I was placeing Hindu monsters in the main land asia thread as Hindu monsters overlap with other Asian countries, however the Hindu gods and devine demons are uniquely seperate from the rest of asia, so I create this thread for the more uniquely Hindu beings

so start with: The idea of avatars, a single being split as many but still ultametly one being, the best example I can think of to explain this is a computer main frame, where one computer functions as a unique individual but ultimately it is only part of a greate system and can only show its true strength as this united force.

this shadows Hindu gods "who are all avatars from the supreme force "Brahma". but incarnate as seperate unique beings. and these incarnate further and further with many different names and forms, "one reason why there are millions if not billions of Hindu gods, which ultiamtely come down to just a few."


to demonstrate the Incarnations of the widely worshiped Vishnu

Matsyavatara (Vishnu as a fish)
Kurmavatara (Vishnu as a tortoise)
Varahavatar (Vishnu as a boar)
Narasimhavatara (the lion-man)
Vamanavatara (the dwarf)
Parasurama (Rama with an axe)
Rama (the prince of Ayodhya)
Krishna (black tribal)
Buddha (the completely enlightened one)
Kalki ( the incarnation to come)

reincarnation, In Hinduism people come back after death in amore advanced form or lesser form depending on their karma, 'this belief helped establish a cast system" where it was believed cast was a result of this as well. until one day a person lives with out any "sin" and reaches complete enlightenment and finally becomes one with Brahma rather than returning to life again.

these are very interesting beliefs..I would like to hear more ^_^

Ok let me begin to talk a little about the hindu and indian culture, and then drift onto the hindu religious beliefs.

In India, every person is born into a caste. What is a caste? A caste is a set of social classes that every Indian is born into, based on pre-generation caste ranks. I.E. If my father was a priest, I will be a priest.

Here is the breakdown of the caste system:

Highest Class (most honorable and respected): Brahmins are the priests and scholars, most of them end up being the ones who perform religious ceremonies and teachers of philosophy, etc. (on a side note: I am part of this level, and no I am not a priest, as I live in USA, but my father does know sanskrit, the language of the vedas). For those of you that do not know, the vedas are basically like the christian bible to us hindus.

Second highest (honorable) class: Ksatriyas are the warriors and rulers. For example, the kings and queens of a certain region are Ksatriyas. Warriors in an Indian army would be Ksatriyas, etc.

Middle-lower (not disrespected, but not honorable) class: Vaisyas are comprised of the farmers, merchants, artisans, traders, etc. A middle class basically.

Lower-class (not affiliated at all with higher class people, sometimes even shunted from them): The Sudras are what we call today, laborers, nothing more nothing less. Most are poor, and never obtain wealth because they've been born into the job from pre-generations.

Outcast class (hated, not wanted at all, sometimes to the extent of not even wanting to touch them): Untouchables are sadly enough, exactly what their name means. No one wants to touch the untouchables, they are considered dirty and foul. Often times the untouchables will do death ceremonial work, and clean human waste products and use to have VERY minimal rights until India declared the caste system illegal.

NOTE HOWEVER: Your caste does not determine your wealth, someone of a warrior class could be more wealthy than someone of the higher class. The Caste system does not determine wealth, although, most of the higher class people are the richer ones. However, there have been many rich farmers, merchants, etc. However, most of the time, the outcast class is always poor and hated.

NOW, moving onto hindu as the religion. KARMA is an essential part of our religion. What you do in life has either good karma, or bad karma. If you often try to help others, and do good deeds like random acts of kindness, you are considered to have good karma. If you yell and discriminate, and hurt others, and do foul things such as kill or rape, you are considered to have bad karma. Your KARMA determines what you will REINCARNATE into after death. If you have good karma, in your NEXT life you will have a BETTER life and probably be born into a BETTER caste system. However, if you have bad karma you will drop into a lower caste, so on and so forth.

After a certain time, a human will learn to meditate enough to lift themselves from mundane existence, this idea is basically laid forth as "the oversoul" which Emerson and other transcendentalist theorists have put forth. Here's an excerpt from about.com:

Lines marked with asterix show what Rhuen was putting forth earlier....

Emerson called this Divine self the 'oversoul'. In his transcendental theory the oversoul, *like Brahma in Indian philosophy, is all pervading and that every human soul partakes of this oversoul. *Therefore, to reach this point of trance where one can perceive the god-head within, Emerson emphasizes the necessity of revering one's own self -

"Be true to thyself. Because every man has within him somewhat really divine".

Excerpt from his poem 'Brahma', too reflect the Upanishadic concept that *the dark and the illumined all emanate from and merge into Brahma:

"Shadow and sunlight are the same;
The vanished Gods to me appear…"

I hope this gave you a better idea of Hinduism, I will be honest, I'm not a priest or some scholar of hinduism, but I know my culture. I'm only 17, but I know my religion and culture. Sorry it was so long, but Hinduism is such a huge religion it can't be described in merely a few words.

-Gaurav

there are quite a few members that practice hinduism in my family, it is a very interesting religion and is very wide spread. Quite a few family members are Madras as well. I wouldn't mind answering questions if anyone has any.