It's idolatry, with a marketable name: "veneration".
Posted on 07/28/2009 7:37:17 PM PDT by Willie Green
Festivities in a new temple dedicated to the Indian monkey god Hanuman in Frisco, Texas, earlier this month remind us that a minority of religions exists within the shores of the United States that is relatively silent. The faith that is the subject here, of course, is Hinduism, which in that North Texas town, at least, is enjoying an "expanding population," according to the Dallas Morning News. Despite the fact that Indians have been quietly enriching the American melting pot for decades to centuries, few non-Indians know much about the colorful religion of Hinduism.
In actuality, the term "Hinduism" represents not a monolithic faith but a conglomeration of more or less varied religions, sects and cults largely originating on the Indian subcontinent and often incorporating beliefs, doctrines and traditions dating back several thousand years. What we perceive of as "Hinduism," then, encompasses and embraces a wide variety of beliefs, to the extent that even recent icons such as Elvis Presley, Princess Diana and Mother Teresa have reputedly made it into the extensive Hindu pantheon of a traditional "333 million" deities, demigods and saints, etc.
According to his hairdresser-cum-spiritual advisor Larry Geller, the "King of Rock and Roll" Presley, who was raised a Christian, was fond of reading books about Eastern spiritual traditions. The affection for Indian philosophy by members of the music group the Beatles is legendary, especially in the case of George Harrison. Many Indian gurus and yogis have found welcome on this side of the Atlantic and Pacific, and the ancient physical and spiritual exercise of yoga in a myriad of forms is practiced by up to 20 million Americans.
Yet, Hinduism remains a mystery to most Americans, both at times intriguing and bizarre with its sundry gods and goddesses. Part of the reason for this oversight is because Hinduism in its fullness seems so alien to cultures largely dominated by either the Abrahamic faiths with their aloof monotheistic God or the "New Atheism," which has a tendency to ridicule and dismiss such lively piety.
Hinduism plays nice in the U.S.
Another reason Americans as whole are largely oblivious to Hinduism is because its practitioners in general do not rabblerouse, set up terrorist camps, call for the destruction of the U.S. Constitution, bilk the American public for millions, establish bogus "charities," engage in unethical and seedy "televangelism," lobby Congress for special favors and consideration, challenge constantly the principle of separation of church and state, abuse the First Amendment and all of the fun stuff (sarcasm) we are used to seeing from fervent religionists in our country and elsewhere.
This lack of aggression by Hindus in America does not reflect that they do not take their faith very seriously, as they certainly do. Like Christians who proclaim that Jesus Christ is real because they have had visions of him, devout Hindus often feel as if their deities have made their very real presence known, as in the case of Cheeni Rao, author of In Hanuman's Hands, who while going down the destructive path of drug abuse was "saved" by the monkey-headed god. Rao's experience was every bit as life changing as that of Christians in a similar position—and this instance illustrates that the form of a profound spiritual presence purportedly experienced is largely if not entirely dependent upon one's cultural conditioning, not upon any "ultimate reality" or "absolute truth."
"Hinduism" as a monolith has its flaws—and non-Hindus both religious and secular will no doubt point them out—including taking itself too seriously to the point where, in its native land, a certain amount of strife and atrocity can be traced to Indian beliefs, such as the rare but ongoing practice of widow-burning or sati in various districts, as well as other sexism, prejudices—such as the caste system—and violence committed by its fanatical minority. Yet, while some "enlightened gurus" have been opportunists preying on a gullible American public with enticing stories of metaphysical and supernatural wonders, so far traditional Hinduism's practitioners generally have not brought unsavory and violent "traditions" along with them to their new homelands and demanded they be allowed to break the law of the land in practicing them, unlike members of other faiths.
We can only hope that other religionists in the United States and elsewhere will follow suit and behave in a similar, more spiritually mature manner as the American Hindu population, rather than bullying and elbowing their way in, exploiting the system and creating enmity. Rarely if ever do we hear complaints or derogatory news items about Hindus in America, while members of other groups such as Christianity, Judaism and Islam often make it into the news for unethical and illegal behavior. Does this frequent broadcasting of these three faiths result because they are under a bigger microscope, or could there be a problem with the Abrahamic monotheism itself, whereby it insists on its own way, to compel and force itself upon people against their will, with dire threats of eternal punishment for rejecting it?
