Guest guest Posted February 19, 2010 Report Share Posted February 19, 2010 The following set of questions from a Western Student trying to make sense of Hinduism (with replies from the Hindu Academy) may be of interest to you. ----------------- My name is Laura, and for my World Religions class I am researching the Hindu religion. In order to get accurate information on Hinduism and its practices, I have a questionnaire with some questions for you. I would very much appreciate any and all responses you can give me. Thank you so much. I very much appreciate your help. Sincerely, Laura 1. How do you know what is the right thing to believe? We can take our guidance from our prophets and their teachings but most importantly we must use our common sense to decide what to accept and what not to accept. 2. What do you know about the geography and demographics of your system? Hindus come from the Indian Sub continent. In the last few hundred years many Hindus have migrated to other parts of the world including the UK. About 800 million Hindus live in India (about 80 percent of the Indian population). The population of Hindus in the UK is about 600,000 which is just about one Percent of the population of UK 3. What are the FUNDAMENTAL beliefs of your system · Pluralism: meaning there are many ways to find God (or become spiritual) · Spiritual Humanism: The essential nature of all living things and human beings is God (spirit) · Law of Karma: What we do will influence our destiny – hence we have to take great care in everything we do because we have to bear the consequences of all our actions. · Reincarnation: meaning we will be born again and again until we find our oneness with God (or spirit). 4. What do you believe about the world? The whole creation including earth ~ living and non-living all are essentially the manifestation of God (or spirit) 5. a. What do you believe about human beings? Human beings are the clearest manifestation of God on earth. Highest worship of God is service to men and women. b. Do we have inherent disabilities? Everyone is inherently divine. The disabilities only appear in the external. Our essential nature is pure and perfect but sometimes this is encased in a body or mind that has disabilities. The potential within all of us is infinite (as we are the spirit). c. Do we have a free will? We all have free-will - that is the reflection of our essential being as something that is neither the body nor the mind but the spirit. The spirit shows up as fighting all limitations including limitations of the body and mind. Free will is the sign of the spirit. 6. What do you believe about God? God can be thought of as a super personality (as many Hindus and Christians do). God can also be thought of as a spiritual principle that underlines everything and everyone. When Hindus think of God as a principle they call that BRAHMAN – this is the most comprehensive word for God in Hinduism. All other gods and goddesses are different manifestations of this principle. 7. a. What is wrong, if anything, in our world? Hindus do not believe in Sin .. they say everything is essentially spirit but sometimes we get our priorities wrong. Anything that leads us back to our essential nature as the spirit is Good and anything that takes us away from our essential nature as the spirit can be classed as wrong or bad. b. How can a person be saved from what is wrong? Hindus do not think we have to be saved. They say we have to become illuminated so that we can experience our essential nature as the spirit (or God) 8. What do you believe about the end of the world? Hindus believe in cycles of creation and destruction (called Kalpa). They say that time too has a beginning and end and they say Space / Time / Causation unfold for the creation to come into being and when they reverse the process the universe is crunched up. This is very similar to the idea of Big Bang and Big Crunch theory in cosmology. 9. What ethical principles do your beliefs advocate? Not only should we learn to live with each other (using the ethical Golden rule – do unto others as you would have done unto you) but we must learn to LIVE FOR OTHERS (i.e. seeing ourselves reflected in all living things so we live in all) 10. How do the people of your belief system organize themselves? We do not have bodies like the Vatican or the Church of England that dictate policy for the devotees. The devotees are free to come into groups and follow a particular spiritual path to make spiritual progress. We have many modern prophets who lead some of these groups. (We have to give a WARNING that for every one genuine modern prophet there are a host of charlatans pretending to be prophets.. so we have to be careful as this system is often abused). regards jay Hindu Academy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 21, 2010 Report Share Posted February 21, 2010 Hari Om Ramakrishna Dear Mr. Lakhanai and memebrs Pranam It was certainly of