Hinduism for Non-Hindus

Together with all of the other great religions of the world, Hinduism is poorly understood in the United States. If you’d like to read just one book about it, I suggest The Hindu Tradition: Readings in Oriental Thought edited by Ainslie T. Embree.

Although the book was first published in 1966, it’s so readable and widely respected it’s still readily available on the Web. On April 17, 2005, I found 110 new and used copies listed at bookfinder.com, priced from $1.48 to $35.95 a copy. You can also borrow the book through almost any public library.

The first misconception newcomers to Hinduism might need to shuck is the belief it’s polytheistic. Many Westerners assume Hinduism is polytheistic then use the label to pigeonhole and dismiss the religion. It’s certainly true 50,000 gods and goddesses exist in Hinduism. But it’s equally true Hindus believe there’s only one God, Brahman, the Absolute. Brahman in Hinduism is similar to godhead in Christianity.

Even the poorest beggar on the streets of Calcutta will insist on the truth of the compound statement that 50,000 gods exist in Hinduism AND there is only one God, Brahman. Think of it like this: The one God Brahman has 50,000 aspects expressed creatively and artistically as 50,000 gods and goddesses. The Hindu conception is no more polytheistic than the Christian idea of Trinity. Besides, who says God is limited by human reason or logic? If God is God, he/she/it, by definition, is without limitation.

In fact, there are millions of gods in Hinduism, one god for every religious Hindu because Hindus believe God is not only up there and out there in some vague place but also right down here and inside us. The Divine, Hindus say, is not only transcendent but also immanent; that is to say, God lives not only in heaven but also pervades everyone and everything in the universe. It is in this sense that millions or billions of gods exist in Hinduism—one god, or one aspect of god, within every person, fish, and stone.

These ideas help explain the famous Hindu equation “Atman equals Brahman.” A crude translation of the Sanskrit might be “the human soul (Atman) equals God (Brahman) because they are One, not two. Hindus are not saying the human ego, personality, characteristics, actions, flaws are divinely perfect. Rather, they mean something similar to what Westerners mean when we say each human being contains a divine spark even when the spark is buried deep in the mud of imperfection.

Ultimately, of course, the Divine is beyond human reason and much must be taken on faith, although Hindus firmly believe Brahman can be experienced on Earth while still alive through meditation and in other ways.

The Oneness or monistic equation is perhaps the oldest theme in Hinduism. It pervades the ancient Vedic religion and literature, such as the Rig Veda. It flowered in the Upanishads and Bhagavad Gita, and it continues today in the Vedanta branch of Hinduism so beloved around the world, as well as in the magnificent poetry of Aurobindo and Tagore.

The Oneness idea in Hinduism is not pantheism, and religious Hindus would likely be impatient or offended by the suggestion. Another important point is that not all Hindus are monists. Dualism, the belief that the Divine and the human are separate realities—the dominant religious idea of the West—is also a highly respected faith of many Hindus.

Hinduism is probably the world’s oldest living religion and is therefore, arguably, the most evolved. It never froze around any particular deity or dogmatism but continued to grow, evolve, and integrate religious ideas throughout its immense history, like a gigantic, passionately spiritual amoeba.

How far back does Hinduism go? No one knows for sure, but my guess is 5,000 to 10,000 years, although it may actually be many thousands of years older than that.

In any event, Hinduism is worth reading at least one book about, if for no other reason than to take out the garbage of misconceptions, to which I may have inadvertently added because, after all, I am not a Hindu. But Hindu or not, I've learned as much about God from Hinduism as from any other religion.