Non-Religious Hindus

[Surya Deva]

Now you didn�t answer my question what did the other people do? They did almost the same as nowadays worship trees, stones, rivers, yogis, yoginis, saints, and idols.

It is possible, do you have proof? We know other groups existed alongside the Vedic tradition like the Sramana tradition. It is entirely possible that like today there was a pluralism of religious traditions that existed in the Vedic age. However, Hinduism refers to the Vedic tradition, not to these other traditions.

Agamas were written down in the middle ages so what? Vedas also existed as an oral tradition before they were written down and still are only partially recorded in script. Vedas are an oral tradition as well , books are only a reminder they still have to be studied with a Guru from mouth to ear to be valid, all else, like self study, is still considered invalid.

So what is your proof that the Agamas were an oral tradition that existed parallel to the Vedic tradition? Even the Agama tradition accepts the authority of the Vedas, but it accepts the Agamas as sruti too. It's central philosophy Shiva and Shakti is simply a rehash of older Vedic Samkhya philosophy. So it is easy to show the Agamic tradition is a development within the Vedic tradition, rather than a parallel tradition.

If there was no indigenous oral folk religion in India in the vedic age who worshipped the Idols unearthed in Excavations?

It is entirely possible there were indigenous folk religious traditions existing during and prior to the beginning of the Vedic tradition. I just need you to show me proof that they exist.

A non brahmin will not be accepted to study in the vedic tradition, not in the past and not today, it is open to a single community. This is the tradition, you can follow new age modern vedanta but that is a recent development. You experienced this yourself when you visited india. Why deny the truth?
Hinduism as a whole is not elitist, there is a path for everyone. Idol worship and worship of humans, stones, trees and other Symbols is as ancient as the Land and you should not denigrate other ancient indian traditions just because you prefer your own style of neo vedanta.

I was actually accepted to study Vedanta at traditional Vedanta ashrams, despite being non-Brahmin. However, I was required to first formally renounce the world and go through a formal initiation, which I declined because I was not ready to do this and because I do not think it was necessary. You are wrong that I am a Neo-Vedantin, I practice Vedanta in the Sankara tradition, meaning I read the prakaranas, the Gita, Upanishads and the Brahma Sutras. I have read all classical Vedanta texts(Panchadasi, Atma Bodha, Jnana Bodha, Vivekchudamni, Vedanta Sara, Upadesa Sahasari, drk-drishya-vivek etc) This is exactly what I would have studied at the Vedanta ashram.

I am not limited to Vedanta though, I also have studied the Samkhyakarika, Vaiseshika Sutras, Nyaya Sutras, Yoga Sutras, Yoga Vasistha. As well as many modern works(which are neo-Vedanta) such as the complete works of Swami Vivekananda, the works of Sri Aurobindo, the works of Ramana Maharishi and the writings of Swami Rama Tirtha.

Outside of Indian literature I have really enjoyed reading the books of Paul Brunton(The quest for the overself) the books of I.K Tamini(Self culture in the light of ancient wisdom)

I have tried reading the Puranas but honestly cannot maintain it, as a lot of it seems like blanket nonsense to me, outright mythology. The descriptions of geography and astronomy within it are embarrassing to read, statements like the moon is further than the sun! The oceans of milk, ghee, honey! It is obvious these texts have not been put together by scholars, but are more like compendiums for common people.

I am fully immersed in reading philosophy(this is my main practice) I really feel very benefited by it because it has expanded my intellect and understanding about reality.

[charitra]

A non brahmin will not be accepted to study in the vedic tradition, not in the past and not today, it is open to a single community. .

WRONG.

The venkateshwara University of Tirupati offers a course that leads to a purohit diploma which is open to ALL hindus. There are laws in place for any hindu regardless of his caste can apply and get accepted just as anyone can apply for a diploma in engineering. I think Rajastan and Tamil Nadu are some other states with similar university admission policies.

[MahaHrada]

WRONG.

