The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c14.s7.6

c14.s7.6

We are to understand that Hindu positivism popularized in folk-tradition the doctrine of political deliverers or ''world-conquerors'' as being none other than *Yugāvatāras* or Gods in human form. The secularization of alleged religious texts or rather the interpretation of alleged god-lore in terms of worldly personalities and human exploits was in the very blood of the Hindu masses and classes. The records from Vijayanagara as from the Maratha annals should furnish concrete illustrations as to how a scientific and critical student of Hindu social institutions and theories ought to interpret them. Those who would follow the folk-tradition of India through the ages are not likely to be shunted off into misleading tracks by mere names of gods and goddesses and the atmosphere of religious ritualism or metaphysical speculations. It is the things ''human, all-too human'' that they would encounter in Hindu institutions and theories. Hindu religion is nothing if it is not in the main a handmaid to worldly progress and material prosperity.