The Terror of Syncretism
Pointing the moral logic of cancel culture at a sacralized Indian (Hindu) culture
As long as I can remember, to be an Indian Christian is defined by a fierce distinction from and suspicion of all Hindu norms. I’ve watched Christians battle over cultural traditions with apparent Hindu origins or ties—like the classical Indian dance Bharatanatyam or tying of the mangala sutra (auspicious thread) at weddings. At one Indian wedding I attended, a pastor had a public outburst over the wedding tradition of wearing toe rings, arguing it was a vestige of Hindu scripture and tradition.
This is a kind of moral panic, though it’s not unwarranted. On one hand, religious communities always tend towards conservatism. On the other, India’s centuries-old religio-cultural force of Brahminism (I call it HinduWorld) makes it so alternate religious movements are often countercultural forces, and thus hyper-resistant to Hinduism in order to survive. This is also true of Dalit Christians and others marginalized under the Hindu caste order, who feel a political conviction—in addition to a moral one—to “purify” their religious practice from the traumatic residue of HinduWorld.
Like other Dalit Americans piecing together cultural identity, I’ve often wondered which Indian cultural artifacts are “polluted” in relation to Brahminism, which aren’t, and which might be “redeemed.” Contrary to what I’ve been told, it’s not a clear calculus.
Moral Panic & Purity
Even the “loosest” cultures can’t shake their pursuit of mural purity. Older, conservative types are the usual purists about values and traditions—but obsessions over moral purity have also migrated leftwards, as progressives moralize language and behavior by novel standards of political correctness. In her new podcast “The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling,” activist Megan Phelps-Roper argues the Harry Potter author is a marked example of this—Rowling’s words spurred countless conservative Christians into a moral hysteria throughout the 1990s and 2000s, but more recently, her words have triggered a moral panic among leftist trans activists. She’s been cancelled.
‘Cancel culture’ stands on the popular moral assumption that certain people, ideas, or things are irredeemable and even capable of polluting other things. It’s led to public reappraisals of everything from Dr. Seuss to master bedrooms. As this kind of moral logic resurges, I’m left to wonder how it applies to South Asia. Is it morally appropriate, for example, to cancel yoga, which might be “polluted” by casteist principles like karma and dharma? What about quasi-cultural religious festivals with casteist origin myths, like Diwali and Holi? What justifies writing these off as casteist, as opposed to merely neutral, with some baggage? This is doubly difficult to discern in the diaspora, where cultural artifacts feel scarce and precious. For South Asians, religious practice is anything but simple.
A Religious Multiverse
“Hindus, in their capacity for love, are indeed hairless Christians, just as Muslims, in the way they see God in everything, are bearded Hindus, and Christians, in their devotion to God, are hat wearing Muslims.” - Pi, Life of Pi (Martel)
Yann Martel’s Life of Pi is one of my favorite novels. In it, Indian protagonist Piscine “Pi” Molitor Patel is an admirer of Hinduism, Christianity, and Islam. He represents the phenomenon of multiple religious belonging (MRB), “the belief that it is possible, or even necessary, to practice the rites, rituals, and beliefs of as many religions as one can muster.” As religions like Buddhism and Hinduism are compatible with MRB, South Asia has seen a complex, dynamic religious multiverse evolve over time.
Syncretism involves the blending of various different religions or schools of thought. This has produced entirely distinct religious traditions, like Sikhism and Sufism, but there are also milder examples. While walking a pilgrimage in India last year, I saw Catholics shave their heads and offer fruits to worship the Virgin Mary—residual rituals from their Hindu background. Idol worship is conventional religious behavior in Hinduism, so converts either subtly reappropriate it in their new context (like adorning the statue of Mary) or vehemently reject it. I was both awed by the pilgrims’ piety and disturbed by the persistence of Hindu practices, which I believe have unhealthy implications.
But Hinduism has seen its own prosocial syncretic reformations, like the 15th century Bhakti movement, which favored devotion to a personal god and rejection of caste distinctions. This was largely shaped by poets, gurus, and singer-songwriters who democratized “religious” practices like reading and writing. In the case of Sikhism, founder Guru Nanak and his contemporary Ravidas aimed to fuse the tenets of Hinduism and Islam—with a concerted resistance to caste. During British colonial rule, scholar Gail Omvedt writes, India made the switch from syncretic and complex to stark, oppositional, religiopolitical identities of “Hindu” and “Muslim.” These two became vortexes that fractured India’s diverse, fluid religious landscape across dogmatic boundaries. And it didn’t end with independence.
