The Hindu Resurgence Movement is finally coming of age, both in India and at global level. And not one minute too soon.
All over the world, dharmic people from various groups (and even those who do not belong to any group) are facing the dangerous fundamentalization of abrahamic ideologies (Islam, Christianity and Hebraism), that is causing a growing polarization of the public opinion. But this does not need to be a negative development.
In fact, it is an unprecedented opportunity for larger numbers of people to actually discover the extent of the difference between the genuine Vedic knowledge and other ideologies.
Too many people – both among Hindus and non-Hindus – are still lost in the misty marshes of “all religions are the same”, and because they are stuck in that delusional assumption, they do not bother to actually verify what has been written in the scriptures and demonstrated in many centuries of history of each religious denomination.
The best solution is to dispel the fog of ignorance by bringing stark and clear evidence, proper correct and truthful quotes, and illustrations that enable people to see the difference between dharma and adharma.
We cannot rely on mainstream academia to support us in this research, because it is still massively built around the euro-centric Christian views of indologists descending from the lineage of Macauley, Muller, and their followers. We should not expect much help from established religious Organizations either, because their policy is largely focused on preserving themselves and with that purpose, they draw their authority solely from their founders and leaders who lived in colonial times.
We need to go directly back to the source, before the point where the river deviated. Unlike the other great ancient pre-abrahamic religions, Hinduism still has a living uninterrupted (although battered and damaged) tradition and the most important texts (the prasthana traya, as well as many others from sruti and smriti) have been preserved almost untouched.
In order to properly understand them, however, we must remove the unnecessary and detrimental cultural superimpositions that have been accumulated in the general mentality of Indians and Hindus. It is a scientific process described by Nyaya (the Vedic science of logic) as neti neti (“not this, not that”), and we could compare it in modern terms to separating a row of transparencies to distinguish one picture from another, and getting clearer images.
The old prejudice according to which Hindus should not study abrahamic texts, theology, and history, needs to be overcome. To eliminate contamination, you need to be able to recognize it, otherwise you will throw out the baby with the bath water, or in some cases there is even the danger of throwing out the baby and keeping the dirty water.
Too many people (including Hindus) are still convinced that Hinduism and Vedic tradition are based on birth prejudice, racism and xenophobia, misogyny, aggressive prudish moralism, social segregation, social injustice and exploitation, religious and ideological intolerance, mistreatment of children, blind faith, opposition to scientific progress, separation of practice from theory, and delegating one’s spiritual and religious life to others. In fact, these are all typical abrahamic concepts, quite opposed to what Vedic knowledge actually teaches.
The process of “de-colonizing the Indian mind” has been going on for several years now, although it only appeared clearly in 2001 with the famous book “Decolonising the Hindu Mind” written by Koenraad Elst.
In the 1990s Internet gave another stupendous push to the process, facilitating hundreds of Hindus all over the world in meeting, discussing, exchanging information and opinions, and measuring their own strength in debates and strategy making. We are not quite there yet, because of the inertia resistance of the “traditional” tendency of many Hindus – a sort of magnification of the universal attitude of the “slow minds” who generally prefer to engage in fighting the previous wars (already finished) rather than realizing that a new conflict is raging all around them and needs to be faced.
Proper knowledge and realization is the first and foremost weapon in this war.
There is no doubt that we are all deeply indebted towards the great first pioneers of the Hindu Resurgence, such as Ramakrishna (1836-1886) and his disciple Vivekananda (1863-1902), Bhaktivinoda (1838-1914) and his son Bhaktisiddhanta (1874-1936), Aurobindo (1872-1950), Ram Tirtha (1873-1906), Ramana Maharshi (1879-1950), Swami Ramdas (1884-1963), Swami Sivananda (1887-1963), Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888-1975), Paramahamsa Yogananda (1893-1952) and Swami Chinmayananda (1916-1993) and others.
However, it is a fact that such great people lived in a time when it was essential to appease the abrahamic listeners (and those who felt a deep inferiority complex towards the abrahamics), both within India and abroad, in order to inspire them to look at Vedic knowledge with a favorable eye.
Swami Dayananda Sarasvati (1824-1883) founder of the Arya samaj, strongly condemned the “idol worship, ritualism, legends and superstitions” of the Hindu tradition, exalting instead the philosophical speculation on the four original branches of Rig, Sama, Yajur and Atharva Veda (Samhitas, Aranyakas and Upanishads), celibacy for the religious students and the meditation on the sacred syllable Om, considered “the real name of God”.
Ramakrishna, who inspired the Ramakrishna Mission founded by his disciple Swami Vivekananda, openly stated he wanted to follow “all religions”. Vivekananda wrote, ” I shall go to the Mosque of the Mohammedan; I shall enter the Christian’s Church and kneel before the Crucifix; I shall enter the Buddhist Temple, where I shall take refuge in Buddha, and in his Law. I shall go into the forest and sit down in meditation with the Hindu who is trying to see the Light, which enlightens the heart of every one.”Still today the Ramakrishna Mission calls “abbots” its “top monks”, compares its “monasteries” to the Essene communities of the times of Jesus Christ and to the Catholic monastic orders, and has openly renounced the Hindu identity by declaring itself “non-Hindu organization” in its registration with the Indian government.
