If we talk about the culture of Ancient India, then we can distinguish in this case four main areas - writing, literature, art, as well as scientific knowledge. All this is presented below in a more accessible and concise form.
Religion of ancient India in brief
In ancient times, the Indians worshiped the forces of nature, on which their productive activities depended. The god Indra was a beneficent deity, a giver of rain, a fighter against the spirits of drought and a formidable god of the storm, armed with lightning.
The sun god Surya, according to the ancient Indians, rode out every morning on a golden chariot drawn by fiery red horses. They sacrificed to the gods, prayed to them. It was believed that the gods could not refuse a person a request if it was accompanied by correctly pronounced spells and a correctly performed sacrifice.
In the era of the formation of a class society and state, the gods of nature turn into gods - the patrons of the state and royal power. God Indra became the patron saint of the king, into the deity of a formidable war.
Over time, in ancient India, a special priestly religious system was formed - Brahmanism. The brahmana priests considered themselves the only connoisseurs and keepers of sacred knowledge. They declared themselves the best of people: 
deities in human form. During the spread of Brahmanism, abundant sacrifices were made to the gods. The brahmana priests benefited from this. Brahmanism sanctified the slave state, as if it had been established by the gods themselves, and strengthened the caste system beneficial to the slave owners.
A protest movement arose in ancient India against the caste system and the Brahmanism that supported it. It found expression in a new religion - Buddhism. Originally Buddhism opposed caste division. The adherents of the new religion taught that all people should be equal, regardless of what caste they belong to. At the same time, the followers of Buddhism did not fight against the caste system and social injustice, since Buddhism preached the rejection of all struggle. Buddhism gained wide
distribution in India in the middle of the first millennium BC. e. From India, he moved to neighboring countries and is currently one of the most widespread religions in the East.
Writing and literature (summary)
The greatest cultural achievement of the ancient Indians was the creation of an alphabetical letter containing 50 characters. These signs designated individual vowels and consonants, as well as syllables. Indian writing is much simpler than Egyptian hieroglyphs and Babylonian cuneiform. The rules of writing were set forth in special grammar textbooks created in the 5th century. BC e. the Indian scientist Panini.
Literacy in ancient India was available mainly to brahmanas. They wrote in their laws that the god Brahma created the Indian letter and only the brahmanas allowed to use it.
Already in the XI-X centuries. before and. e. Indian singers performed hymns to the gods. The collections of these hymns are called the Vedas. They were subsequently recorded and became literary monuments. The Vedas introduce us to the most ancient religious beliefs of the Indians. They contain many legends that formed the basis of works of fiction.
The beautiful poems "Mahabharata" and "Ramayana" contain information about the exploits of ancient kings and heroes, about their campaigns and conquests, about wars between Indian tribes.
The Indians created many tales that reflected the attitude of the people towards the oppressors. In these 
in fairy tales, kings are bred reckless, priests are stupid and greedy, and ordinary people are bold and resourceful.
One of the Indian fairy tales tells of a merchant who spared money for food for his donkey. The merchant put a lion's skin on his donkey and let him graze in the fields of the poor. The watchmen and the farmers scattered in terror, thinking they were seeing a lion, and the donkey ate its fill. But one day the donkey screamed. The villagers recognized the donkey by its voice and beat it with sticks. This is how the merchant, accustomed to deceiving people and making money at their expense, was punished.
Many Indian tales were translated into Chinese, Tibetan and other languages \u200b\u200bof the peoples of the East in ancient times. They live to this day, testifying to the talent and wisdom of their creator - the great Indian people.
Scientific knowledge (briefly)
The ancient Indians achieved great success in mathematics. Around the 5th century they created the numbers that we call "Arabic" numbers. In fact, the Arabs only transmitted to Europe the numbers they met in India. Among the numbers, the writing of which was given by the Indians, there was the figure "O" (zero). She made it easier to count by allowing you to count in tens, hundreds, thousands using the same ten digits
The ancient Indians knew that the Earth is in the shape of a ball and that it rotates on its axis. Indians traveled to distant lands. This contributed to the development of geographical knowledge.
Indian agronomists, relying on the centuries-old experience of farmers, have developed rules for soil cultivation, crop rotation, fertilization, and crop care.
Medicine has reached high development in India. Indian doctors had different specialties (internal medicine, surgery, eye, etc.). They were familiar with jaundice, rheumatism and other diseases, as well as ways to treat them. They knew how to make medicines from medicinal herbs and salts, and perform complex operations. The first medical works appeared.
In India, chess was invented, which is currently the favorite game of millions of people from different countries, in particular our country. The Indians called chess "chaturanga", that is, "four types of troops."
About art (briefly)
Indian architects have built remarkable temples and palaces, distinguished by the extraordinary care of their decoration. The royal palace in Pataliputra amazed with its splendor. The main entrances of this huge wooden building were rows of columns. The columns have been decorated 
gilded vines and birds artfully cast in silver. The strangers could not believe that the palace in Pataliputra was built by humans; it seemed to them that the gods created it.
Stupas were erected on sacred places for the ancient Indians - huge structures made of brick or stone in the form of a mound. The stupa was surrounded by a stone fence with one or more gates. The gate was a complex architectural structure decorated with rich carvings and sculptures.
Ancient cave temples and monasteries preserved in the mountains are monuments of hard work. Vast halls and corridors were cut into the rocks. They were adorned with carved columns and colored paintings that arouse the admiration of contemporary artists.
It would seem difficult to imagine a more "religious" religion than Islam, literally permeating with its dogmas, rituals, customs and traditions the culture and way of life of the peoples and countries where this developed monotheistic system dominates. And yet, even in comparison with Islam, more precisely, with the Muslim Middle East, India is a true kingdom of religion.
The difference between the Near and Middle (India) East is very significant. The religious tradition of the Middle East is in a certain sense closer to the Christian traditions of Europe than to the religious experience of India. If we take into account that the roots of Middle Eastern and European religious traditions go back, ultimately, to a single common source and that the development of monotheistic religions proceeded, in principle, in a single channel from the point of view of the structure of thinking, basic concepts and value orientations, it is difficult to expect otherwise: all monotheistic religions, including Islam, are the product of a single general Middle East-Mediterranean civilization. And this civilization - in the face of all its main centers (ancient Egyptian, Mesopotamian, ancient, Roman-Christian) - is very different from the Indian one with its characteristic depth of philosophical analysis, sophistication of abstraction of thought, impressive practice of asceticism and yoga.
Religious systems of India - if we compare them with the Middle Eastern-Mediterranean monotheistic - in a number of aspects, especially in connection with the problems of ontogenesis, the initial unity of the macro- and microcosm, nature and man, etc., seem to be deeper and more philosophically saturated. In them, reason (albeit merged with intuition and emotions) clearly dominated the blind faith in the omnipotence of the great god characteristic of monotheism. And although this mind, deeply entangled in metaphysical ideas and mystical mysteries, cannot be compared with the rationalistic analysis of ancient philosophers, it was characterized by a constant search. The ultimate goal of this search was liberation from the burdens of mortal life, salvation in the great emptiness and eternal non-existence of the Absolute Reality standing outside the phenomenal world, and finally, the achievement of a foggy but passionately desired nirvana.
An important feature of all Indian religions is introversion, that is, a clear turn inward, an emphasis on individual search, on the desire and ability of the individual to find his own path to the goal, salvation and liberation for himself. Let each person be just a grain of sand, lost among many worlds. However, this grain of sand, her inner self, her spiritual substance (cleared of the vulgar body shell) is as eternal as the whole world. And it is not only eternal, but also capable of transformation: potentially it has a chance to become next to the most powerful forces of the universe, gods and Buddhas. Hence the emphasis on the fact that everyone is the blacksmith of their own happiness. The result of such thinking should be considered a gigantic flowering of the religious activity of individuals seeking bliss, salvation or truth in a variety of ways and tricks, up to the sometimes incredible and seemingly perverted methods of exhausting austerity (tapas).
The introversion of religious culture had a tremendous impact on the psychology and social behavior of Indians, who are inclined to take an interest in vague abstractions and plunge into deep introspection and at the same time are poorly affected, in contrast, for example, to the Chinese, by the problems of social ethics and politics.
The oldest civilization in India. Arias and Vedas. The foundations of the religious systems of India were the result of a synthesis of the primitive beliefs of the Proto-Indians - both indigenous peoples (Proto-Dravids, Munda) and newcomers (the influence of the Sumerians, clearly traced in the urban centers of Mohenjodaro and Harappa, and the invasion of the Aryans). The Aryan invasion - one of the aspects of the wide historical process of migration of Indo-European tribes - played an important role of an external impulse that contributed to a sharp acceleration in the development of ancient Indian civilization, and in the course of this process, the ethnos, language and religion of the Aryans played a dominant role.
The ancient Aryans - like their European relatives (ancestors of the Germans, Slavs, ancient Greeks) or Iranians - were pagans who spiritualized and deified animals, plants, and natural phenomena. The center of gravity of their religious activity falls on the rituals of sacrifices in honor of the gods and related cult activities. Bloody sacrifices, not excluding human ones (it was believed that man is the highest sacrifice to God, the horse is the next, then the bull, ram, goat), were accompanied by the recitation of magic spell formulas, a plentiful feast with sacrificial meat and libations of soma, an intoxicating drink.
The ritual ceremony was led by special priests, who were divided into a number of categories.
All this complex and over time complicating practice of the sacrificial ritual was the impulse that brought to life the sacred texts of the Aryans, later, at the turn of the II-I millennia BC. e., designed in the canonical form in the form of the Vedas. The Vedas (from the root "vedat") are samhits (collections) of sacred songs and sacrificial formulas, solemn hymns and magic spells used in sacrifices. There are four such Vedas in total.
The first and most important of them is the Rig Veda. This is a samhi-ta of 1028 hymns, collected in 10 mandala sections. The hymns of the Rig Veda contain praise in honor of the most important gods, their deeds, family ties, great potencies and basic functions are glorified in a solemn, sublime style. Mytho-poetic images and plots occupy a large place in the hymns of the Rig Veda (the eternal pursuit by the sun god Surya of the goddess of the morning star Ushas, \u200b\u200bas if symbolizing the never-ending and rhythmic running of time; the famous "three steps of Vishnu" with which he crossed the earth; a variant of the creation myth : born of Heaven and Earth, Indra, having drunk soma, began to grow rapidly and thus tore Heaven from the Earth, after which he filled the space between them with air, people, etc.).
The second Veda, Samaveda, is a samhita of chants of 1549 songs, mainly (except 75) repeating the hymns of the Rig Veda, varying the themes of these hymns.
The third, Yajurveda, has several variants of sam-hit, belonging to different schools. The four variants are known as the Black Yajurveda. It consists of sacrificial formulas-incantations (yajus) and short prose commentaries to them. The other two samhitas of this Veda ("White Yajurveda") consist mainly of hymns (about 2000, divided into 40 chapters). The content of the Yajurveda also basically repeats the Rig Veda.
Atharvaveda is the fourth and later of the Vedas. Named after the Atharvan priests, it consists of 731 spells in 20 parts.
The division of the Vedas into four was not accidental - it corresponded to the division of priestly functions at the sacrificial ceremony. At the time of such a ritual, the Hotar, an expert on the Rig Veda, invoked the gods, reciting hymns appropriate to the occasion. Udgatar, an expert on Samaveda, accompanied the ceremony with the necessary chants. Adhvaryu, an expert in Yajurveda, performed the ceremony, accompanying it with the necessary formulas and incantations. A brahmana observer controlled the whole ceremony. Its functions, according to some experts, were somewhat artificially associated with the Atharvaveda; it is possible, however, that this connection - through the priests-atharvan, who were considered "performers of rituals that bring good" - was for that era quite justified and logical.
