THE GIFT OF 
 
 HEBER GUSHING PETERS 
 
 CLASS OF 1892 
 
 r: 
 
 5226 
 
Cornell University Library 
 BL 2001.M74R3 1891 
 
 Brahmanism and Hinduism : or, Religiou 
 
 3 1924 023 004 801 
 
The original of tliis book is in 
 tlie Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924023004801 
 
BRAHMANISM and HINDUISM. 
 
iDxfovl 
 
 HORACE HART, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY 
 
ff: 
 
 m^S^»:'-^tmmm}f?SM 
 
 
 PORTKAIT OF UrB GATJRI-S ANK AR tJDAT-SA^JKAK, C.S I. 
 NOW SYAMl SRt SAUOIDANANDA-SARASVATI. 
 
 Seated, aa a Bi-Sliinnn Sannyaal, in meditation (described at p. xxi of the rrefaco). 
 
Brahmanism and HINDOISM; 
 
 OR, 
 
 RELIGIOUS THOUGHT AND LIFE 
 IN INDIA, 
 
 AS BASED ON THE VEDA AND OTHER SACRED BOOKS 
 OF THE HINDUS. 
 
 BY 
 
 SIR MONIER MONIER-WILLIAMS, K.C.I.E., 
 
 -M.A., HON. D.C.L. OXFORD, HON. LL.D. CALCUTTA, HON. PH.D. GOTTINGEN, V. P. OF THE .ROYAL 
 
 ASIATIC SOCIETir, HON. MEMBER OF THE ASIATIC SOCIETIES OF BENGAL AND BOMBAY, 
 
 AND OF THE ORIENTAL AND PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETIES OF AMERICA, 
 
 BODEN PROFESSOR OF SANSKRIT, ETC. 
 
 FOURTH EDITION, 
 ENLARGED AND IMPROVED. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 MACMILLAN AND CO. 
 
 1891. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The present volume, although it professes to be 
 only a new edition of a book which has already met 
 with considerable acceptance ^ contains so many 
 improvements and additions that it may be regarded 
 as almost a new work, and as needing a new Preface. 
 
 Its aim has been stated in the first page of the 
 introductory observations, but there is one expression 
 in the second line which requires explanation. The 
 word ' Englishmen ' must be understood to include all 
 English -speakers everywhere. 
 
 It has been my earnest endeavour in the following 
 pages to give such a clear account of a very obscure 
 and intricate subject as shall not violate scholarly 
 accuracy, and yet be sufficiently readable to attract 
 
 ^ The first edition was called ' Religious Thought and Life in India ' 
 (denoted by the initials RTL. in the new edition of my Sanskrit- 
 English Dictionary published by the University of Oxford), that title 
 being given to it because it was intended to be the first volume of a series 
 treating of the religions of India. When, however, my volume on 
 ' Buddhism ' appeared — a volume printed in larger type — it was thought 
 better to distinguish the third edition of the present work by the title 
 ' Brahmanism and Hinduism,' and this title has also been adopted for 
 this new edition. 
 
vi Preface. 
 
 intelligent general readers, not merely among the 
 38 millions of the United Kingdom, but among the 
 60 millions of the United States of America and 
 among the rapidly developing populations of the 
 colonies of Great Britain. 
 
 Nor do I despair of its attracting a few readers in 
 India itself, where many thoughtful English-speaking 
 Hindus — educated by us — are not always able to give 
 a clear explanation of their own religious creeds and 
 practices. At any rate those of my fellow-countrymen 
 who are now living in India and working among the 
 natives in their own country, will probably be interested 
 in much of what I have here written, and will sym- 
 pathize with me in my difficulties. 
 
 To all, in short, who, speaking a language destined 
 to become the dominant speech of the civilized globe, 
 are likely to take an interest in the origin, growth, and 
 present condition of a religious system . radically and 
 diametrically opposed to Christianity, and yet presenting 
 many remarkable points of contact with Christianity — 
 a system, too, which of all non- Christian religions is 
 perhaps the best key to ,the study of ' Comparative 
 Religion,' as Sanskrit is the best key to the study of 
 ' Comparative Grammar '—this volume is addressed. 
 
 And I may here draw attention to the fact that 
 the founder- of the Boden Professorship had a religious 
 object in providing by his munificent bequest for the 
 study of Sanskrit in the University of Oxford ^ ; and if 
 the Boden Professor is to carry that object into effect, 
 
 ^ The words are : — ' To enable his countrymen to proceed in the 
 conversion of the natives of India to the Christian rehgion.' 
 
Preface. vii 
 
 he is bound to bring his knowledge of Sanskrit to bear 
 not only on the promotion of philological studies, but 
 also on the elucidation of Indian religious systems 
 with a view to their refutation. 
 
 This is no easy task and its difficulty is enhanced 
 by the close intertwining of religion with social and 
 domestic life in every part of India. 
 
 It is often asserted that the Hindus are the most 
 religious people in the world. Those who make this 
 assertion ought, of course, to define what they mean 
 by the word ' religious.' What is really meant, I think, 
 is that among all the races of mankind the Hindus 
 are the greatest slaves to the bondage of immemorial 
 tradition — not so much in its bearing on religious 
 beliefs, or even on moral conduct, as on social usages, 
 caste practices, and domestic ceremonial observances. 
 
 In proof of this it is only necessary to refer to their 
 marriage-customs (see p. 355); but other evidences of 
 this bondage force themselves on the attention of 
 the inquiring traveller at almost every step of his 
 journeyings — in highways and by-ways, on the hills 
 and in the valleys, in towns and in villages, in the 
 dwellings of rich and poor, prince and peasant. 
 
 And yet, strange to say, these traditional customs, 
 usages, and ceremonial observances, although they 
 constitute the chief element in a Hindu's religion, are 
 nowhere throughout India regulated or enforced by the 
 delegates or representatives of any supreme Head or 
 central religious authority. No doubt one explanation 
 of this fact may be that an Indian's excessive respect 
 for tradition makes the establishment of any central 
 
viii Preface. 
 
 source of ecclesiastical power, and the exercise of any 
 regularly organized religious government unnecessary. 
 
 Reverence for opinions and practices held sacred by 
 his ancestors is ingrained in every fibre of a Hindu's 
 character, and is, so to speak, bred in the very bone of 
 his physical and moral constitution. 
 
 Day by day the pious Hindu offers homage to his 
 father, grandfather, and progenitors, including all the 
 seers, holy men, and patriarchs of antiquity. 
 
 And even if. this were not so, any centralization of 
 religious authority would be almost impossible, be- 
 cause the Indian body politic is divided into a count- 
 less number of distinct castes, communities and sects, 
 each of which has its own usages and its own form of 
 self-government, consisting, perhaps, of a kind of coun- 
 cil and presiding Head, whose office is to prevent the 
 violation of its own traditions, customs, and rules. 
 
 It must be borne in mind, too, that there is one 
 tradition respected by all castes and all sects alike — 
 namely the superiority of the Brahmans and their right 
 to superintend domestic ceremonies. But see p. 386. 
 
 Nevertheless it might certainly be expected that at 
 any rate the Brahmans to whom obedience is by 
 common consent due, would be subject to some one 
 supreme Head — to some one centralized spiritual 
 government or authority — from which their sacer- 
 dotal powers would be derived. But no such central 
 authority exists in India. And the Brahmans are 
 themselves split up into priests and laymen, besides 
 countless subdivisions each with its own rules carried 
 out by its own separate council and leaders. 
 
Preface. ix 
 
 Unquestionably this absence of all religious organi- 
 zation among the dense populations of our Indian em- 
 pire has led to an almost total want of order and 
 unity; yet it is attended with one beneficial result, 
 inasmuch as India, with all its intense religiousness, 
 with all its exaggerated sacerdotalism and ceremo- 
 nialism, is free from the despotism, — is unfettered by 
 the dictation of any one autocratic pontiff. 
 
 At the same time it must be understood that the 
 almost infinite divisions of caste and varieties of caste- 
 observance rest on one unvarying substratum of 
 theological dogma of which the Brahmans are the 
 keepers and exponents. It may be very true that a 
 Hindu who is bound to conform strictly to the social, 
 domestic, and individual observances prescribed by his 
 own caste, is nevertheless allowed great laxity of opinion 
 in regard to his religious creed. It may also be true 
 that he is permitted to choose for himself his own 
 special or favourite divinity, without accepting all the 
 gods of the Hindu Pantheon. It may even be true 
 that while accepting Hinduism he may be at the same 
 time a believer in Buddhism, in Muhammadanism, in 
 Judaism, in Christianity; or may call himself a Theist, 
 a Deist, a Polytheist, a Theosophist, or even an 
 Agnostic. Still for all that, all the varieties of caste- 
 usage, all the multipHcity of domestic ceremonies, all 
 the diversities of sceptical belief are, so to speak, 
 ' roped together ' by one rigid and unyielding line of 
 Brahmanical pantheistic doctrine. 
 
 Any one who glances at the table of contents ap- 
 pended to these prefatory remarks will see at once that 
 
X Preface. 
 
 a great proportion of the volume before him is em- 
 ployed in expounding the evolution of that doctrine. 
 
 I fear, however, that some inquirers may possibly 
 consult its pages, who have little time to pursue 
 step by step the gradual development of Indian re- 
 ligious thought, as I have endeavoured to trace it. 
 These need, as an introduction, a more concise answer 
 to the question. What is a Hindu and what is 
 Hinduism ? 
 
 For their benefit, therefore, I will here endeavour 
 to condense some of the more important points which 
 are set forth at full length in the succeeding pages. 
 
 And first I may point out that the name Hindu 
 is now usually restricted to those who are adherents 
 of the form of religion which the present volume aims 
 at explaining. 
 
 It is, indeed, a solemn thought that at least 200 
 millions of our fellow-subjects are adherents of that 
 religion. And yet it is a remarkable characteristic of 
 Hinduism that it neither requires nor attempts to 
 make converts. Nor is it by any means at present 
 diminishing in numbers. Nor is it at present being 
 driven off the field, as might be expected, by being 
 brought into contact with two such proselyting religions 
 as Christianity and Muhammadanism. On the contrary, 
 it is at present rapidly increasing ; for a man becomes 
 a Hindu by merely being born a Hindu ; so that every 
 day adds to the adherents of Hinduism through the 
 simple process of the daily increase of births over 
 deaths, which in India is everywhere considerable. 
 
 And far more remarkable than this — it will be seen 
 
Bi^eface. xi 
 
 from what I have written in Chapter iii, that another 
 characteristic of Hinduism is its receptivity and all- 
 comprehensiveness. It claims to be the one religion 
 of humanity, of human nature, of the entire world. It 
 cares not to oppose the progress of any other system. 
 For it has no difficulty in including all other religions 
 within its all-embracing arms and ever-widening fold. 
 
 And, in real truth, Hinduism has something to offer 
 which is suited to all minds. Its very strength lies in 
 its infinite adaptability to the infinite diversity of 
 human characters and human tendencies. It has its 
 highly spiritual and abstract side suited to the meta- 
 physical philosopher — its practical and concrete side 
 suited to the man of affairs and the man of the world 
 — its aesthetic and ceremonial side suited to the man 
 of poetic feeling and imagination — its quiescent and 
 contemplative side suited to the man of peace and 
 lover of seclusion. Nay, it holds out the right hand 
 of brotherhood to nature-worshippers, demon-wor- 
 shippers, animal-worshippers, tree-worshippers, fetish- 
 worshippers. It does not scruple to permit the most 
 grotesque forms of idolatry, and the most degrading 
 varieties of superstition. And it is to this latter fact <| 
 that yet another remarkable peculiarity of Hinduism is [ 
 mainly due — namely, that in no other system of the 
 world is the chasm more vast which separates the i 
 religion of the higher, cultured, and thoughtful classes / 
 from that of the lower, uncultured, and unthinkingj 
 masses. 
 
 The former religion I call Brahmanism, the latter 
 I call Hinduism; but, as I have shown at length in 
 
xii Preface. 
 
 the present volume, the two are really one, and the 
 higher, purer, and more spiritualistic system has led 
 to the lower, more corrupt, and more materialistic 
 form of doctrine, through the natural and inevitable 
 development of its root-ideas and fundamental dogma. 
 
 In brief, Hinduism is founded on that highly subtle 
 theory of pantheistic philosophy which was excogitated 
 by the Brahmans at the time when they began to think 
 out for themselves the problem of existence several 
 centuries before the Christian era — a theory, which 
 every human intellect most naturally thinks out for 
 itself — a theory, too, which is, in some respects, almost 
 identical with that thought out by Spinoza and the 
 profoundest thinkers of modern Europe. 
 
 Indeed, if I may be allowed the anachronism, the 
 Hindus were Spinozaites more than 2,000 years be- 
 fore the existence of Spinoza ; and Darwinians many 
 centuries before Darwin; and Evolutionists many 
 centuries before the doctrine of Evolution had been 
 accepted by the Scientists of our time, and before any 
 word like Evolution existed in any language of the 
 world. 
 
 The Hindus, in fact, have for centuries believed 
 that their one god Brahma (neuter) — their one im- 
 personal spiritual Essence or Energy — identified with 
 everything, and constituting everything — is for ever 
 evolving itself out of its own inner substance ; like 
 a vast tree ' with countless branches for ever expanding 
 
 ^ The name for the one Self-existent God, Brahma, is neuter and de- 
 rived from the same root as Vriksha, 'a tree' — namely, the root Vrih 
 or Brih, 'to grow.' By referring, however, to p. 95, note 2, of this 
 
Preface. xiii 
 
 itself out of an eternal seed, and then for ever drawing 
 back and being re-absorbed into itself, and disappear- 
 ing again and again into formlessness and impersonality. 
 
 And the first evolution, according to their belief, is 
 the development of a triple personality ; first, as God, 
 the personal Creator, called Brahma (masculine) ; 
 secondly, as God the personal Preserver or Maintainer, 
 called Vishnu (masculine) ; thirdly, as God the per- 
 sonal Dissolver or Disintegrator (but also the Re- 
 creator and Regenerator after dissolution), called Siva 
 (masculine). These three masculine deities are some- 
 times regarded as co-equal and represented by three 
 noble heads rising out of one body. Often their func- 
 tions are held to be interchangeable, or sometimes 
 one, sometimes the other, may be thought to be the 
 greatest of the three (see pp. 45, 65). 
 
 Brahmanism, then, in its simplest form, consists in a 
 fixed belief that the one eternal impersonal Essence — 
 the sole, really existing Being — expands itself into 
 three principal divine co-equal personalities, which are 
 constantly manifested and ultimately re-absorbed. 
 
