Religious innovation, hybridization, and reinterpretation

Religion continues to change in the Indian setting even as it reinterprets past expressions. People who were once disenfranchised have increasingly become part of the political, cultural, and religious mix and bring their orientations to the practice of religion.

These currents are expressed in a variety of ways. There is the quest for gurus and swamis who are thought to be worthy of emulation. There is the resurgence of old deities, the emergence of relatively new ones, even the hybridization of the attributes of deities and their cultic life. There is the emergence of “new” religio-intellectual movements forged of syncretisms and the restatement of neo-Hindu ideas. Disenchantment with the “estab­lishment” has also led to conversions to new forms of Hinduism or Buddhism and to various sects of Islam or Christianity. Not least of all, there is the use of religion for political ends and the concomitant attempt to construct governmental polities that support one’s religious ideology often at the expense of others. To some of these developments we now turn.

The changing faces of deities

Hindu deities have always been rich symbolic expressions, reflecting many aspects of the human condition. As we have noted in earlier chapters, the

imaging of deities often reflects their cultural history - hunting gods reflecting hunting motifs, etc. It is not surprising, then, in the dynamic cultural interactions of India today, deities are perceived in varying terms.

The favored deity of orthodox Tamil smarta brahmins living in Mumbai is a goddess named Rajarajeswarl (literally, “the sovereign of sovereigns”). This is a deity/name suggested to the group by a swami visiting from Madras. The goddess has roots in Tamil country - for example, as Siva’s consort in the Cola court - yet she is considered “new” enough to be ascribed all the attributes of all previous goddesses. Hence, on the one hand, she is said to have been the favored deity of the famed philosopher Sankara, and the one to whom ancient mantras were addressed; yet, at the same time, her very newness is indication that she is the epitome of goddesses. All sakti (power) is vested in her. To enthrone her within oneself is to internalize the supreme power of the universe.¹⁵

Quite a different story is associated with Sri Jagadamba (Goddess of the universe), the name given to the goddess of a shrine at Golkonda Hill outside Hyderabad. She was once known as Ellamma, the goddess of the Madigas, or shepherds, a “scheduled caste” also known as “dalits” (literally, the “broken ones”) historically outside the pale of Hindu society. Ellamma’s story, however, suggests how the shepherds perceive her true nature and their own: once Ellamma was the primary goddess of the universe. Desiring a sexual companion, she created first Brahma, then Visnu, both of whom refused to have sex with their own mother. For this they were punished. Ellamma then created Siva who agreed to comply with her request. But Siva tricked Ellamma, saying she should give him her third eye, her trident, and other paraphernalia.

Now the Ellamma shrine on Golkonda Hill has been taken over by an inter-caste committee representing various constituencies in the Golkonda area, which has sought to “upgrade” the shrine. While the priest of the shepherds continues to function at the shrine, a brahman priest has been installed. Rituals performed at the shrine are more nearly “agamic” - goat sacrifices must be performed elsewhere on the hill; not least of all the goddess has been given the name Sri Jagadamba. Those Madigas who support such a change would claim that, if now the goddess has been elevated to a more “noble” state, it is only herjust due, as from the beginning she was the supreme being!

The social elevation of other communities has been reflected in the way by which their goddesses have been linked to brahmanical mythology. Such goddesses as Mariamman, Renuka, and Peddamma, for example, share variations of a common myth. Mariamman and Peddamma have very recently been the deities of “folk,” agrarian communities, while Renuka has been classicized for a much longer period. Their shared myth may be summarized as follows: once the goddess was a very chaste woman married to a sage. Everyday her chastity permitted her to bring water home on the top of her head (by some accounts, without benefit of a pot!). One day, when bringing water home she was momentarily diverted by a heavenly male figure and the water splashed all over her and she arrived late. When her husband saw what had happened, he was furious and ordered his sons to slay their mother. Only one of them, Parasurama, the cosmic “hatchet man,” was willing to do the job, beheading his mother and her laundry maid with one stroke.

