Agama Weda: Perbedaan antara revisi

Menurut [[Heinrich von Stietencron]], dalam publikasi di Dunia Barat pada abad ke-19, agama Weda diyakini berbeda dengan Hinduisme Modern. Hindu diyakini berasal dari epos-epos Hindu dan Purana melalui sekte Purohita, [[Tantrisme|Tantra]], dan ''[[Bhakti]].'' Pada abad ke-20, pemahaman yang lebih baik mulai muncul. Agama Weda membagi warisan dan ilmu agamanya dengan Hindu kontemporer, menjadikan sejumlah sarjana menyebut bahwa agama Weda merupakan moyang dari "Hinduisme".{{sfn|Stietencron|2005|pp=231–237 with footnotes}} Gerakan reformasi Hindu dan [[Neo-Vedanta|Neo-Wedanta]] telah menekankan warisan Hindu dan "Hinduisme kuno", dan telah diterima di sebagian umat Hindu.{{sfn|Stietencron|2005|pp=231–237 with footnotes}} Umumnya, agama Weda dianggap sebagai pendahulu [[agama Hindu]], tetapi tidak sama karena bukti-bukti teksnya berbeda.{{refn|[[Stephanie W. Jamison]] dan Michael Witzel, Vedic Hinduism, 1992, "... menyebut Hindu Weda seringkalisering kali ''[[contradictio in terminis]]'' karena agama Weda sangat berbeda dari apa yang kita sebut sebagai Hindu – setidaknya miriplah dengan membandingkan agama Yahudi Kuno dari zaman pertengahan dengan agama Kristen modern. Akan tetapi, agama Weda dapat disebut sebagai pendahulu dari Hindu".<ref name=jamisonwitzelp2>{{cite web|first1=Stephanie|last1=Jamison|first2= Michael|last2=Witzel |year=1992| url=http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/vedica.pdf|title=Vedic Hinduism|publisher=Harvard University|pages=2–4|access-date=2018-08-04}}</ref>|group=catatan}}

Sejumlah sarjana menyebut bahwa agama Weda adalah perpaduan antara agama-agama [[bangsa Indo-Arya]], "sinkretisme antara agama kuno Asia Tengah dan Indo-Eropa",{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=462}} yang menyerap "praktik agama dan kepercayaan yang berbeda"{{sfn|Beckwith|2009|p=32}} dari [[Situs prasejarah Baktria–Margiana|kebudayaan Baktria–Margiana]],{{sfn|Beckwith|2009|p=32}} serta sisa-sisa kebudayaan [[Peradaban Lembah Sungai Indus|Harappa]] di lembah Sungai Indus.<ref name="White 2003 28">{{cite book|last=White|first=David Gordon|title=Kiss of the Yogini|url=https://archive.org/details/kissyoginitantri00whit|year=2003|publisher=University of Chicago Press|location=Chicago|isbn=0-226-89483-5|pages=[https://archive.org/details/kissyoginitantri00whit/page/n28 28]}}</ref>

Menurut ahli Indologi Jan Heesterman, istilah Wedisme dan Brahmanisme dianggap sebagai "dua istilah yang agaknya tidakagak tepatberbeda". Keduanya merujuk pada bentuk-bentuk Hinduisme kuno berdasarkan ideologi yang termaktub dalam kitab-kitab awal.<ref name="Heestermanv14">{{cite book|author=Jan Heesterman|title=The Encyclopedia of Religion, 2nd Edition|publisher=Macmillan Reference|editor=Lindsay Jones|year=2005|volume=14|pages=9552–9553|isbn=0-02-865733-0}}</ref> Wedisme adalah versi yang paling tua, begitu menurut Heesterman, dan lebih tua daripada Brahmanisme. Wedisme merujuk pada ideologi bangsa Indo-Eropa yang bermigrasi ke lembah Sungai Indus yang terletak di anak benua India, yang kitabnya adalah Weda dan Upanisad awal.<ref name="Heestermanv14" /> Brahmanisme, menurut Heesterman, merujuk pada agama yang tersebar di suatu daerah yang membentang dari barat laut anak benua India hingga ke lembah Sungai Gangga.<ref name="Heestermanv14" /> Brahmanisme sudah menyertakan kumpulan tulisan Weda dan literatur nonweda seperti ''Dharmasutra'' dan ''Dharmasastra'', dan merupakan versi Hinduisme kuno yang memuliakan kaum pemimpin agama (kasta Brahmana).<ref name="Heestermanv14" /> Menurut ''Encyclopædia Britannica'', Brahmanisme tidak hanya memuliakan kaum pemimpianpemimpin agama (kasta Brahmana) tetapi juga memuliakan Yang Mahakuasa (Brahman) dalam Upanisad awal, mengingat secara etimologis, kedua kata tersebut berkait.<ref name="britannicavedic" />

