Thursday, March 29, 2007

Reflections on the Indian Traditions

Prof. Balagangadhara (Balu) has begun a series on India Forum of reflections on the Indian traditions.

A central question is - what do we find valuable about the Indian traditions? What should we discard and what should we keep - try to propagate to the next generation?

The first obstacle we hit is that we ourselves do not understand the traditions well enough to answer that question. The framework within which we discuss them is flawed.

Balu mentions as flawed the notions of Hinduism as a religion and of Indian social structure as the caste system. This will be controversial, and will require further explanation and elaboration.