On Holi...

Back in February I visited the Hindu Temple in Morrisville to learn about the founding of the Temple as well as the history of the physical temple structure and observe a service. The weekend on which I made this trip also happened to be the Temple’s annual celebration of the spring-time festival “Holi”. It proved to be a very new and interesting experience for me and as such I decided that I would learn more about the holiday.


Holi is an ancient festival celebrated in India with its roots deeply embedded in Hindu culture. The holiday was originally called “Holika”. Historians believe that the holiday was originally celebrated by all Aryans, but more so by those in the Eastern part of India. It is said that Holi existed several centuries before Christ. However, the meaning of the festival is believed to have changed over the years. Previously, it had been a special rite performed by married women for the happiness and well-being of their families and the full moon was worshipped (Holi, 1). Interestingly enough, many important dates in Hindu culture are determined by the lunar calendar unlike in Western tradition where holidays fall on a specific date (regardless of lunar positioning) or in the case of Thanksgiving where it is celebrated on the third Thursday of November. Holi is no exception to this. There are two days of reckoning a lunar month – “Purnimanta” and “Amanta”. In the former, the first day starts after the full moon; and in the latter, after the new moon. Amanta reckoning is much more common now, though in the earlier days Purimanta was quite popular (Holi, 3). The full moon festival of Holi gradually became a festival of merrymaking, announcing the commencement of the spring season (Holi, 4).


The literal meaning of the word “Holi” is “burning”. There are numerous legends of varying detail as to why this is. The most prominent of these legends involves the demon-king Hiranyakashyap. “Hiranyakashyap wanted everybody in his kingdom to worship only him but to his great disappointment, his son, Prahlad became an ardent devotee of Lord Naarayana. Hiaranyakashyap commanded his sister, Holika to enter a blazing fire with Prahlad in her lap. Holika had a boon whereby she could enter fire without any damage on herself. However, she was not aware that the boon worked only when she enters the fire alone. As a result she paid a price for her sinister desires, while Prahlad was saved by the grace of the god for his extreme devotion. The festival, therefore, celebrates the victory of good over evil and also the triumph of devotion” (Holi, 11). There is also the legend of Krishna which accounts for the play with colors that takes place during the celebration of Holi. Krishna is said to have started this by applying colors to his beloved Radha and other gopis. This practice (application of liquid/powdered colors to friends and family in celebration of Holi) gradually grew in popularity and is now commonplace (Holi, 12).






Why Holika alone is burned in effigy as opposed to Holika and Hiaranyakashyap is very confusing as it was by Hiaranyakashyap’s (Holika’s brother) request that Holika coax Prahlad into the fire with her. Reasonably, one would put both Hiaranyakashyap and Holika at fault. However, this is not the obvious case. Both are noted for being “evil”, but only Holika is burned. Given the context, the scales of morality seem to be a bit off kilter. It seems as though Holika is made out to be the scapegoat for the evils and iniquities of men so that the males might ignore their own faults while purging the guilt from their minds symbolically through the burning of Holika’s effigy.





Rituals associated with the celebration of Holi include the Holi Dahan and the aforementioned play with colors. The Holi Dahan is a bonfire that takes place on the eve of Holi. The bonfire is supposed to represent the effigy of Holika, the devil minded sister of the demon King Hiranyakashyap is placed in the wood and burnt. During this time children often hurl abuses at Holika and play pranks. Another practice associated with the Holi Dahan is the taking home of embers from the fire so that the fire might be rekindled in one’s own home (Holi, 2). The play with colors is especially rampant in Northern India and people take delight in spraying others with buckets of colored water. The singing of Bollywood Holi numbers and dancing to the beat of dholak are also part of the tradition. Furthermore, on the day of Holi drinks laced with bhang (a mixture made from the culled leaves and buds of the cannabis plant) are consumed as it is said to enhance the spirit of the occasion (Holi, 2).


















Works Cited


Holi. Society for the Confluence of Festivals in India, n.d. Web. 11 Apr. 2010. .

Interview with Aparna

For my seventh blog I conducted an interview with a Hindu student at ECU named Aparna Satsangi to gain further insight into the practices and beliefs of Hindus. Bear in mind that there are many different types of Hindus and the beliefs of one do not necessarily reflect the beliefs of all. Aparna is an 18 year-old Indian female and full-time student. I was referred to Aparna by fellow night class student Eddie Sanderlin. Setting up the interview simply involved me e-mailing Aparna to see if she would agree to do an interview, which she did. We set a date, time and location and were on our way. I had never met Aparna previously and as such I was a little nervous beforehand. I had outlined several topics on which I wished to know more about and used them as jumping-off points to open up a dialog between her and myself.


