Vedic religions (or Vedism) were polytheistic, sacrifical
religions of the first two millennia B.C.E. that were the main
precursors of Hinduism. Based on the fact that the language and
concepts in its central texts, the Vedas (see below) show
similarities to Indo-European religious beliefs of the same period,
Vedic religions have long been thought to have been brought to the
Indian subcontinent from Persia in 1500 B.C.E. Vedic deities were
connected with the heavens and natural phenomena, and were the
objects of yajna sacrifices by fire led by the priest/scholar
heriditary class of Brahmins. Of these deities, Indra was perhaps
the most central. A warrior god whose epic victories over demons
were used to explain many historical or natural phenomena, Indra
was in some ways the prototype for the Hindu god Vishnu, who also
appeared as Rama and Krisna.
Sacrifice was at the core of Vedic religions. Agni, the fire
god, had the ability to transform offerings into food for the other
32 deva (a term for deity actually related to the English word
"divine"). In addition to animal sacrifice, Brahmins would press
and drink a sacred alcoholic drink called Soma, also the name of
the other major sacrificial god. The sacrifice was carried out by
Brahmins on behalf of a person with high social standing, who paid
for the sacrifice in the hope of receiving long life, male progeny,
or material benefits.
Records of the detailed ritual universe of Vedic religions are
found in the Vedas, the most ancient Hindu sacred literature. The
Vedas were written in archaic Sanskrit between the 15th and the
fifth centuries B.C.E. There are two senses in which people today
use the label "Vedas". In the narrower sense, the Vedas are the
four collections of hymns called the "Samhitas." Construed more
broadly, the Vedas have four parts: the "Samhitas," the "Brahmanas"
dealing with technicalities of sacrifice, the "Aranyakas" or forest
treatises, and the "Upanisads" for renunciants.
In the later Vedic period, increasingly detailed rituals began
to be understood symbolically, and more philosophical questions
about the nature of reality begin to turn up in the Upanisads,
which were written around the ninth century B.C.E. This shift,
along with the sixth century B.C.E. spread of the idea that karma
(the "balance sheet" of one's good and bad deeds, see "samsara"
below) determined the manner of one's rebirth, meant that the Vedic
idea of a post-mortem Heaven was no longer the ultimate human
concern, and is often identified as the signs of a transition from
Vedic religions to Hindu religions. Since "Hindu" is a dynamic
category, however, it is also possible to consider Vedic religions
as the first stage of Hindu religions.
The term "Hindu" has the same root as the "Indus" river and the
term "India," because all were used to refer to the people who
inhabited a certain geographical region. Because of this,"Hindu"
has always had ethnic, cultural, and religious connotations, and
these three aspects are inseparable. As a religious category, the
lack of a fixed central dogma or founder figure meant that "Hindu"
is especially flexible and porous.
While there are many changes in Hindu doctrines over time, the
gods and their avatars have always been important to Hindu
religiosity. Emerging from polytheistic Vedic religions, Hindu
religions also have a well-populated pantheon, although at times it
also tended toward monotheism. Some sects of Hinduism focus on
particular deities, such as Vishnu in Vaishnavism (supported by the
Gupta emperors, 4th-6th century C.E.) and Siva in Saivism
(expanding in the post-Gupta period). A Hindu deity could be
incarnated as a human, called avatara or "avatar", which was how
Vishnu appeared on earth as Rama and Krisna, taking on the role of
demon-slayer in the epics Ramayana and Mahabharata, respectively.
In the encyclopedic treatments of lore called the Puranas, the
earliest of which was written in the 5th century C.E., Vishnu and
Siva, along with Brahma the creator, appear in even more varied
forms.
Hindu practice dampened the Vedic emphasis on sacrifice, and new
forms of worship developed and took on more importance. From the
7th century C.E., Hindu temples became the center of the ritual of
puja, where priests mediated the public worship of the temple
deity. Alongside these public rituals, the concept of bhakti or
devotion to a god on a personal level led to the development of a
body of vernacular devotional poetry that was sung as part of a
union with that deity. The bhakti movement, based on individual
communication with their god, opposed the religious monopoly of the
Brahmins.