Gods of the Rig Veda (pantheon of the Vedas). What gods did they pray to, or rather, sacrifices to the Aryans of ancient India? The oldest of them, although not the most popular and powerful, was Dyaus, the god of Heaven, the father of the gods, similar in status and name not only to the ancient Greek Zeus, but also to the Latin concept of "god" (Dyaus - Zeus - Deos - Theo). He and his wife, the Earth goddess Prithivi, were considered the progenitors of the world, gods and people.
The central and most popular figure of the Vedic pantheon was their firstborn Indra, god of heat and light, rain and storm, sage and warrior, master of the universe, storm of demons, universal ruler. 250 hymns of the Rig Veda are dedicated to the chanting of his valor and deeds.
A very famous and revered Vedic god was Agni, the god of fire - both the sacrificial flame and the hearth. Agni was considered the patron saint of the family and home, the giver of happiness and healthy offspring, something like a mediator between earth and heaven, people and gods. Young, benevolent Agni was loved by everyone. Almost 200 hymns of the Rig Veda are dedicated to this god.
An important place in the Vedic pantheon was occupied by Soma, the god of the intoxicating drink necessary for the ceremony of sacrifice. Both the drink and God were credited with miraculous supernatural powers. The same power was attributed to the Aryans and some other gods, less widely represented in the Rig Veda, but also possessing considerable power. Among them are the sun god Surya, the deities Mitra (the god of light and day) and Varuna (the god of the night, the keeper of eternal order, who knows everything about everyone, punishes the guilty and forgives the repentant), the god Rudra (the patron saint of wind and destructive forces, as well as the lord of healing herbs, patron of healers). Less famous and revered were the wives of the gods, often named after their husbands (Ind-rani, Varunani, Agnayi). Only a few of the goddesses (Ushas, \u200b\u200bSarasvati, the mother of the Ved Vach) played an independent role in the pantheon.
The Aryans, like the ancient Greeks, besides full gods, also had demigods, of which the most famous are the Apsaras - a variant of the Greek nymphs. The apsaras seduced the gods and heroes, but more and more willingly - the ascetics-hermits, who, "falling into sin", thereby lost the supernatural power attributed to them, the power in the world of the gods. Among the demigods and heroes, the arias also distinguished celestial singers (gandharvas), dancers, who often assumed the appearance of centaurs (half-humans-half horses), well known in Greek mythology.
Transformation of the Vedic religion. Gods of the Atharva Veda. The settling of the Aryans in India, their contact with the local tribes, the interaction of cultures - all this led to a gradual transformation of ancient customs and traditions, primarily religious and cult. This process can be clearly traced in the materials of the latest of the four Vedas - the Atharva Veda. The data of the Atharva Veda testify to the mixing of Aryan and local pre-Aryan ideas and beliefs, to the fusion of all of them into a single whole. Naturally, in the course of such a merger, many of the accents characteristic of the original Vedic religion were somewhat shifted. So, magic began to come to the fore. The functions of a doctor and a sorcerer, a master of magical rituals were paramount for the atharvan priests, whose mediation saved a person from evil spirits (asuras, rakshasas) and their harmful spells. The strength and significance of the atharvans were directly proportional to their holiness, and this latter was in strict dependence on tapas, that is, asceticism, strict hermitism and self-denial, to which the atharvans often indulged. In ancient India, the cult of tapas and austerities began to emerge. Ascetics tapasya were credited with miraculous powers and power over the world of the gods. Asceticism began to be considered a force capable of moving the world, renewing worlds and saving them from destruction. At the same time, an extreme degree of asceticism could shake even the throne of the gods.
Magic and asceticism, which came to the fore, somewhat modified the very basis of the Vedic religion - the practice of sacrifices. If earlier the hymns and songs of the Rishi singers seemed to emphasize mutual trust and understanding between people and gods, who responded with good to the sacrifices and prayers they made, now the sacrifice rite began to take on a more symbolic and magical character. Gone are the abundant bloody sacrifices, which, apparently, was largely caused by changes in the lifestyle of the descendants of the Aryans, who turned from pastoralists into farmers and now had a smaller number of livestock. They were replaced by convention, the symbolism of magical gestures and spells. The rite of libation of soma was also changed: butter and baked milk were dripped into a handful of boiled rice; it was believed that this food, the equivalent of an ancient intoxicating drink, could only be consumed by brahmanas who knew the Atharva Veda.
Some new gods are included in the Atharva Veda pantheon - most likely either non-Aryan in origin, or newly appeared. The former include a large number of goddesses, both benevolent (the heavenly cow Madhukasha; Viraj serving food) and harmful (naked Arati, clinging to sleeping men and taking away their strength; goddesses of illness and misfortune, Apva and Nirriti). Among the newly emerged were a large number of abstract deities, concept deities, category deities, which clearly testified not only to an intensified tendency towards magic and symbolism, but also to the emergence among the priests of interest in the development of philosophical abstractions. It is about the appearance of such gods as Vienna (everything is immersed in it, everything arises from it), Kala (time), Kama (love, sexual practice), Skambha (life). Brahman (Brahman-absolute, Brahman-sacrifice, Brahman-magic and the symbolism of the rite) is more and more prominent among these deity-concepts in the late Vedic period. The Vedic religion is being replaced by Brahmanism.
Brahmanism. Brahmanism as a system of religious and philosophical views and ritual and cult practice is the direct heir of the Vedic religion. However, Brahmanism is a phenomenon of a new era, which has gone quite far from the era of the Vedas with its primitive democratic practice of abundant joint common sacrifices in honor of the tribal Aryan gods. Long centuries of transformation and the gradual spread of complex social structures and proto-states in northern India led to a noticeable stratification of ancient Indian society. The class-varnas of brahmanas (priests), kshatriyas (warriors), vaisyas (farmers, artisans, merchants) and sudra (unequal and slaves) appeared. The class of priests took leading positions: the brahmana priests made sacrifices to the gods, performed rituals, served as advisers to the kings, held in their hands a monopoly on literacy, sacred texts, knowledge.
Through the efforts of the brahmana priests in the late Vedic period, the so-called brahmanas were also compiled - prosaic texts containing ritual and mythological explanations and commentaries to all four Vedas. The time of compilation of these brahmanas is X-VII centuries. BC e., which practically coincides with the time of the canonization of all Vedas. The close connection between the brahmana priests and the brahmana texts is natural and indisputable: it was the priests who had the right (even the duty!) To comment on the Vedas. It is also logical that each of the samhitas had its own brahmanas (Rigveda - Aitareya and Kaushitaki; Samaveda - Pancha-visnu and Jaiminiya; Black Yajurveda - Taittiriya, White Yajurveda - Satapatha; Ltharvaveda - Gopathu), since the priests, as already mentioned , had specialization, processed "their" knowledge.
So, brahmana-priests, brahmana-texts, finally, the emergence of the idea of \u200b\u200bthe supreme Brahman-absolute, which entailed an intensified philosophical development of the cardinal problems of being and the universe, - all this led to the formation of Brahmanism, the religion of the ancient Brahmins.
The formation of this religion was accompanied by a sharp rise in the status of the brahmanas themselves. In Shatapatha it is said: "There are two types of gods - those who are gods, and those who sing hymns praising them. The sacrifice should be divided between them: sacrificial gifts to the gods, and the reward to the human gods - learned brahmanas" (Shat., 2, 2, 6; 4, 3, 4). Indeed, the brahmanas received a corresponding payment for the rituals of sacrifice they performed: it was believed that without this, the sacrifice was useless. According to the brahmana commentaries, there were four forms of payment: gold, bulls, horses, and clothing. The brahmanas themselves had to sacredly observe also four basic principles: to be of genuine brahmana origin (no mixing with representatives of other varnas, later castes!); behave appropriately; learn and shine with learning; to help people, that is, to perform rituals of sacrifices for them.
All this put the brahmanas in an exceptional position: no one dared to touch their property, not even the king, their life was considered immeasurably more valuable than any other, and during their litigation with representatives of other varnas, the decision in favor of the brahmana was made automatically: the brahmana simply could not be trusted or contradicted. In a word, the Brahman priests dominated the ancient Indian society, and they sought to consolidate their position. For this purpose, they developed the foundations of Brahmanism. The brahmana commentaries emphasized the existence of a direct connection between longevity and immortality, on the one hand, and the quantity and quality of sacrifices, on the other: sacrificial food is the food of immortality. A diksha ritual was developed, the purpose of which is to divide the individual into a material shell and a spiritual, immortal substance. It was believed that the one who performed this rite, thereby received the right to a second birth ("A person is born only partially, only thanks to the sacrifice he is really born"). In the texts of the brahmanas, there is a description of many rituals, and the magic of gesture and word, the symbolism of the ritual was given great importance. Sometimes this magic and symbolism bordered on eroticism, which, according to some experts, opened the way for the later developed Tantrism.
Already in the commentaries-brahmanas, along with descriptions of rituals and magical symbols, a considerable place was occupied by speculative abstractions, elements of philosophical analysis - it is enough to recall the Brahman-absolute. Even more of this kind of abstraction was contained in the aranyaks (forest books), which adjoined the Brahmanas, texts for ascetic hermits.
Upanishads. The Aranyaks were the source from which the literature of the Upanishads - the philosophical texts of ancient India - began. The Upanishads arose on the basis of further and more careful development of those passages from the commentaries of the brahmanas and those aranyaks, which explained the deep innermost meaning of magic and the symbolism of rituals and sacrifices and spoke about the highest secret meaning of certain concepts and categories. It is not surprising that some of the most ancient and authoritative Upanishads even retained the names of those brahmanas whose texts they deepened and developed.
The term "upa-ni-shad" itself means "to sit near", that is, to be at the feet of the teacher, to listen to his teachings and revelations, to comprehend the hidden, secret nature of the text. The earliest of them belong to the VIII-VI centuries. BC BC, the rest - to a later time, partially even to the period after AD. e. There are several collections covering up to 50 or even 108 Upanishads (in total, according to various researchers, there are 150-235). However, the most authoritative and ancient of them are 10 - Aytareya (related to Rigve-de), Kena, Chandokhya (Samaveda), Katha, Taittiriya (Black Yajurveda), Isha, Brihadaranyaka (White Yajurveda), Prashna, Mundaka, Mandukya (Atharva- veda). Sometimes a few more are added to them - Kau-shitaki, Shvetashvara, etc.
It is believed that the early Upanishads, like the Aranyakas,. were developed mainly by the efforts of ascetic hermits who had retired from the world and plunged into speculation. This does not mean that the brahmana priests were not related to the Upanishads: most of the ascetics were in the past brahmanas. The teaching on the stages of life (ashram), which took shape during the period of the early Upanishads, proceeded from the fact that a person (i.e., primarily a brahmana) passes through four stages in life. As a child, he studies the Vedas in the teacher's house; as the head of the family and home, he is guided by the commentary brahmanas; retiring in adulthood as a hermit, he meets aranyaks; having turned towards the end of his life into a penniless wanderer from the world, he is busy with the wisdom of the Upanishads. Thus, the ascetic hermits, in principle, did not oppose the brahmana priests, just as the brahmanas, aranyaks and Upanishads did not oppose each other. However, this did not change the important circumstance that the philosophy of the Upanishads was really developed mainly through the efforts of ascetic hermits who had retired from the world, who spent many years in pious reflections, in search of truth, knowledge of the secrets, the innermost.
Philosophy of the Upanishads. Ascetic hermits, the very appearance of which, as an institution, was a kind of reaction of the religious tradition to the increasingly complex social structure of society, to a departure from primitive forms of religious practices, relied in their mental activity on the entire centuries-old experience of analyzing those cardinal problems that had already taken shape by that time being, which the ancient Indians considered the most essential. What problems were discussed in the Upanishads?