I began the interview by asking Aparna what form of Hinduism she and her family practiced. She said that she was a Kyasth Hindu and that her family comes from Northern India, more specifically the Rajasthan region. She is a vegetarian and primarily worships the deities Krishna and Ganesha. I asked her how she goes about her worship practices and she stated that in her dorm she has a stone Ganesha deity to which she prays. The deity is set on an altar in her dorm with a red dot upon it. In front of the deity incense is placed as well as sweets and rock sugar. The purpose of the sweets and rock sugar is to act as sustenance for the deity as well as to demonstrate her devotion to the deity.

One noteworthy aspect of Hindu belief is that Hindus treat the deities as though they are living. The deities are as real to them as Christ is to Christians. Similarly, in Thailand and Siam there is a cultural tradition of giving thanks to the “Rice Mother” by offering to her the rice that has been harvested (Content4reprint, 8). “Even when not directly concerned with the cultivation of rice, the Rice Mother must be propitiated. At the end of a meal children often raise their hands palm to palm in thanksgiving to the Rice Mother. It is said that her ire is incurred if, when eating, one allows grains of rice to fall to the floor, or if these grains are stepped on, or leftover rice is discarded. If one wishes to criticize the way rice has been cooked, one must beg the Rice Mother's pardon first and then politely make one's complaint” (Content4reprint, 8). I followed this up by asking what some of the rituals, traditions and ceremonies were that she personally observed. She answered this by saying that there are many different traditions and ceremonies that she observed, but there were two that were of particular importance. Firstly, there is Divali which is the Hindu festival of lights. Divali takes place around what non-Hindus would term “Christmas time”. The focal point of Divali is the making of homemade candles. The reasoning for this being that long ago the poor did not have money to worship in the same fashion as Brahmin and members of higher castes. To make-up for this the poor would make their own lamps and put them around there homes to welcome the gods. The timing of this holiday is based on the lunar calendar. Secondly, there is the celebration of Holi. Holi is the spring-time celebration of color. Followers gather together for a meal and afterward cover each other and powdered colors.


I then asked Aparna what some of the key principles of her system of belief were to which she responded with a whole host of key principles. In Aparna’s system of belief there is heavy emphasis on respect for elders and loyalty to family. She also pointed out that unlike monotheistic religions such as Christianity, Judaism and Islam, Hinduism is polytheistic and has many gods and goddesses. Overall she said, “The most important things to me are respect, following tradition and being content with the self.” With that I thanked Aparna for allowing me to conduct an interview with her. I felt it a valuable experience that allowed me to connect with an actual practitioner of the subject I had been studying instead of just reading countless pages of text on the subject.

The Journey to Morrisville

I’ve chosen to combine blogs three, four and five because the subject matter of all three is quite interrelated and the information pertaining to each was obtained in one visit to the Hindu Temple in Morrisville. While I realize there is a Hindu Temple here in Greenville, after having found out that it is simply a house I decided that for my project I’d rather just visit a temple with a more traditional structure to give myself more to write about.


I found out about the temple in Morrisville through a personal interview with a student here at ECU named Aparna Satsangi. She had told me that this week would be the week of the Holi celebration. I immediately saw this as an exceptional opportunity for me to learn more about the temple, and observe a special service there at the temple. To find out the time of the service being held at the Hindu Temple I looked at the temple’s website where it was listed on the main page. After a few short minutes I had what I needed.


