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By
Vidya Kathir, Hindu, Seeker, Indian American, Proud Mom, Mkt Analyst
Vidya Kathir, Hindu, Seeker, Indian American, Proud Mom, Mkt Analyst
No one can take Hinduism back to Manusmriti.
It’s a ridiculous thought, to begin with! Hinduism is way too vast,
diverse and flexible to be confined to ONE ancient Hindu law text!
I’ve
been following Rajiv Malhotra for more than 3 years now and NO WAY! he is trying to take Hinduism back to Manusmriti days (of course, you’re assuming here that there was a time in ancient India when Manusmriti was enforced on the society by a “Brahminical King” maybe... and yes, I’m rolling my eyes now). I’ve watched 100s of his videos, I’ve hardly heard
him talk about the Manusmriti and/or as to how tenets from this ancient
Indian law text could be followed today! In fact, I don’t think there is even ONE video of his dedicated to Manusmriti!
When you posed the question, did you make these assumptions?
1. Manusmriti is the Quran or Bible of Hinduism. (Sanatana Dharma or Hinduism is a large umbrella under which hundreds of different paths to spirituality have been allowed to flourish,
therefore, you’d find that diversity is the spirit in Hindu homes, so for example, one family might revere the Gita above everything else and another family might a stickler for the Ramayana text! Hinduism is NOT a
one-book religion; books pertaining to Hinduism would fill hundreds of
libraries!)
2. The ancient priestly class or maybe the ruling class enforced Manusmriti on its people.
(Smriti texts, are in general, words of seers and many Smritis simply documented local practices and customs of different communities.
Manusmriti contains answers given by Rishi Manu while he was in a state of Samadhi. The West calls it the Laws of Manu (erroneously) but in
contrast, these so-called laws were never enforced!)
3. Hindus swear by the Manusmriti just like Christians revere the Bible. (I
can guarantee you that more than 95% of Hindus have never even read the
Manusmriti. Very few, if any Hindu home may have a copy of this text!)
4. The translations and commentaries available of Manusmriti are all accurate and truthful. (Mistranslations and misinterpretations of the text abound especially since the British colonization days!)
My learnings about the Manusmriti from Rajiv Malhotra:
Manusmriti was never a sought-after or a compulsory law book until the British turned it into the Hindu state law. It was ONLY enforced by the British
who claimed that by doing so, they were ruling in accordance with the
Hindu Law (a false assumption made by colonial scholars that MS was the canonical law of Hindus). Manu was ONLY ONE of the several commentators
(or Smriti-writers) in ancient India and these compilers were never appointed by kings, or served in law enforcement or had any official capacity in the state machinery. They were akin to modern social theorists than jurists.
Even in ancient India, Manusmriti was never enforced as the official law of the state. Malhotra argues in his book that only a small subset called vyavahara (i.e. disputes concerning mundane civil and criminal complaints) may be considered “law” in the Western sense.
Manusmriti (8.4–7) lists 18 topics of vyavahara disputes, says Malhotra. (Being Different, Rajiv Malhotra).
Of
course, there are some problematic areas in the text but hey, Manu
himself says that Smritis must be altered to adapt to the changing times
within the purview of Dharma. Hindu Smriti-texts are NOT an equivalent
to the word of God (as for example is the case with Quran).
Read Rajiv Malhotra’s thoughts on the Manusmriti here:
Malhotra’s unique contributions are helping fuel Hindu renaissance…
If you have heard of these NOW commonly used words like Breaking India forces, Hinduphobia and Sanskrit Non-Translatables,
you must know that the man behind these is Rajiv Malhotra! I’d say he
is someone who identified the root cause of many of the symptoms ailing
India and Hinduism and connected the dots to reveal deep systemic
problems and external interventions negatively impacting India/Hinduism
(more specifically, western interventions). As an ex-businessman, his
unique contribution includes a comprehensive SWOT analysis and
particularly, competitive intelligence to understand the inimical forces
targeting India and Hinduism (both internal and external).