 Then a further belief was soon developed out of 
 this earlier creed — a belief that each of the three male 
 divinities possesses maternal or feminine attributes as 
 well as masculine. And hence it followed that each 
 personal god became in due course associated with a 
 wife — regarded as half the god's essence (p. 389). 
 
 volume, it will be seen that the earliest word for the one Spirit of the 
 Universe was Atman (masc). Then to distinguish the spirit of man from 
 the Universal Spirit, the latter was afterwards called Paramatman, ' the 
 Supreme Spirit.' Mahatma — a word now much used by Theosophists — 
 is pure Sanskrit and means ' having a great spirit,' ' noble-spirited.' 
 
xiv Preface. 
 
 Then, again, the process of divine developments was 
 soon supposed to go on indefinitely. There are, there- 
 fore, any number of gods, goddesses, and superhuman 
 beings in a Hindu's pantheon, although his Ishta- 
 devata, or ' Favourite deity,' is generally either Vishnu 
 or Siva, or some deity connected with these two per- 
 sonalities. Nay, according to the Hindu pantheistic 
 theory, all great, useful, and good men are personal 
 manifestations of the one impersonal Spirit — and every 
 man's individualized spirit, released from his body by 
 death, must migrate into higher or lower corporeal 
 states, and so pass through innumerable forms of 
 existence, according to his deeds, until it is re-absorbed 
 into the one self-existent Spirit of the Universe. 
 
 Every man's future, then, depends upon himself 
 Moreover his passage through these various changes 
 of existence may take place as much in other worlds 
 as in the present ; but wherever such changes occur 
 they must remain fixed until another change is caused 
 by dissolution. Hence all the distinct classes of men 
 — such as Brahmans, soldiers, agriculturists and ser- 
 vants — remain unalterably distinct from each other 
 from birth to death, without any more power of alter- 
 ing their condition than if they were quadrupeds, birds, 
 reptiles or fish (see p. 53). 
 
 This may give some idea of the close connexion of 
 the Indian caste system with the Hindu religion, and 
 of the iron sway which it exercises over the people, and 
 of its consequent influence for evil, though in some 
 cases for good also (see Chapter xviii). 
 
 It might be thought, perhaps, that the idea of men 
 
Preface. xv 
 
 and women being, as it were, portions of the divine 
 Essence, would have a good effect in ennobling life. 
 But unhappily the pantheistic philosophy of India leads 
 to many monstrous paradoxes, and one of these is 
 that the divine Essence may become, through the force 
 of an awful law, devilish or demoniacal. 
 
 A Hindu, therefore, holds that, as there are any 
 number of good incarnations, so there are any number 
 of evil. And this is not all. It is held that two 
 antagonistic principles are for ever opposing and 
 counteracting each other in the universe around us, 
 and that the vast pantheon is counterbalanced by an 
 equally vast pandemonium. There are, in short, 
 demons without number and of all kinds, just as there 
 are gods without number and of all kinds ; demons 
 peopling the atmosphere around us ; demons both good 
 and bad, male and female ; the good for ever engaged 
 in unceasing conflict with the bad, the bad for ever 
 impeding every good work, for ever causing accidents, 
 diseases, plague, pestilence and ruin (see Chapter ix). 
 
 Then, again, there is another noteworthy paradox 
 involved in a Hindu s pantheistic creed. For, although 
 human beings are believed to be portions of Brahma 
 the one God, yet that God nevertheless delights in 
 acting as a hard taskmaster towards all these portions 
 of himself, imposing on them intolerable burdens. 
 Hence a pious Hindu who considers himself to be 
 part of the one God, will still feel himself impelled by 
 some law of necessity to propitiate that god by the 
 severest self-imposed religious tasks (pp. 393, 560). It 
 should be noted, too, that the idea of God as an angry 
 
xvi Preface. 
 
 avenger is an essential element in later Hinduism, 
 The god of -destruction delights in destruction for its 
 own sake (p. 82). But his wife, the goddess Kali, is 
 the more bloodthirsty of the two. Blood of some kind 
 she will have. Thousands of goats and buffaloes are 
 therefore daily offered upon her altars throughout 
 India (see pp. 189, 431, 575). 
 
 Finally there is the paradox of a purely spiritual 
 Essence identifying itself with animals, trees, images 
 and stones. 
 
 How, then, can the intelligent and well-educated 
 Hindu — trained by us to think accurately, and in- 
 structed by us in the facts, phenomena, and laws of 
 European science — acquiesce in these extravagances ? 
 ' There is but one God ' — an educated native would 
 probably say, in explanation of the apparent incon- 
 gruity: — ' There is but one God by whateveir form He 
 is worshipped in Asia or in Europe. He (the one God) 
 is in His essence impersonal and formless, though He 
 delights in manifesting Himself in infinite develop- 
 ments, in infinite evolutions and personalities ; and 
 though He chooses to ignore Himself in the distinct 
 individualities created by Himself Hence the separate 
 existence of you, and of me, and of the world around 
 us, is a mere illusion. When, through protracted self- 
 discipline, the illusion is made to vanish, we are again 
 absorbed into the one God. Idols are not intended 
 to be worshipped ; they are merely useful as helps to 
 devotion. They enable ignorant people to form some 
 idea of God's countless manifestations. They are a 
 necessary assistance to the masses of our illiterate 
 
Preface. xvii 
 
 population, whose mental condition is that of children, 
 and who cannot read those written descriptions of God 
 which exist in the Scriptures of all nations, and equally 
 give God human attributes — figure, face, hands, and 
 feet' 
 
 Such would probably be an intelligent , Hindu's 
 apology for his national religion. And by this pecu- 
 liar method of mental engineering is the devious tor- 
 tuosity of the Hindu pantheistic system made straight, 
 and the vast chasm which separates the creeds of the 
 educated and uneducated classes bridged over. And 
 thus, too, it is that the most highly educated natives 
 acquiesce apathetically in all the strange and monstrous 
 forms of their country's superstitions, and are quite 
 content to remain Hindus in name and in religion to 
 the end of their lives. 
 
 The above summary will, I trust, be useful as an 
 introduction to the study of the evolution of Indian 
 religious thought and life, as I have striven to elucidate 
 it in the present volume. At any rate it may help to 
 make clear how it is that the religion of the Hindus — 
 rooted in a super-subtle form of spiritual Pantheism — 
 has branched out into numerous ramifications which 
 have gradually extended themselves over the entire 
 area of an immense site, without check or restraint, 
 without order, organization or coherency, by a process 
 of successive growth, decay, recuperation, and accretion 
 carried on for more than three thousand years. 
 
 To denote the composite and complex character of 
 this wholly unsystematic system, we have called it 
 ' Brahmanism and Hinduism,' but we have been 
 
 b 
 
xviii Preface, 
 
 careful to make it understood that these names are 
 not accepted by its own adherents (see p. 20). 
 
 Its present aspect may be compared to an immense 
 mosaic which, having had no one maker, has been 
 compacted together by a succession of artificers and 
 inlaid with every variety of strange and fanciful image. 
 Or rather perhaps may we liken it to a colossal edifice 
 formed by a congeries of heterogeneous materials, 
 without symmetry or unity of design — a vast, over- 
 grown, irregular structure — which, although often falling 
 into decay in its outlying extremities, still rises from 
 its ruins, still goes through repeated processes of 
 repair, still holds its own with obstinate pertinacity, 
 and still belies the expectations of those who are 
 looking for its downfall. 
 
 It will be readily admitted, then, that the duty of 
 finding my way through such a confused congeries of 
 matter has been one requiring much time and labour. 
 
 But even more beset with difficulties has been the 
 task of trying to clear the way for others — of trying 
 to assist the investigations of students bent on pene- 
 trating the mysteries of Brahmanical philosophy, and 
 arriving at the inner meaning of forms, symbols, and 
 observances, which even the most pious Hindu is often 
 himself unable to explain, except by saying that they 
 have descended from his forefathers. 
 
 I need scarcely say, therefore, that my explanations 
 have been written under a deep sense of the respon- 
 sibility which these difficulties have laid upon me. 
 
 I have felt, indeed, that even the most profound 
 Orientalists who have never come in contact with the 
 
Preface. xix 
 
 Indian mind, except through the study of books or 
 possibly through making the acquaintance of a few 
 stray Indian travellers in European countries, commit 
 themselves to mischievous and misleading statements, 
 when they venture to dogmatize in regard to the 
 present condition — religious, moral, and intellectual — 
 of the inhabitants of India ; while, on the other hand, 
 the ablest men who have passed a great portion of their 
 lives in some one Indian province, without acquiring 
 any scholarlike knowledge of Sanskrit — the master- 
 key to Hindu religious thought — are liable to*4mbibe 
 very false notions in regard to- the real meaning of the 
 religious practices carried on before their eyes, and to 
 do serious harm if they attempt to propagate their 
 misapprehensions in books, pamphlets, and reviews. 
 
 The present volume, therefore, is not merely the 
 outcome of fifty years study of Sanskrit literature. It 
 is the result of my personal researches in India itself, 
 and is put forth from the vantage-ground of personal 
 contact and personal intercourse with the Hindus in 
 their own land. I have, during my tenure of the Boden 
 Professorship at Oxford, felt it my duty to visit India 
 three times, and to make three journeys through the 
 length and breadth of the entire peninsula from 
 Cashmere to Cape Comorin, from Bombay to the 
 confines of Tibet, 
 
 Possibly those who know my companion volume on 
 Buddhism (the 2nd edition of which was published last 
 year ^) may be disposed to inquire how it is that the 
 
 * ' Buddhism in its connexion with Brahmanism and Hinduism and in 
 its contrast with Christianity (John Murray, Albemarle Street).' 
 
 ba 
 
XX Preface. 
 
 present work has not as many oases in its desert of 
 dry matter. But it must be borne in mind that 
 Buddhism offers an unusual focus of interest in the 
 personal character and biography (however legendary) 
 of its founder; whereas Brahmanism and Hinduism 
 have no one central personality capable of attracting 
 the attention of general readers. Nevertheless, those 
 who work their way conscientiously and persistently 
 through all that I have here written will not fail, I 
 think, to find their fatigue alleviated by a few refresh- 
 ing and attractive episodes, if not by any very exten- 
 sive tracts of interesting and pleasant reading. 
 
 Perhaps I may draw especial attention to the later 
 chapters, beginning at Chapter xii. Perhaps, too, I 
 may here state that the chapters on modern Indian 
 Theists were submitted by me to the venerable 
 Debendra-nath Tagore himself, when I was staying at 
 Calcutta, and were revised by him in his own hand- 
 writing. 
 
 It will be seen at once that Chapters xxi and xxii 
 are almost entirely new, and a large number of additions 
 and improvements will be discovered in nearly every 
 page of the entire volume by any one who corhpares 
 this edition carefully with its predecessor. 
 
 Furthermore it will be observed that the Index 
 has been improved and enlarged in a corresponding 
 manner ; while at the same time, in almost every 
 case, the figures in the present Index suit the pagina- 
 tion of the previous editions. 
 
 In conclusion I may be permitted to repeat what I 
 stated in the Preface to the first edition, that the most 
 
Preface, xxi 
 
 cursory jperusal of the following pages will show that 
 
 my sympathy with the natives of our great Dependency 
 
 and my cordial appreciation of all that is good and true 
 
 in their own sacred literature (see p. 533) and in 
 
 their codes of morality, have not led me to gloss over 
 
 what is false and impure in their systems of belief and 
 
 objectionable in their social practices. 
 
 M. M.-W. 
 Enfield House, Ventnor, 
 October J 1 89 1. 
 
 NOTE. 
 
 The interesting portrait opposite to the title-page of this 
 volume requires some explanation. The portrait is also to 
 be found in my volume on Buddhism, but is only inserted 
 there to illustrate the connexion between Brahmanism and 
 Buddhism. It is really an engraving from an excellent 
 photograph of an eminent Brahman which was taken not 
 long ago at Bombay, and may be regarded as furnishing 
 good evidence of the fact that orthodox Brahmanism has 
 not yet died out in India. By referring to p. ^6<i it will be 
 seen that every Brahman, when he arrives at the fourth stage 
 of life, ought to become a Sannyasi — that is, to withdraw 
 from all active duties and devote the rest of his days to 
 religious meditation. The person represented was an able 
 prime minister of the native State Bhaunagar, and in conse- 
 quence of his eminence was created a C. S. I. by our Govern- 
 ment. He has recently retired from his high office and 
 become a Sannyasi. A Rudraksha rosary is suspended round 
 his neck (see p. 67). In front of his raised seat are various 
 ceremonial implements. Near the right-hand corner of his 
 
xxil Preface. 
 
 seat is a Kamandalu or water-gourd. In front of the seat, 
 on the right of the figure, is an Upa-patra or subsidiary 
 vessel used with the Kamandalu. In the middle is the 
 Tamra-patra or copper vessel for containing the water used 
 at the perfofmance of ceremonies, and on the left is the 
 Paflca-patra for tlie purifying water measured out with the 
 Adamani, or spoon used at Acainana (see p. 40a). Near 
 the left-hand corner are the wooden clogs. In his left hand 
 is the Danda or staff called Sudarsana. It is a mystical 
 weapon employed against evil spirits and consists of a 
 bamboo with six knots. The mystic white roll, which begins 
 above the left hand and ends before the fifth knot, is called 
 the Lakshml-vastra. The projecting piece of cloth, folded 
 in the form of an axe (Parasu), represents the weapon of 
 Parasu-rama (see pp. no, 370) with which he subdued the 
 enemies of the Brahmans. 
 
 With reference to p. 460, I am informed by Mr. William 
 Crooke, of the Bengal Civil Service, that in Upper India 
 the village potter (Kumbhar, KumharJ is ' very low in social 
 rank. He is one of the begar or persons bound to contribute 
 their productions to visitors free of charge.' 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 INTRODU-CTORY OBSERVATIONS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Three principal stages or phases of the Hindu religion. Defini- 
 tion of Vedism, Brahmanism, and Hinduism. First seat of the 
 Aryans. Origin of religion among the primitive Aryans. Worship 
 of natural objects i-6 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Vedism. 
 
 Four Vedas. Gods of the Veda. Ideas expressed by the term 
 sacrifice. Use of Soma plant. Animal sacrifice. Remarkable hymns 
 of the Veda. Examples of hymns. Social condition of the people 7-19 
 
 chapter'ii. 
 