The venkateshwara University of Tirupati offers a course that leads to a purohit diploma which is open to ALL hindus. There are laws in place for any hindu regardless of his caste can apply and get accepted just as anyone can apply for a diploma in engineering. I think Rajastan and Tamil Nadu are some other states with similar university admission policies.

Yes today a few people try to change something, but the general rule still holds good, so it is nonsense to belief that all Indians were intelectuals practising vedic religion and murti worship wasn´t done in the past and is an invention of the middle ages, just because the vedic religion is free from it.

[Surya Deva]

Vannakkam: Just to clarify, for others here. I get jnana, but there is confusion to what jnana is.

I am still not convinced you get Jnana.

The soul evolves or goes through the stages of charya, kriya, yoga, and jnana. The jnana that intellectuals have grasped is book knowledge. The likes of Ramana Maharshi, and other mystics in our tradition didn't read books. The jnana they got is the wisdom achieved from the practices of meditation. I'm oft reminded of my Guru's Guru's quote, "It's not in books, you fool!" as he threw a book at some German guy visiting his simple hut of an ashram.

No, Jnana is not achieved through the practice of meditation. This is Raja Yoga, not Jnana Yoga. In Jnana Yoga we achieve wisdom(i.e., awaken the prajnana) through the three part process of 1) Sravana 2) Manana and 3) Nidyasana, meaning listening to the scriptures, critically analyzing the scriptures, contemplating on the meaning. The actual practice of meditation is not necessary and some Vedanta ashrams do not even practice it. The rationale behind Jnana Yoga is that simply through reading/listening and contemplating one can achieve liberation.

Ramana Maharishi did not actually get enlightenment through meditation. He got it through contemplation by thinking of what it would be like to die and then following that train of thought. He calls this practice self-inquiry(atma vichara) However, not everybody who practices his technique gets enlightenment, that is because a certain level of cultivation is needed before prajnana can be awakened. If you have reached that level then hearing Tat Tvam Asi even once can be enough to cause enlightenment.

There is overlap in the stages for sure... charya is virtuous living, that's step one, out of that comes bhakti, or temple worship, then it overlaps into yoga, meditation, and delving within. Then, out of that, comes jnana, or wisdom. So this jnana is clearly very very different from book knowledge. It's knowledge of the Self, perfect clarity of mind.

I am not sure where you are getting this from, but it sounds a bit like pseudo Hinduism to me. Sadhana is not a linear process that goes in stages where you first to learn virtuous living, then move onto worshipping in temples, then to meditation and finally get Jnana. You have to develop everything simultaneously. There are six virtues described in Vedanta that we must develop before Jnana is realized: 1) Shama 2) Dama 3) Uparati 4) Titiksha 5) Shraddha and 6) Samadhana, meaning equanimity, sense-control, withdrawal/introvertedness, forebearance, steadfastness and focus. These qualities are developed naturally through the practice of Vivek and Vairagya.

The Self will never be realised through a book. We're here to realise the Self, not become slaves to the intellect. All the books in the world won't give you moksha. That ... well, you have to experience the non-experience, or so I have read. So books can be guidelines towards that, but ultimately one has to become a gentle soul, a humble being, a caring being, and go inward.

There is an obvious fallacy pointed out in Vedanta of experiencing the experiencer, because to experience an experiencer, one requires another experiencer to experience the experiencer. In other words it is impossible to experience the experiencer. Vedanta says the opposite of what you are saying, that reading a book and contemplating on it can indeed lead to self-realization. All then drops and only the self remains.

Regarding the denial of another's experience, and calling it 'hogwash' as in the looking at someone else's bhakti from a western intellect is just being presumptuous, as if you were some kind of mind reader. For some, it would be downright insulting. "No, no, you didn't have that experience. It's impossible!" Often devotees enter blissful states. Some temples average 400 000 devotees a day. Why? Because they're all deluded nutcases, tricked into some imaginary blissful state by their own mind? I think not. But once again, you have to experience it. If you haven't had that moment of energy rush from nature, from somewhere, from temples, from the shakti emanating from a realised Master, then you are simply not capable of getting it, just as a Nigerian doesn't get snow.

