Inter Gurukula-University Center

Conference on Indic and

Pagan Environmentalism

CALL FOR PAPERS

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Indic Academy’s Inter Gurukula -University Center
is pleased to announce a Conference on Indic
and Pagan Environmentalism in January 2020 at
Hyderabad.

At the conference, Indic Academy is also pleased to

launch “Indic-Pagan Sculpture Park” at Hyderabad.
The sculpture park will comprise of Land and
Environment Art installations by artists from around
the world inspired by the reverence Indic and Pagan
traditions have towards nature.

Indic, Pagan and Environmentalism

Indic:
By ‘Indic’ we mean the entire cultural complex made up of
Vedic , folk ,tribal traditions and non-Vedic (Buddhist and jain)
traditions of India.

Pagan:
Pagan cultures are the animist, pantheistic and nature-
worshipping religious traditions of the world including the
Indian traditions with these features.

Environmentalism:
Our use of the word “Environmentalism” instead of “Ecology”
is deliberate. Ecology is either the discipline of Ecology as a
branch of Biology or the actual environment, flora and fauna
etc of a place. If we want to refer to a worldview, a philosophy,
a point of view, an ideology, in favor of ecology or environment
it must be called “Environmentalism”. We would like to focus
on Eco-friendly, Environment-sustaining worldviews and
ideologies inherent in Indic and Pagan cultures, texts and
traditions. Hence the title “Indic and Pagan Environmentalism”

Recognition for Pagan Environmentalism

The attention towards the value of the pre-modern /traditional
cultures towards Eco-friendly and Environment sustaining
thinking has been recognized right from the moment the world
awoke to the ecological crisis manifest in several different
forms including climate change. But it is Lynn Townsend White
Jr’s “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis (1967)” that has
been the watershed in this realization. His lecture on December
26, 1966 at the Washington meeting of the American Association
for the Advancement of Science was later published in the ‘Journal
of Science’ in 1967. White marked the Industrial Revolution as a
fundamental turning point in our ecological history. He suggests
that at this point the hypotheses of science were married to the
possibilities of technology and our ability to destroy and exploit the
environment was vastly increased. Nevertheless, he also suggests
that the mentality of the Industrial Revolution, that the earth was
a resource for human consumption, was much older than the
actuality of machinery, and has its roots in medieval Christianity
and its attitudes towards nature. Citing the Genesis creation story,
he argued that Judeo-Christian theology had swept away Pagan
animism and normalized exploitation of the natural world. He says,

“In Antiquity every tree, every spring, every stream, every hill had its
own genius loci, its guardian spirit. These spirits were accessible
to men, but were very unlike men; centaurs, fauns, and mermaids
show their ambivalence. Before one cut a tree, mined a mountain,
or dammed a brook, it was important to placate the spirit in charge
of that particular situation, and to keep it appeased. By destroying
Pagan animism, Christianity made it possible to exploit nature in a
mood of indifference to the feelings of natural objects.”

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For an Indian reader, what is described in these words sounds
very familiar, with a difference that the past tense in these
words is present tense for them.

In another seminal work “Man’s Responsibility for Nature:

Ecological Problems and Western Traditions” (1974) the
author John Passmore uses the prevalence of Pagan animism
in the ‘western societies’ and their ‘western tradition’ during
their early or pre-Christian history as one of the defenses for
‘western traditions.’

Pagan and Pagan Environmentalist

movements
Many Pagan traditions continue to thrive in different parts
of the world and currently there is a renewed pride in the
followers of these traditions particularly from the point of
view their potential to contribute to the saving of the earth
and nature. There are neo Paganist movements reviving the
ancient Greko-Roman and other Pagan traditions that are
extinct. European Congress of Ethnic Religions http://ecer-
org.eu/, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Congress_
of_Ethnic_Religions , was founded in June, 1998 as part of
the World Pagan Congress. The organization’s name was the
result of a day-long passionate debate. The words “Pagan” and
“heathen” were rejected because of their perceived cultural
associations with immorality, violence and backwardness. The
word “polytheistic” was also rejected as an oversimplification.
“Indigenous” was seen as satisfactory on a linguistic level but
was voted down with regard to its established use by groups
distinguished from European colonizers. Other suggestions
were terms along the lines of “old religion” and “ancestral
religion”. “Ethnic”, the Greek equivalent to the Latin Paganus in
early Christian sources, was eventually agreed on. The words’
history and the connection to ethnology were things that
appealed to the majority of the participants.