 Brahmanism. • 
 
 Four phases. I. Ritualistic Brahmanism. Development of the 
 idea of sacrifice. II. Philosophical Brahmanism. Upanishads. 
 Sutras. Subtle and gross bodies. Sankhya philosophy. Vedanta. 
 Tri-unity of entities. Three corporeal envelopes. Vedanta and 
 Sankhya systems compared. Nyaya philosophy. Metempsychosis. 
 III. Mythological Brahmanism. Buddhism. Tri-murti. Descents 
 of Vishnu. IV. Nomistic Brahmanism. Three codes of law . 20-53 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 HiNDtJisM. General Observations. 
 
 Distinction between Brahmanism and Hinduism. The philoso- 
 pher Sahkara. Inter-relationship and distinction between Saivism 
 and Vaishnavism. Six principal sects. Doctrine of incarnation. 
 Saiva and Vaishnava marks. Rosaries. Symbols and images 54-72 
 
xxiv Contents. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Saivism. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Definition of Saivism. Worship of Rudra-Siva. Description of 
 Siva. Saiva sects. Ceremonies performed at Walkesvar temple. 
 Ceremonies performed at Bhuvanesvara temple . . . 73~94 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Vaishnavism. 
 
 Chief characteristics of Vaishnavism. Tolerance. Religious credu- 
 lity. Incarnations of Vishnu. Vaishnava sects. Initiation. Sect 
 founded by Ramanuja. Two antagonistic parties. Privacy in eating. 
 Sect founded by Madhva. Common ground with Christianity. Sect 
 founded by Vallabha. Profligacy of Vallabha Maharajas. Sect 
 founded by Caitanya. Four leaders. Ceremonies at a Vaishnava 
 temple, Poona 95~I4S 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Vaishnavism. Minor Sects and Reforming Theistic Movements. 
 
 Sects founded by Nimbarka; by Ramananda ; by Svami-Narayana. 
 Interview between Bishop Heber and Svami-Narayana. Temples at 
 Wartal and Ahmedabad. Svami-lSIarayana's Directory. Theistic 
 sect founded by Kabir. Examples of his precepts. Sikh sect 
 founded by Nanak. Features of his teaching. Antagonism between 
 Sikhs and Muhammadans. Govind founder of Sikh nationality. 
 Deification of the Sikh bible. Examples of precepts. Metempsy- 
 chosis. Govind's shrine at Patna. Golden temple at Amritsar 146-179 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 Worship of the female principle. Two systems. Mysticism. 
 Mother-goddesses. Devi. Kali. Initiation. Wine-drinking. Mantras, 
 Bijas, spells. Mystic diagrams. Amulets, gestures. Tantras . 180-208 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Tutelary and Village Deities. 
 
 Ganesa and Su-brahmanya. Ayenar. Hanuman. Monkey-wor- 
 ship. Duality in unity. Worship of Mothers. Pantheism. Special- 
 ities of the Mothers of Gujarat 209-229 
 
Contents. xxv 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 PACE 
 
 Seven upper and seven lower worlds. Nature and differences of 
 demons. Corporeal organization. Two grand divisions. Triple 
 classification. Methods of neutralizing influences of demons. Men- 
 demons. Demons in the South and West. Devil-dances. Struc- 
 tures connected with devil-worship. Bishop Caldwell on the Shanars. 
 Devil-expulsion. Incantations. Evil eye. Charms, amulets. 
 Sorcery 230-256 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 Hero-worship and Saint-worship. 
 
 No limit to deification of great men. Rama and Krishna. Local 
 deifications. Vithoba; Tuka-rama; Khando-ba; Jnanesvara; Datta- 
 treya; Svami-Narayana. Other examples. Parasu-rama, or Rama 
 with the axe. Five Pandava princes ; Karna . . . 257-273 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 Universal prevalence of homage to the dead. Object of Hindu 
 funeral rites. Ceremonies in Vedic times, and as prescribed by 
 Asvalayana. Other rules for funeral rites. Bone-gathering ceremony. 
 Sraddha ceremonies. Modern practice of funeral and Sraddha cere- 
 monies. Character and functions of Yama, god of death. Descrip- 
 tion of the treatment undergone by a deceased man subject to Yama. 
 Pindas offered to form an intermediate body. Ceremonies to secure 
 immunity from future punishment. Twenty-one different Hells. 
 River Vaitarani. Bone-gathering ceremony at Bombay. Sraddha 
 ceremonies. Sraddhas distinguished under twelve heads. Sraddha 
 for a recently deceased parent. Sraddhas at Gaya. Pindas or balls 
 of rice and milk 274-312 
 
 CHAPTER. XII. 
 
 Worship of Animals, Trees, and Inanimate Objects. 
 
 Motives for worshipping animals. Metempsychosis. Worship of 
 cows and bulls ; of serpents ; ofNagas; of Snakes; of Monkeys and 
 various animals. Marriage of animals. Worship of trees and 
 plants ; of the Tulasi ; of the Pippala ; of the Bilva tree. Marriage 
 of trees. Worship of natural objects; of sun, moon, planets, 
 water, mountains, rocks, stones .... . . . 3i3"3So 
 
xxvi Contents. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 The HiNDtj Religion in Ancient Family-life. ■^ 
 
 PAGE 
 
 No congregational religion. Domestic religion and usages super- 
 intended by Brahmans. Twelve purificatory rites. Importance of 
 a son. Initiation. The sacred thread, y Four stages of a Brahman's 
 life. Ancient marriage-ceremonial. Ancient fire-worship. Ancient 
 sacrificial rites. Soma-sacrifices 3SI~369 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 The Hindu Religion in Modern Family-life. 
 
 Name-giving ceremony. Birth-record and Horoscopes. Shaving 
 and tonsure-rite. Betrothal. Initiation. Marriage ceremonies. 
 Wedding of Sir Mangaldas Nathoobhai's sons. Choice of profession. 
 Status of women. Three objects of human life. The model wife 370-389 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Religious Life of the Orthodox Hindu Householder. 
 
 Description of a modern Hindu house. Some Vedic rites still 
 maintained. A Brahman's daily duties. Dress. Sacredness of the 
 kitchen. Omens ; auspicious and inauspicious sights. Religious in- 
 feriority of women. Teeth-cleaning. Application of ashes. Morning 
 Sandhya service. Midday and Evening service. Brahma-yajiia 
 service. Tarpana service. Paiicayatana ceremony. Vaisvadeva 
 ceremony. Bali-harana ceremony. Dining. Prayer before eating 390-425 
 
 CHAPTER XVI, 
 
 Hindu Fasts, Festivals, and Holy Days. 
 
 Hindu powers of fasting. Special fasts. Makara-saiikranti. Va- 
 santa-pandami. Siva-ratri. Holi. Rama-navami. Naga-pandami. 
 Krishna-janmashtamT. Ganesa-(5aturthi. Durga-puja. Kall-puja. 
 Rama-llla, Divali. Illuminations. Karttika-purnima , , 426-433 
 
 CHAPTER XVII, 
 
 Temples, Shrines, and Sacred Places. 
 
 Benares described. Tanjore temple. Madura temple. RamesvUra. 
 Trichinopoly, Jambukesvara. Kanjivaram, Tinnevelly temples. 
 Jagan-nath in Orissa. SrI-rangam. Temple girls. Courtesans 434-45 1 
 
Contents. xxvii 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The four restrictions of Caste. Caste and occupations are part of 
 religion. State of trades and industries in India. Village communi- 
 ties. Tillers of soil. Village functionaries. Arts, jewelry, sculpture, 
 painting. Delicacy of Indian hand-work. Tyranny of caste; its 
 advantages and disadvantages 452-474 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 
 
 Theism no new doctrine in India. Life of Rammohun Roy. 
 His death at Bristol 475-490 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy's successors. 
 
 Dwarkanath Tagore. Debendra-nath Tagore. Adi Brahma- 
 Samaj. Keshab Chandar Sen. Brahma-Samaj of India. Sadha- 
 rana Brahma-Samaj. Arya-Samaj. Dayananda Sarasvati . 491-531 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 Examples of the moral precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism 532-554 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 Supplementary. 
 
 Worship of Brahma at Pushkara. ' Arrowy-bed ' form of self- 
 mortification. Account of the late Maharani of Nuddea's cremation. 
 Account of the daily Deya-piija of the Maharaja of Dholpur. Ac- 
 count of the customs and religious tenets of the Santals. Con- 
 clusion S5S~S86 
 
 Index 587-603 
 
 CORRECTIONS. 
 
 Page 44, 1. 19 from top, strike out the word 'note ' 
 
 53) !• 9 froni bottom, for 'Sannyasi' read 'SannyasI'. (In a few other 
 instances the long mark has dropped out.) 
 „ 451. Strike out Sacred .Symbols from the Heading. 
 
TABLE OF 
 SYSTEM OF TRANSLITEKATION 
 
 USED IN THIS VOLUME 
 
 WITH 
 
 EQUIVALENT SANSKRIT LETTERS AND PRONUNCIATION. 
 
 YOWELS. 
 
 A, a, for ^, pronounced as in rural; /, a, for W, T, as in tar, father; 
 /, i, for^, r* in fJU; -?. h for t;,'\, as in police; U, u, for^, ^, as in fwll; 
 tj, u, for 'af, . , as in rade ; Bi, ri, for ^, . as in merrily; Bi, n, for ^, 
 as in marine ; B, e, for XT, , as in prey ; Ai, ai, foT% , as in aisle; 0, o, 
 for '^,'^, as in go ; Au, au, for ^, T, as in Haas (German) ; ti or m, for ', 
 i. e. the Anusvara, sounded like n in French mora, or like any nasal ; h, for ',, 
 i. e. the Visarga or a distinctly audible aspirate. 
 
 CONSONANTS. 
 
 K, k, for ^, pronounced as in iill, seeA ; Kh, hh, for ^, almost as in 
 iniAorn ; G, g, for ^, as in ^un, do^r ; Gh, gh, for ToJ^, almost as in lo^Aut; 
 N, h, for ^, as in sing (siii). 
 
 C, 6, for '^j as in dolffe (in music), = English ch in chuxah, hitch (hai); 
 Ch, dh, for ^, almost as in churcAAill (durfffeiU) ; J, j, for ^^, as in^et; Jh, 
 jh, for 5 , almost as in herfffe-iog (he/Aog) ; N, n, for af, as in singe (sin;). 
 
 T, t, for "Z, as in frue (fru) ; Th, th, for ^i almost as in an^Ml (anfAill) ; 
 P, d, for ^3, as in rfrum (rfrum) ; Dh, dh, for S, almost as in redAaii-ed 
 (re6?Aaired) ; N, n, for TJ^, as in none {nun). 
 
 T,- t, for ([^, as in waier (as pronounced in Ireland) ; Th, th, for ^ , 
 almost as in unt-hodk (but more dental) ; D, d, for ^, as in dice (more like 
 th in this) ; Dh, dh, for ^, almost as in arfAere (more dental) ; N, n, for •^^, 
 as in not, \n. 
 
 P, p, for 'H^, as in put, sip ; Ph, ph, for t^, almost as in upAill ; B, b, for 
 ^^, as in Jear, ru6 ; Bh, bh, for H, almost as in aJAor ; M, m, for H^, as in 
 map, jam. 
 
 Y, y, for ^, as in yet ; B, r, for '^, as in red, year ; L, I, for "51 , as in 
 ^ie; V, V, for ^, as in vie (but like w after consonants, as in twice). 
 
 S, s, for 'J^, as in sure, session ; Sh, sh, for 'B[_, as in shun, husA ; S, s, 
 for ^, as in sir, hiss. H, h, for % as in hit. 
 
 Note that the above system difFers in one or two trifling points from 
 that used in my ' Practical Grammar of the Sanskrit Language,' fourth 
 edition, published by the Delegates of the University Press, Oxford, and 
 from that used in my Sanskrit-English Dictionary, published by the same. 
 
BRAHMANISM and HINDUISM. 
 
 Introductory Observations. 
 
 The present work is intended to meet the wants of those 
 educated Englishmen who may be desirous of gaining an 
 insight into the mental, moral, and religious condition of the 
 inhabitants of our Eastern empire, and yet are quite unable 
 to sift for themselves the confused mass of information — 
 accurate and inaccurate — spread out before them by writers 
 on Indian subjects. It will be seen that its aim is to present 
 trustworthy outlines of two important phases of religious 
 thought in India, namely, Brahmanism and Hinduism, as 
 based on the Veda and the other sacred books of the Hindus. 
 It is a companion to my volume on Buddhism \ and these two 
 works will, I hope, be followed by one embodying what I have 
 already written on Zoroastrianism and Muhammadanism. It 
 is my desire to give a clear sketch of the most remarkable 
 features of all these systems, and to note some of the chief 
 points in which they may be contrasted with Christianity. 
 
 Having been a student of Indian sacred literature for jiearly 
 fifty years, and having thrice tray.elled-aver- every part of 
 India, from Bombay to Calcutta, from Cashmere to Ceylon, 
 I may possibly hope to make a' dry subject fairly attractive 
 without any serious sacrifice of scientific accuracy, while 
 I strive at the same time to hold the scales impartially be- 
 tween antagonistic religious systems and, as far as possible, 
 to do justice to the amount of truth that each may contain. 
 
 ' Published by Mr. Murray (Albemarle Street) in 1890 (and edit.)., 
 
 B 
 
2 Introductory Observations. 
 
 Brahmanism and Hinduism may justly claim our earnest 
 consideration, not only for the reason that about two hundred 
 millions of the population of India are adherents of these 
 systems, but because of the intricacy of the doctrines con- 
 tained in them and the difficulty of making them intelligible 
 to European minds. 
 
 With a view to greater perspicuity it is desirable to make use 
 of the word Vedism, as a convenient expression for the earliest 
 stage or phase in the development of Indian religious thought. 
 
 I. Vedism, then, wasjthe first form of t he religion of the 
 Indian branch of the great Aryan family — the form which 
 was represented in the songs, invocations, and prayers, col- 
 lectively called Veda, and attributed to the Rishis, or sup- 
 posed inspired leaders of religious thought and life in India. 
 It was the worship of the deified forces or phenomena of 
 Nature, such as Fire, Sun, Wind, and Rain, which were 
 sometimes individualized or thought of as separate divine 
 powers, sometimes gathered under one general conception 
 and personified, though in a very vague way, as one God. 
 
