A Global Revival of Animism
Religions in the 21st Century
Religion in the 21st century has taken a sharp turn to become extremely integral to the average person’s life, giving one an identity before spirituality as it’s goals, in most cases. The eve of the millennium was marked with excessive US imperialism in disproportionately muslim countries, and a subsequent response of it was given to the US in 2001, on 9/11.
The USA is the biggest economy in the world since the 1920s, with it alone being 25% in the 2000s. Combined with the EU it was 56.2%. Even today, USA accounts for roughly 25% of the world GDP, while China barely makes up for 17.7%, followed by the EU (16.3%), followed by the OIC (9.7%), followed by Japan (4.2%). Bharat (3.4%) comes at 6th position when viewed from this perspective.
As we can see, despite being #6 in this distribution, there is a disproportionate distribution of wealth between the top 5 economies. And this uneven distribution was even more stark in the 2000s, with USA and EU combined to make more than 50% of the world GDP, and this isn’t even counting Canada or Russia!
So one can observe that Christian countries make up almost more than half of the GDP, while Muslim countries make up barely 10%, and native (or in some cases, animist) nations make up 25%-30%, and the bulk of this is carried by China, with only nominal contributions from Japan, Bharat, Korea, and so on.
This continuation of the Eternal Crusades, which have marked much of, if not all of, the Kali Yug, has been marred with these very similar faiths professing to be mortal enemies. They pretend to be different to carve out one large empire after another. While these conflicts have given us some massive growth in economy and technology (as is the case with most, if not all, wars), they have failed to answer the most basic question: that of sustainability of our environment.
Looking westwards for the Kali Yug
While Kali Yug is described as an age where people lose their sense of morality and goodness. This yug started with the death of Krishnaji in the forest, it’s true start can only be described as an age where we stopped venerating and worshipping the environment an it’s products, and started to believe that we were superior to nature.
This is when people started to identify with more anti-nature ideologies and folklore, such as Moses who destroyed a moorti of a golden calf to force his followers to stop worshipping it. This story finds mention in the Bible and Quran both. His boorish behavior to those present is describes as something in these holy texts as something of pride, and needs no special mention here.
Considering that the Ice Age was at it’s midpoint, and the great flood of Manu (or Noah) had just gotten over, many lands were turning into deserts from green marshy lands, as the water seeped away from these soils. The two best examples are Misr (or Egypt) and Rajasthan in Bharat.
While one could question Moses’s intention to push his people to find sustinence outside the desert, and outside of an extinct animal of the habitat, the reverence of his supremacist actions had long lasting effects that affect us today, thousands of years later.
This Holy War, when it comes to development of technology and econmies for the so called “People of the Book”, was great for this middle eastern region. First for the Muslims for nearly 500 years, and then to the Christians the next 500. By now, our ice age should have ended, environmentally speaking. Instead, the planet is getting hotter, and the damage seems almost irreversible.
Origins of Animism and it’s relavance today
Long before the people of the book invented words like “pagan” or “kafir”, all humans worshipped nature just the same. We worshipped the sun, the water, the trees, the mountains, the rivers, various animals whom we thanked for giving us sustenance, or asked for protection from, or for their protection, and our own geography. We did not worship them because they were all powerful, or even all forgiving. There was no idea of supremacy, but of reverence and love. A certain gratefulness for what we had. As we got smarter, we began worshipping traits of individuals that we aspired to emulate. We worshipped courage, dignity, fertility. We respected monogamy and chastity as a means to reduce conflict in society. We even started to worship war, and made war dignified to reduce casualties. All humans worshipped and evolved like this, and their devtas ranged from the Greek God of Thunder Zeus, to the Arab God of War al-Lat, to the Demi people of Anowara:kowa (or as the colonizers called them “Navajo”) and their sun god Tsohanoai, to the King of Japan being a descendant of the Sun God themselves, much like our own Suryavanshi and Chandravanshi kings, to Oxen worship prevalent till date in Chinese culture.
