Socio-Religious Reform Movements — Definition

Definition

Socio-religious reform movements were organised efforts to reconsider social practices and religious authority during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Participants debated education, gender, caste, ritual and the relationship between inherited traditions and new intellectual currents.

Some sought change through reinterpretation of religious texts; others challenged the authority used to defend exclusion. Associations such as the Brahmo Samaj, Arya Samaj, Prarthana Samaj and Ramakrishna Mission pursued different programmes and should not be treated as a single organisation.

Their shared historical significance lies in opening contested public arguments about how society should change and who could claim authority to change it.