Conversions of another kind

On June 30, 2001, The Hindu, a prominent Indian newspaper, reported that some 1,000 people from some 225 low-caste families living in villages near Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, had “embraced” Christianity. The people alleged, through their spokesperson, that they had not been allowed to worship in a particular temple, and, in fact, had been “humiliated” at a festival event on June 6 of that year. Despite several attempts to present their grievance to authorities, they claimed such authorities did not respond. Hence, their “mass” conversion to Christianity.¹⁸

While this incident is increasingly uncommon there have been cases of people, especially from the lower echelons of society, converting to minority religions in quest of greater economic, social, and, at times, religious satis­faction. From the Paravars along the Kerala coast who were baptized by Francis Xavier in the sixteenth century to such tribals as the Nagas and Mizos of the Northeastern Himalayan foothills, who became Baptists and Presbyterians in the twentieth century, disenfranchised groups have turned to Christianity, Islam, or Buddhism when given the opportunity.

Perhaps the single most dramatic act of conversion is that which occurred in Maharashtra subsequent to 1956. The Mahars, constituting nearly 10 percent of the population of Maharashtra, had been suffering the fate of most “untouchables” or dalits: they were unable to use public wells in their own villages or let their shadow fall on caste persons. One of their number, B. R. Ambedkar (1891-1956), had suffered similar indignities as a youth. But he went on to receive a doctorate and law degree and helped to write the Indian constitution. He also fought for the rights of his fellow Mahars even clashing with Mahatma Gandhi, as to whether to make the rights of untouchables a central aspect of the freedom campaign. For much of his adult life, Ambedkar had been studying Buddhism and eventually came to believe that in Buddhism there was a sense of the equality of all persons, a spirit of compas­sion, and an opportunity for all persons to fulfill their own possibilities. Accordingly, in 1956, a few months before his death, he renounced Hinduism and adopted Buddhism (as he reinterpreted the Buddhist dhdmmd) as his religion.²⁰ Many of his fellow Mahars and other dalits joined him, and until today Buddhism (or neo-Buddhism, as it is sometimes called) is the fastest growing religion in Maharashtra.

Some “conversions” have been less dramatic. There are Muslims, for example, who, after working in the Persian Gulf for a few years where they witnessed a more puritan form of Islam, especially in Saudi Arabia, return to India seeking to purge Islamic practice of “non-Islamic” accretions. Other Muslims may join sectarian Islamic movements that are perceived to be more “global” or more “pristine.” Hindus may become followers of certain gurus or sectarian movements that offer specific interpretations of the Hindu way. These include followers of such “god-men” as Satya Sai Baba or such movements as the Brahmakumaris. Other movements attracting a sizable following, especially of upper-class Hindus, are the Arya Samaj or the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh; these latter movements are especially committed to making India a polity in which core Hindu values will dominate. We turn to the story of some of these movements.

Gurus and their movements

A practice that goes back at least to the days of the Upanisads is that of seekers associating themselves with particular teachers or gurus. It is a practice one finds in contemporary India as well as in the Indian diaspora. As people seek to rediscover the essence of their faith, and, in the process, their own identities, they attach themselves to the exponent of a particular school of thought or practice, whether from a distance through the guru’s books, or in ashrams or mathas to meditate in the presence of the teacher. Such teachers are selected for any number of reasons: a friend recommends some­one with whom he or she has been in contact; one is impressed, by word of mouth, with a guru’s style or “miracles”; the guru speaks one’s own vernacular; or, if one is an Anglicized urbanite, one may be impressed by the guru who is also Anglicized and a globe-trotter. So, if one is a Tamil smarta brahman, for example, living in Mumbai, away from one’s home, one may look to the Sankaracarya (the exponent of Sankara’s Vedanta) for guidance - usually the Sankaracarya of Kancipuram if one is from eastern Tamil Nadu and the Sankaracarya of Sringeri, if one is from the southwest. “Gurus” are abundant in the Indian landscape; there is little quality control save as devotees become impressed with the charisma or “wisdom” of the teacher. At times each guru starts movements distinctive to his or her own particular perceptions of the “truth.”

