Not surprisingly, Hinduism is not only criticized for its transcendent impersonality but for its many gods and worship of Nature - which is a criticism of an opposite nature. Those who see Hinduism as caught in the formless or as caught in the diversity of form only reveal their inability to understand its teaching. How can the same teaching be criticized in such opposite ways? It is like criticizing a person for being both too impersonal and too personal at the same time.

Owing to its otherworldly nature and rejection of mundane goals (including heaven, which as another world is also a mundane goal) as the highest reality, Hinduism is said to be pessimistic or anti-life. This appears in a stereotypical image of Hindu yogis mortifying themselves, closing their senses, fasting and weakening the body. This is perhaps the most misinformed of the judgements against Hinduism. Hinduism teaches that we are all God, that we contain within ourselves all time and creation, that our nature is Infinite Bliss inherently transcending all sorrow and limitation.

To call a teaching which says that our nature is Infinite Bliss pessimistic, while religions that teach we are sinners or materialistic science that teaches we are only biochemical reactions, optimistic, is absurd. Hinduism says that all life arises from joy and that we will all eventually return to Eternal Joy, however great a sinner we may temporarily appear to be. Religions that teach an eternal hell for anyone are the real pessimists, and those that teach an eternal heaven that still depends upon a body (which can never be eternal) are also pessimistic. Those who limit our being to this transient life are the worst pessimists of all.

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