Pagan Federation declares Paganism as a World Religion

https://ecoPagan.com/Paganism-a-world-religion/ .

It published a statement on the Earth Day 2015 titled “A

Pagan Community Statement on the Environment “ https://
ecoPagan.com/ . It is signed by 24 Pagan organizations https://
ecoPagan.com/prominent-Pagan-organizations-that-have-
signed/ , from around 100 countries https://ecoPagan.com/
a-global-movement-signatories-from-over-70-countries/ .
The point is that Indic folk and tribal traditions that survived for
millennia and continue to live vibrantly, through ‘Hinduism’,
the cultural complex to which they contributed their features
immensely while retaining their individuality, of course, with the
influences of the other members of the cultural complex, did not
get due prominence in all these global discussions on the potential
of Pagan /indigenous /ethnic religious traditions towards the
contemporary environmentalism.

The Conference
Indic Academy’s Inter-Gurukula University Centre is proposing to
organize a conference on “Indic and Pagan Environmentalism” to
reclaim this due prominence and to join the global efforts in the
direction of repairing our environment and saving the earth, by
bringing Indic and other Pagan traditions on to the same platform.

The conference is aimed at highlighting the potential of the other

components too of the Hindu cultural complex to the resolution
of the present ecological crisis, to a healthy eco-friendly life and
to the prosperity of humans through the prosperity of nature
and the earth. As such, the conference would like to focus on
the environmentalist aspects of the most prominent and the
well-recognized component of the complex, namely, the Vedic
tradition.

The non-Vedic components of the Indic cultural complex such

as the Buddhist and the Jain too form the main focuses of the
conference.

In the process, the conference will create a great opportunity to

discuss the commonalities among and the distinctions of the
Vedic, folk and tribal components of the Hindu cultural complex
at one level and the commonalities among and the distinctions
of the Hindu cultural complex and the non-Vedic traditions such
as the Buddhist and the Jain traditions at the other in the aspect
of the environmentalist spirit and ideas. More particularly this will
be an opportune occasion for a comparative study of all these
Indic traditions with the worldwide Pagan traditions in the aspect
of environmentalism. Such a study will pave the way for (demands
for ) a radically new curriculum for the discipline of Comparative
Religion which currently (a) covers only the living organized
religions (b) does not cover extinct religions (c) does not cover the
currently living ethnic/indigenous/Pagan religions (d) does not
cover the comparison of extinct or living Pagan religions with the

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living organized ‘religions’ (cultural complexes) like Hinduism.
(Nagaraj Paturi, the Director, IGUC included comparison of
extinct or living non-Indic Pagan religions with Hinduism in the
Comparative Religion curriculum designed and taught by him
during 2007-2009 at FLAME School of Liberal Education) .

Study of Pagan environmentalism will also contribute fresh

ideas to “Religion and Environmentalism” which is an
emerging interdisciplinary subfield in the academic disciplines
of Religious Studies, Religious Ethics, the Sociology of Religion
amongst others, with environmentalism and ecological
principles as a primary focus, since currently even in this field,
only the living major/ organized religions are being focused
upon.

