Short Description
Hinduism encompasses a wide variety of beliefs originating in India. Most Hindus believe that God takes many forms and is worshiped by many different names.
Hinduism encompasses a wide variety of beliefs originating in India. No precise dates can be given for its origins, although the Vedas, the earliest texts of Hinduism, arose from a culture that was probably established in India during the second millennium BCE.
Most Hindus believe that God takes many forms and is worshiped by many different names, so the multitude of gods and goddesses in Hindu belief are aspects of the same godhead. God has three main male forms, Brahma the Creator, Vishnu the Preserver, and Shiva the Destroyer. Each of these has a female counterpart: respectively Sarasvati, Lakshmi, and Parvati. God may also come to earth in human form: the best known of these are Krishna and Rama, both incarnations of Vishnu. Each person and each animal embodies a spark (atman) of the universal soul, which is God. After death the atman is reborn in a new body. Therefore God is in every object in the universe, and everything that exists is part of God.
Hindus believe that every action, good or bad, has an effect (karma) on this life and on future lives. By accumulating positive karma one can eventually break free from the cycles of birth and death to achieve liberation or moksha, which is complete union with God.
There are many sacred books, all written in the ancient Indian language Sanskrit. The oldest are the Vedas, first written in the second millennium BCE, followed by the Upanishads, more philosophical writings. Two great epics, the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, existed in oral form long before they were written around 2,000 years ago. The Mahabharata contains the best-loved Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita, or “Song of the Lord,” the god Krishna.
Festivals vary in different parts of India. Two almost universally celebrated festivals are Holi (March/April), a time of games and pranks with several different associated stories, and Divali (October), a new-year festival that celebrates the story of the god Rama and his wife Sita.
There are nearly 750 million Hindus worldwide, almost all living in south Asia. In India there are 650 million Hindus, and other large Hindu communities live in countries where colonial or trading ties encouraged migration from India: the UK, Guyana, Kenya, South Africa, and Indonesia.
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