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In article <3eue72$ldn@ucunix.san.uc.edu>, Vidyasankar Sundaresan <vidya@cco.caltech.edu> wrote: >To which Dr. Jai Maharaj replied, >> ancient >> Puran known as Brihannaradi in the Sham village, >> Hoshiarpur, Punjab. It contained the verse: >> HIMALAYAM SAMARABHYA YAVAT BINDUSAROVARAM >> HINDUSTHANAMITI QYATAM HI ANTARAKSHARAYOGATAH > ^^^^^^^^^^^^ >> Kumar translates it as: >> "The country lying between the Himalayan mountain >> and Bindu Sarovara (Cape Comorin sea) is known as >> Hindusthan by combination of the first letter `hi' of >> `Himalaya' and the last compound letter `ndu' of the >> word `Bindu.'" >Under the circumstances, I wonder how the ISKCONites can continue to claim >that "Hindu" is a word coined by invaders, that there is no such thing as >"Hinduism", and that "Vaishnavism" is not "Hinduism". I suggest the ISKCON >crowd give up their hypocrisy and come up with a consistent argument about >such things. It seems to me that this particular verse is suspect. Hinduism Today is altogether a respectable magazine, so I am surprised that they did not include the verse number for this sloka. Perhaps this article came in from some other source only. I have never seen any verse like this cited by any acarya. But, even if the verse were genuine, note that this verse only refers to some particular piece of land as the land of the Hindus. Therefore, anything originating from that land could be counted as Hindu, not just the religious/philosophical system known as Hinduism. However, since the Vedas _DO NOT_ belong to any piece of land or its inhabitants, but are from the spiritual platform, the Vedas cannot be just relegated as "Hinduism" (although the race known as the Hindus might follow the Vedas), and therefore the Vaisnava system cannot be some subgroup of "Hinduism" since the Vaisnava system descends from the spiritual world through the parampara. Perhaps the Vaisnava system could be called Vaikuntha-ism, if you have to associate it with some place and some "ism". Vedic is also thoroughly acceptable. Anyway, the "harer nama" verse that Krishna Susarla includes in his signature can also be found in the Narada Purana, as I learned when I attended a Madhva sampradaya temple in Bombay in July 1994. The Narada Purana is in the list of 18 primary Puranas, as accepted in the Bhagavatam. The "harer nama" verse was cited by Sri Caitanya in his discussion with the Sankarites of Benares (headed by Prakasananda Sarasvati), and they accepted his conclusions. >S. Vidyasankar Yours, Vijay
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