Talk:Hinduism

Editing Sources and Footnotes

I recently noticed a few things have "Unreliable Source" written next to it, plus i wanted to add a few sources that are not listed. help? --Lee522 (talk) 19:25, 4 December 2011 (UTC) I'm pretty sure my religion is Hindu not Hinduism, i don't call other religions like Christians and say who is Christianism god!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Parthkdesai (talk • contribs) 02:37, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Citation problem in "oldest surviving religion in the world"

Citation 14 by G. Laderman needs to be fixed. Please remove "in the world." written before the author's name. Also, the Judaism is making an uncited claim that it is the oldest surviving religion in the world. The editors there are pretty adamant about this issue. They are claiming that nobody disagrees with this on the talk page and hence it must be true. Is voting the current norm on WP?--70.64.86.187 (talk) 00:50, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Error in citation 14 has been corrected. Kanchanamala (talk) 04:27, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

The claim by Judaism is quite wrong, the citation they provided is quite okay, but the source clearly states it deals with religions in the Middle East alone and not the world. I'm heading over to their talkpage now. Écrivain (talk) 10:30, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Correction - I just noticed, their claim to be the oldest religion, is actually the claim to be the oldest monotheitic religion, except that its not worded so. I shall ask them the same. Écrivain (talk) 10:36, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Changes made.

I made some changes to the article since some sources did not say what was claimed. Moreover some tantric Shivas do not accept the authority of the Vedas. This is mentioned in the "Tantric Body" by Flood and also on the Shaivism wikipedia page. Snowcream reversed my changes saying "Ronald Inden's notes are not universally accepted." This is blatantly false. It is hard to find an encyclopedic treatment of Hinduism that does *not* cite Inden. Moreover as Snowcream was the editor that pushed the fringe theories of Buddha's birthplace saying "Wikipedia articulates all significant perspectives," I find this the height of hypocrisy. CO2Northeast (talk) 19:47, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Paul Barlow, thank you for acknowledging this material is valuable. It talks specfically about Hindu gods replacing Buddha, and Buddha becoming an avatar of Vishnu. I will minimize the material and compromise as show of good faith. Hopefully this satisfies everyone. Thank you. CO2Northeast (talk) 20:55, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

I completely agree with you that it's important to make that point about Tantric/Dravidian traditions, which raises the wider point about what consitutes "Hinduism" , and, yes, I think the idea that Buddhism can be absorbed is important. It might be worth emphasising the argument that the essential difference is institutional: Buddhism being defined by the institution of the sangha rather than Brahminism. Paul B (talk) 21:41, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I believe it was Flood who said somewhere that the Kaula tantras, which reject the Vedas entirely, can still be considered Hindu, since they follow a Hindu God Shiva. CO2Northeast (talk) 21:45, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Sanātana Dharma

In the archives there seems to be vehement opposition to the use of "Sanātana Dharma" by multiple people. One source merely says that Sanātana Dharma is a frequently used expression **in** Hinduism, and says nothing about calling Hinduism Sanātana Dharma. The other texts are nationalist political texts. Since this is a modern political term that would be unfamiliar to most Hindus, why is it in the first line of this article?Ecragnol (talk) 05:03, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

What you say is true. Moreover I found sources that explicitly say that this is a nationalistic term, for example here. CO2Northeast (talk) 22:10, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Reversion by Q Chris

As stated above, the sources do not support what is in the lead. For example "A Historical-developmental study of classical Indian philosophy of morals" merely states that sanatana dharma is a frequently used expression within Hinduism. Yet the sentence uses other phrases from this source to imply the source calls Hinduism sanatana dharma. CO2Northeast (talk) 17:30, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Some Hindus in North India, and not too long ago, came up with the description sanātana dharma to differentiate the age-old practices of Hinduism from the then newly founded school of Arya Samaj of Swami Dayananda Saraswati. sanātana dharma is not widely used in India even today. Kanchanamala (talk) 21:48, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes exactly. Thank you. CO2Northeast (talk) 22:55, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Influence of native Dravidian/Tamil religions

Please include the influence of ancient Tamil religion in this article as a lot of important deities that is worshipped in hinduism today such as Shiva,Durga,Indra,Muruga and etc were initially worshipped by the tamils/Dravidians even before the start of vedic civilisation.Shiva statue(in the conceptof Trimurti)which is found in the ruins of indus valley civilisation were the proof of this statement.Even in Tamil Nadu,statues of these deities found in the oldest form before the arrival of vedic hinduism in Tamil Nadu.Later all these deities were absorbed by the sanskrit rituals,which introduces new philosopy based on these deities thus destroying the original concept/philosophy that is followed by the Dravidians.It is also noted that Vedic Hinduism enters Tamil Nadu only in 5th century,where there is a lot of native religion text were written in Tamil before the arrival of Vedic Hinduism in the Tamil country.--Tan Meifen (talk) 10:26, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

Would you please provide some citations for the statements you have made. It would help. Kanchanamala (talk) 00:26, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

Suspicious Sentence

"Followers of the Bhakti movement moved away from the abstract concept of Brahman, which the philosopher Adi Shankara consolidated a few centuries before, with emotional, passionate devotion towards the more accessible Avatars, especially Krishna and Rama.[42]" Does anyone have the material in relation to Adi Shankara? SaibAbaVenkatesh (talk) 23:57, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

The citation suggests that the observation is made in a published work. How can one object to it even though it is unacceptable to you and me? Kanchanamala (talk) 03:33, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

gnosticism claim

Is the gnosticism claim in the article really supported by the references?AssociateLong (talk) 19:47, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't know about the references but it certainly seems a stretch. The gnosticism article states: "s a modern scholarly term for a set of religious beliefs and spiritual practices found among some of the early Christian sects called "gnostic" ("learned") by Irenaeus and other early Christian heresiologists. The term also has reference to parallels and possible pre-Christian influences of the Christian gnostics."

You can see some parallels with some Hindu beliefs but it sounds like quite a misleading statement to me. -- Q Chris (talk) 19:58, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

I am not a Wikipedia regular, so maybe someone such as yourself can check the references etc. AssociateLong (talk) 21:18, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

OK, It is in The man who was a woman and other queer tales of Hindu lore. I am going to remove it from the article as this appears to be:

1. Gnosticism is just an off-hand comment, not something explored in the book.
2. The book seems to be by experts on gay cultures rather than on Hinduism
3. Since Gnosticism is a Christian term also used to highlight parallels its use here seems to be inappropriate. It would be like describing Christianity as "following the Dvaita philosophy", which while at a broad level true implies a lot more than is fact.

For this reason, though there are parallels between the beliefs of some Hindus and gnosticism, I think it is more likely to mislead than inform -- Q Chris (talk) 11:58, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

The agnosticism claim

I think that this is based on this Vivekenanda quote from the reference "Hinduism a way of life": “From the high spiritual flights of the Vedanta philosophy, of which the latest discoveries of science seem like echoes, to the low ideas of idolatry with its multifarious mythology, the agnosticism of the Buddhists and the atheism of the Jains, each and all have a place in the Hindu's religion.” This is clearly talking about Hinduism in the inclusive sense, seeing Buddhism, Jainism, Sikhism etc. as parts of the Hindu religion. Since the rest of the article assumes the normal definition I will remove this also. -- Q Chris (talk) 15:20, 24 February 2012 (UTC)