Strategic Syncretism
Religious nationalism can also be understood as a kind of syncretism, though it rarely is. Writer Tyler Huckabee calls the phenomenon of Christian nationalism, “The business of merging Christian and American identities, liberally mixing biblical teaching with the principles of constitutional democracy until the line between them is blurred or even erased altogether.” When Christianity attaches itself to culturally “American” values like individualism, guns, and capitalism, the result is a political identity buttressed with the strength of spiritual stories and convictions. This union can prove very difficult to decouple, and is easily manipulated to political ends.
In India, the invention of Hindu nationalism involves what political scientist Christopher Jefferlot calls “strategic syncretism”—a deliberate attempt to assimilate Hindu identity into the systems of other groups. This flattens India’s otherwise diverse religious community in service to caste elites. Researcher Rida Fatima writes: “Hindu nationalism born out of strategic syncretism is not purely Hindu but elitist. [Assimilation] instrumentalises syncretic norms to maintain the power and cultural equilibrium, and a mirage of development appears for the strategic aim of establishing a Hindu ‘Rashtra’ [Nation].” This critique is also relevant in the diaspora, where South Asians compete to define their culture for the world’s gaze.
Given that syncretism can range from organic to devised, populist to elitist, inclusive to oppressive, and fundamental to cosmetic, how should religious adherents reckon with the imperfect milieu that shapes our spiritual traditions?
Should We De-Syncretize?
“[In] a Western culture, the sacred and secular are clearly defined, and the bulk of cultural artifacts (work, leisure, food, art, etc.) occupy the secular realm,” writes pastor Michael VandenEnden. “But what about highly sacralized cultures in which almost all cultural artifacts are deemed sacred?” South Asia is perhaps the most glaring example of this. Hindu, Buddhism, and indigenous spirituality is so baked into Indian history, society, and norms, it’s nearly impossible to isolate any nonreligious cultural artifacts. So, does it make sense to parse out parts we should cancel by guilty association?
One response is to simply observe which practices transcend religion to become culturally conventional, and accept them as such. Take the mangala sutra I described earlier—a yellow necklace worn by a bride at her wedding. While having origins in Hindu mythology, the practice has become commonplace across groups. Syrian Christians have also reappropriated this practice by placing a cross on the necklace. Historian Usha Balakrishnan argues that the practice has been sustained largely through marketing efforts by jewelers, not cultural processes. So, the mangala sutra has become culturally ordinary, been repurposed for alternate religious purposes, and lost some of its religious valence as a consumer good. This scores it as merely cultural for some, but to others, it remains an enduring symbol of problematic religious and social traditions.
Arvind P. Nirmal, widely regarded as “the father of Dalit theology,” felt that syncretism steered us in the wrong way. He argued that a syncretic Indian Christianity actually perpetuated caste and marginalized Dalits. He called conventional Indian Christian theology “Brahminical Christianity”—a faith fundamentally corrupted by caste society. He wasn’t wrong. The same Syrian Christians who contextualized their Christian faith into “Indian” models were known for their “upper-caste” pride and perpetuating caste discrimination against Dalit neighbors. It was, perhaps, an example of strategic syncretism that preserved caste power.
Instead, Nirmal and others advocated for a distinct Dalit liberation theology, which would not blindly absorb culture, but subject it to the perspective of the oppressed. Whether Dalit Christians specifically practice liberation theology or not, they are often critical of Christianity’s inculturation or indigenization into a Hindu society, which inevitably infects Christian traditions with caste. This may even lead them to take refuge in more Eurocentric expressions of Christianity—though these aren’t immune to their own versions of syncretism, either.
Culture is never a blank slate. And there is no one way to ethically deal with its history. Some Indians are busy sorting and reclaiming cultural artifacts from their baggage. Others are happy to throw out the cultural baby with the casteist bathwater. Some Dalits lose no sleep over participating in Hindu observances. And other Dalits consider Hinduism antithetical to their very existence. As cancel culture popularizes the prospect of novel moral absolutes, concerns about syncretism are given new energy. Regardless of how one reconciles them, it is crucial that we expose the many shades to “Indian culture.” As The Big Fat Bao depicts above, there is perhaps no such thing after all.