 II. Brahmanism grew out of Vedism. It teaches the 
 identification of all the forces and phenomena of Nature with 
 one spiritual Being — the only real Entity — which, when un- 
 manifested and impersonal, is called Brahma (neut.) ; when 
 manifested as a creator, is called Brahma (masc.) ; as a dis- 
 integrator, Siva ; as a preserver, Vishnu ; and when manifested 
 in the highest order of men, is called Brahmana ('the Brah- 
 mans '). Brahmanism is rather a philosophy than a religion. 
 Its fundamental doctrine is spiritual Pantheism. Hence 
 Brahma is only a creator in the sense of being the first 
 Evolution out of the one Spirit, the evolution out of which all 
 other evolutions have proceeded. He is not a creator in the 
 sense of creating the world out of nothing. The only Creator 
 or, more correctly, Evolver, is the neuter entity called Brahma, 
 the source of all created things. I Hence according to the Sata- 
 patha-brahmana (XI. 2, 3, i etc.) we find it stated : — 
 
Introductory Observations. 3 
 
 ' In the beginning Brahma was this (universe). He created 
 gods. Having created gods, he placed them in these worlds. 
 Having gone to the most excellent worlds he considered : 
 How can I pervade all these worlds ? He then pervaded 
 them with form and with name. He who knows these two 
 great, manifestations of Brahma becomes himself a great 
 manifestation.' (Muir's Texts, v. 388.) / 
 
 III. Hinduism ^rew out of Brahmanism. It is Brah- 
 manism, so to speak, nm to seed and spread out into a 
 confused tangle of divine personalities and incarnations. The 
 one system is the rank and luxuriant outcome of the other. 
 Hinduism is chiefly to be distinguished from Brahmanism 
 in this — that it takes scant account of the primordial, im- 
 personal Essence Brahma, as well as of its first personal 
 manifestation Brahma ; but honours, in place of both, the 
 two popular personal deities Siva and Vishnu l(pp. 54, 73)- { ^^ 
 it noted, however, that Hinduism includes Brahmanism." It 
 is indeed a somewhat unsatisfactory term. Unhappily there 
 is no other expression sufficiently comprehensive to embrace 
 that all-receptive, all-absorbent system, which, without any one 
 Founder, was the product of Brahmanism amplified by contact 
 with its own offspring Buddhism, and with various pre-existing 
 cults. Hinduism is Brahmanism modified by the creeds and 
 superstitions of Buddhists jjjd-Non-Aryan^ races of all kinds, 
 including TJrlividian^^-^larianife, and'^^rhaps pre-Kolarian 
 aborigines. li-haseven been rnedffied by ideasTinported from 
 tji^ religions of later conquering races, such as Islam and 
 Christianity. 
 
 I propose therefore to trace the gradual development of 
 Indian religious thought through these three phases which 
 really run into and overlap each other. In so doing I shall 
 examine it, as in fairness every religion ought to be 
 examined, from the point of view of its best as well as of 
 its worst side. 
 
 But I ought to premise that the mass of the Hindus think 
 
 B a 
 
4 Introductory Observations. 
 
 far more, about the observance of caste-rules and social cus- 
 toms and the propitiation of local deities and evil demons than 
 about any of the theological creeds excogitated by their reli- 
 gious teachers. Hinduism with the masses is little more than 
 a system of social rules and local superstitions. 
 
 It is probable that one of the earliest homes (if not the 
 first seat^) of the members of the great Aryan family was 
 in the high land surrounding the sources of the Oxus, to the 
 north of the point connecting the Hindu Kush with the 
 Himalayas. The highest part of this region is called the 
 Pamir plateau, and, like the table-land of Tibet, with which 
 it is connected by a lofty ridge, it well deserves the title ot 
 'the roof of the world' {bam-i-dunya). The hardy inhabit- 
 ants of these high-lands were a pastoral and agricultural 
 race, and soon found themselves straitened for i^oom within 
 the limits of their mountain tracts. With the increase of 
 population they easily spread themselves westwards towards 
 Balkh, and southwards, through the passes of Afghanistan on 
 the one side and Cashmere on the other, into Northern India. 
 
 There they developed high mental capacities and moral 
 feelings. They possessed great powers of appreciating the 
 magnificent phenomena of nature. They were endowed with 
 a deep religious sense — a consciousness of their dependence 
 on the invisible forces which regulated the order of the world. 
 They were fitly called 'noble' {dry a), and they spoke a lan- 
 guage which was ultimately called ' polished ' or ' carefully 
 constructed ' [Sanskrita). 
 
 To trace the origin of religion among such a people requires 
 no curious metaphysical hypotheses. We have only to ask 
 ourselves what would be the natural working of their devo- 
 tional instincts, unguided by direct revelation. Their material 
 
 _ ' According to Dr. Schrader's theory the cradle-land of the primitive 
 Aryans was in the Steppes of Southern Russia. Others place it in 
 Northern Europe. Others dispute both theories, and hold to the old 
 idea of ' somewhere in Central Asia.' I also hold to the old idea. 
 
Introductory Observations. 5, 
 
 welfare depended on the influences of sky, air, light, and sun 
 (sometimes fancifully imaged in the mind as emerging out of 
 an antecedent chaotic night); and to these they naturally 
 turned with awe and veneration. Soon all such phenomena 
 were believed to be animated by intelligent wills. At first 
 the relationship between spirit, mind, and matter was im- 
 perfectly apprehended. Whatever moved was believed to 
 possess life, and with life was associated power. Hence 
 light, fire, air, and storrn were thought of as mysterious 
 forces, whose favour required propitiation. Next they re- 
 ceived homage under the general name of Devas, ' luminous 
 ones.' Then, just as men found themselves obliged to submit 
 to some earthly leader, so they naturally assigned supre- 
 macy to one celestial being called the 'light-father' (Dyu- 
 pitar, Dyaus, Zevs iraTrip, Jupiter). Or, again, a kind of pre- 
 eminence was accorded to the all-investing sky or atmo- 
 sphere (Varuna, Ovpavos), the representative of an eternal 
 celestial Presence watching men's actions, and listening to 
 their words by night as well as by day. Then of course 
 closely connected with light and sky was the actual orb of the 
 Sun called Mitra, often associated with another aspect of the 
 Sun, Aryaman, whose influences fertilized lands, enriched 
 pastures, and fructified crops. 
 
 Then other phenomena, connected with Sun and fire (Agni, 
 Latin Ignis), such as the dawn (Ushas, 'Hcis, Aurora), and Ida 
 or Ira (Iris), were by degrees regarded with varying degrees 
 of veneration. They all had narnes which still exist under 
 diff'erent modifications among different branches of the Aryan 
 stock, leading us to infer that they were among the most 
 ancient objects held sacred in the original abode of the Aryan 
 race, before the several members of the family separated. 
 
 There is even ground for conjecturing that triads of natural 
 objects, such as Sky, Atmosphere, and Sun, or three forms 
 of the Sun, called Aryaman, Varuna, and Mitra, were asso- 
 ciated together and worshipped by the primitive Aryans in 
 
6 Introductory Observations. 
 
 the earliest times. It is certain that the Aryan race, from 
 the first development of its religious sense on the soil of 
 India, has shawn a tendency to attach a sacred significance 
 to the number three, and to group the objects of its adoration 
 in triple combinations. 
 
 Not that the nascent religious ideas of a people naturally 
 devout were regulated or circumscribed in ancient times by 
 any definite rules or precise limitations. The objects and 
 forces of nature received homage in different ways — some- 
 times singly, as if impelled by separate and independent 
 wills ; sometimes in groups, as if operating co-ordinately ; 
 sometimes collectively, as if animated and pervaded by one 
 dominating Spirit — the maintainer of law and order in the 
 Universe. 
 
 As to the form of worship, that, too, was a natural process 
 not yet burdened by tedious ceremonial observances. When 
 men had personified and deified the forces with which they 
 were surrounded, they gave them characters like their own. 
 They attributed to them human tastes, likings, and predilec- 
 tions. They propitiated them by praise and flattery, accom- 
 panying their hymns and invocations with such presents and 
 offerings of food and drink as would be deemed acceptable 
 among themselves, and would be needed for the maintenance 
 of their own vigour and vitality. 
 
 Perhaps the earliest and commonest offerings were rice and 
 clarified butter. Then the exhilarating juice of the Soma 
 plant, afterwards an essential ingredient in both Aryan and 
 Iranian sacrifices, was used as a libation. But the form of 
 worship, like the creed of the worshipper, was unfettered by 
 precise rule or ritual. Each man satisfied his own religious 
 instincts, according to his own conception of the character of 
 the supernatural being or beings on whose favour his welfare 
 was thought to depend. 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 Vedism. 
 
 So much has been of late years written and spoken about 
 the Veda, that to go minutely into this subject would be, 
 according to a Hindu saying, ' to grind ground corn.' 
 
 When the Indian branch of the Aryan family settled down 
 in the land of the seven rivers {Sapta Sindku, cf. Rig-veda X. 
 75, Zend Hapta Hendu), now called the Panjab, about the 
 fifteenth century B. c, their religion was still nature-worship. 
 It was still adoration of the forces everywhere in operation 
 around them for production, destruction, and reproduction. 
 But it was physiolatry developing itself more distinctly into 
 forms of Anthropomorphism, Polytheism, Theism, and Pan- 
 theism. The phenomena of nature were thought of as some- 
 thing more than radiant beings, and something more than 
 powerful forces. To the generality of worshippers they were 
 more distinctly concrete personalities, and had more personal 
 attributes. They were addressed as kings, fathers, guardians, 
 friends, benefactors, guests. They were invoked in formal 
 hymns and prayers (mantras), in set metres (chandas). 
 
 Thes e hymns were composed in an early form- of the 
 (Sanskrit language, at different times — perhaps during several 
 cenTurles, from the fifteenth to the tenth B.C. — by men of light 
 and leading (Rishis) among the Indo- Aryan immigrants, who 
 were afterwards held in the highest veneration as patriarchal 
 saints. Eventually the hymns were believed to have been 
 directly revealed to, rather than composed by, these Rishis, 
 and were then called divine knowledge (Veda), or the eternal 
 word heard (Sruti), and transmitted by them. 
 
8 Vedism. 
 
 These Mantras or hymns were arranged in three principal 
 collections of continuous texts (Samhitas). The first and 
 earliest was called the Hymn-Veda (Rig-veda). It was a 
 collection of 1017 hymns, arranged for mere reading or re- 
 citing. This was the first bible of the Hindu religion, and 
 the special bible of Vedism. We might imagine it possible 
 to have collected the most ancient hymns and psalms of our 
 own Sacred Scriptures in the same manner. 
 
 The second, or Sacrificial Veda (Yajur), belongs to the sacri- 
 ficial phase of the Vedic system. 1 1 was a liturgical arrangement 
 of part of the same collection of hymns, with additions ^ for 
 intoning in a peculiar low tone at sacrificial ceremonies. Be 
 it noted, however, that some of the hymns of the Rig-veda 
 (for example, the horse-sacrifice or Asva-medha hymn, I. i6a) 
 presuppose a ritual already definite and systematized. 
 
 The third, or Chant- Veda (Sama), was another liturgical 
 arrangement of some of the same hymns for chanting at par- 
 ticular sacrifices in which the juice of the Soma plant was the 
 principal offering (pp. la ; 368). 
 
 A fourth collection — which might suitably be called the Spell- 
 Veda — was added at a later period. It was a collection of hymns 
 — some of them similar to those of the Rig-veda, but the greater 
 part original — composed by a particular class of priests called 
 Atharvans^- Many of the texts and formularies of this 
 Atharva-veda were ultimately used as charms and spells, and 
 are still so used in various parts of India. 
 
 By some of the earliest hymn-composers the gods continued 
 to be regarded as one jamily — children of the old pre-Vedic 
 heavenly father (Dyo or Dyaus), while Earth (Prithivi) was 
 fabled as a divine mother. To other sacred poets the pre- 
 
 ^ Certain passages in prose were added, which were especially called 
 Yajus. 
 
 ^ This was a generic name for a class of priests, descended from a man 
 named Atharvan, who appears to have been the first to institute the 
 worship of fire, before the Indians and Iranians separated. It is certain 
 that particular priests both in India and Persia were called Atharvans. 
 
Vedism. 9 
 
 Vedic deification of the Sky (Varuna, Ovpavos) remained a 
 principal object of adoration. He was still occasionally- 
 exalted to the position of a Supreme Being. A well-known 
 hymn in the Atharva-veda (IV. 16) describes him as ruling 
 the world, as penetrating the secrets of all hearts, as detecting 
 the plots of wicked men, as sending down countless mes- 
 sengers who for ever traverse the earth and scan its inmates, 
 as numbering every wink of men's eyes, as wielding the whole 
 universe in the manner of a gamester handling dice. 
 
 But the true gods of the Veda constituted a triad of 
 deities. They were the F«;e-god (the earth-born Agni), the 
 Rain-god (the air-born Indra), and the Sun-god (the sky-born 
 Surya or Savitri, pp. 19; 341) — one forTaich of the three 
 worlds, earth, air, and sky (bhur, bhuvah, svar). These three 
 were the special objects of worship of the early Indo-Aryans. 
 All their other principal deities were either modifications of, 
 or associated with, one or other of the members of this Vedic 
 triad. For example, the wind (Vayu) and the storm-gods 
 (Maruts), led by the destroying god (Rudra), were regarded 
 as intimate associates of the Rain-god Indra, and were really 
 only forms and modifications of that god. On the other hand, 
 the ancient Aryan deities, Varuna and Mitra, with Vishnu, 
 were all mere forms of the Sun (Surya or Savitri, also called 
 Pushan). Of course the Dawn (Ushas) was also connected-^ 
 with the Sun, and two other deities, the Asvins — probably 
 personifications of two luminous points in the sky^were fabled 
 as his twin sons, ever young and handsome, travelling in a 
 golden car as precursors of the Dawn. 
 
 As to the Fire-god (Agni), he had various attributes sig- 
 nificant of his interest in the world of human beings. He was 
 God on the' earth and therefore more accessible than other 
 deities. He was manifested by the friction of the two pieces 
 of the sacred fig-tree called Arani, and consequently always 
 to be found at hand. He was visibly present in every house- 
 hold. He was man's domestic friend, the father of the sacrifice. 
 
lo Vedisnt. 
 
 the mediator between men and gods, the bearer of hymns and 
 prayers from every family altar upwards towards heaven. 
 
 Fire, in fact, may be regarded as the next god to the Rain- 
 god in the estimation of Vedic worshippers ; and certainly he 
 takes precedence over every other god in connection with 
 sacrificial rites. Even the Sun-god, who is generally first in 
 all Pagan systems, is held to be a form of heavenly fire. Fire 
 has always been an object of veneration among all nations. 
 