The Brahmakumaris

Take, for example, the Brahmakumari movement. While the Brahmaku- maris (Daughters of Brahma) are not a numerically large group by Indian standards (perhaps 100,000 devoted members over all), it illustrates one of the ways in which the Hindu tradition is reinterpreted in the modern period.²¹ It was founded by a Sindhl businessman, Dada Lekhraj, who died in 1969. It was founded, in part, from a sense of disenchantment with the world that Sindhis were experiencing in middle-class households. Sindhi businessmen were away from home for extended periods while the women were expected to engage in traditional wifely duties back home. This sense of disaffection with the world was exacerbated with the dispersal of Hindu Sindhis during the partition at the time of independence. In any case, Lekhraj was given to visions by means of which he reconfigured Hindu notions about the nature of history and of the self. Succinctly put, the world would come to an end soon and people should prepare for it by purifying themselves accordingly. While its official headquarters are in Mt. Abu in Rajasthan, the movement, nonetheless, has some 800 local centers especially in such northern cities as New Delhi, and, increasingly, overseas. The Brahmakumaris encourage the practice of yoga, vegetari­anism, abstinence from tobacco and alcohol, and, most controversially, of celibacy. The group proselytizes vigorously, especially through exhibits, advertisements, and lectures.

Based on Lekhraj’s visions and teachings, the Brahmakumaris believe the real self to be the immaterial self or atman within one. The self’s true home is paramdtman (the supreme Self), in which Siva or Shiv Baba presides at the top of the universe. The self’s intention is to eschew material attach­ments and become one with its true nature at the end of history. History, for the Brahmakumaris, is an accelerated form of the Hindu yuga system; rather than being comprised of ageless cycles of time, however, history is a matter of four finite cycles becoming increasingly degenerate. We live near the end of the final cycle, the kaliyuga, where torpor and ignorance (tamagun) prevail. This age will come to an end very soon, but, thanks to the grace of Shiv Baba, through Dada Lekhraj, people can learn how to make the transition into the world to come.

To prepare for the new world, as in traditional Indian concerns for cosmology, one must understand the nature of the universe as perceived in the Brahmakumari system. Not only must one know the truth, however, one must perform it. Lifestyle should be completely transformed, often requiring living in the established centers: eating proper food, keeping company with the faithful, practicing raja yoga (as reinterpreted by the group), and practicing celibacy are among the requisites of preparation. The practice of celibacy alone can be considered controversial, especially for women, who were traditionally considered auspicious insofar as they gave birth to sons. Nonetheless, not only do widows, widowers, and couples whose children have grown join the group; the core of the movement and, especially of its local centers, are women (known as sisters) who propagate the faith and serve the needs of seekers.

While many of these ideas are clearly derived from classical Indian speculations (the importance of cosmology, the need for proper practice, etc.), the nuances given by the group are often seen as controversial, espe­cially the emphasis on millenarianism and the notion that women should be celibate. Yet even these notions have resonances of earlier images: an end of history was intimated in the mythology of Kalkl, the incarnation of Visnu who would come to rescue the world in the end; and female celibacy was counte­nanced by those women who turned to the monastic life in the early days of Buddhism and in the experience of those medieval poetesses - devotees who sought only to live in the presence of their Lord. Be that as it may, the Brahmakumaris are highly disciplined and their impact on the Indian landscape exceeds their numbers, especially in the cities of North India.

