A History of Hinduism | Episode 76 | Everything is Everything

Hinduism contains multitudes -- and is contained by multitudes. Any simple story you tell about it is bound to be false.

Welcome to Episode 76 of Everything is Everything, a weekly podcast hosted by Amit Varma and Ajay Shah.

In this episode, Amit and Ajay put together a potted history of Hinduism that goes beyond simple narratives and acknowledges its complexity. They also try to make sense of the historical circumstances and incentives that shaped it.

If you like watching Everything is Everything, please like, subscribe, share, comment. :)

TABLE OF CONTENTS:
00:00 Packaging
00:13 Intro: Not a Name, But a River
03:32 Chapter 1: The Early History
17:09 Chapter 2: The Role of Religion
20:07 Chapter 3: The Puranic Period
29:35 Chapter 4: The Arrival of Islam
34:43 Chapter 5: The Open-Source Epics
37:56 Chapter 6: The Missionaries
46:20 Chapter 7: Colonialism
52:18 Chapter 8: The Movements Within Hinduism
58:14 Chapter 9: Arriving at Hindutva
1:05:43 Chapter 10: The Question of Caste
1:11:09 Chapter 11: Hinduism Today
1:14:45 Chapter 12: Recommendations

USEFUL RESOURCES:

Produced by Amit Varma

[krishnabattula]

I am 63 and I have just discovered the beauty of podcasts and Amit Verma's work .Highly educative. Great job.

[Kalinga_]

In essence, Hinduism means 'everything is everything'

[PB.]

devdutt patnaik is zakir naik of hinduism.

[dylanfernanes]

What do you call what is Amit wearing?
Is it a gown,
Is it a kurti,
Is it an over-oversized tee,
Is it a nightey?
Whatever it is, he's rocking it!

[sjlptpsnh]

Books Recommended in the Podcast:
. Who We Are and How We Got Here - David Reich
2. Early Indians - Tony Joseph
3. Wanderers, Kings, Merchants - Peggy Mohan
4. Gods, Guns and Missionaries - Manu S. Pillai
5. A Prehistory of Hinduism - Manu V. Devadevan
6. Stationary Bandit & Rolling Bandit - Jens M. Olsen (Concept not a book)
7. The Ivory Throne - Manu S. Pillai
8. Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India - Akshaya Mukul
9. The History and Geography of Human Genes - Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza
10. Ahimsa: 100 Reflections on the Harappan Civilization - Devdutt Pattanaik

[gauravchauhan]

That poem by dilip chitre was one of the poems in my 12th grade in 2017-18. Ah! feels like it was yesterday.

[divyasethi]

Brilliant episode - thought provoking! My key takeaway- everything is not what it seems; there are layers upon layers of history beneath.

[suvachattopadhyay]

Amit thanks for structuring such a long journey in an hour. I read Manu’s book and yet I loved the summary. I liked how you also captured the marketing aspects of different leaders like Roy, Saraswati, Savarkar, Tilak etc. How you brought in types of raiders is also very interesting.
Thanks for the wonderful reading list.
And of course Turn Black is new knowledge and I hope Ajay is taking care of his cold.
Thank you for the episode.

[jarinwallah]

I heard this today and having already heard the podcast with Manu, still found some new gems. But a few things I didn't understand well. These are observations/ questions of an uninformed man.
1. If the precursor of Tamil / other dravidian languages were spoken in IVC, there must be some precursor of Sanskrit being spoken by Indo-Aryan groups. How could we say that Tamil is older? I know the politics accompanying this debate, and I hate it. None of these are my language, so I guess I''m a little impassioned.
2. The quote from Reich that the archaeological evidences don't really back the attacks on Rome can't be extended to other cases. Yes, the possibility remains but so are the other possibilities. We didn't find much evidence of violence in IVC either. Perhaps we should not count on this being a rather non-violent civilisation. I know it is also backed up by the city designs but that is again based on the assumption about the nature of war technology. The pointers for Aryan invasions have been debunked long ago, so we simply don't know. Plugging in Reich's statement doesn't add much here.
3. On violence and cruelty during medieval times, I think we should avoid making the mistakes that the people in charge of framing history curriculum made. We shouldn't downplay it and neither we should politicise it. In the construct of "stationary bandit", the second word is equally important. Entire north India is devoid of old temples - that can't be a coincidence.
4. In the 300 Ramayana - do we count Kalidasa's raghuvnsha too? I see all these Ramayana's as interpretation instead of open source epics. Kalidasa's book doesn't have same religious standing. Others wanted to spread the story to the masses, wrote in a different language and added their own interpretations, because everyone of them acknowledged Valmiki. So, we have one book or two epics - but it's not normative even though sacred. On a lighter note, the Telugu version got the math wrong on average sleeping hours. :)

I loved the conversation and I guess I have assimilated many mental models that are used in making sense of the world. I have also been very interested in the history of hinduism and its bewildering diversity. Thanks for helping me.

[sajeeshg]

Excellent stuff. Brilliant narration. Great thing is that you mention the reference books also. Which make your talk scientific❤❤❤

[prasadshinde]

This episode was really Nice ❤ Full of insights from your Seen and unseen guests. I wish it was longer as your podcasts 😄

[sreelalvariar]

Please do a video on the situation in Argentina. Milei seems to be practically bringing about the ideas of this podcast. Reducing control of the state, encouraging free trade, cutting welfare spending etc. Yet, there is a lot of hatred from within the country and from outside media. Inflation is getting under control, at least by the government numbers.

[rvind]

Agastya muni, one of the original Saptrishis is credited for developing Tamil. He obviously knew Sanskrit. He might have developed Tamil from the local language that was already present there, which may make it older than Sanskrit atleast on this planet. There are mentions of tribals speaking different kind of Tamil by Tirumular which he could not understand.

[aat]

Migrating from Africa to India couldn't be along the sea Coast. What would they drink ?
My theory is that They must have gone along the. River Nile. Second phase of migration could be along Euphrates river. Next stage they should have is go down the Irani rivers and finally make it to Afghanistan. Cross the Khyber pass and the join Harappans.
Unless they had boats to sail over the ocean.

[AmitGoyal-wj]

Even I was approached to write on interpretation of religious texts, I denied if its funded by reliable source, outside source or if the purpose is not foretold

[wazbir]

Bro just talked to two amazing individuals and dropped a banger

[Inndjkaawed]

Please also add Castes of the Mind by Nicholas B Dirks to your reading list. It is awesome!

[PB.]

as an atheist, i don't conceive hinduism as a religion because a religious is something that has a founding father from which a religion starts, which hinduism clearly lacks.

hinduism is more of a cultural thing, hinduism of southern india is totally different from northern india, their deity, religious texts, festivals all are different from eachother.

especially all hindu texts don't have a word that describes their belivers like 'hindu'. this word was derived from sindu, which was originally a river and the people there lived were called 'hindu' by persians.

[cinefile]

Hindu word came from sindhu. Its mispronunciation by persian. Theres nothing like hinduism. Its basically brahmnism. Read or watch nimit arora's series. He made great series about indian religions.

[Sameer-erwz]

One thing became clear, Amit is not spiritual. 😄
The quest of happiness is the core of all religion.