HINDUISM AND OTHER RELIGIONS

What is the Hindu View of Conversion?

There is only one real religion, the universal tradition of Truth. The different religions of the world are different formulations - or perhaps distortions - of that One Truth. Recognizing this universal tradition, true Hindus do not see the need to convert people to a particular belief. They recognize the Divine presence that exists already in all. If the other is God, what are we going to convert them to and why? What is important is to recognize the internal Divinity in all, not to convert others to our idea of religion.

There may be different religious and spiritual approaches that we can follow but this is at best to choose an angle of approach to the One Truth. Such different teachings are not different religions but different formulations of the one religion of Truth. Sanatana Dharma recognizes that many such approaches are possible and a diversity of them should always be encouraged, but that the underlying universality of Truth should never be forgotten.

Such different teachings are Shaivism, Vaishnavism or Shaktism, which are different lines (sampradayas) of Sanatana Dharma, not different religions. All the religions of the world can similarly be seen as different lines or approaches to the universal religion of Truth to the extent that such truth is their goal.

To get people to think that they have a particular religious identity and it should be replaced with another, is to confuse the Self with the body and is a sign of ignorance. God is our essential nature. The Divine is our Self. It is not something that we have to be converted to, a new identity to assume, but our own real Self that we have to discover.

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