Hinduism

by Vijay Chandra

October, 1993

Dear Praying Friends,

Greetings to you all from the Fiji Islands. I trust that you are all well. We as a family would like to thank you all for your continued prayer and practical support. The Lord has blessed us with 24 baptized believers. We praise and glorify Him for all He has done.

In this prayer letter I want to share with you what the Hindu religion is all about, since we are working with many different groups of Indian people.

Hinduism

Over half the population of Fiji is made up of Indians who came from India over 150 years ago. When they settled here they brought their gods, their customs and their culture to Fiji. We as missionaries need to understand their beliefs which they have. So very briefly, I will outline some of the basic teachings of Hinduism.

a) Brahman, the “ultimate reality” for Hindus, is the preoccupation of the Hindu mind. To achieve this goal Hindus are willing to renounce the world, give up family and all physical comfort.

b) Moksha, also known as Mukfi, i.e., freedom, is a term used for the liberation of the soul from the wheel of Karma. A Hindu’s chief aim of his existence is to be freed (samsora) from the binding life cycle and the wheel of Karma with its endless cycle of births, deaths, and rebirths. Moksha can be achieved through these paths:  by knowledge, devotion, and ritual works.

c) Karma literally means action and has reference to a person’s actions and the consequences thereof. In Hinduism, one’s present state of existence is determined by his performance in previous lifetimes. The law of Karma is the law of moral consequences, or the effect of any action upon the performers in a past, a present, or even a future existence. As one performs righteous acts, he moves toward liberation from the cycle of successive births and deaths. The cycle of births, deaths, and rebirths could be endless. The goal of the Hindus is to achieve enough good Karma to remove himself from the cycle of rebirths and achieve eternal bliss.

d) Samsora refers to transmigration of rebirth. It is passing through a succession of lives based upon the direct reward or penalty of one’s Karma. The continuous chain consists of suffering from the results of acts of ignorance or sin in past lives. During each successive rebirth, the soul, which Hindus consider to be eternal, moves from one body to another and with it comes the Karma from its previous existence. The rebirth may be to a higher form, i.e., a member of  higher caste or god, or down the social ladder to a lower caste or an animal, since the wheel of Karma applies to both man and animal.

To achieve salvation, Hindus have to follow the path of selflessness or perform religious duty or have exclusive devotion to the gods and finally follow the path of higher knowledge.

Customs and festivals

Some religious rituals are performed daily in the home before the images of gods or abstract symbols of deity. Some worship in the temple. Astrological calculations determine the days for understanding any course of action, in particular for arranging marriages, business deals, etc. Many annual festivals are connected with the worship of gods and goddesses. For example, there is a goddess of wealth, education, and destruction. They also worship Christ as one of their gods. They believe Christ is the reincarnation of Krishna.

I trust that this will help you to pray effectively for us as we minister and try to reach out to Hindus.

Prayer Requests

  1. For the newly baptized believers
  2. That we will be faithful in teaching and preaching
  3. For our family’s health and protection
  4. Transportation (very important)

I would like to share a verse which is found in 2 Timothy 2:13, “If we are faithless, He remains faithful.” We indeed want to serve our Lord faithfully. Thank you once again for all your prayers and support.

Yours in His service,

Vijay, Narsamma, Andrew, and Philip Chandra

[This missionary prayer letter is from October, 1993, over 25 years ago! Continue to pray for the cross-cultural Christian ministry of Vijay Chandra, who has now returned to America to serve in the Flint, Michigan area where he continues to minister the Gospel to Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims on a daily basis.]

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