First of all, about the problem of life and death, about the universe and cosmogony, about the close relationship between man and space, people and gods. What is the carrier of life? Water, without the eternal circulation of which there is and cannot be alive? Food without which living things cannot exist? Fire, warmth, which is the condition of life? Or, finally, breath, prana - after all, you can't do without it for a minute? Since it was a question of the bearer of life as a philosophical category, as the fundamental principle of the existence of all living things, the interest in clarifying the truth itself, no matter how far from it the arguing sides, is understandable and justified.
In the Upanishads, serious attention was paid to the problem of sleep, and the state of deep sleep was considered as something like a line between life and death. On this verge, the life principle of a person (jiva) "reaches himself" and "is freed from fatigue," and the spiritual substance of a person, his soul (purusha), seems to be separated from him. Therefore, one should not abruptly wake up a person - his purusha may not find a way back to any of the human sense organs, which may result in deafness, blindness, etc.
And what about the other side of life, where the purusha finally leaves the mortal remains of a once-lived person? What is death?
The idea of \u200b\u200ban eternal cycle of life, a life principle - whether it be heat, light and fire, or water, or breath-prana, leaving the dead and entering the newborn, apparently pushed the ancient Indian philosophers to the idea of \u200b\u200ba natural cycle of life and death in general and of man in particular. The idea of \u200b\u200bthe separation of the spiritual and bodily principles of a person, especially the deceased, and in general of the primacy of the spiritual principle (recall the ancient Vedic ideas of the second, true birth only - after the sacrifice, that is, after the realization of a conscious spiritual connection between a person and his patronizing deity) gave this the regular cycle of the form of transmigration of souls. This was the beginning of the concept of an endless chain of rebirths, characteristic of the entire religious and cultural tradition of India.
The essence of this concept is that death is not the end, much less the achievement of bliss or tranquility. This is just a kind of break in continuity, an element of an endless cycle, which sooner or later will be followed by a new life, more precisely - a new form that the soul that once left the body, or at least a part of it, will acquire. But what specific form will this soul take and on what does it depend? The answer to this question is given by the concept of karma developed in the Upanishads.
Karma - one of the cardinal provisions of Indian philosophical thought, the role of which in the history of the entire Indian civilization can hardly be overestimated. Its essence is that the sum of the good and bad deeds of each person (his karma) determines the form of subsequent rebirth. Good karma guarantees a successful rebirth (you will be reborn in a new life as a brahmana or a prince, everyone will respect and honor you deservedly); average karma will make it possible to be reborn in about the same quality as it was before; bad karma leads to the fact that in a new life you will be reborn as an outcast, slave or untouchable, or even an animal at all, a worm, a mosquito, a pitiful midge.
The idea of \u200b\u200bkarma satisfactorily explained and solved the problem of good and evil - everything depended only on yourself. All ideas about social injustice, property inequality and its socio-economic reasons were left aside, as insignificant. All this had nothing to do with the main thing: the cause of your suffering in your present birth is you yourself, or rather, your sins in the past, your karma. What you deserve is what you got. The idea of \u200b\u200bkarma was of great psychological importance, becoming a regulator of the individual and social behavior of tens of generations of Indians. On the one hand, it was a powerful incentive that dictated the observance of high ethical standards, which determined the characteristic Indian caring dislike attitude towards nature, towards "our smaller brothers", in each of which one could expect to see a reborn person, perhaps your recently deceased and beloved relative or friend. On the other hand, she took people to her individual corner, encouraged them to an egoistic desire to improve their karma, forced the oppressed and unfortunate not to grumble - they are to blame! It is significant that, unlike China, where from time to time the society was shaken by grandiose peasant uprisings aimed at restoring trampled social justice, India had almost no such movements. Not social justice - this issue has practically not risen for a long time throughout the history of India, and individual salvation, liberation, a change in fate on a purely personal level has always been in the center of attention in the Indian religious and cultural tradition. And an important reason for this is the concept of karma that has become entrenched in Indian thinking, first formulated in the Upanishads.
Everyone is subject to the law of karma, except for those few who renounced mundane life, took the path of an ascetic hermit, the path of the gods (devayana, unlike the path of the ancestors, pitriyana). These latter, acquiring more and more divine power over the years, eventually reached the worlds of Brahman and dissolved there, not returning to life anymore, falling out of the chain of rebirths, thus becoming independent of the law of karma.
Brahman, Atman, Thoth, Om (Aum). The ideal of the Upanishads is cognition of Brahman, merging with it, achieving oneness with this supreme reality, achieving bliss (ananda). Brahman is the supreme absolute reality. This is not a creator god, as he sometimes appears in some authors (the Indian religious and philosophical thought of the creator did not know). This is an abstract higher power, which at times embodies part of its realities in the form of phenomena of the phenomenal world, that is, it creates something - but not out of nothing, as it might seem at first glance.
Brahman is the one who owns souls, the highest spiritual unity. Each individual soul - Atman - is a part of it. Atman is "I", but not just the spiritual substance of the individual. Rather, it is "I" with a capital letter, a manifestation of Brahman, its differentiated emanation. And at the same time, Atman is the same Brahman, the same great and incomprehensible. Atman, like Brahman, created the worlds and death, created food and water, although again this is not a creation out of nothing, but the realization of the spiritual potencies of the Atman in the phenomenal world.
Atman and Brahman are identical to Purusha, the highest spiritual principle, the highest soul, of which the soul of the individual is a grain of sand. Finally, all of them are identical "Thoth" ("That", Skt. Gag.) "Thoth", according to the Katha Upannshad, - "inexpressible, supreme bliss", this is Brahman and Atman, and Purusha. And, as the final moment of the philosophical and religious mystical comprehension of all these identical to each other and at the same time being part or manifestation, emanation of each other, higher abstract spiritual categories, a magic (you cannot call it otherwise!) Word appears in the Upanishads, rather a syllable - "Om "(" Aum "). The word does not mean anything and does not express anything on its own. And at the same time, it means everything, has a truly magical power. "Om is Brahman, Om is everything" (Taittiriya Upandshada, 8, 1). "Dum" is the past, present and future, it is Atman and Brahman, and each of the three letters of the three-member version of the reading of the syllable has a special meaning, corresponding respectively to the state of wakefulness, light and deep sleep (Man-dukya Upanishad). Saying "Om", the brahmana says: "May I reach Brahman" and attains it (Taittiriya up., 8, 1).
This mysticism of the Upanishads is the key to that secret, intimate, which was considered the basis of the foundations of the ancient Indian philosophy of religion. And although these foundations in their most complete and complete form were fixed later, especially within the framework of the Vedanta system, their origins, undoubtedly, date back to the period of the Upanishads.
Foundations of ancient Indian religious philosophy. Everything phenomenal, that is, everything that is perceived by the senses and is in constant change, is not real, that is, it is impermanent, fragile, not immovable, not eternal. But behind everything phenomenal, which is only an external manifestation, there is a real one that is higher than attributes and qualities. This reality is Brahman, Atman, That, eternity and infinity, the root cause of the phenomenal world, the Universe. That is why it is so important for a true sage to penetrate beyond the phenomenal aspect of all things, the whole world, to Him, to Brahman, to the Absolute Reality.
The Absolute Reality has three fundamental principles: Space, Motion and Law. The phenomenal manifestation of matter is the emanation of the first of them, the phenomenal manifestation of energy is the emanation of the second, the phenomenal manifestation of any laws of being is the emanation of the third. In general, the whole world of the phenomenal is an emanation of the Absolute. The fact of the alienation of this world from its primary source, from real fundamental principles, led to the fact that this world, in fact, illusory, gave rise to all kinds of uncertainty, suffering, and dissatisfaction. The one who comprehended this (that is, the ascetic hermits, to whom the true picture of the world was discovered), got away from the illusory world. Only the rejection of everything material, concentration on everything spiritual, dissolution in the One, in Brahman, in the Absolute, opened, Before him the path to salvation, that is, they gave liberation from the chain of rebirth.
At first, hidden, secret, secret, this was accessible only to a few ascetics. Over time, however, the idea of \u200b\u200bthe world around us as something illusory and the desire to get out of the world of illusions, from the chain of rebirths, from the sphere of the phenomenal, to merge with That, the Real, which stands behind the world of phenomena and is its unshakable, eternal basis, turned into a powerful impulse for religious thinking. In other words, the religious philosophy of the Upanishads in the middle of the 1st millennium BC. e. as it were, determined the main parameters of the worldview and the entire system of values, spiritual orientation within the framework of traditional Indian civilization. Of course, in the following centuries, far from all the life of the country and the people was built on the principles of religious thinking of the Upanishad philosophers, but the influence of this philosophy was always very strong. At different levels it was felt in different ways: mysticism and metaphysics in the form of pure abstractions (advaita) were accessible only to the perception of the wise; for average people, all these ideas were presented in their theological and mythological modification (Abeolut was reduced to virtue, liberation - to paradise, abstractions were replaced by gods, etc.); the lower level of perception was characterized by ritual prescriptions, ceremonies, prayers, cult formulas, virtuous behavior, etc. It was the widespread mass perception of the profane ideas of the Upanishads that over time gave rise to that Hinduism, which became a widespread religion in medieval India.
However, before the rise of Hinduism, Indian religious and philosophical thought went through transitional stages characterized by the existence of various systems. We are talking about six systems-darshans, formed on the basis of the philosophy of the ulanishads. These six systems are a kind of six parallel aspects of the development of this philosophy. Three of them (nyaya - logic; vaisesika - cosmology; mimamsa - ritual) are secondary. The other three have had a significant impact on the development of religious and cultural traditions of India.
Sankhya is one of these three. In the center of this system, created, as is commonly believed, at the turn of the VIII-VII centuries. BC e. by the ancient Indian thinker Kapila, - two actively interacting principles, prakriti (primary material substrate, matter and energy) and purusha (the spiritual principle that generates forms of the material world, from atoms to humans). Both purusha and prakriti are emanations of the One. Purusha consists of myriads of spiritual atoms-monads of individual souls, she: - the conscious principle. Prakriti is inexhaustible creative energy, but devoid of consciousness. The effect of the purusha on prakriti can be likened to the effect of a magnet on a metal: the spiritual principle, as it were, magnetizes matter devoid of consciousness, gives it form and spiritual substance. This interaction of purusha and prakriti, according to the Samkhya system, is the root cause of the emergence and existence of the entire phenomenal world. It leads to the emergence of 25 elements, essences (purusha itself, a spiritual essence, and 24 tattvas - elements of matter, including physical, physiological and psychological principles, such as five senses, mind-manas, physical elements, etc.) ...
The abundance of tattwas is explained by the fact that energy-prakriti in its original form, free from the influence of the spirit-purusha, is woven from three different parts, properties, qualities (three gunas), a combination of which in various versions manifests itself in the phenomenal profane world. The first guna, sattva, is a good beginning that creates light and peace, gives birth to wisdom and happiness, leading to balance and harmony; the second, rajas, is an active and passionate beginning, exciting, pushing to action; the third, tamas, is an inert and inert beginning, leading to laziness and stupidity, giving rise to indifference and deception. Individually, these gunas do not work, but their interaction, with the predominance of this or that principle in a certain proportion, manifests itself everywhere - in love and hate, in joy, sorrow, etc.
The goal, the main meaning of the Samkhya philosophy with its emphatically dualistic structure of the world is to help the purusha free himself from the captivity of matter, get rid of the state of samsara (earthly life and rebirth) and karma, leave the bodies in which it is imprisoned, and acquire a state of bliss and liberation (moksha). This is not easy to do. For this, it is necessary, using various complex methods and ways, to separate the purusha from the 24 tattwas with which it merges and interacts. But on the other hand, the human soul, separated from the tattwas, merges with the already liberated monads of the Purusha-One, Purusha-Absolute, Purusha-Brahma-na, Purusha-Atman, and the goal is thus achieved.