Buddhism and Jainism, Indic

fore-runners of Contemporary ompassionate
Environmentalism:
One of the consequences of environmentalist awareness
is the critique of modernity and Science and Technology.
It is against the nature-dominating, nature-controlling and
nature-exploiting at-titude in the contemporary Science and
Technology and its potential to destroy nature and its re-
sponsibility for the present ecological crisis. This is different
from the approach discussed earlier which is for Paganism as
nature-friendly and against Christianity for its anthropocentrism.
Mas-anobu Fukuoka, Graham Bell, Bill Mollison and Robert Hart
are an example of such critics of modernity and Science and
Technology. Another stalwart among Eco-philosophers, Henryk
Skolimowsky, in his Technology and Human Destiny (1983)
comes up with a highly systematic critique of the contemporary
S & T for its anti-environmentalist worldview foundations. In
this context , it may not be out of place to observe that it is
this critique of modernity and S & T, that truly deserves to
be called ‘post-modern’ since it is this that truly questions ,
point out and moves away from the worldview fundamentals
and foundations of modernity; what is being now called as
‘post-modern’ is in fact more modern than the modern , and
continues all the fun-damental features of modernity such
as its anti-religious , anti-traditional , anti-past etc. , as such is
just ultramodern and does not deserve to be called as post-
modern. Whereas the environmen-talist critique of modernity
is a true disruption of modernity.
Coming back to our point, the works of Masanobu Fukuoka, Graham
Bell, Bill Mollison and Robert Hart etc. lead to what is called as
perma-culture, a new life- style movement based on this anti S &
T environmentalism.

The anti S & T nature of perma -culture can be noted in the shifted
principles of Natural Farm-ing founded by Fukuoka. Fukuoka,
who was once a scientist at Yokohama Customs Bureau shifted
to Natural Farming . He lays out what he calls the “four principles
of natural farming” as guidelines for any one who wants to try to
create a natural garden, in his book, One Straw revo-lution (1978,
33-34). These are:

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1. No cultivation. This means no plowing or turning the soil.
The earth cultivates itself naturally.
2. No chemical fertilizer or prepared compost. These practices
drain the soil of its natural nutrients and increase human
interference in the natural cycle.
3. No weeding by tillage or herbicides. Weeds are an important
part of building soil fer-tility and in balancing the biological
community. As a fundamental principle weeds should be
controlled, not eliminated.
4. No dependence on chemicals. Weak plants develop from
such unnatural practices which increases their vulnerability
to disease and insects.
The opposition to technology in Permaculture reminds us of the
opposition to what is called as Udyoginī hiṃsā or occupational
violence in Jainism.
Fukuoka acknowledges his indebtedness to Buddhism,
Gandhi and their philosophy of compas-sion. The conference
focuses on Buddhism and Jainism as two ancient Indic
traditions and the contemporary Indic philosophies such as
Gandhism that are playing an important role in con-temporary
environmentalist movements that have their foundations in
Buddhism and Jainism comparing them to contemporary
eco-philosophies such as Permaculture.

Vedic Worldview, the Indic forerunner of the

contemporary balanced environmentalism.
• Between the contemporary compassionate extreme
and aggressive extreme towards na-ture lies the
contemporary model of balance between conservation
and development. This approach has got to do with
no opposition to use of technology. No opposition to
interfering with nature and its processes through man-
made tools and techniques. But the technology used is
sought to be eco-friendly and interference with nature
through man made tools is sought to be to the extent
and in the manner not to lead to ecological imbalance.
Vedic worldview as found in the Vedic texts, in the
culture reflected in those texts and in the Vedic aspects
of the currently living Hindu cultural complex has a
similar combi-nation of and balance between passion
and compassion, violence and non-violence, con-
servation and prosperity etc.

