10. introduction
THE TERM “HINDUISM”
The English word Hinduism was coined by British writers in the final decades of the
eighteenth century and became familiar as a designator of religious ideas and prac-
tices distinctive to India through such books as Monier-Williams’s much-read Hin-
duism,published in 1877.^5 Initially it was an outsiders’ word, building on usages of
the term Hindu that go back many centuries. Early travelers to the Indus Valley, be-
ginning with the Greeks, spoke of its inhabitants as “Hindu” (Gr. indoi), and by the
sixteenth century residents of India themselves had begun to employ the term to dis-
tinguish themselves from “Turks.” Gradually the distinction became not primarily
ethnic, geographic, or cultural, but religious.
Since the late nineteenth century, Hindus have reacted to the term Hinduism in sev-
eral ways. Some have rejected it in favor of indigenous formulations. Those prefer-
ring “Veda” or “Vedic religion” want to embrace an ancient textual core and the tra-
dition of Brahmin learning that preserved and interpreted it. Those preferring
sanatana dharma(“eternal law” or, as Philip Lutgendorf has playfully suggested,
“old-time religion”)^6 emphasize a more catholic tradition of belief and practice
(worship through images, dietary codes, veneration of the cow, etc.) not necessarily
mediated by Brahmins. Still others, perhaps the majority, have simply accepted the
term Hinduism or have adopted one of its analogues in various Indic languages, es-
peciallyhindu dharma.
From the first decades of the twentieth century onward, textbooks on Hinduism
have been written by Hindus themselves, often under the rubric ofSanatana
Dharma.An important early example is the primer called just that—Sanatana
Dharma: An Elementary Text-book of Hindu Religion and Ethics—first published in
1903 by the Central Hindu College in Banaras for use by boys studying there. It bears
an interestingly cross-cultural stamp, not only because its language is English (inter-
spersed with extensive quotations from Sanskrit) but because a guiding force behind
its production was the Theosophist Annie Besant, a Hindu convert born in England.
Such efforts at self-explanation were and are intended to set Hinduism parallel with
other religious traditions. The idea ofsanatana dharmaemphasizes the importance
of a general human goal—maintaining personal and universal equilibrium—while
at the same time calling attention to the crucial role that Hindus assign to the per-
formance of traditional (sanatana)religious practices in achieving that goal. Here
tradition is understood to be inherently pluriform, since no one person can occupy
all the social, occupational, and age-defined roles that are requisite to maintaining the
health of life as a whole. Hence the stress laid upon universal maxims such as ahimsa,