As one can observe, the similarities are obviously there to our own vast culture and geography. Any differences that arise, arise due to geographic differences. Hotter climates like the one of the Pharoahs of Misr revered the Sun god as more supreme, vs those in the stormy regions of Greece and Europe revered thunder gods like Zeus as more able.
Today, after centuries of this conflict, in many countries this animism is returning as a peaceful alternative, such as in Iceland where Norse Animism is coming back to life as the fastest growing religion, Kurds who are adapting Yazidi folklore into their own protests demanding a Kurdistan, many Iranic people identifying with Zoroastrianism as a form of their protest or Turkish seculars looking at Tengrism for the same. Africans have become wary of Christianity and Islam today, recognising the role of these religions in colonizing and enslaving them. Lithuanian’s have revived their native Romuva religion through conscious effort. Arabs and Egyptians have taken a fonder interest in their Mushrikun (no offense if i got the name wrong) and Pharoah religion, at least from a historic perspective. Senator Thorpe of Australia has vocally spoken out against the Queen of England and in favour of Aboriginal rights. Native Americans have used social media to further their identity, Mongolians seek to do the same closer to home. The list goes on.
Africa itself deserves a special mention,. Being an entire continent of extremely rich and diverse culture and religions, they chose a pseudo-identity with Christianity or Islam to claim legitimacy in the international stage at a time where most of the white (or Abrahamic world) was ensalving them and coercing their kingdoms and culture. This came from a place of lack of choice, at a time when their kingdom was at it’s most divided. In Africa, even today, this lack of choice is what many are growing aware of, under Chinese imperialism. Still, this movement has not found it’s organized voice and footing yet.
In the rest of the world, things aren’t much better. South Korea, for the first time in it’s history, decided to adopt the Gregorian Calendar over their native calendar, thereby denouncing a part of their Dejengeon identity. In Japan, the ex-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated by a person frustrated by his ties to the Unification Church, China’s CCP is finally returning to it’s roots with culture after their 100 years of humiliation, and Bharat seems to be losing out on it’s battle against it’s European Church-centric secularism. As we can see, stronger nations too have a certain lack of identity, and some nations are trying to define and progress it more than others at this challenging hour.
China’s revival of course, requires it’s own mention as a comparative study, as in recent times their cultural revival has been unprecedented. Sites like Jiguan Cave and Laojun Mountains (where the founder of Taoism, Lauzi, retreated to in Chinese history), once littered with hippies, has banned all foreigners whatsoever anymore, and are totally sufficient on pilgrimage money alone. Authors such as Michael Wood have made special note of this “cultural revitalization” of China.
As the Chinese themselves claim, in many museums such as Haw Par Villa in Singapore, to people who study ancient cultures of this part of central and central-south Asia, Chinese religion was deeply inspired by the religion of the Bharatian Subcontinent. Buddhism was the basis of uniting all the folk religions into Taoism. Buddhism itself has a massive impact on China. Even Nichiren of Japan’s Nichiren Daishonin sect of Buddhism, in the 1200s, said that one must study the teachings of “Confucianism, Brahmanism and Buddhism” doctrines. While our religious impact on our neighbourhood may have been a great feat thousands upon thousands of years ago, it is old history, done and dusted with. We can’t crry about our stolen past without taking any inspiration from it. We need to have our eyes on the future. The world is a much smaller place, and ideas can travel much faster now.
Understanding how bleak things are for Animism in the future, the readers must be asking themselves, why do we need a revival of animism at all, and is it for the better or worse?
The answer is simple, but most people fail to understand it. The reason is that our ice age should have been on it’s twilight right now. Climate is always changing, but it changes cyclically, in waves of glacial and interglacial periods. Sadly, due to our massive industrialization drives worldwide, and rapid growth everywhere, we have failed to as a planet, keep us in check. As a result, the glacial period does not seem anywhere in sight. Scientists struggle to figure out whether this change is reversible or not.