The Satya Sai Baba movement

Yet another movement that has gained great popularity in India’s current milieu is that of Satya Sai Baba. While he has his detractors who speak of him as a charlatan and an exponent of “easy” religion, not a few middle- and upper-class urbanites, many of whom have lost touch or confidence in more “traditional” forms of religion, find him to be a charismatic and attractive figure. “Satya Sai Baba” was born in 1926 in a village now in Andhra Pradesh.²² His boyhood is said to have been filled with a variety of miraculous occurrences, including a “disclosure” at the age of thirteen when he declared himself to be an incarnation of Sai Baba, the Muslim-Hindu guru who died in 1918. In a later “revelation” (in 1963) he declared himself to be the embodiment of Siva and Sakti (literally the divine totality), in the flesh. In the meanwhile, he had begun to attract considerable attention through his “miracles,” his travels throughout the south, and the establishment of his ashram in Puttaparthi, the village of his birth. He predicted he would live until the age of ninety-six and that the latter half of his life would be devoted to teaching, the performing of miracles, and, eventually, offering intensive teachings to selected groups.

Even though he is thought to be the incarnation of all the deities and is called Bhagavan (“God”) by his devotees, Satya Sai Baba is especially asso­ciated with Siva and is depicted most commonly in the company of Siva’s linga (an aniconic representation). In addition, he is most noted to his followers for his ability to make sacred ash (vibhuti, commonly used in Saiva worship) appear at will and in massive amounts.

The movement which Satya Sai Baba has established has mushroomed into a major pan-Indian phenomenon. Its funds are kept in a trust fund. The Central Shri Satya Sai Trust supports ashrams, engages in philanthropic activities, publishes a magazine, and endows at least four colleges.

The demands on devotees are considerably less rigorous than for such a movement as the Brahmakumaris. These activities range from moderate vegetarianism to daily meditation and participation in social activities and devotional singing. Clearly the center of the movement is Satya Sai Baba himself - he is the object of worship and the iaison d’etre of the movement. Worship of Satya Sai Baba, in other words, is primarily a form of pietism - of bhakti - whereby, it is thought, one is directing one’s thanksgiving and one’s personal requests to God himself. It is clear that many of these bhaktas, sometimes referred to as “urban alienates,” are economically well-placed. Though many have never seen Satya Sai Baba in person, they have come to believe in his persona, and in his claims for himself and even attest to miracles wrought in their own lives. No profound theological claims need be affirmed; no rigorous discipline needed. One need only worship at the “altar.” Little wonder millions find this attractive, while others dismiss it as “pop religion.”

The resurgent right

Among the movements that mark the contemporary landscape of India are those which represent the Hindu right wing; at least six such movements should be mentioned. The oldest is the Arya Samaj, founded by Dayananda Saraswati in 1875. From its founding its intention has been to return Hinduism to its “Vedic” roots (as these “Vedic” roots were interpreted by Dayananda). It has sought to homogenize Hindu practice, rid it of its “folk” elements, including the elimination of the slaughter of animals and other “non-Vedic” practices. It espoused the doctrine of sanatana dharma, the “eternal truth,” that was thought to characterize the Hindu experience.²³ By the 1890s it was also involved in political agitation which was implicitly or explicitly directed against Muslims: there was the Cow Protection Movement of 1893; the crusade, started in 1895, to reconvert those believed to have been forcibly converted to Islam or Christianity; protests launched in 1907 against the perceived pro-Muslim bias of British authorities; and others.²⁴ Today the presence of the Arya Samaj continues on many fronts; one illustration is the attempt to change the character of the Bonalu festival, mentioned earlier, so that animals are no longer sacrificed, in favor of vegetarian rituals. That is, the movement is involved in trying to include the previously disenfranchised subaltern groups within mainstream Hinduism and standardize Hindu practice by all groups.

