RAJIV GANDHI NATIONAL UNIVERSITY OF

LAW, PUNJAB
          
 
            

TOPIC: History of Origin of Hindu: Issues and Challenges

SUBMITTED BY: SUBMITTED TO:

Yogesh Khandelwal Dr. Rachna Sharma

B.A.LLB 2nd Semester ( Faculty of History )
Roll no. 19207
Group No. 22

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 CONTENTS

Acknowledgement...................................................................................................3

1. Introduction.........................................................................................................4

2. The Sources of Hinduism....................................................................................4

2.1 Indo European sources..................................................................................4

2.2 Other sources: the process of “Sanskritization”.........................................5

2.3 Religion in the Indus valley civilization.......................................................6

2.4 The Vedic period............................................................................................7

3. Issues in Hinduism...............................................................................................8

3.1 The rise of the major sects: Vaishnavism, Shaivism, and Shaktism.........8

3.2 The development of temples..........................................................................9

3.3The spread of Hinduism in Southeast Asia and the Pacific......................10

3.4 Inuence on the Mediterranean world.........................................................11

4. Challenges faced by Hinduism.........................................................................12

4.1 Challenges to Brahmanism.........................................................................12

4.2 The challenge of Islam and popular religion.............................................13

4.3 Temple complexes........................................................................................14

4.4 Sectarian movements...................................................................................15

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 4.5 Bhakti movements........................................................................................16

5.The Religious Situation After Independence...................................................18

5. Sacred texts........................................................................................................20

5.1 Vedas.............................................................................................................20

5.2 The Upanishads............................................................................................20

5.3 Smriti texts....................................................................................................21

5.4 Epics and Puranas........................................................................................22

6. Conclusion..........................................................................................................22

7. Bibliography.......................................................................................................23

Acknowledgement
Every project, however big or small it may be and however important it is, is successful largely
due to the efforts and dedication of a number of persons who have helped in whatever way they
can, by providing information related to it or by giving advice that is essential in the completion
of the project. I sincerely appreciate the assistance of these people and thank them for their
support and guidance that was instrumental in making this project a success.

I, Yogesh Khandelwal, a student of Rajiv Gandhi National University of Law (Patiala), am

grateful to the University for the confidence bestowed in me and entrusting my ability.

I also appreciate and extend my thanks to my project guide, Dr. Rachna Sharma, who mentored
me in compiling the project. His insight has been extremely valuable in the completion of this
project.

My last word of gratitude goes to everyone else who has helped me in any way, big or small, in
making this project in the stipulated period of time.

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 1. Introduction
Hinduism, major world religion originating on the Indian subcontinent and comprising several
and varied systems of philosophy, belief, and ritual. Although the name Hinduism is relatively
new, having been coined by British writers in the first decades of the 19th century, it refers to a
rich cumulative tradition of texts and practices, some of which date to the 2nd millennium BCE
or possibly earlier. If the Indus valley civilization (3rd–2nd millennium BCE) was the earliest
source of these traditions, as some scholars hold, then Hinduism is the oldest living religion on
Earth. Its many sacred texts in Sanskrit and vernacular languages served as a vehicle for
spreading the religion to other parts of the world, though ritual and the visual and performing arts
also played a Significant role in its transmission. From about the 4th century CE, Hinduism had a
dominant presence in Southeast Asia, one that would last for more than 1,000 years.1

In the early 21st century, Hinduism had nearly one billion adherents worldwide and was the
religion of about 80 percent of India’s population. Despite its global presence, however, it is best
understood through its many distinctive regional manifestations.2

2. The Sources of Hinduism

The history of Hinduism in India can be traced to about 1500 BCE. Evidence of Hinduism’s
early antecedents is derived from archaeology, comparative philology, and comparative religion.

2.1 Indo European sources

The earliest literary source for the history of Hinduism is the Rigveda, consisting of hymns that
were composed chief during the last two or three centuries of the 2nd millennium BCE. The
religious life reflected in this text is not that of contemporary Hinduism but of an earlier
subracial religious system, referred to by scholars as Brahmanism or Vedism, which developed
in India among Indo-European-speaking peoples. Scholars from the period of British colonial
rule postulated that this branch of a related group of nomadic and seminomadic tribal peoples,
originally inhabiting the steppe country of southern Russia and Central Asia, brought with them
the horse and chariot and the Sanskrit language. These scholars further averred that other
1
Knott, Kim (1998). Hinduism: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press.
2
Basham, Arthur Llewellyn (1 989). The Origins and Development of Classical Hinduism. Oxford University Press

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branches of these peoples penetrated into Europe, bringing with them the Indo-European
languages that developed into the chief language groups now spoken there. These theories have
been disputed, however, and the historical homeland of the Indo-Europeans continues to be a
matter of academic and political controversy.

Present-day Hinduism contains few direct survivals from its Indo-European heritage. Some of
the elements of the Hindu wedding ceremony, notably the circumambulation of the sacred re and
the cult of the domestic re itself, are rooted in the remote Indo-European past. The same is
probably true of some aspects of the ancestor cult. The Rigveda contains many other Indo-
European elements, such as ritual sacrifices and the worship of male sky gods, including the old
sky god Dyaus, whose name is cognate with those of Zeus of ancient Greece and Jupiter of
Rome (“Father Jove”). The Vedic heaven, the “world of the fathers,” resembles the Germanic
Valhalla and seems also to be an Indo-European inheritance.

