According to many scholars Hinduism is the world's oldest religion Hinduism embraces many religious ideas
So for this reason it's sometimes referred to as a way of life or a family of religions as opposed to just a single organized
Religion and journey of those who practice Hinduism do not claim to belong to any particular denomination
or sect of Hinduism
so with that said it makes the term branches or
Denominations of Hinduism a bit different when we use these terms relating to religions like Christianity or Islam
Where there's often disputes about which branch is the correct branch?
so let's look at the four main branches of
Hinduism and explore a bit more about how these branches came about. How's going everybody?
My name is Leroy Kenton and thanks for tuning in to another episode of FTD facts
This is a channel where we love exploring the different countries
cultures and people from all around the world and we're diving into the world of
Hinduism once again now before we dive right in if you're a Hindu yourself or just love learning in general
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There are 4 major traditions when it comes to studying Hinduism and they are as follows. There's Ivana vism
Shaivism shaktism and smart ism now these Hindu
Denominations are traditions within Hinduism that Centre on one or more gods or goddesses. So they're sometimes referred to as
Denominations of Hinduism and the terms denominations or traditions are often used interchangeably
So they pretty much mean the same thing now these different denominations
They differ primarily in their focus of what deity is at the centre of the tradition
so when we look at Vashon of ism Vajra vism is also called Vishnu ism and it's distinct because followers pay devotion to
Vishnu and his incarnations or avatars the followers of this tradition are called
Vaishnavas for Vashon of there's absolute reality or Brahman is
Manifested in Vishnu who in turn is incarnated in Rama?
Krishna and many other avatars and when we break this down we see that it is polymorphic
monotheism which means that it's a theology that
recognizes many forms of one single
divinity since there are many forms of one original deity through this we have avatars through his avatars the tradition states that
Vishnu defends traditional righteousness in keeping the moral law
Which is called Dharma and among other popular names used for the Supreme Being are Rama, Krishna
Narayana Kalki Hari
Vithoba Kesava, madhava, govinda
Sri not G and
Jagannath fashion vism originated between the late
Centuries BCE and the early centuries CE II and it's really the mixture of the heroic
Krishna Vasudeva the divine child and also mixing there are Bala Krishna of Gopala traditions fashioned vism
comprises of many different sects and smaller groups that defer in their interpretation of their relationship between
Someone and the higher power or God then there is shaivism
so in Shive ism shiva is seen as the supreme being and the followers of
Shaivism are called shaivites or sigh bites some trace the origins of this back to the Indus Valley
Civilisation which reach its peak around 2500 to 2,000 BCE revering Shiva like this can be found all across India
Azules Sri Lanka and Nepal now reverence to Shiva is very popular
it could have something to do with what the word Shiva actually means and Shiva literally means kind friendly gracious or
Auspicious and when he used it as a proper name Shiva means the auspicious one and the name like that
Denotes success for people so I don't know who knows
Scheib ism has many different sub traditions as well and there's different variations of them
Just depending on the region that you're in you're gonna notice some differences there
There's a lot of literature also relating to Shive ISM because I mentioned it is so popular
And there's also several different schools of thought one of the other major branches is shaktism
So shaktism is a worship of the Hindu goddess Shakti whose name means power or energy
The full form of the goddesses name is Adi parashakti
And it's very popular in the states of West Bengal and Assam in India in this tradition. The
Metaphysical reality is considered to be feminine as a metaphor
And then when we examine this sruthi and smirky texts in Hinduism
We'll notice that they're very important to the framework of shaktism and its entire tradition
Yogi's regard Shakti as the power that lies dormant within the body as a coiled serpent. You may have heard the term Kundalini
so that's what that energy refers to the coiled serpent the Kundalini power and followers of shaktism believe that this must be
aroused and awakened in order to realize spiritual liberation and freedom on top of that shaktism is an
important part of Hindu Tantra the whole system of practices and everything
This is really designed to empower people so that they can just be free in their mind and their body now before I continue with
The facts in this episode just want to let you know that we do have a playlist dedicated to just videos about Hinduism
so Hinduism is a very complex and intricate religion or way of life if you choose that word and
So we go a lot into the history and some of the meanings and the definitions and how the religion is
Structured on a whole so I highly recommend watching those videos
I'll have the link to the playlist in the card section of this episode as well as we'll have it as a link below in
the video description
And then in case you didn't click on any of those, I'll have it at the end of this episode as well
Check those videos out to expand your knowledge about Hinduism. There's a lot that I cover in those videos
Now the final tradition that I want to look at in Hinduism is smart ism
Now smart design is a bit different from other Hindu traditions because it's not just specifically about one God
It doesn't revolve around one god or goddess. Smartest is what you call those who follow smart ism
They may worship any God that they choose but the most common of these gods are Shiva can neasha
vishnu Surya Skanda and
Shakti as well
they're also open to worship any of the avatars of these gods now the smartgit tradition developed during the
Classical period around the beginning of the Common Era and the term smarta also refers to
Brahmins who specialized in the Mirta corpus texts named the griot
Sutras, and we look at the etymology of this word the meaning of the term smart relates to memory or something. That's
Recorded. So those are the four main branches of Hinduism all of which have other sub branches with different
Variations based on the region and also the cultural practices now
There are also many minor branches of Hinduism
Some of the main minor traditions are schrott ism now
They put a lot of importance on the performance of a vedic sacrifice called ajna
where they place various types of offerings into a fire then there is sri ism or SAR ism and this is a worship of
Surya as the main form of
Saguna brahman, which means the absolute with qualities. There's also ganapataye more Lord
Ganesha is worshipped as the main form of saguna brahman
Kama ROM is another one that's found in South India as well as Sri Lanka and in this tradition, Lord, Muruga
Kirti kiya is a supreme god, then there's also
Indonesian Hinduism where the followers consider a
Cynthia as the supreme god as well as they view all other gods as his different manifestations
I also found some other newer forms of Hinduism and those are ananda marga
Arya samaj. I Avadh z brahma ism. Prathana Samaj ramakrishna mission Sri Narayana
Dharma para palana. Yeah, try saying that three times fast
There's also the SWA da power of our movement and the Satya Sai organization now with these different traditions
It's very common that you're gonna find Hindus revering
Shiva Vishnu
And Shakti as well as celebrating festivals that relate to them in different times of the year many Hindu temples also feature
multiple gods in there so you're gonna find a lot of
overlap in the Hinduism traditions
but with the freedom that Hinduism really brings there's not much division in terms of what is the
Actual right belief in Hinduism because it's so liberating and so free and open in terms of what you can
Believe in the religion. That's why many people don't want to call it a religion. They just say Hinduism is their way of life
Hey, listen, if this attribute connects with you
You're free to believe in that if Shakti and female energy speaks to you
well
You're free to revere that as well all still seen as different manifestations
And qualities of the Supreme Being God and that's all I have for you in this episode
Be sure to leave your thoughts and comments down below your voice and your opinion really matters
Now before you go don't forget to hit that like button and that subscribe button if you haven't done so already
My social media links are also below as well. Other than that
My name is Leroy Kenton, and I can't wait to learn with you in another upcoming episode. So I'll see you all real soon
for
Those of you that want to continue learning about the world of Hinduism
Here's a playlist that I recommended where you'll find videos all about Hinduism
We also cover other religions here on FTD facts as well as different countries and cultures as well
So there's something new for you to learn every single day here on FTD facts