The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) was founded in September 1925 by a Maharashtrian brahman and physician named Hegewar (1889-1940).²⁵ It was launched at a time when Hindu-Muslim skirmishes were breaking out all over India during the Dasara festival in October to November, which celebrates Rama’s victory over Ravana. Indeed, the corps’ favored deity is Rama, who is particularly popular amongst Hindl-speakers especially since the time of the Hindi bhakta, Tulsidas (1532-1623), and in Maharashtra where Rama became a sacred symbol of Marathi autonomy since the time of Sivaji and Ramdas. The RSS is comprised of a cadre of dedicated “mission­aries” (“pracharahs”), many of them celibate males. Many of them were trained as young men in the political and martial arts in gymnasia. In addition to Rama, most are dedicated to Hanuman, the monkey general of Rama’s army, known in Maharashtra as Maruti. The movement is committed to fostering a national consciousness and cohesion amongst Hindus and working toward making India a Hindu polity rather than a “secular” country. RSS “sevaks” (volunteers) have been active in trying to construct Hindu temples on the sites where mosques have stood and were largely responsible for the destruction of the famed Babri Mosque in Ayodhya in 1992. At the time of the Ayodhya incident the RSS included some 35,000 local units and about 2.5 million active members.²⁶

The Jan Sangh was founded as the political arm of the RSS in 1951 with the assistance of the politically conservative B. Modhak (born 1920).²⁷ The Jan Sangh has led demonstrations to Hinduize the Indian government. For example, it was active in leading a demonstration march in 1967 seeking a national law banning the slaughter of cows and has worked with other groups subsequently to implement the vision of “Hindutva” - a nation representing Hindu values.

The Vishwa Hindu Parisad (VHP - Hindu World Federation) was founded in 1969 and is specially active amongst overseas Indians. The VHP believes Sanskrit to be the oldest of languages and sanatana dharma the oldest of humankind’s religions. Many of its members believe Sanskrit should be compulsory in all India’s schools; and that the slaughter of cows should be forbidden by law. They assume all mosques and churches were originally Hindu shrines and should be restored to their “original” state. It is similarly assumed that Jains, Buddhists, and Sikhs are really Hindus (despite the insistence of these communities to the contrary).²⁸

The Shiv Sena was spawned in Maharashtra as a movement to advance Marathi interests over those of other ethnic groups. It was named after Sivaji, the presumed Marathi hero and founder of the Maratha empire. The Shiv Sena early in the twentieth century was resisting migrations into Mumbai of ethnic groups from the south who were presumably taking jobs away from the locals. Under the leadership of Bal Thackeray, a former journalist, the Shiv Sena became an increasingly militant movement often baiting Muslims and other minorities and seeking to bring about a more nearly homoge­neous Marathi-Hindu culture. The group has been known to threaten non-Hindu shopkeepers and instigate riots in various parts of Mumbai.

Many of these groups support the Bharata Janata Party (BJP - the party for the victory of India), which was founded in 1980 as a successor to the Jan Sangh, as the Hindu alternative to an increasingly ineffective Congress Party, and as a way of installing Hindu values on the national government. Hindu-Muslim tension had been exacerbated in the 1980s by several factors: the conversion of low and outcasted people to Islam in the village of Meenakshipuram, Tamil Nadu, in the early 1980s; response to the strident reaction of Muslims to the killing by tribals of over 1,000 Muslim migrants from Bangladesh into Assam; and the ruling of the Supreme Court in a case known as the Shah Bano case. Simply put, in this case a Muslim woman sought redress from a divorce ruling favoring her husband. The court’s decision was perceived by some Muslims as a threat of “secular” law to the Islamic Shan‘a and conversely, because the Congress Party sought to pass a law permitting Muslims to abide by the Shan‘a, the decision was perceived by many Hindus as the Congress Party’s politicization of ethnicity, that is, as a favoring of Muslims who were permitted to follow Islamic law, while Hindus were obliged to follow secular law.

Studies indicate that, like most of these right-wing Hindu movements, the BJP’s activities are most commonly supported by brahmans, non-brahman upper castes, especially those who are traders and small businessmen, white­collar workers, and those over forty-five years of age - that is, amongst those who seek to retain a certain way of life. Students and laborers are least likely to support the BJP, though there are those upwardly mobile lower-caste men who see in such groups as the RSS a way to improve their circumstances.

