Hinduism Branches of Faith

Hinduism, as a religion, believes in several branches of faith. Each of these branches differs from the other in terms of their view on God and His attributes. One of the major schools of thought of Hinduism is known as Smarta tradition. Following Advaita philosophy, the Smartains consider all avataras of Gods to be different forms of the impersonal Absolute, Brahman.

As per Smartans, this omniscient and omnipresent God of neuter gender is indefinable. This Brahman is of two types, namely, the Sagun Brahman and the Nirgun Brahman as per the personal attributes incurred in it. The Advaita Vedanta stresses that God is nothing but a simple manifestation of Brahman upon our minds. Therefore, the supreme can be with or without attributes.

Vaishnav and Shaives
These two branches are the astute believers of the supremacy of their presiding deities, namely, Vishnu for Vaishnavs and Shiva for Shaives. In both of these monotheistic branches of faith, Vishnu or Shiva is personified as male. Worshipped in two non anthrop forms, better known as the Shaligram and Shivlinga, Lord Vishnu and Shiva command unshakeable devotion from their devotees.

Vishnu of the Vaishnavs is portrayed in the more humanized form in all the scriptures presenting a closer to life perspective, whereas for Shaives the form of God that is to be worshipped is slightly scary with gothic features imbued in it.

Then, there also are some of the Hindus who worship the female prowess of the Godhead under Shakti. These devotees of Shakti believe her to be the supreme divinity and are thus known as Shaktas. They consider their Goddess to be a personification of primordial energy and origin of all the divine and cosmic evolution.

Identified with the Supreme, she is the controller of all the forces and potentialities of nature. This absolutely female-oriented system of worship is found only in India.

Some of the Shaivites though argue that this feminist approach to God is just a means to reach the masculine Shiva. They often conclude Shaktism to be an effective sub-denomination of Saivism. They emphasize that the Goddess is worshipped to gain union with Shiva. A very minor view though, this branch of faith of Hinduism considers Shiva as an equal and inseparable aspect of Devi.

A union of substance and energy, the Being and his power and Shiva and Shakti is also worshipped by devotees under the name of Ardhanarishvara. This form of God is split into two halves of male and female thus incorporating that both are incomplete without the other.

This eternal unity of these two powers, a cornerstone of two major ideologies of Hinduism, represents that Shiva and Uma are inseparable. The core of Durga and Kali, Uma, serves as the female form to the Destroyer Lord of the Hindu Trinity.