Hindu Dharma doesn’t believe in conversion by force or design. In an age when religious conversion has become an industry in the context of Abrahamic religions, Hindu Dharma stands out. It still doesn’t have any organized machinery to propagate religious conversions. If you look at the endless charity that’s done outside Hindu temples, you’ll notice it’s done without any ulterior motive. That is why Hindu Dharma makes the missionary ecosystem uncomfortable.

People the world over are increasingly adopting the principles and way of life of our Dharma willingly and of their own accord. This is something that’s beyond the comprehension of Abrahamic faiths. They stress the various codified rituals for initiation into their “way of life” whereas Hindu Dharma doesn’t force anyone to turn a Hindu ritualistically. That’s why it draws people into the folds of its philosophy harmoniously and magnanimously.

It’s always inspiring to read the life story of a “westerner” who embraced Hindu Dharma on his own accord and got drawn into it so much that he undertook scholarly study of the Vedas and the Upanishads and became an intellectual force to reckon with in the field of Indic Studies. Dr David Frawley or Pandit Vamadeva Shastri needs no introduction.

An acclaimed Vedacharya, he is the founder and director of the American Institute of Vedic Studies. He has authored many books on Yoga, Ayurveda, Vedic Sciences, etc. I recently read “How I Became a Hindu” by David Frawley. This heart-warming account of Frawley’s initiation into Hindu Dharma is quite different from his other books.

While most of his other works talk about the principles and philosophy of Sanatan Dharma, “How I became a Hindu” is an intimate peep into David Frawley’s life trajectory. The book is written in a bildungsroman style, and one is fascinated by the sheer expanse of Frawley’s interaction with different facets of Hindu Dharma, and how something that he started casually exploring in the hippie circles of the US, would go on to become an inseparable part of his life and identity. “How I Became a Hindu” is a compelling read full of twists and turns.

The writing style is conversational, and Frawley comes across as a skilled storyteller of his own life. It’s an unusual story because David Frawley’s initiation into Hindu Dharma isn’t all of a sudden and sporadic. It’s not as if he gets a déjà vu one fine morning, meets a Guru and gets transformed overnight. It’s a much complex story with a lot of meandering twists and turns. It’s the story of a young man’s coming of age as he dabbles into multiple ways of life in a quest for his own identity and finally finds solace in the teachings of Hindu Dharma.

It’s the story of a boy born into a strict Roman Catholic family and how he gets disenchanted with the arbitrarily imposed rigid discipline of Christianity and the concept of eternal damnation. The young boy finds it hard to accept that a God could be so cruel and unloving that he is forever damning his own followers for the smallest of mistakes or sins. This disenchantment with the black and white nature of Abrahamic faiths and a quest for knowledge makes young Frawley dabble into various philosophies of his times – the Hippie Movement, New Age Philosophy, and even communism.

But finally, his quest for truth and knowledge finds its optimal expression when he gets deep into the teachings and philosophy of Hindu Dharma. Frawley meets a Hindu Dharma Guru in the US, and that’s how he gets drawn to Hindu Dharma. He then studies the Vedas, Upanishads, and various Hindu texts and scriptures, on his own initiative. The second part of the book deals with his Bharat journey. At some point, David Frawley decides to visit Bharat and learn more about Hindu Dharma directly from the great sages and Gurus.

This part of the book tells the reader about his journey throughout Bharat, from the ashrams in the Himalayas to various ashrams of Dakshin (south) Bharat. One gets to know about various anecdotes as well, instances of Frawley’s mystical awakening and the sublime experiences he encountered at various ashrams.

Next, the book delves deep into Frawley’s involvement with the political side of Hindu Dharma, Hindu activism that is. Frawley’s Bharat visits take him to close association of the BJP, RSS, Hindu Mahasabha, etc, and he gets deep into Hindu activism and the academic side of Hindu Dharma. Frawley starts contributing articles as a journalist to various nationalist portals. He gets deep into the debates surrounding the appropriation of Hindu Dharma and culture by missionary propaganda and emerges as a strong voice against Christian conversions in Bharat.

“How I Became a Hindu” by David Frawley is fascinating and sheer mind- boggling in the kind of range it covers telling the reader both about Frawley’s encounters with Hindu Dharma and Hindu activism in Bharat, and simultaneously how a parallel spiritual movement grounded in Hindu Dharma was shaping up in the US. Not just the US, David Frawley also highlights the growing influence of Hindu Dharma in many countries across the world he travelled to such as Trinidad and Tobago.

In “How I Became a Hindu, David Frawley also makes a point that while the Hindu diaspora is getting more connected to their Dharmic roots, strangely enough, Hindus in Bharat are getting distanced from their own culture and civilization. I suppose the dynamics of this can be seen at play in our present day Bharatiya society where many educated Hindus are getting brainwashed
by woke propaganda and feeling ashamed of their own culture and heritage.

This book is a must-read for all Hindus, and especially for those who seem to have doubts about the greatness of their own culture and civilization. “Hindus in Hindu Dharma” by David Frawley will make you revisit Hindu Dharma in a new light, and if you tilt towards the woke crowd, it will help you get rid of your own prejudices towards Hindu Dharma, culture, and civilization.