 A conjecture may even be hazarded that the three letters 
 A, U, M, which combine to form the sacred syllable Om— 
 afterwards typical of the Brahmanical triad (pp. 44 ; 403)— 
 were originally the initial letters of the names of Fire, Wind, 
 and Sun, i. e. Agni, Vayu or Varuna (for Indra), and Mitra. 
 It must not be forgotten, however, that both Indra and Agni 
 were, like Varuna, often addressed as if each deity were 
 supreme. Moreover, the god of fire was sometimes held to 
 possess a kind of triple essence in himself, consisting of terres- 
 trial fire, celestial lightning, and solar heat. Sometimes he 
 represented a simple creative energy, which evolved all things 
 out of its own eternal essence. 
 
 There are allusions, too, in the Rig-veda to thirty-three 
 gods (I. 34. II ; I. 45. 3), or to the three groups consisting of 
 eleven Rudras, eight Vasus, and twelve Adityas with Heaven 
 and Earth. Their names are given variously, but they are little 
 more than modifications of the three leading personifications. 
 
 Only two or three instances occur of Vedic deities who 
 stand alone. One of the most remarkable is Yama, god of 
 departed spirits. It is noteworthy that the spirits of departed 
 ancestors (Pitris) who have attained to heavenly bliss, are 
 believed to occupy three different stages of blessedness, — the 
 highest inhabiting the upper sky, the middle the intermediate 
 air, and the lowest the atmospheric region near the earth. 
 Adoration is to be offered them, and they are presided over 
 by Yama, leader of the spirits of the dead, both good and bad. 
 
 The earliest legends represent Yama as the first of created 
 
Vedisnt. 
 
 II 
 
 men (his twin-sister being Yami) and the first of men who 
 died. Hence he is supposed to guide the spirits of other 
 men who die to the world of spirits. Sometimes Death is 
 said to be his messenger ; he himself dwelling in celestial light 
 to which the departed are brought, and where they enjoy his 
 society and that of the patriarchs. In the later mythology he 
 is Judge of the dead and punisher of the wicked (p. 389). In 
 the Veda he has no such office,— but he has two terrific dogs, 
 with four eyes, which guard the way to his abode (p. 17). 
 
 In brief, enough has been said to show that the early 
 religion of the Indo-Aryans was a development of a still 
 earlier belief in man's subjection to the powers of nature 
 and his need of conciliating them. It was an unsettled 
 system which according to one view assigned all the pheno- 
 mena of the universe to one Cause ; or again, attributed them 
 to several Causes operating independently ; or again, supposed 
 the whole visible creation to be a manifestation of one 
 universal all-pervading spirit. It was a belief which, accord- 
 ing to the character of the worshipper, was now mere animism, 
 now monotheism, now tritheism, now polytheism, now pan- 
 theism. But it was not yet idolatry. Though the forces 
 of nature were thought of as controlled by divine persons, 
 such persons were not yet idolized. There is no evidence 
 from the Vedic hymns that images were actually worshipped, 
 though they appear to have been occasionally employed ^. 
 
 The mode of divine worship continued to be determined 
 from a consideration of human likings and dislikings. Every 
 worshipper praised the gods because he liked to be praised 
 himself. He honoured them with offerings because be liked 
 to receive presents himself. He pretended to feed tbem be- 
 cause he required food himself This appears to have been 
 the simple origin of the sacrificial system — a system which was 
 afterwards closely interwoven with the whole Hindu religion. 
 
 ' For example, in Rig-veda II. 33. 9 an image of Rudra is alluded to ; 
 and in I. 25. 13, V. 52. 15, visible forms of some kind seem implied. 
 
12 
 
 Vedism. 
 
 What, then, were the various ideas' expressed by the term 
 sacrifice? In its purest and simplest form' it denoted a dedi- 
 cation of some simple gift as an expression of gratitude for 
 blessings received. Soon the act of ' making sacred ' became 
 an act of propitiation for purely selfish ends. The favour of 
 celestial beings who were capable of conferring good or 
 inflicting harm on crops, flocks, and herds, was conciliated' 
 by offerings and oblations of all kinds, and especially of the 
 products of the soil. 
 
 With this idea the gods were invited to join the every-day 
 family meal. Then they were invoked at festive gatherings, 
 and off'ered a share of the food consumed. Their bodies 
 were believed to be composed of ethereal particles, dependent 
 for nourishment on the invisible elementary essence of the 
 substances presented to them, and to be furnished with senses 
 capable of being gratified by the aroma of butter and grain 
 offered in fire (homa)^; and especially by the fumes arising 
 from libations of the exhilarating juice extracted from the 
 Soma plant. 
 
 This plant — botanically known as Sarcostema Viminalis, or 
 Asciepias Acida, a kind of creeper with a succulent leafless stem 
 — which was indigenous in the ancient home of the Aryans, as 
 well as in the soil of India and Persia, supplied an invigorating 
 beverage supposed to confer health and immortality, and held 
 to be the vital sap which vivified the world. Hence its juice 
 became an important ingredient at every sacrifice, and was the 
 subject of constant laudation in numerous Vedic hymns. It 
 was believed to be peculiarly grateful to the Rain-god (Indra), 
 while oblations of butter were specially presented to the god 
 of fire. Eventually the great esteem in which the Soma plant 
 was held led to its being itself personified and deified. The 
 god Soma was once the Bacchus of India. The whole, ninth 
 Book of the Rig-veda is devoted to his praise. 
 
 ' Compare Gen. viii. 21. 
 
Vedism. 1 3 
 
 And yet this sacred plant has fallen into complete neglect 
 in modern times. When I asked the Brahmans to procure 
 specimens of the true Soma for me, I was told that the sinful 
 condition of the world had caused the holy plant to cease 
 growing on earth, though it was to be found in heaven ^. 
 
 Nor were these the only offerings. In process of time, 
 animal sacrifice was introduced. At great solemnities goats 
 and other animals were killed by hundreds. Portions of the 
 flesh were consumed in the fire, and portions were eaten. 
 Gods, priests, and people feasted together. Of course all 
 offerings were accompanied with hymns of praise. A tedious 
 ceremonial was gradually added. The whole sacrificial service 
 was called Yajiia. By diligent performance of Yajna a man 
 gained admittance to Indra's heaven (Svarga, see p. 49). 
 
 I close this sketch of Vedism by citing portions of my 
 
 translations of a few remarkable hymns in the Rig-veda, as 
 
 given by me in ' Indian Wisdom.' One hymn (Mandala X. 
 
 129) describes the origin of creation thus : — 
 
 In the beginning there was neither nought nor aught; 
 
 Then there was neither sky nor atmosphere above. 
 
 What then enshrouded all this teeming universe? 
 
 In the receptacle of what was it contained? 
 
 Was it enveloped in the gulf profound of water ? 
 
 Then was there neither death nor immortality; 
 
 Then was there neither day, nor night, nor light, nor darkness, 
 
 Only the Existent One breathed calmly, self-contained. 
 
 Nought else but he there was — nought else above, beyond. 
 
 Then first came darkness hid in darkness, gloom in gloom; 
 
 Next all was water, all a chaos indiscrete, 
 
 In which the One lay void, shrouded in nothingness. 
 
 Then turning inwards, he by self-developed force 
 
 Of inner fervour and intense abstraction, grew. 
 
 First in his mind was formed Desire, the primal germ 
 
 Productive, which the Wise, profoundly searching, say 
 
 Is the first subtle bond, connecting Entity 
 
 And Nullity. 
 
 ' A creeper, said to be the true Soma, was pointed out to me by the 
 late Dr. Burnell in Southern India, and is still, I believe, used by those 
 orthodox Bra)imans in the Maratha country who attempt to maintain the 
 old Vedic worship. A specimen was given by me to the Indian Institute. 
 
14 Vedism. 
 
 In the foregoing hymn we detect the first dim outline of the 
 later philosophical theories, both Sankhyan and Vedantic. 
 
 The idea of the female principle as necessary to the act of 
 creation is also, as may be seen, vaguely implied — an idea 
 which gathered such strength subsequently that every prinr 
 cipal deity in the later mythology has his feminine counter- 
 part, who shares the worship paid to the male god, and who 
 sometimes receives the greater homage of the two. That 
 this idea is not fully developed in the Rig-veda is proved by 
 the fact that the wives of the chief gods, such as Indrani, 
 Agnayl, etc., are not associated with their husbands as objects 
 of worship, and even Lakshmi and SarasvatI, though named, 
 are not adored. 
 
 The next example from the i2ist hymn of the tenth 
 Mandala is often quoted to furnish an argument for main- 
 taining that the original faith of the Hindus was monotheistic. 
 The hymn is addressed to Hiranya-garbha, a form of the 
 Supreme Being, no doubt originally a personification of the 
 Sun. In the Vedanta philosophy, Hiranya-garbha represents 
 the third condition of the Supreme Spirit (see p. o^^). In 
 the later system he must be regarded as related to the God 
 Vishnu. He is thus described : — 
 
 What god shall we adore with sacrifice ? 
 
 Him let us praise, the golden child that rose 
 
 In the beginning, who was bom the lord — 
 
 The one sole lord of all that is — who made 
 
 The earth, and formed the sky, who giveth life, 
 
 Who giveth strength, whose bidding gods revere, 
 
 Whose hiding-place is immortality, 
 
 Whose shadow, death; who by his might is king 
 
 Of all the breathing, sleeping, waking world. 
 
 Where'er let loose in space, the mighty waters 
 
 Have gone, depositing a fruitful seed. 
 
 And generating fire, there he arose 
 
 Who is the breath and life of all the gods. 
 
 Whose mighty glance looks round the vast expanse 
 
 Of watery vapour— source of energy. 
 
 Cause of the sacrifice — the only God 
 
 Above the gods. 
 
Vedism. 1 5 
 
 The following is a portion of a well-known hymn to the 
 
 Sky-god (Varuna) from the Atharva-veda (IV. 16) : — 
 
 The mighty Varuija, who rules above, looks down 
 
 Upon these worlds, his kingdom, as if close at hand. 
 
 When men imagine they do aught by stealth, he knows it. 
 
 No one can stand, or walk, or softly glide along, 
 
 Or hide in dark recess, or lurk in secret cell, 
 
 But Varuna detects him, and his movements spies. 
 
 Two persons may devise some plot, together sitting. 
 
 And think themselves alone ; but he, the king, is there — 
 
 A third — and sees it all. His messengers descend 
 
 Countless from his abode, for ever traversing 
 
 This world, and scanning with a thousand eyes its inmates. 
 
 Whate'er exists within this earth, and all within the sky. 
 
 Yea, all that is beyond, king Varuna perceives. 
 
 The winkings of men's eyes are numbered all by him : 
 
 He wieldp the universe as gamesters handle dice. 
 
 Here follow portions of hymns addressed to the Vedic 
 
 triad. Firstly, the Fire-god (Agni) : — 
 
 Agni, thou art a sage, a priest, a king. 
 
 Protector, father of the sacrifice. 
 
 Commissioned by us men, thou dost ascend 
 
 A messenger, conveying to the sky 
 
 Our hymns and offerings. Though thy origin 
 
 Be threefold, now from air, and now from water. 
 
 Now from the mystic double Arani, 
 
 Thou art thyself a mighty god, a lord. 
 
 Giver of life and immortaUty ; 
 
 One in thy essence, but to mortals three ; 
 
 Displaying thine eternal triple form, 
 
 As fire on earth, as lightning in the air, ,: 
 
 As sun in heaven. Thou art the cherished guest 
 
 In every household— father, brother, son, 
 
 Friend, benefactor, guardian, all in one. 
 
 Deliver, mighty lord, thy worshippers, 
 
 Purge us from taint of sin, and when we die. 
 
 Deal mercifully with us on the pyre. 
 
 Burning our bodies with their load of guilt. 
 
 But bearing our eternal part on high 
 
 To luminous abodes and realms of bliss, 
 
 For ever there to dwell with righteous men. 
 
 Secondly, the Rain-god (Indra, afterwards lord of Svarga) :— 
 
 Indra, twin-brother of the god of fire. 
 When thou wast born, thy mother, Aditi, 
 
1 6 Vedism. 
 
 Gave thee, her lusty child, the thrilling draiight 
 Of mountain-growing Soma— source of life 
 And never-dying vigour to thy frame. 
 Thou art our guardian, advocate, and friend, 
 A brother, father, mother— all combined. 
 Most fatherly of fathers, we are thine, 
 And thou art ours. Oh ! let thy pitying soul 
 Turn to us in compassion when we praise thee, 
 And slay us not for one sin or for many. 
 Deliver us to-day, to-morrow, every day. 
 Vainly the demon ^ dares thy might, in vain 
 Strives to deprive us of thy watery treasures. 
 Earth quakes beneath the crashing of thy bolts. 
 Pierced, shattered lies the foe — his cities crushed, 
 His armies overthrown, his • fortresses 
 Shivered to fragments ; then the pent-up waters. 
 Released from long imprisonment, descend 
 In torrents to the earth, and swollen rivers, 
 ; Foaming and rolling to their ocean-home. 
 
 Proclaim the triumph of the Thunderer. 
 
 Thirdly, the Sun-god (Siirya, Rig-veda, I. 50) : — 
 
 Behold the rays of dawn, like heralds, lead on high 
 
 The Sun, that men may see the great all-knowing God. 
 
 The stars slink off like thieves, in company with Night, 
 
 Before the all-seeing eye, whose beams reveal his presence, 
 
 Gleaming like brilliant flames, to nation after nation. 
 
 Surya, with flaming locks, clear-sighted god of day. 
 
 Thy seven ruddy mares bear on thy rushing car. 
 
 With these thy self-yoked steeds, seven daughters of thy chariot, 
 
 Onward thou dost advance. To thy refulgent orb 
 
 Beyond this lower gloom, and upward to the light 
 
 Would we ascend, O Sun, thou god among the gods. 
 
 The thoughts contained in various hymns addressed to the 
 ' god of departed spirits ' (Yama, p. 11) are so remarkable that 
 a few are here given : — 
 
 To Yama, mighty king, be gifts and homage paid. 
 He was the first of men that died, the first to brave 
 Death's rapid rushing stream, the first to point the road 
 To heaven, and welcome others to that bright abode. 
 No power can rob us of the home thus won by thee. 
 
 \ n 
 
 ^ The demon Vritra, who is supposed to keep the waters imprisoned 
 in thick clouds. 
 
Vedism. 1 7 
 
 O king, we come; the born must die, must tread the path 
 That thou hast trod— the path by which each race of men. 
 In long succession, and our fathers, too, have passed. 
 Soul of the dead ! depart ; fear not to take the road — 
 The ancient road — by which thy ancestors have gone ; 
 Ascend to meet the god — to meet thy happy fathers. 
 Who dwell in bliss with him. Fear not to pass the guards — 
 The four-eyed brindled dogs — that watch for the departed. 
 Return unto thy home, O soul ! Thy sin and shame 
 Leave thou behind on earth ; assume a shining form^ 
 Thy ancient shape — refined and from all taint set free. 
 