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 Indic and non-Indic Pagan traditions,
• Vedic texts such as itihasas (dynastic
these divinities being entities in and
legendary sacred narratives), puranas
aspects of nature, some concrete
(works of collections of sacred narratives
some abstract, again an aspect
and sacred instructions) and kavyas
similar to the na-ture-worship in the
(narrative poems) have descriptions of
Indic and non-Indic Pagan traditions.
a social life of diversity where rishis or
But one great distinction of the
sages lived a life of compas-sion very
tradition of the Vedas was that they
similar to the permaculture of Fukuoka.
were always associated with Yajnas,
The remaining society is described to
the fire-mediated sacred procedures
be living a life of passion, but with the
through which they interacted with
ideal of living with Dharma, the nature-
their divinities, different aspects
sustaining principle (etymologically
of nature. Though the Indic folk
that which holds, sustains). They
and tribal Pagan traditions have a
passionately pursued prosperi-ty but
different kind of sacred procedures
only through the path of conservation.
such as offerings to images to
Rishis lived the life of non-violence. The
worship their divinities, it is probably
Kshatriyas (etymologically, protectors
the common environmentalist
from harm), the warrior class lived
worldview that lead to a harmonious
the life of vio-lence intended to save
inter-cultural interac-tion among
the vulnerable from harm from the
the Vedic and the non-Vedic Pagan
cruel and the unethical and to save
(Indic folk and Indic tribal) traditions
nature from the violence committed
leading to a ‘third’ ‘mediating’ culture
by the anti-nature. Passionate society
, a syncretism of the Vedic with the
respected the compassionate Rishis
folk and the tribal Pagan traditions.
and the compassionate Rishis loved the
One way, probably, of explaining
passionate, instructing them Dharma,
the new features of Puranas and
the nature-sustaining principle. Neither
Agamas, the texts that evolved
imposed their life style on the oth-er.
later to Vedas in the Vedic tradition
Violent warrior class respected the
is that those texts reflect this ‘third’,
non-violent Rishis and the non-violent
‘mediating’ culture. It is probably the
Rishis loved the violent warrior class
typically environmentalist diversity-
instructing them to use their violence
oriented nature of the Vedic, and
for non-violence / no violence to the
the non-Vedic Pagan (Indic folk and
vulnerable. Neither demanded or
the In-dic tribal) traditions that they
expected the other to live their life
continued to retain their distinctions
style. In contemporary parlance, it can
for millennia despite contributing
be said that these texts depict a society
to this syncretic ‘third’ ‘mediating’
where Permaculture community and
culture. It is the cultural complex
the community pursuing Sustainable
that includes this ‘third’ ‘mediating’
Development lived side by side with
culture with multiple diverse sub-
mutual love and respect.
traditions to the most part and the
• An interesting aspect of the Vedas, the individual cultures of the Vedic, and
extremely ancient texts of the Vedic the non-Vedic Pagan (Indic folk and
tradition is that they mostly include texts the Indic tribal) traditions, that is
in praise of multiple divinities , an aspect being called ‘Hinduism’ today.
comparable to the polytheism of the
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 • Another distinct aspect of the Vedic tradition is that
it has very ancient texts that very clearly articulate its
environmentalist worldview in an explanatory way. For
example, Bhagavadgita, an ancient Vedic text, held in high
esteem as the most central texts by the entire Hindu cultural
complex, describes the mutual relationship between nature
and hu-mans not as that of domination, but of friendship
and says,

sahayajñāḥ prajāḥ sr̥ṣṭvā purōvāca prajāpatiḥ |

anēna prasaviṣyadhvamēṣa vō’stviṣṭakāmadhuk || 3-10||
dēvānbhāvayatānēna tē dēvā bhāvayantu vaḥ |
parasparaṁ bhāvayantaḥ śrēyaḥ paramavāpsyatha || 3-11||
iṣṭānbhōgānhi vō dēvā dāsyantē yajñabhāvitāḥ |
tairdattānapradāyaibhyō yō bhuṅktē stēna ēva saḥ || 3-12||

Creator, in the beginning created human beings along

with the Yajnas, the fire-mediated sacred procedures (eco-
friendly/nature nourishing/sacrificial procedures) and said
through these procedures get what you want; these fulfil
whatever you want. Through these procedures, nourish and
nurture the devas = divinities (nature forces) and they nourish
and nurture you back. Thus ‘treating’ each other, may you
the humans and the nature forces both achieve the best
of the welfare. Luxuries and pleasures that you want are
provided by the devas = divinities (nature forces) who get
treated by your Yajnas, the fire-mediated sacred procedures
(eco-friendly/nature nourishing/sacrificial proce-dures);
thus, you enjoy all the luxuries provided by them.

Though the word Yajna was originally used in the sense of

the fire-mediated nature-nourishing sacred procedures only,
gradually it acquired a semantic expansion to refer to any
nature-sustaining activity involving organismic organization
( yaj = to organize) of sacrificial (= selflessly giving) activities.