Kata Brahmanisme digagas oleh Gonçalo Fernandes Trancoso (1520–1596) pada abad ke-16,<ref name="Županov2005">{{citation|last=Županov|first=Ines G.|title=Missionary Tropics: The Catholic Frontier in India (16th–17th Centuries)|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Nix4M4dy7nQC&pg=PA18|year=2005|publisher=University of Michigan Press|isbn=0-472-11490-5|pages=18–}}</ref> dan berhubungan dengan konsep metafisika [[Brahman]] yang berkembang dari ide-ide pasca-Weda selama akhir periode Weda ([[Upanisad]]).<ref name="Maritain2005p6">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=n9GnOWELyRYC&pg=PA7|title=An Introduction to Philosophy|author=Jacques Maritain|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|year=2005|isbn=978-0-7425-5053-7|pages=6–7 with footnote 1}}, Quote: "This [the primitive religion of the Vedas] resulted, after a period of confusion, in the formation of a new system, Brahmanism (or Hinduism), which is essentially a philosophy, a metaphysic, a work of human speculation, [...]; footnote 1: "[...] the neuter, Brahman, as the one impersonal substance."</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FLuEAgAAQBAJ|title=Eastern Philosophy: Key Readings|author=Oliver Leaman|publisher=Routledge|year=2002|isbn=978-1-134-68918-7|pages=64–65}}, Quote: "The early Upanishads are primarily metaphysical treatises concerned with identifying the Brahman, the ground of the universe. [...] The essence of early Brahmanism is the search for the Absolute and its natural development is in Vedantin monism which claims that the soul is identical with the Absolute."</ref><ref name="Biardeau1994p17">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jS1aAAAAYAAJ|title=Hinduism, the anthropology of a civilization|author=Madeleine Biardeau|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=1994|pages=17–22}}</ref> Konsep Brahman merujuk pada Zat yang telah ada sejak zaman azali (sebelum penciptaan alam semesta), masa-masa penciptaan, pemeliharaan, dan kehancuranyakehancurannya, dan terjadi dalam siklus yang tiada berhingga.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-19bAAAAcAAJ|title=Brāhmanism and Hindūism: Or, Religious Thought and Life in India, as Based on the Veda and Other Sacred Books of the Hindūs|author=Monier Monier-Williams|publisher=J. Murray|year=1891|pages=2–3}}</ref><ref>For the metaphysical concept of Brahman, see: {{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qv3fCgAAQBAJ|title=Hindus: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices|author=Julius Lipner|publisher=Routledge|year=2012|isbn=978-1-135-24061-5|pages=251–252, 283, 366–369|authorlink=Julius Lipner}};

