Hinduism is a modern term applied broadly to mean “the religion of India.” The term encompasses myriad sects, cults, and schools of philosophy and theology that are united by certain core beliefs and practices.
Modern Hinduism derives from the ancient religion of India, known as Vedism or Brahmanism. Originating in prehistoric times, this was a highly formalistic religion in which ceremonies, sacrifices, and purifications were carried out by a priestly class in accordance with sacred texts. In the first millennium B.C., a new body of literature proposed that spiritual mastery is not limited to a priestly caste but is available to anyone who has sufficient discipline and devotion.
After about the fourth century A.D., Hinduism spread from India to Southeast Asia, especially in what is now Indonesia, where it was later replaced by Islam. Most Hindus now live in India or are part of the worldwide Indian diaspora.
Hindu worship today is largely an individual or family matter, stressing individual devotions rather than collective worship (except during festivals, in which tens of thousands of people might participate). There are striking regional and sectarian differences in the relative importance accorded to various gods, the ways in which they are worshipped, and in other practices.
♦Scripture The Vedas, which date to about 1500 B.C., are collections of hymns, chants, and rituals that guided the practices of the ancient priestly class. Foremost among them is the Rig Veda, which contains a large body of hymns sung to accompany sacrifices and other ceremonies. The religion of the Vedas was modified by the Upanishads, texts (usually in dialogue form) from the mid-first millennium B.C. that explore basic religious and philosophical concepts and expand the scope of religious belief and practice. Religious ideas are also expressed in the historical texts and mythology that form the foundation of Indian culture, especially the Ramayana (ca. 300 B.C.), an account of the struggles and triumph of the paragon of virtue, Lord Rama; the Mahabharata (ca. 200 B.C.), which tells of a titanic war between two royal clans; and the
Bhagavad Gita—originally an independent text later incorporated into the Mahabharata—a classic exploration of issues of karma and dharma. A huge body of philosophical and theological literature has grown up over the centuries in the form of commentaries to these early texts.
♦Core Beliefs Atman and brahman are often translated simply as “soul” and “divine spirit,” but they carry more complex meanings. Brahman is both the source and substance of all existence; atman is brahman manifested as the individual “self” of a living being. The key spiritual insight of Hinduism is that there is fundamentally no dividing line between atman and brahman, between the “self” and the universe.
Maya, usually translated as “illusion,” refers to the impression, gained through the senses, that the differentiation of things in the universe is real and stable. Maya implies that the apparent differentiation of substance into individual things is illusory, and that the world ultimately is of a singular spiritual nature in a constant state of flux.
Karma refers to the moral consequences of every act committed by an individual in life, carried over from one lifetime to the next. Karma in itself is neither good nor bad, but on an individual level the experience of its consequences might be perceived as good or bad.
Dharma means both “duty” and “truth.” It refers to an individual’s duty as determined by life circumstances (such as caste status, sex, wealth, and power) and the actions that proceed from that duty. A person’s individual dharma might include devotion to a particular god. Thus, acting appropriately in accordance with one’s station in life is itself a form of worship, and a path to oneness with the universe.
Moksha means “liberation.” The primary goal of Hindu belief and practice is the spiritual liberation that comes from a realization that there is no distinction between brahman and atman. Having moksha as a spiritual goal (in part through dharma or appropriate religious duty) does not preclude the pursuit of worldly goals, such as arrha, wealth and power, and kama, pleasure.
Castes Caste determined the fundamental structure of traditional Indian society and remains important today despite legal prohibitions of discrimination according to caste status. There are four main castes: Brahmins or priests; kshatryas or warrior-aristocrats; vaishyas, including merchants, landowners, and skilled artisans; and shudras, laborers. There are hundreds of sub-castes, based on occupation, region, and
other factors. Below the caste system are dalits, “untouchables” who perform ritually unclean occupations. Caste forms the basis of religious practice through the concept that one’s dharma varies according to caste. Hinduism is generally not a proselytizing religion, and many Hindus deny the possibility of conversion because converts would have no caste.
