyani, Noble Truths. Noble is the word for Arya there. The four Noble truths, Arya Satyani. So, the word Arya was used by Buddha, as also by earlier Vedic literature. And this word, Arya is, therefore, a very great word in Sanskrit. Be an Aryan means, be noble-minded. Don't be petty, don't be small. 'Swami Ranganathananda, commentary of the Bhagavad gita ( Volume 1,Chapter 2.88)

So one paper and a motif that has existed in many cultures over a long time refute the Kugan hypothesis? That...doesn't seem like it fulfills the burden of proof

 

[Notthedarkweb]

Also, the results of the studies don't refute the Hypothesis, but instead states that pastoral agriculture in the IVC existed prior to the onset of the migrations. To quote:

“The population has no detectable ancestry from Steppe pastoralists or from Anatolian and Iranian farmers, suggesting farming in South Asia arose from local foragers rather than from large-scale migration from the West"

Also,

“These individuals (in Rakhigarhi) had little of any Steppe pastoralist-derived ancestry, showing that it was not ubiquitous in north-west South Asia during the IVC as it is today,”

So ancestry from PIE migrations does exist, the ET article is highly misleading. Further going on,

“While there is a small proportion of Anatolian farmer-related ancestry in South Asians today, it is consistent with being entirely derived from Steppe pastoralists who carried it in mixed form and who spread into South Asia from 2000–1500 BCE.” This literally says that there were migratory waves and that genetic composition has been diluted due to intermixing between succeeding filial generations? I don't see how this refutes the hypothesis, once again.

Then, the disclaimer at the bottom of the study, which ET conveniently forgot to include, points towards the study's own realization of its flaws.

“While our study is sufficient to demonstrate that this ancestry profile was a common feature of the IVC, a single sample — or even the gradient of 12 likely IVC samples we have identified — cannot fully characterise a cosmo-politan ancient civilisation."

So yeah, this is complementary to the hypothesis in fact.