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hinduism invented in north india

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  Quote Guests Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: hinduism invented in north india
    Posted: 22-Mar-2012 at 12:06
Originally posted by oxydracae

the term "Hinduism" was invented by British in 19th century

Right!

"Hinduism" does not exist. It's like grouping together Confucianism, Daoism, and Shinto and calling it "East Asianism". The modern usage of "Hinduism" is as an umbrella term for the various 'orthodox' (astika) sects/schools that exist in India. By 'orthodox sect' I mean a sect that believes in the supreme authority of the Vedas. Thus, the term 'Vedic sect' can be used interchangeably with 'orthodox sect' in the Indian context.

On the other hand, the heterodox (nastika) sects, which include Buddhism and Jainism, reject the Vedas (and with it, other important aspects of 'Hinduism', such as the caste system).


Edited by Kakatiya - 22-Mar-2012 at 12:08
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  Quote Afghanan Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22-Mar-2012 at 17:12
So what do you call yourselves?  And what should people of your faith be called?
The perceptive man is he who knows about himself, for in self-knowledge and insight lays knowledge of the holiest.
~ Khushal Khan Khattak
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  Quote Guests Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22-Mar-2012 at 18:16
Originally posted by Afghanan

So what do you call yourselves?  And what should people of your faith be called?

Well, today Hindus call themselves Hindus. But this is a fairly recent phenomenon and did not exist before the 19th century. It gives the impression that 'Hinduism' is a monolithic religion, when in reality it is as diverse as the subcontinent itself. Historically, Indians described themselves based on their particular sect or school; for example, the two most prominent denominations of ancient and classical India were Shaivites (followers of Shiva) and Vaishnavites (followers of Vishnu), and these two denominations are still followed today, though members of both sects now refer to themselves as 'Hindus'.
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  Quote oxydracae Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22-Mar-2012 at 21:22
^^ yeah, most of the people refer to themselves by thier castes.. it was only Muslims and Christians who were addressed by their religion in South Asia.

Edited by oxydracae - 22-Mar-2012 at 21:23
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  Quote Don Quixote Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 22-Mar-2012 at 21:46
Oxy and Kakatiya, thank youSmile for the insightful perspective you brought to that thread - it's very interesting and educational. Most of the cultural misunderstandings happen because people naturally assume that every culture follows the social and other rules like their own - and post like yours help such illusions to be corrected. Keep on the good work.
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  Quote Venkytalks Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15-Jan-2013 at 12:33
Originally posted by Ancient Dravidian

Hinduism is not a religion. It is the Indian way of life. The truth is, almost everything in Hinduism is Dravidian. Only caste system and some gods of the Aryans were assimilated into Hinduism. The confusion is only there, because a foreign language Sanskrit is used widely in our culture. It's the same thing, that happened to Christianity. To the original Semites Latin is a foreign language, still Latin dominates today as the liturgical language of Christianity. Also many foreign pagan elements from Europe were assimiliated. Our Indian culture similarly remains 95% Dravidian.

I agree with this - very little of Rigvedic religion or culture is practiced by any Hindu, despite almost all of them giving primacy to the Veda and practicing Vedic rituals blindly (because that is how the Pundit does it)

Just as there are so many denominations, sects and versions of Christianity and Islam, similarly Hinduism also has many denominations, sects and versions.

They are all Hindus.

Just as all Catholics, anglicans, orthodox, methodists, Jehovah's witnesses, Mormons and protestants are Christians.

And Sunnis, Shias, Sufis, Barelvi, Deobandhi and Wahabi are all Muslims.

There is no confusion - only complexity.


Edited by Venkytalks - 15-Jan-2013 at 12:34
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  Quote balochii Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23-Jan-2013 at 13:53
^ hindusism today is a mix of dravidian beliefs/culture. The vedic people were very different from today's hindus
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  Quote Venkytalks Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 24-Jan-2013 at 08:12
Originally posted by balochii

^ hindusism today is a mix of dravidian beliefs/culture. The vedic people were very different from today's hindus

Most of us Hindus follow the fire sacrifices almost exactly as it is prescribed in the Veda - with only one exception - no animal sacrifice (after Buddhist ahimsa was absorbed into Hinduism)

Most of us recite the daily prayers of the Vedas. Most of our religious rituals (yearly functions, marriages, birth, death rites etc) follow the Veda. Most of the priests will memorise the Yajur Veda completely to become a priest. So about 50% of current Hinduism is Vedic.

Classical Hinduism (which is modern Hinduism) evolved in 250-500 AD in the Gupta empire.

North India was mainly Vedic and Buddhist. In 50AD or so the Kanvas (Bahmin kings) of Bihar were defeated by Satavahanas. They brought many of the South Indian cultural practices to north India.

Satavahanas defended the Bihar area and further south areas from invasions by the Kushans, Indo-Parthians, Indo-Greeks and Shakas (who ruled different parts of North India in different times).

From 250 BC to 250 AD, North India from NWFP to Madhya Pradesh in central India and Bihar in the East - was almost completely Buddhist.

From 250 AD, under Guptas, a new classical religion of Hinduism which mixed the Vedic and the South India cultures and practices evolved and this is what we call Hinduism now also. Many new stories were added to the mythology and many old stories of the Vedas were either forgotten or changed completely.

Guptas built the first Indian temples (in Devgir) and had the first non-Vedic iconography in the form of Vishnu (it was a Vishnu temple) in his Dasha-avatara or ten human forms on Earth. This is the religion all of us Hindus believe in and follow even now.