Yoga is widely understood in the West as meaning a system of exercise and breath control; in Hinduism that is only one meaning of a much broader term. A yoga (also called marga, “way”) is an active path to spiritual growth and perfection; yogas can focus on meditation and study, social duty and the performance of good works, devotion to a deity, or other paths such as the hatha yoga of physical culture.
Deities in Hinduism manifest themselves in a variety of forms and receive many different types of devotion, but three fundamental forms predominate. Brahma represents the creative force; Vishnu preserves and sustains the universe; and Shiva will bring about its ultimate destruction. Many other gods are understood as particular manifestations of these three: for example, the widely revered Rama and Krishna are both incarnations of Vishnu; the popular elephant-headed god, Ganesh, patron of auspicious beginnings, is the son of Shiva and his wife, Parvati. Many of the (mostly male) gods have consorts and animal companions, and each god has vivid stories of their lives and actions. Individual worship of these deities through prayer and offerings is known by the general term puja.
Hinduism teaches a deep respect for living things; many Hindus are vegetarians. Cows are especially revered as exemplars of maternal goodness and divine bounty.
The diversity of Hindu holidays reflects the religion’s regional and sectarian variety. Some of the more important and widespread holidays are Dipavali, a festival of lights celebrating Lakshmi, goddess of prosperity; Holi, a spring festival; and Dashara, a harvest festival.
♦History The oldest Hindu writings are Vedic texts associated with a group of invaders (probably from southeastern Europe or somewhere in the region between the Black and Caspian Seas) known as the Aryans, who conquered much of India early in the second millennium B.C. (Hindu fundamentalists associated with the Hindutva movement regard Vedic civilization as wholly indigenous to India, and they deny that any invasion took place, despite significant archaeological and linguistic
evidence to the contrary.) The invaders also brought with them the caste system, the Sanskrit language, and a family of gods with obvious ties to other European deities (the Aryan father of the gods, Dyaus Pitr, was clearly the same figure as the Roman Jupiter or the Greek Zeus). Over many centuries, the Vedic religion assimilated local customs and folk religions, including the ideas of karma and reincarnation.
The mid- to late first millennium B.C.—the time when many of the Upanishads, along with the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, and the Bhagavad Gita were composed—marked a major transformation in Vedism, as ascetics challenged the religion and the power of the priests. Prominent among these reformers were Vardhamana, the founder of Jainism, and Siddhartha Gautama, later known as the Buddha. During this volatile period some Brahman priests propounded the doctrine that there is a dharma (duty) for each stage of a person’s life. This was an argument, in effect, for social responsibility; among other things it inveighed against the increasingly widespread phenomenon of men abandoning society for a life of religious rigor and austerity. To become a hermit, in this view, was contrary to dharma unless the person had reached an “appropriate” stage of life.
Between the second century B.C. and the fourth century A.D., the classic epics (probably initially composed for oral performance) became standardized in written form; cults of Vishnu and Shiva grew in power; and Hinduism spread to Southeast Asia. From the fourth to the ninth century, bhakti (“devotional”) Hinduism grew rapidly in popularity as religious leaders adapted their practices to vernacular languages, such as Tamil, rather than the traditional Sanskrit. Beginning with the establishment of the Delhi Sultanate in 1206, a succession of Muslim regimes dominated northern India, and many Hindus in areas that are now Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Kashmir, as well as in northern India itself, willingly or forcibly converted to Islam. Christianity, which had existed in India since the early centuries A.D., became more widespread in the subcontinent in the 19th century, especially under the influence of the British East India Company.
The 19th and 20th centuries also brought the struggle for Indian independence. Many major new leaders and reformers linked the struggle for independence to a revival of Hindu religion and culture. The best known of these leaders was Mahatma Gandhi, who brought the Hindu
ascetic tradition and the principle of satyagraha (“passive resistance”) to bear on the social and political reform movement in India.