Even in the earlier parts of the Rigveda, however, the religion displays numerous Indian features
that are not evident in Indo-Iranian traditions. Some of the chief gods, for example, have no clear
Indo-European or Indo-Iranian counterparts. Although some of these features may have evolved
entirely within the Vedic framework, it is generally presumed that many of them stem from the
influence of inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent who had no connection with Indo-European
peoples. For example, some scholars attribute non-Vedic features of Hinduism to a people who
are often vaguely and incorrectly called “Dravidian,” a term that refers to a family of languages
and not an ethnic group. Some scholars have further argued that the ruling classes of the Indus
civilization, also called the Harappa culture (c. 2500–1700 BCE), spoke a Dravidian language
and have tentatively identified their script with that of a Dravidian language. But there is little
supporting evidence for this claim, and the presence of Dravidian speakers throughout the whole
subcontinent at any time in history is not attested.

2.2 Other sources: the process of “Sanskritization”3

The development of Hinduism can be interpreted as a constant interaction between the religion
of the upper social groups, represented by the Brahmans, and the religion of other groups. From
the time of the Vedas (c. 1500 BCE), people from many strata of society throughout the
subcontinent tended to adapt their religious and social life to Brahminic norms. This
3
Witzel, Michael (1995). "Early Sanskritization: Origin and Development of the Kuru state"

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development resulted from the desire of lower-class groups to rise on the social ladder by
adopting the ways and beliefs of the higher castes. Further, many local deities were identified
with the gods and goddesses of the Puranas.

The process, sometimes called “Sanskritization,” began in Vedic times and was probably the
principal method by which the Hinduism of the Sanskrit texts spread through the subcontinent
and into Southeast Asia. Sanskritization still continues in the form of the conversion of tribal
groups, and it is reflected in the persistence of the tendency among some Hindus to identify rural
and local deities with the gods of the Sanskrit texts. Sanskritization also refers to the process by
which some Hindus try to raise their status by adopting high-caste customs, such as wearing the
sacred cord and becoming vegetarians.4

If Sanskritization has been the main means of connecting the various local traditions throughout
the subcontinent, the converse process, which has no convenient label, has been one of the means
whereby Hinduism has changed and developed over the centuries. Many features of Hindu
mythology and several popular gods—such as Ganesha, an elephant headed god, and Hanuman,
the monkey god—were incorporated into Hinduism and assimilated into the appropriate Vedic
gods by this means. Similarly, the worship of many goddesses who are now regarded as the
consorts of the great male Hindu gods, as well as The Great Bath, Mohenjo-Daro. Frederick M.
Asher the worship of individual unmarried goddesses may have arisen from the worship of non-
Vedic local goddesses. Thus, the history of Hinduism can be interpreted as the interplay between
orthopraxy custom and the practices of wider ranges of people and, complementarily, as the
survival of features of local traditions that gained strength steadily until they were adapted by the
Brahmans.

2.3 Religion in the Indus valley civilization

The Harappa culture, located in what is now Pakistan, has produced much evidence of what may
have been a cult of a goddess and a bull. Figurines of both occur, female figures being more
common, while the bull appears more frequently on the many steatite seals. A horned figure,
possibly with three faces, occurs on a few seals, and on one seal he is surrounded by animals. A
few male goriness, one apparently in a dancing posture, may represent deities. No building has
been discovered at any Harappan site that can be positively identified as a temple, but the Great
4
The Hindus: An Alternative History. Oxford University Press.

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Bath at Mohenjo-Daro may have been used for ritual purposes, as were the Ghats (bathing steps
on riverbanks) attached to later Hindu temples. The presence of bathrooms in most of the houses
and the remarkable system of covered drains indicate a strong concern for cleanliness that may
have been related to concepts of ritual purity but perhaps merely to ideas of hygiene.

Many seals show what may be religious and legendary themes that cannot be interpreted with
certainty, such as seals depicting trees next to figure who may be divinities believed to reside in
them. The bull is often depicted standing before a sort of altar.

and the horned figure has been interpreted over confidently as a prototype of the Hindu god
Shiva. Small conical objects have been interpreted by some scholars as phallic emblems, though
they may have been pieces used in board games. Other interpretations of the remains of the
Harappa culture are even more speculative and, if accepted, would indicate that many features of
later Hinduism were already in existence 4,000 years ago.5

2.4 The Vedic period

The people of the early Vedic period left few materials remains, but they did leave a very
important literary record called the Rigveda. Its 1,028 hymns are distributed throughout 10
books, of which the first and the last are the most recent. A hymn usually consists of three
sections: an exhortation; a main part comprising praise of the deity, prayers, and petition, with
frequent references to the deity’s mythology; and a specific request. The Rigveda is not a unitary
work, and its composition may have taken several centuries. In its form at the time of its final
edition, it reflected a well-developed religious system. The date commonly given for the final
recension of the Rigveda is 1200 BCE. During the next two or three centuries it was
supplemented by three other Vedas and still later by Vedic texts called the Brahmanas and the
Upanishads.6

5
Possehl, Gregory L. (11 November 2002). "Indus religion". The Indus Civilization: A Contemporary Perspective.
6
Basham, Arthur Llewellyn (1989). The Origins and Development of Classical Hinduism. Oxford University Press

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3. Issues in Hinduism
3.1 The rise of the major sects: Vaishnavism, Shaivism, and Shaktism
The Vedic god Rudra gained importance from the end of the Rigvedic period. In the
Svetashvatara Upanishad, Rudra is for the first time called Shiva and is described as the creator,
preserver, and destroyer of the universe. His followers are called on to worship him with
devotion (bhakti). The tendency for the laity to form themselves into religious guilds or societies
—evident in the case of the yaksha cults, Buddhism, and Jainism—promoted the growth of
devotional Vaishnavism and Shaivism. These local associations of worshipers appear to have
been a principal factor in the spread of the new cults. Theistic ascetics are less in evidence at this
time, though a community of Shaivite monks, the Pashupatas, existed by the 2nd or 3rd century
CE.

