page_title: Ayyavazhi
section_title: Inclusiveness and exclusivity
hierarchical_section_title: Ayyavazhi / Inclusiveness and exclusivity
caption_attribution_description: English: I took this photograph hallo i'm ...
context_page_description: Ayyavazhi is a henotheistic belief that originated in South India. It is cited as an independent monistic religion by several newspapers, government reports, journals, and academic researchers. In Indian censuses, however, the majority of its followers declare themselves as Hindus. Thus, Ayyavazhi is also considered a Hindu denomination. Officially, it exists within Hinduism as a Hindu denomination.
  Ayyavazhi is centered on the life and preachings of Ayya Vaikundar; its ideas and philosophy are based on the holy texts Akilathirattu Ammanai and Arul Nool. Accordingly, Vaikundar was the Purna avatar of Narayana. Ayyavazhi shares many ideas with Hinduism in its beliefs and practice, but differs considerably in its concepts of good and evil and dharma. Ayyavazhi is classified as a dharmic belief because of its central focus on dharma.
  Ayyavazhi first came to public attention in the 19th century as a Hindu sect. Vaikundar's activities and the growing number of followers caused a reformation and revolution in 19th-century Travancorean and Tamil society, surprising the feudal social system of South India.
context_section_description: The formula of inclusiveness and exclusivity, as applied in the religio-cultural universe of Ayyavazhi, is unique because both the theories are mixed up in Ayyavazhi scriptures. The inclusive theory accepts the views of different religions for a certain period of time, and from then onwards exclusively rejects all of them in its narrative.
  Ayyavazhi accepts different god-heads of several religions, like the concept of Allah and almost all the god-heads of Hinduism. It also says that the one and the same God incarnates in different parts of the world at different time for rescuing the people from sufferings. But due to the advent of Kaliyan and because of the cruel nature of his boons, for the first time, the supreme power Ekam incarnates in the world as Vaikundar, and so all the lesser god-heads and previous scriptures had lost their substances. So after the time of the Vaikunda Avatar, Vaikundar was said to be the only worshippable God and hence, the theology of Ayyavazhi was channeled towards exclusivism. The manner in which Akilam treats the scriptures of different religions is complicated. For instance, while there is no direct reference to the terms 'Christ' or 'Bible' anywhere in any of the Ayyavazhi texts, there is an indirect reference in Akilam thirteen which is supposed to be an implication that Christ was an incarnation of Narayana, but it was widely thought that it did not recognise the Bible composition. It seems the view of Akilam on Bible is "it was created with the intention of man and not that of God". In common, creation of religions and shaping individualities for them are heavily criticised. The concepts 'God' and 'Religion' are kept poles apart in Akilam, and it seems to maintain an ideology something like  'Accept God; Reject religion' .
  Ayyavazhi accepts various incarnations in Hinduism, but necessarily rejects the so-called ' Hindu ' scriptures. It initially accepts Vedas. Later since Kaliyan had bought the Vedas as boon they too lost their substance by the advent of Kaliyan, and so had gone invalid. It also says that he (Kaliyan) had performed several additions and had hidden some of their content. And hence God incarnated as Vaikundar. So for the present age, Akilam is said to be the only  'Book of Perfection' . By this Ayyavazhi rejects all other scriptures and follows only its own. Akilam highly condemns the creation of religions especially exclusivistic religious and theological ideas. It shows them as the foremost Kali mayai (evil of Kali). The scriptures teach sensibly and symbolically that God and his activities are beyond the reach of religions. It also preaches about universal oneness.
caption: The door of Swamithoppe Palliyarai with the ten avatars of Vishnu carved on it
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