LEARNOGRAPHY

  General nature of Hinduism More strikingly than any other major religious  community , Hindus accept—and indeed celebrate—the organic, multileveled, and sometimes pluralistic nature of their traditions. This expansiveness is made possible by the widely shared Hindu view that truth or reality cannot be  encapsulated  in any creedal formulation, a perspective expressed in the Hindu  prayer  “May good thoughts come to us from all sides.” Thus, Hinduism maintains that truth must be sought in multiple sources, not dogmatically proclaimed. Anyone’s view of the truth—even that of a  guru  regarded as possessing superior authority—is fundamentally conditioned by the specifics of time, age, gender, state of  consciousness , social and geographic location, and stage of attainment. These multiple perspectives  enhance  a broad view of religious truth rather than diminish it; hence, there is a strong tendency for contemporary Hindus to affirm...