It freely celebrates Christmas and Easter, but it does not recognize its western-born disciples as eligible to become authorized gurus to confer initiation in the name of the Math. It also has a separate organization for women, called Sri Sarada Math, because the Ramakrishna Math is strictly for men only. The ideology of the Ramakrishna Mission states that God is essentially without a form, but he takes personal aspects for the benefit of mankind; however, it discourages the building of temples or altars including private altars in one’s own house.
The adaptation of Hinduism to the abrahamic mentality (language, theology, etc) has become increasingly unnecessary, also because at the same time Christianity lost almost all its power in western countries, while exponentially increasing numbers of educated westerners have become very eager to learn a more direct and original form of Hinduism.
This progress was due mostly to the work of the second generation of the preachers of Sanatana Dharma – starting from Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada (the famous founder of the Hare Krishna movement), followed by Neem Karoli Baba, Herakhan Babaji, Meher Baba, Mother Meera, Swami Muktananda (Siddha Yoga), Anandamayi, Amritananda Mayi, Osho (Rajneesh), Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Mataji Nirmala Srivastava (of Sahajya Yoga), Sant Sri Asaramji Bapu (founder of Sri Yog Vedanta Seva Samiti), Sri Sri Ravi Shankar (not the musician, but the head of the Art of Living Foundation) and a growing number of Swamis and Gurus who have accepted millions of disciples among westerners.
Today, the circumstances around us are changing faster and faster, and we are faced with a new and substantial “quantum leap” in the Hindu Resurgence Movement in its early adulthood.
For the first time since the early invasions of Arab Muslim marauders into the Greater Indian territory not long after Islam was founded, and many decades after the British Raj left India, Hinduism does not need to modify and adapt its culture and knowledge in order to please the foreign invaders and thus enable its survival, because at global level there is a growing interest and support specifically for those very ideals and ideas that characterized India’s original culture and knowledge in the purest form.
True Hinduism has the intrinsic power to be the Global Dharma for the new Millennium, because it is open, inclusive, tolerant, and incredibly deep in meaning and knowledge, capable of reconciling all theoretical differences and absorbing many different perspectives in a most harmonious non-dualistic way, into a complete, consistent and logical wider picture, favoring cultural diversity and a great variety in iconography and hagiography, and thus allowing the greatest possible freedom of religion. It offers a personalized access and progressive programs, addressing and accommodating each degree of personal development and field of interest for each individual.
Practically all the problems lamented in Hindu society are in fact due to the cultural superimposition of alien concepts and beliefs, and can be solved automatically by returning to the original knowledge presented by the genuine Vedic literature, and separating it from the detrimental and incompatible foreign ideas that have accumulated in the centuries, hiding the true radiance of Sanatana Dharma.
In this spirit, we need to gather a sufficient number of intelligent and knowledgeable Hindus, who are able to read and understand the original Sanskrit texts and the genuine Hindu traditions.
Together, we will be able to produce much better alternatives to the outdated translations of the sacred Vedic texts, so that a greater number of our contemporaries will be able to understand them better and apply their teachings into practice.
The Jagannatha Vallabha Vedic Research Center has been created specifically for this purpose.
We have already published several chapters of a new translation and commentary on Bhagavad Gita, specifically aimed at washing off centuries of confusing abrahamic cultural superimpositions, and completely non-sectarian as it embraces all the Vedic perspectives. The text contains the original devanagari, transliteration, word to word translation, literal translation, and purport enriched with many original quotes from universally recognized scriptures.
The language is extremely clear, simple, easily understandable, and there are also several practical examples to illustrate the concepts.
Another important work of our Jagannatha Vallabha Vedic Research Center is a 4 volume Introduction to Vedic Knowledge that has become very popular.
We are now working on a series that proposes to discuss the various aspects of Krishna Chaitanya’s actual life, mission and teachings, as well as the history of his followers in the centuries after his disappearance. This work is particularly important because Chaitanya’s figure and teachings have been historically used to create a particular “package” of Hinduism that could be acceptable for the Muslims first and for the British later, and we need to dig deep into the texts and records of the times in order to find “the real Chaitanya”. We can guarantee that it will be an eye-opening experience.
The first volume of the series has already been published, and presents a clear linear sequence of the events of Chaitanya’s life, with direct reference to his traditional biographies, and extensive quotes also from other relevant texts. By reading it, you will find out (for example) that Chaitanya was actually a Shankarite sannyasi, that he taught his devotees to worship Shiva Mahadeva and Mother Durga, and that he stormed the Kazi’s palace in Navadvip shouting death threats to him and his henchmen.
The subsequent volumes of the series will throw more light on Chaitanya’s actual teachings and sadhana method, on his favorite readings, his companions and followers (Gaudiyas and Oriyas, caste Gosvamis etc), and the historical context of Chaitanya’s mission.
All the published books are available in hard copy on Amazon and will be distributed for free in digital format to all those who will ask for them.
All interested readers are welcome to present their questions, comments and even suggest corrections where applicable.
All interested scholars who wish to become members of the Jagannatha Vallabha Vedic Research Center and get assistance to get their books published, are welcome to contact Mataji Parama Karuna Devi.
For further information:
paramakaruna@aol.in
