What is the origin of is the word 'Hindu'?
Why is 'Bharat' called as 'India'?
If you have ever wondered about these questions. here is the answer to the first question ?
There seems to be consensus that the term "Hindu" is the Persian equivalent of the word "Sindhu". It seems in Persian "Si" is pronounced as "Hi". No wonder that the mighty river "Sindhu" that was the cradle of our civilization is used as reference.
Some have hesitation to use the term "Hindu" due to its foreign origin and instead prefer to use the equivalents from our terminology like Sanatana Dharma and Manav Dharma. We should avoid this hesitation since there is always exchanges of words & terminologies between languages. It is a natural phenomenon.
Especially after the advent of Islam, due to its natural intolerance towards other faiths, the Persians who had just converted into Islam started giving abusive meaning to the word "Hindu". These meanings are quoted by the anti-national organizations like "Dravidar Kalagam" in Tamil Nadu. The intolerance of Islam towards other belief systems is the reason behind abusing other faiths. Even if there was another term in place instead of "Hindu" the Islamic intolerance would have tarnished that term too.
"The Iranians used the word Hindu to designate the river Sindhu and the countries and populations situated around and beyond the Sindhu. From Persian, the Greeks borrowed the river name as Indos and the peoples name as Indoi, hence English Indus, India, Indian."[1]
The terms Hindu and Indian were synonymous. Both had territorial meaning. It also denoted the socio-cultural aspects of our people in that territory.
Today, It is strange that the term "Indian" is considered secular and the term "Hindu" is considered communal.
Lot of thought process have gone in defining the term Hindu. Each of those definitions certainly captures major aspects of Hinduism. But none of them seems to be simple and complete. The Belgian Scholar named Koenraad Elst has written a book with title "Who is Hindu?" on this subject. This book has been a great source of information and inspiration in writing for this section even though I differ from the author in few aspects.
My simple definition of the term Hindu is,
"All sampradayas (belief systems) that originated in Bharat including the vanvasi forms".
As per the above definition the different sampradhayas like Vaishnavam, Shaivam, Bauddham, Jainam, Sikh panth and various derivatives of them and all our vanvasi sampradhayas should be classified as Hinduism.
Some of you might feel that the second part of the definition "including the vanvasi forms" is redundant. The reason for explicitly including it is, the legal definition of Hindu in Indian Constitution [2] (and also in the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955 [3]) is more in tune with the above definition except that it excludes the scheduled tribes (Vanvasis).
Why were the Vanvasis excluded?
The general argument put forward for excluding vanvasis from Hindu fold is that 'the tribal worship the natural forms trees, snakes, etc. and hence it is animist nature'.
Sri Golwalkar responds to this argument as follows "These protagonists of separatism argue that these 'tribal' worship things like trees, stones and serpents. Therefore they are 'animists' and cannot be called 'Hindus'. Now this is something which only an ignoramus who does not know the ABC of Hinduism will say. Do not the Hindus all over the country worship the tree? Tulasi, bilva, ashwattha are all sacred to the Hindu. The worship of Nâg, the cobra, is prevalent throughout our country. Then, should we term all these devotees and worshippers as 'animists' and declare them as non-Hindus ?'[4]
Another major reason for the exclusion of vanvasis from the legal Hindu definition may be the the adviser on tribal affairs to Jawarharlal Nehru, Mr. Verrier Elwin is an ex-missionary.
It is worth studying the real motive behind this exclusion of vanvasis from the legal Hindu definition.
Historically, If you look at way Christianity spread in Europe, it initially spread in the cities and moved to rural areas. The converted city folks referred the rural religions as 'Pagan". The Latin root of the word Pagan is Paganus that means rural.
When these Christian historians and sociologists started studying our culture they started classifying on similar basis as urban and rural. They concluded that rural here is nothing but the tribal form and it different from the urban nature of religion. This approach of theirs is wrong.
Instead, We should classify the components our belief systems into 2 major classifications one is the common (or Vedic) and the other the local. The common components can be seen in different parts of the nation where as the local components are specific to that geography. The ratio of these components might vary from location to location (even within the same belief system) but all our belief systems have these these 2 components. For example the 'Kula Theivam" (the god of the heritage) might be different for different sects within the same caste. Since Vanvasi's are more in tune with the nature and their geography, their local component in their tradition will be more. They do have the common components that are seen in other parts of the Nation. As Sri Guruji pointed out, the concept of worshiping trees,snakes itself a national characteristic.
definition-of-term-hindu.htmlVanvasis are an integral part of the Hindu society. I would like to assert this by quoting the words of Sri Rama "We were 4 brothers, we have become 5 including Guha" [5]. Guha is the vanvasi boatman who helped Sri Ram ( with Lakshman and Sita) to cross the river Ganga in Ramayana.
References:-
References:-
1 "Who is Hindu?" by Koenraad Elst. Chapter 2.
2. Article 25 (2)(b) of the Indian Constitution
3. Section 2 of The Hindu Marriage Act of 1955
4. M.S. Golwalkar: Bunch of Thoughts, p.471-472.
5. In Aranya Kandam in Kamba Ramayanam(Tamil). Sri Rama says "Guhanodu Aivaranom".
Why is 'Bharat' called as 'India'?