Concerning the fanatical monotheism depicted in the Old Testament, from which the Abrahamic faiths arose, in Pagan Christs (17-18) John M. Robertson remarked:
Monotheism of this type is in any case morally lower than polytheism since those who held it lacked sympathy for their neighbors. Most of the Jewish kings were polytheists. What I am concerned to challenge is the assumption—due to the influence of Christianity—that Jewish monotheism is essentially higher than polytheism, and constitutes a great advance in religion.... If the mere affirmation of a Supreme Creator God is taken to be a mark of superiority, certain primitive tribes who hold this doctrine and yet practice human sacrifice must be considered to have a 'higher' religion than the late Greeks and Romans."Monotheism in America will simply need to become accustomed to the fact that this country is inhabited by polytheists such as the Hindus as well as atheists, humanists and secularists, and to stop being so aggressive and insistent upon its own way. That's America under the U.S. Constitution, a fact that freedom lovers everywhere will appreciate.
OMG! How did I miss your return Willie?!
Well I suppose maybe I just don't have the same energy and stamina I had when I was younger, so I can't post quite as prolificly as I used too. (((sigh)))
I made many pings in your honor on some train posts!
Cool! It's comforting to know that somebody continued the crusade during my hiatus.
But I see that the naysayers are still quite abundant.
You'd think that $4/gal gas would've been a wake-up call.
But some people are just.... well... they're just off topic for this thread... so enough of that.
Welcome back!
Thanks! It's good to be back!
From One God to thousands. One of them will surely understand....
***well good....the more non-muslim religious the better IMO.....***
I failed to mention, there is the mosque in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
That’s interesting. How is it you know so much about Hinduism? And Hinduism vs Christianity? Just wondering....
I think a lot of Christians harbor suspicion of Hinduism (even more than moderate Islam) because they see it as nothing but idolatry.
It's idolatry, with a marketable name: "veneration".
A belief system that accepts Christ as the incarnation of God and then allows for gods incarnated as monkeys and baboons makes a mockery of Catholicism and its central tenets. The clear fact is that Catholic belief posits itself as the one true religion. See below.
Of course you could dispute this, as do all the 20,000 plus other Christian sects as did the early pagans and today’s New Age followers.
So it is quite natural and logical that embrace of the Catholic faith must reject all other faiths as false. We do not believe the simplistic notion that “there are many paths to Heaven” because this would make the birth, death, and resurrection of the Christ meaningless. Why add one more path?
So long as missionary work is peacful, it is part of the fabric of democratic traditions that allow for freedom of worship and freedom of belief. If India’s Hindu communities cannot abide by this, then as an aspect of comity they ought not to be allowed the reciprocal benefits of practising their faith without interruption in western democracies. Yet, the constitutional structures of western societies are exploited by Hindu and Moslem faiths to set up religious centers here to practrice their faith, but this is not extended to Catholic Churches and missionaries to practice their faith- proclaiming the one True God- in other countries.
In short what you seek, is that for the Catholics to practice their faith, they must shed their core belief. This is a fallacy exposed by its own internal contradiction.
Hinduism has a better claim of being the "one true faith' of the Indian people, as it evolved out of various faiths that existed on the subcontinent prior to the invention of Christianity.
I seem to remember a certain other faith that (among the hierarchy, not necessarily among intellectuals and laypeople) violently denounced Republicanism and religious pluralism until the 1960s.
I don’t think Indian Catholics in general support communism anymore than Hindus in India or Nepal support Maoism or communism. Hindu Calcutta (Kolkatta) has been officially communist for decades.
*******************
Okey dokey.
You love to paint Catholics as gentle little lambs, don’t you?
