“Koenraad Elst”的意思、由来-开放百科全书

Koenraad Elst (born 7 August 1959) is a Belgian orientalist and Indologist known for his writings on comparative religion, Hindu-Muslim relations and Indian history.^[1] He has contributed columns of numerous Indian and Flemish newspapers, and published in Dutch about philosophy, politics and religion.^[2] He is also known for his support of the Out of India theory which argues against the mainstream academic view that the Indo-European languages originated in the Kurgan culture of the Central Asian steppes. Elst, who has a doctorate on the subject of Hindu nationalism,^[3] is sympathetic to Hindutva, a Hindu nationalist movement.

Biography

Elst though born into a Flemish Catholic family, rejects Roman Catholicism and calls himself a “secular humanist”.^[4] He graduated in Indology, Sinology and philosophy at the Catholic University of Leuven. Around that time, Elst became interested in Flemish nationalism.{{sfn|Nanda|2009|p=112}} Between 1988 and 1992, Elst was at the Banaras Hindu University. In 1999, he received a Ph.D. in Asian Studies from Leuven.^[5] His doctoral dissertation on Hindu revivalism was published as Decolonizing the Hindu Mind.{{sfn|Nanda|2009|p=112}}

He was an editor of the New Right Flemish nationalist journal Teksten, Kommentaren en Studies from 1992 to 1995,^[6] focusing on criticism of Islam, various other conservative and Flemish separatist publications such as Nucleus, 't Pallieterke, Secessie, or the neoconservative The Brussels Journal and Middle East Forum.{{cn|date=October 2017}}

Elst, known for his support for the Out of India theory related to Indo-Aryan migration, has also written about multiculturalism, language-policy issues, ancient Chinese philosophy and history, and comparative religion.^[7] Elst became identified with Hindutva politics during the 1990s, following his support for the Bharatiya Janata Party's position on the Ram Janmabhoomi temple in Ayodhya and in parallel with the BJP's rise to prominence on the Indian national stage.{{cn|date=October 2017}}

Indigenous Aryan theories

In two books, Update on the Aryan Invasion Debate (1999) and Asterisk in Bhāropīyasthān (2007), Elst has written in support of Out of India, a fringe theory which argues against the academically accepted view that Indo-European languages originated in the Kurgan culture of the Central Asian steppes and that the migrations to Indian subcontinent in the second millennium BCE brought a proto-Indo-European language with them.^[8]^[9] Elst argues that the migration went the other way and that Aryans indigenous to India migrated out of India, taking Indo-European languages to the Middle East and to Europe. Elst is one of the few supporters who uses paleolinguistics in support of the Out-of-India theory.^[10]^[11] The Out-of-India theory is considered{{by whom?|date=March 2019}} an extreme view of the origin of the Indo-European family of languages and Elst is thought to be one of its leading proponents.^[10]^[12]{{qn|date=March 2019}}

According to Elst, the linguistic data are a soft type of evidence and are compatible with a variety of scenarios. The dominant linguistic theories may be compatible with an out-of-India scenario for Indo-European expansion.^[13]

Hindu revivalism

Elst is known to be sympathetic to Hindutva, a Hindu nationalist movement.^[14] In Ram Janmabhoomi vs Babri Masjid, Elst makes the case for an enduring historical tradition associating the Ram Janmabhoomi site with the birthplace of Rama, the Hindu god/king.^[15] The book, which was published by Voice of India, a publication house devoted to furthering the Hindu cause,{{sfn|Nanda|2009|pp=112–113}}^[16] brought attention and praise for Elst from L. K. Advani, the leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party.^[17]

Writings on Islam

Elst is considered a member of the school of thought championed by Ram Swarup and Sita Ram Goel, the founders of the Voice of India (VOI) publishing house and writers who were highly critical of both Christianity and Islam. He adopts their hard-line stance against the two religions in his book, Decolonizing the Hindu Mind.{{sfn|Nanda|2009|pp=112–113}} In it, he contends that the "need for 'reviving' Hinduism spring from the fact that the said hostile ideologies (mostly Islam) have managed to eliminate Hinduism physically in certain geographical parts and social segments of India, and also (mostly the Western ideologies) to neutralize the Hindu spirit among many nominal Hindus."{{sfn|Guichard|2010|p=94}} In Ayodhya and After (1991), Elst states that the Ayodhya temple movement offered "an invitation to the Muslim Indians to reintegrate themselves into the society and culture from which their ancestors were cut off by fanatical rulers and their thought police, the theologians. It is thus an exercise in national integration".{{sfn|Anand|2011|p=138}}

According to Meera Nanda, Elst uses "the writings of his [Voice of India] mentors to peddle the worst kind of Islamophobia imaginable". She supports this with an example from one of his essays where he advises his readers that the best way to criticise Muhammad is to question his sanity as, from a yogic viewpoint, his divine revelations were "born from a deluded consciousness" fed by "sexual arousal" provided by his wife, Khadija.{{sfn|Nanda|2009|pp=112–113}}{{sfn|Nanda|2011|pp=161–163}} Elst, on the other hand questions Nanda's motive behind "shielding the religious dogma of monotheism from criticism," and suggests she accepts the Christian view of moral superiority of monotheism.^[18] Elst strongly denies the charges of him being an anti-Muslim, but insists that "not Muslims but Islam is the problem".^[19]

