Where Did Hinduism Come From?
How Hinduism developed over thousands of years from the Indus Valley Civilisation, Vedic religion and local traditions, and what scholars and Hindus say about its origins.
Hinduism has no founder and no single moment of origin. It grew gradually over more than three thousand years, drawing on many sources: the religion of the Vedas, the beliefs of the Indus Valley Civilisation and countless local traditions of gods, goddesses, rituals and sacred places across South Asia. Many Hindus regard their tradition as eternal (Sanatana Dharma), revealed to ancient sages rather than founded by them. Historians, meanwhile, trace how its ideas and practices took shape over time.
The Indus Valley Civilisation
From around 2600 to 1900 BCE, a sophisticated urban civilisation flourished in the valley of the Indus river and beyond, in what is now Pakistan and north-west India. Its cities, such as Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, had planned streets, drainage systems and a large public bath. Its script has never been deciphered, so its religion is known only through archaeology.
Some finds suggest continuities with later Hinduism: figurines that may represent a mother goddess, an emphasis on ritual bathing, and a famous seal showing a seated figure surrounded by animals, which some scholars have linked to an early form of Shiva. These links remain uncertain. Read more in The Indus Valley Civilisation.
The Vedic period
The oldest Hindu scriptures, the Vedas, were composed in an early form of Sanskrit from roughly 1500 BCE. They centre on hymns to deities such as Agni (fire) and Indra (the storm god), and on elaborate fire sacrifices performed by priests.
The origins of the Vedic people are debated. Most historians and linguists hold that Indo-Aryan languages, related to Persian and the languages of Europe, were brought into north-west South Asia by migrating groups during the second millennium BCE, and that Vedic culture developed from their interaction with existing peoples. Recent studies of ancient DNA, published in 2018–19, have been widely read as supporting this. Some Indian writers argue instead that Vedic culture was indigenous to India. Whatever the answer, Vedic religion became one of the main foundations of later Hinduism. See The Vedic period.
The Upanishads and new movements
Between about 800 and 300 BCE, a period of great religious creativity, the Upanishads turned from outward ritual to inner knowledge, teaching the unity of the self and Brahman. The ideas of karma, rebirth and liberation became central. In the same era, the Buddha and Mahavira founded Buddhism and Jainism, which rejected the authority of the Vedas.
The classical synthesis
From about 500 BCE to 500 CE, the great epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata (including the Bhagavad Gita), and the early Puranas took shape. Devotion to Vishnu, Shiva and the Goddess grew, temple worship developed and the law books set out the ideals of dharma. Many scholars see this period as the time when recognisably “Hindu” religion emerged, combining Vedic authority with devotion to great gods and local traditions. See The epic and Puranic period.
A living, growing tradition
Hinduism has continued to change ever since: through the devotional bhakti movements, the great philosophers of Vedanta, encounters with Islam and Christianity, nineteenth-century reform movements and the spread of Hindu communities around the world. Its ability to absorb new ideas while preserving ancient ones is one reason it has survived for so long.
Sources and further reading
- Gavin Flood, An Introduction to Hinduism (Cambridge University Press, 1996), chapters 1–3.
- Edwin Bryant, The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture: The Indo-Aryan Migration Debate (Oxford University Press, 2001).
- Vagheesh Narasimhan et al., “The formation of human populations in South and Central Asia”, Science 365 (2019).
- Alf Hiltebeitel, “Hinduism”, in Joseph Kitagawa (ed.), The Religious Traditions of Asia (Macmillan, 1989).