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• In the same context, a few verses later, the book even talks
of following the ‘cycle’, a concept that is so frequently found
in the contemporary ecological literature and says,

ēvaṁ pravartitaṁ cakraṁ nānuvartayatīha yaḥ |

aghāyurindriyārāmō mōghaṁ pārtha sa jīvati || 3-16||

one who does not follow, life according to (the principles of)
the cycle run thus (as de-scribed in the previous verses) is a
sinful creature and lives a vain life.

• Incidentally the idea of cycle is central to the Hindu

cosmology starting from the de-scription of ‘Creation’ in the
hymn to the (Cosmic) Person, connected into the concepts
of cosmic cyclic time scales of Puranas. Mircea Eliade, the
guru of the gurus of Religious Studies in his book “Myth of
the Eternal Return”, highlighting the distinction of this view
in cultures like the Hindu says,
“The essential theme of my investigation bears on the image of
himself formed by the man of the archaic societies and on the
place that he assumes in the Cosmos. The chief difference between
the man of the archaic and traditional societies and the man of the
modern societies with their strong imprint of Judaeo-Christianity
lies in the fact that the former feels himself indissolubly connected
with the Cosmos and the cosmic rhythms, whereas the latter insists
that he is connected only with History.”

His whole book is a critique of the ‘tyranny’ of ‘History’ which he

says is rooted in the ‘Linear Time’ of Judaeo-Christian tradition
over the traditional societies that believed in ‘Cyclic Time’.

Puranas (works of collections of sacred narratives and sacred

instructions) of the Hindu cultural complex have a special triad
of the supreme divinities for creation, sustenance and devolution
cycles of the Earth’s eco-system. In each cycle, a monstrous power
arro-gantly captures the nature forces such as fire, wind, light,
etc. and dominates and tyran-nizes them (exhibits the attitude
of the nature-controlling S & T ), tortures the performers of fire-
mediated sacred procedures meant to nourish nature, torments
those who are ded-icated to the power of sustenance and at each

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such instance, the power of sustenance manifests itself on the
Earth in some form or the other, destroys the destroying force and
restores the Earth / nature to its prosperity. Vedic texts such as the
Bhagavadgita clearly articulate the theory behind such narratives
saying that whenever Dharma, the nature-sustaining principle is
harmed/damaged, the force of sustenance manifests itself and
re-stores Dharma, the nature-sustaining principle.

• Another interesting aspect of the environmentalism inherent

in the Hindu cultural com-plex has similarity to a strand
of the contemporary environmentalist movement called
Ecofeminism. In the 1993 essay entitled “Ecofeminism:
Toward Global Justice and Plan-etary Health” authors Greta
Gaard and Lori Gruen outline what they call the “ecofemi-
nist framework” in which they held the rise of patriarchal
religions and their establish-ment of gender hierarchies
along with their denial of immanent divinity as responsible
for the present ecological crisis. But in the Hindu world
view, the power of sustenance mentioned above is viewed
in a feminine form too. The Earth is viewed as a feminine
divinity, Bhūdēvī. In the Indic folk and tribal Pagan traditions,
there is a huge number of feminine divinities, all of them
being feminine divine forms in which trees, plants, ant-hills,
snakes, water streams such as brooks and rivers, water
bodies such as tanks etc. are viewed. There are fertility
divinities worshipped in the form of flowers, creepers, crops,
earth etc. There is a huge tradition of village goddesses
which is nothing but viewing the whole village ecosystem
as a feminine divinity. Entire forest eco-system is viewed as
a feminine deity by the tribals who too have their feminine
deities of the landscape enti-ties. Epidemics and natural
calamities are viewed as her malevolent aspect. Greenery
and prosperity of nature is viewed as her benevolent aspect.
This is another area where the Vedic tradition and the Indic
folk and tribal Pagan traditions have commonality. The
concept of dēvī, the feminine divine is found in the Vedas
them selves. Many aspects of nature are viewed as dēvī ,
the feminine divine there. Puranas (works of collections
of sacred narratives and sacred instructions) have the
supreme power of sustenance in a feminine form. In these
narratives, the supreme feminine power of sustenance
manifests in several different forms to kill the aggressors
of environ-ment/nature. There is a whole Purana called
dēvībhāgavatam dedicated to this supreme feminine power
of sustenance, Dēvī. Dēvī is also known by the name śakti,
the Power. A number of spiritual traditions śāktēya, tantra,
śrīvidyā etc. developed around this su-preme feminine
divine. The ‘third’ ‘mediating’ culture , a syncretism of the
Vedic with the folk and the tribal Pagan traditions, resulting
from a harmonious inter-cultural inter-action among
the Vedic and the non-Vedic Pagan (Indic folk and Indic
tribal) traditions based on the common environmentalist
worldview has a great place for this Dēvī / śakti . Indic folk
and tribal Pagan traditions view their local feminine deities
as local forms of that all pervading supreme feminine divine.
Again there is a significant explanatory liter-ature in the Indic
tradition explaining this ecofeminism in the Vedas, Puranas
and the common Hindu cultural complex.