After independence and the separation of Pakistan from India in 1947, the gulf between the Hindu majority and the large Muslim minority in India widened. Violent clashes continue into the 21st century, especially in the disputed territory of Kashmir. In India, two contradictory trends exist at the same time. On the one hand, Hindu nationalism, inspired in part by fear of and opposition to Islam, has emphasized the links between Hinduism and Indian identity. On the other hand, secularization and urbanization have led to the decline (though by no means the disappearance) of many traditional Hindu practices and a diminution in the importance of the traditionally privileged priestly class.
♦Buddhism The central tenets of Buddhism were developed by Siddhartha Gautama in the fifth century B.C. Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha (“awakened one”), began his religious practice and exploration in ancient Indian Vedic traditions, and thus Hinduism and Buddhism share many religious concepts. However, Buddhism offers its own unique prescription for escaping from life’s grim cycle of birth, death, old age, sickness, and death.
History Siddhartha Gautama was brought up in the wealthy, sheltered palace of his father, the ruler of a small kingdom in northeastern India, and upon leaving the palace was shocked to learn of the suffering of ordinary people. Embarking on years of travel, austerity, and meditation, he eventually experienced enlightenment, becoming the Buddha. Preaching his new insights on the causes of suffering (the Four Noble Truths), and the means for escaping it (the Noble Eightfold Path), he gathered a group of disciples who formed the first Buddhist community. Later, followers wrote down the Buddha’s teachings and spread the faith, in part through the establishment of monastic communities. Promoted by King Ashoka of the Maurya dynasty (r. 269–232 B.C.), Buddhism was firmly established in India and spread to Southeast Asia, then to the Silk Road kingdoms of Central Asia, and finally to China, Korea, and Japan. Hinduism eventually supplanted Buddhism in India.
As it spread, Buddhism divided into the three major sects that continue to characterize it today. Buddhism differs from other world religions in that its sects have developed around central teachings and texts. Theravada (“The Teachings of the Elders”) sees the quest for enlightenment as primarily a matter of individual spiritual cultivation in a monastic environment. The Theravada ideal is the arhat, a fully enlightened person who will enter Buddhahood in his or her next rebirth.
Mahayana (“The Greater Vehicle”) stresses the role of bodhisattvas, beings of perfect compassion, who have postponed their own Buddha-transformation in order to assist ordinary people along the path to salvation and enlightenment. Many Mahayana Buddhists believe that the souls of those helped by bodhisattvas wait in a paradise-like setting until the time all sentient beings simultaneously achieve nirvana, and the world of illusion comes to an end.
Vajrayana or Tantric (“Esoteric”) Buddhism, also called Lamaism, is sometimes considered a branch of Mahayana Buddhism. It stresses the interpretation of cosmic forces of good and evil through images, sacred diagrams, rituals, dance, and other means.
Theravada Buddhism today is prominent in Southeast Asia, particularly Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, and Sri Lanka. In those countries, it is customary for young boys to take temporary vows and experience monastic life for a period of several weeks or more; some pursue permanent religious vocations. Mahayana is the main form of Buddhism in China, Korea, and Japan. Prominent East Asian Mahayana sub-sects include Pure Land, which gives special prominence to the bodhisattva Amitabha, the great savior Buddha; the Japanese sect of Nichiren, named for its 13th-century founder and which stresses the Lotus Sutra, one of the earlier Mahayana texts; and Chan (Japanese Zen), which emphasizes monasticism, self-discipline, and meditation over scriptural authority. Vajrayana practitioners are found primarily in Tibet and Mongolia.
Scripture Buddhist scriptures amount to thousands of volumes, organized into the Tripitaka (“Three Baskets”), comprising three types of teaching: sutras, considered the authentic word of the Buddha (though some sutras were not written until centuries after the Buddha’s lifetime); vinayas, rules of monastic life; and abhidharmas, commentaries and systematizing treatises on Buddhist doctrines.