The service began at 2:30 pm (HSNC, 1). I wasn’t quite sure if I should dress for the occasion, but I’ve never been one to try and wear out my welcome so I treated it as thought I were going to church. I put on a Polo and headed out the door. I took off from my house around 1:40 to embark on the 45 minute drive ahead of me. Throughout the duration of the 45 minute drive to the temple I kept running through the possible scenarios and outcomes that might take place once I had reached the temple. I was worried that I might be turned away or that I might commit some heinous intercultural faux pas. In hindsight I was probably just over-thinking the whole situation, but such is the way my mind operates. I mean, how often is it that one casually strolls out of their house on a Sunday and goes to the temple of a faith completely foreign to them with the intent of finding out the entire history of said temple? Not often I imagine, but that’s exactly what was happening. I arrived at the temple with little to no navigational problems. Upon pulling into the parking lot of the Hindu Temple and seeing the massive tan brick and white stucco structure that lay before me I felt a bit intimidated. This was all new to me, foreign. I felt out of my element seeing as I knew little about what actually went on inside a Hindu Temple outside of what I had read in a book or article and secondary sources don’t ever quite do justice to their primary counterparts.
After stepping out of my black truck I took a look around me to get a feel for the architecture. There is a smaller building at the entrance of the parking lot which is the actual temple. This is where the deities are kept, prayers are said, offerings to the deities are made and worship takes place. There are 20 deities kept in the temple, under each deity is a brass nameplate with the deity’s name written in English and Sanskrit. They sit on ledges made of marble and tile and in front of them sits offering plates, candles and incense. Above these ledges are bells which are rung by congregants after they say a prayer to whichever deity they are worshipping. When one enters the temple they must remove their shoes, because shoes are dirty, we wear them everywhere, even the dirtiest of places and this is seen as disrespectful for shoes to be left on while entering a holy place (Satsangi).





I began my walk up to the larger building, into which most of the congregants appeared to be entering. It was much, much larger than I had imagined it being. Over the entrance I noticed a large “Om” symbol which is the Hindu symbol that represents the formless, all-pervading nature of God (Sherma). At that point I decided it best to throw my initial apprehensions out the window (for the time being) to better facilitate my getting into the temple for the sake of my English 1200 grade. That plan faltered slightly when I entered the temple and saw the crowds of people bustling about grabbing programs for the impending service. I felt as though I stuck out like a sore thumb, a very large, mangled, sore thumb (of the purple and gold variety). I made my way through the glass doors and into the main hall. I was confused and didn’t really know where to start, so I started where anyone logically should; the beginning. I asked the woman sitting at the front folding table to whom I could speak to find out information regarding the history of the temple, the though, “this is the point where things start falling into place or I hit a brick wall” did flash in my mind much like the words “CONSTRUCTION, RIGHT LANE ENDS, MERGE NOW!” appear on those fancy black road signs with LED displays. Luckily, the woman was able to help me in that she was part of a small chain of events that ultimately led to my meeting Dr. Sherma.


After asking her who I should talk to regarding the history of the temple she immediately directed me to a young man behind me wearing an orange shirt. I approached him and asked the same question, he said “Follow me.” I was then led into the great room which was filled with congregants taking their seats, conversing and generally getting settled in. I was taken across the expanse of the great room to the front where the stage lay. To the right of that, sitting down was an older Indian man wearing a white tunic. I was introduced to him as an ECU student who needed help with a project and he was introduced to me as Dr. G. D. Sherma. Dr. Sherma is an older Indian gentleman. He stands at about 5’5 and is soft-spoken with a kind demeanor. His hair is a dark black with specks of gray intermittently dispersed throughout, his brow hangs low and his face is one well-worn by time. He had an inviting and “grandfatherly” way about him. Dr. Sherma put me at ease in that he was the “answer”. Dr. Sherma was more or less the reason I had gone to the temple that day. He said to me, “What kind of questions do you need help with?” I proceeded to then give him the gist of blogs three, four and five. He responded cordially, “Ok, in a few minutes after I give the invocation I will help you with your questions.” We sat and conversed, making small talk whilst we waited for the service to begin and for him to give the invocation to Krishna.


Upon Dr. Sherma’s taking the stage and beginning the invocation the great room took on an air of silence and earnest reverence. Afterward he announced that it was an invocation to Krishna to bless the celebration of Holi and the service taking place soon thereafter. Dr. Sherma left the stage and made his way back down to the chairs in which we sat just before the invocation, putting on his shoes and jacket he said to me, “Are you ready to talk about the temple?” I nodded and followed behind him as we left the great room, through the main hall and into a side room which was empty, but looked as though it was used for classes, dinners and a variety of other functions. We sat down at the table, I took out my notebook and without a further word Dr. Sherma began telling me the complete history of the temple. It seemed as though he had fully remembered the questions I outlined for the blog and was already prepared to answer them without hesitation. He only ever paused for me to finish writing what he said and every time I finished writing I would tilt my head up and he would begin again.