We do not have any sense of waste management, constantly burning or dumping our waste instead of recycling or re-using it sustainably. Ocean water has been contaminated, and fishes show up dead in the millions from Tibet to Australia. Our forests have turned into nothing but overglorified zoos, artifically maintaining the top predators to maintain the ecosystem. The same predators our ancestors hunted for sport, and their ancestors hunted for food. As hunting got more convenient, our respect for the animal reduced. As religious restrictions on this hunting and reverence for animals was removed, the number of animals killed only skyrocketed further. All of this is pushed us towards a weaker Planet, and risks killing us off further. The only way to prevent this is to, even if temporarily, is to halt the gears of progress, at least in it’s current state.
Establishing a Vishwa Jeevwaadi Sangh
The first step to preserving this planet from total eco destruction is to establish a common identity which returns us to our roots as a pluralistic global civilization. Bharatian cultures are mostly united through our geographical unity; so are other faiths to their own geography, topography and weather systems. They must be united under a larger global umbrella of a world geography as well. Other faith systems must be judged and criticized by how they impact the peace between people, and nature and environment, first and foremost.
Our universities should be a hub to demarc and catalogue various practices globally, whether dead or alive. Oral traditions must be written, and in multiple languages, to increase awareness cross-globally. The list of traditional African religions, Anglo-Saxons in the UK, Roman and Greek Animists, Germanic Anmists or Nords, or many others in Europe, Native Americans, etc; or a recreation of what practices during ancient Egypt or Arabia must have been like, all should come under one umbrella with the same goal of returning to our reverence for nature.
Of course, neighbourhood comes first, and so the Zororastrians (including the Bharatian Parsi population), Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, Mongolians and the Hindus in south-East Asia, all come first. But this should not mean that we neglect the wider world, or to limit our ambitions to just our immediate periphery. We have to aim bigger.
Below I would list some movements that have been trying to revive native animism in the world:
- Africa: Despite being a whole continent that is bigger than China India and USA combined, Africa seems to have little or no organizations as such seeking to preserve African indigenous cultures. Wheter it is the southern Tribes of Zulu and Xhoso (coming under Ubuntu tradition), or the Bantu religion, the Serer, or the diverse religious and tribal groups of West Africa, these are diverse and complex enough to be a full study of their own. Their teachings of humility and humanity is unique, and different from our own Sanatan Dharm’s versions. African languages and religions played a hude role in decolonization, and continue to play a role decolonialization in academia. Hopefully one day, each of these cultures would be known for their uniqueness, by name and practice both, outside of the academic world. Africa has massive work to be done with collectivizing their native faiths, and these processes mut only be aided and cultivated as Africa continues to industrialize, and hopefully find an independent voice on the world stage as well, soon.
2. Native Anowara:kowa: Today known as the Americas, this region was part of some very powerful confederation of tribes, aware of the geography they lived upon and traded both amongst each other ad globally, long before the Christians stepped in. The Native Anowara:kowa (translating to the Great Turtle Island, describing the shape of the today-called “north America”) traded with many like the Vikings in the 900s, annd the Cholas, without facing any Abrahamic colonization. Mayan Civilization also was there, and many unexplored links between the South Americas and the Cholas (in sites like Machupichu) remain highly unexplored. Native Anowara:kowa had so many of their native holy sites destroyed and rebranded, such as the Lakota tribes’s holy mountain Tunkasila Sakpe Paha, which was bombed and carved up to make present day “Mount Rushmore”, or the Onguiaahra Waterfall of the Atiquandaronk tribe, part of the Iroquois collective, which is home to the stroy of how Hinum, the god of Thunder, helps save a girl from the Serpent Monsters in the lake, which taught the tribes how to fend for themselves in nature. This site of holy reverence is today known as “Niagra Falls”, an anglicization of it’s name, and a site lost of it’s glory and meaning it once held to the native Anowara:kowa people. Such examples on the Alkebulan and Anowara:kowan people (African and American people) are well documented in decolonial literature, but have remained confined to academia alone. These need a push to be formented into more muscular religious, social and political groups, and their faith should be something that they can fall back upon in times of hardships and desperate needs, and not merely for aesthetics. The European immigrant should adapt to this faith, and not the other way around. That is the logical sensible conclusion.
