Tribal Religion and Revelation

Researchers studying the so-called tribal religion label it as the earliest form of religion in Indian society. Nevertheless, some scholars see less or no difference between Hinduism and tribal religion (Marten 1924:110-111 and Ghurye 1959), though they recognise the accul­turation of tribes into the Hindu fold.

Religious scholars have come up with various theories to understand the religion of tribes or indigenous people that fall outside the purview of world religions. In the anthropology of religion, mention may be made of animism, animatism, naturism, and totemism that are believed to be the earliest forms of religion. The diverse religious beliefs and practices of Indian tribes exhibit features of what the Western scholars had identified as ‘primitive’ religions. Notwithstanding the diverse tribal faiths, these are believed to be influenced by the immediate environment, local histories, and common experiences of the people. Unlike the monotheistic religions, tribal religions do not base their origin on divine revelation, but the reformed religions among tribal communities tend to show an element of revelations similar to world religions. In the Indian context, revelations play an important role in the reformed religion or religious revivalism among tribal communities.

In comparative religion an important distinction is made between ‘natural’ and ‘revealed’ religions; in this regard tribal religion and Hinduism may be classified as non-revealed or natural religion in a sense that their principle beliefs are ‘discerned within the natural order’, unlike the revealed religion which ‘comes from a source other than that of a human recipient, usually god’ (Bowker 1997:814). The development of a belief system within a ‘natural order’ has huge implications in the comparative study between Hinduism and tribal religion, since there are bound to be shared similarities between the two traditions; but with regard to revelations tribal religion is far more enterprising, since it is based on the versatility of oral tradition as compared to Hinduism, which is foundationally based on the ancient scriptures.

Arguably, the instances of revelations in Hinduism have come largely from the folk tradition, rather than the Vedic tradition. This folk tradition where the Sanskritic Hindu gods and goddess become part of the local culturescape and worldview (Srinivas 2003 and Chophy 2019a) has proven a fertile ground for divine revelations, blurring the boundary between the tribes and castes that have been in contact for generations. The ethnographic researchers show that religious innovators from the tribal communities have drawn inspira­tion from their Hindu neighbours to start politico-religious movements.

A less discussed dimension of tribal religion is a belief in a creator god, which is similar to monotheistic religions like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Revelations in the Abrahamic religions hinge on the notion of a powerful, personal, and conscious god; similarly, reli­gious reformation in tribal societies have emerged significantly due to the reinterpretation of a belief in a creator god, rather than the multitude of spirits that are believed to inhabit the physical world. According to Rodney Stark, “Revelations will tend to occur when (a) there exists a supportive cultural tradition of communications with the divine, and (b) the recipient of the revelation(s) has direct contact with a role model, with someone who has had such communications” (Stark 1999:289). The primacy of supernatural beings in tribal religions and cultural contact with world religions has nurtured a strong rendition for rev­elations in tribal societies.

There are substantial ethnographic data to show a belief in the involvement of supernat­ural being(s) in everyday life; in fact, the religious beliefs of tribes has to do with maintain­ing a balance between the human world and the world of the spirits, which gives rise to a host of rites and rituals. A communication with the spirit world is found in most tribal reli­gion, but this existing tradition does not necessarily translate into religious revival or revi­talisation movements. To echo Stark’s thesis, tribal societies possess the cultural tradition of communicating with the supernatural beings, but revitalisation movements involving divine revelations do not take place in a vacuum. In the Indian context, revitalisation movements having origins in the claim of divine revelations are predicated upon the socio-economic and political factors, and contact with the world religions like Hinduism and Christianity.

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