Here is your essay on religious pluralism as value in India.
Religious pluralism as Value: Sociologists have studied religious pluralism in our country from the perspective of values specially the issue how far the different Religions in India share elements of commonality in terms of values.
Among the Indian Religions Islam, Christianity, Sikhism have a strong communitarian emphasis. Islam and Christianity also have organized Church with a view to consolidate and monitor the life styles of their followers. The following are meant to reinforce religious solidarity among the believers:
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(i) Islamic concept of Umma i.e. religious community, and
(ii) The Christian concept of brotherhood i.e. community of followers.
(1) Religion and Social Identity:
Over a period of time, on account of changes in social and political contexts in which Religion has functioned in society, the sense of identity and exclusiveness has increased in most Religions. One consequence of this process of change has been the emphasis on
purification.
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It is through this process that effort is made to shed their customs, Rituals and beliefs from religious practices of the group which have no harmony with the essential attributes of a Religion. In several Religions emphasis is laid on the exclusive nature and identity of Religions. Islam expanded by converting people of diverse faiths. It used to be more syncretic i.e. a synthesis of many ideas from different Religions.
Even today many Muslim communities maintain some values, beliefs and practices which are survivals from their pre-Islamic cultural past. The same is true about the Christians, Sikhs and Buddhists. Even the Jews in India have influence of another Religion.
For example, the Bene Israel Jews have a strong impact of Hindustan on their own religious values and beliefs. Some are even contradictory to their beliefs. They live in a polytheistic environment where people believes in number of Gods and Goddesses while Polytheism was viewed by them as a vice and sin.
(2) Religious Pluralism and Shared Values:
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One can observe the persistence of the values of religious pluralism in India at many levels:
(i) First, most Religions share in common a set of values which can be characterized as universal Tolerance of all faiths, love for fellow beings, nonviolence and righteous conduct are common to all faiths. Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Christianity and Sikhism, share the values of non-violence and humanism in common.
(ii) Secondly, most Religions in India which have expanded through converting the local population such as Islam, Christianity, Sikhism, etc., retain in their values and beliefs many elements which come from their past and belong to other Religions.
Many tribal Religions and Ritual practices persist in Hinduism, It is believed that some of its deities, such as Siva, Hanuman and Krishna are incorporation into Hinduism of deities of tribal origin.
There are a great number of Myths and legends about tribal deities being installed ass paramount Hindu God-heads. For instance, lord Jogannath of Puri temple is said to have a tribal origin. Various attributes of the tribal Religion such as the belief in spirits animism, totemism i.e. identifying an animal or part of the animal to which a tribe attributes its origin or are found in many non- tribal Religions, such as, in Hinduism, Buddhism and many sects of Christianity.
Jainism too has in its Rituals and beliefs elements which can be traced to the other Religions. Sikhism has drawn heavily from Hinduism, Islam and Sufism. The exclusive and syncretic or non-exclusive levels of value orientations in Religion are a feature to be found in all major Religions of India.
(iii) Thirdly, Religion in its day-to-day expression maintains closer relationships with existential (life-related) problems of human beings. Some problems are: births, deaths, diseases, survival and physical sustenance.