By the time of the early Gupta empire the new theism had been harmonized with the old Vedic
religion, and two of the main branches of Hinduism were fully recognized. The Vaishnavas had
the support of the Gupta emperors, who took the title paramabhagavata (“supreme devotee of
Vishnu”). Vishnu temples were numerous, and the doctrine of Vishnu’s avatars (incarnations)
was widely accepted. Of the 10 incarnations of later Vaishnavism, however, only two seem to
have been much worshipped in the Gupta period (4th–6th century). These were Krishna, the hero
of the Mahabharata, who also begins to appear in his pastoral aspect as the cowherd and flute
player, and Varaha, the divine boar, of whom several impressive images survive from the Gupta
period. A spectacular carving in Udayagiri (Madhya Pradesh) dating from about 400 CE depicts
Varaha rescuing the earth goddess, Vasudha. Temples in Udayagiri (c. 400) and Deogarh (c.
500) also portray Vishnu reclining on the serpent Ananta (“Without End”).7

The Shaivites were also a growing force in the religious life of India. The sect of Pashupata
ascetics, founded by Lakulisha (or Nahulisha), who lived in the 2nd century CE, is attested by
inscriptions from the 5th century; it is among the earliest of the sectarian religious orders of
Hinduism. Representations of the son of Shiva, Skanda (also called Karttikeya, the war god),
appeared as early as 100 BCE on coins from the Kushan dynasty, which ruled northern India,
Afghanistan, and Central Asia in the first three centuries of the Common Era. Shiva’s other son,
the elephant headed Ganesha, patron deity of commercial and literary enterprises, did not appear
7
www.britannica/topic. Hinduism

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until the 5th century. Very important in this period was Surya, the sun god, in whose honour
temples were built, though in modern times he is little regarded by most Hindus. The solar cult
had Vedic roots but later may have expanded under Iranian inuence.

3.2 The development of temples

The Gupta period was marked by the rapid development of temple architecture. Earlier temples
were made of wood, but freestanding stone and brick temples soon appeared in many parts of
India. By the 7th century, stone temples, some of considerable dimensions, were found in many
parts of the country. Originally, the design of the Hindu temples may have borrowed from the
Buddhist precedent, for in some of the oldest temples the image was placed in the centre of the
shrine, which was surrounded by an ambulatory path resembling the path around a stupa (a
religious building containing a Buddhist relic). Nearly all surviving Gupta temples are
comparatively small; they consist of a small cellar (central chamber), constructed of thick and
solid masonry, with a veranda either at the entrance or on all sides of the building. The earliest
Gupta temples, such as the Buddhist temples at Sanchi, have at roofs; however, the shikhara
(spire), typical of the north Indian temple, was developed in this period and with time was
steadily made taller. Tamil literature mentions several temples. The epic Silappatikaram (c. 3rd–
4th centuries), for instance, refers to the temples of Srirangam, near Tiruchchirappalli, and of
Tirumala-Tirupati (known locally as Tiruvenkatam).8

The Buddhists and Jains had made use of articial caves for religious purposes, and these were
adapted by the Hindus. Hindu cave shrines, however, are comparatively rare, and none have been
discovered from earlier than the Gupta period. The Udayagiri complex has cave shrines, but
some of the best examples are in Badami (c. 570), the capital of the Chalukya dynasty in the 6th
century. The Badami caves contain several carvings of Vishnu, Shiva, and Harihara (an
amalgamation of Vishnu and Shiva), as well as depictions of stories connected with Vishnu’s
incarnation, Krishna. Near the Badami caves are the sites of Aihole and Pattadakal, which
contain some of the oldest temples in the south; some temples in Aihole, for example, date to
approximately 450. For this reason, these sites are sometimes referred to as the “laboratory” of
Hindu temples. Pattadakal, another capital of the Chalukya empire, was a major site of temple

8
. Hindu Places of Pilgrimage in India: A Study in Cultural Geography. University of California Press.

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building by Chalukyan monarchs in the 7th and 8th centuries. These temples incorporated styles
that eventually became distinctive of north and south Indian architecture.

Evidence for contact between the Pallava empire and Southeast Asia is provided by some of the
earliest inscriptions (c. 6th–7th centuries) of the Khmer empire, which are written in “Pallava
style” characters. There are also several visual connections between temple styles in India and in
Southeast Asia, including similarities in architecture (e.g., the design of temple towers) and
iconography (e.g., the depiction of Hindu deities, epic narratives, and dancers in carvings on
temple walls). Yet there are also differences between them. For example, the Cambodian Shiva
temples in Phnom Bakheng, Bangkok, and Koh Ker resemble mountain pyramids in the
architectural idiom of Hindu and Buddhist temples in Borobudur and Prambanan on the island of
Java in present-day Indonesia.

