From Srinivas Bharadwaj <srini.bharadwaj@gmail.com
The various models of Dharmic Resistance over the centuries have included importantly
Meijism. In the 19th Century, Japan, began a switch from a traditional Dharmic to an Industrial
post-agrarian society. Meijisim adopted several of the new technologies while also retaining its
older perspectives and built the first successful evolution of a Dharmic Industrial Society. China,
on the other hand evolved down a different road, having turned to Communism and taking with it,
several of the East Asian Societies.
India was a late entrant to this party and its first turn was to take a quazi-socialist turn in the form of
a Gandhian Socialist model which was evolutionary rather than revolutionary in the transformation of
India. The bipolar nature of the world's economic models, namely Capitalism and Socialism, left military
and geo-political concerns foremost in the minds of planners. Hinduism itself was absorbed with
some approval and even a little awe notably with the Beatles and Ravi Shankar fitting easily into the
Western Cultural Ethos. Culture was seen as important only in its ability to combat communism. In this
respect, Islam was seen as a key counterpoint to Communism. And its resistance to transformation was not
seen as important. Expediency drove Western intentions to influence and transform foreign civilizations.
Earlier the need to conquer and occupy had driven the need to convert the natives of places like
South America, Southern America.
Post-Soviet Union, and the rise of China, a new set of concerns emerged. Europe began to diverge in
its perspectives, notably separating its economic and culture interests. However, one lesson learned in
the transformation of the Soviet Union was the "Billy Graham" and Pope John Paul II Crusades. It was felt that Christianity had a key role to play in the transformation into "our model". Multi-culturalism in the real sense
implied an acceptance of cultural values and the way forward for this process was also going to be Christian
Evangelism.
The rise of the BJP lead to a key Western Concern with respect to India, namely that it was headed towards
fundamentalism. Once Modi came to power and it was understood that he would follow a proReform economic
agenda and have in place some progressive principles, it became clear that the battle in the West was going
to move towards a bifurcation of policy, namely encourage Buddhism but discourage Hinduism. The broad
push in Europe has been towards a drop in interest in Christianity, despite a new Pope. The trend towards
Atheism in Britain is seen as having contagion effects. The recent Internatinoal Yoga Day effort was received
with some resistance in the West.
Protestant Evangelicals notably in the Southern Denominations have seen India as a key next step, notably
as unfinished work. Yet, there is a need for both sides to build a key dialog that is more substantive. The
problem is that there is not an organized set of leaders able to facilitate this. The problem is a lack of coordination in defining the key issues and the key players. Academia necessarily is used as a "guerrilla agency" like the CIA is in military intelligence. It does not toe the line of any traditional religious body.
The religious bodies will talk.
The ability to engage academia or more importantly, get academia to talk back to you is part of the problem.
Today, a few individual actors with a free license can operate boldly. The question is why this ability is not
properly harnessed and applied appropriately from the other side, beyond a few players. The "Operatives" model, where a few aim to drive an opinion into the world that then sticks needs to be appropriately managed.
Asking questions and defining a method of engagement and dialog needs to be initiated.
For instance, an open dialog with various Religious Studies departments in the Ivy schools against the back
drop of the Dharma Conference is called for. I feel that there should be an open invite to Select Professors
to freely come to the Conference and have an open dialog and discussion with an "Open House" is called for.
In the East coast, this should not be difficult to arrange.
COMMENT BY Come Carpentier comecarpentier@gmail.com
Japan in the wake the Meiji revolution embarked on a course of military expansion and colonisation inspired by the western powers and that brought about its undoing as its refined Dharmic civilisation was engulfed in the savagery of modern techno-warfare and has now been diluted by sheer consumerism.
The dialogue with academics is needed but the problem is that university trained intellectuals are expected and even compelled to work under certain methodologies and theories which don't accept the Dharmic principles as anything more than a pre-industrial society's caste-based rules. They must be made to look outside the frameworks of deconstructionism, dialectical materialism and liberal empiricism and the insights of the physical and biological sciences such as quantic physics and organic chemistry can help to change the perspective.
Western missionary movements of course are much harder to influence because they work on semi-militaristic lines and don't rely on reason or analysis but merely on the "commercial" need to conquer markets and win over bodies and minds.
By Vamadeva Shastri (Dr. David Frawley)
Western academia has had an almost uncritical control of Hindu studies, unlike that of any other religion. There are few practicing Hindus in academic positions in the West, and those that exist rarely challenge the dominant discourse openly in front of their peers. Indians seem to be encouraged if they are Marxists or Non-Hindus. This is very different than Christianity, Judaism and Islam that have many practicing members in the ranks of academic teachers in the West, who openly defend their faith.
Western academics can denigrate Hinduism in often unkind terms, yet feel that Hindus should not be allowed to criticize them in return, as if they should be immune from scrutiny by the Hindu community.
There is a new battle over Hindu studies and what Hinduism means in a global context, particularly since India now has what is regarded as a more pro-Hindu government. The popularity of Hindu based movements worldwide like the many different Yoga groups, Vedanta and Ayurveda are part of this issue. While Hinduism is being denigrated at an academic level as backward and superstitious, Hindu based ideas are at the forefront of much of the new spiritual, healing and ecological thought in the world.
Current views of Hinduism that predominate in academia follow colonial, missionary, Marxist and Freudian perspectives that have largely been discredited in other fields and which most Americans would not embrace. There are rarely any dharmic, yogic, Vedantic or Hindu perspectives taken up in so-called Hindu studies. Hindus today – like Blacks and the Native Americans up to recent times – find that academic views of their culture and history are controlled by outside groups with vested interests that seem biased against them.
The recent attack on Malhotra reflects long term academic distortions in the field of Hindu studies. As someone who has written in the Vedic and Hindu field for over thirty years, I have found such insensitive attitudes towards Hindu scholars common in certain circles, which generally write on Hinduism without respecting or deeply studying Hindu traditions.
While Americans today have learned to respect the Hindu-American community – which is one of the most affluent and educated minority groups in the country – they would be surprised to know that much of American academia, which is supposed to represent tolerance, still treats them in a demeaning manner. It is important that a Hindu point of view must be allowed, even if it may be critical of accepted academic ideas, which as these currently stand can hardly be called considerate of any Hindu point of view.