 I add a few verses from the celebrated Purusha hymn (Rig- 
 veda, Mandala X. 90, as freely translated by me in another 
 work). It illustrates the intertwining of polytheism, mono- 
 theism, and pantheism. It also foreshadows the idea of sacri- 
 fice, as well as the institution of caste ^, which for so many 
 centuries has held India in bondage. The one Spirit is sup- 
 posed to take a body and then allow himself to be sacrificed. 
 
 The embodied spirit has a thousand heads, 
 
 A thousand eyes, a thousand feet, around 
 
 On every side enveloping the earth. 
 
 Yet filling space no larger than a span. 
 
 He is himself this very universe ; 
 
 He is whatever is, has been, and shall be ; 
 
 He is the lord of immortality. 
 
 All creatures are one-fourth of him, three-fourths 
 
 Are that which is immortal in the sky. 
 
 From him, called Purusha, was born Viraj, 
 
 And from Viraj was Purusha produced, 
 
 Whom gods and holy men made their oblation. 
 
 With Purusha as victim, they performed 
 
 A sacrifice. When they divided him. 
 
 How did they cut him up ? What was his mouth ? 
 
 What were his arms ? and what his thighs and feet ? 
 
 The Brahman was his mouth, the kingly soldier 
 
 Was made his arms, the husbandman his thighs, 
 
 The servile Sudra issued from his feet. 
 
 Further examples and a fuller account of the Veda will 
 be found in my book called ' Indian Wisdom.' The above 
 
 ^ This hymn (generally admitted to be a comparatively modern pro- 
 duction) is the only hymn in the Rig-veda which alludes to the distinctions 
 of caste. 
 
J g Vedism. 
 
 selected examples would, if taken alone, encourage a false 
 estimate of the merits of the Vedic hymns. Although the 
 majority of the Hindus believe that the four Vedas contain 
 all that is good, great, and divine, and although . many of 
 the hymns are to this day in constant daily use and form part 
 of the religious services of every orthodox Brahman (see pp. 
 403, 406), yet Vedic compositions will be found, when taken 
 as a whole, to abound more in puerile ideas than in lofty 
 conceptions. At the same time it is clear that they give 
 no support to any of the present objectionable usages and 
 customs for which they were once, through ignorance of 
 their contents, supposed to be an authority. The doctrine 
 of metempsychosis or transmigration of souls, which became 
 an essential characteristic of Brahmanism and Hinduism in 
 later times, is scarcely hinted at in the religion of the Veda^ 
 Nor do the hymns give any sanction to the prohibition of 
 widow-marriages, the general prevalence of child-marriages, 
 the tyrannical sway of caste, the interdiction of foreign travel, 
 and the practice of idolatry. 
 
 The social condition of the people, when the hymns were 
 composed, was marked by considerable civilization. They 
 were rich in flocks and herds ; they understood the principles 
 of agriculture ; they built towns and fortified places ; they 
 had some knowledge of arts and of working in metals ; they 
 engaged in philosophical speculations; they had political 
 rulers, and a high type of morality; they were separated 
 into classes, though they were not yet divided off by iron 
 barriers of caste ; polygamy existed, though monogamy was 
 the rule ; they killed animals for sacrifice ; they ate animal 
 food, and did not even object to the flesh of cows ; amoijg 
 their weaknesses was a fondness for gambling and intoxi- 
 cating beverages. 
 
 ^ Maijdala I. 164. 32 bahu-prajah is explained by bahu-jahma-bhak, 
 ' subject to many births ; ' but it may mean ' having abundant offspring.' 
 There is another text (VIII. loi. 14) beginning Praja ha tisro atyayam lyulj. 
 
Vedism. ig 
 
 And it is^>^ observed that, just as the children of 
 Israel foupd the lahd of Can^afi' pre-pccupied by Hittites, 
 Perizzite^ and PhilistbieSr^ the Arya"^ immigyaiffsTwhen 
 they^aflvanced into India, found the soh he^by previous 
 races, variously called Dravidas, Dasyus, Anaryas, Nishadas, 
 etc., and even by more primitive aboriginal tribes, contact 
 and intercourse with whom very soon affected them socially, 
 morally, and religiously. 
 
 Monsieur A. Barth^ comes to the conclusion that the 
 Vedic hymns give evidence of an exalted morality, and 
 draws attention to the fact that they acknowledge no wicked 
 divinities. 
 
 Worship of the gods was performed by sacrifice (yajiia), 
 invocation (avahana), prayer (prarthana), praise (stuti), and 
 meditation (upasana) ; and the name Brahman (nom. Brahma), 
 ultimately applied to the one Universal Spirit, was often 
 identified with Prayer. 
 
 Finally be it observed that the most sacred and the most 
 universally used of all Vedic prayers is that called Gayatrl, 
 or, as addressed to the Vivifying Sun-god, Savitrl : — 
 
 ' Let us meditate on that excellent glory of the Divine 
 Vivifying Sun ; may he enlighten our understandings ^.' This 
 is still a Brahman's daily prayer (see below, pp. 403, 406). 
 
 Yet the author, or, as a Brahman would say, the Seer 
 (Rishi), of this celebrated prayer was Visvamitra — a man 
 originally "of the Kshatriya or military caste, once opposed to 
 the Brahmanical. It should be noted that this Gayatri is 
 often personified and worshipped as identified with SarasvatI 
 and as the mother of the Vedas. 
 
 ' His work on the religions of India is excellent, but some of his 
 opinions are new. He sees no 'primitive natural simplicity' in the 
 hymns, and denies that the Vedas represent the general belief of a race. 
 
 ^ Tat jSavitur varenyam bhargo devasya dhimahi, Dhiyo yo nah 
 pracodayat (Rig-veda III. 62. 10). In my opinion the Sandhya (p. 401) 
 derives its name from the root dhi for dhyai, ' to meditate,' in this prayer. 
 
 C a 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 Brahmanism. 
 
 The second phase of Indian religious thought may be suit- 
 ably called Brahmanism. The Brahmans themselves would 
 reject such a title. They call their religion Arya-dharma, 
 'the religion of the Aryas' (or Vaidika-dharma, or Rishi-sam- 
 pradayo dharmah, Patanjali I. i. i). They of course regard 
 it as the only true religion, and have no difficulty in includ- 
 ing all other religions — such as Muhammadanism and even 
 Christianity — under it. 
 
 As Brahmanism was the outgrowth of Vedism, so it cannot 
 be separated from Vedism. Its development was gradual, 
 just as the development of Hinduism out of it was. Vedism, 
 Brahmanism, and Hinduism are all closely inter-connected. 
 
 It is interesting to trace the crystallization of the rudi- 
 mentary doctrines of Brahmanism into definite shape. In 
 Vedic times there was, as we have seen, a feeling after one 
 Supreme Being, if haply He might be found. The hymn- 
 composers gave expression to man's craving for some percep- 
 tion of the Infinite. To satisfy this craving they turned to 
 personifications of the Sky, Sun, Fire, Air, Water, Earth. 
 
 What the deepest thinkers, even at that early period, felt 
 with ever-increasing intensity was that a Spirit (Atman), 
 beyond the cognizance of sense, permeated and breathed 
 through all material things. They bethought them with 
 awe of this same Spirit vivifying their own bodies with 
 the breath of life^of this mysterious Presence enshrined in 
 their own consciences. Then they identified this same Spirit 
 with the divine afflatus thrilling through the imaginations 
 of their own hymn-composers — with the spiritual efficacy of 
 the hymns themselves, with the mystic power inherent in 
 divine knowledge and prayer. This mysterious, all-pervading, 
 
Ritualistic Brahmanism. 2 1 
 
 vague spiritual Power and Presence, which was wholly un- 
 bound by limitations of personality and individuality, became 
 at last a reality. This Breath of Life (Atman) received a 
 name. They called it Brahman |(nominative neuter Brahma, 
 from the root brih, ' to expand '), because it expanded itself 
 through all space. It was a pure essence which not only 
 diffused itself everywhere, but constituted everything. Men, 
 gods, and the visible world were merely its manifestations. 
 
 Such was the fundamental doctrine of Brahmanism. Such 
 was Brahmanism in its earliest origin. Soon, however, it 
 became a more complex system — a system which may be 
 regarded as possessing four sides, or rather four phases run- 
 ning into each other and nowhere separable by sharply 
 defined lines, namely (i) Ritualistic, (a) Philosophical, (3) 
 Mythological or Polytheistic, (4) Nomistic. 
 
 Ritualistic Brahmanism. 
 
 This phase of the Brahmanical system has for its special 
 bible the sacred treatises called Brahmanas, added to the 
 Mantra or Hymn portion of each Veda (for example, the 
 Aitareya, Satapatha, Tandya, and Gopatha Brahmanas added 
 to the Rig, Yajur, Sama, and Atharva Vedas respectively). 
 They consist of a series of rambling prose compositions, 
 the oldest of which may have been written seven or eight 
 centuries B. C. Their relationship to the Vedic hymns re- /' 
 sembles in some respects that of the book of Leviticus 
 to the Psalms in our own sacred Scriptures. They are an ^ 
 integral portion of the Veda, and are supposed to contain 
 that portion of divine knowledge or revelation particularly 
 adapted to serve as a directory for the Brahmans in the 
 conduct of the complicated sacrificial ceremonies. For if . 
 it was deemed necessary in the early Vedic period to pro- 
 pitiate and maintain the energies of nature by means of 
 invigorating offerings of food, it was clearly still more in- 
 cumbent on men to make offerings to these same forces when 
 
22 
 
 . Ritualistic Brahmanism. 
 
 personalized and endowed with forms acknowledged to be 
 perishable. In fact the necessity for sacrificial acts {karman) 
 to secure the favour of the gods became ingrained in the whole 
 Brahmanical system. Not even Jewish literature contains so 
 many words relating to sacrifice as the literature of the Brah- 
 mans. The due presentation of sacrificial offerings formed 
 ^ the very kernel of all religious service. Hymn, praise, and 
 prayer, preaching, teaching, and repetition of the sacred 
 words of scripture were only subsidiary to this act. Every 
 man throughout his whole life rested his whole hopes on 
 continually offering oblations of some kind to the gods, and 
 the burning of his body at death was held to be the last 
 offering of himself in fire (antya ishti or antyeshti). 
 
 But the idea of the great efficacy of sacrifice was developed 
 gradually. In the Brahmanical, as in the earlier system, the 
 first aim of sacrifice was to present a simple thank-offering. 
 The second aim was to nourish the gods with the essence of 
 the offered food (as with that of the Soma-juice, p. 369), and 
 so strengthen them for their duty of maintaining the uni- 
 verse. The next idea was that of making these oblations 
 the means of wresting boons from the invigorated and grati- 
 fied deities, and so accomplishing some specific earthly object, 
 such, for example, as the birth of a son. A still more am- 
 bitious idea was that of employing sacrifice as an instrument 
 for the attainment of superhuman powers and even exaltation 
 to heaven (svarga, see p. 49). 
 
 All this involved the elaboration of a complicated ritual, 
 and the organization of a regular hierarchy. To institute any 
 sacrificial rite (e.g. the Asvamedha, or the Jyotishtoma Soma- 
 sacrifices, Agnishtoma, Aptoryama, or that called Vajapeya, 
 ' strengthening drink,' p. 368), and to secure its being, con- 
 ducted with the proper intonation of innumerable hymns and 
 texts from the Veda, and the accurate observance of every 
 detail of an intricate ritual by a full complement of perhaps 
 sixteen different classes of priests, every one of whom received 
 
Ritualistic Brahmanism. 23 
 
 adequate gifts, was the great object of every pious Hindu's 
 highest ambition. Every ceremonial rite, too, had to be 
 performed with sankalpa, i.e. voluntarily, with earnest reso- 
 lution and conscious will. The whole course of prayer, 
 praise, ritual, and oblation — sometimes lasting for weeks and 
 even years — though called, as in Vedic times, Yajiia, ' sacri- 
 fice,' was very inadequately expressed by that term. It was 
 like an intricate piece of mechanism, or a chain of which 
 every link required to be complete and perfect in all its parts. 
 It could then effect anything. It was the great preservative 
 from all evil, the great maintainer of the energies of the 
 Universe, the great source of all benefits. It could procure 
 a whole line of sons and grandsons^, or secure admission 
 into Indra's heaven (svar, svarga, see p. 49), or even raise the 
 sacrificer to the level of the highest deities. It was believed 
 that the gods themselves had attained their celestial position 
 by performing sacrifices. ' By sacrifices,' says the Taittiriya- 
 brahmana, ' the gods obtained heaven.' 
 
 The most preposterous of all the ideas connected with the 
 sacrificial act was that of making it the instrument of creation. 
 In the Purusha hymn of the Rig-veda (X. 90) the gods are 
 represented as cutting up and sacrificing Purusha, the primeval 
 Male, and then forming the whole Universe from his head 
 and limbs (see p. 17). The Tandya-brahmana makes the lord 
 of creatures offer himself up as a sacrifice. Even Sacrifice 
 (Yajfia) itself was sometimes personified as a god. 
 
 Lastly, the shedding of blood was believed by some to 
 expiate sin. The victim consigned to the fire was thought to 
 be an expiation for sins committed by the gods, the fathers, 
 and men. Probably the idea was not so much that of killing 
 an innocent victim for the removal of guilt as of warding off 
 the punishment which an angry Being was likely to inflict. 
 
 ^ An uninterrupted line of sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons was 
 needed for the due performance of funeral rites, through which alone 
 the bliss of a man after death could be secured (see pp. 274-312). 
 
/ 
 
 24 Ritualistic Brahmanism. 
 
 It is even probable that human sacrifice was once part 
 of the Brahmanical system. The Aitareya-brahmana (VIL 
 13) has the well-known story of Harisdandra and Sunahsepa 
 which points to its prevalence. The same Brahmana records 
 the substitution of the sacrifice of four kinds of animals — 
 horses, oxen, sheep, and goats — for that of men. Sometimes 
 numbers of animals were tied to sacrificial posts (yupa), some 
 being killed and some liberated at the end of the ceremony. 
 As to the Horse-sacrifice (Asva-medha) see p. 339. 
 
 One of the most noteworthy ideas to be found in the 
 Brahmanas is that the gods were merely mortal till they 
 conquered Death by sacrifices. Death is thereupon alarmed 
 lest men also should be victorious over him and deprive 
 him of all his rights ; but the gods promise that those who 
 perform sacrifices should not become immortal without first 
 offering him their bodies, .and that non-sacrificers should 
 present him their bodies in many successive births. 
 