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• The explanatory literature of the Indic tradition almost always
shares the spirit of Deep Ecology, another contemporary
trend in environmentalism. The hymn to the Cosmic Per-
son in the Vedas is a celebration of the organismic intricate
interconnection and interde-pendence among all parts of
the cosmos that the contemporary Deep Ecology advocates.
Every eco-system or a system with the self-regulation and
self-sustenance is called puru-sha, ‘person’ in this system of
thought and the source of such an auto nature of such sys-
tem is given the name ātman , self in here. Humans in the
explanatory literature of the Indic tradition almost always
are viewed as part of bhūtāni, beings. Interconnections and
continuities among all bhūtāni, beings, jaḍa , the inanimate
/ the non-conscious and the animate / the conscious, are
discussed through several detailed theoretical frameworks.
Ōne of such frameworks is that of cosmos as yajna , the
process similar to the fire-mediated sacred procedures, a
unifying organization of life-generating contributions from
all the beings. Cosmos is described as Yajna that consumes
sub-yajnas, and that Yajna is described as performed by
nature forces.
• Upanishads (etymologically, close sittings), the Vedic texts
discussing the concepts of ātman = self, Bramhan = the
imperishable essence manifest as cosmos, also known
as paramātman (parama + ātman ) = self of the cosmic
ecosystem etc. These texts almost always talk of the all
pervading nature of the divine essence of the cosmos.
The key con-cepts of these texts such as jīva (individual
self) , jagat (the world), īśvara (the world-running principle),
bramhan (the imperishable essence manifest as cosmos)/
paramātman (self of the cosmic ecosystem) are explained
as intricately connected through ideas such as brahman
and/or īśvara permeate the jagat and jīvas or brahman
and/or īśvara are made up of a combination of jīvas or
jīva (individual self) is the limited version of bram-han (the
imperishable essence manifest as cosmos)/paramātman
(self of the cosmic eco-system) etc.
The conference is intended to cover allthese environmentalist
aspects of the Indic Vedic , non-Vedic ( Buddhist, Jain), folk
and tribal Pagan traditions alongside those of the Pagan
traditions of the other parts of the world.

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 Indic Academy’s Inter Gurukula-University
Center invites papers on:
1. Environmentalist aspects in individual Pagan traditions of
the world
2. Contemporary environmentalist ideas and actions around
Pagan traditions of the world
3. Comparative study of the environmentalist aspects of
different Pagan traditions of the world
4. Environmentalist aspects in various Vedic, non-Vedic
(Buddhist, Jain), folk and tribal Pagan traditions.
5. Comparative study of the environmentalist aspects of
various Vedic, non-Vedic (Buddhist, Jain), folk and tribal
Pagan traditions and the environmentalist basis for the
syncretism in the Indic /Hindu cultural complex.
6. Scope for building environmentalist ideas and actions
around Vedic , non-Vedic ( Buddhist, Jain), folk and
tribal Pagan traditions individually and jointly with the
contemporary environmentalist ideas and ac-tions around
Pagan traditions of the world.

Dr. Nagaraj Paturi

Director of Inter Gurukula - University Center is curating the conference.

Abstracts may be submitted to namaste@indica.org.in by 31st October. Full papers may be

submitted by 15th December. The conference is scheduled for the second half of January 2020.

* The images used are of various public Land and Environmental Art installations from around the world.