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Understanding the Religions of the World
An Introduction
Willoughby Deming
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eBook - ePub
Understanding the Religions of the World
An Introduction
Willoughby Deming
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Ă propos de ce livre
Understanding the Religions of the World offers a new approach to the study of religion which moves away from the purely descriptive and instead helps students understand how religions actually 'work'. Covering all the main faith traditions, it combines historical context, contemporary beliefs and practices, and original theory, with numerous study features and valuable overviews.
- A major new student-focused textbook concentrating on contemporary practices and beliefs of world religions
- Brings together a team of experts to provide a uniquely comprehensive coverage of religious traditions, including African religions and the religions of Oceania, which are rarely covered in detail
- Integrates original theory by arguing that each religion operates according to its own logic and order, and that they fulfill our need for a point of orientation
- Incorporates extensive student features including chapter introductions, 'did you know?' sections, boxed examples/material, numerous images and maps, conclusions, study questions and teaching plans, available on publication at www.wiley.com/go/deming
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Informations
CHAPTER 1
Hinduism
DID YOU KNOWâŠ
The popular term avatar comes from Hinduism, where it has been used for hundreds of years to describe the ten incarnations of the great god Vishnu. In Hinduism an avatar is a form by which this god can cross over from his reality into ours.
OVERVIEW
Hinduism is the predominant religion of India, the world's second most populous country. More than 80 percent of its population, or about 1 billion people, identify themselves as Hindu. The next largest religion in India is Islam, at about 13 percent of the population, followed by Christianity and Sikhism, at about 2.3 percent and 1.9 percent, respectively. More than 30 million Hindus also live in the countries surrounding India, such as Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan; and large populations can be found in Indonesia, Malaysia, the United States, Mauritius, South Africa, and the United Kingdom.
Hindus have no single scripture that codifies their core beliefs, nor do they have a governing body that establishes a standard for religious practices. Instead, Hindus recognize an enormous diversity within their religion. In India alone one finds innumerable regional differences, and outside the country this diversity is sometimes even greater. Indonesians, for example, practice forms of Hinduism that incorporate elements from Islamic and folk traditions.
It should come as no surprise, then, to learn that the name âHinduism,â which manages to gather this diversity neatlyâperhaps too neatlyâunder a single designation, was not created by Hindus themselves. Rather, the ancient Persians used âHinduâ to designate their neighbors to the east, who lived along the banks of the Indus river. But even the Persians did not intend to identify the religion of these people, just their geographical location. Only when India was under British colonial rule in the eighteenth century did âHinduismâ gain currency as an umbrella term for the religion. The British, who thought of religions as theological systems, and who governed India by taking into account the religious affiliation of their subjects, needed terms to distinguish Indians of this religion from Indians who were Sikhs, or Muslims, or something else. In contrast, Hindus had traditionally referred to their religious activities simply as dharma (duty), and distinguished themselves from others in various ways, such as calling themselves Aryans (noble people), or followers of Brahmins (Hindu priests), or devotees of a particular god in the Hindu pantheon. Today, many Hindus also accept and use the names âHinduâ and âHinduismâ to speak of themselves and their religion, despite its unusual diversity.
In an attempt to envision such a multiform religion, Julius Lipner has likened Hinduism to the famous banyan tree near Kolkata (Calcutta), in West Bengal. The banyan, India's national tree, can become quite old. It prospers by sending out a profusion of aerial roots which become new trunks that cover large areas and assimilate everything in their path. The Kolkata banyan, which is estimated to be over two centuries old, covers approximately four acres. It has no central trunk or core segment, but is nonetheless a single tree. In a similar way, we can understand Hinduism as a single entity, but one whose diversity almost defies description. (Julius Lipner, âOn Hinduism and Hinduisms: The Way of the Banyan,â ch 1, pp. 9â34 in The Hindu World, ed. Sushil Mittal and Gene Thursby, New York and London: Routledge, 2004).
History
Timeline | |
2300 to 2000 BCE | The Indus Valley civilization is at its height. |
2000-1500 BCE | The Indus Valley civilization is in decline. |
1700-1500 BCE | Aryans migrate into the Indus Valley; the Rig-Veda is composed. |
1200-900 BCE | The Collections are brought to completion. |
900 BCE | Aryan peoples spread eastward to the Ganges river. |
800-600 BCE | The Brahmanas are composed. |
500-400 BCE | The first Upanishads are composed; Buddhism begins. |
5thâ4th century | The caste system begins to take shape. |
300 BCEâ300 CE | The Mahabharata and the Ramayana are composed; the practice of puja begins. |
3rd century BCE | Ashoka becomes king of the Mauryan dynasty. |
1st century CE | The Bhagavad Gita is composed. |
2nd century CE | The first evidence of Hindu temples. |
3rdâ4th century CE | Devotional practices (bhakti) become popular in south India among Tamils. |
350 CE | The first Puranas are composed. |
7th century CE | Devotional practices (bhakti) are used widely in Hinduism. |
1000 CE | Muslims enter the Punjab. |
1206-1526 CE | The Delhi Sultanate. |
1526 CEâ18th century | The Mughal Dynasty. |
mid-13th century | Buddhism disappears from most of India. |
15th century CE | Sikhism founded. |
1600 CE | The East India Company establishes offices in Kolkata. |
1757 CE | The beginning of British colonial domination. |
18th and 19th centuries | The Hindu Renaissance. |
1869-1948 CE | Mohandas Gandhi. |
1872-1950 CE | Aurobindo Ghosh. |
1947 CE | End of British rule; millions of Hindus and Muslims are uprooted and resettled during India's Partition, which created the nation of Pakistan. |
1950 | The Indian Constitution prohibits discrimination on the basis of caste. |
1980s | The resurgence of Hindu Nationalism. |
The Indus Valley
Hinduism began in the middle of the second millennium BCE in the Indus valley, a fertile region fed by five tributaries of the Indus river. Today this area is known as the Punjab (five rivers), and is divided between the nations of India and Pakistan. From approximately 2300 to 2000 BCE a complex, urban civilization flourished in the Indus Valley. It had two major cities, Harappa and Mohenjo-da...