Yoga. Among the methods and ways that allow you to achieve this goal include those that later received development within the framework of another system - yoga, which was formed around the turn of the 4th-3rd centuries. BC. and associated with the name of the ancient Indian thinker Patanjali, the author of the "yoga sutra". In the Yoga Sutra, as well as in the yoga system as a whole, right up to the followers of yoga practice today, the main goal is the same as in the Samkhya system: to separate the purusha from prakriti and to achieve the merger of one's individual purusha with the universal Purusha. , referred to in this system as Ishvara. Ishvara in the yoga system, more definitely than in the Samkhya, is not related to samsara. Here there is no total fusion of the purusha with prakriti - a significant part of the purusha in the form of Ishvara is already free, and it is with her that one should merge.
That is why the whole character of yoga - in contrast to Samkhya - is directed not so much into the area of \u200b\u200bspeculative abstractions, vague reasoning about merging and liberation, various gunas and tattvas, as into the area of \u200b\u200bthe practical realization of the goal. In this sense, those authors are right who note that "classical yoga begins where the Samkhya ends."
So, the main thing in the yoga system is practice, methods, exercises, the ultimate meaning of which is for the individual striving for moksha to learn to suppress and control his everyday consciousness, his feelings, sensations, his physical and life activity in general, and in this way to cultivate a special an oversensory consciousness, already prepared for the meeting with Ishvara.
The complex of practical techniques and methods in the yoga system is very complex. To master it, you need endurance, perseverance, ascetic discipline, strict self-control, constant training, the ability to put your whole body, even its physiological functions, under the beginning of volitional impulses based on complex psychotechnics. The whole system of self-training and training is divided into eight methods, stages.
1. Abstinence (pit). To be restrained in everything, to be able to self-restrict in food, in life comforts, and even more so in passions: suppression of the sexual instinct prevents the waste of vitality, nervous energy and promotes concentration, moderation.
2. Fulfillment of prescriptions (niyama). Here one of the cardinal principles of the ancient Indian tradition comes to the fore, which is closely related to the idea of \u200b\u200brebirth: non-violence (ahimsa). The principle of ahimsa, i.e. refusal to kill and harm all living things, in the second half of the 1st millennium BC. e. actively supplanted the ancient practice of bloody sacrifices. But not only murder - any harm, even in a word, was condemned. To follow the instructions meant to achieve complete harmony of behavior, thoughts, words.
3. Exercises for the body (asana). At this stage, it was necessary to learn various postures that provide conditions for concentration, temper the body, exercise it, learn to control it. It is worth noting that all this led to physical hardening of the body - yogis, as a rule, are not susceptible to diseases, their body does not age for a long time.
4. Discipline of breathing (pranayama). The task is to achieve uniform, slow and deep breathing, to learn to control the breath, to hold it without harming the body. As you know, yoga masters have achieved a lot on this path: descriptions of the temporary burial of yogis, deprivation of their air, confinement in glass coffins for many days, even weeks, bringing to an almost breathless state with barely palpable pulse, followed by "resurrection" are quite reliable.
5. Discipline of the senses (pratyahara) - the last of the preparatory stages, the essence of which is the ability to turn off your senses, not to react to their external stimuli. A naked yogi on the snowy peaks of the Himalayas should not feel cold and uncomfortable, his mouth, eyes and ears should be able not to taste, not to see or hear when he wants it.
6. Discipline of the mind (dharana). At this stage, a fully prepared yogi must master the art of regulating his consciousness, be able to concentrate his thoughts on a chosen object or object (be it a part of his body or abstract, the appearance of a deity, the same Brahman). This is already the first step towards the state of the highest holiness, towards the state of merging with the Absolute.
7. Contemplation (dhyana) is the second step on this path. The thought concentrated on one thing deepens, becomes more and more abstract, irrational and ideally, as it is believed, comes to the knowledge of the real fundamental principle of the illusory phenomenon on which the thought is focused.
8. Trance and ecstasy (samadha) - the last stage. If the dhyana reaches the goal and the contemplative reaches the state of trance, absolute inner spiritual ecstasy, then his spiritual self, his) purusha, is liberated. The state of samadhi leads to the ultimate goal of all efforts of the yogi - to liberation, to moksha.
It is in this, and not in the demonstration of their miraculous capabilities, not in the defeat of the imagination of ordinary people, the meaning of all the activities of a yogi. The yogi usually does not try to work for show, on the contrary, he avoids it, because it leads to the loss of his strength and potency, hinders him on the way to the goal. All this, however, in no way excludes the fact that it is not transcendental goals, but just a specific practice and the amazing results achieved by it, which are now widely known and are a model for study and imitation in many countries.
Vedanta. The Vedanta system is one of the most philosophically rich and capacious. Its foundations date back to about the 7th century. BC e., although the "Vedanta-sutra" dates from only the 2nd century. BC e., and the most famous system and all doctrine received only in the 7th century. n. e. in the interpretation and with commentaries of the famous Sri Shan-kara Acharya (Shankara). The meaning of the system is briefly reduced to the following.
The source of all that exists, the phenomenal and illusory world is the Absolute Reality, Brahman, Thoth. This source is beyond qualities and attributes, it is one and indivisible. And if so, then the spiritual "I" of each individual, his Atman, is identical to him. At the same time, this spiritual "I" in Vedanta does not oppose the body, for, unlike Samkhya, Vedanta denies the duality of the world, does not see the differences between purusha and prakriti. Here everything is one, everything is Brahman, and within the framework of this one, only Brahman itself and the spiritual monads that are part of it, the "I" of everyone, really exist. The body and even thought, like the entire material phenomenal world, are imaginary, illusory.
So Brahman is the only reality. The material universe is imaginary, it is the result of the action of maya, the emanation of Brahman. Maya is the material cause of the world, existing only because there is its real cause - Brahman with its eternal energy. Maya is active only because of its involvement with Brahman, which acts on it like a magnet, endowing it with its immanent power. Therefore, although the world created by Maya may appear to be real, in reality it is nothing more than an illusion. A true sage always sees behind the illusory nature of the phenomenal, imaginary world its real essence, that is, Brahman, with whom his spiritual "I" is identical and seeks to merge. Only one who has realized this identity can expect liberation, moksha.
To realize the ultimate identification with Brahman, one who strives for this must morally and materially purify himself, give up desires and passions and be ready to reject everything in the name of a great goal. Having cognized his Atman, man attained peace; most fully his inner "I" was identified with Brahman during deep sleep without dreams.
The Vedanta system played a very important role in the history of Indian religious and philosophical thought. Its construction was almost to the greatest extent (if we mean all six darshan schools) were perceived in the national tradition of India, influenced the appearance of Hinduism and even became one of the spiritual foundations during the revival of ancient traditions, in the era of critical rethinking of the foundations of Indian civilization (neovedentism).
India is constitutionally a secular state. Hindus make up a clear majority in the country (80%), followed by Muslims (14%), Christians - Protestants and Catholics (2.4%), Sikhs (2%), Buddhists (0.7%), Jains (0, 5%) and others (0.4%) - Parsis (Zoroastrians), Judaists and animists. Despite the fact that many religions are represented in India, Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Sikhism and other religions coexist peacefully in India.
Tell your friends
Hinduism - the oldest national religion of India. Its origins usually go back to the time of the existence of the Proto-Indian (Harappan) civilization, i.e. to II-III millennium BC Consequently, by the turn of the new era, it had already counted more than one millennium of its existence. We will not see such a long and full-blooded existence of religion in any other place on the globe, except India. At the same time, Hinduism, to this day, preserves the laws and foundations of life established from ancient times, extending into modern times the traditions of culture that originated at the dawn of history.
By the number of adherents (there are over 700 million), hinduism - one of the most widespread religions in the world. Its followers make up about 80 percent of the Indian population. Followers of Hinduism also live in other countries of South and Southeast Asia: in Nepal, Pakistan, Bangla Desh, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, South Africa and other places. By the end of this century, Hinduism crossed national borders and became popular in several countries in Europe and America, claiming to be recognized as one of the world's religions.
Most Indian Muslims are sunnisconcentrated in West Bengal, Kashmir, Assam and Kerala. Shiites are located locally: in Lucknow, Mumbai (Bombay), Hyderabad and several districts of Gujarat. In South India, Muslims gravitate towards cities where they engage in trade and handicraft production.
Christians in India divided into several confessions, about two-thirds are Catholics, a large proportion of Protestants.
Most of the Sikhs live in Punjab, the rest in Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai (Bombay) and other major cities. In the Punjab, the Sikhs are mainly engaged in peasant labor, in the cities they work mainly in industrial enterprises and in trade, are in the civil service, and form an influential stratum in the armed forces. After 1947, thousands of Sikhs emigrated to Britain, Canada, the United States and Australia.
The Buddhist community has grown in recent decades thanks in part to the conversion of the untouchable leader, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, to Buddhism in 1956, followed by many of his followers. This religion has long taken deep roots in Ladakh (Kashmir) and several regions of West Bengal.
Jains concentrated in Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra. Small groups of them are scattered throughout the cities of the state of Karnataka. Jains are supporters of Mahavira's teachings and followers of the most peaceful religion on earth, preaching non-harm to living beings. Up to the fact that they wear bandages on their mouths so as not to accidentally swallow a flying insect and thereby not take its life. Moving on foot, the Jains sweep the road dust in front of them to the right and left, so as not to crush anyone to death. For this reason, they are not allowed to use any form of transport. It is not difficult to become a Jain - from a certain day you just need to start following all the rules by which a true devotee of Mahavira lives.
Zoroastrians, who are called in India parsis, form a small denomination tied to Bombay. The Baha'i community numbers approx. 1 million believers. The main centers of accommodation for Judaists are the former principality of Cochin in Kerala, Mumbai and Calcutta. Cochin Jews immigrated to the country several centuries ago, but by now have mostly returned to Israel.
Religion of Ancient India
One of the most magnificent and original cultures that existed on our planet is Indo-Buddhist philosophy, which was formed mainly in India. The achievements of the ancient Indians in various fields - literature, art, science, philosophy - entered the golden fund of world civilization, had a significant impact on the further development of culture not only in India itself, but also in a number of other countries. Indian influence was especially significant in Southeast, Central Asia and the Far East.
The thousand-year cultural tradition of India has developed in close connection with the development of the religious ideas of its people. The main religious movement was Hinduism (more than 80% of the population of India now follows it). The roots of this religion go back to ancient times.
§ 1. Vedism
The religious and mythological ideas of the tribes of the Vedic era can be judged by the monuments of that period - the Vedas. containing rich material on mythology, religion, ritual. The Vedic hymns were considered and are considered sacred texts in India, they were passed down orally from generation to generation, they were carefully preserved. The combination of these beliefs is called Vedism. Vedism was not a common Indian religion, but flourished only in East Punjab and Uttar. Prodesh which were settled by a group of Indo-Aryan tribes. It was she who was the creator of the Rig Veda and other Vedic collections (samhit).
For Vedism, the deification of nature as a whole (community of celestial gods) and individual natural and social phenomena was characteristic: So Indra is the god of thunder and powerful will; Varuna is the god of world order and justice; Agni is the god of fire and home; Soma is the god of the sacred drink. In total, 33 gods are considered to be the highest Vedic deities. The Indians of the Vedic era divided the whole world into 3 spheres - heaven, earth, antarizhna (the space between them), and certain deities were associated with each of these spheres. Varuna belonged to the gods of the sky; to the gods of the earth - Agni and Soma. There was no strict hierarchy of gods; referring to a specific god, the Vedic people endowed him with the characteristics of many gods. The creator of everything: gods, people, earth, sky, sun - was some abstract deity Purusha. Everything around - plants, mountains, rivers - was considered divine, a little later the doctrine of the transmigration of souls appeared. The Vedians believed that after death the soul of the saint goes to paradise, and the sinner to the land of Yama. Gods, like people, were able to die.