Agama Weda dalam periode akhir Weda juga semakin menguat dalam [[Kerajaan Kuru]],{{sfn|Witzel|1995}} dan hidup berdampingan dengan kepercayaan lokal seperti kultus [[Yaksa]],{{sfn|Samuel|2010}}{{sfn|Basham|1989|p=74-75}}<ref group="web">[http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/651312/yaksha Encyclopædia Britannica, ''yaksha'']</ref> dan itu adalah hasil dari "perpaduan antara peradaban Harappa dan Indo-Arya".{{sfn|White|2006|p=28}} David Gordon White mengutip tiga sarjana arus utama lain yang "dengan tegas membuktikan" bahwa agama Weda berasal dari [[Peradaban Lembah Indus]].<ref name="White 2003 28" /> Agama orang Indo-Arya terus berkembang kala mereka bermigrasi ke [[Lembah Gangga]] setelah sekitar&nbsp;1100&nbsp;SM dan menjadi petani yang hidup menetap,{{sfn|Witzel|1995}}{{sfn|Samuel|2010|p=48-51, 61–93}}{{sfn|Hiltebeitel|2007|p=8-10}} lalu mengalami sinkretisme dengan kepercayaan asli India utara.{{sfn|Samuel|2010}}{{page needed|date=August 2018}}{{refn|Hingga akhir abad ke-19, [[suku Nuristan]] dari Afghanistan mempraktikkan bentuk primitif dari Hindu hingga akhirnya [[pindah agama paksa|dipaksa masuk]] Islam di bawah pengaruh [[Abdur Rahman Khan]].<ref name="Minahan2014">{{cite book|last=Minahan|first=James B.|title=Ethnic Groups of North, East, and Central Asia: An Encyclopedia|year= 2014|publisher=ABC-CLIO|language=English |isbn=9781610690188|page=205|quote=Living in the high mountain valleys, the Nuristani retained their ancient culture and their religion, a form of ancient Hinduism with many customs and rituals developed locally. Certain deities were revered only by one tribe or community, but one deity was universally worshipped by all Nuristani as the Creator, the Hindu god Yama Raja, called ''imr'o'' or ''imra'' by the Nuristani tribes.}}</ref><ref name="BarringtonKendrick2006">{{cite book|last1=Barrington|first1=Nicholas|last2=Kendrick|first2=Joseph T.|last3=Schlagintweit|first3=Reinhard|title=A Passage to Nuristan: Exploring the Mysterious Afghan Hinterland|url=https://archive.org/details/passagetonurista00barr|date=18 April 2006|publisher=[[I.B. Tauris]]|language=English |isbn=9781845111755|page=[https://archive.org/details/passagetonurista00barr/page/111 111]|quote=Prominent sites include Hadda, near Jalalabad, but Buddhism never seems to have penetrated the remote valleys of Nuristan, where the people continued to practice an early form of polytheistic Hinduism.}}</ref><ref name="WeissMaurer2012">{{cite book|last1=Weiss|first1=Mitch|last2=Maurer|first2=Kevin|title=No Way Out: A Story of Valor in the Mountains of Afghanistan|url=https://archive.org/details/nowayoutstoryofv0000weis|date=31 December 2012|publisher=Berkley Caliber|language=English |isbn=9780425253403|page=[https://archive.org/details/nowayoutstoryofv0000weis/page/299 299]|quote=Up until the late nineteenth century, many Nuristanis practiced a primitive form of Hinduism. It was the last area in Afghanistan to convert to Islam—and the conversion was accomplished by the sword.}}</ref> Akan tetapi, aspek agama Weda purba terus bertahan di penjuru anak benua India, seperti [[Kerala]], tempat Brahmana-brahmana [[Nambudiri]] melestarikan upacara Śrauta. [[Suku Kalash]] di barat laut Pakistan juga meneruskan praktik peribadatan ala Hinduisme kuno.<ref name="West2010">{{cite book|last=West|first=Barbara A.|title=Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Asia and Oceania|date=19 May 2010|publisher=[[Infobase Publishing]]|language=English|isbn=9781438119137|page=357|quote=The Kalasha are a unique people living in just three valleys near Chitral, Pakistan, the capital of North-West Frontier Province, which borders Afghanistan. Unlike their neighbors in the Hindu Kush Mountains on both the Afghani and Pakistani sides of the border the Kalasha have not converted to Islam. During the mid-20th century a few Kalasha villages in Pakistan were forcibly converted to this dominant religion, but the people fought the conversion and once official pressure was removed the vast majority continued to practice their own religion. Their religion is a form of Hinduism that recognizes many gods and spirits ... given their Indo-Aryan language, ... the religion of the Kalasha is much more closely aligned to the Hinduism of their Indian neighbors that to the religion of Alexander the Great and his armies.}}</ref><ref name="Bezhan2017">{{cite web|url=https://www.rferl.org/a/28439107.html|title=Pakistan's Forgotten Pagans Get Their Due|last=Bezhan|first=Frud|date=19 April 2017|publisher=[[Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty]]|language=English|accessdate=31 July 2017|quote=About half of the Kalash practice a form of ancient Hinduism infused with old pagan and animist beliefs.}}</ref>|group=catatan}}

Dalam Weda dan [[Sutra|sutrassutra]]s, kata ''satya'' ({{linktext|सत्य}}) berkembang sebagai sebuah konsep etis terkait kebenaran dan memiliki nilai penting dalam kebajikan.<ref name="knt">KN Tiwari (1998), Classical Indian Ethical Thought, Motilal Banarsidass, {{ISBN|978-8120816077}}, page 87</ref><ref>A Dhand (2002), The dharma of ethics, the ethics of dharma: Quizzing the ideals of Hinduism, Journal of Religious Ethics, 30(3), pages 347–372</ref> Hal ini melambangkan sikap benar dan konsisten dalam pemikiran, perkataan, dan perbuatan (perilaku jujur).<ref name="knt" />