Question: How do you explain someone that a pig is unlike any other bird?

Correct Response: The answer doesn’t lie in how a pig is different from other birds but it requires the understanding that a pig is not a bird at all. Similarly, in the case of Hinduism: What type of a religion is Hinduism? The answer doesn’t lie in how Hinduism is different from other religions but it requires the understanding that it is not a religion at all.

Strictly speaking, Hinduism is not even a culture, or a way of life, as many have tried to portray for their own vested interests. The question is just like asking, “What type of a religion is Indianism? If ‘Indianism’, a word that nobody to date has felt the desire to promote, is not a culture/way of life, then Hinduism is not a culture/way of life either.

It may be possible to consider Hinduism, like Indianism, as a culmination of various, some totally unrelated traditions, faiths and cultures (Not culture.. but cultures with ‘s’) from the vast land of the  Asian Subcontinent. For many, the opposing ways of life and contradictory religions were alien to each other due to great distances and other factors between them.

The term Hinduism was coined by the British as late as the early nineteenth century in a not so mindful attempt to donate ‘a’ way of life for the then Indians called ‘The Hindus’. A Hindu was a settler/occupier of a land called Hindustan, which today is known as India.

The term Hinduism, with it a new definition of ‘Hindu’ as a (perceived) follower of Hinduism’ came into everyday use after the RSS started successfully promoting it in since 1925 to date. They initially allowed the masses to believe that Hinduism is a religion. What an Indian is to India, a Hindu was to Hindustan.

An Indian has nothing to do with a religion but can follow any religion. Similarly, a Hindu had/has nothing to do with any particular religion either and could follow any belief system and what an Indian from India is to Indianism, a Hindu from Hindustan was to Hinduism. Hindu and Hinduism are terms related to Hindustan as Indian and Indianism are terms related to India.

A Hindu was and an Indian is nothing more than a geographical identity. Since constitutionally there is no country called Hindustan, there is no geographical identity called Hindu. The Indian constitution states that the people of India are firstly and lastly Indians NOT Hindus.

The words ‘Hindu’ and ‘Hinduism’ often cause grave confusion in important discussions and debates. It’s better to use the words Indian and Indianism instead. It’s about time, the confusion-creating misleading words are made obsolete.

What Hinduism really means when used in everyday language: What is commonly referred to as Hinduism is really Brahminism. Brahmin and non-Brahmin scholars agree that there is no such religion called Hinduism. The words “Hindu” and “Hinduism” do not appear in any Vedic or other Brahminic religious texts.

The word Hindu in Persian means a dark-skinned slave who is a thief. It was used by the Persians to refer to the ‘Kaffir’ citizens/residents of the land they invaded which they themselves referred to as Hindustan. So the word Hindu was a geographical term and not a religious term used for ‘a person from Hindustan’.

It had nothing to do with the comparatively newly coined British word ‘Hinduism’. Just as there can be a group of religions (e.g. Islam, Christianity, and Judaism) called Abrahamic religions; Similarly, a failed attempt has been made to form a group of many different religions of India and call that group of religions as Hinduism. Hinduism is generally mean two different things by the common man causing unnecessary confusion. It can either mean: a) BRAHMINISM. The way of life of the Brahmins where   Hinduism = Casteism, and Casteism = Hinduism or b) INDIANISM. Here ‘Indianism’ being a word like ‘Hinduism’ which hasn’t much beneficial use either but certainly causes less confusion therefore in discussions related to religion, it makes more sense to use the words ‘BRAHMINISM’ instead of ‘Hinduism’ and ‘BRAHMIN’ instead of ‘Hindu’ and in discussions not related to religion, it makes more sense to use the words ‘CASTEISM’ instead of ‘Hinduism’ and ‘CASTEIST’ instead of ‘Hindu’

Author – Shekhar Bodhakar

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