In his 1992 book, Negationism in India: Concealing the Record of Islam,^[20] Elst attempts to demonstrate that there exists a prohibition of criticism of Islam in India and a denial of its "historic crimes against humanity" that amounts to censorship.^[21]^[22]^[23]^[24] The book compares the phenomenon of "negationism" to holocaust denial in Europe.{{citation needed|date=August 2018}}

Reception

Elst's work has drawn both praise and criticism. David Frawley called his work on Ayodhya "definitive",^[25] K. D. Sethna regarded it as "absolutely the last word".^[26] Paul Beliën described him as "one of Belgium's best orientalists",^[27] while the neo-conservative Daniel Pipes was positive about his stance on the Rushdie-affair.^[28]

On the other hand, the anthropologist Thomas Blom Hansen described Elst as a "Belgian Catholic of a radical anti-Muslim persuasion who tries to make himself useful as a 'fellow traveller' of the Hindu nationalist movement",^[29] while the historian Sarvepalli Gopal called Elst "a Catholic practitioner of polemics" who "fights the Crusades all over again on Indian soil".^[30] Meera Nanda criticised his support for Hindu nationalism.{{sfn|Nanda|2009|pp=112–113}}

Works

Notes

1. ^{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kNZdRJfQAFEC&pg=PA305&dq=Koenraad+Elst+indian+history&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjutYWhtqrNAhWHPo8KHUk4AEgQ6AEINjAF#v=onepage&q=Koenraad%20Elst%22indian%20history%22&f=false|title=The Rushdie Affair: The Novel, the Ayatollah, and the West|first=Daniel|last=Pipes|page=305|publisher=Transaction Publishers}}
2. ^{{cite book|title=Indian Epic Values: Rāmāyaṇa and Its Impact : Proceedings of the 8th International Rāmāyaṇa Conference, Leuven, 6-8 July 1991|publisher=Peeters Publishers|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EVnK3q48dL0C&pg=PA42|isbn=9789068317015|year=1995|first=Gilbert|last=Pollet|page=42}}
3. ^{{Cite news|url=https://swarajyamag.com/insta/indic-academy-chennai-event-koenraad-elst-will-speak-on-hinduism-source-of-indian-pluralism|title=Indic Academy Chennai Event: Koenraad Elst Will Speak On ‘Hinduism - Source Of Indian Pluralism’|access-date=2018-02-11}}
4. ^{{cite web |url= http://koenraadelst.bharatvani.org/articles/chr/missionaries.html |title= The Problem of Christian Missionaries | publisher= bharatvani.org |accessdate= 11 December 2010}}
5. ^{{cite book|last1=Geybels|first1=Hans|last2=Herck|first2=Walter Van|title=Humour and Religion: Challenges and Ambiguities|date=2011|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing|isbn=9781441194831|page=IX|url=https://books.google.co.in/books?id=CnUSBwAAQBAJ|language=en}}
6. ^ NIEUW RECHTS TEN ONDER, beschreven door Dr Koenraad Elst
7. ^{{cite web |url=http://www.brusselsjournal.com/koenraadelst |title=Koenraad Elst - The Brussels Journal}}
8. ^{{cite book|title= Building Resilience of Human-Natural Systems of Pastoralism in the Developing World|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=JJjvDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA16|quote= The nomads originated from the Kurgan culture of southern Russia are believed to have expand into the Indian subcontinent about 3500 years ago, bringing with them not only the practice of nomadic pastoralism but also the Indo-European languages they spoke|publisher= Springer|year= 2016|author =Shikui Dong, Karim-Aly S. Kassam, Jean François Tourrand, Randall B. Boone | access-date = 31 Mar 2019}}
9. ^{{cite book|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=CPP0CAAAQBAJ&pg=PA9|title= Advances in Forensic Haemogenetics|publisher= Springer Science & Business Media|author= Walter Bär, Angelo Fiori, Umberto Rossi | access-date = 31 Mar 2019 | quote = The Gimbautas hypothesis of an origin in the kurgan region and spread during the Bronze Age (between 4,000 and 2,500 BC) [...] seems to have the greatest support from archaeological and other considerations [...].}}
10. ^¹{{Cite book|title= The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture: The Indo-Aryan Migration Debate|publisher= Oxford University Press|date= 2001|last= Bryant|first= Edwin|place= New York |page= 146|quote= In any event, Elst's proposal that earlier tribes could have emigrated from India bearing the centum characteristics and, after the velars had evolved into palatals in the Indian Urheimat, later tribes could have followed them bearing the new satem forms (while the Indo-Aryans remained in the homeland), cannot actually be discounted as a possibility on these particular grounds.}}