3.3The spread of Hinduism in Southeast Asia and the Pacific

Hinduism and Buddhism exerted an enormous inuence on the civilizations of Southeast Asia and
contributed greatly to the development of a written tradition in that area. About the beginning of
the Common Era, Indian merchants may have settled there, bringing Brahmans and Buddhist
monks with them. These religious men were patronized by rulers who converted to Hinduism or
Buddhism. The earliest material evidence of Hinduism in Southeast Asia comes from Borneo,
where late 4th-century Sanskrit inscriptions testify to the performance of Vedic sacrifices by
Brahmans at the behest of local chiefs. Chinese chronicles attest an Indianized kingdom in
Vietnam two centuries earlier. The dominant form of Hinduism exported to Southeast Asia was
Shaivism, though some Vaishnavism was also known there. Later, from the 9th century onward,
Tantrism, both Hindu and Buddhist, spread throughout the region.9

Beginning in the first half of the 1st millennium CE, many of the early kingdoms in Southeast
Asia adopted and adapted specific Hindu texts, theologies, rituals, architectural styles, and forms
of social organization that suited their historical and social conditions. One of the largest Hindu
temples ever built, it contains the largest bas-relief in the world, depicting the churning of the
ocean of milk, a minor theme of Indian architecture but one of the dominant narratives in Khmer
temples.

9
Hiltebeitel, Alf (2007). "Hinduism" In Joseph Kitagawa (ed.). The Religious Traditions of Asia: Religion, History,
and Culture. Routledge.

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The civilizations of Southeast Asia developed forms of Hinduism and Buddhism that
incorporated distinctive local features and in other respects reflected local cultures, but the
framework of their religious life, at least in the upper classes, was largely Indian. Stories from
the Ramayana and the Mahabharata became widely known in Southeast Asia and are still
popular there in local versions. In Indonesia the people of Bali still follow a form of Hinduism
adapted to their own genius. Versions of the Manu-smriti were taken to Southeast Asia and were
translated and adapted to indigenous cultures until they lost most of their original content.

Claims of early Hindu contacts farther east are more doubtful. There is little evidence of direct
inuence of Hinduism on China or Japan, which were primarily affected by Buddhism.

3.4 Inuence on the Mediterranean world

There is no clear evidence to attest to the inuence of Hinduism in the ancient Mediterranean
world. The Greek philosopher Pythagoras (c. 580–c. 500 BCE) may have obtained his doctrine
of metempsychosis (transmigration, or passage of the soul from one body to another; see
reincarnation) from India, mediated by Achaemenian (6th–4th century BCE) Persia, but similar
ideas were known in Egypt and were certainly present in Greece before the time of Pythagoras.
The Pythagorean doctrine of a cyclic universe may also be derived from India, but the Indian
theory of cosmic cycles is not attested in the 6th century BCE.10

It is known that Hindu ascetics occasionally visited Greece. Furthermore, Greece and India
conducted not only trade but also cultural, educational, and philosophical exchanges. The

most striking similarity between Greek and Indian thought is the resemblance between the
system of mystical gnosis (esoteric knowledge) described in the Enneads of the Neoplatonic
philosopher Plotinus (205–270) and that of the Yoga-sutra attributed to Patanjali, an Indian
religious teacher sometimes dated in the 2nd century CE. The Patanjali text is the older, and
inuence is probable, though the problem of mediation remains difficult because Plotinus gives no
direct evidence of having known anything about Indian mysticism. Several Greek and Latin
writers (an example of the former being Clement of Alexandria) show considerable knowledge
of the externals of Indian religions, but none gives any intimation of understanding their more
recondite aspects.

10
Ramstedt, Martin (2004). Hinduism in Modern Indonesia: A Minority Religion Between Local, National, and
Global Interests

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4. Challenges faced by Hinduism
4.1 Challenges to Brahmanism11
Indian religious life underwent great changes during the period 550–450 BCE. This century was
marked by the rise of breakaway sects of ascetics who rejected traditional religion, denying the
authority of the Vedas and of the Brahmans and following teachers who claimed to have
discovered the secret of obtaining release from transmigration. By far the most important of
these figures were Siddhartha Gautama, called the Buddha, and Vardhamana, called Mahavira
(“Great Hero”), the founder of Jainism. There were many other heterodox teachers who
organized bands of ascetic followers, and each group adopted a specific code of conduct. They
gained considerable support from ruling families and merchants. The latter were growing in
wealth and influence, and many of them were searching for alternative forms of religious activity
that would give them a more significant role than did orthodox Brahmanism or that would be less
expensive to support.

About 500 BCE asceticism became widespread, and increasing numbers of intelligent young
men “gave up the world” to search for release from transmigration by achieving a state of
psychic security. The orthodox Brahmanical teachers reacted to these tendencies by devising the
doctrine of the four ashramas, which divided the life of the twice-born after initiation into four
stages: the brahmacharin (celibate religious student); the grihastha (married householder); the
vanaprastha (forest dweller); and the sannyasin (wandering ascetic). This attempt to keep
asceticism in check by conning it to men of late middle age was not wholly successful.
Thereafter Hindu social theory centered on the concept of varnashrama dharma, or the duties of
the four classes (varnas) and the four ashramas, which constituted the ideal that Hindus were
encouraged to follow.

Inscriptions, iconographic evidence, and literary references reveal the emergence of devotional
theism in the 2nd century BCE. Several brief votive inscriptions refer to the god Vasudeva, who
by this time was widely worshipped in western India. At the end of the 2nd century, Heliodorus,
a Greek ambassador of King Antialcidas of Taxila (in Pakistan), erected a large column in
honour of Vasudeva at Besnagar in Madhya Pradesh and recorded that he was a Bhagavata, a

11
Nath, Vijay (2001). "From 'Brahmanism' to 'Hinduism': Negotiating the Myth of the Great Tradition"

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term used specifically for the devotees of Vishnu. The identication of Vasudeva with the old
Vedic god Vishnu and, later, with Vishnu’s incarnation, Krishna, was quickly accepted.

