I am a Hindu Woman. I used to have an innocous handle before. But then I got tired of hearing Hinduism trashed by Christians and Muslims, as if their religious record is anything to boast about! Even more serious are the so called 'secularists' in India, who are anxious to be praised by white men as liberals and so trash Hinduism. Since they are educated and can communicate on a level Westerners understand, ( with a dash of Marxism and Feminism to impress academia) it is not surprising that awful sterotypes of Hinduism linger on. So I am keeping this name to show I am proud of my heritage and do not feel ashamed to call myself a Hindu merely because of what other people say.
CRITICISM OF CERTAIN HINDU TYPES:
However, I feel that the most serious danger comes from blindly devout Hindus themselves. Many of them, in India and abroad, revere their heritage but have never read the scriptures themselves nor made a critical study of the culture --- consequently they cannot properly answer back when they are attacked. But the scriptures are not meant only to be revered. The Scriptures themselves say that he who merely mouths words without understanding their deeper meaning, is like a washerman's donkey, carrying the load but never understanding what is going on. Human beings are born with intelligence and they must use it, otherwise how can we call ourselves human? To understand how Hindu civilization developed throughout the ages and how society changed, we must analyze and reanalyze. As Gandhi put it, though he revered the Scriptures, whatever we find contrary to reason and human values must be discarded. Only in this way can Hinduism flower. Do not our own scriptures repeatedly declare that dharma changes from age to age and place to place, so that what was good at one time and place, becomes bad at another? Hindus are human beings who do not always live up to the ideals expressed in Sanatana Dharma. Many evils have therefore crept into Hindu culture; we must therefore thoroughly understand their cause and their consequences so that they do not happen again. In order to eliminate the evils that are even now plaguing us, we must deconstruct the past and our culture. Hindu civilization, in spite of efforts to demonize it by Christian missionaries and Islamic Jehadis, are no worse than any other civilization. But though in many aspects it is definitely better, we simply cannot ignore its worst aspects. Many of its worst aspects stem from customs and laws that are regarded as holy. Therefore, a Hindu must read and apply logic to what he is reading. It is not enough to be afloat in a sea of devotion --- critical study is needed. It is not enough to declare that Hindu dharma is glorious and teach children to worship it. We must understand and freely criticize. We must read the various scriptures we possess, from the complete Vedas to complete Mahabharata. We must understand what they are trying to teach instead of simply assuming that they are saying the things we want to hear. If there are materials which we find is no longer acceptable in the modern age, we must discard them. "Charaivati, charaivati", says the Upanishads, go forward always. Therefore this cannot harm Sanatana Dharma in any way. Hindus must understand critically in what respects Sanatana Dharma is great --- otherwise it is simply nothing other than superstition.
Similarly, when many blindly devout Hindus find in the scriptures many things that do not coincide with their particular prejudices, they become angry and say these had been inserted later. They have not been inserted later. Our scriptures rejected nothing in life: not meat-eating, not drinking, not sex. What they insisted on was that there must be a balance in everything we do and we must not becomes slaves to our appetites. As time passed, sensibilities changed so that today many beliefs and practices are different from what was in the past. The Hindus who reject that these things are in the holy books harm themselves and their cause. Let them follow what their conscience tells them what their everyday Dharma is --- because in Hinduism you are allowed to find your own path to your duty instead of blindly obeying the shastras only --- but they must not say that these things are attempts at defamation. Similarly, if there are unpleasant aspects in our history we must not turn away from them: we must critically study them to understand why and how they happened so that they cannot happen again.
The Hindu Advantage:
Remember, we Hindus have one great advantage over Christianity and Islam. Both these religions have one founder and they cannot go beyond him. Both of them have one single holy book which is carved in stone; they cannot change it to cope with modern conditions and the truly devout must follow it blindly. Therefore they are unwilling to criticise their holy books or accept that there are other universes beyond their own religion. They think they possess the Truth and that ends the matter for them. We, the followers of Sanatan Dharma are allowed to change our laws as society evolves. Thus says the son of All-Purifying Ganges as he counsels Krishna and the Pandavas, " Hard it is to know what right Dharma is ... WE CENSURE NOT THOSE WHO DO NOT ACCEPT THE LAWS AND WORKS PRESCRIBED BY THE SRUTIS [VEDAS] AS DHARMA, BECAUSE ALL TASKS PRESCRIBED BY THE SRUTIS CANNOT BE ACCEPTED AS DHARMA [EVERY TIME]."
We Hindus are allowed to think freely. Let us not waste this advantage. It is neccessary for us to fight physically to annihilate the militants of other religions who are trying to kill us. But we must wage an war on the intellectual front as well --- we must think and think critically. It will not affect the core of Hinduism itself. Remember, Sanatana Dharma is eternal precisely because it embraces change and evolves. Only then we can make our culture develop further.
Women and civil society in Hinduism. : 1, 2 : These two pages deal with the inheritance rights of women, their economic condition, their rights to divorce and remarriage, their condition as wives, their role in politics and on the positive impact of the feminist virangana culture. But they are only about traditional hinduism, not modern.
Maha Sati or Great Satis: This is not about sati as the term is understood. This is the true meaning of sati and my take on it.
Image of Women in Hindu Religion: How women are portrayed, their good and bad qualities, their creation, and their standing in it.
Prostitution
in Hindu culture , secular and religious: self-explainatory! I cannot
leave this class of women out merely because it is an unpleasant topic.
Hindu Women Rulers: a list of Hindu queens
who ruled directly, and women who were governors
Lies of Christian Missionaries and their atrocities: countering the propaganda unleashed by christian missionaries about how Christians are being victimized in India, and giving a list of their methods of terror and fraud they use to convert the heathen.
Muhammad is not mentioned in Vedas: recently a number of Islamic sites have started spreading propaganda that Muhammad's arrival and deeds had been predicted in Hindu scriptures, particularly Vedas. This page refutes that claim thoroughly.
Answer to "Why I am Not a Hindu": an answer to a biased propaganda from a former Hindu. His rejection of Hinduism is not based on pure atheism or holistic viewpoint. I have offered a critique of his article. [both the article and my critique are off-site].
Aryan
Invasion Theory: This page discusses AIT and refutes it using biological
and archaeological data. I have tried to do it in a scholarly manner.
Caste system : A brief discussion about the
probable origin and nature of caste system and the difference between 'varna'
and 'jati'
Caste in other religions: In India Sikhs,
Muslims and Christians also practice caste and untouchability while criticisng
Hinduism for it.
Email me at hinduwoman@hindunet.com if you want to discuss these topics further.