I am no longer Hindu

The enemy of my enemy is my friend. I’ve never bothered to read this thread before, and I’ve only read from Bheem’s post on down. Lo and behold here is Surya Deva making false statements about me. (In a court of law that is known as libel, by the way.)

For the record I do not consider myself to be a Christian fundamentalist, nor would any Christian fundamentalist accept me as one of them, because of my lack of involvement in their churches and my interest in yoga and other Indian philosophies. Neither am I anti-Hindu. I never had a problem with hindus until I encountered a few hostiles posting on this forum. I’m not crazy about Shankara and his advaita vedanta, but that doesn’t mean I’m anti-hindu.

Surya Deva needs to stop this nonsense.

Asuri is not the typical Christian fundamentalist and he is right that no Christian fundamentalist would accept him, because of his affinity for yoga, Samkhya and other Indian philosophies. However, that does not change the fact that Asuri appropriates these philosophies and distorts them to fit his Christian worldview. What he is doing is arguably worse than a conventional Christian fundamentalist, he is undermining the philosophical viewpoint, framework and uniqueness of an entirely different tradition of philosophy by forcing into a Christian paradigm.
This is one of the biggest complains of Eastern cultures against the West, that rather than the West showing real sincere and genuine interest in their cultures, the West seeks to assimilate and appropriate their culture, philosophy and arts as part of the larger and more superior Western category, hence undermining their own.

My gripe with Asuri is that he is distorts and misrepresents the philosophical tradition of India and attempts to reduce it to Western ways of thinking, and he is simply too arrogant to acknowledge that he doing it. On several occasions I have caught him reducing Samkhya to Cartesian dualism(Christian dualism) and despite me showing him the obvious differences between the two, he still has not corrected his mistakes. He is thus consciously undermining Samkhya. I have also caught him undermining Yoga by denying that Yoga is the total quietening of the mind, despite the fact that in the Eastern tradition of philosophy the quietening of the mind is accepted universally as the modus operandi of all spiritual practices.

What Asuri is doing is more insidious and dangerous than a regular Christian fundamentalist, because he is misleading people by misrepresenting the Indian philosophical tradition. I will summarize all the misrepresentations I have seen him do so far:

  1. Presenting Samkhya as an anti-Vedic philosophy and fabricating a conspiracy theory how the Hindus oppressed the Samkhya thinkers - The truth is that Samkhya considers itself a pro-Vedic philosophy, accepts the authority of the Vedas and even cites from the Vedas to support its conclusions. Samkhya is a Hindu philosophy and therefore Samkhya philosophers were all Hindu.

Asuri’s agenda in doing this is to distance Samkhya-Yoga from Hinduism and to make it seem more like brethren with Christianity.

  1. Presenting Yoga as just a discipline to control negative thoughts, while keeping the positive ones - the truth is Yoga makes no value judgements on any thoughts, it considers them all to be undesirable(vice and virtue) and ultimately all need to be extinguished and silenced.

Asuri’s agenda here is to make Yoga seem like a discipline that can aid Christian practice of sifting out virtuous thought from viceful thought.

  1. Presenting Vedanta as a belief system, oppressive religion, purely based on dogma fro scripture: The truth is Vedanta is a philosophy, and a widely influential and highly regarded philosophy both in the East and the West, and it has emerged as the strongest philosophy in Hindu philosophy because it presents the most consistent worldview and the one most aligned with the Vedas.

Again Asuri agenda here is to undermine Hindu philosophy by presenting its main school of philosophy as just another religion or belief system, ignoring its sophistication, bringing it down to the level of Christianity.

  1. Presenting the SPS, a late medieval text as the foundational text of Samkhya, ignoring the classical text of the school the Karika. The truth is, the Karika is the oldest extant text of the school and this is not a controversial issue at all in scholarship and one will find in any encyclopedia the karika named as the oldest and defining text of the school.

In this case there is no Christian agenda I can identify, other than the fact that the late Samkhya thinkers(SPS) accept a god separate from other souls(which is more aligned with Christian doctrine) Asuri is just being a stubborn pig-head by not accepting what is widely considered fact in the academic world.

Asuri’s agenda for everybody to see:

05-29-2011, 11:31 AM #62
Asuri
sah?sra Member

Join Date: Apr 2009
Posts: 1,359
I got interested in Samkhya-Yoga philosophy because it is rational and seemed more suitable for western minds than the idealistic Vedanta. I also like yoga for the health benefits. But then you have these nimrods trying to say that Hindus need to be in charge of all things remotely related to Yoga and Hinduism. They’re actually trying to impose their caste system on us.