Aum Namasivaya

I am not denying another person's experience. If somebody says they are feeling divine love, ecstasy or they are feeling god's presence with them or the divine mother has possessed them I cannot prove or disprove their experience, because it is subjective. However, I can certainly tell apart an emotional fool, a pretender and psychotic from a saint simply by their behaviour, and my friend if you look at the behaviour of those 400,000 devotees who often end up in stampedes, you can definitely tell these are not people touched by god's grace.

If hundreds of millions of these devotees are really contacting the divine every day, then why is India in such a sorry state? Why is there so much angst, anger, rivalry? Poverty, illiteracy, corruption? Many of those people who you describe as devotees are corrupt. So how can they remain corrupt if they are really being graced by god almighty?

It all sounds good when we say look at all these lovely devoted people, how lovely is their devotion to god. You hear similar stuff about Christians and Muslims from themselves. The reality is of course very different.

[MahaHrada]

It is possible, do you have proof? We know other groups existed alongside the Vedic tradition like the Sramana tradition. It is entirely possible that like today there was a pluralism of religious traditions that existed in the Vedic age. However, Hinduism refers to the Vedic tradition, not to these other traditions.

There is ample archeological proof of idol worship and shakti worship in IVC. Certainly at the time the Agamas were written there was already an admixture of vedic concepts with other traditions, especially since Agamas and Tantras were already sanscritized adaptions of the more ancient oral traditions that are also still carried on by some sadhus and householders that also today cherish traditions that do not depend on books.

So what is your proof that the Agamas were an oral tradition that existed parallel to the Vedic tradition? Even the Agama tradition accepts the authority of the Vedas, but it accepts the Agamas as sruti too. It's central philosophy Shiva and Shakti is simply a rehash of older Vedic Samkhya philosophy. So it is easy to show the Agamic tradition is a development within the Vedic tradition, rather than a parallel tradition.

The agamas and tantras mostly contain deities and concepts that are alien to the vedic tradition that is obvious and no Scholar who has studied the tantras and agamas has ever denied this.

It is entirely possible there were indigenous folk religious traditions existing during and prior to the beginning of the Vedic tradition. I just need you to show me proof that they exist.

What more proof do you want than excavated idols and yoni lingas, and todays existance of the same local folkloristic, puranic, agamic and tantric traditions, that still follow these so called animistic beliefs. There is actually no Scholar east or west i know of, who doubts the ancient even prehistoric origin of some of the non vedic Hindu traditions and practises.

I was actually accepted to study Vedanta at traditional Vedanta ashrams, despite being non-Brahmin. However, I was required to first formally renounce the world and go through a formal initiation, which I declined because I was not ready to do this and because I do not think it was necessary. You are wrong that I am a Neo-Vedantin, I practice Vedanta in the Sankara tradition,

In traditional smarta smapradaya it was last year the first time that a non dvija was admitted for the study in Sringeri, if what you say is true you could have been the second person. Congratulations. But this is not exemplary.

I am fully immersed in reading philosophy(this is my main practice) I really feel very benefited by it because it has expanded my intellect and understanding about reality.

I am happy for you, but different people have different inclinations, i have studied the tantric tradition and yoga since my youth and couldn´t care less about Vedanta. This diversity is the beauty of Indian tradition and nothing to frown upon.

