The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c5.s7.2

c5.s7.2

Another work which, like these two, is the farthest removed from the positive data of Hindu culture is *Die indoarische Gesellschaftsordnung* (Tübingen 1935) of Alfred Geiger. At the very outset Geiger postulates a number of *Grundzüge* or fundamental principles in regard to the *indisches Volkstum* (Indian people) and its *Gesellschaftsordnung* (societal order). And just those *Quellen*, sources or authorities are *vornehmlich* (preferentially) selected by him which belong to or illustrate the "peaks of Indian history as signalized by those principles." The author's study thus becomes not an objective or historical analysis of what the *indisches Volkstum* (Indian people) factually was and has grown to be but a statement of what he considers to be the basic features of Indian civilization, and a rejection of all those facts, data or principles which do not suit his own postulates. He wants to pass off his own ideas about India as India itself and look for only those evidences from Indian literature which serve to prove his point. And this he does,—not unconsciously like many other indologists and sociologists but quite deliberately and in a planful manner with all the honesty of a scientific researcher.