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Comments posted by Merlot Daruwala
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Hindu Fundamentalism: Is It Really An Oxymoron?
Excellent blog - but after correctly defining the word fundamentalism in the beginning, you blur its meaning a couple of paragraphs later.
Despite differences between Catholicism and Protestantism, their fundamentals are exactly the same. They still venerate the same Book and have the exact same concept of God. So the term Christian fundamentalist carries a definite meaning which does not change with denomination.
Likewise with Muslims. They have only one God, one Prophet Mohammad and one holy book. So a fundamentalist Muslim - whether Shia or Sunni - has a definite set of fundamental beliefs.
Not so with Hindus. You can have bigoted and fanatical Hindus but not fundamentalist Hindus because the term Hindu does not have any set of fundamentals associated with it. There is no one single book, no one single God, no one single messiah and no one single philosophy.
So to use the fundamentalist label, you'd need to be very specific - fundamentalist manuvaadi, fundamentalist advaitin, fundamentalist carvakan etc. to indicate individuals who unquestioningly believe every aspect and every written word of those philosophies / associated texts.
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