interest and highly illuminating. However, I have somewhat different views on soem of the points which I humbly present by embedding them in green fonts in the body of the QA itself: Wah Guru Ki Fateh Utpal Chakrabarty Jay Lakhani <vivekanandaramakrishna ; Vivekananda ; selfknowledge Sent: Fri, 19 February, 2010 11:50:42 PM[sri Ramakrishna] Understanding Hinduism The following set of questions from a Western Student trying to make sense of Hinduism (with replies from the Hindu Academy) may be of interest to you. ------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -----My name is Laura, and for my World Religions class I am researching the Hindu religion. In order to get accurate information on Hinduism and its practices, I have a questionnaire with some questions for you. I would very much appreciate any and all responses you can give me.Thank you so much. I very much appreciate your help.Sincerely,Laura1. How do you know what is the right thing to believe? This question is not a specific one for any particular religion. Apart from believing what is found by direct observation (Pratakhsya), one may use ones analytical power (Anuman) and believe in the sayings of those whose characters are beyond doubt like the Rishis and Avatars (Apta Vakya). 2. What do you know about the geography and demographics of your system?Percent of the population of UK Apart from those Hindus who migrated from India, there are Hindus in Indonesia who have been living there from ancient times and their features do not bear any similarity with the Indians. 3. What are the FUNDAMENTAL beliefs of your system · 11pt"> c. Do we have a free will?SPAN> Sri Ramakrishna has categorically denied the existence of free will (in absolute term). He said that that misconception that free will exists is by God's design for the relative world or else men would not have feared sin (once one realises that one does not have free will one can not sin). class=MsoNormal>10. How do the people of your belief system organize themselves?#984806"> There is no need to organise - Hindus believe in Universalism. 11pt"> Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 23, 2010 Report Share Posted February 23, 2010 Hi Laura, As much as Jay has explained your questions so well, I would like to give you a few links that may help you in your research. Hindu-Christian Point-Counterpoint http://www.himalayanacademy.com/basics/point/index.html Hinduism v/s Christianity- Major differences (from a former Christian now a practicing Hindu) http://karthikseetharaman.blogspot.com/2008/05/hinduism-vs-christianity.html OM Shanti, Alphanso. http://www.youtube.com/user/Alphanso108 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 24, 2010 Report Share Posted February 24, 2010 Hari Om Ramakrishna Dear Members Pranam, I feel a bit uncomfortable when I hear the word "differences" in relation to religions; why not talk about the commonalities and harmonise all the faiths. Sri Ramakrishna was born to teach the world that not only all religions are true but the same Truth can be realised through all of them. The age is of Universalising religion and forming human fraternity Wah Guru Ki Fateh Utpal Chakrabarty alphansojohn <alphanso108Ramakrishna Sent: Tue, 23 February, 2010 11:08:12 AM[sri Ramakrishna] Re: Understanding Hinduism Hi Laura, As much as Jay has explained your questions so well, I would like to give you a few links that may help you in your research. Hindu-Christian Point-Counterpointhttp://www.himalaya nacademy. com/basics/ point/index. htmlHinduism v/s Christianity- Major differences (from a former Christian now a practicing Hindu)http://karthikseeth araman.blogspot. com/2008/ 05/hinduism- vs-christianity. htmlOM Shanti,Alphanso.http://www.youtube. com/user/ Alphanso108 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted February 24, 2010 Report Share Posted February 24, 2010 This point... I like a lot. This has meaning for me tonight. Hinduism: the problem with humanity is ignorance of their true Self and thinking that they exist seperate/outside of God. The solution is to reawaken to our true nature. To see God in ourselves and everything and everyone and thus treat (respect, honor, etc) ourselves, everything, and everyone the same way we treat God. alphansojohn <alphanso108Ramakrishna Sent: Mon, February 22, 2010 5:08:12 PM[sri Ramakrishna] Re: Understanding Hinduism Hi Laura, As much as Jay has explained your questions so well, I would like to give you a few links that may help you in your research. Hindu-Christian Point-Counterpointhttp://www.himalaya nacademy. com/basics/ point/index. htmlHinduism v/s Christianity- Major differences (from a former Christian now a practicing Hindu)http://karthikseeth araman.blogspot. com/2008/ 05/hinduism- vs-christianity. htmlOM Shanti,Alphanso.http://www.youtube. com/user/ Alphanso108 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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