It is true that at some time in the remote past there was a melding of two cultures, the rational and relatively more civilized people, from which the Samkhya originated were dominated by the relatively less civilized people who were obsessed with the worship of naturalistic gods. The insistence that there could be no divergence from the Vedas was the action of a conquering people. This is still being perpetuated to this day with the insistence that there was never any convergence of cultures, and that only caste Hindus are qualified in the areas of yoga and philosophy.

Yoga and the philosophies that originated in India are not the property of any religion. We are free to study and interpret them as we see fit. I still find Yoga and Samkhya-Yoga philosophy to have some value, but you can keep Hinduism. I don’t want it.

Note then:

I got interested in Samkhya-Yoga philosophy because it is rational and seemed more suitable for western minds than the idealistic Vedanta. I also like yoga for the health benefits.

As I showed above his only interest in Samkhya-Yoga is to appropriate it to Western thinking. His only interest in Yoga is to reduce to a system of exercise for the West.

We are free to study and interpret them as we see fit. I still find Yoga and Samkhya-Yoga philosophy to have some value, but you can keep Hinduism. I don’t want it.

Here we can say how explicitly Asuri separates Samkhya-Yoga from Hinduism. As a Christian who has interest in Samkhya-Yoga which are Hindu philosophies and practices, Asuri is more comfortable with Samkhya-Yoga by first separating it from Hinduism, creation a false division between Samkhya-Yoga and Hinduism, and then appropriating and reducing it into Western thinking.

You are accusing Asuri for things you are doing yourself. You are looking at Sanatana Dharma from your own western and modernist bias of philosophy, phychology and neo-vedanta biased universalism. You yourself have repeatedly denounced Hinduism, now you are accusing Asuri for doing the same. You are the biggest threat here, because you are loudest in declaring your view is the one and only true version of Sanatana Dharma, just like a Christian fundamentalist.

You have even praised Christians in this threat for not having a pluralistic attitude of religion. You are holding the Sankhya karika as the single most authority on Sankhya philosophy, just like a Christian would do with a Bible or maybe even to set up a strawman, because you can’t argue against other views of Sankhya. You have even refered to the upanishads as the “new testament” of Hinduism. All this betrays that you are much closer to Christian fundamentalism than anyone else on this forum.

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?”

“The camel cannot see the crookedness of its own neck”

“If your house is of glass, don’t throw rocks at others”

“The pot calling the kettle black”

Asuri’s anti-Hindu agenda fully exposed for everybody to see:

06-13-2011, 02:47 PM #28
Asuri
sah?sra Member

Join Date: Apr 2009
Posts: 1,359
Go worship a cow, you filthy piss-drinking dot-head.

User was banned for two months for this and the below posts - admin - 06/13/2011 4:18pm central


Be here now.
Asuri

06-13-2011, 03:02 PM #29
Asuri
sah?sra Member

Join Date: Apr 2009
Posts: 1,359
And stay on your side of the Atlantic, or go home in a box.


Be here now.
Asuri

06-13-2011, 03:08 PM #30
Nietzsche
Satyagraha

Join Date: Dec 2010
Posts: 1,489
Quote:
Originally Posted by Asuri
Go worship a cow, you filthy piss-drinking dot-head.
. Thanks for the laugh. Touched a nerve did I?

This is merely more proof that even something as profound as Indian wisdom fails to civilize Westerners like you.

I also love how you keep breaking your vow to stay out of this forum. A civilized person does not give into his desires so easily. Of course, I would expect nothing less from Westerners like you, who have had quite an impressive history of rape, genocide, hate crimes, murders, lynching, supremacy and so on.

In the meantime, I will compile all the racist comments you have made so far:

Quote:
Well, I never thought much about Hindus at all, but if I were to base my opinion on the two of you, I’d have to say that Hindus are arrogant, egotistical, nasty little eggheads, bigots, haters, and BS artists
Quote:
And quit twisting my words, you punk. I didn’t say that Indians only own the Dunkin Donuts and 7 11’s, I said they own ALL of them.
Quote:
Oh yeah, I watched Ice Road Truckers when they went to India. Man, you guys can’t drive. And you need to do something about those roads.
Quote:
Nice try Thomas, but we know what happens when pearls are cast before the swine. What did you expect from people who drink their own piss?