Violence halts Da Vinci Code screening in Hyderabad
IANS 23 June 2006, 09:52pm IST
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS/India/articleshow/msid-1674892,curpg-2.cms
HYDERABAD: The screening of controversial Hollywood movie “Da Vinci Code” was suspended at a theatre here after a group of Christians,
protesting against the release of the film, ransacked the theatre.
The movie was to be released at Prasad Imax following a direction by the Andhra Pradesh High Court, quashing the state government’s order to ban its screening.
However, dozens of activists under the banner of the Christian United Front raided the theatre and damaged the property extensively forcing the management to suspend the film’s screening.
The protesters, who were carrying banners and placards describing the film as “Devil’s Code”, barged in to the theatre located near the Hussain Sagar lake in the heart of the city even as hundreds of people eager to watch the movie were standing in queues for the tickets of the first show of the movie.
Police said the mob shattered the glass panes and damaged furniture and ticket counters. The protesters also raised slogans against the court’s order lifting the ban imposed by the state government on the film.
Prasad Imax was the only theatre in the state, where the film was scheduled to be released on Friday.
The court, on petitions by the film’s distributors, Wednesday quashed the June 1 government order banning the screening of the movie in the state. The movie was to be released in the state on June 2.
The government move came following protests by various Christian and Muslim groups that said the movie would hurt religious sentiments. The government, in its order, contended that the film might lead to law and order problems.
Following the court order, the distributors had announced plans to release the English and Hindi versions of the movie next week.
The movie, based on Dan Brown’s bestseller with the same title, remains banned in several Indian states.
Try depicting Ganesh with its elephantile trunk as a god better fit for worship in a sanitarium and see what happens? Or just ask the sikhs about the the massacre at their golden temple by hindu mobs. Hinduism in all its forms is myth that has survived the long bygone era of paganism only because of the vast swath of illiterate Indian masses. Its belief, practice, rituals and customs can only charitably be described as barbaric and unfit for accommodation in western societies whose civilization was founded by Catholicism.
Yada... yada.
You keep mixing up the Gita for nonsense. Why don’t you maintain a consistent stance?
Only after the Enlightenment movement and the Protestant reforms tamed the Catholic cult did the West really begin to progress. Until then, Catholics were jabbing spears, barbs, stretching, boiling and burning others at the stake, like uncivilised barbarians.
The Deist god is NOT the Catholic god. Please try to be a bit more intellectually honest. You are seeking an umbrella so that you can hide under the fruits of success and progress of the nation the Deists founded. Without them, you’d have to seek idealogical refuge in Third World hell-holes like Brazil and Mexico, both Catholic.
It’s funny you mention the Sikh riots, engineered by the thugs on the payroll of the Congress party.
Ask the Sikhs what the role of the RSS was, during the riots, and then report back to me.
It’s not coicidental that Sikhs support this Hindu fundamentalist group, to this day.
As for the Christian North-East terrorists, the less said, the better. So too about garbage like The Lord’s Resistance Army.
Any comments on this Wikipedia post below?
____________________________________________________________________________
1984 anti-Sikh riots
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
“A Sikh family in front of their dwelling after a rampaging mob attacked their property”
The 1984 anti-Sikh pogroms were triggered by the assassination of Indira Gandhi on October 31, 1984, by two of her Sikh bodyguards. The assassination itself was in retaliation for Operation Bluestar, in which the Indian Army attacked Sikh militants hiding in the Harmandir Sahib, the holiest Sikh shrine.
Over the next four days, as many as 3100 Sikhs were killed in retaliatory attacks.
The most affected regions were neighborhoods in Delhi.
Many ordinary Indians of different religious dispositions made significant efforts to hide and help Sikh families. There are allegations that the massacre was organized.
On November 1, 1984, large mobs descended on eastern and central Delhi. Sultanpuri, Mangolpuri, Trilokpuri, and other Trans-Yamuna areas of Delhi were the worst affected.
The mobs carried iron rods, knives, clubs, and combustible material, including kerosene. They used voters’ lists, allegedly provided, by the politicians themselves[citation needed], to identify houses and business establishments owned by Sikhs.
