Dharma, Deities and Destruction

Abrahamic religions destroyed pagan temples in Europe and Arabia, just like they did in India.  Murthies were broken or desecrated.  But unlike in the West and Arabia, Hindu Dharma continued but kept a low profile for hundreds of years. What made the difference?

Our deities aren't just images.  There's divinity behind an installed deity.  The form is a physical representation of the underlying divinity.  So, were the deities elsewhere. The difference is - here their divinity is rooted in Dharma.

We have many local deities that established dharma - some were explicitly called Dharmasastas.  This Dharma represents the connectedness and unending nature of creation.  The destruction of evil or the adharmic is just one part of the Dharma.  The fiery mother goddess who protects, and the angry devtaa who settled after burning a city are all part of this Dharma.

That Dharma continues to exist in the culture and people's hearts - not as an ideology but as an eternal truth. When the time is right, the deities spring from the same Dharma. 

Elites without a connection to our roots fail to see this. Their sense of righteousness comes from Western ideologies.  They see a deity as an image of a historical figure or an outcome of the sculptor's creativity.  They fail to see the innate Dharma the deity represents. The word 'faith' is another Western concept when a rational explanation is impossible.  

Unlike Hindu deities, Abrahamic symbols lack the breadth and depth of Dharma.  Islam deifies the holy book.  An uneducated Muslim will have "faith" that the book is holy. Beyond that, there is no intrinsic value it represents.  The image of Jesus is a good representation of his teachings; but is unidimensional. Can there be an angry or a playful Jesus? But that is not a problem.  Christianity focuses too much on the historicity of the character Jesus.  Attempts to prove that Jesus did not exist, are seen as anti-Christian.  A Hindu does not give much importance when a political leader questions the historicity of Rama.

Because, to a Hindu, Rama vigraha represents the qualities of Rama - the same Dharma that resides in some corner of the devotee's heart.  The deities and their temples are also important to the devotee as they keep reminding him of the forgotten Dharma.  And when the temples are destroyed, Dharma will ensure they are rebuilt at the right time.