Near the end of the Mauryan period, the first surviving stone images of Hinduism appear.
Several large, simply carved figures survive, representing not any of the great gods but rather
yakshas, or local chthonic divinities connected with water, fertility, and magic. The original
locations of these images are uncertain, but they were probably erected in the open air in sacred
enclosures. Temples are not clearly attested in this period by either archaeology or literature. A
few fragmentary images thought to be those of Vasudeva and Shiva, the latter in
anthropomorphic form and in the form of a lingam, are found on coins of the 2nd and 1st BCE.

4.2 The challenge of Islam and popular religion

The advent of Islam in the Ganges basin at the end of the 12th century resulted in the withdrawal
of royal patronage from Hinduism in much of the area. The attitude of the Muslim rulers toward
Hinduism varied. Some, like Fīrūz Tughluq (ruled 1351–88) and Aurangzeb (ruled 1658–1707),
were strongly anti-Hindu and enforced payment of jizya, a poll tax on unbelievers. Others, like
the Bengali sultan Ḥusayn Shah ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn (reigned 1493–1519) and the great Akbar (reigned
1556–1605), were well disposed toward their Hindu subjects. Many temples were destroyed by
the more fanatical rulers, however. Conversion to Islam was more common in areas where
Buddhism had once been strongest—Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Kashmir.

On the eve of the Muslim occupation, Hinduism was by no means sterile in northern India, but
its vitality was centred in the southern areas. Throughout the centuries, the system of class and
caste had become more rigid; in each region there was a complex hierarchy of castes strictly
forbidden to intermarry or dine together, controlled and regulated by secular powers who acted
on the advice of the court Brahmans. The large-scale Vedic sacrifices had practically vanished,
but simple domestic Vedic sacrifices continued, and new forms of animal, and sometimes
vegetable, sacrifice had appeared, especially connected with the worship of the mother goddess.12

By that time, most of the main divinities of later Hinduism were worshipped. Rama, the hero of
the epic poem, had become the eighth avatar of Vishnu, and his popularity was growing, Surya
Deula, Konarak, Orissa, India. Frederick M. Asher though it was not yet as prominent as it later
became. Similarly, Rama’s monkey helper, Hanuman, now one of the most popular divinities of
12
Ayalon, David (1986). Studies in Islamic History and Civilisation.

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India and the readiest helper in time of need, was rising in importance. Krishna was worshipped,
though his consort, Radha, did not become popular until after the 12th century. Harihara, a
combination of Vishnu and Shiva, and Ardhanarishvara, a synthesis of Shiva and his consort
Shakti, also became popular deities.

4.3 Temple complexes

Although early temples in south India may have been made of disposable materials as early as
the first few centuries of the Common Era, permanent temple structures appear about the 3rd and
4th centuries, as attested in early Tamil literature. From the Gupta period onward, Hindu temples
became larger and more prominent, and their architecture developed in distinctive regional
styles. In northern India the best remaining Hindu temples are found in the Orissa region and in
the town of Khajuraho in northern Madhya Pradesh. The best example of Orissan temple
architecture is the Lingaraja temple of Bhubaneswar, built about 1000. The largest temple of the
region, however, is the famous Black Pagoda, the Sun Temple (Surya Deula) of Konarak, built in
the mid-13th century. Its tower has long since collapsed, and only the assembly hall remains. The
most important Khajuraho temples were built during the 11th century. 13Individual architectural
styles also arose in Gujarat and Rajasthan, but their surviving products are less impressive than
those of Orissa and Khajuraho. By the end of the 1st millennium CE the south Indian style had
reached its apogee in the great Brihadeshwara temple of Thanjavur (Tanjore).

The great temples were—and still are—wealthy institutions. The patrons who endowed them
with land, money, and cattle included royalty as well as men and women from several classes of
society. As early as the 5th century, Kulaprabhavati, a Cambodian queen, endowed a Vishnu
temple in her realm. The temples were also supported by the transfer of the taxes levied by kings
on specific areas of the nearby countryside, by donations of the pious, and by the fees of
worshipers. Their immense wealth was one of the factors that encouraged the Ghaznavid and
Ghūrid Turks to invade India after the 11th century. The temples were controlled by self-
perpetuating committees—whose membership was usually a hereditary privilege—and by a large
staff of priests and temple servants under a high priest who wielded tremendous power and
inuence.
13
Michell, George (1977). The Hindu Temple: An Introduction to Its Meaning and Forms

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In keeping with their wealth, the great walled temple complexes of south India were—and still
are—small cities, containing the central and numerous lesser shrines, bathing tanks,
administrative offices, homes of the temple employees, workshops, bazaars, and public buildings
of many kinds. As some of the largest employers and greatest landowners in their areas, the
temples played an important part in the economy. They also performed valuable social functions,
serving as schools, dispensaries, poorhouses, banks, and concert halls.

The temple complexes suffered during the Muslim occupation. In the sacred cities of Varanasi
(Benares) and Mathura, no large temple from any period before the 17th century has survived.
The same is true of most of the main religious centres of northern India but not of the regions
where the Muslim hold was less rm, such as Orissa, Rajasthan, and south India. Despite the
widespread destruction of the temples, Hinduism endured, in part because of the absence of a
centralized authority; rituals and sacrifices were performed in places other than temples. The
purohitas, or family priests who performed the domestic rituals and personal sacraments for the
laypeople, continued to function, as did the thousands of ascetics.

