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Essay on Hindu Religious Traditions
Hindu religious Traditions begins with the Vedas (c. 1200 BCE), vast collections of sacrificial hymns which are treated as shruti, 'revealed truth' or 'heard knowledge', a form of divine revelation. However, this sacred knowledge was not received by one Prophet but by an undefined group of ancient wise men or sages, who transmitted it to their pupils. This makes the origins of Hindu traditions difficult to identify and has had very important consequences. For example, belief in the divine nature of the Vedas is not a prerequisite for being a Hindu. In fact, the average Hindu has little idea of what the Vedas are, not least because they are written in difficult Sanskrit, the classical language of India.
Universal self called Brahman and the somewhat complex doctrine of human union with him which is achieved through the Atman (inadequately translated into English as "the Self"). Put into its simplest terms, this union involves the divinity (or Brahman) within man, as Akhenaten conceived Aten within his heart, as Taoism spoke of man's Tao, and, perhaps with a slightly different emphasis, as Jesus spoke of "the kingdom of God within you.
Brahman, within the heart of man as the Atman, or Self, is also in everything else—indeed, is everything else: "He is the sun, dwelling in the bright heaven, he is the air, dwelling in the sky, he is the fire, dwelling on the hearth, he is the Soma [sacred wine] dwelling in the sacrificial jar; he dwells in men, in gods, in the sacrifice, in heaven; he is born in the water, on earth, on the mountains; he is the true and the great."Ātman doctrine is one which illustrates rather clearly the distinction between two strands of spiritual discourse, and this distinction is vital to most of the other things which one needs to say about doctrinal schemes......