 The following is a free translation of a passage of the Sata- 
 patha-brahmana : — 
 
 The gods lived constantly in dread of Death — 
 
 The mighty Ender — so with toilsome rites 
 
 They .worshipped and repeated sacrifices 
 
 Till they became immortal. Then the Ender 
 
 Said to the gods, 'As ye have made yourselves 
 
 Imperishable, so will men endeavour 
 
 To free themselves from me ; what portion then 
 
 Shall I possess in man.?' The gods replied, 
 
 'Henceforth no being shall become immortal 
 
 In his own body; this his mortal frame 
 
 Shalt thou still seize ; this shall remain thy own. 
 
 This shall become perpetually thy food. 
 
 And even he who through religious acts 
 
 Henceforth attains to immortality 
 
 Shall first present his body; Death, to thee.' 
 
 Other passages in. the Brahmanas prove that the doctrine of 
 transmigration was beginning to be developed at this period. 
 
 It is certainly remarkable that the idea of sacrifice as an 
 atonement for sin seems never to have taken firm hold of the 
 
Philosophical Brahmanism. 25 
 
 Hindu mind. Goats were generally sacrificed by Vaidika 
 Brahmans at their Soma-yagas, but only in connexion with 
 the central offering of the Soma or liquor of immortality, and 
 mainly with the idea of nourishing the gods who were their 
 friends. Fire was the chief god, not only because he was 
 visibly present, but because he carried up the essence of the 
 oblation to the other gods. In later times the deities were 
 thought to have a malevolent side to their characters, and 
 when sacrifice was needed for the propitiation of an angry 
 deity, it was called Bali. Goats and buffaloes are now immo- 
 lated in India with the view of appeasing the goddess Kali, 
 who delights in blood. But in this there is no idea of 
 jffaci ng gui lt or making a vicarious offering for sin. 
 
 The ordinary Hindu wholly rejects the notion of trusting 
 to anything for salvation but his own self-righteousness ; that 
 is, to his own merit (punya) acquired through his own pious 
 acts, or through the karma-marga, ' way of ceremonial acts,' 
 presided over by the Brahmans. 
 
 Philosophical Brahmanism. 
 
 The second or philosophical phase of Brahmanism cannot 
 be .marked off by any decided line from the other phases. 
 Its rudimentary ideas are found in the earlier system, and 
 had their germ in Vedism. It laid stress on the knowledge 
 (jiiana) of the one universally diffused spiritual essence (Brah- 
 man) which constitutes everything, and in which all things 
 are merged. This purely spiritual way or way of knowledge 
 (jnana-marga) made sacrificial ceremonies useless. 
 
 In fact, a reaction from an overdone ritual was inevitable. ' 
 People became wearied with sacrifices and sacrificers. The 
 minds of thinking men found no rest in the blood of 
 slaughtered victims. It only remained to take refuge in 
 metaphysical investigations. If every man was a part of 
 God, what necessity was there that God should propitiate 
 himself? If a portion of the one self-existent Spirit chose 
 
26 Philosophical Brahmanism. 
 
 for a time to ignore itself, to invest itself with a body, to 
 fetter itself with actions and their inevitable results, the 
 consequences could only be borne by itself in its passage 
 through numberless births. Nor could there be any final 
 emancipation from a continued succession of corporeal ex- 
 istences, till action ceased and the consciousness of identity 
 with the one universal Spirit returned. 
 
 The Upanishads, or hidden spiritual doctrine of the Veda, 
 are the special bible of this phase of Brahmanism. Many 
 treatises so called were added to the Mantra and Brahmana 
 portion of the Veda (such as the Tsa, Katha, Chandogya, 
 Mundaka, and Brihad-aranyaka Upanishads). The aphorisms 
 (sutras) of the three systems of philosophy with their three 
 so-called branches (that is, the Nyaya with Vaiseshika; 
 Sankhya with Yoga ; Vedanta with Mimansa) were connected 
 with these writings ; but only the Sankhya and Vedanta can 
 be said to be really founded on them. 
 
 According to a learned Brahman who is now a convert to 
 Christianity, the Upanishads are to the Mantras and Brah- 
 manas what our New Testament is to the Old. 
 
 They were compositions which expressed the desire of the 
 living personal spirit (jiva or jivatman) for deliverance from 
 a long series of separate earthly existences and from liability 
 to pass through a variety of bodies— gods, men, animals, 
 plants, stones — and its longing for final reunion with the one 
 self-existent Spirit of the Universe {Atman, afterwards called 
 Brahman). And here it may be noted that Philosophical 
 Brahmanism was not philosophy in the European sense of 
 the word. It was no mere search for truth, for truth's sake. 
 It was rather a form of mystical religious speculation. Nor 
 was it an expression of the soul's desire to be released from 
 the burden of sin. It was i rather an_inquiry int o the best 
 method of its escape from transmigration ; the dread of con- 
 tinued metempsychosis being the one haunting thought 
 which colours the whole texture of Indian philosophy. If 
 
Philosophical Brahmanism. 27 
 
 an Indian metaphysician sets himself to inquire into the 
 nature of spirit and matter, and their relation to each other, 
 his investigations are sure to be conducted with the sole 
 object of liberating the spirit of man froni the bondage of 
 repeated earthly existence, and reuniting it with the one 
 Universal Spirit as a river is reunited with the ocean. This is 
 called the way of knowledge (jilana). This constitutes the 
 right measure (prama) of all difficulties. This is the summum 
 bonum (nibsreyasa) of Brahmanieal philosophy. 
 
 What, then, are the articles of a Hindu philosopher's creed ? 
 
 Most Hindu thinkers agree that the one Spirit^ is eternal, 
 both retrospectively and prospectively. The Spirit of God 
 and the spirit of man must have existed from all eternity 
 and must continue to exist. The two spirits are not really 
 distinct ; so says the Vedantist. The living spirit of man (jiva) 
 — the human Self (Atman) — is identical with God's Spirit. 
 It is that Spirit limited and personalized by the power of 
 Illusion ; and the life of every living spirit is nothing but an 
 infinitesimal arc of the one endless circle of infinite existence. 
 
 Again, Hindu philosophers agree that the mind (manas) is 
 distinct from the spirit. Mind is not eternal in the same way. 
 It is an internal organ of the body, standing between the five 
 organs of perception and the five organs of action, connected 
 with both, receiving the impressions conveyed by both, and 
 directing both through the exercise of volition. To the mind 
 appertains the faculties of perception (buddhi), volition (sari- 
 kalpa, vikalpa), self-consciousness and thought, and the spirit 
 cannot possess these, unless joined to mind and invested with 
 a bodily covering or vehicle. 
 
 And of actual bodily coverings there are two (though the 
 
 ' It is generally better to translate the philosophical terms Atman, 
 Brahman, and Purusha by ' spirit ' rather than by ' soul,' because the 
 expression 'soul' is liable to convey the idea of thinking and feeling, 
 whereas pure Atman, Brahman, and Purusha neither think, nor feel, 
 nor are conscious. The translation ' Self is not universally suitable. 
 
28 Philosophical Brahmanism. 
 
 Vedanta system reckons three i) : — first, the subtle body 
 (hnga or sukshma-sarira or ativahika^), which incloses a 
 portion of the universal spirit in three sheaths (kosha), cog- 
 nitional, sensorial, and aerial, constituting it a living individual 
 personal spirit (jivatman), and carrying it through all its 
 corporeal migrations, till, on its reunion with its source, even 
 its subtle body becomes extinct ; secondly, the gross body 
 (sthula-sarira), which surrounds the subtle vehicle, and is of 
 various forms in the various conditions of existence through 
 animate or inanimate, organic or inorganic life. 
 
 And mark that this gross body is of three kinds— divine, 
 earthly, and intermediate— the intermediate being that peculiar 
 frame which the departed spirit receives, after the burning of 
 the earthly gross body and during the interval preceding the 
 assumption of another gross body. This intermediate body 
 (called preta-sarira, ' the departed man's body,' or, philosophi- 
 cally, Adhishthana-deha) serves, as it were, to clothe the 
 departed spirit during its several residences in the world of 
 departed spirits (pitri-loka). It is of the same nature, though 
 inferior to the divine body which belongs to the gods ; and it 
 should be noted that this divine intermediate body is really 
 composed of gross (sthula) particles, though of a more ethereal 
 substance than the earthly body. Without it the departed 
 spirit would have no vehicle but the subtle body, and would 
 be incapable of enjoying bliss or suffering misery in the tem- 
 porary paradise, or purgatory^, through which all the departed 
 have to pass before returning to earth (see pp. 393-394). 
 
 And be it noted that the union of spirit with a succession 
 of bodily forms is dreaded as the worst form of bondage. 
 
 ^ In the Vedanta system there are three bodily coverings, the Causal 
 body (Karana-sarira) coming first ; but this is merely another name for 
 Ajnana (see p. 35), and can scarcely be regarded as a material substance. 
 
 " Its minuteness is denoted by its being described as ' of the size of 
 a thumb ' (angushtha-matra), though some apply this expression to the 
 intermediate body. 
 
 ' The heaven and hell of orthodox Brahmanism are only temporary. 
 
Philosophical Brahmanism. 29 
 
 The spirit, so united, commences acting, and all actions, good 
 or bad, lead to consequences, and these consequences must 
 have their adequate rewards or punishments. It is on this 
 account that the departed spirit must of necessity be removed 
 to temporary heavens or hells. Thence it must migrate into 
 higher, intermediate, and lower earthly forms, according to its 
 various degrees of merit or demerit, till it attains the great 
 end — entire emancipation from the bondage of repeated bodily 
 existence, and reabsorption into the one Spirit of the Universe. 
 
 With regard to the external world, it is a fixed dogma of 
 every Hindii philosopher that N avastuno vastu-siddhih there 
 cannot be the production of something out of nothing (ex nihilo 
 nihil fit). Therefore, the external world is eternal, though 
 according to one view, it is evolved out of an eternally existing 
 productive germ united to eternally existing individual spirits ; 
 and according to another, it is evolved out of the Illusion which 
 from all eternity overspreads the one eternal Spirit, though 
 having no real existence. These two theories in regard to the 
 creation or evolution of the world^the first in the Sarikhya, the 
 second in the Vedanta system — are both of great antiquity. 
 
 The first shadowing forth of the mystery of the creation of 
 male. and female, and of the living world through their union, 
 is traceable in some of the Vedic hymns. The well-known 
 hymn of the Rig-veda (X. 139. 4), already quoted, asserts that 
 first ' in that One Being arose Desire, which was the primal 
 germ of Mind, and which the wise, searching out in their 
 thoughts, discovered to be the subtle bond connecting Non- 
 entity with Entity.' 
 
 Again, the Satapatha-brahmana (XIV. 4. 2. 4, etc.) and 
 Brihad-aranyaka Upanishad (I. 3) declare that 'the One 
 Being was not happy, being alone. He wished for a second. 
 He caused his own nature to fall in twain, and thus became 
 husband and wife. He approached her, and thus were human 
 beings produced' (see p. 18a). 
 
 In this latter passage is the first clear statement of a duality 
 
30 Philosophical Brahmanism. 
 
 in the divine unity— an idea which took root in the Hindu 
 mind quite as strongly as the doctrine of a Triad (Tri-murti) 
 did in the minds of later thinkers — an idea, too, which had 
 been adumbrated in the supposed marriage of Heaven and 
 Earth for the production of gods, men, and all creatures. 
 
 The idea was expanded in the mythical cosmogony of 
 Manu, Book I. 5, etc. There it is said that the universe first 
 existed only in darkness as if immersed in sleep. Then the 
 Self-existent (Svayam-bhu) still undeveloped (A-vyakta), 
 having willed to produce various beings from his own sub- 
 stance, first with a mere thought created the waters, and 
 placed on them a productive seed or egg (bija). Then he 
 himself was born in that egg in the form of Brahma. Next 
 he caused the egg to divide itself, and out of its two divisions 
 framed the heaven above and the earth beneath. Afterwards, 
 having divided his own substance, he became half male, half 
 female (I. 3a), and from that female produced Viraj, from 
 whom was created Manu, the secondary progenitor of all 
 beings. The order of creation of the five elements is, i. Ether 
 (Akasa) ; 3. Air (Vayu) ; 3. Fire (Tejas or Jyotis) ; 4. Water 
 (Apah, pi.) ; 5. Earth (Prithivl or Bhumi) ; but these were pro- 
 duced from a previous creation of five subtle elements (tan- 
 matra). The Nyaya-sutra reverses the order, placing Earth first. 
 
 So again in the Sankhya philosophy, there are two eternally 
 existing principles — the Producer and the Spirit. The former 
 is an eternal procreant germ or Creative Force which is called 
 Pra-kriti (fe'm.), because it produces (root-Jk-ri) twenty-three pro- 
 ducts ; these twenty-three, with the Producer, being called the 
 twenty-four Tattvas. It is also called Pradhana, because it is 
 the fixed material cause of everything except the Spirit— which 
 is the twenty-fifth Tattva. The infinitely subtle elementary 
 germ, Prakriti or Pradhana, though one, is supposed to be made 
 up of a triad of co-eternal primordial substances or essences in 
 equipoise (samya). These are called Gunas, but they are not 
 properly ' qualities,' though certain qualities result from them. 
 
Philosophical Brahmanism. 31 
 
 The term Guna simply denotes that these constituent essences 
 of Prakriti act like cords to bind the spirit with triple bonds. 
 They are, i . Sattva, ' purity ' or ' goodness ; ' 3. Rajas, ' passion ' 
 or 'activity;' and 3. Tamas, 'darkness' or 'apathy;' some- 
 times regarded as equivalent to happiness, pain, and igno- 
 rance, or denoted by white, red, and black respectively. 
 
 The Spirit or second eternally existing principle called 
 Purusha (the Male or Self) is not, like Prakriti, one; nor does it 
 produce anything. It is multitudinous. Spirits are innumer-,/ 
 able, each separate Spirit being co-eternal with Prakriti, but 
 doing nothing and creating nothing. When human beings or 
 any other beings are created, the creation is always effected 
 through evolution out of Prakriti, which is nevertheless a 
 merely blind and dark force ; no creation at all being apparent 
 unless this force brings itself into union with some one eter- 
 nally existing separate Spirit. Prakriti, in short, unites itself 
 with a Spirit or Self and binds it with the triple bond of 
 the three above-named Gunas ^ in order that this Spirit may 
 reflect the evolved world as a clear river reflects dark trees, 
 while they darken the river, or as a bright crystal vase 
 illumines a flower, while the flower colours the crystal. 
 