These comments Asuri made were so racist and anti-hindu that even by the liberal standards of the religion forum, they were considered unacceptable and Asuri was banned for 2 months. Very recently when Asuri was reminded(by Sarva ironically) of making these comments, Asuri responded, “I was defending my Christian heritage”

I rest my case.

So Sarva is this the person you are palling up with me against? A known Hindu-hater? No wonder your country got invaded so much.

You are not any better with the comments you have made about India and Hinduism.

In Sarva’s quick jump to defend Asuri or mitigate his racist and anti-Hindu comments(the irony is, Sarva is Hindu lol) we can clearly see why I think India is a doomed nation: because the people are idiots. They would rather fight among each other, than unite. Sarva is a Hindu who strongly subscribes to Puranic Hinduism(which I am strongly against) and I am a Hindu who subscribes to the Jnana universalist Hinduism(I do not reject Hinduism entirely, only the Puranic form of it which is popular today) Yet, Sarva considers me a more dangerous threat and would pal up with a known anti-Hindu and Christian fundamentalist against me.

This is exactly how India was invaded and completely subjugated by the British - because Indian people were so busy fighting among each other as they were highly fragmented - they never united against the British, but rather each of them tried to pall up with the British against their Indian rivals, and in the process they gave British their own land just to get at their Indian rivals. They were pit up against each other and finally assimilated.

Such idiotic people deserve such a fate. There is a reason why I have so few Indian friends. As I already forecasted, the same is going to happen in the near future with China. India is just as fragmented today, as it was when the British invaded. All it will take is just one organized power with imperialist intention to subjugate it - and China is right next door.

[QUOTE=Surya Deva;72737]… we can clearly see why I think India is a doomed nation: because the people are idiots. …

Such idiotic people deserve such a fate.[/QUOTE]I rest my case.

This is typical Surya Deva thinking. He has placed me in a box of who he thinks I am, then he has to distort and misrepresent my views in order to make me fit into his box. The truth of the matter is that my views regarding Samkhya-Yoga philosophy have nothing at all to do with Christianity. They have much more to do with my lack of affinity for Vedanta philosophy, and my belief that the dominance of Vedanta has resulted in the distortion of much of Samkhya-Yoga philosophy. So what I’m about has more to do with trying to discover the true meaning of these philosophies, minus the Vedanta influence.

I’ve learned a few things since joining this forum, and as a result I have, in fact, altered some of my views on the subject.

By the way just to back up my prediction that China will take over India and my opinion of Indian people’s idiocy: Refer to this article:

They want to encircle India from all sides, fan sub-nationalism in India and break up the Republic. Assamese, Tamils and Nagas along with Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan and the "decadent " Hindu religion will all be used to decimate India or rather dismember the great Indian federation. An article espousing such a strategy has appeared on a quasi-official Chinese website. So it cannot be taken lightly. China is not India, where democracy in expression of opinion prevails. On a quasi-official site, it is an opinion that has possibly some sort of official sanction.

The Indian government has rightly taken exception to the article, which incidentally has appeared just a few days ahead of our 62nd Independence Day. Whereas the Indian government and you and me have the right to fume at this open Chinese desire to break India, isn’t it a fact that we are all party to this “weakening” of India. Sixty-two years after our “tryst with destiny” are we really Indians, or do we think ourselves as Bengalis, Punjabis, Tamils, Malayalis, Gujaratis and Marathis?

Is our Hindu, Muslim, Christian or Sikh identity more important to us than our Indian tag ? This is a point worth pondering over. Most of us, when asked the question, will say that our Indian identity is more important to us. But in reality our Indian identity becomes the most important identity when we are travelling abroad or watching a cricket match. In our own country we think nothing of denigrating other communities and generally looking down on them. This may not be the attitude of each and every one of us, but generally it is true. Worse still, most of us have made no effort to understand the sociology and culture of Indians living in other parts and their problems and would prefer to fly off abroad for a holiday rather than visiting other states.

Sixty-two years later not only have we failed to consolidate our Indian identity, but have regressed the other way. So in large parts of India, not to talk of being Indians, we are not even Marathis, Biharis, Tamils or Telugus. We are Rajputs, Reddys, Patels, Kshatriyas, Jats, Kurmis, Vaniyars, Dalits and what have you. This is the reason why the Chinese talk about balkanisation of India: they realise that if the Indians are moving in the opposite direction, instead of consolidating their Indian identity then it would not be too difficult to break them? Are they wrong in thinking so?

