The Book

This book is a collection of ideas about Hinduism from Swami Vivekananda, by Swami Tattwavidananda. The book is available here.

Summary

Origin of the word Hindu

It was a term started by Persians to call the people who lived on the other side of the Indus river. Vaidikas (followers of veda) or Vedantists (followers of vedanta) is a more apt word for a Hindu.

The vedas

Vedas are the knowledge of God himself. As such, they don't have a beginning nor an end. Rishis (the seer of thought or knowledge), were mere discoverers of this knowledge that already existed in the universe. Vedas are divided into 2 parts:

  1. Karma Kanda - the duties of student, man, householder and recluse
  2. Jnana Kanda - Vedanta or the end of Vedas, the spiritual portion. It comprises of Upanishads.

Different Schools of Thought

There are 2 pre-dominant interpretations of Vedanta:

  1. Dualists - Dwaita philosophy
  2. Monists - Adwaita philosophy These mainly differ in the way they relate between God, Soul and Nature.

Vedanta is not the Adwaita system only

Every sect is mainly an interpretation of the 3 Prasthana's:

  1. Upanishads - Revelations - Shruti's
  2. Sutras - Vyasa Sutras - a consummation of all preceding philosophies!
  3. Gita - the divine commentary of the Vedanta itself

Smriti's

Books written by sages to lead us on how to live our lives, corresponding to the state of that society of that time. However, they are subordinate to the Vedanta, in the sense that if they contradict anything in Vedanta, they are supposed to be rejected. Because Vedanta is built upon eternal principles.

Puranas and Tantras

Puranas are simplified version of Vedas to be amenable towards common people. They talk about the same eternal principles in forms of stories. Tantras were an attempt to revive the sacrificial ideas found in Karma Kanda.

Why different sects?

Even though there so many sects, the book goes onto concentrate on the intersection of all these, which every Hindu must believe

Theory of creation

This world has not been created by God on one fine day. It is, instead, continually undergoing through the process of creation and disintegration. Thus, there is no beginning or end to this Nature (aka Prakriti).

Brahman

The Almighty, benevolent eternal being who creates and sustains this universe is Brahman. But the disparity/partiality we see in our worlds is mainly due to the fault of ours, for it is not the fault in clouds, but the properties of the land who receives their rains, to grow good crops.

Law of Karma

A child is not born out of gift from nature, but born due to his infinite past. So, the differentiation we see around us is caused by us and only us. We are the cause and the effect of our own deeds. If we can be sad, we could be happy too. If we are impure, we can become pure too. This is the law of Karma.

The Soul

We cannot understand God without the understanding of Soul (Atman). Every form of life has a soul, however big or small. Atman goes through the process of birth and death of the body, accompanied by the mind (Sukshma Sharira). The ultimate goal, hence, should not be heaven, but freedom (Mukti) from this cycle into an Eternal Bliss (Aananda). Just like we are distracted by power, position and money in this materialistic world, we will be distracted by similar such situations even in heaven.

Mukti or Freedom

Ignorance is the cause for all bondage. Knowledge is the means to break this bondage. This knowledge is attained through Bhakti, love towards God and his creation.

Life after Death

There is no permanent heaven without the realization of God. Also, anything with name and form has a beginning and end in time. Likewise heavens too are temporary and we should give up on them and instead pursue Eternal Bliss.

Universalism

God is like the same light coming in different colors out of the prism. He is like the string unifying all the pearls (religions, beliefs, etc) together.

Image worship

Rose called by any other name still smells sweet. Different forms of worship of God, under different names, images and idols are all but an effort by our minds to try to realize the divine. This is because material image calls upon the mental idea and vice-versa. Hence, none of these forms of worship be called sin.

Guru

Every soul is destined to be perfect. But the trigger to become perfect only comes from another soul. We could learn about spirituality from infinite books. Those will only tell us how to speak spiritualism, but do not help when it comes to its practice. This only happens with the interaction and guidance of another soul, called Guru (the teacher).

Divine incarnation

Divine incarnations are the highest manifestations of God through a man. They are the teachers of all teachers. These are the ones we are bound to workship. Being humans, we cannot see God and worship Him as anything other than a human. There are only two kinds of people who do not worship God as another human: an ignorant fellow and a free soul (Jeevanmukta) who has expanded his knowledge to understand that God is everywhere.

Yoga - The means

Yoga (union) is the union between the following four directions, that which applies to all sectors of people in a community.

  1. To the worker, between man and the whole of humanity - Karma Yoga
  2. To the mystic, between his lower and higher self - Raja Yoga
  3. To the lover, between himself and the God - Bhakti Yoga
  4. To the philosopher, the union of all existence - Jnana Yoga An ideal religion is the one that finds harmony among all these 4 directions. A Yogi is one who practices in any of these forms of Yoga.

Raja Yoga

There are 3 sorts of instruments of knowledge:

  1. Intuition - basest of all the instruments, found in all animals.
  2. Reason - found in men. But even this has limitations when it comes to acquiring knowledge.
  3. Inspiration - our reasoning functions only within the realm of our own consciouness. Inspiration is the third instrument that can helps us gain knowledge beyond the limited realm of our reasoning

Note, however, that all these 3 instruments will never contradict each other.

Concentration is the main workhorse behind every deed of a man. It is a way of trying to bring to focus, our galloping mind, into the very act one is doing. Raja Yoga deals with the challenges of trying to get our minds to concentrate.

Karma Yoga

Karma Yoga deals with the aspect of attaining God through work. Greater part of out energies are spent dealing with misery, misery which arises through our expectation of something in return for the work we have done, for the help we did for another human being. A Karma Yogi is deattached from his work, he only gives and cares less in return, thereby, he is free from the pains of misery.

Bhakti Yoga

Bhakti Yoga teaches us how to love God. It shows us God is there in every form of love.

Jnana Yoga

Jnana Yoga teaches us that every life is a manifestation of God Himself. It shows us the real unity of being, that each one of us is the Lord Himself.

The Goal

All these forms of Yogas must not only be studied, but most importantly carried out in practice. They must be listened to, mulled over, reasoned with, meditated upon and practised, until they become part of us. After all, religion is all about realization, not just ideals and theories.