3. “Aboriginals” of Australia: Recently, in Australia, there has been a boom in the Aboriginal movement to seek being recognised as citizens and as people, something one would assume would already have been the case. Aboriginals of Australia too have several sacred sites, along with considering their rivers as sacred. Some Aboriginal people, like the Nunga, Koori, Goori, and Palawa all hold their nature supreme. Sacred sites like the Baiami Caves, and Ban Ban Springs, were sites of pilgrimage. Uluru-Kata Tjuta was declared a “living continuous tradition” by UNESCO in 1994. Recently, an Australian state senator named Senator Thorpe openly abused the Queen of England, adding the word “colonizing” to the honorific of her majesty queen elizabeth. While there is a push by the aboriginals, we still don’t see the movement forment into an aboriginal-religious one, which can help fight colonization for the Aboriginals in their daily lives and way of living. Approaching and interacting with the Aboriginal groups in Australia as Bharatians should be a means to do so.
4. Europe: Europe too has a diverse and pluralistic Pagan culture. For starters, Britain was never called Britain until it’s Christian colonization, but natively called Albion, by the Anglo-Saxons themselves. We must also call them the same. Europe has many diverse cultures, from Germanic Animists, Norse, Vikings, Slavic Animists, Hellene, Greeks, Azerbaijanis and Armenians (Hetanes), and the list goes on. One simple search on YouTube will show you the Lithuanian Romuvas handled by the Romuva Institution, Slavs returning to their Rodnovery faith but without a sizable platform, Hellenistic orgnaizations like Supreme Council Of Ethnikoi Hellenes running affairs, Hetanism in Armenia which traces it’s roots of revival to Garegin Nzhdeh, or the revival of Norse Animism by the group named Ásatrúarfélagið, or Faith in the Aesir, or gods connected with power and war. Even Heinrich Himmler was involved in some revival of Germanic practices, but he pulled more from the Church than his own faith, and failed to see it’s bigger picture beyond mere means to nationalism. The UK was a part of the Roman empire for the first time in 43AD, which means for 1990 years, they have not gained independence from their colonizers. These movements could be strong, and be researched so as to add value to the people of Europe when they study them.
5. Russia (Asia): For the longest time, Russian Federation has been a colonial empire, starting it’s expansion around the same time every other colonial power in Europe did the same: the late 1400s. While all European powers, even the Portuguese, have mostly relinquished control over natives, Russia still maintains their control. Missing out on the Renaissance period, their ideals of separation of Church and State exists in name only, and this lack of separation keeps Orthodoxy of Church deeply rooted in Russian society. This, obviously, is a terrible precedent for the natives living in the East Russian Occupied territories, from the Yakuts, Tuvans, Nenets, Yukaghir, and the list goes on. The Yakuts are the Sakas who invaded Bharat back in the day, and established their own calendar today known as the “Saka Cakendar”, one of the main Hindu calendars. The identity of these people is always made subservient to the Russian one, and hence they are not able to promote their culture free from the biases of the Russian Colonial state, as independent nations. This is no different from the Princely States in the time of the British in concept, although in practice the Russian state has loosened their control of these regions due to other priorities. Unlike Bharat or Chinese mainland, these Russian territories never had anything in common with the mainland Russia, and therefore no civilizational nationality to unite them with the mainland Russians. Russia too, has no interest in keeping this land except for exploiting it for it’s resources, something that the natives can choose for themselves with their own sensibilities and native faith systems in mind. This land expanse is the only thing the Russian state clings onto for natural gas and the largest drinking water reserve to maintain their economy, and do not have any geographic or cultural attachment to these territories. The natives of these regions losing parts of their faith to Christianity over many generations and centuries is a continuous loss for the pluralistic planet that we live in, and a detriment to nature itself. This is something even the West is too cowardly to admit about it’s enemy.
different “Russian” tribes.
