Contemporary Indian Philosophy III: Narayana Guru, Thiruvalluvar, Jyotiba Phule, Bhima Bhoi and Dayananda Saraswati

The last five thinkers of Unit 5 come from different regions and centuries but share a concern with the ethical and social meaning of religion. Narayana Guru joined Advaita to a programme of social equality in Kerala; Thiruvalluvar's Tirukkural is a classical Tamil treatise of universal ethics; Jyotiba Phule offered a critical understanding of the caste system from Maharashtra; Bhima Bhoi gave the Mahima Dharma of Odisha its poetry and its social vision; and Dayananda Saraswati sought to reconcile the six systems and taught traitavāda. Each is presented through the ideas the syllabus lists. The syllabus's phrase for Bhima Bhoi, "Socio – Ethnical perspective of Mahima Dharma", is read here as socio-ethical, which is what the rest of the item concerns; "Traitavada" is traitavāda.

1. Narayana Guru: spiritual freedom and social equality

Sree Narayana Guru (1856–1928) was born into the Ezhava community of Kerala, which was then barred from temples and learning. In 1888 at Aruvippuram he consecrated an image of Śiva himself, an act reserved by custom for Brahmins, and answered critics that he had consecrated "our Śiva". His philosophy is Advaita, set out in verse in the Ātmopadeśa Śatakam (One Hundred Verses of Self-Instruction) and the prayer Daiva Daśakam, but he drew from non-duality a social conclusion: if all beings are one in the Self, distinctions of caste and creed have no spiritual basis.

  • "One caste, one religion, one God for humankind" (oru jāti, oru matam, oru daivam manuṣyanu) is his best-known saying; humanity itself is the only caste, as each species has its own kind.
  • "Whatever the religion, it is enough if man becomes good": religions differ as paths but agree in their end, and the Guru convened an all-religions conference at Aluva in 1924, "not to argue and win, but to know and to let know".
  • Spiritual freedom and social equality are one project: the Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana (SNDP) Yogam, founded in 1903 with his blessing, pursued education, organisation and self-reliance ("be enlightened through education, be strong through organisation"), while his temples later installed a mirror or a lamp in place of an image, pointing the worshipper to the Self within.

2. Thiruvalluvar: the Tirukkural

The Tirukkural, attributed to Thiruvalluvar, is a Tamil treatise of 1,330 couplets (kural) in 133 chapters of ten couplets each. Its date is uncertain; scholars place it variously between the last centuries BCE and the fifth century CE. It is called Ulaga Podhu Marai, the universal scripture, because it teaches an ethics addressed to all human beings without reference to caste, sect or ritual; Jains, Śaivas, Vaiṣṇavas and others have all claimed it.

The three books of the Tirukkural
BookChaptersSubject
Aṟam (virtue; Sanskrit dharma)38Domestic virtue and ascetic virtue: love, hospitality, gratitude, truthfulness, non-killing, renunciation
Poruḷ (wealth; artha)70Kingship, ministers, statecraft, friendship, the conduct of public life
Iṉbam or Kāmam (love; kāma)25Love before and within marriage
ℹ️ What is distinctive
The Kural follows the three aims of dharma, artha and kāma but has no separate book on mokṣa. It opens with "as the letter A is the first of all letters, so the primal God is the first of the world", yet names no sectarian deity. Its ethics stresses non-killing and refusal of meat, truthfulness defined by harmlessness ("truth is speech free from the least harm"), gratitude and just rule; this universalism is why it is taught in a unit on Indian ethical thought.

3. Jyotiba Phule: a critical understanding of the caste system

Jotirao (Jyotiba) Phule (1827–1890) of Pune, with his wife Savitribai Phule, opened a school for girls in 1848 and later schools for children of the "untouchable" castes. In 1873 he founded the Satyashodhak Samaj (Society of Truth-Seekers) and published Gulamgiri (Slavery), which he dedicated to the people of the United States who had fought to end slavery, drawing a parallel between the two systems. Shetkaryacha Asud (The Cultivator's Whipcord, 1881) extended the critique to the exploitation of peasants.

  • Caste as domination: Phule read caste not as a natural or divinely ordained order but as a historical system of domination by which a priestly elite kept the Śūdras and Ati-Śūdras (the untouchables) in mental and material slavery. He reinterpreted Purāṇic myths, making the demon-king Bali a just ruler of the toiling people.
  • Knowledge and liberation: the denial of education was the root instrument of this slavery; his verse runs that without learning wisdom was lost, without wisdom morality, without morality progress, without progress wealth, and without wealth the Śūdras were ruined. Education, including women's education, was therefore the first step to freedom.
  • A universal religion of truth: rejecting the authority of scriptures that sanctioned inequality and the need for priestly mediation, he proposed a religion of one Creator (nirmik) equal to all, in his posthumous Sārvajanik Satya Dharma (1891).

