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Re: Conversion
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To: soc-religion-hindu@uunet.uu.net
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Subject: Re: Conversion
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From: santhosh@iss.nus.sg (Santhosh Kumar)
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Date: 15 Jan 1996 10:09:18 GMT
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Newsgroups: soc.religion.hindu
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Organization: Institute Of Systems Science, National University Of Singapore.
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References: <4cge6k$jr4@babbage.ece.uc.edu> <4cnnbl$obt@babbage.ece.uc.edu> <4d4hmv$6g5@babbage.ece.uc.edu>
Singam (vijia@pop.jaring.my) wrote:
: caitanya@torfree.net (Gary Stevason) wrote:
:
: >Pat, as far as I'm concerned, Krsna is my life, but I was born in
: >Canada of Irish/Scottish decent. Now perhaps the real Hindus will not
: >accept me? Krsna does. So I think the 'real' Hindus will too. :-)
:
: >They certainly have been nice to me here in Canada.
:
: Gary, let me put it this way. Any person who insists that you are not
: Hindu is himself not Hindu.
:
: Hinduism is not about rituals and sectionalism. No one can claim be
: more 'real' a Hindu than any other. If any think they are, they are
: simply identifying themselves as those animals in Orwell's Animal Farm
: that declared, 'some animals are more equal than others'.
:
I would like to clarify Caitanya that you cannot be a Hindu
because you are born in Canada, a Hindu is the one who is
born in Hindustan ( INDIA ) and follows Sanatana Dharma.
However, the Hinduism is based on Sanatana Dharma and anybody
could practise that and benefit from it. It does not ask you
to follow any particular dogma, you could be a Christian
and still benefit from Sanatana Dharma, it may help you
understand Christianity better, or a Muslim could benefit
by understanding the teachings of Islam better by understanding
the self, that is the essence of Sanatana Dharma.
On the other hand, if you are classifying religions based on
dogmas, then even a Christian is a Hindu. Christianity is
on the path of Bhakthi ( devotion, if you don't have faith
in Jesus Christ you are not a Christian ) and is well within the
prescriptions of Sanatana Dharma. Sanatana Dharma does not
restrict you to worshipping the listed images like Ganesha,
Muruga, etc., no, worshipping these images are not at all
required to follow Sanatana Dharma, if you are on the
path of realising Athman ( Self ), you are following Santana
Dharma, and Bhagavat Gita is precisely giving you the directions
for that. I would advise you not to worry about being a Hindu
or Christian as long as you can follow Gita in its essence.
This was the message Swami Vivekananda gave to his audience at
Chicago, the parliament of Religions, about 100 years ago
when he was asked whether he would like them to be converted
to Hinduism.
More often, Hinduism is confused with the Brahminical order
of Indian society which is based on Manu Smriti. That
interpretation of Hinduism is a wrong one, there were so
many Smritis like that of Manu. Smriti comes and goes
depending on social necessities at that time, but the
Srutis ( Vedas ) remains. The latest Smriti is the
Indian constitution, Smritis are required to keep a
a social order in the society and that is what exactly
the Manu Smriti was meant to be, to classify people
based on the type of jobs they do. But as time
progressed, it evolved into a social order of caste
system as being practised now.
Regards,
Santhosh Kumar