4.4 Sectarian movements

Before the Muslim invasion of the subcontinent, the new forms of south Indian bhakti had spread
beyond the bounds of the Tamil-, Kannada-, and Telugu-speaking areas. Certain Vaishnava
theologians of the Pancharatra and Bhagavata schools gave the growing Vaishnava bhakti cults a
philosophical framework that also inuence some Shaivite schools.14

Several Vaishnava teachers deserve mention, including Ramanuja, a Tamil Brahman of the 11th
century who was for a time chief priest of the Vaishnava temple of Srirangam, and Nimbarka, a
Telugu Brahman of the 12th or 13th century who spread the cult of the divine cowherd and of
Radha, his favorite Gopi (cowherdess, especially associated with the legends of Krishna’s
youth). His sect survives near Mathura but has made little impact elsewhere. More important was
Vallabha (Vallabh Acharya; 1479–1531), who emphasized the erotic imagery of the Vaishnava
doctrine of grace and established a sect that stressed absolute obedience to the guru (teacher).
Early in its existence the sect was organized with a hierarchy of senior leaders (Goswami), many
of whom became very rich. The Vallabh Acharya sect, once very inuential in the western half of

14
Basham, Arthur Llewellyn (1989). The Origins and Development of Classical Hinduism

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north India, declined in the 19th century, in part because of a number of lawsuits against the
chief guru, the descendant of Vallabha.

The Shaiva sects also developed from the 10th century onward. In south India there emerged the
school of Shaiva-Siddhant, still one of the most significant religious forces in that region and one
that, unlike the school of Shankara, does not accept the full identity of the soul and God. A
completely monistic school of Shaivism appeared in Kashmir in the early 9th century. Its
doctrines differ from those of Shankara chiefly because it attributes personality to the absolute
spirit, who is the god Shiva and not the impersonal brahman.

An important sect, founded in the 12th century in the Kannada-speaking area of the Deccan, was
that of the Lingayats, or Virashaivas (“Heroes of the Shaiva Religion”). Its traditional founder,
Basava, taught doctrines and practices of surprising unorthodoxy: he opposed all forms of image
worship and accepted only the lingam of Shiva as a sacred symbol. Virashaivism rejected the
Vedas, the Brahman priesthood, and all caste distinctions. It also consciously rejected several
religious and social conventions, such as the ban against the remarriage of widows, and practiced
burial rather than cremation of the dead.

Shaivism underwent significant growth in northern India. In the 13th century Gorakhnath (also
known as Gorakshanatha), who became leader of a sect of Shaivite ascetics known as Nathas
(“Lords”) from the title of their chief teachers, introduced new ideas and practices to Shaivism.
The Gorakhnathis were particularly important as propagators of Hatha Yoga, a form of Yoga that
requires complex and difficult physical exercises and that has become popular in the West. These
yogis, who are still numerous, inuence the teachings of several of the bhakti poets.

4.5 Bhakti movements15

The poets and saints (highly respected ascetics who were at times believed to be incarnations of a
deity) of medieval bhakti appeared throughout India. Although all had their individual genius,
the bhakti lyricists shared a few common features. Unlike Sanskrit authors, mainly well-educated
members of the Brahman class whose learning and status shaped their outlook, bhakti poets were
not restricted to a single language or class. They brought to their poetry a familiarity with folk
religion unknown or ignored in the Sanskrit texts. The use of the spoken language, even though it
was formalized, made possible the expression of an unmediated vision that needed no further
15
Jones, Constance; Ryan, James D. (2006). Encyclopedia of Hinduism

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context; thus, the lyrics are intensely personal and precise. These works illustrate the localistic
and reformist tendency evidenced throughout India in the vernacular literatures, especially in
Tamil, Bengali, and Hindi. (See below Vernacular literatures.)

Much has been said about the synthesis of Hinduism and Islam in the period of Muslim
dominance. Numerous Muslim social customs were adopted, and Persian and Arabic words
entered the vocabularies of Indian languages. The teachings of such men as Basava and Kabir
may have been inuence by Muslim observances and social customs. A still greater synthesis took
place among the Muslims, most of whom were Indian by blood. In Tamil, Hindi, Bengali,
Gujarati, Punjabi, and Marathi there is much poetry, written by Muslims and commencing with
the Islamic invocation of Allah, which nevertheless betrays strong Hindu inuence. Some works,
such as Umaru Pulavar’s Tamil Sira puranam (late 18th–early 19th century), which provides a
detailed life of the Prophet, display the strong literary inuence of Kamban’s Iramavataram (c.
9th–11th century), a rendering of the Ramayana in Tamil. While these works were strikingly
similar in literary strategy and arrangement of chapters, there was no theological syncretism in
the Sira puranam. However, there are texts in northern India that proclaim Krishna as being in
the line of the prophets of Islam and as the teacher of the unity of God. Much mystical poetry,
though written by authors with Muslim names, uses Hindu imagery and Hindu terminology. This
literature originated in the accommodating character of early Indian Susm, which, well before
Kabir, proclaimed that Muslim, Christian, Jew, Zoroastrian, and Hindu were all striving toward
the same goal and that the outward observances that kept them apart were false. Some Indian Sus
were greatly inuenced by Hindu customs. For example, a school of Kashmiri Sus—whose
members call themselves Rishis, after the legendary Hindu sages of the same name—respect and
repeat the verses of Lal Ded, a 14th-century poet and holy woman from Kashmir, and are strict
vegetarians.16

Tolerant Muslim rulers encouraged syncretic tendencies, which reached their zenith in the reign
of Akbar (1556–1605). Taking a great interest in the religion of his Hindu subjects, Akbar tried
to establish a single, all-embracing religion for his empire. Although his efforts failed, they
inuenced India for more than 50 years after his death. Orthodox Muslim theologians complained
about the growth of heresy, however, and the emperor Aurangzeb (reigned 1658–1707) did all in
his power to discourage it. Popular Muslim preachers throughout the 18th and 19th centuries
16
Jones, Constance; Ryan, James D. (2006). Encyclopedia of Hinduism

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worked to restore orthodoxy. Thus, syncretic tendencies were somewhat reduced before the
imposition of British power in the mid-18th century. Furthermore, British rule emphasized the
distinctions between Hindu and Muslim and did not encourage efforts to harmonize the two
religions.

