I.

Introduction

Pre-Vedic traditions, traces of which seem to be incorporated in Hinduism(e.g Indus

Valley Civilization, Deccan Neolithic Culture, etc.)

Gavin Flood, An Introduction to Hinduism

The Chronology of Hinduism.20 Before the first millennium CE there is no historiography

in the south Asian cultural region and texts are not dated. The chronology of Indian religions
has therefore been notoriously difficult to establish. We have to rely on archaeological
evidence of coins, pottery and particularly, inscriptions, and on the internal evidence of texts.
21 The chronology of south Asia has been divided into ancient, classical, medieval and
modern periods. The following pages assume the following general chronological scheme: 1)
the Indus valley civilization(c2500 to 1500 BCE. Elements of Hinduism may be traced back
to this period. 2) the Vedic period(c.1500 to 500 BCE). The rise of Aryan, in contrast to
Dravidian, culture occurs during this period, though there may be more continuity between
the Aryan and Indus valley cultures than was previously supposed. During this period the
Veda was formulated and texts of Dharma and ritual composed. 3) the Epic and Puranic
period(c.500 BCE to 500 CE). This period sees the composition of the Mahabharata and
Ramayana, as well as the bulk of the Puranas. A number of important kingdom arise,
particularly the Gupta dynasty(c.320 CE to 500 CE), and the great traditions of Vaisnavism,
Saivism and Saktism begin to develop. 4) the Medieval period(c.500 CE to 1500 CE) sees the
development of devotion to the major Hindu deities, particularly Vishnu, Siva and Devi.
There are major developments in the theistic traditions of Vaishnavism, Saivsim and Saktism.
This period sees the composition of 22 devotional and poetic literature in Sanskrit and
vernacularl language, as well as the composition of tantric literature. 5) the Modern
period(c.1500 CE to the present) sees the rise and fall of two great empires, the Mughal and
the British, and the origin of India as a nation state. The nineteenth century sees the rise of
Renaissance Hinduism and the twentieth century the development of Hinduism as a major
world religion.

The Origins of Hinduism23 The origins of Hinduism lie in two ancient cultural complexes,
the Indus valley civilization which flourished from 2500 BCE to about 1500 BCE, though its
roots are much earlier, and the Aryan culture which developed during the second millennium
1
BCE. There is some controversy regarding the relationship between these two cultures. The
traditional view, still supported by some scholars, is that the Indus valley civilization declined,
to be replaced by the culture of the Aryans, an Indo-European people originating in the
Caucasus region who migrated into south Asia and spread across the fertile, northern plains,
which, throughout India’s long history, have offered no obstacle to invaders or migrants. The
alternative view is that Aryan culture is a development from the Indus valley civilization and
was not introduced by outside invaders or migrants; that there is no cultural disjunction in
ancient south Asian history, but rather a continuity from an early period. Yet, whether the
Aryans came from outside the subcontinent or not, Hinduism might be regarded as the
development over the next, 2000 years of Aryan culture, interacting with non-Aryan or
Dravidian and tribal cultures, though it is Aryan culture which has provided the ‘master
narrative’, absorbing and controlling other discourses.

The Indus Valley Civilization and Its Religions. In 1921 Sir John Marshall, Director
General of the Archaeological Survey of India, directed D.R. Sahni to begin excavations at
Harappa. He and R.D. Banerjee, excavating at Mohenjo-Daro in Sind, discovered the Indus
valley civilization. This Indus valley or Harappan civilization developed from about 2500
BCE, though its origins reach back to the Neolithic Period(7000-6000BCE), reached its peak
around 2300-2000 BCE, was in decline by 1800 BCE and had faded away by 1500. The was
a developed, urban culture. 24 The development and expansion of the Indus valley culture
was probably the consequence of a growth in population, itself due to the development of
farming and the availability of food supplies grown on the rich alluvial deposits of the Indus
valley.