The Chinese may take delight in the dismemberment of India but we must also look inwards to figure out why we are unable to consolidate our Indianness and our position as a nation. A hundred and fifty-two years ago in 1857, the British were able to crush the Indian revolt because Indians did not think of themselves as Indians then — there were Sikhs, Biharis, Rajputs and Marathas. The British were able to play one community against the other and take the support of some of them to crush the others.

In 1993, RDX smuggled in through the sea route with the connivance of customs officials was used to bomb Mumbai and kill over 300 people. A senior customs official who allowed the consignment in said he did not know what the consignment contained. He just took a bribe and allowed the consignment in, and this is what he did for all consignments. Fifteen years later on 26/11, terrorists from Pakistan launched a deadly attack on the same city. They came by the sea route and one can be perfectly sure about this that they had local logistical support. So things have not really changed. Why blame the Chinese then for harbouring ambitions of dismembering India? Two hundred and fifty-two years ago in 1757 that is precisely the way Robert Clive was able to plant the English flag in India after the battle of Plassey. He bribed a general of the Nawab of Bengal, who stood inert with his troops as Clive’s men cut down to size the other part of Nawab’s team.

If our “tryst with destiny” has not resulted in consolidating our Indianness in 62 years, neither will it by taking pledges on August 15, which we do every year. But it is time to ponder and seriously think how to consolidate the concept of India, Indianness and Indian nationalism. It is not too late still. But time is running out with the enemy lurking around. And his ambitions are not hidden any more. What are your ideas, fellow Indians?


India is a nation, or more accurately civilization, that has historically been hopelessly divided. Hence it is also the nation that has been always falling prey to invasions. These Indian people never seem to learn that strength comes from unity not diversity. While Indians today are busy quarreling amongst themselves, China is silently encircling India from all sides, inciting revolutions in India and exploiting Indian fault lines, turning all of its neighbors against it.

And its because of idiots… like :wink:

You are completely out of line here, implying that disagreeing with you results in the fall of India. You have an immense delusion of grandeur.

Well, I never thought much about Hindus at all, but if I were to base my opinion on the two of you, I’d have to say that Hindus are arrogant, egotistical, nasty little eggheads, bigots, haters, and BS artists

This is a good example of how you misunderstand and twist my words to suit your purposes. What I’m really saying here is that [I]you two[/I] (Surya Deva and Neitsche) are arrogant, egotistical, etc., and if I had to base my opinion of all hindus on you two, that is what my opinion would be. But implicit in the statement is that I do not base my opinion of all hindus only on you two, and that’s a good thing for them, because you are giving them all a bad reputation.

Now are you really so stupid that I have to explain this to you, or is there some other motive?

I have already explained elsewhere that the remarks I made that got me banned were directed at Neitsche, who went around this forum for months bashing Christians, and not anyone else. He deserved it.

From the article:

A hundred and fifty-two years ago in 1857, the British were able to crush the Indian revolt because Indians did not think of themselves as Indians then — there were Sikhs, Biharis, Rajputs and Marathas. The British were able to play one community against the other and take the support of some of them to crush the others.

You exhibit exactly the same mentality: You identify me as an outsider, outside of the fold of Indianess and Hinduism, and therefore I am your enemy and my enemy is your friend. Rather than seeing me as just another Indian and another type of Hindu, you exclude me, to the extent that you feel more affinity with a known anti-Hindu and racist.
And this is what happened when the British invaded India and in the 1857 first war of independence - where Indians rose to fight against the British - and do you know why they lost? Because it was Indians who rose to fight against those Indians :smiley:

I really hope other Indians can see how in Sarva you can see that very mentality that has lead to India historically falling prey to invasions again… and again… and again. Perhaps then you will begin to understand why I have such a low opinion of Indians.

[QUOTE=Asuri;72742]This is a good example of how you misunderstand and twist my words to suit your purposes. What I’m really saying here is that [I]you two[/I] (Surya Deva and Neitsche) are arrogant, egotistical, etc., and if I had to base my opinion of all hindus on you two, that is what my opinion would be. But implicit in the statement is that I do not base my opinion of all hindus only on you two, and that’s a good thing for them, because you are giving them all a bad reputation.

Now are you really so stupid that I have to explain this to you, or is there some other motive?[/QUOTE]

Save it, you were banned for 2 months for making explicitly racist anti-Hindu comments. You did the crime - and you’ve served the sentence.

You have already denounced India and you have denigrated almost every aspect of Hinduism and now you want me to pick your side because you are Indian. You can’t be serious.