The mobs swarmed into Sikh neighborhoods, arbitrarily killing any Sikh men they could find. Their shops and houses were ransacked and burned. In other incidents, armed mobs stopped buses and trains, in and around Delhi, pulling out Sikh passengers to be lynched or doused with kerosene and burnt.
The argument has been made that these events should not be called riots, but be described as a pogrom or a crime against humanity.
____________________________________________________________________________
Irrelevant.
What was the role of the Hindu-fundamentalist RSS in saving the Sikhs during the riots?
Research, and post here.
Meanwhile:
16 shot dead by NLFT in Tripura
http://www.rediff.com/news/2002/jan/13trip.htm
In their first major strike in four months, the National Liberation Front of Tripura militants on Sunday gunned down 16 people, including a seven-year-old girl and two women, at a market in West Tripura district.
Superintendent of Police (operations) Dhurjati Gautam said 12 people died on the spot and 13 were injured when two groups of NLFT ultras, clad in olive green uniforms, encircled the Singicherra Bazar and opened indiscriminate fire.
The bazaar was buzzing with Makar Sankranti shoppers.
Two persons died when they were being taken to the hospital and two more succumbed to their injuries while being treated.
Of the 16 dead 12 have been identified: Shreema Nath Sharma (7), Abu Nath Sharma (36), Megh Shabar (30), Balai Shabar (32), Mantu Paul (40), Malati Paul (45), Binod Paul (52), Nagendra Paul (65), Manindra Nandi (40), Paritoh Das (30), Babul Goswami (32) and Swapan Kotal Das (42).
DIG Range A K Shukla rushed to the spot with a large contingent of Tripura State Rifles and launched a massive search operation in the area.
The ruling CPI-M condemned the incident and called a dawn to dusk bandh on January 15 in Khowai subdivision in protest against the massacre.
PTI
NLFT
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/para/nlft.htm
National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT)
The National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) was formed in December 1989 for the purpose of seceding from India in order to create an independent Christian fundamentalist state of Tripura. The group was banned under the Unlawful Activies Prevention Act of 1967.
The headquarters of NLFT is located in the Khagrachari district of Bangladesh, about 40-45 km southeast of Simanapur.
In Tripura a systematic surrender of arms by a faction of NLFT insurgents and NLFT fringe groups is due to the increased security pressure and to infighting within NLFT insurgent ranks. Since 2000 a few hundred militants have surrendered in small groups to the security forces, handing in their weapons. The NLFT leadership engaged in peace talks with Mizoram Chief Zoramthanga in April 2001, however the NLFT has not promised acceptance of any future peace process.
The NLFT has set up a number of camps in Bangladesh’s Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT), in the Sylhet, Maulavi Bazar, Habiganj and Comilla regions. NLFT also has ties with Pakistan’s external intelligence agency, the Inter Services Intelligence Agency (ISI).
From Wiki:
Protection of Sikhs during anti-Sikh riots 1984:
Khushwant Singh credits members of the Hindu-fundamentalist RSS with helping and protecting Sikhs who were being targeted by members of the Congress(I) political party during the 1984 Anti-Sikh Riots. Singh who otherwise has been critical of the RSS and believes that it is a “ communal organization and dangerous to the country’s secular fabric” has said:
“The RSS has played a honorable role in maintaining Hindu-Sikh unity before and after the murder of Indira Gandhi in Delhi and in other places”
“It was the Congress(I) leaders who instigated mobs in 1984 and got more than 3000 people killed. I must give due credit to RSS and the BJP for showing courage and protecting helpless Sikhs during those difficult days.”
Reference:
K. Singh, Publik Asia, 16-11-1989.
Hanuman is not an incarnation of a monkey, but plenty of human beings have the monkey nature.
So long as missionary work is peacful, it is part of the fabric of democratic traditions that allow for freedom of worship and freedom of belief. If India’s Hindu communities cannot abide by this, then as an aspect of comity they ought not to be allowed the reciprocal benefits of practising their faith without interruption in western democracies.
You lose. (sniff, sniff)
Thank God for the Constitution or we'd all be Catholics.
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