“I moved to Raleigh, North Carolina in 1972. I had been working in Africa as an advisor to the UN (UNESCO). I worked in places like Nigeria and Sudan as an expert on education.” Upon moving to Raleigh Dr. Sherma worked with the USDA Forestry Department in Research Triangle Park (Sherma). I looked up and saw him rub his forehead as though trying to recall exact details which had not been accessed in some time. “When I moved here there were less than 50 Indian families in Raleigh at the time. My father was a Brahmin , as am I. So, people began coming to me and asking for me to pray for them. There was nowhere for people to pray and worship, they had to do it at home. From time to time I would call over a pupil to my home. People liked for me to pray for them.” As I looked up I saw Dr. Sherma lean back slightly and begin laughing as he said, “You know it’s just human tendency for people to get other people to do things for them. I guess that’s how it all started.” Dr. Sherma had an inviting and relaxed demeanor about him. Of this, I was glad. I had worried about seeming intrusive and out-of-place, but Dr. Sherma put my mind at ease with the way spoke as though I was as welcome as any family member. He continued, “Gradually a group was formed. We started praying collectively at homes, apartments etc. It took four years to develop an interest amongst the pupils to get an organized form of worship established. In 1976 the group became registered as the Hindu Society of North Carolina, a non-profit organization based in his home at 5400 Kaplan Drive.” My hand stopped writing and my pencil stopped moving and without fail Dr. Sherma started again. “In 1978 we bought a Jehovah’s Witness church near NC State where we held weekly prayers. Then number of Indians in the area grew to around 200. Then, in 1982-1983 the Indian population in the Raleigh area grew to 500-600 families due to Research Triangle Park providing a wealth of new jobs. We outgrew the Jehovah’s Witness church and purchased land near the airport. It was then that the plans for the new temple began.” I was astonished at the detail with which Dr. Sherma described all the events leading up to the creation of the current temple. The history of the temple was far richer than I had originally thought. “At that time Morrisville was very small, but we had faith in the temple’s future. In 1984 the temple was built and the deities were affixed.” He went on to explain that the temple he was speaking of was the smaller building I had seen when I pulled into the parking lot. The building we were currently in was the community hall which is used for celebrations and functions outside of prayer and worship. The community hall was added to accommodate the large growth in the temple’s congregation. “Now the number of families in the Research Triangle Park area is greater than 25,000.”


I looked up at Dr. Sherma trying to scour my mind for any further questions I might have. He had done a thorough job of explaining from beginning to end the temple’s history, inception and current standing. I asked merely if he could tell me a bit more about himself, his education, where his family came from. He said, “My family comes from North India, from Agra where the Taj Mahal is. I got my PhD from Montreal in Entomology, that is, the science dealing with insects, did you know that? I also taught at Governor Morehead School for some time, but now I am retired. I am the priest here, but I have hired two other priests to help me. There is a lot to do here. We pray two times a day (morning and evening), seven days a week.”


With that I told Dr. Sherma that I greatly appreciated his time and knowledge. He told me that if I needed help with anything else to give him a call, and then gave me his phone number. While we walked out of the side room he asked me, “Will you be leaving now or will you stay?” I told him I would be staying for the duration of the service and then headed back in to the great room.


When I returned to the great room there were three young girls up on the stage dancing. This reminded me a lot of holiday services in Christian churches where often times the children act out skits, sing or dance. The dancers were dressed in bright dresses, wore headscarves and had their hands painted. After this, several other children came up to the stage to sing songs which they had been working on for some time. Shortly thereafter, people began making their way out into the main hall where food that had been prepared for the celebration was set out. The congregants made their way through the different tables and made their way into the side room where Dr. Sherma and I had been not but a half hour earlier. Everyone appeared to have a good disposition and much laughter and conversation was to be heard in the main hall. Some time after, the temple began an activity which takes place on Holi in which the people “play” with colors which essentially means that friends and family throw powdered colors on each other. This is because Holi is a spring time celebration of colors.


When the color play part of the celebration was through, the Holi Dahan began. The Holi Dahan is a bonfire on the evening of Holi. I couldn’t stay around for much of the bonfire as I needed to get back to Greenville to write this and have it completed at a reasonable time. So I slipped away from the bonfire quietly and headed back to my truck to get home, get packed and get this blog written. I enjoyed every minute of the experience. It was something new and it was a valuable learning experience most especially from a cultural standpoint. At this point I am quite content with my choice of research project.










