About Hinduism

Hinduism is the oldest living

religious tradition in the world and
is also known as Sanatana
Dharma and Vedic Dharma. It is
not a single religion but a set of
different schools of thought and traditions.
Hinduism is a mixture of many religious rituals,
sects and philosophies and all of them are different
from each other in different parts of India. Majority
of Hindus follow the Vedanta philosophy of one
God- "Brahman" who is worshipped in many forms
like Vishnu, Shiva, Durga, etc.

About 1 billion people worldwide are followers of

Hinduism making it the third largest religion of the
world. The followers of Hinduism regard the four
vedas as the main scripture. Each veda is divided
into parts called : Brahmanas, Samhitas, Aranyakas
and Upanishads which are also widely followed.
The other main scriptures are the 18 puranas, 18
up-puranas, the bhagvad gita and ramayana.

The basic beliefs of Hinduism are :

  Dharma (individual ethics, duties and
obligations)
 Samsara ("rebirth")
 Karma ("actions")
 Moksha ("salvation")

Different schools of Hinduism follow different paths

or means for salvation. The four main paths that
most of the schools follow are : the path of
devotion- "Bhakti", the path of action-"Karma", the
path of meditation- "Raja" and the path of
enlightenment- "Jnana". The basis of hindu
philosophy is that all souls that are born from
Brahman ("Cosmic Spirit") finally merge with it.