Many features of Vedism entered Hinduism, this was a new stage in the development of spiritual life, that is, the emergence of the first religion.
§ 2. Hinduism.
In Hinduism, the creator god is brought to the fore, and a strict hierarchy of gods is established. Trimurti (trinity) of gods Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu appears. Brahma is the ruler and creator of the world, he belonged to the establishment of social laws on earth (tharm), division into varnas; he is the punisher of the unfaithful and sinners. Vishnu is the guardian god; Shiva is the destroyer god. The growing special role of the last two gods led to the emergence of two directions in Hinduism - Vishnuism and Shaivism. Such a design was fixed in the texts of the Puranas, the main monuments of Hindu thought that developed in the first century AD.
Early Hindu texts speak of ten Ovatars (descent) of Vishnu. In the eighth of them, he appears in the guise of Krishna, the hero of the Yadav tribe. This Ovatara has become a favorite subject, and her hero is a character in numerous works. The cult of Krishna is so popular that the direction of the same name emerged from Vishnaism. The ninth avatar, where Vishnu appears in the form of Buddha, is the result of the inclusion in Hinduism, Buddhist ideas.
The cult of Shiva became very popular very early, which in the triad of the main gods personified destruction. In mythology, Shiva is associated with different qualities - he is an ascetic fertility deity, a patron of cattle, and a shaman dancer. This suggests that local beliefs have been mixed in the orthodox cult of Shiva.
The Indians believed that one cannot become a Hindu; one can only be born; that varna is a social role predetermined forever and changing it is a sin. Hinduism gained particular strength in the Middle Ages, becoming the main religion of the population. The "book of books" of Hinduism was and remains the "Bhagavad Gita" part of the ethical poem "Mahamharata", in the center of which is the love of God and through this is the path of religious liberation.
§ 3. Religion of Ancient India (briefly)
Much later than the Vedism of India, Buddhism developed. The creator of this teaching, Sidgartha Shanyamuni, was born in 563 in Lumbina into a Kshatriya family. By the age of 40, he achieved enlightenment and began to be called the Buddha. It is impossible to tell more precisely about the time when his teachings appeared, but the fact that Buddha is a real historical person is a fact.
Like any religion, Buddhism contained the idea of \u200b\u200bsalvation - in Buddhism it is called "nirvana".
It can be achieved only by following certain commandments. Life is suffering that arises in connection with desire, the desire for earthly existence and its joys. Therefore, one should give up desires and follow the "Eightfold Path" - righteous attitudes, righteous behavior, righteous efforts, righteous speech, righteous mindset, righteous memory, righteous lifestyle, and self-absorption. In Buddhism, the ethical side played a huge role. Following the "eightfold path" a person should rely on himself and not seek outside help. Buddhism did not recognize the existence of a creator god on whom everything in the world depends, including human life. The cause of all man's earthly suffering lies in his own blinding; inability to give up worldly desires. Nirvana can be achieved only by extinguishing all reactions to the world, by destroying one's own “I”.
By the Mauryan period, two directions took shape in Buddhism: sthaviravadins and mahasangiki. The latter teaching formed the basis of the Mahayana. The oldest Mahayana texts appear as early as the first century BC. one of the most important in the Mahayama doctrine is the doctrine of a bothisattva being able to become a buddha, approaching the attainment of nirvana, but not entering it out of compassion for people. Buddha was considered not a real person, but the supreme absolute being. Both Buddha and Bothisattva are objects of worship. According to the Mahayana, the attainment of nirvana occurs through the bothisattvas, and because of this, in the first century AD, the monasteries received generous offerings from the mighty of this world.
The attitude to the world in Indo-Buddhist culture is contradictory. In the doctrine of samsara, he is portrayed as terrible, full of suffering and pain. Wherever you look, there are aspirations and passions, emptiness and heat of destructive desires. »The world is full of connection and change. All this is samsara. " A person living in the world of samsara should be guided by a combination of four ethical norms. Tharma is the most important part of the basic moral law that directs the life of the universe, determines the duty and duties of people of different castes; Artha - norms of practical behavior; Kama-values \u200b\u200bof gratification of sensual impulses; Moksha is the teaching on how to get rid of samsara. Do not answer evil for evil, do good, be patient - these are the moral guidelines of ancient India.
The bulk of the population (about 80 percent) is Hindu. However, this is far from the only religion in India. The second largest religious movement is Islam. Also in India there are those who practice Christianity, Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism. The Constitution in India allows the practice of any faith.
Main Gods in Hinduism
The specificity of religions in India is built in such a way that representatives of various religious movements live peacefully nearby. In the second millennium BC.
Indian religions
e. the teachings of the ancient Aryans appeared in India. They deified animals, plants, and various natural phenomena. They made sacrifices, sometimes people became victims.
The caste system in India originated from the rise of Brahmanism and the story of the Purusha. Purusha is the first man, he laid the foundation for life on earth.
The main religion in India is Hinduism, its basis is Trimurti (three main deities) - these are Brahma, Shiva and Vishnu. Brahma is the God who created the world, Vishnu is the keeper of the world, and Shiva destroys the world at the end of a certain life stage.
Shaivism involves worshiping God Shiva. This current is more popular in the south and east of India. Shiva is an exemplary husband, his son God Ganesha (the patron saint of writers and God who helps to cope with obstacles) and the wife of Parvati, she is Durga and Kali. The authority of the Brahmans and priests in India is unrealistically great. Shamans meet in villages and small towns. Among Hindus, chanting of mantras, which have supernatural power, is considered common in everyday life.
Religion in India has numerous holidays, many adherents of various movements take part in them. For example, New Year is celebrated there more than once a year, and absolutely everyone considers it normal. They light bonfires, chant mantras, and together with the smoke from the fire, all worries and sorrows are dispelled, everyone rejoices in the reigning peace.
Maha Shivaratri is the main festival of the main religion in India (Great Night of Lord Shiva). On this sleepless night, millions of people glorify God the destroyer. Celebrations take place all over India.
10 most interesting temples in India
- Ellora cave temples
- Kandarya Mahadeva, Khajuraho temple complex
- Somnath Temple
- Kashi Vishwanath Temple (Varanasi)
- Jagannath Temple in Puri
- Tirumala Venkateswara Temple
- Meenakshi Temple
- Kedarnath temple
- Harmandir Sahib (Amritsar, Golden Temple)
- Lotus Temple
Read also:
India is a religiously unique country. Such a number and variety of religions that we find in India, perhaps, we will not be able to meet in any other state. Almost all people in India are deeply religious. Religion and spirituality permeates their daily life and is an integral part of everyday life. Such a number of temples, ashrams, stupas, sanctuaries, small and large shrines as in India is probably difficult to find anywhere else. Therefore, visiting different sacred places naturally becomes an integral part of any tours to India.
Religion in India and its role in modern Indian life
Regardless of what the original purpose of your tourist trip is, this side of Indian life will in one way or another touch you.
All major world religions are represented in India: Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Judaism. Also here you can meet Zoroastrians, Jains and Sikhs. India is home to Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism and Sikhism. Throughout its history, India has given the world, perhaps, a record number of religious leaders and spiritual mentors, such as Buddha Shakyamuni or Mahavira, religions founded by which are already more than 2 and a half thousand years old, and such more modern, but probably , not less famous teachers like Osho, Sri Aurobindo, Sai Baba, Sri Chinmoy, Krishnamurti, Raman Maharishi, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and many others.
Another unique feature of India is its religious tolerance. Despite all the diversity of religions and small beliefs represented in the country, there have never been major religious conflicts in India. According to the constitution, India is a secular state and it is allowed to practice any religion.
80 percent of India's population is Hindu. Hinduism is one of the oldest religions in the world. It is believed that it developed around the middle of the 1st millennium BC, but in fact its roots go so far back into the centuries that it is quite difficult to speak with confidence about its origin during this period. Hinduism has neither a specific founder, nor any fundamental text that could be considered its main base (there are many such texts and they arose at different times: the Vedas, Upanishads, Puranas and many others).
In Hinduism, many elements of primitive beliefs have been preserved (worship of sacred animals, natural phenomena, the cult of ancestors, etc.). Hinduism is the religion that gave rise to the caste system of India, and strictly regulates all the rights and obligations of a person throughout his life. The central teaching in Hinduism is the teaching of the reincarnation of souls, which occurs according to the law of retribution for good or evil deeds during life. Depending on what kind of life a person leads in this incarnation, his future life is determined - what body he will acquire after death with a new birth, in what caste he will be born, if he is lucky enough to find a human body, whether he will be poor or rich, etc.
Hinduism is characterized by the idea of \u200b\u200bthe universality and universality of the supreme deity. Each of the many Hindu gods carries one of the facets of the omnipresent God, for it is said: 'Truth is one, but the sages call it by different names'. For example, Brahma is the creator of the world, Vishnu is its keeper, and Shiva is the destroyer and at the same time the creator of the world. Hindu gods have several incarnations. And those incarnations that take place in the human world are called avatars. For example, Vishnu has many avatars and is often depicted as king Rama or Krishna the shepherd.
There are currently two main streams in Hinduism: Vishnuism and Shaivism. Vishnuism is distinguished by its ability to incorporate various local beliefs and religions. So, for example, Buddha, along with Krishna and Rama, in Vishnuism began to be considered an avatar of Vishnu. Vishnu, being the keeper of the world, at different times took different forms in order to save him. Vishnuism is most widespread in the north of India.
The main dogma of Shaivism is the statement that there is nothing permanent in the Universe, except for Shiva, who destroys and revives everything that exists. At the beginning of the cosmic cycle, Shiva creates the Universe, and then he himself destroys it. The cult of Shiva is inextricably linked with the cult of Shakti, the female creative and energetic principle. The Shiva cult is widespread mainly in southern India.
Many Hindu temples (and there are a great many in India) are masterpieces of architecture and sculpture and visiting them is an irreplaceable part of the program of most trips to India.
Despite the fact that India is the birthplace of Buddhism, currently the number of its followers in India is quite small.
They make up only 0.7% of the total population of India. Buddhism originated in India in the 5th century BC. Having experienced its heyday in the first 5 centuries after its inception, Buddhism in India was assimilated by Hinduism. Later, Buddhist monks were persecuted by Muslims and most of the followers of Buddhism left India, moving to neighboring China, Tibet, Nepal and the countries of Southeast Asia. Nowadays, Buddhism in India is widespread, mainly in the Sri Lankan version of Theravada Buddhism. But there are also small Zen communities, and after the conquest of Tibet by China, many representatives of Tibetan Buddhism moved to India. Dharamsala (Himachal Pradesh) has become a place of pilgrimage for many followers of Buddhism from all over the world - there is the residence of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government in exile; sometimes this city is called ‘little Lhasa’.
For many centuries, not being a Buddhist country, India, nevertheless, attracts many Buddhists from all over the world. Among them, tours to India for visiting holy Buddhist places are extremely popular: Bodhgaya is the place where Buddha found enlightenment, is the main holy place of pilgrimage in Buddhism, Lumbini is the birthplace of Prince Siddhartha, the future Buddha Gautama, Sarnath is the place where Buddha read his first sermon after reaching Nirvana, Kushinagar - the place of Buddha's departure to Parinirvana. These places, like many others (there are a huge number of Buddhist temples and shrines in India), constantly attract a huge number of tourists from different countries, among which are not only followers of Buddhism.