11. ^{{cite book|last1= Avari|first1= Burjor|title= India: The Ancient Past: A History of the Indian Subcontinent from c. 7000 BCE to CE 1200|date= 2016|publisher= Routledge|isbn= 9781317236726|page= 79|url= https://books.google.co.in/books?id=XziTDAAAQBAJ|language= en | quote= A Belgian revisionist, Koenraad Elst, has nevertheless claimed that the Aryan migration was not towards India but out of India. Their ancestral homeland, their Urheimat, was the land of Sapta-Sindhava (the Punjab), and from there they expanded outwards towards Afghanistan, Iran, Central Asia and, ultimately, towards Europe.}}
12. ^{{Cite journal|last= Humes|first= Cynthia Ann|title= Hindutva, Mythistory, and Pseudoarchaeology|journal= Numen. International Review for the History of Religions|volume= 59|date= 2012|jstor= 23244958|pages= 178–201|doi= 10.1163/156852712x630770}}
13. ^{{cite book|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=fHYnGde4BS4C|editor1-last= Bryant|editor1-first= Edwin|editor2-first= Laurie L.|editor2-last= Patton|publisher= Psychology Press|year= 2005|isbn= 9780700714636|title= The Indo-Aryan Controversy|pages= 1-19|quote= It is possible that the absorption of foreign words could have taken place after the emigration of other branches of Indo-Europeans from India (p. 8).|chapter= Introduction|first= Laurie L.|last= Patton}}
14. ^{{Cite journal|title=Negotiating Evidence: History, Archaeology and the Indus Civilisation|last=Guha|first=Sudeshna|journal=Modern Asian Studies|publisher=Cambridge University Press|volume=39|issue=2|date=May 2005|pages=399–426|jstor=3876625|doi=10.1017/s0026749x04001611}}
15. ^{{Cite journal|title=Justifying Hindu Hurt.Ram Janmabhoomi vs Babri Masjid by Koenraad Elst. Review|last=Sethi|first=Harish|journal=Economic and Political Weekly|volume=26|issue=4|date=26 January 1991|pages=167–168|jstor=4397247}}
16. ^{{Cite journal|last=Sikand|first=Yogesh|title=Hinduism and Secularism After Ayodhya by Arvind Sharma: A Review|journal=Islamic Studies|volume=41|issue=1|date=Spring 2002|pages=166–169|jstor=20837185}}
17. ^Sita Ram Goel, How I became a Hindu. ch.9
18. ^{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.co.in/books?id=HKi4CAAAQBAJ&pg=PA45|title=Return of the Swastika: Hate and Hysteria versus Hindu Sanity|last=Elst|first=Koenraad|date=2015-02-18|publisher=Arktos|isbn=9781910524183|language=en}}
19. ^{{Cite web|url=http://koenraadelst.bharatvani.org/reviews/saffronwave.html|title=Book Review -- Saffron Wave|website=koenraadelst.bharatvani.org|access-date=2017-10-20}}
20. ^Negationism in India: concealing the record of Islam
21. ^{{cite web | last=Singh | first=Ranbir | title=Negationism in Indian History: Its Lessons for the Arab Spring Dystopia | website=ChakraNews.com | date=2012-02-14 | url=http://www.chakranews.com/negationism-in-indian-history-its-lessons-for-the-arab-spring-dystopia/2169 | access-date=2018-02-11}}
22. ^{{cite web | title=WebCite query result | website=WebCite | date=2009-10-25 | url=https://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/Stadium/5142/negislamindia.html&date=2009-10-25+07:21:02 | language=es | access-date=2018-02-11}}
23. ^{{cite web | last=| first=| title=Taj Mahal or Tejo-Mahalaya? | website=The Express Tribune | date=2016-07-21 | url=https://tribune.com.pk/story/1146608/taj-mahal-tejo-mahalaya/ | access-date=2018-02-11}}
24. ^{{cite book|author=Robin Abraham|title=The Philosopher Volunteer|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bhAxDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT49|date=16 August 2017|publisher=Notion Press|isbn=978-1-947498-27-3|pages=49–}}
25. ^{{cite book|title= How I Became a Hindu: My Discovery of Vedic Dharma|last= Frawley|first=David|authorlink=David Frawley|page=96|publisher= Voice of India|year= 2000|isbn= 9788185990606}}
26. ^Mother India: Monthly Review of Culture, Volume 58. page 521
27. ^Is Islam Dying? Europe Certainly Is
28. ^{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kNZdRJfQAFEC&pg=PA305|title=The Rushdie Affair: The Novel, the Ayatollah, and the West|first=Daniel|last=Pipes|page=305|publisher=Transaction Publishers}}
29. ^{{cite web |first=Thomas |last=Hansen |title=The Saffron Wave |page=262 |url=http://koenraadelst.bharatvani.org/reviews/saffronwave.html }}
30. ^Gopal, S., [https://books.google.com/books?id=47AARF595dUC Anatomy of a Confrontation: Ayodhya and the Rise of Communal Politics in India], Palgrave Macmillan, 1993, p.21.