[yajvan]

hariḥ oṁ
~~~~~~

namasté

It's central philosophy Shiva and Shakti is simply a rehash of older Vedic Samkhya philosophy. So it is easy to show the Agamic tradition is a development within the Vedic tradition, rather than a parallel tradition.

I walk lightly in this conversation and do not wish to derail the overall subject matter, yet wish to offer this to the discerning reader.

In kaśmir śaivism there is no doubt that that veda-s are of great import and valued but are not considered the highest. The notion if śiva and śakti being a rehash of the śāṁkhya school would be off the mark. Just in one area alone, the śāṁkhya school recognizes 25 tattva ( some argue 24); In trika¹ śaivism, another name of kaśmir śaivism (some even call īśvaryavādavarā) 36 tattva's are considered. Puruṣa takes on a different meaning in trika śaivism.


Within this śaiva literature we find 3 broad catagories:

• āgama śāstra
• spanda śāstra
• pratyabhijñā śāstra

If we read some of these works it does not take long to see there are substaintial differences between the core knowledge of trika and the śāṁkhya school.

If we look to vedānta and compare and contrast it to kaśmir śaivism here too we find there are differences... I can think of 8, but will not
articulate them here. Yet the key ones fall into the brahman and its nature, māyā as being ~detrimental~ , the universe as being mithyā,
etc. ; these items are viewed quite differently and are not a rehash of vedānta or other schools.

praṇām

words and references
In kaśmir śaivism it operates on the notion of the trika ( 3 fold) system. We know this as śiva , śakti and nara. These are the 3 energies of Śiva-Bhairava i.e.　

• parā śakti - considered Supreme energy (śakti)
• parāparā śakti - considered medium śakti
• aparā śakti - lower śakti

Within these 3 energies the whole universe and every action ( worldly, mental, physical, spiritual, etc) exists within these 3 śakti-s.
So within kaśmir śaivism and the trika philsophy or trika śaivism is composed of a few schools of thought:
pratyabhijñā ( SELF recognition),
kula ( grouping and used for 'totality' , Universal Consciousness),
krama ( progress made step-by-step),
spanda ( the throb, movement, SELF-referral of the Divine).
This is the wonderful knowledge that is found in the agama-s. The āgama-s are made up of the following:

• Bhairava śāstra-s - 64 in number; these are considered non-dual some call monistic; parā
• Rūdra śāstra-s - 18 in number; these are considered dual-non-dual or mono-dualistic ; parāparā
• Śiva śāstra-s - 10 in number; these are considered dualistic; aparā

You can see they total 92 śāstra-s that make up the āgama-s , yet some say there are 96.
IMHO the best way to know of knowing parā, parāparā & aparā is through the books and śāstra-s that are available today.

• For the linegage of Kaśmir Śaivism according to svāmī lakṣman-jū, you may wish to visit this HDF post: http://www.hindudharmaforums.com/showthread.php?t=3150

[Surya Deva]

There is ample archeological proof of idol worship and shakti worship in IVC. Certainly at the time the Agamas were written there was already an admixture of vedic concepts with other traditions, especially since Agamas and Tantras were already sanscritized adaptions of the more ancient oral traditions that are also still carried on by some sadhus and householders that cary on traditions that do not depend on books.

Proof of idol worship and Shakti worship in the IVC is not evidence of it being pre-vedic. It is still a hotly debated topic whether the IVC is pre-vedic, vedic or post-vedic. Moreover, finding some statues or pictures on seals of what maybe Shiva is not proof that idol worship flourished in the IVC. The only way to prove this is to find an ancient temple in the IVC. Do you have such proof?

The agamas and tantras mostly contain deities and concepts that are alien to the vedic tradition that is obvious and no Scholar who has studied the tantras and agamas has ever denied this.

No, they do not. I have read some of the Agamas and Tantras and the concept can easily be traced to older Vedic texts, such as shiva-shakti duality is simply a rehash of purusha-prakriti dualism. Nor are the deities alien to the Vedic tradition, both proto-Shiva and proto-Shakti can be found in the Rig Veda. In Vedic times Shiva was known as Rudra(and still today Shiva is called Rudra) and Devi was known as Pritvhi, Adi and Durga. Her various nine forms are described in the Devi Suktam.

Your arguments sound like classic Dravidian nationallism.