The description of the process of transmigration and rebirth,
known as samsara, is important to the Hindu worldview. Every social
interaction results in either a positive or a negative effect on
the condition of one's rebirth. However, by realizing the identity
of the true self of atman and universal principle of brahman, one
may attain moksha or escape from the cycle of samsara.
Hinduism was continually in contact with other religions, and
both reacted against and incorporated the doctrines and practices
of these religions. After Jainism and Buddhism in the 6th and 5th
centuries B.C.E. provided an alternative to Vedic authority, Buddha
was absorbed into Hinduism as the ninth avatar of Vishnu. The rapid
expansion of Islam altered Indian religious life, and Islamic
rulers controlled much of India from the 11th through middle of the
18th century. The resulting lack of imperial support for temple
worship during this period has been cited as a reason for the
spread of popular bhakti devotions and esoteric tantra practices.
The seclusion of women in upper castes (parda or purdah) has often
been seen as a variation on Islamic social customs.
Hinduism in modern India became self-conscious as it was invoked
as part of the early 20th century nationalist movements. Following
independence from Britain in 1947, the influential Congress
Movement attempted to dismantle many of the hierarchies associated
with Hinduism as it promoted a secular state. In the 1980's, the
rise of the Bharatiya Janata (Indian People's) Party (BJP), a
predominantly Hindu political party, led the way for the rise of
the current government.
Buddhism is a monastic religion that began in India, and spread
south and east to become the most influential religion in Asia. It
began around the period of the Upanisads in the 6th and 5th
centuries B.C.E. and its emphasis on renunciation, asceticism and
meditation mirrors developments in Hinduism. At the same time,
Buddhism was a reaction against Vedic authority, and contradicted
some important assumptions of Hinduism. While the goal in Hinduism
is to realize that atman and brahman are the same, in Buddhism one
must realize that atman -- the true self -- does not exist. What
this means is that a Buddhist must reconfigure her mind to unlearn
the notion that subjects (like "me") make the world go around,
since conventional ideas of the self and causation are false. By
contrast, for a Hindu the life of ritual purity that is spelled out
in the Vedas is simply true. Practically, both these views end up
arguing against conventional views of the self, and for overcoming
desires, but the reason for the arguments are very different.
The Buddha ("enlightened one") refers to Siddhartha (in
Sanskrit, Siddhartha; in Pali, Siddhattha), who lived in the sixth
century B.C.E., in an area now on the border of Nepal and India.
Born a prince, Siddhartha renounced his title and family to become
a wandering ascetic and learn different spiritual disciplines.
Eventually he attained enlightenment and became an arhat (in Pali,
arahant) or "perfected one." He realized that his existence as
Siddhartha was only one in a long line of incarnations in which
merit had been progressively attained. Because Buddhists believe
that through the accumulation of merit, anyone can become a Buddha,
the distinction between "the Buddha" (Siddhartha) and "a Buddha" (a
person who has attained enlightenment) is important.
The teaching of the Buddha is dharma, which is both the order of
the universe, and the moral law. The dharma has many features, but
central to it is the role that karma plays in the cycle of
reincarnation. Karma is the balance of one's accumulated deeds. It
both affects one's current behavior (since good acts create a
propensity for more good acts) and how one is reborn. While deities
constitute a pantheon of sorts in Buddhism, their individual
existences are not nearly as important as the cosmological model in
which all modes of existence are connected through the cycle of
rebirth. The spiritual goal is not being reborn as a god, but
escaping the cycle of rebirth, attaining the state of nirvana (in
Pali, nibbana), and becoming a buddha. In Mahayana Buddhism, it is
possible to attain enlightenment but return to the world as a
bodhisattva in order to assist other living creatures.
Following his enlightenment, the Buddha organized a sangha or
"community" of disciples that preached his message and began
disseminating his Sutras (religious classics). Over time, the term
sangha came to denote the community of renunciants -- monks and
nuns who had modified the robes of the Buddhist bhikkhu (begging
ascetic), intent on eliminating desires and accumulating good
actions.