Buddhism is based on the doctrine of the Four Noble Truths: there is suffering, there is a cause of suffering, there is an end to suffering and there is a way to end suffering. This path is the middle or Eightfold Path, associated with three kinds of virtues: morality, concentration, and wisdom. A person who practices this Eightfold Path is gradually freed from three poisons: anger, envy and ignorance and gains access to a true understanding of reality, which gives him liberation from suffering and the ability to help free other living beings.
Buddhism does not recognize castes, asserting the absolute equality of all living beings: everyone, from the smallest worm to the greatest brahmana, is equally endowed with Buddha nature and have the same chance of liberation.
Jainism
In the 6th century BC, Vardhamana, who is also Jina or Mahavira, created and spread the religious teaching of Jainism in India.
It is based on asceticism, abstinence and non-violence. The goal of the Jains is liberation from the chain of rebirth - a way out of samsara, which can be achieved through strict austerity and adherence to the principle of ahimsa (not harming living beings). Jains are known to wear gauze bandages on their faces to avoid inhaling small living creatures, and to sweep a path in front of them so as not to accidentally crush any insect. In Jainism, there are two main streams: the Digambaras ("dressed in the sky"), who believe that the ancient texts are lost, and abandon all worldly temptations, including the need to wear clothes, and the Shvetambaras ("dressed in white"), who try to restore the lost texts and profess a less strict approach to life.
Now in India there are about 1 million Jains who play an important role in Indian society, since the followers of Jainism belong to the most prosperous and educated strata of the Indian population. The Jain community in India is famous for the construction of many temples, unique in architecture and interior decoration, attracting the attention of numerous tourists.
Another religion native to India.
Sikhism, founded by Guru Nanak in the 16th century, was a manifestation of the protest of small traders, artisans and peasants against feudal oppression and caste in India. Sikhism was directed against the bigotry and intolerance of the Muslim rulers of the time, as well as against caste discrimination and the complex rituals of Hinduism. Nanak proclaims the whole world to be the manifestation of the supreme power of the one god. The scripture of the Skikhs appeared for several generations, the book "Granth Sahib", which was compiled by the fifth guru Arjun and included the hymns of Hindu and Muslim saints, and the writings of Sikh gurus, mainly Guru Nanak. In the late 17th - early 18th century, the tenth guru, Govind Singh, turns the Sikh community into a military brotherhood and calls it Khalsa (pure). To stand out among Hindus and Muslims, Sikhs were required to strictly observe five rules: never cut their hair (kesh), comb them with a special comb (kangha), wear a special type of underwear (kachha), wear a steel bracelet (kara) on the wrist, and always have with a dagger (kirpan). Nowadays, few Sikhs follow all these rules. In modern India, there are about 17 million followers of Sikhism. Sikh temples are located in large numbers in the northern regions of India. In Sikh temples there are no images of gods, and the ceremony of worship is reduced to the reading of the "Guru Granth Sahiba". The main shrine of the Sikhs is the “Golden Temple” in Amritsar.
India has about 130 million Muslims and has the second largest Muslim population in the world. The majority of Indian Muslims are Sunnis, about 20 percent of India's Muslims are Shiites. There are also some separate sects (for example, the Ahmadis), as well as established communities - Bohra, Ismailis, Kashmir Muslims, Memon, Mopla, etc.
Christianity
According to legend, Christianity was brought to India by the Apostle Thomas, who is credited with creating the Syrian Christian Church in southern India. It is called "Syrian" because it uses liturgy and scriptures in Aramaic, or Syriac, in its worship. In the 16th century, the Portuguese colonialists began the forcible conversion of the inhabitants of India to Christianity, which continued under the auspices of the papacy for several hundred years. Since the 18th century, Protestant missionaries from the USA and Europe have been developing in India. Now India is home to about 20 million Christians of all possible directions - Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox, etc.
Zoroastrianism
During the Persian Empire, Zoroastrianism was the main religion of Western Asia and, in the form of Mithraism, spread throughout the Roman Empire up to Britain. After Iran was conquered by the Muslims, some Zoroastrians migrated to India. Presumably, their first group landed in the area of \u200b\u200bthe city of Diu in 766, and later they settled in the land of Sanjan (Gujarat state). In memory of their Persian ancestors, Zoroastrians in India began to call themselves Parsis. At present, their number all over the world is no more than 130 thousand people. Of these, about 10 thousand live in Iran, while almost all the rest live in India, most of them in Mumbai. The Zoroastrians were instrumental in transforming the city of Mumbai into a major business center and port. Despite their small numbers, the Parsis occupy an important place in the trade and industry of the city.
Prases worship 4 elements of the Universe - water, fire, earth and air. A special burial ceremony for the Parsis is connected with this: the bodies of the dead are placed on special towers (dakmas), which the Parsis call “towers of silence”. There corpses are eaten by vultures. Thus, the "pure" elements of the elements do not come into contact with the "unclean" corpse. In Zoroastrian temples, an eternal flame is constantly maintained.
The first contacts of the inhabitants of India with the followers of Judaism date back to 973 BC. These were the merchants of King Solomon, who bought spices and other goods from the Hindus. In 586, Judea was captured by the Babylonians and some of the Jews moved during that period to India on the Malabar coast. Currently, in India, Judaism is spread mainly in the states of Kerala and Maharashtra, although representatives of this religion can be found in other parts of the country.
Features of Brahmanism, Hinduism, Buddhism
Brahmanism and Hinduism
At the beginning of the 1st millennium BC. e. Settlement for the Indo-Aryans has become an everyday way of life. Numerous principalities were formed, often at war with each other. With the gradual complication of the cult of the Vedic religion, the role and authority of the brahmana priests increased. The composition and nature of the pantheon of gods have changed. And although the attitudes of the Vedic religion, its gods and traditions did not undergo drastic changes, the numerous religious teachings of the early slave society in India in the first centuries BC. e. constituted a religious trend - Brahmanism, illuminating tribal fragmentation and exclusivity.
According to the new cosmogonic theory, the creator of the universe Brahma is born from a golden egg floating in a huge ocean. The power of his thought divides the egg into two parts - heaven and earth. In the process of subsequent creation, the elements are formed (water, fire, earth, air, ether), gods, stars, time, relief, etc. People, masculine and feminine principles, opposites are created (heat - cold, light - darkness, etc.). ), fauna and flora.
The transition to Brahmanism has not yet revealed a single hierarchy of gods. Each locality had its own supreme deity worshiped. The god Shiva, in whose cult various religious beliefs were combined, was considered the embodiment of the destructive forces of nature and a symbol of fertility. God Vishnu acted as god - the guardian of everything that exists. A significant role was played by animistic ideas and the cult of ancestors.
Illuminating social inequality, Brahmanism declared the suffering and misery of people insignificant, since the whole world of phenomena is only an illusion. The only real thing is the existence of the world spirit. The most important key element of Brahmanism preserved in Indian religion and philosophy is samsara (Skt. wandering, transition, reincarnation of the soul or personality) - the theory of rebirth;according to this teaching, with the death of a person, his soul migrates into a new being (human, animal, plant, God). This chain of incarnations is endless and depends on human destiny - karma. Man is a prisoner of the visible, sensible world, he must strive for liberation, which is impossible without moral effort. Going through the chain of births and deaths, a person performs actions and acquires his own value, or karma. Karma, representing the moral result of all human deeds, determines the nature of his new birth. A person has the right to commit or not to commit certain actions, but at the same time he must know that in any case he determines his own karma, his own destiny. The doctrine of karma presupposes a person's personal responsibility.
Karma (from Skt. - deed, deed) - the chain of a person's deeds, which determines his new birth.
Karma, although predetermined from above, can be corrected by a person's actions. His high spirituality and virtue, self-discipline, rejection of hatred, suppression of envy, study of the Vedas, veneration of brahmanas, etc. can lead in the chain of rebirths to a high position in society, and in the future they open up prospects for further improvement. In turn, unworthy behavior is fraught with grave consequences: the incarnation of a drunkard into a mole, a killer into a predatory animal, a thief into a rat, etc.
The Vedic religion and Brahmanism were further developed in Hinduism, which was formed in the 1st millennium AD.
Already under the Guptas, in the 4th-5th centuries, when even the kings themselves did not adhere to Buddhism, local religions, which absorbed numerous elements of Brahmanism and Buddhism, in new conditions (in particular, the formation of a caste system, not recognized by Buddhism, etc.) a set of religious beliefs commonly referred to as Hinduism.
The unifying principle of Hinduism, professed by the inhabitants of India to this day, are: the recognition of the Vedas, the doctrine of karma, samsara and castes (varnas). The central place in the pantheon is occupied by the "trimurti", or triune image ("trinity"), symbolizing the creation of the world, its existence and death:
Brahma (god-creator, creator of the Universe),
Vishnu (the keeper of the world order, capable of incarnation into earthly mortal beings),
· Shiva (the embodiment of cosmic energy, sometimes a destructive god).
Cementing religion with the cult of Brahma - Vishnu-Shiva, creating a kind of synthesis of an abstract idea of \u200b\u200bthe absolute spirit and local gods of peasant communities, Hinduism allowed people to bring these gods closer to their earthly conditions, endow them with specific qualities and abilities to participate in earthly events.
"Three Faces" in Hindu Iconography: Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva
So, Vishnu, capable of reincarnation, is an active assistant to people, informs them the truth, protects them from danger and evil. Shiva is very contradictory - a harsh and rather tough creature, a destructive god. Three eyes, skulls around the neck, snakes along the body complement its unusual appearance. Acting at times the patron saint of love pleasures and riotous life, he at the same time patronizes art and scholarship. The sculptors in the image of Shiva brought the personification of the creative principle of the universe, a physically perfect person, full of vitality and energy.
Hinduism as a faith is tolerant, vague, amorphous, everyone is free to understand it in their own way. This is a kind of religion for everyday life. Jawaharlal Nehru, believed that its meaning can be expressed as follows: "Live and let others live."
One of the schools of Hinduism is the school of Tantrism, which adopted yoga methods and developed a system of esoteric practice. The religious-philosophical concept is based on the idea of \u200b\u200ba human microcosm and the idea of \u200b\u200bmale and female energetic principles.
Tantra (from saknskr. - weaving, intricacy) - collections of the sacred text of worshipers of the female incarnation of Trimurti - the wife of Shiva.
The philosophical school of Tantrism proclaims love as a creative principle of being. According to Tantrism, human anatomy reflects the anatomy of the cosmos. This school developed during the Middle Ages. The essence of the school was expressed in the worship of the great mother goddess in the form of Shiva's wife Parvati (Shakti).
Buddhism
The first movement to question Vedic values \u200b\u200bwas Jainism (4th century BC). Jainism categorically rejected the Brahmanist pantheon of gods, priesthood and sacrifice, religious consecration of varnas. The prevailing idea of \u200b\u200bJainism was asceticism, as a true religious feat. Buddhism, which originated in the VI century. BC e., offered a "middle way". This was a more successful attempt to overcome the varna-caste division in the system of Brahmanism (where the path to salvation was open only for the Brahmins - priests).
In India in the VI century. BC e. cities are growing rapidly, people's lives are changing rapidly. Representatives of the lower caste - the sudras, become financially secure and occupy higher positions, gaining more and more weight in the state. In this regard, the society is losing the traditional idea of \u200b\u200bnatural and true life according to the Vedas, since the values \u200b\u200bof the lower varna become prevailing. Human qualities are depreciated, their place is taken by material, property values, violence is growing and morality is falling. All of this brought confusion to society. It was obvious that the varnas had outlived their usefulness, they did not fit into the urban lifestyle. But it was also obvious that the desire of uneducated and uncultured, but possessing and ambitious people to take higher positions, to become brahmanas, is evil. To all this, the Buddha opposed his teaching about the true values \u200b\u200bthat are contained in the person himself and do not depend on wealth and nobility.
Buddha - enlightened, overshadowed by truth) - awakened to a new life.