What more proof do you want than excavated idols and yoni lingas, and todays existance of the same local folkloristic, puranic, agamic and tantric traditions, that still follow these so called animistic beliefs today. There is actually no Scholar east or west i know of that doubts the ancient even prehistoric origin of some of the non vedic Hindu traditions and practises.

I am not sure what scholars you know, but I am not really interested in opinion here but fact. Please provide me references to these excavations so I can look into it and come to my own judgement. I still have not seen any proof that the Agama and Tantra traditions existed parallel to the Vedic tradition. If you are saying the discovery of lingams etc in the IVC is proof of this, then I say not so, because we still don't know if the IVC is pre-vedic, vedic or post-vedic for certain.

I am happy for you, but different people have different inclinations, i have studied the tantric tradition and yoga since my youth and couldn�t care less about Vedanta. This diversity is the beauty of Indian tradition and nothing to frown upon.

Tantra and Yoga are both a part of the Vedic tradition. The germs for both Tantra and Yoga are found in the Vedas. The very first mention of Yoga and description of its practices is found in the Vedas. Tantra is just a very late development which draws from Yoga and Vedanta.

In any case my argument is for the original Vedic dharma, before everything else was tagged on. I practice that original Vedic dharma. I reject Puranic Hinduism and only partially accept Tantra(Kriya Yoga, which developed from Tantra, its philosophy of working with desires in the vama path. I have no love for the rituals and mythology in Tantra)

[Surya Deva]

In kaśmir śaivism there is no doubt that that veda-s are of great import and valued but are not considered the highest. The notion if śiva and śakti being a rehash of the śāṁkhya school would be off the mark. Just in one area alone, the śāṁkhya school recognizes 25 tattva ( some argue 24); In trika¹ śaivism, another name of kaśmir śaivism (some even call īśvaryavādavarā) 36 tattva's are considered. Puruṣa takes on a different meaning in trika śaivism.

Thank you for sharing this. Perhaps the word 'rehash' is incorrect. I recognize that Trika Kashmir Shiavism has many differences from classical Samkhya, and it can be considered a new and original philosophy. However, what cannot be denied is that it is draws heavily from the existing philosophy of Samkhya. So it adds 11 more tattvas to the Samkhya list, but it still very clear that it is drawing heavily from Samkhya metaphysics and cosmology. I see Tantra more like a radical synthesis and reinterpretation of Samkhya and Vedanta. In that both Samkhya and Vedanta consider nature to be avidya, inferior, illusory, whereas Tantra instead teaches that nature is a great benefactor and only she can grant us liberation if we approach her properly. Hence why the body is given so much importance in Tantra, because the body contains shakti in the form of kundalini, and via practices of Hatha Yoga the kundalini can be awakened. In the vama path desire and sin is also given new significance, rather than being seen as something to shun, it actively encourages you to indulge mindfully within it.

It is obvious, however, Tantra is not separate from the Vedic tradition. It is a development within the Vedic tradition.

[Believer]

Namaste,

We would be so ignorant and continue to live in the dark, without the benefit of all these enlightening posts. There are no words to thank the poster enough for the intellectual gymnastics displayed here. May we always be blessed with 'higher spirits' visiting the Forum on their 16 month cycle through this universe, so that we can stay sane and spiritualized.

Pranam.

[Eastern Mind]

Namaste,

We would be so ignorant and continue to live in the dark, without the benefit of all these enlightening posts. There are no words to thank the poster enough for the intellectual gymnastics displayed here. May we always be blessed with 'higher spirits' visiting the Forum on their 16 month cycle through this universe, so that we can stay sane and spiritualized.

Pranam.

Vannakkam: I tried to give you points but it said something about having to spread them around. I'm taking my deluded ignoramus of a self off to Pradosham tonight to practice my pseudo-Hinduism, and then Thai Pusam tomorrow night for even more. Hopefully someone will actually do kavadi tomorrow. I wish you could join me. It'd be fun. Seriously.

One day in your travels you have to do the Canadian Rockies. I'll host you here.

Aum Namasivaya