Author: Maria Wirth
It hardly ever happened in recent times that I read a book from cover to cover within a few days, due to the huge daily influx of information via the internet. But it happened after I received “From the Beginning of Time – Modern science and the Puranas” by Ganesh Swaminathan. The Puranas fascinate me, ever since I started many months ago to study the Srimad Bhagavata Mahapurana (1700 pages in English) and I am glad that more and more books come out on the Puranas. It seems that slowly the realization dawns that the Puranas are an incredible treasure…
The biggest problem in today’s world is terrorism, many political leaders acknowledge. The strange thing is that they close their eyes to its root cause. This closing of eyes is seen as politically correct. Naturally, there is little chance to improve things but it’s likely to get worse. If someone commits an act of terror, he must be motivated. Yet this motivation is ignored, because in most terror cases in our times, terror is connected with Islam, and if someone hints at this fact, he is promptly accused of Islamophobia. Yet Christianity also used terror in earlier times. In fact…
This question is natural for any human being and is asked in every generation by many of the youth. I remember it troubled me a lot when I was young. I don’t think I could have found the answer on my own because some basic philosophical knowledge about us and the universe is needed, but luckily I landed up in India and was even luckier to become familiar with India’s profound wisdom. This philosophical knowledge is contained in the Vedas and has painstakingly been memorized by Indian Brahmins and handed down to us over many millennia. One could call the…
Eating beef is not right and I wonder where are those “some Vedas” which allow Hindus to do so. Please keep in mind that there were and still are vested interest who want to weaken Hindus and who used wrong translations and interpolations of the ancient texts to make Hindus ashamed of their tradition. Many Hindus believed those translations, including big names. I grew up in the west and there, we were indoctrinated by Christian tenets (and Muslims by Islamic tenets) that nature including animals is there to serve man who is considered ‘the crown of creation”. The result is…
Last August I got a mail from a “researcher from Italy”. She wrote: “I hope you are in the best of health and spirit. I am working on my dissertation on ‘Hindu neo-fundamentalism in India: the rise of RSS and impact on the Muslim minority’. I have been following your work on social media. May I request to please assist with your learned opinion by replying the attached questionnaire.” The heading on the questionnaire said it was for MS level research in Religion, Politics & Citizenship, University of Padua, on the rise of Hindutva, its impact on Muslims and implications.…
“Í prefer Trump to Hillary”, I told a German friend in the run up to the US elections in 2016. There was a little pause and then she said, “You are the only person I know who says this openly.” I knew that my view was politically incorrect though I did not understand why German media was so virulently anti-Trump. It was as anti-Trump as it had been anti-Modi before the 2014 elections. At that time, German media called Modi a Hindu fundamentalist and racist, and predicted that Modi would be extremely bad for India. Modi won and turned out…
Zakir Naik is again in the news. His organisation is allegedly involved in financing the CAA protests and Delhi riots. He tries to appear as a scholar but his scholarship is based only on unverifiable belief – the belief that Muslims need to dominate the world. Only then Allah would be happy and the world at peace. Many are impressed by him. It flatters people if they are told that their group is superior to all others and soon they will be ruling the world. Unfortunately, they don’t question if their belief is based on truth. A few years ago,…
There are several major differences between Christianity and Islam on one side and Hindu Dharma on the other, and all of them are in Hindu Dharma’s favor. Yet one difference plays out as an advantage for the Abrahamic religions and it could easily be avoided: It is the behavior of Gurus and Swamis as opposed to the behavior of the clergy of the two Abrahamic religions. Generally, Gurus only talk about Hindu Dharma, but don’t touch on the serious flaws in the two exclusivist religions. In fact, they even praise those religions if they find something good in them. It…
In recent years the number of ex-Muslims has been rising all over the world. On Twitter, hashtags like “Awesome without Allah” or “Ex-Muslim because…” were trending. In USA, according to a PEW Research Centre report, 23 per cent of those born in the Muslim religion don’t identify with it any longer. Most of them keep it secret. Yet, several ex-Muslims speak up on You Tube, including women. A Turk, who grew up in Germany, went back to Turkey at the age of 16 and now lives in USA, has become popular as Apostate Prophet on You Tube, so popular that…
The questions for this interview were lying with me for years. I was discouraged to answer because there were too many (17 in all) and I wondered who will read through a long interview. Yet when I got again a reminder during Corona lockdown, I answered them. You can scroll through them and pick what interests you. Personal How you got attracted towards Hinduism? What was the turning point in your life? It happened when I came to India on a stopover on my way to Australia and went to see the Swami Vivekananda Memorial in Kanya Kumari in March…