Hindu Fundamentalism and Sati Restorationism

[ignorantianescia]

I just read about this Hindu movement seeking to reinstate sati. I guess most people are familiar with nationalist Hindu fundamentalists and their attitude to other religions (hit squads), but it was quite a surprise to me (in hindsight rather naïve) that they actually wanted to reinstate the practice. This piece from a Hindu teacher mentioned a protest march against the movement and this one from a Catholic (who does resort to very misogynistic language in reference to some American very unconventional Catholic ladies, so be warned, but is otherwise a good read) discusses some of their other crimes. Their own website, of course, goves no results when searching on sati or suttee.

Which made me think, I rarely (if ever) hear from Hindu fundamentalist nationalism in the news and never of sati restorationism. Maybe this is different in the UK (after all, Dutch news also has a special focus on Indonesian, Moluccan and Surinamese affairs), but it is highly contrasting with the media focus on other fundamentalists, both Christian and Muslim.

[noons]

I've read some stories about this when they hit the news, mostly having to do with Hindu fundamentalists physically attacking Christian converts in India. And I've always been perplexed about it, mainly from my minimal knowledge of Hinduism. I'm looking at it from a Pascal's Wager perspective: according to the Hindus, the Christian converts will simply come back in another life, according to the Christians...you get the picture. So what are these particular Hindus so angry about?

[perplexedseeker]

From what I have heard (I know some Hindus very well) it's less about religion per se than about the caste system (which is often practised by Hindus, but is not essential to Hinduism). You are quite correct that Pascal's Wager works out quite differently for a Hindu (everyone is affected by divine justice or karma regardless of whether or not they assert or deny factual statements about God in any single incarnation), which is why historically they have never put much effort into proselytising.

The problem is that under the caste system, the lower orders are treated so badly that conversion is a highly attractive prospect as it means the higher castes no longer have a hold on you (particularly for Christianity with its long history of popularity with oppressed minorities). Although the caste system has legally been abolished in India, in rural areas it still persists, and the reports I have read suggest that the riots against Christians have been instigated by high-caste polemicists who are worried about losing their authority over converts.

[ignorantianescia]

That makes a lot of sense. I recall having read an article that underpinned an important difference between monotheistic religions of the Abrahamic branch (the writer actually also included Zoroastrianism, but not in the Abrahamic category) and Eastern religions; in Abrahimic religions (and Zoroastrianism according to the author, I know little of Zoroastrianism though) creation has been fundamentally corrupted (though to a varying degree) in events like the Fall of Man, requiring a reform (of a religious nature), while Eastern religions tend to promote a view of an inherently good or neutral world in which balance is fundamental, with the natural order being reflected in the social order. The author argues that this urge of reform is part of what makes universalist Abrahamic religions appeal to oppressed minorities (Marxism is said to derive this same tendency from Christianity, a credible point I think), but does not exclude religious and other social motivations. In particularly among the outcasts Christianity is popular enough to get the special term Dalit Christianity.

But I do wonder why the conversions are such a recent phenomenon, since Christianity has been around in India for an incredibly long time, before several European lands were Christianised.

[perplexedseeker]

Whilst I think there is something to what you say, it's important to remember that the "eastern" religions have histories and diverging branches of philosophy every bit as complex as the Abrahamaic religions. Whilst some schools of Hinduism are highly conservative and authoritarian, there are many universalist Hindus, in the strongest theological sense (every soul will achieve final and perfect union with God), though there is considerable debate as to how this can be achieved. Not to mention, various sects of the Abrahamaic religions also have a concept of an ideal natural order, however corrupted it may be in the present state, which has been invoked many times to stifle social reform (using the Great Chain of Being to justify feudalism and imperialism, for example).

You are correct that there are very old Christian communities in India, though most date from the arrival of European missionaries during the 17th century onwards. The British occupation also resulted in a fair few conversions. I would say that the recent violence is due to long-term political trends in India. The leaders after independence were mostly British-educated secularists, who wished to transform India into a secular nation state modeled on the USA and France. However, their successors failed to address chronic problems of corruption and poverty, which prompted a resurgence of nationalist religious groups, who had objected to the secularists in the first place but now found themselves with much support among the dispossessed. The removal of "foreign" names from cities like Bombay (now Mumbai) and Madras (now Chennai) is just part of this trend. It's not just Christians. Look up the Ayodhya Controversy to see that some Muslims have been having problems as well.

[ignorantianescia]

Fair enough, I'm aware of those universalist Hindu movements (I think the site of the Swami in my other post is one), but I am not sure whether they view the natural order as corrupted. I think the generalisation holds overall from my knowledge of various eastern religions (not that afwul much I admit, though I know of some various sects within them), at least I am not familiar with lapsarian beliefs. Note that I am using universalist in a different meaning than in my previous post, I used it to distinguish Islam and Christianity from Judaism, in which affiliation is usually the result of being a member of the Jewish nation (joining Judaism is of course possible, but you would be asked several times to reconsider before joining).

Anyway, what the author (and thus I when trying to pass the message) means with natural order is an explicitly not lapsarian state. Though I little reasons to doubt that medieval theologians have tried to justify feudal systems (medieval theology is again something I hardly know anything of), I would doubt whether they were not lapsarian or whether they would reject the need of changing the corrupted order if they are lapsarian. I completely agree that a lapsarian worldview does not necessarily encompass social reform.

So would you suppose that the increase in power of reactionary Hindu groups is reason for outcasts and people from lower castes to convert? There has also been some news of Hindus converting to Islam, but I lack reliable figures or news articles for being certain.