If you have ever wondered about these questions. here is the answer to the first question ?
There seems to be consensus that the term "Hindu" is the Persian equivalent of the word "Sindhu". It seems in Persian "Si" is pronounced as "Hi". No wonder that the mighty river "Sindhu" that was the cradle of our civilization is used as reference.
Some have hesitation to use the term "Hindu" due to its foreign origin and instead prefer to use the equivalents from our terminology like Sanatana Dharma and Manav Dharma. We should avoid this hesitation since there is always exchanges of words & terminologies between languages. It is a natural phenomenon.
Especially after the advent of Islam, due to its natural intolerance towards other faiths, the Persians who had just converted into Islam started giving abusive meaning to the word "Hindu". These meanings are quoted by the anti-national organizations like "Dravidar Kalagam" in Tamil Nadu. The intolerance of Islam towards other belief systems is the reason behind abusing other faiths. Even if there was another term in place instead of "Hindu" the Islamic intolerance would have tarnished that term too.
"The Iranians used the word Hindu to designate the river Sindhu and the countries and populations situated around and beyond the Sindhu. From Persian, the Greeks borrowed the river name as Indos and the peoples name as Indoi, hence English Indus, India, Indian."[1]
The terms Hindu and Indian were synonymous. Both had territorial meaning. It also denoted the socio-cultural aspects of our people in that territory.
Today, It is strange that the term "Indian" is considered secular and the term "Hindu" is considered communal.
Lot of thought process have gone in defining the term Hindu. Each of those definitions certainly captures major aspects of Hinduism. But none of them seems to be simple and complete. The Belgian Scholar named Koenraad Elst has written a book with title "Who is Hindu?" on this subject. This book has been a great source of information and inspiration in writing for this section even though I differ from the author in few aspects.
My simple definition of the term Hindu is,
"All sampradayas (belief systems) that originated in Bharat including the vanvasi forms".
As per the above definition the different sampradhayas like Vaishnavam, Shaivam, Bauddham, Jainam, Sikh panth and various derivatives of them and all our vanvasi sampradhayas should be classified as Hinduism.
Some of you might feel that the second part of the definition "including the vanvasi forms" is redundant. The reason for explicitly including it is, the legal definition of Hindu in Indian Constitution [2] (and also in the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955 [3]) is more in tune with the above definition except that it excludes the scheduled tribes (Vanvasis).
Why were the Vanvasis excluded?
The general argument put forward for excluding vanvasis from Hindu fold is that 'the tribal worship the natural forms trees, snakes, etc. and hence it is animist nature'.
Sri Golwalkar responds to this argument as follows "These protagonists of separatism argue that these 'tribal' worship things like trees, stones and serpents. Therefore they are 'animists' and cannot be called 'Hindus'. Now this is something which only an ignoramus who does not know the ABC of Hinduism will say. Do not the Hindus all over the country worship the tree? Tulasi, bilva, ashwattha are all sacred to the Hindu. The worship of Nâg, the cobra, is prevalent throughout our country. Then, should we term all these devotees and worshippers as 'animists' and declare them as non-Hindus ?'[4]
Another major reason for the exclusion of vanvasis from the legal Hindu definition may be the the adviser on tribal affairs to Jawarharlal Nehru, Mr. Verrier Elwin is an ex-missionary.
It is worth studying the real motive behind this exclusion of vanvasis from the legal Hindu definition.
Historically, If you look at way Christianity spread in Europe, it initially spread in the cities and moved to rural areas. The converted city folks referred the rural religions as 'Pagan". The Latin root of the word Pagan is Paganus that means rural.
When these Christian historians and sociologists started studying our culture they started classifying on similar basis as urban and rural. They concluded that rural here is nothing but the tribal form and it different from the urban nature of religion. This approach of theirs is wrong.
Instead, We should classify the components our belief systems into 2 major classifications one is the common (or Vedic) and the other the local. The common components can be seen in different parts of the nation where as the local components are specific to that geography. The ratio of these components might vary from location to location (even within the same belief system) but all our belief systems have these these 2 components. For example the 'Kula Theivam" (the god of the heritage) might be different for different sects within the same caste. Since Vanvasi's are more in tune with the nature and their geography, their local component in their tradition will be more. They do have the common components that are seen in other parts of the Nation. As Sri Guruji pointed out, the concept of worshiping trees,snakes itself a national characteristic.
definition-of-term-hindu.htmlVanvasis are an integral part of the Hindu society. I would like to assert this by quoting the words of Sri Rama "We were 4 brothers, we have become 5 including Guha" [5]. Guha is the vanvasi boatman who helped Sri Ram ( with Lakshman and Sita) to cross the river Ganga in Ramayana.
References:-
References:-
1 "Who is Hindu?" by Koenraad Elst. Chapter 2.
2. Article 25 (2)(b) of the Indian Constitution
3. Section 2 of The Hindu Marriage Act of 1955
4. M.S. Golwalkar: Bunch of Thoughts, p.471-472.
5. In Aranya Kandam in Kamba Ramayanam(Tamil). Sri Rama says "Guhanodu Aivaranom".
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