Welcome to Eternal Path! This week we feature: The Journal of Sanatana Dharma, Buddhist-Muslim collaboration in the Sri Lankan civil war, and an aesthetic!
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Academic journals in a world dominated by Western epistemology are where truth gets created, and we encourage Hindus to engage in this process. The Journal of Sanatana Dharma - https://josd.info/ - is an exciting publication that we recently learned about. You can read their first volume here - https://josd.info/archives/vol-1-issue-1/
The founders outline their philosophy below:
We, a group of academicians, have felt that there is visible hiatus between the traditional scholarship and the modern scholarship upon the subjects of the Sanātana Dharma. We look forward to bridge that gap and cater before the inquisitive minds a comprehensive understanding of the subjects. We have also felt a strong lack of journals which publish research works upon the domains parented by the Sanātana Dharma. Moreover, we have often felt that the research works published in certain journals on “Hindu Studies” tend to have Orientalist and Indological biases which undermine the greater ‘dhārmika’ causes. Apart from that, it has also been observed that traditional scholars from the Indian subcontinent find less frequent representation in those journals. The articles published in those journals are mostly by Western scholars or Indian/Asian scholars with Western institutional affiliations. The mission of this journal is to provide the traditional scholars a platform to publish their works. In addition to these serious concerns, we also feel that the article processing charges (APC) is often too much of a burden for scholars with merit but having financial constraints. The objective of the Journal of Sanātana Dharma is to be free from all sorts of racism (ethnic or geographical), ideological biases, economic discrimination, and institutional snobbery.
They will be covering a wide range of topics:
They also have a board of academicians with proper training as well as practitioner experts, found here - https://josd.info/board-members/
To read their first volume visit - https://josd.info/archives/vol-1-issue-1/
One thing that differentiates us as a publication from other “Hindu” publications is our clear-eyed view on nastika cults such as Ajivika, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism. Whereas others see those religions as dharmic or sometimes even Hindu, we, and our readers, know that anyone who’s belief system doesn’t uphold the primacy of the Vedas (however indirectly) really cannot call themself a Hindu.
The first King in India to fall to Islamic armies was Raja Dahir of Sindh in 711CE. The region during that time had both Hindu and Buddhist populations. He lost in his third battle with the Umayyad Empire, betrayed by his Buddhist subjects, and within the next 500 years, much of modern-day Pakistan, an area with a heavy Buddhist presence converted to Islam. So began the Buddhist-Muslim nexus in the subcontinent.
Fast forward about 12-1300 years and you get to the Sri Lanka Civil War. The war was fought between the government, dominated by the Sinhala ethnicity (mostly Buddhist with a Christian minority) and the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam), the most prominent secular Tamil rebel group, fighting for an independent Tamil homeland in the North and East of the country called Tamil Eelam. Tamils in Sri Lanka consist of a Hindu majority and a Christian minority. The largest Muslim group in Sri Lanka are the Moors, who speak Tamil, but claim their descent from Arab traders, and the rest of Sri Lanka’s population includes Muslim Malays, Christian Burghers, and a few other ethnicities. Tamils and Moors were especially distributed in the Northern and Eastern province, with the Eastern Province being close to half and half Tamil and Moor respectively. The Sinhalese Buddhists slandered Hinduism, attacked Hindu temples, killed Priests, and tried to convert people and places of worship to Buddhism.
In fact, The Department of Hindu Religious and Cultural Affairs has indicated that 1,479 temples were destroyed across the northeast provinces from 1983 to 1990. Hindu Students Council published an article chronicling the war from the perspective of an Eelam Tamil Hindu at this link, which goes on to note:
A few notable attacks on Hindu temples by the Sri Lankan military include the burning of the Selva Channithy Murugan Temple chariot in 1986, the repeated aerial bombardments of the Naguleswaram Temple in 1990, and the vandalism of the Thiruketheeswaram Temple in 1990. The Naguleswaram Temple and Thiruketheeswaram Temple are considered to be two of the Pancha Ishwarams, or five abodes of Lord Shiva, which have ancient significance dating back to the Ramayana.
The atrocities committed by Buddhists and Christians deserve an article on its own, but today we’ll focus on their Moor lapdogs in the war.
The Muslims in this war, even though they spoke Tamil, supported the government and were involved in a whole host of atrocities. They did not wish to be a minority in a minority state (if Tamil Eelam were to be created). Early on in the war, the Sri Lankan government created institutions called “Home Guards” where they would arm civilians and provide them military in areas bordering LTTE-held territory under the pretext of protecting “threatened villages.” These home guards, many of them Muslim committed uncountable atrocities on Tamil Hindus, resulting in thousands of Hindu deaths.
Ampara district in the southern part of Eastern Province was a hotspot for Muslim atrocities against Tamil Hindus, with Hindu priests and preachers being killed, and multiple Hindu temples set ablaze. One of the more harrowing attacks, on August 12, 1990 involved a gang of Muslim Home Guards mobbing the Ganesh Temple and Ramakrishna Mission in Veeramunai village in Ampara, killing 55 people including women and children. The screenshot below discusses a couple other incidents in the same area, with some animals even playing a role:
These atrocities and killings continued over the course of the war, and even after the war concluded in 2008. In Eastern Province, Muslims have likely become the majority community. At least 10 villages have gone from Tamil majority to nearly 100% Muslim, Arab money flows in to the area, and more than 50 Muslim villages have popped up in the area. They also continue to steal Hindu land. In fact a member of Sri Lanka’s parliament, and former Eastern Province governor M. L. A. M. Hizbullah, went on TV and proudly proclaimed: “I have provided weapons to Muslims. I have seized Hindu temples. I have seized Tamil lands.” (from this post).
However, in a twist of irony, the Sinhalese Buddhists have turned their eye more generally on Islam. The Sinhalese Buddhists still continue to disrespect Hindus and Hindu sites but Sri Lanka’s religious discussions now focus on extremist Buddhist priests lambasting Islam and its influence. The Easter Church bombing conducted by Muslims, furtherotherized them as a community. This is very similar to Sindh after Dahir’s fall, where then Buddhists were useful idiots against the Hindus for the future rise of Islam; in Sri Lanka the Muslims served as useful idiots against Hindus for the rise of Buddhist supremacy. Either way, the Hindus got screwed.
Why is reading about this history important? Because Hindus need to understand that people who do not worship our Gods and who do not venerate our sacred texts are not our friends, and it does not matter what religion they practice.
