Tag Archive for: Religious tolerance

Are Hindus indifferent to people of other religions? Why is there no practice of converting others to Hindu religion? Are Hindus indifferent to their own religion?

No. It is not true that Hindus are indifferent to other religions. Because Hindus, knowingly or unknowingly, consciously or unconsciously believe that there are other paths through other faiths leading to God, they have a tendency to accept others following their own faiths in their own ways.

The Rig Veda says “Ekam sat, vipra bahuta vadanti” — ‘The truth is one, seers speak of it differently’. Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa said “yat mat, tat path” –‘as many faiths, so many paths’.

That’s why Hindus never went about doing conversion of people of other religions to Hinduism. That’s why Hindus accepted people of other religions to come and settle in India and gave them freedom to follow their faiths.

Hindus have all along been doing it matter of factly, without the need for pseudo-secularists educating them on it.

That was the strength of Hinduism. Unfortunately, there are indeed certain religions in this world whose spiritual mentality is not designed to be so generous and all encompassing. Those religions seem designed to be arrogant, pushy, greedy, self-serving, adamant and bulldozing.

That’s where the problems for Hindus started in India. There is a saying in Tamil:

இடத்தை கொடுத்தால் மடத்தைப் பிடுங்குவான்
‘Idatthai kodutthaal madatthai pidunguvaan’

Meaning: “If you give him a place to rest in your Math (monastry) he will forcefully grab from you the entire Math!”

There is yet another one:

“ஒண்ட வந்த பிடாரி, ஊர் பிடாரியை விரட்டியதாம்”
‘Onda vantha pidaari, oor pidariyai virattiyathaam’

Meaning: The goddess of the next village begged to stay in the local temple and when permitted, ousted the local goddess!’

Such things started happening widely on account of Hindu elite educated class, marginalized class and the ruling class started neglecting, mocking at and unjustly criticizing Sanata Dharma without any deeper understanding of its greatness. The pseudo-secularists were in the forefront in doing this damage from inside.

Hence, as a consequence, Hindus seem to be becoming increasingly pessimistic about their own innate nature of broadmindedness and started wondering whether they have bent too much to allow others to sit on their backs and ride them.

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