Arya Samaj

Subject: History

Context :

Social activist and AryaSamaj leader Swami Agnivesh passed away at the Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences in New Delhi.

Concept:

• The AryaSamaj Movement, revivalist in form though not in content, was the result of a reaction to Western influences.
• Its founder, DayanandaSaraswati or Mulshankar (1824-1883) was born in the old Morvi state in Gujarat in a brahmin family.
• The first AryaSamaj unit was formally set up by him at Bombay in 1875 and later the headquarters of the Samaj were established at Lahore.
• Dayananda’s views were published in his famous work, SatyarthPrakash (The True Exposition). His vision of India included a classless and casteless society, a united India (religiously, socially and nationally), and an India free from foreign rule, with Aryan religion being the common religion of all.
• He took inspiration from the Vedas and considered them to be ‘India’s Rock of Ages’, the infallible and the true original seed of Hinduism. He gave the slogan “Back to the Vedas”.
• Dayananda launched a frontal attack on Hindu orthodoxy, caste rigidities, untouchability, idolatry, polytheism, belief in magic, charms and animal sacrifices, taboo on sea voyages, feeding the dead through shraddhas, etc.
• Dayanandasubscribed to the Vedic notion of chaturvarna system in which a person was not born in any caste but was identified as a brahmin, kshatriya, vaishya or shudra according to the occupation the person followed.
• The AryaSamaj fixed the minimum marriageable age at twenty-five years for boys and sixteen years for girls.
• Intercaste marriages and widow remarriages were also encouraged. Equal status for women was the demand of the Samaj, both in letter and in spirit.
• The Samaj also helped the people in crises like floods, famines and earthquakes. It attempted to give a new direction to education. The nucleus for this movement was provided by the Dayananda Anglo-Vedic (D.A.V.) schools, established first at Lahore in 1886, which sought to emphasise the importance of Western education.
• It should be clearly understood that Dayananda’s slogan of ‘Back to the Vedas’ was a call for a revival of Vedic learning and Vedic purity of religion and not a revival of Vedic times. He accepted modernity and displayed a patriotic attitude to national problems.