What We Learnt About Hinduism?

 Hinduism is one of the hardest subjects (Or Is it Saivism? ) to hate during Ordinary Level as for most people Its a hard subject to fail. You memorize some Thevarams, Thirukkuravar stories and they dont even bother to change the first question of the paper (It's the same question over and over again.). It's a boring subject to study but is easy to score off (Its like Anti English Literature in that aspect). But how many of us got a better understanding about Hinduism after studying it for the exam.

 I memorized all those Thevaarams for the exam and after 5 years of the examination, no of Thevarams I remember has a grand total of 3! This is not only me, This could be applicable to my friends too. You don't copy and paste when you're writing for an exam, it's always Cut and Paste. This is not only isolated to Religion subject though, but unlike other subjects we don't get to study Hinduism in our higher studies!

What do we study in our subject Hinduism? 

  Things what we study in our Primary school is the foundation of your higher studies and the building is only as strong as your foundation. They teach us about all these supposed miracles that god and his devotees have done. Thiru Gnana Sambanthar story and all the other stories that I learned in my primary is still fresh in my mind (Had I remembered those stories in my grade 3 Hinduism exam, I would've scored better than 33). When I look back at those stories they sound stupid, but those stories could leave a large imprint on young impressionable infants. These stories are used so that the kids would learn the moral of the story in an easier manner.

But the problem is when those kids grow up into young adults, most of them gather enough common sense to know that most of those stories are untrue! But when they realize the truth, their thought process is that they believe even those Morals of the stories are untrue! Those stories made them believe Hiduism is all about those miracles and superstitions! In an age when being an atheist is a fashionable thing, Its hard to explain the bigger picture of Hinduism to them. 

Lot of them might not question the religion and will continue to believe in what they were told. Or worse, they might go behind those so called "Human Gods" ! But the truth is that the religion will only be carried forward by those who question not by those who follow!

Anbe Sivam is the best Tamil movie I have ever watched, and it is a must watch movie for everyone who have eyes! That movie is the creation of a Popular atheist Kamal Hasan! But he captured the essence of Religion in that movie! Name says it all "Love is God" ! Its the essence of our Religion, which has been gift wrapped by those miracle stories and superstitions! And we are ogling around the Gift Wrap rather than the Gift itself.

Once I posted in Twitter

Hinduism has lot to offer than these stupid Superstitions! But sadly even some of these hardcore Hindus are unaware of that!! 

A Pakistani friend of mine replied me saying " Can you explain me how is it so? I am from Pakistan and I still believe Hinduism is all about superstitions" ! Cant blame him for thinking about Hinduism like that when we have loads of Hindus who believe in the gift wrapping rather than the gift.

And How many of us know the history of ourselves? 

Do you know that Hinduism and Judaism are the oldest religions to be practiced even today!! We are not taught to be proud of ourselves. They just mention about Harappa and Mohanjadaro in passing for like one page of our text book. History books of other nations might have a better description of it. 

We prefer to see things under a sentimental point of view rather than a historical perspective. We are not striving hard to do excavations in our historic areas to validate our historical importance. They say that there are lot of yet to be found historically important sculptures around Thiru Koneswaram area. But yet they aren't interested about the excavations but instead they are trying to build one more Shiva statue.

All the other contemporary religions of Hinduism are extinct now with the exception of Judaism (Even after the best efforts from Hitler). Greek and Egyptian Mythologies are just "Mythologies" now. If you take a close look into those religions you could find a lot of similarities between them and Hinduism. The hierarchy of gods, The way they built their temple and lot of other things are very much similar to Hinduism. Yet only one of those religion is still being practiced now. 

Why is that? Because Hinduism is flexible, not like other religions Hinduism can adapt and live. We dont have lot of rigid laws in our religion, The guy who doesn't eat meat at all is also a hindu and a guy who eats meat all 7 days of the week is also a Hindu (Me) ! 

 But the concern with teaching our historical values to our future generation is we may create more Religious extremists like BJP ! And if we teach the future generation our historical and philosophical values (In the right way) we might carry our religion forward!

PS : I am the exception, I hated the subject Hinduism. The Editor of this souvenir used to be neck to neck with me in other subject marks but will pip me out with the Religion marks (He is so good in memorizing things) Maybe thats why he is studying medicine now!! learnt