6. The MENA world: The MENA world, or “Middle East-North Africa” world, is predominantly Muslim, which has let them retain their tribal structures unlike Europe, but they too have lost a lot of their native faiths which has interfered with their ability to form a democracy in their regions. This region would interact heavily in both war and trade, with the Hellenic cultures, and hence, has a sense of togetherness with this region. The first and most prominent real (or native) faith of this region is Mazdayasna, which has seen a rise in Iran during the hijab protests there. While already having a very active and alive community of “Parsis” (or Persians, or Zororastrians, or Mazdayasna) is alive in Bharat, even Irani NRI’s have been using Zororastrian imagery to symbolize their protests. This sentiment must be formented by those who seek revival of animism, especially considering how the Eagle population of Persia and Bharat are dying out due to manmade causes, an animal very important in Zororastrian burial rituals. Organizations like the World Zororastrian Organization have also contributed heavily to allowing proselytisation to the faith. Other than the Persians, we have to look at the rest of the continent, with a rising interest in the Pharoas and the Mushrikuns in Egypt and Arabia. These, while not being a religious interest per se, still shows a certain keenness to know where one came from. When competing with giants like China and Bharat in terms of history, such countries feel fairly new, and thus the longing as to where they came from. Even the Carthage culture of ancient Tunisia should fill the Tunisians with a sense of pride every time they hear this name. Tunisia is where the Arab Spring started, and one can hope that this revival movement could start from the Carthaginians as well? This region is also home to the Turks, whose native faith was Tengrism and used to worship wolves. The region is also home to the the Babylonians, who worshipped patron gods like Marduk. Finally, let’s talk about Judaism. Judaism is not a native faith, and Israel must revert to Yahwism immediately before further colonizing their own people in Palestine. The whole war is a competition on who can be a worse human being, and Israelis have no respect for freedom of religion. If ou doubt this, then try taking a pocket statue of Ganeshji through their airport. It will be confiscated and destroyed! With no constitution in Israel, they rely solely on their scriptures to dictate rules on idolatry. It is truly shameful that they consider themselves a native faith on the basis of racial purity alone. Their true religion is the Yahwey, and everything else is nothing but a false worship of one’s own self.
7. Japan and Korea: Shintoism and Dejjengeonism are the two faiths of Japan and Korea, respectively. While being vibrant and alive cultures in daily lives of the people, exponentially beautiful in their own ways, they too must keep their guard up. Missionary activities in both these countries have undermined their cultures, and in both countries, this Church funding comes from the USA, through NGOs. Korea recently lost their native Dangunism calendar, which finds it’s roots in the founding of the Gojoseon kingdom. Instead, they adopted the Gregorian calendar. While North Korea may be a bit more nationalistic about it’s pre-ancient history, it too suffers since it uses the birth of Kim il-Sung to mark it’s own calendar. This means both the Koreas lost their native identity, one to communism and the other to Christianity. Meanwhile in Japan, doe to many con-religious organizations, majority of the population tried to identify with none. Still, the murderer of Shinzo Abe, Tetsuya Yamagami, shot him because he blamed Shinzo Abe for allowing the Unification Church to run it’s operations in Japan, which made his mother donate all her money to the Church, leaving their family poor and neglected. This act has obviously cemented Tetsuya Yamagami as the Nathuram Godse of Japan, and how he would be percieved in the future in Japanese society is something only time would tell. Regardless, such violence is not the answer, and preventing foreign funding of the subversive type is something all ASEAN countries could work together co-operatively to make a framework on, maybe with Bharat itself.
