Excellent answer. That is my exact point. Hindu religion is more than 8000 years old and it has evovled and is evolving. Earlier vedas where there which talked about sacrifices( not human or animal). If you do this, you will attain heaven, wealth,... But then sages came up with upanishads which talks about philosophy nothing materalistic.
Hindus can be polytheist, monotheist, monist, pantheist or atheist still being a hindu. Hindusim does not ascribe to any single book or code. There are multiple ways human beings can live and attain salvation. These are some of the ways and has been put down in the books like puranas, vedas, upanishads,... You choose your way with your justification and live accordingly. I think hindu sages overestimated the intellect of human beings. Human beings still expect like small children to be taught what they have to do each moment of the life. They do not want to think for themselves and have flexibility to choose among the diffent options.
