What makes a Hindu a Hindu - Version 2

[Poeticus]

Shun the non-believer!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRB8Jor8tPs

 

[Poeticus]

So this thread is now officially derailed as well.

Wait...didn't you and I make a bet
that this thread will derail as well?
Pay up, Uncle V! Pay up!​

 

[Vinayaka]

Wait...didn't you and I make a bet
that this thread will derail as well?
Pay up, Uncle V! Pay up!​

I don't remember. Sorry. There are some advantages to being ancient.

 

[Maya3]

Yup, let's all stop this who is Hindu enough and eat chocolate instead. (Oh wait...spiritual people don't eat chocolate it would mess up their flawless physical form and mess up their meditation)

Maya

 

[Nyingjé Tso]

Yup, let's all stop this who is Hindu enough and eat chocolate instead. (Oh wait...spiritual people don't eat chocolate it would mess up their flawless physical form and mess up their meditation)

Maya

SORRY CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER MY AWESOME CHOCOLATE FORT

There is plenty of chocolate room for you if you want

 

[Maya3]

SORRY CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER MY AWESOME CHOCOLATE FORT

There is plenty of chocolate room for you if you want

Ohhhh ohhhhh ohhhhh, give me your address right now, I'm on my way!!

Maya

 

[Aupmanyav]

SORRY CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER MY AWESOME CHOCOLATE FORT

There is plenty of chocolate room for you if you want

Oh, so much chocolate and in India we need to import it. I will settle for 'gajar ka halwa'. However, a very solid fort. Will need a lot of effort to be taken care of.

 

[Marcion]

3. Given the above situation, for Hindus, Karma/Bhakti/Jnana paths are suggested in Gita. In Yoga, the Yama-Niyama, which is common to all of Hinduism, is the primary requirement. It is impossible to attain higher levels of yoga, such as a status of Stitha Prajnana, without first mastering the basic steps of the Yama-Niyama. I do not think that any master will contradict this.

So just supposing that an Islamic Sufi or a mystic Christian is fully practising all the Yama/Niyama's and is fully immersed in a Bhakti lifestyle (without naming them in such a way!), then why would you not call such a person a Hindu?

 

[atanu]

So just supposing that an Islamic Sufi or a mystic Christian is fully practising all the Yama/Niyama's and is fully immersed in a Bhakti lifestyle (without naming them in such a way!), then why would you not call such a person a Hindu?

Why are you calling them Sufi or Christian?

 

[Marcion]

Why are you calling them Sufi or Christian?

Because of the context of their practising?
Following Yama and Niyama is not an exclusive Hindu thing (although they are poorly defined outside Hindu philosophy) nor is practising Bhakti.
So the crux of the matter is, would you not rather focuss on the things that are typical for Hindu's only?

 

[Aupmanyav]

So just supposing that an Islamic Sufi or a mystic Christian is fully practising all the Yama/Niyama's and is fully immersed in a Bhakti lifestyle (without naming them in such a way!), then why would you not call such a person a Hindu?

How can we call a person Hindu unless he desires to be called as such? He/She is sure a nice person and is entitled to a sojourn in heaven as per Hindu laws of 'karma'. And in 'advaita', a good person or an evil person, both are none other than Brahman.

 

[Marcion]

And in 'advaita', a good person or an evil person, both are none other than Brahman.

So, let us do away with this calling people "hindu" as if hinduism were a religion. This narrow identity was imposed on the people of South Asia and has no real enough meaning. Let us be an example to all those people who think they are a member of an "exclusive or final religion".
Let us declare, 'I'm not a hindu, I am a human being following my human Dharma'.

 

[Aupmanyav]

So, let us do away with this calling people "hindu" as if hinduism were a religion. This narrow identity was imposed on the people of South Asia and has no real enough meaning. Let us be an example to all those people who think they are a member of an "exclusive or final religion".
Let us declare, 'I'm not a hindu, I am a human being following my human Dharma'.

That is your view and not mine. For me, Hinduism and being known as a Hindu is of great importance. It allows a freedom of views, it does not insist upon the silly contention that 'there is one and only one God' who must either be called YHWH, or Allah; and so-and-so is a son, messenger, manifestation, mahdi, prophet sent by that God. I follow the final religion which is 'advaita' (non-duality) and which does not necessitates the existence of a all-controlling God, hating (those who do not accept him or worshiping anyone other than him) or loving (who dittoes his line). The grain has to be separated from chaff.

Existence and non-existence are just phases. Looked through Quantum Mechanics, what exists also is non-existent. This was speculated as far back as 3,000 years ago in RigVeda:

सतो बन्धुमसति निरविन्दन हृदि प्रतीष्याकवयो मनीषा ll
sato bandhumasati niravindan hṛidi pratīṣyākavayo manīṣā ll
Sages who searched with their heart's thought discovered the existent's kinship in the non-existent.
Rig Veda: Rig-Veda, Book 10: HYMN CXXIX. Creation.

 

[Marcion]

It allows a freedom of views, it does not insist upon the silly contention that 'there is one and only one God' who must either be called YHWH, or Allah; and so-and-so is a son, messenger, manifestation, mahdi, prophet sent by that God.

So I was right that you were mainly defined by the negative of others (mainly the muslims who started this business of identifying "hindus").
So if those nasty ignorant sides of monotheism had not existed everyone in the world or perhaps no-one had been a hindu?

