Central tenets of Hinduism (which unite the many sects and schools)

1. The world is ordered, not chaotic. It is based on dharma, the law. There is a dharma that
attaches to categories (like humans), a social dharma that attaches to one's position in life
(species, gender, class, jati, age etc) and an individual dharma based on one's accumulated karma
2. Karma (literally, action) is the sum total of the attachments that one has, based on one's
previous actions. When reborn, one sheds all one's attributes (class, jati, gender, species, physical
appearance etc) but attachments persist from one birth to the next. Only by working through or
detaching oneself from attachments, can one achieve liberation from the cycle of rebirths.
3. Everything in the universe (deities, humans, animals, rocks, rivers etc) is a manifestation,
more or less realized. of the divine Self/Spirit/Atman. Hence Hindus will worship living beings
(other humans such as teachers, parents or saints) and certain animals as manifestations of the
divine, and also worship some non-living beings like rivers, mountains, trees, books as
sacred/divine.
4. The Bhagavad Gita, or Gita for short, is an important ancient Hindu text, a dialogue between
Arjun, who stands for the individual self, and Krishna, who is God, the universal Self. Krishna
tells Arjuna that liberation can be achieved by several paths - knowledge, selfless action or
loving devotion to a chosen deity. Devotion is easy and direct, as anyone can practice it.
5. All paths and all religions lead to the same goal. Some are more direct and some more
roundabout (like different paths up a mountain). Hinduism has thousands of deities, thousands of
sacred texts and also does not deny the truth of other religions. One chooses the path, the text and
the deity most congenial to oneself. Most Hindus are therefore happy to include pictures of Jesus
and Mary or Buddha in their shrines, and to visit churches or shrines of Muslim saints, which
they do in large numbers in India.

Indian civilizational tendencies

1. A tendency to assimilate outside influences and incorporate it into one's own worldview and
daily life e.g. English has been embraced as an Indian language; Chinese food is now cooked
with Indian spices and happily consumed; Macdonalds, now very popular in India, offers various
vegetarian burgers and announces that it does not use either beef or pork in any of its food.
2. A tendency to worship elders, especially the mother. An ancient Hindu scripture states that the
mother is greater than the father and the teacher greatest of all. The Quran states that heaven is at

the mother's feet. The famous film dialogue "I have Ma" has the power it does because of the
cultural resonance of the word "Ma" - goddesses are addressed as Ma or mother, gods are less
often addressed as father. No word for father carries the same resonance as Ma (nor does Mom).
3. A tendency to separate what is seen as pure from what is seen as impure. Thus Indians (both
Hindus and Muslims) traditionally eat only with the right hand and use the left hand to wash
after using the toilet. Most Hindus also practice jootha, which means never to eat anything that
has touched the mouth of another and never to offer anyone food or drink that has touched one's
mouth. Many Indian non-Hindus also practice this.
4. Addressing others, whether friends or strangers, by kinship terms, and assimilating friends and
their families into one's own family (e.g. addressing a friend's mother as "Mother").