BTW, Hindu is Persian for Sindhu, which is the Indus river. Hindu means people east of the Hindu river and the place was called Hindustan. 


Edited by Venkytalks - 24-Jan-2013 at 08:22
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  Quote balochii Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 24-Jan-2013 at 09:38
religion and culture are two different things, Just because 2000 year ago a guy in NWFP area of pakistan was buddhist, doesn't mean he was same as a ganga or bihari Indian. Gandhara civilization was very different from civilizations in mainland india, even their art works prove that.  Northern Pakistanis overall look completly different from their indian counter parts and their culture was and is totally different
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  Quote Venkytalks Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15-Feb-2013 at 01:21
Originally posted by balochii

religion and culture are two different things, Just because 2000 year ago a guy in NWFP area of pakistan was buddhist, doesn't mean he was same as a ganga or bihari Indian. Gandhara civilization was very different from civilizations in mainland india, even their art works prove that.  Northern Pakistanis overall look completly different from their indian counter parts and their culture was and is totally different

The guys of NWFP are an everchanging set of people - they move eastward as they get displaced by a new set of people.

Using just approximate dates,

In 2000 BC it was IVC people. They mostly vanished, though some must have persisted in low populations

In 1000 BC it was Aryans. They went East.

In 500 BC it was Iranians (Acheminid Darius the Great). They were a tiny minority but gave us writing - and mainly went back to Iran

In 300 BC it was Greeks - and gave us proper writing Brahmi. And Ghandhara culture

In 200 BC it was - for the first time from East to West - Biharis (Ashokans). They made the whole area Budhist

In 100 BC it was the Parthians 

In 0 AD it was Shakas

In 100 AD it was Kushans

In 300 AD it was Biharis (Guptas) again - who for the second time went west from east and pushed back the Budhist Kushans (Kayasths) and Shakas (Rajputs) west from northern India.

500 AD it was Huns

From 700 to 1200 AD it was the Shakas (Rajputs) who came West from north India into the Punjab and NWFP for the third time in history (after they had mingled with the local Indian populations

In 1200 AD is was Afghans and also Mongols.

In 1400 it was Turkmens

In 1500 it was Mughals

In 1700 it was PErsians

In 1800 it was the Sikhs who for the fourth time came West from northern India into NWFP

The NWFP has never had the same set of people or the same culture or the same religion. Punjab was similar - it was a melting pot of all kinds of nationalities and cultures and religions. Nothing is fixed.

And they are all mixed up with the north Indian people. 

As I said above, there have been four times in history when people from India went into Pakistan - and maybe including the original IVC people that is 5 times where the genetic material came from the subcontinent - and maybe 10 times that genetic material came Iran, Parthia (Herat and Turkmenistan) and Uzbekistan.

Iran, Parthia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgizthan are all deserts with low population levels. The people are vigourous fighting tribals but never populous. Even Iran's recent population explosion is if very recent origin.

Population is only achieved in the plains like Syria, Iraq, Punjab. 

So in the genetic mixture, people from the more populous agricultural settlements are always more likely to predominate vis-a-vis the smaller tribal rulers. For example, the peak population of IVC is likely between 2-5 million people - more than Egypt and Mesopotamia put together - and that was 4000 years ago.

The tendency for massive population increase is in the Punjab even now - Balochistan and NWFP do not and can never support the kind of massive populations which the Punjab can
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  Quote balochii Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15-Feb-2013 at 14:39
Punjabis are not so different looking from other north indians, infact all north indians looks generally the same, punjabis are more robust, that's it. The real difference in looks comes once you cross the indus river, people like pashtuns, baloch, Kalash, Dardics etc... can never be classified as indians because they look much more west asian

Edited by balochii - 15-Feb-2013 at 14:40
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  Quote Venkytalks Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15-Feb-2013 at 15:06
Originally posted by balochii

Punjabis are not so different looking from other north indians, infact all north indians looks generally the same, punjabis are more robust, that's it. The real difference in looks comes once you cross the indus river, people like pashtuns, baloch, Kalash, Dardics etc... can never be classified as indians because they look much more west asian

The pathans are probably maximally derived from parthians. They were from Turkmenistan and Herat region and dominated and invaded most of the nfwp and afganistan. 

The parthians were famed in historical records for extraordinary fighting ability. They ruled much of iran afghan and nwfp 2000 years ago.

Their two main accomplishments were cavalry without stirrup and the parthian or parting shot from the bow.

After decline of the empire pathans continued to be famous for being spartan fighters. They invaded most of  nwfp after the decline of the empire when they had left iran behind.

Theh were never Hindu. They were Buddhist for a long time and then muslim.

They have their own culture and mostly absorbed the later influx of kushans and huns and uzbeks and mongol blood while preserving their culture.

They were of course famous fighters even in British times and in current times against russians and now americans.

The mughals also faced continuous trouble on the border from pathans. A heavy garrison was always sent from Delhi to man the borders and mughal empire never really controlled the nwfp for any length. In fact Parthians werent living in afghanistan at all when Ashoka ruled afghanistan. After the parthians came to afghanistan nobody has ever ruled over the parthian people at all except for brief military victories. Which is pretty extraordinary.

Of course most of the army sent to man the borders in mughal times were of local indian muslim converts only. So the biggest westward flow of indian blood into nwfp ocurred during the mughal empire.

By now some 50 million in afghanistan and another 50 million in pakistan must be pathans. Even if my numbers are wrong there must be 60 million plus pathans in the world. That is bigger than iran or egypt and dwarfs any other muslim country in the middle east.


Edited by Venkytalks - 15-Feb-2013 at 15:23
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