| How I Became A Hindu - My Discovery Of Vedic Dharma |
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| Books By David Frawley |
| DISCOVERY OF SOCIAL AND POLITICAL HINDUISM | |
| The VHP,
particularly in America, created forums for religious understanding, regularly bringing
Christian, Islamic and Jewish speakers to their conferences, emphasizing the commonality
of all mystical traditions, something that Christian or Islamic groups would never do
anywhere. That such broadminded people were branded narrow fundamentalists demonstrates
the extent of anti-Hindu prejudice in the world. A Hindu accepting many paths and
religions is branded an extremist if he wants to preserve his traditions and questions
attempts to convert him. But a Christian or a Muslim actively trying to convert Hindus,
negatively stereotyping the religion as pagan or polytheist, is considered progressive. It
seemed to me at the time in India that just to call oneself a Hindu was enough to get
branded a Hindu fundamentalist! I propose a simple litmus test on fundamentalism. Ask a person whether they think that there are many paths to God and that no single religion, teacher or book has the last word on the matter. Ask them if there should be a free diversity of spiritual teachings in the world and that no single faith should try to convert the world to its belief. If the person insists upon one religion alone as true, then he is a fundamentalist. If he accepts many paths, then he is not. By this test few Hindus, even VHP or RSS members, would be fundamentalists, while few Christians and Muslims, particularly their main leaders, would not be.
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