The Canon · No. 015
Hinduism
Sanatana Dharma; the eternal way
c.1500 BCE (Vedic roots) – present · Dharmic / Indian · Living · India, Nepal, Bali, Mauritius, worldwide diaspora
III. THE AXIAL AGE — c.900 – 200 BCE
How many
About 1.2 billion (Pew, 2020), 14.9% of humanity. Third largest religion.
Who began it
No founder, and this is a doctrinal point, not an accident. Adherents call it Sanatana Dharma, the eternal order, on the grounds that it was not started but discovered. Hinduism is an external word: Persian Hindu for the people beyond the Indus, turned into a religion-name by British administrators and census-takers in the 18th and 19th centuries, who needed a single box.
What it is for
To achieve moksha, release from the beginningless cycle of birth, death and rebirth, and in the meantime to live according to dharma, the duty appropriate to one's nature and station.
What it worships
Ranges across the entire theological spectrum and holds all of it simultaneously. The Trimurti: Brahma (creator, barely worshipped), Vishnu (preserver, who descends as avatars including Rama and Krishna), Shiva (destroyer and transformer, ascetic and lord of the dance). Devi in her forms — Durga, Kali, Lakshmi, Saraswati, Parvati. Ganesha, remover of obstacles. Hanuman. Behind or within all of them, Brahman: the impersonal, attributeless absolute. A Hindu may be monotheist, polytheist, pantheist, monist or atheist and remain a Hindu.
What it holds
Karma — action and its consequence, an impersonal moral physics with no judge required. Samsara — the wheel of rebirth. Moksha — release from it. Atman, the self, and its relation to Brahman, which is the central philosophical dispute: Advaita Vedanta says they are identical (tat tvam asi, that thou art); Vishishtadvaita says qualified unity; Dvaita says they are genuinely distinct. Four aims of life (dharma, artha, kama, moksha), four stages (student, householder, forest-dweller, renunciate), and four varnas which in practice hardened into the caste system — a social order that the tradition has produced both the strongest defences and the fiercest internal critiques of.
What it does
Puja, image worship with light, flowers, incense, food and water, at home shrines and temples. Darshan — the reciprocal act of seeing and being seen by the deity. Pilgrimage to Varanasi, Rishikesh, Tirupati, and the Kumbh Mela, the largest gathering of human beings on earth. Vegetarianism widely though not universally. Yoga in its four classical paths — jnana (knowledge), bhakti (devotion), karma (action) and raja (meditation). Festivals: Diwali, Holi, Navaratri, Ganesh Chaturthi, Maha Shivaratri. Sixteen life-cycle rites (samskaras).
After death
Rebirth, driven by karma, into any of a vast range of destinies including animal and divine births. Heavens (svarga) and hells (naraka) exist but are temporary — they exhaust the merit or demerit that put you there and you return to the wheel. This is the decisive structural difference from the Abrahamic afterlife: the goal is not to reach a good afterlife but to stop having afterlives at all. Moksha is release, variously described as absorption into Brahman or eternal loving communion with a personal God depending on the school. Cremation is standard, with ashes committed to a river, ideally the Ganges.
Its texts
Shruti (heard, revealed): the four Vedas, Brahmanas, Aranyakas and the Upanishads. Smriti (remembered): the epics Mahabharata (containing the Bhagavad Gita) and Ramayana; the eighteen Puranas; the Dharmashastras including the Laws of Manu; the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali; the Tantras and Agamas.
Its branches
Vaishnavism (Vishnu, largest), Shaivism (Shiva), Shaktism (the Goddess), Smartism (five deities held equal). Philosophical schools: Advaita, Vishishtadvaita, Dvaita. Regional and modern: ISKCON, Arya Samaj, Swaminarayan, Lingayat.
Of note
The single hardest religion on this list to define, because it is not a religion in the sense the word was built for. It is a family of traditions sharing texts, geography and a vocabulary — including one, Samkhya, that is functionally atheist.
Its timeline
- c.1500–1200 BCE Rigveda composed.
- c.800–500 BCE Upanishads. Karma, samsara, atman and moksha enter the tradition; the ritual system is reinterpreted as interior.
- c.500–200 BCE The six orthodox darshanas take shape: Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Samkhya, Yoga, Mimamsa, Vedanta.
- c.400 BCE–400 CE Mahabharata and Ramayana assembled; the Bhagavad Gita reframes duty, devotion and action for the non-renouncer.
- c.320–550 CE Gupta period. Temple Hinduism, Puranas and the great sectarian traditions of Vishnu and Shiva flourish.
- c.500–1600 CE The bhakti movement spreads across India in vernacular languages — Alvars, Nayanars, Kabir, Mirabai, Tulsidas, Chaitanya — and repeatedly challenges caste and priestly monopoly.
- 788–820 CE Adi Shankara systematises Advaita Vedanta and founds four monastic seats.
- 1017–1137 CE Ramanuja argues qualified non-dualism against Shankara.
- 1828 CE Ram Mohan Roy founds the Brahmo Samaj; the reform era begins, targeting sati, child marriage and caste.
- 1893 Vivekananda addresses the World's Parliament of Religions in Chicago and introduces Vedanta to the West.
- 1947 Partition of India; mass communal violence and population transfer.
- 1980s–present Rise of Hindutva as a political ideology, which many Hindu scholars distinguish sharply from Hinduism as a religion.
Sources
Not yet checked against named sources. This entry is the house's reading; until it is checked, treat each claim as unverified. Correct it, with a source.