27 There is a system of writing, the Indus valley script, which has been found inscribed on
steatite seals and copper plates, but this has not yet been successfully deciphered. The biggest
issue which has bearing on the development of Hindu traditions from the Indus valley, lies in
the answer to the questions: what is the language of the steatite seals? And to what group of
language is it related. There have been two predominant views among scholars, one that it
represents a language belonging to the Dravidian linguistic family, the other that it is an early
form of Indo-European. The Dravidian languages include the south Indian languages of Tamil,
Kannada, Telugu and Malayalam, as wellas Brahui, the language of a hill people in Pakistan.
The presence of these languages is strong evidence for there being a pan-Indian Dravidian
2
presence, before the predominance of the Indo-Iranian language group. Perhaps the most
striking thing about the Indus civilization is the high degree of uniformity of urban planning
and even a conformity in size of building bricks. Many houses had a water supply and
drainage system. This suggest a sophisticated administration and a hierarchical structure of
authority. In both Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro there was a fortified lower city separated from
a fortified citadel or ‘acropolis’ situated 28 on a raised mound, which contained halls and
temples. Such uniformity may suggest the earliest imperial formation in South Asia, although
there is no conclusive evidence.

The state religion of the mature Indus valley seems to have involved temple rituals, perhaps
animal sacrifice, and ritual purificatory bathing, an important idea in Hinduism. The large
number of female terracotta figurines unearthed may have been goddess images and the
presence of the goddess in later Hinduism may be traced back to this early period. ‘Phallic’-
shaped stones have also been found, suggestive of the later an iconic representation of Siva,
the linga. It is tempting to speculate that there are continuities of religion from the Indus
valley into Hinduism, but we must exercise caution. The ritual bath, the fire altars, the female
figurines, the horned deities and the ‘lingas’ are certainly suggestive of later Hindu traditions.
However, ritual purity, an emphasis on fertility, sacrifice, and goddess worship are common
to other religions of the ancient world as well.

The Indus valley civilization seems to have declined rather suddenly between 1800 and 1700
BCE, primarily due to environment causes such as flooding or a decrease in rainfall.

30 The most commonly accepted theory to date has been that Hinduism is the consequence of
incursions of groups known as Aryans into the northern plains of India from central Asia,
around 1500 BCE. Some of these groups went into Iran and there are close affinities between
the Iranian religion of the Avesta(the sacred scripture of Zoroastrianism) and the religion of
the Veda. This narrative has maintained that the Aryans were of the same stock as groups
which went west into Europe. Their language was an Indo-European tongue which developed
into Vedic Sanskrit and finally into classical Sanskrit, the sacred language of Hinduism, and
they worshipped primarily a fire god, Agni, a hallucinogenic plant, Soma, and a warrior god,
Indra. The self-designation of these people was the Sanskrit arya, meaning ‘noble’ or
‘honorable’, which referred to the three highest social classes of their society, as distinct from

3
the indigenous people of south Asia who they encountered and subjugated by means of a
superior war technology, two-wheeled war-chariots drawn by horses. 31 They spread over the
northern plains and, Aryan culture slowly spread to the Deccan and was established in south
India by around the sixth century CE.

The predominance of Aryan culture over Dravidian culture is not disputed, but the origin of
the Aryan culture over Dravidian culture is not disputed, but the origin of the Aryans as
coming from outside the subcontinent has recently been questioned. Two theories concerning
the origin of the Aryans have emerged: 1) The Aryan migration thesis. The Indus valley
civilization, which speaks a Dravidian language, declines between 2000 and 1800 BCE. The
Aryan migrations, or even invasions, occur from about 1500 BCE and the Aryans become the
dominant cultural force. This has been the traditional, scholarly picture. 2) The cultural
transformation thesis. Aryan culture is a development of the Indus valley culture whose
language belongs to the Indo-European family, possibly spoken in the region as far back as
the Neolithic Period,, in interaction with Dravidian culture. On this view there were no Aryan
incursions into India, but Indus valley culture is an early Aryan or vedic culture.

