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Santosh Kumar, Lovely Professional University Unit 3: Socio-Religious Reforms Movement

Unit 3: Socio-Religious Reforms Movement Notes

CONTENTS
Objectives
Introduction
3.1 The Brahmo Samaj (The Society of God)
3.2 The Arya Samaj
3.3 Singh Sabha Movement
3.4 Summary
3.5 Key-Words
3.6 Review Questions
3.7 Further Readings

Objectives

After studying this unit, students will be able to:
• Discuss social reforms made by Brahma Samaj.
• Explain the improvements made by Arya Samaj to curb the superstitions and rumeurs spread
in Hindu Religion.
• Understand Singh-Sabha Movement.

Introduction

For some time it seemed that India was completely bowled over by new Western ideas and
Western values in life. It seemed that India had lagged behind in the rase for civilisation. This
produced diverse reactions. Some English-educated Bengali youth (known as Derozios) developed
a revulsion against Hindu religion and culture, gave up old religious ideas and traditions and
deliberately adopted practices most offensive to Hindu sentiments, such as drinking wine and
eating beef. More mature minds led by Rammohan Roy were certainly stimulated by Western
ideas and Western values but refused to break away from Hinduism; their approach was to
reform Hindu religion and society and they saw the path of progress in an acceptance of the best
of the East and the West. Another current was to deny the superiority of Western culture and
prevent India from becoming a colourless copy of Europe; they drew inspiration from India’s past
heritage and reinterpreted it in the light of modern rationalism. This neo- Hinduism preached that
Europe had much to learn from India’s spiritualism.
The new concept of secularization was born. The term secularization implies that what was
previously regarded as religious was no longer regarded as such. The magic wand was moved by
rationalism i.e., the emergence of a tendency to regulate individual religious and social life in
accordance with the principles of reason and to discard traditional beliefs and practices which
cannot stand the test of modern knowledge. This approach brought a great change in the concept
of ‘pollution and purity’ which formed an integral part of traditional Hindu religion. The educated
persons could see no logic behind labelling certain forbidden vegetables such as garlic, ginger,
onion, beetroot as impure; rather food value of vegetables received more importance. Further,
domestic rituals underwent a change. For example, the attainment of puberty by girls was no
longer an occasion for elaborate rituals; it began to be looked upon as a natural stage in the process
of growth. Urbanisation, modernisation, new trends in eating at tables and restaurants promoted
new outlook and erosion of orthodox way of living.

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