5.The Religious Situation After Independence

Increasing nationalism, especially after the division of India into India and Pakistan in 1947, led
to a widening of the gulf between Hindus and Muslims. In the early 1970s Indian scholars
painted the relations of the two religions in earlier centuries as friendly, blaming alien rule for
the division of India. In Pakistan the tendency has been to insist that Hindus and Muslims have
always been “two nations” and that the Hindus nevertheless were happy under their Muslim
rulers. Neither position is correct. In earlier times there was much mutual inuence. But the
conservative element in Indian Islam gained the upper hand long before British power was
consolidated in India17.

One of the pioneers of nationalism, Tilak, gloried the Maharashtrian hero Shivaji as the liberator
of India from the alien yoke of the Mughals; and Bankim Chandra Chatterjee’s militant ascetics,
who pledged to conquer and expel the Muslims, sang a battle hymn that no orthodox Muslim
could repeat. British rulers of India did little or nothing to lessen Hindu Muslim tension, and
their policy of separate electorates for the two communities worsened the situation. Many leaders
of the Indian National Congress movement, such as Jawaharlal Nehru, carried their Hinduism
lightly and favored a secular approach to politics; the majority, however, followed the lead of
Gandhi. Although to the right of the Congress politically, the Hindu Mahasabha, a nationalist
group formed to give Hindus a stronger voice in politics, did not oppose nonviolence in its drive
to establish a Hindu state in India.

The policy of the new Indian government was to establish a secular state, and the successive
governments have broadly kept to this policy. The governments of the Indian states, however,
have not been so restricted by constitutional niceties. Some state governments have introduced

17
Sweetman, Will (2004). "The prehistory of Orientalism: Colonialism and the Textual Basis for Bartholomaus
Ziegenbalg's Account of Hinduism

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legislation of an especially Hindu character. On the other hand, the Congress governments have
passed legislation more offensive to Hindu traditional prejudices than anything the British Indian
government would have dared to enact. For example, all forms of discrimination against
“untouchables” (now usually referred to in administrative language as “scheduled castes” and in
informal speech as “Dalits”) are forbidden, although it has been impossible to enforce the law in
every case. A great blow to conservatism was dealt by legislation in 1955 and 1956 that gave full
rights of inheritance to widows and daughters, enforced monogamy, and permitted divorce on
quite easy terms. The 1961 law forbidding dowries further undermined traditional Hinduism.
Although the dowry has long been a tremendous burden to the parents of daughters, the strength
of social custom is such that the law cannot be fully enforced.

The social structure of traditional Hinduism is changing rapidly in the cities. Intercaste and
interreligious marriages are becoming more frequent among the educated, although some aspects
of the caste system show remarkable vitality, especially in the matter of appointments and
elections. The bonds of the tightly knit Hindu joint family are also weakening, a process helped
by legislation and the emancipation of women. The professional priests, who perform rituals for
laypeople in homes or at temples and sacred sites, complain of the lack of custom, and their
numbers are diminishing.18

Nevertheless, Hinduism is far from dying. Mythological elms, once the most popular form of
entertainment, are enjoying a renaissance. Organizations such as the Ramakrishna Mission
nourish and expand their activities. New teachers appear from time to time and attract
considerable followings. Militant fundamentalist Hindu organizations such as the Society for the
Self-Service of the Nation (Rashtriya Svayamsevak Sangh; RSS) are steadily growing. Such
movements be the cause or the result, or both, of persistent outbreaks of communal religious
violence in many parts of South Asia. On both the intellectual and the popular level, Hinduism is
thus in the process of adapting itself to new values and new conditions brought about by mass
education and industrialization. In these respects, it is responding to 21st-century challenges.

18
Sweetman, Will (2004). "The prehistory of Orientalism: Colonialism…

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5. Sacred texts19
5.1 Vedas
The Vedas (“Knowledge”) are the oldest Hindu texts. Hindus regard the Vedas as having been
directly revealed to or “heard” by gifted and inspired seers (rishis) who memorized them in the
most perfect human language, Sanskrit. Most of the religion of the Vedic texts, which revolves
around rituals of fire sacrifice, has been eclipsed by later Hindu doctrines and practices. But even
today, as it has been for several millennia, parts of the Vedas are memorized and repeated as a
religious act of great merit: certain Vedic hymns (mantras) are always recited at traditional
weddings, at ceremonies for the dead, and in temple rituals.

5.2 The Upanishads

The beginnings of philosophy and mysticism in Indian religious history occurred during the
period of the compilation of the Upanishads, roughly between 700 and 500 BCE. Historically,
the most important of the Upanishads are the two oldest, the Brihadaranyaka (“Great Forest
Text”; c. 10th–5th century BCE) and the Chandogya (pertaining to the Chandogas, priests who
intone hymns at sacrifices), both of which are compilations that record the traditions of sages
(rishis) of the period—notably Yajnavalkya, who was a pioneer of new religious ideas.