4. Bhima Bhoi: the socio-ethical vision of Mahima Dharma

Mahima Dharma arose in nineteenth-century Odisha with the ascetic Mahima Gosain (Mahima Swami). It worships Alekh, the indescribable, formless and attributeless Absolute (also called Śūnya Brahman), and rejects image worship, the authority of Brahmin priests, temple ritual and distinctions of caste. Bhima Bhoi (c. 1850–1895), a poet from the Kondh tribal community who was blind and had little formal schooling, became its greatest voice; his devotional works include the Stuti Chintāmaṇi and the Brahma Nirūpaṇa Gītā, and he set up an āśram at Khaliapali.

  • Compassion for all beings: his most quoted lines say that the suffering of living beings is immeasurable, and who can see it and bear it; "let my life be cast into hell, but let the world be redeemed". Liberation is not private escape but concern for the suffering of all.
  • Social equality: since Alekh is formless and present in all, caste hierarchy and priestly privilege have no religious basis; the movement drew followers from low castes and tribal communities.
  • Ethical discipline over ritual: devotion, truthfulness, simplicity and restraint replace sacrifice and temple worship, which is why the syllabus asks for the socio-ethical, rather than theological, perspective of the movement.

5. Dayananda Saraswati: the six systems and traitavāda

Swami Dayananda Saraswati (1824–1883) founded the Arya Samaj in Bombay in 1875 and set out his teaching in the Satyarth Prakash (Light of Truth, 1875, revised edition 1884). His call was a return to the Vedas, meaning the Saṃhitās, which he held to be revealed and infallible; he rejected image worship, polytheism, the doctrine of avatāras and caste by birth, and held that varṇa should follow merit and conduct.

  • Reconciliation of the six systems: against the view that the six darśanas contradict one another, Dayananda held that they are complementary. Each treats a different aspect of one Vedic truth, and in the Satyarth Prakash he explains them as describing different factors in the creation of the world, so that a student should study all six rather than choose one against the others.
  • Traitavāda (the doctrine of three): there are three eternal, uncreated and distinct realities, Īśvara (God), jīva (the soul) and prakṛti (matter). God is one, formless, all-pervading, sat-cit-ānanda and the efficient cause of the world; souls are many, eternal and finite, free agents who reap the fruits of their actions; prakṛti is the eternal material cause. God does not create out of nothing but shapes prakṛti into the world for the sake of souls.
⚠️ Traitavāda is not Advaita, nor Dvaita in Madhva's sense
Traitavāda denies Advaita's identity of soul and Brahman and its illusory world. It resembles Madhva in keeping God, souls and matter distinct, but it rejects image worship and the avatāra doctrine that Madhva's Vaiṣṇavism accepts, and its authority is the Vedic Saṃhitās rather than the Purāṇas.

Key takeaways

  • Narayana Guru: Aruvippuram consecration (1888); "one caste, one religion, one God for humankind"; Advaita (Ātmopadeśa Śatakam) joined to social equality; SNDP Yogam (1903); Aluva all-religions conference (1924).
  • Tirukkural: 1,330 couplets in 133 chapters; Aṟam 38, Poruḷ 70, Iṉbam 25; no book on mokṣa; universal, non-sectarian ethics of non-killing, truthfulness and just rule.
  • Phule: girls' school (1848), Satyashodhak Samaj and Gulamgiri (1873), caste as historical domination of Śūdras and Ati-Śūdras, education as liberation, one Creator for all.
  • Bhima Bhoi: Kondh poet of Mahima Dharma (worship of the formless Alekh); rejection of caste, image worship and priestly ritual; "let my life be cast into hell, but let the world be redeemed".
  • Dayananda: Arya Samaj (1875), Satyarth Prakash, return to the Vedic Saṃhitās; the six darśanas as complementary; traitavāda of three eternal realities, God, soul and prakṛti.

Practice questions (10)

Attempt each one before opening the answer. Every explanation names the tempting wrong option as well as the right one, because that is where marks are lost.

  1. "One caste, one religion, one God for humankind" is the teaching of:

    1. Dayananda Saraswati
    2. Narayana Guru
    3. Jyotiba Phule
    4. Bhima Bhoi
    Show answer

    Answer: B — Narayana Guru

    The saying is Narayana Guru's, who drew social equality from Advaita. Phule founded the Satyashodhak Samaj, Dayananda the Arya Samaj, and Bhima Bhoi was the poet of Mahima Dharma.

