Brahmo Samaj

The earliest of the Hindu reform groups,
founded in Calcutta in the early nineteenth century by Ram Mohan Roy
(1774–1833). His purpose was to purge
contemporary Hinduism of its “corrupt”
practices, such as sati (widow burning),
the ban on widow remarriage, image
worship, and caste. In his effort to find a
traditional authority for such reforms,
he chose the Upanishads as his key religious texts. After his death the movement was eventually headed by
Debendranath Tagore (father of the
Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore)
and later by Keshub Chander Sen; disagreements over ritual matters split the
movement under both leaders. By the
late 1800s the Samaj’s influence had
largely passed, although in an interesting twist, it became the vehicle through
which the mystic Ramakrishna met
many of his disciples.
The Brahmo Samaj’s social program
reflected and responded to contemporary European critiques of popular
Hinduism, some levied by Christian
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Brahmo Samaj
missionaries and others based on
the rationalist emphasis of the
Enlightenment. The Brahmo Samaj’s
openness put it at the forefront of legal
reform—in particular, influencing the
1829 law banning sati. But at the same
time, its members were mostly
Westernized urban intellectuals, far
removed from the life and religious
concerns of Hindus. For further
information see Spencer Lavan, “The
Brahmo Samaj: India’s First Movement
for Religious Reform,” in Robert D. Baird
(ed.), Religion in Modern India, 1998.