“He was definitely an apologist of Hinduism, a defender of Hindu values and traditions (including the caste system) against the numerous misconceptions and prejudices common among the Western and anglicized-Indian audiences.”

— Ananda K. Coomaraswamy

Elst, Koenraad (2002). Who is a Hindu?: Hindu revivalist views of Animism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and other offshoots of Hinduism. ISBN 978-8185990743

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Ananda K. Coomaraswamy4

Ceylon-American art historian 1877–1947

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Elst, Koenraad (2002). Who is a Hindu?: Hindu revivalist views of Animism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and other offshoots of Hinduism. ISBN 978-8185990743

“But many other Indians are cast in that mould, Indians in their basic culture though their high culture is western.”

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“Thus, to depict Rama as a virile warrior was a sin against Hinduism, an imitation of colonialist virility myths, a betrayal of the feminine passivity of genuine Hinduism. Or, to organize the Hindu religious personnel on a common platform (the Dharma Sansad, more or less 'religious parliament') is an un-Hindu imitation of the Bishops' Synod in the Catholic Church. Or, to alert the Hindus against Muslim or Christian conversion campaigns is an abandonment of the cheerful Hindu indifference to sectarian name-tags, the only thing which really changes upon conversion. Indeed, anything that could play a role in upholding and preserving Hinduism was found to be un-Hindu, while anything that could make or keep Hinduism defenceless and moribund, was glorified as true Hinduism. Anything that smacked of vitality and the will to survive was dubbed 'Semitic.”

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“In such a situation, where any scholar, Indian or Western, who finds that the facts indicate an Indian homeland, has to struggle against a strong tide of prejudice in Western academic circles (not to mention the deeply entrenched leftist lobby in Indian academic circles), it is clear that establishing the truth about the original homeland is, practically speaking, an uphill task.”

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“He then goes a step further and briefly imposes a Freudian reading on the text, a reading outdated and crude even in the current Western context of cultural criticism. He says the depiction of 'the other' in Ramayana can be understood as a projection of the unfulfilled sexual desires of traditional Indians. …. The motive of applying a totally alien framework, viz., the Freudian one, to a traditional Hindu text is something that is questionable.”

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“Western Christianised Europe has values and experience that is worth defending.”

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“He was definitely an apologist of Hinduism, a defender of Hindu values and traditions (including the caste system) against the numerous misconceptions and prejudices common among the Western and anglicized-Indian audiences.”

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Ananda K. Coomaraswamy4

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