Textbooks And Hinduism -- Why Accuracy Matters

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Textbooks And Hinduism -- Why Accuracy Matters

 

New America Media, Commentary, Viji Sundaram, Jan 10, 2006

 

Editor's Note: The subject of world religions and how they are

depicted in California textbooks is no longer a distant issue.

Earlier this month, Hindu groups faced off with prominent U.S.

religious scholars over what many Hindus felt were inaccurate

portrayals of their community. Accuracy matters, the writer contends,

especially when the faith being discussed is not just lodged in

history, but also being practiced by some of the children in today's

California classrooms.

 

FREMONT, Calif.--Earlier this month, the arm of California's Board of

Education that decides what will and won't go into the history

textbooks of millions of students was persuaded by followers of

Hinduism and Judaism to correct what the groups felt were historical

inaccuracies pertaining to their religion and culture.

 

What the Hindus and Jews were demanding had nothing to do with

evolution or intelligent design. They were asking that the books

accurately and fairly portray their religions and histories. But the

request to make the changes was met with antagonism by a group of

prominent religious scholars. The group, led by Harvard Sanskrit

scholar Michael Witzel, filed a petition against the changes,

claiming they had more to do with religious fanaticism on the part of

the groups than with accuracy.

 

Many Hindu groups and parents in California were understandably

upset -- Witzel unfairly branded them as extremists. But he doesn't

have to worry about his child coming home from school and declaring

that he no longer wants to be a Hindu because his classmates

ridiculed him about something taught in class that day. That recently

happened to one Milpitas, Calif., parent of an 11-year-old.

 

Parents are justified in being upset when textbooks claim that such

Hindu rituals as walking on a bed of hot coals or lying on a bed of

nails to gain spiritual mastery are still practiced in India. In fact

they are rarely practiced; when they are, it's mostly to entertain

tourists.

 

A similar argument was raised by the Jewish community at a December

meeting of the Curriculum Commission, which was charged by the

California Board of Education with democratically deciding what

should and should not be included in the social studies and history

textbooks of California's half a million sixth-graders. Why, asked

Jackie Berman, a representative of the Jewish Community Relations

Council, should the story of the crucifixion of Jesus be told in

sixth-grade textbooks in a manner that blames the Jews for being

responsible for it when, in fact, it was the Romans who crucified him?

 

In 1987, California mandated the study of world religions in its

public schools. Judaism, Hinduism, Christianity and Buddhism would be

studied in sixth grade, while seventh graders would learn about

Islam. Every six years, textbook publishers offer the California

Board of Education drafts of textbooks they plan to bring out, hoping

to make California, the nation's largest textbook purchaser, their

customer. California often sets the tone for what is adopted by other

states. Public hearings form a vital part of the review process.

 

The fact that Witzel's unsolicited petition had a scholarly consensus

backing it must have influenced the Board of Education when they

decided that the edits and corrections suggested by the Hindus, and

largely adopted in September by an ad hoc committee, might benefit

from another round of scrutiny -- this one by the Curriculum

Commission.

 

Everyone will agree that history must be told as truthfully as

possible. Glossing over unpleasant issues, whether of the past or the

present, maintains a country's status quo and can promote cultural

exclusivity. To say that the Holocaust did not happen could mean

repeating the mistakes of history. Ditto for slavery in the United

States.

 

One of the most contentious issues the Hindu groups and Witzel and

his supporters locked horns over was whether there was any truth to

the Aryan invasion theory, which maintains that a group of people

from Central Asia who called themselves Aryans invaded India around

1,500 B.C., and that Hinduism grew out of the beliefs and practices

of the Aryans. Witzel and his group support the theory; the Hindu

groups do not. The Hindu groups say that more recent archeological

and DNA findings debunk the theory and suggest that the Aryans were

an indigenous people who did not invade. Moreover, say the Hindu

groups, plenty of linguistic and other evidence indicates that

Hinduism existed in India long before 1,500 B.C.

 

At a special meeting held by the Board of Education on Jan. 6, to

which Witzel and Prof. Shiva Bajpai, whose views the Hindu groups

support, were invited, a compromise was hammered out and accepted by

both sides. The textbooks would reflect both views, and the

word "invasion" would be replaced by migration.

 

Witzel, however, was right in objecting to a correction suggested by

the Hindu groups that would have changed a sentence in an upcoming

textbook that read, "Men had many more rights than women," to "Men

had different duties, as well as rights, than women." India has long

been a patriarchal society, with women treated as the inferior sex.

The two groups finally agreed to replace the sentence with "men had

more property rights than women."

 

The Board of Education will finalize its decision over some 131

corrections in early February.

 

Understanding the many facets of Hinduism and India's cultural mores

is not easy. Hopefully, middle school teachers can be thoroughly

educated on the subject. The correction of inaccuracies in history

textbooks, however, is an important first step.

 

PNS contributor Viji Sundaram is a reporter for India-West, a weekly

Indian newspaper based in the United States.

 

 

 

 

User Comments

 

 

Aravindan Neelakandan on Jan 10, 2006 at 23:43:24 said:

 

Your article says:"The Hindu groups say that more recent

archeological and DNA findings debunk the theory and suggest that the

Aryans were an indigenous people who did not invade." This is wrong.

Hindu groups have long been saying that Aryans are not a race and

only a term meaning a human being of good or noble values. Thus house

head and teacher are addressed as 'Arya'by wife, children and

students respectively. Interestingly the same custom can be seen very

clearly in so-called Dravidian Tamils where we address father and

teacher as 'Ayya'. Hindus say that Aryan is not a racial term and

that Vedic people are indigenous people. DNA evidence supports this.

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