He coined the term “Intellectual Kshatriya” (i.e. intellectual warrior) to explain the role of a modern-day Hindu who is passionate about preserving his/her Sanskriti, values and civilization. He revived the ancient Indian idea of “Purvapaksha”, a
debating technique wherein a debater has to first critically study and
prove his mastery of the opponent’s viewpoint before the debate even
began. Malhotra projected Purvapaksha as a must-have in the toolkit of
today’s intellectual Kshatriya and challenged modern-day Hindus to “reverse the gaze”
and view/critique western universalism through their own civilizational
lens. Most Hindus of today live in a la-la land believing things like
“All religions say the same thing and lead to the same truth”. They refuse to believe the fact that religion too is a competitive marketplace of ideas.
Ask any Christian or a Muslim, he/she won’t deny this fact, in fact,
they’d tell you why the whole world must turn Christian or Islamic.
India is a mega-major market for the expansionist religions of the world
and India in deeply entangled in the conversion war, take for example
the fact that evangelism is a multi-billion dollar business worldwide
and about a billion dollars flow into India every year for conversion
activities or the openly evangelist Joshua Project being very active in
India or the more covert Project Thessolonika attacking every Indian
tradition left, right and center throughout the year. Listen to activist
Sankrant Sanu’s latest talk on this topic:
Conversion War, Religious Freedom, and Native Traditions
My suggestion would be for anyone to research deeper into Malhotra’s works first to understand that his contributions to the Indian civilization are a game-changer!
He was the first lone voice and probably still the strongest voice
against deep and entrenched biases surrounding study of India/Hinduism
(Indology) in western academia. His works like Academic Hinduphobia, The
Battle for Sanskrit and Invading the Sacred have challenged established narratives and have forced a change in discourse! Thanks to him, we have Swadeshi Indology conferences
every year to provide an alternative to the monopoly set by western
Indology! The latest conference #5 is a series where traditional
Sanskrit scholars take on and critique (for the first time ever!)
prominent voices of western Indology like Sheldon Pollock. Listen here!
Title: Vakyartha Sadas | Manipulation of Traditional Categories by Western Indology
While every book of his is a game-changer, I’d say Breaking India and Being Different are of utmost importance.
If you want to understand how India is being targeted by foreign nexuses for Balkanization and how this ecosystem functions in India then you must read this book Breaking India. It’s a 640-page book and focuses on the role of US and European churches, academics, think-tanks,
foundations, government, and human rights groups in creating separate identities for Dravidian and Dalit communities from the rest of India.
Being Different is a must-read book to understand how Hinduism (based on the concept of Dharma) is different from the concept of religion as understood in Abrahamic faiths. The book is an original masterpiece where he has introduced many
new scintillating concepts and ideas like history-centrism, embodied knowledge vs revealed truths, Sanskrit non-translatables, integral unity vs synthetic unity, and difference anxiety.
I’ve heard this from so many people on social media and the following is true for me personally as well.
“Rajiv
Malhotra changed my entire outlook - about the way I look at myself and the world. It helped me re-discover my identity (as someone from the
Indian subcontinent) and helped develop a sense of pride and confidence
in my history, ancestors, nation and identity. His ideas have sparked
revolutions of every size and shape.”
Given
the vast scope of his works and his ocean of research (and I haven’t
covered all of his works and projects here), it sounds highly uninformed
and myopic to suggest that Rajiv Malhotra might be trying to take
Hinduism back to Manusmriti!
For more background on Rajiv Malhotra:
According
to Wikipedia, Rajiv Malhotra is an Indian-American who took an early
retirement (at the age of 44) from a career in computer and telecom
industries and founded Infinity Foundation in 1995, which focuses on
Indic studies and also funds projects such as Columbia University’s
project to translate the Tibetan Buddhist Tengyur. You can listen to a more detailed introduction to Malhotra here.
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