Excerpts from “Word as a Weapon”

Some months ago, I came across this extremely well-written and persuasive article by Dr Frank Morales on: “Word as a Weapon: The Misuse of Terminology in the Study of Hinduism“.

It echoed a theme that had been at the back of my mind since I first read Dr David Frawley’s “Idols and Icons” more than a year ago (Issue #2, Sept ’04).

Context
Almost all the reporting and politico-social commentary in India today (especially in English) is heavily shaped by a western (often dating back to colonial times) interpretation of terms related to Hinduism and Hindutva. A good example of this was the essay I wrote some time ago on “Castes, Varnas and Jatis” (Issue #8, Jun ’05).
While the interpretation is, at times, harmless in its inaccuracy or misunderstanding, more often than not, the distorted, misinterpreted and incomplete theories [pl. see footnote] that result as a consequence, deeply influence and shape the political & intellectual debate and often put Hindutva-adherents on a defensive.

Worse, they subtly influence and shape the thought processes of children and young adults (a group that today comprises well over 50% of the population and is generally more educated, more confident, economically better off and has more longevity than their preceding generations).

To compound this situation, mass media (in particular the medium of television) and the penchant for “instant news and analysis” perpetuates these distortions and misunderstandings to such a degree that any attempt to “correct” them or to set the record straight is viewed in terms of fanaticism or fundamentalism (Incidentally since when did the term fundamentalist become an insult?) and perceived as being medieval and opposed to a “progressive” mind-set.

Which is why essays like these are extremely important and need to be publicised as widely as possible.

Although the essay explores “only a few of the more insidious terms used specifically throughout the history of South Asian Studies and Hindu Studies”, Dr Morales has gone beyond simply identifying the misused terms. Not only does he give us a proper perspective of several of these terms, he also offers alternative & more accurate terms.

The essay is a very good example of how this distortion has taken place and the side-effects of the constant repetition of the original misinterpretation.

Hinduism or Sanatana Dharma ?
Dr Morales begins his essay by examining the terms “Hindu/Hinduism”. Most readers would be aware, as Dr Morales says that “the term “Hindu” is not a term that is inherent to the religion itself. Rather, the term is known to have been first coined by the ancient Persians, who were culturally, religiously, and perspectively extrinsic to the culture. The term was first used by these ancient Persians in order to conveniently designate the ancient Vedic spiritual culture, and was mistakenly used to refer to the Vedic religion as primarily a geographic and ethnic phenomenon, more than as a religio-philosophical world-view.To the ancient Persians, the word “Hindu” simply referred to the culture, people, religion and practices of the peoples who lived on the other side of the Sindhu River. In the ancient Avestan Persian language ‘s’ grammatically became ‘h’. Thus, the Persians pronounced the name of this river “Hindhu”, rather than “Sindhu”. Thus, ironically, the currently used word “Hindu” is itself a corruption of the Persian word “Hindhu”, which is in turn a corruption of the term “Sindhu”, which is itself only referring to a river, and not a religion! Thus when the word “Hindu” is used today to refer to the ancient religion of India, the term is in actuality a corruption of a corruption of a word whose meaning is irrelevant to begin with.

The terms “Hindu/Hinduism” were not used by practitioners of the ancient religion nor do they any reference in ancient classical literature. Unsurprisingly, the word was absent from many of the local dialects until the medieval times.

Even if one was to ignore the obvious confusion here between a religion and a “way of life” (or a set of beliefs and practices) and consider “Hindu” simply as a term to denote the ancient religion, we must bear in mind that this usage is fairly recent.

As Dr Morales points out, “It was not, in fact, until as late as the 19th century, under the colonial rule of the British Raj, that these dual terms even acquired any legal significance on a national scale in India.”

The actual term that the Vedic tradition uses to refer to itself is “Dharma”. The word Dharma is found repeatedly throughout the entire corpus of the Vedic scriptures, from the Rg Veda to the Bhagavad Gita. There is almost no scripture in the entirety of Hinduism where one will not come across the word Dharma as the pre-eminent name of the religion in question.(In particular) the name “Sanatana Dharma” has been the most widely used name of this ancient religion, and is used as far back as the Rg Veda, the very earliest scripture of Hinduism, and the earliest written text known to humanity.
The term has a profound philosophical implication which is often not realised and not many may be aware of it.

As Dr Morales explains, although “Sanatana” can be roughly translated as “eternal”, translating the term “Dharma” in English is less straightforward.

Unlike the word “sanatana”, the term ”dharma” is a term that can be properly rendered into the English language only with the greatest of difficulty. This is the case because there is no one corresponding English term that fully renders both the denotative and the connotative meanings of the term with maximal sufficiency.