Core Beliefs Because of their common roots in ancient Indian religion, Buddhism and Hinduism share many concepts. These include ahimsa (doing no harm to living creatures); samsara, the cycle of birth and rebirth; karma, the accumulated consequences of an individual’s actions over the course of multiple lifetimes; and dharma, which in Buddhism is expanded to mean not only “truth” and “duty,” as in Hindu tradition, but also the doctrine proclaimed by the Buddha.
Nirvana The Buddhist nirvana, escape from the cycle of rebirth, is conceptually similar to the Hindu moksha. Buddhism, however, rejects the key Hindu belief in the unity of the individual soul and the universal soul (“atman is brahman”) in favor of anatman, a denial that any phenomenon, even the soul, has ultimate reality, thus extending the doctrine of maya, “illusion,” to include the entire universe. Buddhism also differs from Hinduism in explicitly rejecting the concept of caste.
The Four Noble Truths encapsulate the basic doctrine of Buddhism. Formulated by the Buddha in the course of achieving enlightenment, they are: all life is suffering; suffering stems from desire or attachment, a futile wish for the illusions of the world to be real; desire can be overcome; the means for overcoming desire is the Noble Eightfold Path.
The Noble Eightfold Path consists of eight steps, practiced simultaneously (not sequentially), to guide the spiritual life of the Buddhist. They are: right views, right intentions, right speech, right conduct, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration. Right views and intentions produce morality; right speech, conduct, and livelihood produce wisdom; and right effort, mindfulness, and concentration produce spiritual development. Right in all these instances means “in conformity with the individual’s dharma.”
The Three Jewels of Buddhism constitute the foundations of Buddhist communities: Buddha, dharma, and sangha (the community of Buddhist monks and nuns). A key point of Buddhist doctrine is that the Buddha is not a deity (Buddhism is sometimes described as “a religion without a god”), but a being who has attained a state of full enlightenment and thus nirvana, liberation from illusion and therefore from the cycle of rebirth and suffering. Buddhahood is a state to which all sentient beings can aspire.
Buddhist monastic life revolves around communal study, performance of rituals (such as chanting the sutras), and ministering to the religious
needs of the laity. Lay Buddhist worship is largely an individual affair, with few or no occasions involving the laity as a whole. Some sects of Buddhism celebrate holidays that vary from sect to sect; there are no universally celebrated Buddhist holidays or festivals.
♦Confucianism Confucianism takes its name from the sixth-century B.C. scholar and civil servant Kong Qiu or Kongzi (“Master Kong”; sometimes written as Kung Fu-Tzu and latinized as “Confucius” by 17th-century Jesuit missionaries in China), but he is not the “founder” of Confucianism in the same sense that the Buddha was the founder of Buddhism. Rather, Confucius was responsible for systematizing and teaching a scholarly tradition and code of ethical conduct that had its roots hundreds of years in the past, particularly in China’s ancient cult of ancestor worship. The teachings of Confucius, as recorded in the Analects (the collected teachings of Confucius, written down by disciples over a long period after the Master’s death) advocate a humanitarian ethical system focused on five values: ren (“reciprocal human-feeling”); yi (“righteousness”); li (“propriety, including ritually correct behavior”); zhi (“knowledge”); and xin (“trustworthiness”). Collectively these values contribute to the paramount Confucian virtues of xiao (“filial piety”); and wen (“culture or civilization; also civil as opposed to military power”).
Confucianism remained primarily a philosophical school of thought and a political ideology for many centuries, but it began to develop into more of a religious system, complete with ceremonies, festivals, and temples, in the first century A.D., partially in response to the growing influence of Buddhism in China. Today, it is widely viewed in China as an equal part of a religious triad with Buddhism and Taoism (below); Confucius is often portrayed in religious images next to Laozi and the Buddha. There are about 6.3 million self-identified Confucianists in various countries around the world, but in a sense anyone who is culturally Chinese is to some degree a Confucianist.