 

[Aupmanyav]

Hindus were identified thousands of years before Islam came on the scene. That is why the Punjab region was known to Zoroastrians as 'Hapta-Hendu'. No, everybody would not have been Hindu - there would have been Native African, American, Australian religions, Sumerian, Egyptian, Tao, Shinto, Buddhism, Jainism, Celtic, Basque, Druids, Germanic, Norse, Slavonic, Greek, Roman, Pacific, Indo-Chinese, Tibetan, Mongolian, Inupiat, Yupik, etc. religions.

 

[Marcion]

Hindus were identified thousands of years before Islam came on the scene. That is why the Punjab region was known to Zoroastrians as 'Hapta-Hendu'.

That though means only that they were identified as a people, the people of greater India.
So this idea of people in India with different religions one of which is Hinduism is relatively recent. Even the Muslims initially meant by the term "hindus" not people with a specific religion but even Christian Indians, Jain Indians etc..
The Hindu identity was foremost strengthened under the British rule because they were trying to control people through their so-called religious leaders and registering people by their religion and caste.
So the people of India were brainwashed by Westerners into thinking in terms of religion, originally they were focussed mainly on Dharma.
The tragic partitioning of India would never have happened without this brainwashing.

 

[Vinayaka]

Hindus were identified thousands of years before Islam came on the scene. That is why the Punjab region was known to Zoroastrians as 'Hapta-Hendu'. No, everybody would not have been Hindu - there would have been Native African, American, Australian religions, Sumerian, Egyptian, Tao, Shinto, Buddhism, Jainism, Celtic, Basque, Druids, Germanic, Norse, Slavonic, Greek, Roman, Pacific, Indo-Chinese, Tibetan, Mongolian, Inupiat, Yupik, etc. religions.

This is important to note. The idea that the term 'Hindu' was invented by outsiders as a general geographic name 'people east of the Indus' is only one theory on how the term came to be. It's never been established as historical fact, and there are several more theories, including the one you alluded to. I used to have a link to a paper that explored several other theories. But it's indicative of how we've been defined by westerners, and how many myths have been integrated into western 'knowledge' like encyclopedias.

Editted to add ... Not the link I found before, but one that outlines several other possibilities ...
Karah Dham (करह धाम मुरेना)

 

[Aupmanyav]

That though means only that they were identified as a people, the people of greater India.
So this idea of people in India with different religions one of which is Hinduism is relatively recent.
The Hindu identity was foremost strengthened under the British rule because they were trying to control people through their so-called religious leaders and registering people by their religion and caste.
So the people of India were brainwashed by Westerners into thinking in terms of religion, originally they were focussed mainly on Dharma.
The tragic partitioning of India would never have happened without this brainwashing.

It does not men that. Those people lived outside India and 'Hapta-Hendu' (Sapta-Sindhu, the land of Seven Rivers) was closest to them, so they mentioned it. Aryans came to India around 1,500 BC. In later times, the Iranians and Central Asians must have been visiting these areas for trade. There was/is a lot more of India but those people did not know about it.
Yeah, the present shape of Hinduism is recent and traces from the Gupta dynasty times. But Hinduism as such is very old. It is a pre-Aryan indigenous religion. Even Jainism and Buddhism arose out of Hinduism. Yeah, if not for British, Jains, Buddhists and Sikhs would still be termed as Hindus. The divide came with British, otherwise they were sects (Panthas) of Hinduism.
That is true, we do not even have an exact equivalent of the English word 'religion' (other than Pantha or Marg, which means the way, the Jain way, the Buddhist way and the Sikh way). People respected all of them equally and sometimes shifted from one to another.
We cannot blame solely the British for the partition of India. The Muslims due to their 'Pan Islamic' view wanted a separate country.

 

[Aupmanyav]

QUOTE="Vinayaka, post: 5794525, member: 27944"]'people east of the Indus'[/QUOTE]'Hapta-Hendu' theory is the oldest recorded. I am going through your link. Perhaps the word is older than coming of Aryans in India. Just think how Aryans in Central Asia, Iran and Afghanistan would refer to India. 'Sindhu' was their word for ocean/river. So, it is not even Zoroastrians who named us as Hindu. It must have been the Arians of Ariana, who would address us in this way.
My conclusion: We were named 'Saindhavas' - 'Sindhu-vasis' by Aryans themselves. Later, in time, some of them themselves became 'Saindhavas'.
We should not simmer by thinking that the Muslims or the British gave us this name.

Inhabitants of Ariana:

The tribes by whom Ariana was inhabited, as enumerated by Strabo were:
Arachoti; Arii; Bactrians; Drangae; Gedrosii; Paropamisadae; Parthians; Persians; Sogdians.

Pliny (vi. 25) specifies the following tribes:
Angutturi; Arii; the inhabitants of Daritis; Dorisci; Drangae; Evergetae; Gedrussi; Ichthyophagi; Methorici; Pasires; Urbi; Zarangae.
Ariana - Wikipedia

 

[Jainarayan]

I've got a slightly more "out there" view of why it's ok to be called Hindu, even if you're a white western-born Italian-American (I know, that's all redundant)... if hapta hindu and sapta sindhu, Old Persian and Sanskrit, respectively, mean [the land of] seven rivers, one could think of themselves in their heart and soul as being of that land. From the time I was a pre-teen I had a fascination and affinity for all things Indian. I can't explain it. People ask me if I've been there. I say yes. Oh really, when? I don't know, maybe 1,000 years ago, 500 years ago. As I learned more about India and Hinduism, it feels like something has reawakened. The first time I went to temple I mentioned I had some trepidation because I'm "different". The woman I became friendly with, who does seva at the temple, said "pfft! we're all the same, and you were always Hindu". So, who knows?