Salt Lake Herald, 1906

“Absurd Religious Practices in India”

#HindooHistory #Benares #Varanasi
“It seems hard to believe that in this civilized day there should exist anywhere, such preposterous absurdity as are practiced in India in the name of religion”
“Although England has ruled here for more than a century, and the Protestant missionary societies have spent upwards of a hundred million gold dollars in trying to make converts to Christianity, the mass of people still adhere to the ridiculous practices of the ancients”
“We find them worshipping snakes and monkeys and held in awe by the false pretenses of charlatans and sorcerers”
“Although the message of the Nazarene has gone afar, it has affected India so little that the dead are still burned on the banks of the sacred river or left in towers for the vultures to devour”
“Fiction Writers Outdone”

“The four marvelous books which the Brahmins wrote were inscribed on pages of gold and the most versatile fiction writer of modern times could not produce more fanciful nor elaborate tales...”
“Old Religious Shell Game”

“There is no trick to which Brahmin priests will not resort in order to excite the fervor of the worshippers, and thus enrich themselves by the offerings of the ignorant”
“Although the oracle is out of date in most countries where pagan priests impose upon the people, it is still worked in India with great success”
“Sometimes the idol itself addresses the awe-struck crowd of people, who listen with their hearts in their mouth as the image of stone finds voice and threatens them with dreadful punishments if their flow of offerings is not increased”
“Crazy Acts of Votaries”

“The belief that generosity and physical ordeals are the means of winning the favor of the gods is so general, that many worshipers give themselves over to disgusting and ridiculous acts of fanaticism”
“The forms of this religious frenzy takes are innumerable...
“A Glimpse of Barbarism”

“The scene of one of the Pujas is a glimpse of ancient barbarism. Around the image are prostrate supplicants, the women praying for male children and the men asking the favor of the destruction of their enemies”
“Such idolatrous scenes as this leave an unpleasant impression on the mind of the spectator. The bleating goats struggling in the hands of their gory executioners, the uncanny sounds of paganism...”
“And the shining faces of the half-crazed fanatics swarming around their gaudy idol, makes one wonder if the real reason for India’s misery and degradation is not the disobedience of the divine command: “thou shalt have none other gods but me”
Left caption: “ A Hindoo Temple”

Right caption: “A Religious Hindoo Fanatic”

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More from @HindooHistory

5 Apr
The title page of Mabel Potter Daggett’s 1911 essay, “The Heathen Invasion of America”

#HindooHistory
“Eve is eating the apple again. It is offered as a knowledge of the occult that shall solve the riddles of existence. Yoga, that eastern philosophy the emblem of which is the coiled serpent, is being widely disseminated here”
“Literally yoga means the ‘path’ that leads to wisdom. Actually it is proving the way that leads to domestic infelicity and insanity and death”
Read 25 tweets
4 Apr
The Birmingham age-herald, 1912

“MOST CRUEL-MOST KIND IDOLS IN THE WORLD”

“Terrible tortures of human beings figure in bloody rites of ‘Kali’, Goddess of thugs and robbers, in interior state of India, says British archaeologist...”

#HindooHistory Image
“The ritual performed in the worship of Kali involves the most revolting rites, which the British government has long tried to suppress, but not with complete success” Image
“To the ‘true worshipers of Kali’ human sacrifice is essential...cutting their flesh and burning portions of their bodies is part of the devotion required of Kali’s worshipers.” Image
Read 7 tweets
17 Mar
The Washington Times, 1908

“MYSTERIOUS YOGA FAITH OF EAST INDIES WHICH HAS ROBBED AN AMERICAN CITIZEN OF A DEVOTED WIFE”

#HindooHistory #Yoga
“‘You are my affinity no longer.’ It was with these words that Mrs. W. E. Stone abandoned husband, children, home, country, and friends—gave up her position as a leader of the exclusive society of LaFayette, Ind....”
“And she accepted, in the place of all this, a life of semi-barbarity, among the mystics, the fakers, and the dervishes of East India, where as a devotee of the weird, intangible faith which is called Yoga, she must satisfy her heart’s desire in the contemplation of the occult..”
Read 8 tweets
15 Mar
The Hawaiian Star, 1908

“TRAGEDY MARKS THE YOGA CULT”

“Reported Separation at Purdue Recalls Sensational Incidents in Chicago”

“ADEPT IS HEARD IN SOCIETY”

“Swami Vivekananda Listened to by Many, But Mrs. Craddock Driven Away to Final Suicide”

#HindooHistory #Yoga
“The cult, which is now reported to have claimed Mrs. Stone, is an offshoot of an ancient Hindoo system of thought”
“A number of years ago one phase of the cult was forcibly called to the attention of Chicagoans through the lectures of Mrs. Ida Craddock, who applied its theory to details of life in such a way her books and publications were barred from the malls and she was indicted”
Read 10 tweets
14 Mar
Tacoma Times, 1915

“SEATTLE YOGA SCANDAL GROWS”

“CULT LEADERS BATHED LIKE SEPT. MORN”

#HindooHistory #Yoga Image
“Lack of drapery appeared today as one of the chief beliefs of the leader of the Christian Yoga cult, Yogi Ralph DeBit, in his trial with Mrs. Dorothy Gerber before Justice Brinker for alleged misconduct” Image
“Like the character in ‘The Naked Truth,’ it appeared that the mystery of human life was unveiled, and the inner truth revealed to the elect only when earthly and statutory vestments were tossed away”
Read 8 tweets
14 Mar
Kinsley Graphic, 1899

“SAVED FROM SUTTEE”

“How a Hindoo Woman, Now an American, Escaped from a Horrible Heathen Sacrifice”

“Mrs. Ramee Lalros... arrived in Chicago recently from India via Yokohama and San Francisco, with her husband.”

#HindooHistory Image
Mrs. Lalros...was about to become the victim to the terrible suttee of her caste when reduced by the man who afterward would become her husband” in Image
“At the age of 11, just on the eve of the children’s marriage, the youth of 13 who was to be the bridegroom died and... according to the irrevocable laws of her caste, she was doomed to be burned on the funeral pyre” Image
Read 5 tweets

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