The Analects of Confucius The Analects is one of the 13 works that form the Confucian canon of classical Chinese literature and philosophy. The Chinese title, Lunyü, can be translated as “Discussions and Conversations” or “Assessments and Conversations.” The term analects (from the Greek, meaning “literary gleanings”) is now conventional; it was first used by Jesuit missionaries in China in the 17th century.
The 20 chapters of the Analects purport to record the conversations
of the teacher and philosopher Confucius (Kongzi) with his disciples. Traditionally it was thought that these conversations and teachings were written down from memory by a group of disciples shortly after Confucius’s death. Recent scholarship has shown that the chapters are so diverse in both language and doctrine that they cannot have been composed in a short period of time by a small group of collaborators. The current view is that the chapters were composed over a period of more than two centuries, approximately 479–250 B.C., and that the present order of the chapters within the book does not reflect the order in which they were written.
The chapters of the Analects can be considered in groups, reflecting their approximate date of composition.
Chapters 4, 5, and 6 These are the work of Confucius’s original disciples, dating to about 479–460 B.C. They emphasize the cardinal virtue of ren (“reciprocal human feeling”), the dao (the “Way,” the natural order of things), the concept of the gentleman (junzi or “son of a prince,” but in Confucius’s radical reformulation, defined by conduct rather than by aristocratic birth), and the importance of putting one’s cultivation of virtue into practice by holding public office. These chapters begin to define Confucianism as a coherent “school” of teachings.
Chapters 7, 8, and 9 These derive from the disciples’ disciples and date to the last half of the fifth century B.C. They continue to define the school’s doctrines and portray Confucius as a “transmitter, not an innovator,” guided by the enlightened example of the sage-rulers of antiquity and emphasizing the internalization of values and virtuous conduct.
Chapters 2, 3, 10, 11, 12, and 13 The mid-fourth century (roughly 380–320 B.C.) chapters introduce ritual (li, a word covering meanings from the correct conduct of religious rituals to ordinary social etiquette) as a key Confucian virtue, and speak, as the earlier chapters do, about Heaven and the realm of spirits. Individual passages specifically engage in debate with other philosophical schools of the time.
Chapters 1, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, and 20 Dating to the late fourth to mid-third century B.C., these final chapters depict a world of escalating warfare, in which the Analects struggle to define the role of the public official. By the mid-third century B.C., it appeared that the Confucian school had been soundly defeated; but not much more than a
century later, early in the early Imperial era, Confucianism made a decisive recovery, becoming the basis for China’s official ideology for the next two millennia.
♦Taoism The legendary founder of Taoism (also spelled Daoism) is Laozi (old spelling Lao Tzu; probably a wholly mythical figure but traditionally dated ca. 600 B.C.), whose name means “old master.” According to tradition, he is the sole author of the core Taoist text, the Daodejing (The Way and its Power). Modern scholarship has established, however, that the book is a work of anonymous, and probably multiple, authorship from the late fourth century B.C. The Daodejing, also known as the Book of Laozi, is a collection of 81 brief, poetic chapters that discuss, often through challenging paradoxes, the nature of the Dao (Tao), the source and essence of all being. An eponymous collection of writings by Zhuangzi (old spelling Chuang Tzu; ca. 300 B.C.) is another important Taoist text. From the beginning, Taoism included elements of both religion and philosophy. It advocated a political ideal of simplicity and austerity, with the state being ruled by a sage-king empowered by his complete oneness with the Dao itself to act with wu-wei, or nonintentionality: effortlessly effecting his actions while seeming to do nothing. Self-cultivation was central to early Daoist practice, with sagehood and immortality its religious goals.
Beginning in the third century A.D., undoubtedly under the influence of Buddhism, Taoism took on more of the overt trappings of organized religion and gave rise to various sects through divine revelations granted to their founders. The two most important sects, the Heavenly Masters Sect and the Highest Clarity Sect, organized networks of temples, ordained clergy, and were governed by hereditary leaders. These sects remain a vital part of religious life in Taiwan and in many overseas Chinese communities, and they are experiencing a dramatic revival in post-Mao China, where thousands of active priests are serving hundreds of temples.