Preserving Our Roots and Ancient Knowledge by Chahna Tailor Gupta
W
hen I was in grade school, questions such as “Why does your religion have monkeys, elephants, and other animals?” were ubiquitous. I was always interested in our religion, but I could never defend it because I felt I wasn’t well-informed. My friends practicing other religions were able to speak eloquently about their faith, but they never had to defend it. It didn’t help that school textbooks contained incorrect details on Hinduism, probably because they were written by someone of a different faith. (A huge thank you to the Hindu American Foundation for changing that!) While other religions had similar prophets or roots, it was obvious how starkly different Hinduism seemed — and at times, Hinduism was seen as a joke. As I became older, I started asking my parents and family members more questions about Hinduism. Thanks to Bala-Vihar at South Florida Hindu Temple with Swamini Divyananda and Swami Vijayananda, in
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JULY 2022 - WWW.DESHVIDESH.COM