8. South-East Asia: South-East Asia must beware of the subversive nature of Indonesia and Malaysia, both of whom have been leaning towards the highest waste production in all of the region, as well as the subversive nature of communism in countries like Vietnam, which also has been not very far behind in the waste production statistics. While cities like Jakarta sink, maybe it is time for South-East Asia to revive it’s animist practices and begin working towards technology that can help them with their shrinking coastline and massive waste production problem. This problem is a living breathing one, and can only be resolved if it stays on the minds of their people to do a thorough preservation, as a religious duty. Tracing the origins of the wildlife, their inclusion in the religious practices of their ancestors, and how to continue their way of life, this should be South East Asia’s biggest concern. Meanwhile, countries like Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar, Vietnam, come under the Hindu influence just as much as Indonesia or Malaysia, albeit they are closer to their native faiths. In these regions, we could have a direct influence through organizations like an RSS, which help promote, maintain and create communities around the Sanatan Dharmic history of these regions, that too in the local language of Siamese, Malay, Burmese, Laobhasha, etc. These organizations must focus on remaining peaceful and non-violent. While an RSS in Myanmar already does exist, it needs to ditch it’s Hindi-ism and start itt’s operations in Burmese, and include the Burmese people in their fold. Still, today, RSS seems to be losing their edge, it would be a breath of fresh air to see a new organization rise up from it’s ashes to unite the subcontinent further under our identity’s umbrella, without the baggage of the Indian Independence movement holding it back.
9. China: China seems to have sorted out it’s problems as far as outside external influences on their native culture goes. This, however, has not been perfect, and many a times Chinese philosophy, such as Confucianism, is bent to suit the communist means to an end. This could stop to some degree, but for the most part, China seems to have it sorted, albeit in a very authoritarian and colonial manner. Their subjugation of Tibetan culture has been extreme and not grounded in geographical or civilizational nationalism, and that combined with their Uighyr subjugation could actually implode in it’s face in the future. This is where China must be careful, and protect it’s mainland at all costs, even the cost of Tibet.
10. Bharat: Bharat has it’s own issues which are similar to China, but much more pronounced. While one may feel this is a slow and disheartening change, it’s actually a better method. The plethora of decolonial literature in the past 5 years alone has been astounding, and exponentially growing. This has given way to a lot of newer debates to be had on culture, language, unity, pluralism, constitution, and the list goes on. Naturally, our foreign influences too have been just as militant in approaching us, and we have to be just as united in the face of this adversity. Things are actually looking up, and the future seems brighter. While a certain curbing of speech has entered Bharatian society, and one may not be as free to criticize the govt itself, this trend is worldwide, and thankfully nothing as of yet has happened which has made this trend irreversible. Hard times give us an opportunity to grow, and on a cultural level, the decolonial literature being pumped out in Bharat has a potential to change the global scene just as much as the national one, provided we promote it in a thoughtful and strategic manner.
Reading all of this, one may wonder, how can we ever learn and understand all of this? The answer is that we may not necessarily understand all of it. When we travel to a country, we must make an effort to visit the native sites instead of the colonial ones. Why visit Europe for Notre Dame when we could visit the Tree of Irminsul? Google is our friend in finding as many “pagan” sites in these countries, and making it a prioroity to visit them and offer our prayers at these sites.
Our own religion unites us by geography, and therefore we are privilged to have fought continuously for so many centuries with valour and survived despite all odds. Our goal shouldn’t be to dilute our own culture, but to expand and enrich the others instead. We also shouldn’t chase this revival for the sake of it, to boost our egos and nothing else. It should have a greater role in bringing environment conservation and sustainability as a basic understanding to the masses.
If religion is the opium of the masses, our veneration for nature should be the high the world chases. While we may be excited about our growin presence in the neighbourhood, we shouldn’t restrict our trumped up fantasies about a “hindu rashtra” to merely a geographical extent rooted in history and nothing current. Instead, we should aim to reignite the light that the world seems to forget it ever saw once upon a time.
We don’t want to make everybody the same as us. Rather, we want to include them in with us, in a pluralistic manner, and in the process help the planet heal itself too. Coming together for a greater good, it is the spirit of Vasudev Kudumbakam!
Jai Sanatan, Jai Bharat.