34 A modified Aryan migration theory is supported by Parpola’a work. At the beginning of

the second millennium BCE, Aryan nomads entered the Indian subcontinent. They were, of
course, a minority, and while the Indus valley culture continues without a break, the Aryan
culture lived and developed alongside it and absorbed elements of it. The new groups, who
possessed arya, ‘nobility’, formed a dominating eleite speaking the Aryan language, though
Sanskrit has absorbed proto-Dravidian features, such as the retroflex sound which does not
exist in other Indo-European languages, as well as agricultural terms. Dravidian languages, as
one would expect, have also absorbed elements of Sanskrit. Over a number of centuries
bilingualism would have developed until the majority of the population adopted the Aryan
language, a form of vedic Sanskrit. This idea of bilingualism is perhaps problematic but
Parpola’s arguments are well supported.

J.L. Brockington, The Sacred Thread

24 The Mohenjo-daro Harappa civilization seems to have come to an end a considerable time

4
before the Aryan invasion; nevertheless, it is at least a possibility that some of the beliefs of
these people lingered on in popular form, with elements eventually being absorbed into
Hinduism alongside those inherited from the Vedas. 26 In general, the evidence afforded by
the material remains of the Indus Valley cities can only be regarded as insufficient to give a
true picture of the religious beliefs and practices of their inhabitants, except to demonstrate
their total dependence on the forces of nature.

Another possible source for those elements of later Hinduism obviously not from a Vedic
background is the Deccan Neolithic culture, which flourished about 2000 to 750 B.C. This
culture is known from a number of often sizable ashmounds found in Karnataka and Andhra
Pradesh. These ashmounds have resulted from the periodic firing of the dung in the stockades
where the pastoral and partially nomadic people involved penned their cattle; some are
associated with settlements and some not, presumably representing a seasonal shifting of
pasture. These people evidently were very dependent on their cattle and it has been suggested
that the firing of the cattle-pens may have been related to some ceremonial connected with
the 27 seasonal migrations, just as the worship of cattle and the lighting of lamps or bonfires
are associated in the modern festivals of Holi and Divali in the north ad Pongal in the south.
The use of ash for ritual purposes by followers of Siva could also conceivably be connected.
These conjectures would certainly provide sources for certain aspects in Hinduism of non-
Vedic origin but can scarcely be considered as established.

That there was a large influx of deities and spirits from non-Vedic sources into the religion
during and after the Vedic period is however indisputable. Perhaps the most obvious feature
is their evident local character, for they have fixed places of worship, often outside the
settlements on a hill or in a grove. The earliest term to denote such beings, found even in the
Rigveda, is yaksa, essentially denoting some kind of apparition or manifestation of the
numinous, perhaps also pointing to the fact that such powers were often represented visibly
from an early stage. Within Hinduism the Yaksas were regarded as generally benevolent and
were most commonly honoured by a stone tablet or altar placed under a sacred tree,
suggesting an origin in vegetation cults analogous to those which may perhaps be postulated
for the Indus Valley Civilisation. In later times the Yaksas’ chief is Kubera, the god of wealth
and regent of the north, who also has connections with the Raksasas, a class of definitely
malignant and deceptive beings. A similar important element is the veneration of Nagas,
5
sometimes represented purely as snakes(especially the cobra) 28 and sometimes half human.
Of course, even in the Rigveda Vritra is represented as a snake or serpent, but the use of a
new term and the attitudes involved in the post-Vedic period indicate a quite different source.
Despite the lack of early textual evidence, from the wide diffusion of their cult as a
subordinate element in many forms of Hinduism it is clear that Nagas were very ancient
objects of worship, a type of chthonic deity obviously significant for good or ill to the
peasants themselves. At subsequent periods, Nagas are incorporated in subsidiary roles into
Buddhism in the form of the snake king Mucalinda, into Jainism as the symbol of Parsva, into
Vaishnavism as the cosmic serpent Ananta on whom Vishnu rests, and into Saivism as a
garland for Siva and a weapon for Ganesha; in short they penetrate all the more developed
forms of religion, as well as remaining regular objects of worship by the villagers. The
earliest evidence so far for temple worship of Nagas goes back to the first century B.C.

Such are the types of influence that entered the main stream of the religion, blending with the
Vedic traditions to form an ever evolving synthesis. Though only fully under way in the
periods following the hymns, there is nonetheless, especially in the Atharvaveda, evidence
that elements from non-Aryan sources were already being absorbed within the Vedic period.