So shortsighted were the Bauddhas of Sindh in their perspective of their squabbles with Hindus that they unwittingly helped facilitate Muslim domination & were finished as a religion in that region.

Screenshots are from the excellent thesis (later, book) by Derryl N. Maclean, “Religion and Society in Arab Sind” The essential difference between the Hindu & Buddhist responses to the Arab invasion of Sindh. One side primarily collaborated with the Arabs. The other resisted.

The Buddhists went out of their way to collaborate with the Muslim armies while the Hindus, barring a rare few exceptions, resisted.

However, हिंदु-धर्म continued to put up a fight in the region. Its Temples & rites were robust & deeply appealing; enough that some Muslims even converted to the धर्म.

For the interested, some screenshots going through in detail the individual factors behind the eventual & complete decline of Buddhism in the Sindh. Such thoroughness & structured, factor-by-factor analysis. This is how theses should be written.

The dhimmitude of सिन्धुदेश-Buddhists was such that they even tried to link their conversion to the era of Muhammad’s companions through fabricated accounts (see last line of last screenshot of the previous tweet).

One of the primary motives was the desire to safeguard economic interests. Even Buddhist monks, with all their supposed “enlightenment”, were motivated by this desire to collaborate with the Muslims. They disliked the “Protectionist” streak of the ब्राह्मण king & administration.

Thus, Buddhist urban laity, comprised mainly of merchants & Traders, as well as the monks worked hard to collaborate with the Muslim armies, in the hopes that they will gain economic opportunities from the Arab trading networks.

Unfortunately for the Buddhists, the Arabs went around the Buddhist monastic & merchant networks as soon as they realized that they didn’t need the Buddhists. And it didn’t take too long before Buddhism disappeared, almost without a trace, from the region.

Sindhi सम्मितीय-बौद्ध-s hated हिंदुधर्म so much that they went to Bihar to join their स्थविरवाद (Theravada) brethren to break statues of तान्त्रिक Buddhist deities like हेवज्र they thought to be too Hindu, leaving their fellows in Sindh to become prey for Islam. Priorities!!

Despite their shilling for Arabs, Sindhi Bauddhas ceases to exist as an ethno-religious entity. They had preserved one of the oldest strands of Buddhism, the सम्मितीय sect. They perished into oblivion entirely while Sindhi Hindus, despite centuries of misery, ceased to survive.

Also, note the स्थविरवाद (Theravada) bauddha urge to “purify” Buddhism of Hindu features, which had absolutely overwhelmed the महायान & बज्रयान Buddhist schools. Compare this with Xtian & Muslim urge to “cleanse” their “deviant” sects of Pagan residues.

One of the most interesting arguments made in the Thesis is how the structural features of the सम्मितीय Buddhist school made the particular branch of Sindhi Islam (Ashab Al-Hadith, Ahl Al-Hadith) attractive to Sindhi Buddhists. More in the next tweet:

An interesting discussion. What features of a religious tradition can make it susceptible to a smooth conversion to Abrahamisms? Something to reflect on.

(This article has been compiled from the tweet thread posted by @GhorAngirasa on December 31, 2019, with minor edits to improve readability and conform to HinduPost style guide)