  2. Gulamgiri (Slavery), dedicated to the people of the United States who fought against slavery, was written by:

    1. B. R. Ambedkar
    2. Jyotiba Phule
    3. M. N. Roy
    4. Narayana Guru
    Show answer

    Answer: B — Jyotiba Phule

    Phule published Gulamgiri in 1873, the year he founded the Satyashodhak Samaj. Ambedkar's comparable text is Annihilation of Caste (1936).

  3. In Mahima Dharma, the object of worship is:

    1. The Buddha as the Śramaṇa teacher
    2. The Vedic fire in the daily homa
    3. Jagannātha in the temple at Puri
    4. Alekh, the formless and indescribable Absolute
    Show answer

    Answer: D — Alekh, the formless and indescribable Absolute

    Mahima Dharma worships Alekh (Śūnya Brahman), without images, and rejects temple ritual and Brahmin priesthood; the image-centred worship of Jagannātha is precisely what it set aside.

  4. Which book of the Tirukkural contains the largest number of chapters?

    1. Poruḷ (wealth)
    2. Iṉbam (love)
    3. Aṟam (virtue)
    4. Vīṭu (liberation)
    Show answer

    Answer: A — Poruḷ (wealth)

    Poruḷ has 70 chapters, Aṟam 38 and Iṉbam 25. There is no separate book on vīṭu (liberation), a notable feature of the Kural.

  5. According to Dayananda's traitavāda, God is related to the world as:

    1. Its creator out of nothing
    2. Its material cause, transforming himself into it
    3. Its efficient cause, shaping eternal prakṛti
    4. Its substrate, on which it is an illusory appearance
    Show answer

    Answer: C — Its efficient cause, shaping eternal prakṛti

    For Dayananda prakṛti is the eternal material cause and God the efficient cause who shapes it; souls are the third eternal reality. Being the material cause is Rāmānuja-like pariṇāma, an illusory appearance is Advaita's vivarta, and creation from nothing is rejected.

  6. Assertion (A): Narayana Guru consecrated a Śiva image at Aruvippuram in 1888. Reason (R): Narayana Guru held that all religions should be abolished in favour of a purely secular ethic. Choose the correct option.

    1. Both A and R are true, and R is the correct explanation of A
    2. Both A and R are true, but R is not the correct explanation of A
    3. A is true, but R is false
    4. A is false, but R is true
    Show answer

    Answer: C — A is true, but R is false

    A is true: the consecration challenged the custom that only Brahmins could install deities. R is false: he taught that whatever the religion, it is enough if one becomes good, and convened an all-religions conference to promote mutual understanding, not abolition.

  7. Assertion (A): Phule regarded education as the first step towards ending the subordination of the Śūdras and Ati-Śūdras. Reason (R): For Phule, the denial of learning was the root instrument by which caste domination was maintained. Choose the correct option.

    1. Both A and R are true, and R is the correct explanation of A
    2. Both A and R are true, but R is not the correct explanation of A
    3. A is true, but R is false
    4. A is false, but R is true
    Show answer

    Answer: A — Both A and R are true, and R is the correct explanation of A

    Both are true and R explains A: because exclusion from learning sustained the system, opening schools, including for girls and the "untouchable" castes, was Phule's first remedy.

  8. Which of the following are the three eternal realities of Dayananda's traitavāda? Select all that apply.

    1. Jīva
    2. Māyā
    3. Prakṛti
    4. Īśvara
    Show answer

    Answer: A — Jīva; C — Prakṛti; D — Īśvara

    Traitavāda recognises God, soul and prakṛti as eternal and distinct. Māyā as a principle of illusion belongs to Advaita, which Dayananda rejected.

  9. Which of the following are features of Mahima Dharma as expressed by Bhima Bhoi? Select all that apply.

    1. Compassion for the suffering of all beings
    2. Temple image worship as the central practice
    3. Rejection of caste distinctions
    4. Authority of Brahmin priests over ritual
    Show answer

    Answer: A — Compassion for the suffering of all beings; C — Rejection of caste distinctions

    Mahima Dharma rejects caste, image worship and priestly authority, and Bhima Bhoi's poetry is marked by compassion for all beings. Image worship and Brahmin ritual authority are exactly what the movement set aside.

  10. How many couplets (kural) does the Tirukkural contain? Type the number.

    Numerical answer — type the value.

    Show answer

    Answer: 1330

    1330: 133 chapters of 10 couplets each, divided among Aṟam (38 chapters), Poruḷ (70) and Iṉbam (25).