Buddhism is the earliest world religion, which is now followed by about 700 million people. This religion flourished in India in the 5th century. BC e. - early n.
Religions of India - briefly about their origin and formation
e. The founder of Buddhism is considered to be a real historical person - Siddhartha Gautama (623-544 BC according to Buddhist tradition, 563/560 - 483/480 BC - according to historians). According to legend, he descended from the royal family of the Shakya tribe (one of the names of Buddha - Shakyamuni - "a hermit from the Shakyas").
The father wanted to protect his son from the hustle and bustle of life.
From childhood, he amazed with his abilities. Surrounded by luxury and splendor, he spent his life in beautiful palaces, defeated rivals in knightly tournaments. A beautiful wife and beloved son completed the prince's happy and trouble-free life. But once, when he was 29 years old, for the first time, life turned its cruel and prosaic side, previously unknown to him. On one of his pleasure walks, he saw people who were far from so happy: a decrepit old man, a man with leprosy, a hermit monk and a dead man. The shock was so great that, leaving everything, he went on a seven-year journey. He studies the Vedas, indulges in severe asceticism, learns the causes of evil, achieves nirvana. He becomes Buddha. For more than 40 years of preaching his doctrine, he gained many disciples and followers.
Buddha condemned Brahmanism for its addiction to a rich and secure life, the predominance of external forms of religiosity; jainism - for severe austerity; and spoke in favor of the "middle way." From the ancient Lendian tribal religions, he inherited the animistic idea of \u200b\u200bthe animate nature of all living things in nature and the idea of \u200b\u200bthe transmigration of the soul. The central principles in the teachings of the Buddha are considered: "four noble truths", the theory of causality; impermanence of elements; "Middle way"; "Eightfold path".
How to understand these basic principles of Buddhism?
The Four Noble Truths:
1) life is suffering;
2) the cause of suffering is endless desires and aspirations for pleasures and pleasures;
3) the destruction of desires, the path to which lies through the implementation of a number of conditions and norms of behavior, which imply the prevention and suppression of evil, contributing to the emergence and maintenance of good.
4) in order to suppress desires and get rid of suffering, a person must follow the path of moral perfection indicated by the Buddha.
At the end of this path comes complete freedom and illumination - nirvana, a kind of passive, from the point of view of Christian culture, ethics, as it calls for tolerance and dispassion, indifference to everything, both good and evil.
Causality theory -everything in the world is interconnected and has its own reason.
There are no actions and deeds in the world that would not have consequences.
Variability of elements -there is nothing permanent in the world and everything changes. This means that nothing in the world can serve as a guarantee of well-being, deliverance of a person from suffering. Man himself is the cause of this suffering.
"Middle Way"- Buddha called for moderation, for avoiding extremes.
The Eightfold Path -this path leads to the goal, represents a gradual transformation of the consciousness and life of a person, his rebirth or birth in a state of nirvana. It involves the formation of:
1) correct views;
2) correct striving (achieving nirvana);
3) correct speech (avoid lying);
4) correct behavior;
5) correct lifestyle;
6) correct aspirations;
7) correct thoughts (freedom from self-interest);
8) correct contemplation, getting rid of desires. Nirvana is another dimension of being; it is the extinction of false desires and passions.
Nirvana (from Skt. - extinction) is the highest state of spiritual activity and energy, which is free from base attachments.
Buddha, having achieved nirvana, preached his teachings for many more years. His teaching was not a preaching of passivity and pessimism. On the contrary, he called for activity and for directing this activity into his life. Not a struggle with others for a place in the sun, a struggle with another, with an alien in oneself. According to the Buddha's teachings, people are equal by birth. But people are equal before the fact of death. Equality is an innate property of people that they lose during their lifetime. Life is a kind of battlefield, where people rise and fall, where the laws of power reign, and not the laws of justice and equality. Is it possible to achieve equality of people during life? Buddha says yes! This state is nirvana. It is not being, on the contrary, nirvana is the fullness of being, where a person does not cling to the minutes of life for fear of death, his existence is full of joy and perfection. The wishes of the poet and playwright Kalidasa correspond to the state of nirvana. He wrote: “When you walked into the world, you cried bitterly, and everyone around you was laughing with joy. Make life such that when you leave the world, you laugh happily, and everyone around you cries. "
In India, Buddhism spread gradually. In the III century. BC e. By the legendary king Ashoka, Buddhism was adopted as the state religion. The tsar devoted all his efforts to spreading it by peaceful means. In the 1st century BC. e. Buddhism split into Hinayana (small right hand), intended for an enlightened minority, and Mahayana (large chariot), which was a vulgarized teaching of the Buddha, addressed to those to whom the impersonal god was inaccessible.
In the Middle Ages, Buddhism became one of the world religions, becoming widespread, but mainly outside India, India itself by the XIII century. Buddhist communities have largely ceased to exist.
At the end of the XII century. Mahayana spread to Japan, where it became known as Zen Buddhism. Two of the most influential schools of Buddhism are distinguished here - Rinzai and Soto. There was a saying that reflected the specialization of schools: "Rinzai is for the samurai, Soto is for the commoners."
Hindi religion
The one who loves God can no longer love man, he has lost the understanding of the human; but also vice versa: if someone loves a person, truly loves him with all his heart, he can no longer love God.
With the beginning of the 4th quarter, a new educational course "Fundamentals of Religious Cultures and Secular Ethics" will begin to be taught in Russian schools. This event was preceded by heated debates, which, I think, will not subside for a long time. Personally, I perceive this event as a defeat of common sense in the fight against the active imposition of the interests of certain groups of citizens. I do not in any way deny the huge role of religion as such at a certain stage of human development and recognize the need for its existence at this stage. Moreover, I have nothing against people believing in God. Hindi religion. If someone believes or wants to believe - that is his business. But I am totally against teaching any religion in a secular school, and I will try to explain why.
Unfortunately, I was not able to familiarize myself with the textbook "Foundations of Orthodox Culture" or any other (after all, they will still teach Islam, Judaism, etc.), but I think this textbook would not change my position. Officials said that this curriculum and the textbooks it will be taught does not include "missionary activity" instilling in a fragile child's mind and heart (since fourth grade students will begin to teach, I am sure that their minds are fragile) faith in God. In the lessons on the "foundations of world religions" children will be taught kindness, mercy, responsibility, morality and, probably, other positive qualities using examples from the Bible, the Koran, the Talmud and other sacred books. I have a question: is there really a shortage of such examples in the history of Russia (and of humanity as a whole)? Such a scarcity that it is necessary to study the Bible to learn about instances of kindness, self-sacrifice, compassion, responsibility, and mercy? The entire Russian history is filled with such examples. In addition, I was struck by the opinion of the compiler of the textbook "Fundamentals of Orthodox Culture", in the message of one of the news agencies. I will cite this paragraph in full: “The author of the textbook on the basics of Orthodox culture, the famous missionary Protodeacon Andrei Kuraev, in turn, believes that the task of the experiment to introduce the foundations of religious culture in school is to learn the basic values \u200b\u200bof a particular religion by children, and not to expand the art history and fostering tolerance, as the officials want. " As far as I understand, the basic values \u200b\u200bof the entire civilized world community are the same, and in order to assimilate them, one does not need to be a religious person. It is enough to be normally brought up. It was just by expanding the art criticism (and, I would add, culturological) outlook and the education of tolerance that it was possible to somehow justify the introduction of such lessons. Apparently, the author of the textbook considers these goals unimportant, and I doubt that in his textbook he went against his own beliefs. I am sure that the sole purpose of the experiment for the clergy is to increase the number of parishioners. This can be judged by the statement of Archbishop Mark of Berlin-German and Great Britain: “In these lessons, you can lead young people to church issues, even those young people who are far from the Church due to their home education. The schoolchildren will simply refuse the subject "God's Law" or they will not be allowed there from the very beginning, their parents will not encourage it. Meanwhile, in the classes on the course "Fundamentals of Orthodox Culture" there is an opportunity for more broad missionary activity. " The archbishop also claims that secular ethics (chosen by the majority of parents for their children) will not give them anything, and that a person “needs the foundations of Orthodox culture, because he cannot otherwise understand, for example, Dostoevsky or Gogol, and indeed all Russian literature.”
I was simply amazed at the last statement. Ethics is useless, and if you do not believe in God, you will not understand the meaning of "Dead Souls", "The Gambler" and everything else (I wonder if Soviet writers at least remained accessible to the understanding of an atheist?). One of the arguments in favor of introducing religious education in Russian schools (cited mainly by the spiritual leaders of Muslims) is that it is precisely the wrong, perverted interpretation of Islam that allows extremists to train terrorists, deliberately misleading them, and high-quality spiritual and religious education must solve this problem. The first thing that catches the eye in this logic is that in the republics of the North Caucasus, religious education is widespread almost everywhere, and it is from there that most Russian terrorists are.
I would draw the opposite conclusion - a person who does not believe in God has no reason for religious enmity, intolerance or extremism. There was no religion in the Soviet Union and, as a result, there was no religious extremism. An educational experiment carried out in the country can lead to the formation of a religious worldview in a huge number of children, who will subsequently be guided by their spiritual leaders.
Now about the very concept of "experiment". An experiment involves the study of a parameter or indicator. First, a quantitative or qualitative (or any other) assessment of the indicator under study is made, then the conditions affecting the indicator are changed, and then the change in the indicator is assessed. I would very much like to know how and when the "level" of kindness, morality or spirituality was measured in 4th grade students?
On the basis of what data, in a couple of years, will a conclusion be drawn about the success or failure of the experiment and whether it is worth expanding it throughout the country? Is it possible for a child of 10-15 years old to draw a conclusion about how moral and spiritual a person he will be at 25? As far as I know, the conclusion about the success of the experiment will be made based on a survey of students and their parents. The researchers will find out if the children were interested in these lessons and if they want to attend them further. The criterion is very controversial. Not everything that is interesting is useful and vice versa. The conclusion about the expediency of teaching a particular subject should be made on the basis of the benefits it brings. Hindi Religion Trying to prove to believers that teaching religion at school is not worth it on the grounds that there is no evidence of the very existence of God is useless. For believers, this is not an argument. That's why I mentioned the benefits. Why do schools and other educational institutions exist at all? To pass on reliable knowledge to the next generation, on the basis of which it will further develop science, technology and the social sphere. It is the continuity of knowledge that has allowed humanity to reach such heights of development.
And the knowledge given at school (especially at primary school) lays the foundation for the rest of the perception of information. The school must teach what has already been proven absolutely for sure and is not subject to doubt. Religious leaders themselves admit that religion does not belong to the scientific sphere. Religion is something from the realm of supersensible knowledge, it does not require proof. She demands to believe. The school should not teach to believe, it has a different function. The school must teach to know and understand. Religion has no place in school. It is impossible to simultaneously illuminate the theory of evolution of Darwin and the creation of man and animals by God. These opinions contradict each other, but one of them is proven, and the other is simply offered to be believed. There are many such contradictions that will arise when teaching religion at school. Not every child will be able to draw a conclusion about where is the religious myth, and where is the scientific truth (adults, then, not everyone could). Therefore, I hope that high-ranking officials will relieve children of the need to do it, and parents from the need to check whether their child has not been turned into a religious fanatic in an institution created for his mental development. Hindi religion
Passions are the enemies of peace, but without them there would be no art or sciences in this world, and each would doze naked on a heap of his own dung.
Over the centuries, three main religions have replaced each other in India:
- Vedic religion, the name of this religion comes from the name of the Vedas - a collection of sacred texts, solemn hymns and sacrificial spells;
- Hinduism, in modern times Hinduism is the main religion of India, it is practiced by about 80% of the country's inhabitants;
- Buddhism, today is practiced by only a part of the population of India.