No, I have denounced bad things about India and Hinduism. I am an Indian and Hindu(in the Santana dharma way) who is cable of self-criticism, but self-criticism is not the same as hatred or antagonism. You will find my criticisms are shared by Indian visionaries and spiritual leaders like Swami Vivekananda(who is also critical of idol worship) but you would side up with a known anti-Hindu and India racist against me. That is why the situation is so ironic and so idiotic as well :wink:

Again you support my argument that Indians would rather fight amogst each other, than fight an outside enemy.

Ah, so now you admit you are a follower of neo-vedanta which was heavily influenced by Biblical thinking and western esotericism. Swami Vivekananda was never even initiated into the order of Shankaracharya, he initiated himself into monkhood after telling the story of Jesus Christ to a few disciples of Ramakrishna after his demise in front of a campfire. The visionaries you talk about were all influenced by Christianity (Dayananda, Rama Mohan Roy, Vivekananda). It is clear that you are also looking at Hinduism through the eyes of Christianity while ironically you are accusing other people for being biased by Christianity. The difference is that you are the biggest missionairy of this Christianized Hinduism.

Neo Vedanta is not influenced by biblical thinking, but rather it is Vedanta as explained by modern Hindu gurus. Swami Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda’s guru, was not influenced by Christianity, he was a traditional Shakta. He was the one that taught Swami Vivekananda and Swami Vivekananda got a traditional Vedanta education. It is easy to see how well versed Swami Vivekananda is in Vedanta and Hinduism in general by reading his complete works. His explanations of Hinduism were the first exposure the West got on Hinduism and today in the UK the Vivekananda foundation runs courses on Hinduism at school, college and degree level as a part of the national curriculum.

My understanding of Hinduism is also not based on biblical thinking, but I certainly do bring a modern outlook to it, because I am after all a modern person. I base my understanding on the primary texts themselves - which by the way are the Vedas(sruti) NOT THE PURANAS. Even you know that the Vedas predate the Puranas by a huge margin.

The fact is that the Samkhya thinkers opposed the belief in Brahman as the source of the world, which is the central belief of Vedanta. I think that classifies Samkhya as non-hindu, because hindus accept Vedanta.

The following is a quote from Vijnana Bhiksu’s introduction to the Samkhya Pravachana Sutram.

It is therefore, on this ground alone that the disparagement of all darsanas except the Vedanta and Yoga in the Padma-Purana can be justified…

He then goes on to quote from the Padma Purana which names the "Tamasa Sastras’, including Vaisesika, Nyaya, Samkhya, Purva-Mimamsa, Charvaka, and Buddhism. It is a fact that Sankara also argued against many of these. So it is not my imagination to say that not only Samkhya, but Buddhism and others were suppressed. I cannot, however, justify a view that this was the result of an invading culture that dominated a pre-existing culture.

[QUOTE=Surya Deva;72748]Neo Vedanta is not influenced by biblical thinking, but rather it is Vedanta as explained by modern Hindu gurus. Swami Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda’s guru, was not influenced by Christianity, he was a traditional Shakta. He was the one that taught Swami Vivekananda and Swami Vivekananda got a traditional Vedanta education. It is easy to see how well versed Swami Vivekananda is in Vedanta and Hinduism in general by reading his complete works. His explanations of Hinduism were the first exposure the West got on Hinduism and today in the UK the Vivekananda foundation runs courses on Hinduism at school, college and degree level as a part of the national curriculum.[/quote]This is wrong, the reformist movements have been influenced heavily by Christianity and Vivekandanda by no means was a traditional vedantin or a traditional shakta. He was first a member of the reformist movement, the Brahmo Samaj, before he assigned himself the leadership of the Ramakrishna mission.

My understanding of Hinduism is also not based on biblical thinking, but I certainly do bring a modern outlook to it, because I am after all a modern person. I base my understanding on the primary texts themselves - which by the way are the Vedas(sruti) NOT THE PURANAS. Even you know that the Vedas predate the Puranas by a huge margin.

You create an unnecessary division between vedas and puranas. The Chandogya Upanishad, Brihadaranyaka Upanishad and the Atharvaveda all mention the Itihasa and Purana as the fifth veda. Shankaracharya also had great respect for the puranas and tantras. Also, I am not a follower of merely “puranic” Hinduism as you call it. I have been initiated into the vedic tradition since I was eight years old. You are basically an outsider to this tradition of the vedas.