One of the cardinal figures in the development of Buddhist
thought was Nagarjuna (circa 150-250 C.E.), originator of the
Madhyamika (Doctrine of Middle Way) school of Buddhist philosophy.
The dialectic of Madhyamika attempts to negate every theory about
the nature of reality in order to show that all such theories are
false, and thereby supports the doctrine of sunyata or "cosmic
emptiness." At the start of the eighth century, Santideva wrote the
Bodhicaryavatara (Bodhisattva Way of Life), representing the
Prasangika school of Madhyamika. Another school that ended up
having even greater influence when developed in other areas of Asia
was Yogacara, founded in India in the 5th century C.E.
Buddhism spread from India to other lands at different times,
which accounts for the different types of Buddhism found in Asia.
Under the patronage of King Asoka (reigned 270-230 B.C.E.) what is
now generally called Theravada (Way of the Elders) Buddhism spread
south and southeast, and so now is found in Sri Lanka and Southeast
Asia. During the Gupta dynasty (circa 320-600 C.E.), a newer and
more universalistic form of Buddhism known as Mahayana (Greater
Vehicle) became increasingly important in monastic centers like
Nalanda. These centers were visited by Chinese monks (such as
Faxian in 399 C.E.) who brought Mahayana sutras east to China.
Another period of patronage was by the norteastern Pala kings (8th
through 12th century C.E.) who embraced Tantra, an esoteric form of
Buddhism that spread into Tibet. So Mahayana, Theravada, and Tantra
may be arranged historically as different phases of Buddhism in
India, or divided geographically as they came to be dominant in
different areas of Asia.
While Buddhism continued to thrive in areas outside of India,
following the fall of the Pala dynasty and the encroachment of
Islam in the 12th century, Buddhism all but disappeared in India
until the 20th century. Its modest revival in modern India is
largely due to three factors: a reaction against the cultural
conservatism of Hinduism, the influx of Tibetan refugees following
the Chinese invasion of Tibet in 1959, and the incorporation of the
mountain kingdom of Sikkim into India in 1975.
First exposed to Buddhism in the 7th century C.E., since the
17th century Tibet has been ruled by the Dalai Lama, thought to be
the incarnation of the Bodhisattva of compassion, Avalokitesvara.
It was during the 11th and 12th centuries that esoteric Tantric
Buddhism and large portions of the Buddhist Canon were translated
from Sanskrit into Tibetan. Tibetan Buddhism centers on a set of
practices such as visualization, mantras, and mandalas, which
enable adepts to transform their bodies so as to attain liberation.
At the same time, an ethics based on karma determines the one of
the six realms into which one will be reborn: a god, demigod,
human, animal, ghost, or hell-being.
Founded at roughly the same time as Buddhism, Jainism is also
best seen as reaction against Vedic authority. Its founder,
Mahavira (circa 599-527 B.C.E.) promoted an ascetic life, which
both strives for individual enlightenment and for ahimsa, reverence
for life. The latter idea was the basis for the Jain rejection of
Vedic animal sacrifice. Today, Jainas are mostly located in western
India.
Beginning in the seventh century C.E., when the prophet Muhammad
received his revelations in Mecca, Islam quickly spread, by
evangelism and military conquest, throughout many areas of Asia.
The monotheistic Islamic religion derives chiefly from
Christianity, and requires faith, prayer, and pilgrimage of its
followers. It was made orthodox in northern India by the Sultan of
Delhi from the 11th through the 16th centuries, and then by the
Mughal empire from the 16th through the 18th centuries. After being
pressured to end their colonial rule (1858-1947), in the British
divided India into an Islamic Pakistan and a Hindu India. In 1971,
East Pakistan became Bangladesh.
Beginning in the 16th century, Sikhism was founded by Guru
Na-nak (1469-1539 C.E.) who combined elements of Islam and
Vaishnava bhakti Hinduism, while rejecting many of the ritual
elements of each. Instead, devotion consisted of remembering and
repeating the divine name and singing hymns of praise. Today, Sikhs
are mostly located in the Punjab state of India.