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Showing posts with the label Sindhu

A Religion, that is not: Hinduism

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Approximately, 60% of population across the globe pursue more than 4 thousand religious beliefs. Most of them fall under 2 main streams of religions i.e. Abrahamic and Dharmic (Indian) with nearly 95% followings. In almost all cases the religions are named either after the founder or the philosophy. Interestingly both the factors are brushed aside in case of the oldest religion with a third of world's population, the Hinduism. However, etymology considers Hinduism as a geographical term and refers to nationality of the people who lives across the river Sindhu a.k.a Indus. Though coined initially by the Persians, with difficulty to pronounce the river name correctly, assumed the cult status afterwards. The parody is, the most civilized people living at the bank Sindhu are referred as Hindus by Persians and Indus by Europeans, defying a canon of language "Proper names are never translated". Moreover, the ill-conceived notion of the nationality is now imposed o...