Vedism - the religion of the ancient Aryans
The earliest beliefs of ancient India include Vedism; according to some unofficial versions, this religion appeared after the ancient state of Arctida disappeared.
Remark 1
Arctida - (also Hyperborea or Arctogea) is a hypothetical northern polar continent, presumably existing in the recent geological past.
According to this version, once upon a time the earth's axis moved, as a result of which the climate changed and cold came to Arctida, then its inhabitants - the Aryans began to migrate towards the equator, a significant part went to the South and North Urals, the other part reached Southeast Asia and mixed with the indigenous population.
An important part of the Vedas is the Vedanta (End of the Vedas) - theological writings that consider the relationship of the human soul - Atman with the world soul - Brahma, which is scattered throughout the world. For a complete connection of Atman with Brahma, it is necessary to comprehend everything that is said in the Vedas and perform all the rituals.
The religion of the ancient Aryans had a complex structure: they deified many natural phenomena, animals, plants and even stones. An important rite in their religion was the sacrifice, and not only animals but also people were sacrificed.
Remark 2
The list of gods in Vedism was quite large, but Indra, the lord of thunder and rain, was considered the main god.
The Vedic texts made it possible to understand how gradually the attention of the inhabitants of ancient India was transferred from the phenomena of the external world to a person, his actions and thinking. The Vedas have had a tremendous impact on the development of Hindu religious and philosophical schools and various religious movements. The Vedic texts are still considered sacred.
Brahmanism and castes
The main provisions of this religion are the chain of rebirths of the human soul, while each subsequent rebirth directly depends on the actions of a person in his real life, and the idea of \u200b\u200bPurusha, the first man who gave rise to all living things on earth.
From the parts of the body of Purusha, castes arose, so from his mouth arose the highest caste - the brahmanas (priests, philosophers), from the feet - sudras (servants).
Further, the idea appears in it about the circulation of life and death - samsara, about rebirths - incarnations of the individual soul into all new bodily shells, about karma - the law that determines the next birth, about moksha - the ideal that every soul should strive for, which consists in getting rid of rebirths and incarnations.
Jainism
The basis of the adherents of this religion were monks - Jaims, who denied everything worldly and led a life full of renunciation and denial, they had no property, they could not even live in one place for a long time, they did not eat meat and ate very poorly and watched so as not to harm anything living.
Definition 1
Jainism is an ancient dharmic religion that appeared in India around the 9th-6th centuries BC. e.
Preaching the principles of asceticism, Jains sometimes went to extremes: they spent many years in silence, did not eat anything and drove themselves to exhaustion, etc.
Jains were divided into two directions: dressed in light and dressed in white, on this occasion they had a lot of disagreements. So those dressed in white covered their bodies and faces, especially their mouths, so as not to accidentally swallow some insect with a cloth, and those dressed in light walked naked, they were dressed only in the light of the Sun, not everyone could fulfill such strict requirements, therefore Jainism never had a large number of followers.
Hinduism
Gradually, the ancient religion of India - Vedism - was transformed into modern Hinduism, this is associated with the increased influence of the Brahmin caste. A hierarchy of gods appears in it. The Creator is placed in the foreground in the form of Brahma-Vishnu-Shiva.
- Brahma is the creator of laws and the initiator of the division of society into varnas.
- Vishnu was revered as the main guardian.
- Shiva is the destroyer god.
For ancient India, Hinduism was not only a religion, but also a whole philosophy that determined the rules of behavior, norms of morality and ethics, but the basis of this religion was the concepts that came from Vedism, while the caste system is the main one for Hinduism.
The role of the main religion Hinduism begins to play in India since the Middle Ages, and this is what it is today. Representatives of this religion believe that you cannot become a Hindu. They can only be born. That is, varna (the social role of a person) is something that is given and predetermined by the gods, and, therefore, cannot be changed.
Shaivism
Shaivism is considered the direction of Hinduism, which implies the worship of God - the destroyer Shiva. Shiva is the god of thunder, rain and lightning, people are afraid of him, he destroys cities and sends diseases, personifying a destructive force.
Buddhism
Jainism and Buddhism originated from the Shramana culture. Buddhism was founded by Buddha Gautama - a prince who became an ascetic hermit. As a result, Buddhism began to spread beyond India and became the main religion in the countries of Southeast Asia. Even later, under the influence of the Hindu Renaissance and under the influence of Islam that came to India, Buddhism in India lost its role, but remained in Nepal and Sri Lanka.
Sikhism
Sikhism is a monotheistic religion. Sikhism appeared in the 15th century of the northern part of India, based on the teachings of Guru Nanak and his followers - the nine gurus of Sikhism. Most of the followers of this religion are from Punjab.
Remark 3
Punjab is the northeastern province of Pakistan, formed as a result of the division of British India in 1947 into India and Pakistan.
In ancient India, the Sikhs, constituting about 2% of the total population, were an influential ethno-confessional group. There are now more than 25 million adherents of Sikhism worldwide. Almost all of them are Punjabis.
The faithful Sikhs are prescribed to be good people, to seek and manifest in themselves what God has given - faith and love, to be free in their will and respect freedom. Sikhs preach love and brotherhood for all people on Earth, regardless of origin.
Hello dear readers. Today we will talk about how the religions of India originated and formed.
The main religious denominations in this country are represented by Hindus, Muslims and Christians. Less than 1% of the indigenous population of the country preaches Buddhism. We will also dwell in a little more detail on the question - In order to understand everything, let us turn to historical facts.
Important milestones
The following periods can be distinguished, which had a significant impact on the formation of cultural and religious movements in India:
- Proto-Indian. This is the religion of the civilization of the same name. The period lasted from the 3rd millennium BC. and until about 1700 BC ...
- Vedic (early and late). It lasted, according to historians, from about the beginning of the second millennium BC to the VI century BC.
- Brahmanism. The beginning of the period dates back to the 6th century BC.
- ... The heyday of the teaching falls on the period from the 6th century BC. until the 7th century of our time.
- Medieval India. A period characterized by the revival of Hinduism, on the one hand, and on the other by wars, colonization of territories that contributed to the birth of Islam.
- Christian. Due to the fact that from 1750 to 1947 India became a colony of Great Britain.
1947 - the time of the proclamation of the independence of the former British colony and the formation on its territory of three independent states at once - Bangladesh, India and Pakistan. This event marked the onset of the heyday of Hinduism. It retains its position as the main religion to this day.
Proto-Indian period
Very little is known about this time in ancient India. According to archaeological data, subsistence farming, primitive relationships contributed to the fact that such primitive concepts as the cult of fertility, female labor, snakes, buffaloes and sacred trees formed the basis of the proto-Indian religion.
By the time the Aryans settled in India, at the end of the second millennium BC, there was already a decline and fragmentation of religious views. However, according to many researchers, the philosophy and culture of the proto-Indian civilization formed the basis of the Vedism that replaced it.
Now it is impossible to reliably indicate in which century a new worldview era began. Historians claim that this happened around the turn of the second millennium BC.
Vedic period
Having absorbed the views and spiritual beliefs of the ancients, a completely new era begins with the settlement of the Aryans. It is characterized by the formation of a harmonious religious and mythical system.
The Vedas date back to the end of the second and the beginning of the first millennium BC. The sacred texts that appeared, revered by the Indo-Aryans, became the beginning of the emergence of the Vedic religious period in the history of India, and then formed the basis of Hinduism.
The fundamental canons of the doctrine are:
- division into estates and caste differences;
- worship of gods and forces personifying natural phenomena, deeds, various spheres of the Universe;
- unification of deities in pairs (an example is the God of the Earth Prithvi and Heaven Dyaus, the deity of the day Mithra and the night of Varuna, etc.);
- division of deities into higher and lower;
- the emergence of creatures opposing themselves to the forces of good - demons;
- the practice of complex ritual bloody sacrifices, which also had pronounced caste differences;
- the emergence of the institution of brahmanas, whose obligations included the performance of the rituals described in the Vedas.
For many centuries, ethnic, cultural, historical factors subjected the Vedic teaching to transformation, which gave rise to the erabrahmanism. This is the next evolutionary stage of ancient Indian philosophical thinking. The Vedic worldview gave rise to Jainism and, in fact, Hinduism itself.
Brahma time
The emergence and formation of Brahmanism in India dates back to about the 6th century BC. and the 8th century of our time. This period is the second most important after the Vedic in the formation of subsequent religious views. The principles that originated at that time formed the basis of later Hinduism.
The important differences between Brahmanism are:
- the central place in the doctrine is given to the concepts of spirit, soul, "self", which contradicts the canons of Vedic philosophy;
- the concept of "brahman" acquires a completely different meaning - it is the Absolute, the highest spirit;
- a harmonious teaching about samsara is formed - the cycle of births, through which the formation of the soul of any living creature on earth is carried out;
- the concept of karma appears as the actions that determine samsara;
- the main postulate is the assertion that everything is subject to change, according to the laws of samsara, only the Supreme Spirit is unchanged, to which one should strive - brahman and atman;
- the doctrine contains the doctrine that the highest aspiration of every believer is to achieve the state of getting out of the cycle of samsara (a series of reincarnations), as close as possible to the brahmana and atman, which requires a certain way of life and strict restrictions;
- the theory of Brahmanism streamlined the basic concepts of cosmogony and theology, the primary meanings of the Creator, the Creative Power, as the cause that gave birth to the world and preserves it, were revised.
Brahman
The religious teachings of that time did not differ in unity. Even within the framework of Brahmanism, there were different trends.
The rise of Buddhism
The founder of the doctrine Siddhartha Gautama was born in the northeast of the Indian subcontinent in the middle of the first millennium BC. The history of that time is the best proof of the assertion that political and religious prerequisites must exist for the emergence of a new philosophical thinking:
- By about the sixth century AD, the influence of Vedic teachings was gradually weakening in this geographical region.
- At the same time, an active process of building statehood and power was noted, suggesting the exalted position of some estates over others, therefore the emergence of Buddhism appeared as the opposite and alternative to Brahmanism. It can be safely called an oppositional philosophical trend.
- The created Buddhist teaching had an important political role, since it contributed to the creation and strengthening of the influential state at that time.
- Buddhism was supported and welcomed in every possible way by the royal authority of Ashoka. This, of course, played an important role in strengthening the position of the doctrine in the Indian subcontinent. According to many modern researchers, the ruler of the Mauryan empire had unlimited power and strength. It was he who helped to ensure that Buddhism acquired the position of that time. It was a mutually beneficial symbiosis of power and creed.
- The strength of the inner content of Buddhism as a worldview also played a significant role in strengthening its position and spread.
Image of King Ashoka
A difficult period for the further development of philosophical doctrine and a time of decline are the 7th-13th centuries of our time, when it lost the support of the upper class.
Similar processes were caused by a series of Muslim conquests in the Indian subcontinent. At the same time, the advent of Islam contributed to a new wave of revival of Hindu religious movements.
Buddhism and Hinduism
From the first moments of the emergence of the Buddha's teachings, there were peculiarities of relationships , due to contradictions between new views on the structure of the world and the old religious foundations, formed over centuries and millennia.
The arrival of Islam in India marked the end of the era of Buddhism on the subcontinent.
Despite the fact that Hinduism is not a single religion, but consists of many currents, it is he who is the historically grounded, traditional and established religion of the majority of the indigenous people.
Spring Festival (Holi) in India
At the same time, we can safely say that the cultural heritage of ancient India had a huge impact on the formation of worldview around the world. Lacking historical support in its homeland, Buddhism has spread throughout the world and continues to attract new followers of the philosophical doctrine.
Conclusion
And we will end on this today. If the article turned out to be useful to you, recommend it to your friends on social networks.
And subscribe to our blog to receive new informative posts in your mail.
See you soon!
