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Discussion (Hinduism)
1. What is Hinduism? How should it be explained to someone who knows nothing about it?
2. What is yoga? Select one of its six forms as the path you would choose, if you were a Hindu. What reasons can you give for why you selected this particular method?
3. Illustrate Hinduism's respect for religious tolerance. Do you think this a useful religious approach? Discuss why or why not. What examples of religious intolerance are presented in the chapter? What accounts for this intolerance?
Discussion 1-Long (Hinduism)
1. The Hindu concepts of dharma and karma are based on
Rigvedic statements that imply an integral connection between cosmic order, divine benevolence, moral virtue, bodily health, and material prosperity. Explore this particularly in terms of the positive and other psychosomatic influences of religion upon human life and everyday well being.
2. The Hindu caste system has been a curse on Hindu society--or else the best safeguard of the security and well being of the Indian people. Which statement is correct?
3. People at different levels of social and cultural development and different temperaments and mental ages need different forms of religious definition and expression which are provided either by religious pluralism (the proximity of disparate religions) or else by a syncretically complex religion like Hinduism. True or false? Why?
4. Hinduism's survival from the impacts of Muslim and British imperial rulership and postwar Westernizing technological and cultural influences has not depended on Hinduism's traditional syncretistic adaptability but on the discovery of dynamic rapid adjust capacities. What evidence is there to support this?
5. The promotion of Hinduism by Mahatma Gandhi and other religious leaders of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was motivated more by political and nationalistic causes than by religious concerns. True or false? Why?
6. The universalistic Vedanta Hinduism that intellectuals, scholars, and writers have propagated abroad is not the same as the traditional Hinduism of India. What are the implications of this shift for the meaning of Hinduism today and its future in India beyond the twentieth century?
Terms
Indo-Aryans; The Four Vedas; Brahmana; Upanishads; Manu; Bhagavad Gita; Brahman-Attman; That Art Thou; Kama; Artha; Dharma; Moksha; Ashramas (The Four Stages); Purusha; Samsara; Trimurty; Maya; Bhakti; Dharma; Karma; Varna (The Four Castes); Yoga; Devas; Varuna; Indra; Agni; Jnana yoga; Karma yoga; Bhakti yoga; Raja yoga; Brahma; Brahmin; Brahmanism;Visnu; Siva; Maya; 4 Stages of Life; Mystical monism; Sacrificial