Because of these difficulties, the Supreme Court has to define Hinduism
in its theistic terms. Bal Gangadhar Tilak’s definition was therefore
taken as a satisfactory definition of Hinduism. It defines Hinduism as
follows:
The Indian Supreme Court, in 1966, formalized a judicial definition of
Hindu beliefs to legally distinguish Hindu denominations from other
religions in India. The Court affirmed this list as recently as 1995 in
judging cases regarding religious identity.
1) Acceptance of the Vedas with reverence as the highest authority in
religious and philosophic matters and acceptance with reverence of
Vedas by Hindu thinkers and philosophers as the sole foundation of
Hindu philosophy.
2) Spirit of tolerance and willingness to understand and appreciate the
opponent's point of view based on the realization that truth is many-
sided.
3) Acceptance of great world rhythm-vast periods of creation,
maintenance and dissolution follow each other in endless succession-by
all six systems of Hindu philosophy.
4) Acceptance by all systems of Hindu philosophy of the belief in rebirth
and pre-existence.
5) Recognition of the fact that the means or ways to salvation are many.
6) Realization of the truth that numbers of Gods to be worshiped may be
large, yet there being Hindus who do not believe in the worshiping of
idols.
7) Unlike other religions, or religious creeds, Hindu religion's not being
tied down to any definite set of philosophic concepts, as such.
"Acceptance of the Vedas with reverence; recognition of the fact that the
means or ways to salvation are diverse; and the realization of the truth
that the number of gods to be worshiped is large, that indeed is the
distinguishing feature of the Hindu religion."
Supreme Court of India
on July 2, 1995, referred to
this as an "adequate and
satisfactory formula."
Some of the recent definitions of Hinduism by Scholars are given below:
The Vishva Hindu Parishad
declared its definition in a Memorandum of Association, Rules and
Regulations in 1966:
"Hindu means a person believing in, following or respecting the eternal
values of life, ethical and spiritual, which have sprung up in Bharatkhand
[India] and includes any person calling himself a Hindu
"The Hindu recognizes one Supreme Spirit, though different names are
given to it. God is in the world, though not as the world. He does not
merely intervene to create life or consciousness, but is working
continuously. There is no dualism of the natural and the supernatural.
Evil, error and ugliness are not ultimate.
“No view is so utterly erroneous; no man is so absolutely evil as to
deserve complete castigation.
There is no Hell, for that means there is a place where God is not, and
there are sins that exceed His love. The law of karma tells us that the
individual life is not a term, but a series. Heaven and Hell are higher and
lower stages in one continuous movement. Every type has its own
nature, which should be followed. We should do our duty in that state of
life to which we happen to be called. Hinduism affirms that the
theological expressions of religious experience are bound to be varied,
accepts all forms of belief and guides each along his path to the common
goal. These are some of the central principles of Hinduism. If Hinduism
lives today, it is due to them.
Sri K. Navaratnam,
Sri Lankan religious scholar of Southern Saiva Agamic tradition.
1) A belief in the existence of God.
2) A belief in the existence of a soul separate from the body.
3) A belief in the existence of the finitizing principle known as avidya or
maya.
4) A belief in the principle of matter-prakriti or maya.
5) A belief in the theory of karma and reincarnation.
6) A belief in the indispensable guidance of a guru to guide the spiritual
aspirant towards God Realization.
7) A belief in moksha, or liberation, as the goal of human existence.
8) A belief in the indispensable necessity of temple worship in religious
life.
9) A belief in graded forms of religious practices, both internal and
external, until one realizes God.
10) A belief in ahimsa as the greatest dharma or virtue.
11) A belief in mental and physical purity as indispensable factors for
spiritual progress
Sri Pramukh Swami Maharaj
of the Bochasanwasi Shri Akshar Purushottam
Sanstha (Swaminarayan Faith)
1) Parabrahman, one supreme all-powerful God:
He is the Creator, has a divine form, is immanent,
transcendent and the giver of moksha.
2) Avatarvad - manifestation of God on Earth: God
Himself incarnates on Earth in various forms to revive
dharma and grant liberation.
3) Karmavad - law of action: the soul reaps fruits,
good or bad, according to its past and present actions,
which are experienced in this life or future lives.
4) Punarjanma - reincarnation: the mortal soul is continuously born and
reborn in one of the 8,400,000 species until it attains liberation.
5) Moksha, ultimate liberation: the goal of human life. It is the liberation
of the soul from the cycle of births and deaths to remain eternally in the
service of God.
6) Guru-shishya sambandh - master-disciple relationship: guidance and
grace of a spiritually perfect master, revered, as the embodiment of God,
is essential for an aspirant seeking liberation.
7) Dharma, that which sustains the universe: an all-encompassing term
representing divine law, law of being, path of righteousness, religion,
duty, responsibility, virtue, justice, goodness and truth.
8) Ved pramana - scriptural authority of the Vedas: All Hindu faiths
are based on the teachings of the Vedas.
9) Murti-puja - sacred image worship: consecrated images represent
the presence of God, which is worshiped. The sacred image is a medium
to help devotees offer their devotion to God
"I call myself a Sanatani Hindu because I believe in the Vedas, the
Upanishads, the Puranas and all that goes by the name of Hindu
scriptures, and therefore in avatars and rebirth.
Above all, I call myself a Sanatani Hindu, so long as the Hindu society in
general accepts me as such.
In a concrete manner he is a Hindu who believes in God, immortality of
the soul, transmigration, the law of karma and moksha, and who tries to
practice truth and ahimsa in daily life, and therefore practices cow
protection in its widest sense and understands and tries to act according
to the law of varnashrama."
Sri Swami Vivekananda
"All Vedantists believe in God. Vedantists also believe the Vedas to be
the revealed word of God-an expression of the knowledge of God-and as
God is eternal, so are the Vedas eternal. Another common ground of
belief is that of creation in cycles that the whole of creation appears and
disappears. They postulate the existence of a material, which they call
akasha, which is something like the ether of the scientists, and a power,
which they call prana.
Irfan Habib
“Hindus are those who have been debating with each other within a
common framework for centuries. If they recognize another as somebody
whom they can either support or oppose intelligibly, then both are
Hindus.”
http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/refpages/RefArticle.aspx?refid=76155575
69th Shankaracharya of the Kamakoti Peetham,
Kanchipuram.
1) The concept of idol worship and the worship of God in His nirguna as
well as saguna form.
2) The wearing of sacred marks on the forehead.
3) Belief in the theory of past and future births in accordance with the
theory of karma.
4) Cremation of ordinary men and burial of great men
Thus, we see that Hinduism is not a unified religion and in the process of
history, something happened to mix up the basic unity of the religion of
India viz. the great concepts of Para-Brahman and the acts of God in
history. The only common factor today is the specific beliefs connected
with re-incarnation and idol worship. It is this historical development
that we are looking at.