The Upanishads reveal the desire to obtain the mystical knowledge that ensures freedom from
“re-death” (punarmrityu), or birth and death in a new existence. Throughout the later Vedic
period, the idea that the world of heaven is not the end of existence—and that even in heaven
death is inevitable—became increasingly common. Vedic thinkers became concerned about the
impermanence of religious merit and its loss in the hereafter, as well as about the transience of
any form of existence after death—an existence that would culminate in re-death. The means of
escaping and conquering death devised in the Brahmanas were of a ritual nature, but one of the
oldest Upanishads, the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, emphasizes the knowledge of the cosmic
connection underlying ritual. When the doctrine of the identity of atman (the self) and brahman
(the Absolute) was established in the Upanishads, those sages who were inclined to meditative

19
Muesse, Mark William (2003). Great World Religions: Hinduism.

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thought substituted the true knowledge of the self and the realization of this identity for the ritual
method.

5.3 Smriti texts

The shastras are a part of the Smriti (“Remembered”; traditional) literature which, like the sutra
literature that preceded it, stresses the religious merit of gifts to Brahmans. Because kings often
transferred the revenues of villages or groups of villages to Brahmans, either singly or in
corporate groups, the status and wealth of the priestly class rose steadily. Living in the
settlements called agraharas, the Brahmans were encouraged to devote themselves to the study of
the Vedas and the subsidiary studies associated with them, but many Brahmans also developed
the sciences of the period, such as mathematics, astronomy, and medicine, while others
cultivated literature.

The Smriti texts have had considerable inuence on orthodox Hindus, and Hindu family law was
based on them. Although there is evidence of divorce in early Indian history, by the Gupta period
marriage was solemnized by lengthy sacred rites and was virtually indissoluble. Intercaste
marriage became rarer and more difficult, and child marriage and the rite of suttee (or sati; ritual
immolation of a wife on her husband’s pyre after his death) were already in existence, although
less frequent than they later became. One of the earliest denite records of a widow burning
herself on her husband’s pyre is found in an inscription from Eran, Madhya Pradesh, dated 510,
but the custom had been followed sporadically long before this. From the 6th century CE
onward, such occurrences became more frequent, though still quite rare, in certain parts of India,
particularly in Rajasthan.20

5.4 Epics and Puranas

During the centuries immediately preceding and following the beginning of the Common Era,
the recension of the two great Sanskrit epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, took shape out
of existing heroic epic stories, mythology, philosophy, and above all the discussion of the
problem of dharma. Much of the material in the epic’s dates far back into the Vedic period, while

20
Nakamura, Hajime (2004), A History of Early Vedanta Philosophy, Part Two, Delhi

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the rest continued to be added until well into the medieval period. It is conventional, however, to
date the nal recension of the Sanskrit texts of the epics to the period from 200 BCE to 200 CE.

Apart from their inuence as Sanskrit texts, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata have made an
impact in South and Southeast Asia, where their stories have been continually retold in
vernacular and oral versions, and their inuence on Indian and Southeast Asian art has been
profound. Even today the epic stories and tales are part of the early education of all Hindus. A
continuous reading of the Ramayana—whether in Sanskrit or in a vernacular version such as that
of Tulsidas (16th century)—is an act of great merit, and a popular enactment of Tulsidas’s
version of the Ramayana, called the Ramcharitmanas, is an annual event across northern India.
The Ramayana’s inuence is expressed in a dazzling variety of local and regional performance
traditions—story, dance, drama, art—and extends to the composition of explicit “counter epics,”
such as those published by the Tamil separatist E.V. Ramasamy beginning in 1930.21

6. Conclusion
Hindu is the religion which is not founded by any saint or a prophet like any other religion. It is
revealed religion in the world. The original name of Hindu/Hinduism is “sanatan dharma”.
Gandhi to consider the service pf god incarnates in poor and that service of the poor and the
downtrodden people of India. In Hinduism, caste is rigid system in which a social hierarchy is
maintained even the state governments headed by the communists who speak deadly against
caste and who want a casteless society have also not taken any positive steps to encourage inter
caste marriages. Everything remains a lip services by these political parties.

7. Bibliography
 Anthony, David W. (2007) The Horse the Wheel And Language
 Basham, Arthur Llewellyn (1989). The Origins and Development of Classical Hinduism.
Oxford University Press

21
Itihasas Religion Facts.

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 Basham, A. L. (1999). A Cultural History of India. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-
0-19-563921-6.
 Bhardwaj, Surinder Mohan (1983). Hindu Places of Pilgrimage in India: A Study in
Cultural Geography
 Bhaskarananda, Swami (1994), Essentials of Hinduism
 Comans, Michael (2000). The Method of Early Advaita Vedanta
 Hiltebeitel, Alf (2002). "Hinduism", In Joseph Kitagawa (ed.): sanatan dharma |
Hinduism. Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 17 November 2016.
 "The Global Religious Landscape – Hinduism". A Report on the Size and Distribution of
the World's Major Religious Groups
 Ninians Smart (2007). "Polytheism". Encyclopedia Britannica. Encyclopedia Britannica
Online
 V, Jayaram. "The Hindu Caste System" Hindu website
 Venkataraman, Swaminathan; Deshpande, Pawan. "Hinduism: Not Cast in Caste" Hindu
American Foundation
 Encyclopedia Britannica, yaksha
 Itihasas". Religion Facts.

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