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Book No. – 19 (Sociology)
Book Name – Social Background of Indian Nationalism (A.R. Desai)
What’s Inside the Chapter? (After Subscription)
1. Religious Reform Movement. Expression of National Awakening
2. “Appeal to Past”, its Real Significance
3. Medievalism Vs. Liberalism
4. Religio-reform Movement, its All-embracing Scope
5. Similar Developments in Europe
6. Brahmo Samaj Movement
7. Prarthana Samaj
8. Arya Samaj
9. Ramakrishna Mission Movement
10. Theosophy
11. Religious Reforms by Eminent Political Leaders
12. Materialism, Its Near-absence in India
13. Early Religio-Reform Movements. their Progressive Significance
14. Growth of Rationalism and Materialism
15. National Awakening among Muslims, Reasons for its Slower Growth
16. Ahmadiya Movement
17. Aligarh Movement
18. Sir Mahmud Iqbal
19. Other Muslim Reform Movements
20. Religion-reform Movements, their Reactionary Role in Subsequent Period
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Religious Reform Movements Among Hindus and Muslims
Chapter – 17
Religious Reform Movement, Expression of National Awakening
- National democratic awakening in India also expressed in the religious sphere.
- Contradiction between traditional religious outlook and new social and economic reality led to various religio-reform movements.
- These movements sought to revise old religions in line with new principles of nationalism and democracy, key for the development of the new society.
- Nationalism was needed to unite people in solving national problems, caused by political and economic unificationunder British rule.
- Economic and cultural evolution of Indian society became a unified task for rising Indian nationalism.
- Early Indian nationalists and social reformers recognized that British rule, despite its progressive elements, hindered Indian national development.
- Democracy was extended to religion by early pioneers like Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Debendra Nath Tagore, Keshubchandra Sen, Mahadev Govind Ranade, Jotirao Phooley, and Arya Samaj founders.
- British conquest introduced a capitalist society, emphasizing individual liberty, freedom of competition, and property rights.
- In contrast, the pre-capitalist society was authoritarian, maintaining distinctions based on birth, sex, and subordinating the individual to caste and joint family system.
- The new society required the abolition of privileges based on birth or sex.
- Early religious reformers aimed to extend individual liberty to religion, reshaping Hinduism through movements like Brahmo Samaj, Prarthana Samaj, and Arya Samaj.
- Some reformers (especially Arya Samaj) mistakenly believed in reviving ancient Vedic social structures, but were actually adapting Hinduism to modern national needs.
- These reform movements aimed at national unity across Hindus, Muslims, Parsis, and others to solve national taskslike economic development, equality, abolition of caste, and ending the Brahmin monopoly over classical culture.
- Religious reformers, like their European counterparts, were not returning to the past but consolidating the rising new society.
- Liberalism (philosophy of rising capitalism) emphasized nationalism and democracy, and religio-reform movements aimed to extend liberalism to religion.
“Appeal to Past”, its Real Significance
- Psycho-philosophical reason behind illusion of reformers (like Arya Samaj) thinking they were returning to the pristine past, while actually forging a new society.
- This illusion arises from the contradiction between old conscious formulations and new social conditions.
- Man is composed of current active being and inherited conscious formulations, creating tension between new beingand old thought.
- The incomplete future drags at individuals, but because instinctive components of the psyche are old, it is often felt as the past dragging them.
- Paradox: The hero appeals to the past to bring it back, but in doing so, produces the future.
- Examples: Bourgeois Renaissance and influence of Rome on Napoleon and the Revolution; eighteenth-century revolutionists idealized the return to the natural uncorrupted man.
- The future is often perceived as the past, and only after its realization is it seen as something new.
- Reformer “returning” to primitive Christianity ends up creating bourgeois Protestantism.
- Gandhi thought he was reproducing Ram Raj of the Golden Age of Hindus, but was actually attempting to create a modern democratic capitalist national state for India.
- The urge to orient towards the past was intensified by India’s status as a subject nation under foreign rule.
- Along with a desire for national freedom, some chauvinist dreams of spiritual conquest through resurrected Hinduism emerged (e.g., Vivekanand and the Ramakrishna Mission Movement).
- Claims of India’s special “spiritual genius” were proclaimed.
- Early religio-reform movements were progressive, representing the first national awakening of the Indian people.
- Such religio-reform movements have historically appeared during transitions from medievalism to modern capitalism in every society.