ACKGROUND BOOKS

INDUISM AND THE FATE OF INDIA
enturies ago, when Muslims classified the
nonbelievers under their rule, they used "people of the Book" to distinguish Christians and Jews from Hindus. That distinction re-mains useful, and any consideration of Hindu- ism must first confront the problem of what I might call the "booking" of Hinduism, the slow solidification of a fluid religious tradition into ink and paper, print on page. This transforma- tion from oral tradi...