These groups combined to engage in a whole range of activities and processions in the 1980s and 1990s. Marches or yatras were held in 1983 and after, seeking “national integration.” In these processions a political-religious agenda was obvious. Large trucks carried brass vessels filled with Ganga water and a picture of “Mother India.” Water would be distributed to Hindu temples along the route. By 1984-86 the processions were designed to reclaim certain mosques for Hindu use, especially that at Ayodhya. The marches asked for sacrifice to liberate the “place of Rama’s birth” (Ayodhya) and while the response in Ayodhya itself was modest, a number of Hindus along the way were energized. In 1990 yet another yatra was performed, this time launched by the BJP in seeking votes. Hindu symbols were used for political ends: the nationaljourney (to Ayodhya) was a pilgrimage; the vehicle carrying the leader of the BJP, at the time Advani, was the “chariot of Rama.” Indeed, the symbol of the BJP is the lotus revered as a sacred symbol of “new creation” throughout the subcontinent and frequently held iconographically by a goddess. Advani exhorted the faithful to be devoted to Ram and exercise people’s power.

While the 1990 procession ended in Advani’s arrest by the government of Uttar Pradesh, yet another procession in 1992 led to destruction of the mosque in Ayodhya. By then the UP government was controlled by the BJP, and the central government by Congress, which thought it had reached a compromise with the pilgrims to permit them to worship at the Ayodhya site, then move on. However, some zealous “sevaks” (volunteers) climbed the mosque and within the day had demolished it with handheld tools. The event led to a series of riots and reprisals that particularly affected crowded parts of cities like Mumbai.

These movements continue to put pressure on the BJP party to Hinduize the national polity. They seek to homogenize the practice of Hinduism through education and socialization; they try to upgrade and include into the Hindu mainstream dalits and scheduled castes who had for years felt disenfranchised by power brokers. They increasingly have sought to become the voice of the “Hindu establishment” which determines the way festivals should be organized and Hindu dharma should be expressed. And while these organizations receive considerable resistance from academics, dalit power blocs, minority communities, and others, they remain very much a part of the contemporary religious landscape of the subcontinent.

The people of India are living at a particularly crucial juncture of history. In many respects, the subcontinent is a microcosm of the world itself, and, in a real sense, that world looks to India to see whether and how it may be possible for people of great diversity to share the same space. On the one hand, the Indian nation-state has made strides since independence which have been remarkable: discriminations based on caste or religion have been constitutionally outlawed; a democratic and unified nation has been maintained despite its great variety (something Europe has yet to do); the opportunity for education has been provided for all its people; resources for medical care have increased; there has been the creation of a large middle class that cuts often through caste, ethnic, and religious boundaries; one of the world’s largest communities of scientists has been created - this is to name but a few of the achievements of the past half century.

Yet “fault lines” persist not so far beneath the surface, which threaten the body politic. Religion has certainly been a part of the rich heritage of India, but religion can also be one of the “fault lines,” used as an excuse to legiti­mate hatred, suspicion, and violence, as it has been in other parts of the world and in India itself. Seldom is religion the sole (or even the main) cause of these eruptions - rather, economic and political marginalizations; the cynical exploitation by politicians of cultural divisions; the fundamental ignorance of members of one community about the history, character, and values of other communities all contribute to the frustrations that sometimes lead to acts of hostility.

Yet, India has had a remarkable history of hosting an enormous spectrum of religious expressions. The present moment has become yet another test of the Indian people’s resilience of spirit. As brahman rubs elbow with dalit, and Muslim or Christian with Hindu, and “folk” forms of religion interact with the “classical,” this is a good time to evoke the sense of humility implied in the tradition which understands every perception of the truth to be a darsan - a viewpoint - each one a strand in the multicolored fabric of humanity’s religious life.

Recommended reading

On Contemporary Indian Society

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Religion in contemporary India

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