In essence, “dharma is communicating a metaphysical concept”. A thing’s dharma is what constitutes the thing’s very essence, without which, the very concept of the thing would be rendered meaningless. To illustrate the full meaning of this term, we can use the following examples: It is the dharma of water to be wet. Without the essential attribute (dharma) of wetness, the concept and existential fact of water loses all meaning. Likewise, it is the dharma of fire to be hot, the dharma of space to be expansive, etc.

The crux of Dr Morales’ argument is this: “Hinduism” is a term that was coined to describe a religious culture and tradition that observers saw in a purely ethnic, geographical and social context. It fails to capture the metaphysical aspects and the philosophical richness of the ancient religion tradition. The breadth of the belief system alone makes it a far richer concept than any “-ism”.

So although it will continue to be used for the sake of convenience if nothing else, it is important o realise that it misses some very important and conceptually rich dimensions of the Vedic/Hindu religion.

Myths as Sacred Stories
Dr Morales then examines the word “idol” for which he suggests “Murti” as an alternative and finally analyses the term “myth” which is often used to describe the various stories in ancient texts.

“The related terms “myth”, “mythology”, “mythological”, etc., have had an interesting history and a very pointed polemic use in Euro-American discourse on Sanatana Dharma. That the terms are rife with very negative connotations is doubted by very few. The way the terms are used today both within academia, as well as by the general public, is to denote something that is untrue, false, a lie, “primitive” (i.e., not Euro-American).

Dr Morales asserts that right from the very beginning, academic research into ancient Indian literature has been shaped by simplistic misconceptions of the 18th Century European classicists about their own Greco-Roman, pre-Christian religious and cultural heritage which have been “grafted onto all contemporary non-Christian cultures – including that of India.”

These historians simplistically divided religious stories and legends in two categories: myths and history. While mythology got relegated to the disciplines of anthropology and ethnic studies, the study of “history” got more prominence and credibility.
Needless to say, most studies of Hindu religious legends fell under mythology, although many had strong (and in some cases stronger that Western religious stories) historical basis.

The irony, as Dr Morales eloquently points out is that “the evidence for supposed historical facts (in Western religious history studies) are in many cases no stronger, or even less so, than the evidence supporting the historicity of the ancient stories of Sanatana Dharma. What these Western scholars and their Westernized Indian counterparts called the “mythical” Sarasvati River, for example, was later discovered to be a concrete geological fact in our century by no less empirical evidence than satellite photography. Krishna’s “mythological” city of Dvaraka was, likewise, impertinently discovered off the coast of Gujarat about three decades ago

Despite these hard geological and archeological facts, the histories of the Puranas and Itihasas are – unlike the stories of the Bible – summarily relegated by modern Euro-American scholars to the misty realm of myth. Or more bluntly: to the realm of primitive fables. If we would venture to speculate that what has brought this stark double standard about has been nothing less than European xenophobia and intellectual colonialism, coupled with a very strong element of Hindu inferiority complex, we would not be far from the mark.

I would go a step further and point out that it is not just the histories that have been ignored but also the science, the mathematics and the advanced skills in medicine, astronomy and several other subject areas revealed in these texts.
Even well-educated and otherwise clear-thinking Indians (and Hindus) often ignore, pooh-pooh or worse, laugh off the evidence when confronted with it. I suspect it is at least partially because of the mental block that is immediately created when you say something is a myth vs. if you were to say that it is “unknown” history.

As Dr Morales says, “Whether such unscholarly use of these otherwise legitimate terms will be allowed to continue as a weapon against the sacred stories of Vedic culture, or whether the use of such terms will be relegated to the same dust-bin of other such derogatory terms, is up to the will of the global Hindu community.
We ourselves, as Hindus, need to stop using derogatory terms to describe the beliefs and elements of our religion. Such terms as “myth” should be absolutely anathema to every sincere and self-respecting Hindu when speaking about the sacred stories of Sanatana Dharma. If we ourselves don’t have the determination to describe our own religion in legitimate and positive terms, how can we expect anyone else to?

As a more positive alternative to these terms, I propose more culturally sensitive term “Sacred Stories” (already used in studies of other formally oppressed non-Christian cultures e.g. that of the Native Americans) –  or divya katha (and although) we can debate over the actual meaning of these stories Let us, in any case be in agreement that these Sacred Stories must never again be degraded by terming them “myth”.

He concludes by saying, “It is my fervent hope that we  will stop using the terminology of our antagonists to describe our religion. We must begin to call our religion by its true name we must never use the words “idol” and “mytholog” to describe our murtis and sacred stories again. We must reclaim our heritage. Such positive change might come about slowly, one person at a time. Every revolution, however, begins with thoroughly grasping the power of the word.

I wish more of us would think about that.

Footnote:
Another example is the essay on Aryan Invasion in the last issue  which basically hinges around the fundamental misunderstanding of the meaning of the word, “Arya”)

Related Posts: Setting the record straight: Pantha, Dharma and Secularism