Works Cited
Atourcity.com. The Hindu Society of North Carolina. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Feb. 2010. .
Sherma, Dr. G. D. Personal Interview. 28 February 2010
Satsangi, Aparna. Personal Interview. 23 February 2010

A Brief History of Hinduism

Hinduism is the world’s oldest major religion and as such there are many details regarding its origins which cannot be known for sure. However, what information we do have on the origins of Hinduism is more or less hypothetical and has been compiled through anthropological study, more specifically, archaeology. Through the deciphering and analysis of ancient texts we have arrived at what is currently our “best guess” as to how Hinduism arose in the Indus River Valley as far back as 2000 BCE.

One of the focal points in any account of the origins and formation of the Hindu religion is that of the “Aryans” and their invasion of the Indus Valley in the wake of the Harappan civilization’s downfall. There is much dispute amongst historians and academics as to whether or not such invasions actually occurred. For the sake of education, both viewpoints will be given and discussed. No matter what viewpoint is chosen we can infer several things about the Harappan civilization itself through the examination of materials excavated from the site it once occupied. “Evidence from the seals and potsherds would seem to support the view that the Harappans were either worshippers of trees or of beings or gods identified with trees or, most likely, both” (Herman, 42). Furthermore, the repeated inclusion of a certain figure on such seals is believed to be that of the god we now know as Shiva. “Several of the seals depict a man seated cross-legged in the style that came much later to be associated with the ‘lotus posture’ of yogis in meditation. […] Another of these ‘yogis’ gives very strong support to the hypothesis that what we are looking at is the first appearance of that being later to be identified as the Hindu god Siva” (Herman, 42). In light of this information we are able to more fully appreciate the influence the Harappan civilization had in the development of Hinduism as we know it today. The Harappan civilization declined shortly after 1900 BCE. What took place after their decline is up for debate.

Two major theories have evolved in an attempt to understand what occurred after the downfall of the Harappan civilization. In the first, the region previously occupied by the Harappans was “invaded” by Aryans in the surrounding Indus Valley area. “The Aryan migration thesis that the Indus Valley groups calling themselves ‘Aryans’ (noble ones) migrated into the sub-continent and became the dominant cultural force. Hinduism, on this view, derives from their religion recorded in the Veda along with elements of the indigenous traditions they encountered” (BBC, 17). In the second, there is no invasion and it is believed that the Aryan culture developed out of the Indus Valley culture. “The cultural transformation thesis states that Aryan culture is a development of the Indus Valley culture. On this view there were no Aryan migrations (or invasion) and the Indus valley culture was an Aryan or Vedic culture” (BBC, 17).

It is from this point that the ball really gets rolling in terms of developing the Hindu religion into what it is today. The Vedas are the oldest form of Hindu scriptures, containing hymns, prayers and ritual texts composed during a period of a thousand or so years. The word Veda means wisdom or knowledge (Allaboutreligion, 5). The Vedas are also the primary text on which Hinduism, as we know it, is based. From the period of 500 BCE to 500 CE we see the composition of further texts including the Dharma Sutras, Shastras, Mahabharata, Ramayana and Puranas. The Dharma Sutras introduced the concept of dharma (law, duty and truth) which is central to Hinduism. During this period of time there was also a minimization in the practice of Vedic fire sacrifice in light of an increase in devotional worship (BBC, 27).

From the period of 500 CE to 1500 CE we see a stark rise in the devotional worship of three major deities (Vishnu, Shiva and Devi). It is also in this period of time that great regional temples begin to be constructed.

More importantly this time period sees extensive developments in the philosophies and teachings of the two major branches of Hinduism: Vaishnavism and Shaivism (BBC, 33). Hinduism continued to flourish until British occupation from the mid-1700’s to the mid-1900’s at which point there was a large movement to westernize the population. The nineteenth century saw the development of a “Hindu Renaissance” with reformers such as Gandhi making headway in returning India and the Hindu population back to its roots and being freed of British occupation while other reformers sought to rid Hinduism of what they saw as “superstitious” elements (BBC, 60).

Works Cited

All About Religion - History of Hinduism. N.p., 2002. Web. 11 Apr. 2010. .allaboutreligion.org/history-of-hinduism-faq.htm>.

Flood, Gavin. BBC - Religions - History of Hinduism. BBC, 24 Aug. 2009. Web. 11 Apr. 2010. .bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/hinduism/history/history_1.shtml>.

Herman, Arthur L. A Brief Introduction to Hinduism: Religion, Philosophy and Ways of Liberation. N.p.: Westview Press, 1991. 42-43. Print.