 The first step in the evolution out of Prakriti is the pro- 
 duction of Intellect or intelligent perception (Buddhi). Next 
 comes the faculty of Self-consciousness or personality, called 
 the I-maker (Ahain-kara), and then the five subtle and five 
 gross elements, the latter being the product of the former. 
 Last in the series come the five organs of perception, the five 
 organs of action and the internal organ, mind (Manas), which 
 holds a position between the ten other organs, mediating 
 between them as an instrument of volition between perception 
 and action ^. These, with the Spirit (Purusha), constitute the 
 twenty-five principles (Tattvas) of the Sankhya system. 
 
 ' The Spirit before its association with these Gunas is called Nirgupa ; 
 and when bound by them, Saguna. 
 ^ In this and in the Nyaya system Buddhi, ' intellect,' is anterior and 
 
32 Philosophical Brahmanism. 
 
 The noteworthy point is that self-consciousness, cognition, 
 will, and thought do not belong to the creative force Prakriti 
 and its creations, Intellect, the I-maker, and Mind (Buddhi, 
 Aham-kara, Manas, which together make up Antahkarana) 
 when existing separately, nor to a Spirit (Purusha) when ex- 
 isting separately, but only to the two when united, or to the 
 Antahkarana illuminated by a Spirit. In short, two factors 
 — the active, creative but blind force, and the inactive, passive 
 but illuminating spirit — must come together before there can 
 be even any self-consciousness or sense of personality. And 
 yet the creation is not supposed to take place for the sake 
 of the two together, but only that it may be illuminated and 
 observed by each separate individual spirit or soul, which never- 
 theless is a wholly apathetic, isolated, and indifferent spectator 
 of the act. It is clear from this how easy it became to confuse 
 Purushawith Prakriti and to regard either the one or the other 
 or the union of both as the source of the external world ^. 
 
 Of course when any being is created the three primordial 
 essences, Purity, Passion, and Darkness, are no longer equally 
 balanced as they are in the creative germ, Prakriti. Creation 
 is a result of the disturbance of this equilibrium. One or 
 other quality is then in excess, making a being unselfish and 
 good, selfish and energetic, bestial and ignorant, according as 
 purity, passion, or darkness may happen to preponderate. 
 
 I need not point out that this remarkable theory of innu- 
 
 superior to Manas, ' mind,' which is merely the instrument of thought. 
 It governs the mind, and causes it to decide. Manu's theory is a 
 combination of Sankhya and Vedanta. In Book I. 14, etc. it is said that 
 Brahma, when born from the egg deposited by the Self-existent, drew 
 out the external world from pure spirit (Atman). The first product was 
 the principle of thought (Manas = Buddhi or Mahat). Next came 
 Personality (Ahatn-kara), and then the seven subtle elements (Tan- 
 matras). From these seven active principles (called ' the seven Purushas,' 
 1. 19) — viz. Mahat or Buddhi (called Manas in I. 14, 74, 75), Aham-kara, 
 and the five subtle elements^were evolved in the five gross or material 
 elements {mahd-bhuta), the organs of sense, and the whole world of sense. 
 ^ Professor A. E. Gough in his ' Philosophy of the Upanishads ' has 
 thrown great light on the Sankhya and Vedanta systems. 
 
Philosophical Brahmanism. 33 
 
 merable personal creations for the sake of individual spirits is 
 not without its counterpart in European systems 1. In India '>> 
 the idea of a separate spiritual force combining with a pri- 
 mordial material force for the creation of all things was, as 
 we have seen, of great antiquity. And notwithstanding the 
 metaphysical subtleties with which it was connected, the 
 notion of a universe proceeding from a male principle or 
 generator, and a female principle regarded as an energy or 
 capacity (sakti), commended itself to the popular mind as 
 harmonizing with the operations and phenomena everywhere 
 apparent in nature. To this day it is symbolized all over 
 India by temples dedicated to the male and female sex (in 
 the union of the sexual symbols called Linga and Yoni)./ 
 It is clear that in such a system there can be no need for the 
 existence of any supreme Spirit as distinct from the personal 
 spirit, even though such a supreme Being be theoretically 
 admitted (as in the Yoga branch of the Sahkhya). 
 
 The so-called pantheistic theory of the Vedanta philosophy 
 is even more attractive to the majority of Hindu thinkers. It 
 is true that both the Sankhya and Vedanta together underlie 
 Brahmanism; but the Vedanta is, so to speak, the latest 
 revelation of the Veda, teaching the non-duality and non- 
 plurality of Spirit — that is, the real existence of only one 
 Spirit called Atman^ (n&m,^Atma) or Brahman (nom_Brahma, 
 see p. 43) instead of many; the separation of human spirits 
 and of all the phenomena of nature from that one Spirit being 
 only effected when it is enveloped in Illusion. In other 
 words, the separate existence of man's spirit and of all natural 
 phenomena is only illusory. 
 
 This doctrine is said to rest on another well-known hymn 
 of the Veda (X. 90) called the Purusha-sukta. There the 
 one embodied Spirit is called Purusha (see p. 17), and is 
 said to be * everything, whatever is, has been, and shall 
 
 ' The Sankhya has much in common with the Idealism of Berkeley. 
 ^ One etymology given for Atman is an, ' to breathe.' Compare p. 20. 
 
 D 
 
34 Philosophical Brahmanisni. 
 
 be.' The same doctrine is briefly formulated in three 
 words (from the Chandogya Upanishad) used as a creed in 
 the present day by Indian Theistic as well as Pantheistic 
 sects — Ekam eva adviityam, ' there is but one Being, without 
 a second.' Nothing really exists but the one impersonal 
 Spirit, called Atma or Brahma-( = Purusha). Brahma is real, 
 the world is an illusion (Brahma satyarn Jagan mithya). From 
 it everything is born, in it everything breathes and is dissolved 
 (tajjalan). That Spirit, in the illusion which overspreads it, 
 is to the external world what yarn is to cloth, what milk is to 
 curds, what clay is to a jar ; but only in that illusion^. As 
 ether contained in various vessels, and as the sun reflected on 
 various mirrors, is one but apparently many, so the spirit is one 
 and many. The potter by the help of clay makes various 
 pots, but the Spirit itself evolves its own various forms. As an 
 actor paints his body with colours and assumes various forms, 
 so the Spirit assumes the bodies caused by its deeds. This 
 self-existent, eternal, impersonal Atma or Brahma is abso- 
 lutely One (unlike the Sankhyan Spirit or Purusha, which is 
 multitudinous); yet it is made up of a triad of essences^ 
 to wit, pure , Existence (Sat), pure Thought (dit) ^, and pure 
 Bliss (Ananda), and it may assume three bodily envelopes 
 and three conditions or Gunas (p. -ifi). 
 
 And here let me observe that more than one Christian 
 writer has compared this tri-unity of Entities with the Trini- 
 tarian doctrine of God the Father, who is the Author of all 
 Existence ; God the Son, who is the Source of all Wisdom 
 and Knowledge ; and God the Holy Spirit, who is the Source 
 of all Joy. But it is a mistake so to compare it ; because, 
 with the Vedantist, Brahma is only Existence in the negation 
 
 ^ He is not the actual material cause of the world as clay of a jar, but 
 the illusory material cause as a rope might be of a snake ; see p. 2,1, 1- H- 
 
 ^ Cit, 'pure thought,' or its equivalent Caitanya, is often used alone for 
 Brahma, the one Self-existent Being. Sat may also be so used. Brahma 
 IS also described in the Upanishads as Truth, Knowledge, Infinity. 
 
Philosophical Brakvianism. 35 
 
 of non-e^pvistence, only Thought in the negation of non- 
 thought, (.jjnly BHss in the negation of non-bh"ss and in freedom 
 front the .ipiiseries incident to hfe and transmigration. 
 
 Wb.eii .'this impersonal Spirit — which is without self-con- 
 sciousriessjr^assumes consciousness of a personal self; that is, 
 when it b^egins to exist in anything external to itself, and 
 when it tfiegins to think about anything or be joyful about 
 anythingii .besides itself — it does so by the power of Illusion 
 (Maya) an;<i by investing itself with three corporeal envelopes. 
 
 First, tbpe causal body (karana-sarira) identified with Ajfiana 
 or Ignoral^nce (Illusion)^; secondly, the subtle body (liiiga- 
 sarlra) ; an^d thirdly, the gross body (sthula-sarira). In this way 
 the imperslonal Spirit is converted into a personal God who 
 can be wonjhipped, and so becomes the Supreme Lord (Isvara, 
 Paramesvara) and creator of a world of illusion. To be accurate, 
 however, it j^ should be stated that the Vedanta theory makes 
 the asaumptdon of these three bodies involve the assumption 
 of three-distinct mystical personalities, each of which is sup- 
 posed to invest a particular condition of spirit. Thus, with the 
 first or eaujsai body, the impersonal Spirit becomes the 
 Supreme tord, ■ Paramesvara, supposed to represent and 
 embody the mystical totality of dreamless spirits ; with the 
 second or subtle body the impersonal Spirit becomes Hiranya- 
 garbha (or Sfltratman, or Prana), supposed to represent the 
 aggregate of dreaming spirits (connecting them like the Sutra 
 or thread of st.vifeddace) ; with the third or gross body it 
 becomes Viraj (or Vaisvanara, Praja-pati, Purusha), supposed 
 to represent and embody the aggregate of waking spirits 
 (compare p. 28). 
 
 This third condition of spirit or that of being" wide awake. 
 
 ' The Karana-sarira is nov only identified with Ignorance (Ajfiana or 
 Avidya), but also with Illusioi. (Maya). It is, therefore, no real body. 
 Both Ignorance and Illusion together cause the separation of the personal 
 supreme Spirit and the personal human Spirit from the one impersonal 
 Spirit. In the same way they are Ue. cause of every existing thing. 
 
 D X 
 
36 Philosophical Brahmanism. 
 
 though with us considered to be the highest state, is ^''y Hindu 
 philosophers held to be the lowest, because farthc-^L^rfefflCved 
 from pure impersonalized Spirit. In fact, beyond aiid:iunder- 
 lying all three conditions of spirit is the fourth (turfwajsor pure 
 unconditioned, unembodied, impersonal Spirit (Brahpia) itself 
 Of course these hyper-subtleties are beyondi'th^' scope of 
 ordinary philosophic thought ; but they show ho^ir -j^eat is 
 the difference between the Pantheism of India ahdtthat of 
 Europe. A Vedantist believes in one impersonal Sjipiirit, who, 
 by association with Illusion, becomes the one Supj'feme per- 
 sonal God (Paramesvara) of the world (of illusion), 'f And it is 
 this personal God who, when he engages in tha creation, 
 preservation, and dissolution of an illusory Universe, is called 
 Sa-guna because believed to be associated with the three 
 Gunas which are held to be substances (dravya) aujd are the 
 supposed constituents of his causal body, identified, .as it is, 
 with Ignorance \ These three Gunas are the saihe ff' those 
 which in the Sahkhyan system are the constituent'iei^ces or 
 ingredients of Prakriti, resulting in the three ■conditions of 
 Activity, Goodness, and Apathy called Rajas, Sa^tn^ Tamas 2. 
 They are the same as those which in the later d««irine of the 
 Puranas separate the one Supreme Being into^the three divine 
 personalities of Brahma (nom. case masc), Vishn.U.jand Rudra- 
 Siva, each accompanied by his own consott.*/ -* 
 
 Dominated by Activity (Rajas), the orte/Universal Spirit is 
 Brahma, the Creator ; by Goodness (Sattva), it 5s Vishnu, the 
 Preserver ; by Indifference (Tamas), it is Ruara, the Dissolver. 
 
 ' In other words, the Karana-sarlra— consisti.ig of Ignorance, and 
 therefore made up of the three Gunas-is the illusory corporeal disguise 
 (upadhi), or investing envelope, or triple bond of the impersonal Spirit 
 Brahma, by which it becomes the personal GoJ Paramesvara. 
 
 ^ See top of p. 31. These Gunas of activi.y, goodness, and apathy are 
 not properly identical with the so-<^^ta^ |6fllities, but are rather con- 
 stituent substances or essences or ipgiedJants, though they may result in 
 such qualities. • ■ j.yg, 
 
 ' In the later mythology the term olfcti, 'active energy' (rather than 
 Maya, Prakriti, and Ajiianaj, is used^t tile female half of the personal God. 
 
 £ a 
 
Philosophical Brahmanism. 37 
 
 Pure Vedantism, then, is not only a belief in one impersonal 
 Spirit made up of three abstract essences. It is a belief that 
 a kind of threefold triad of essences — to wit, three spiritual 
 essences, three corporeal envelopes, and three dominating 
 conditions or qualities — together constitute one personal God, 
 while constituting at the same time every human personality. 
 
 It is by reason, then, of association with Illusion or Ignor- 
 ance (made up of the three Gunas or Conditions), that the 
 Supreme Spirit (Paramatman) enshrined in the personal God, 
 and the living spirit (jivatman) enshrined in the personal 
 man, believe in their own individuality, mistaking it and the 
 world for realities, just as a rope in a dark night might be 
 mistaken for a snake. When the personalized spirit sets itself 
 free from the power of Illusion the consciousness of its own 
 identity and of the identity of the whole universe with the 
 one impersonal Spirit, (Atman = Paramatman, Brahma), is 
 re-established. Strange to say, this Illusion or Ignorance is 
 held, like the one eternal Brahma \ to have an existence from 
 all eternity, though, owing to the fact that such existence is 
 unreal, and the whole evolved world unreal too, it follows 
 that nothing really existent is left but Brahma. In other 
 words, all that really exists is identical with Brahma. . 
 
 In fact, the more evidently physical and metaphysical 
 speculations are opposed to common sense, the more favour 
 do they find with some Hindu thinkers. Common sense 
 tells an Englishman that he really exists himself, and that 
 everything he sees around him really exists also. He cannot 
 abandon these two primary convictions. Not so the Hindu 
 Vedantist. Dualism is his bugbear, and common sense, 
 when it maintains any kind of real duality, either the separate 
 independent existence of a man's own Spirit and of God's 
 Spirit or of spirit and matter, is guilty of gross deception. 
 
 ' Maya-did-yogo 'nadib, ' the union of (fit (p. 34) and Maya is from all 
 eternity.' See Professor Cough's able and instructive articles on the 
 Philosophy of the Upanishads. 
 
38 Philosophical Brahmanism. 
 
 And yet, after all, when the Vedantist theory, as held at 
 present, is closely examined, it turns out to be virtually as 
 dualistic, in regard to spirit and matter, as the Sahkhya ; 
 the only difference being that the source of the material 
 world (Prakriti) in the Sankhya is held to have a real existence 
 (though one of its names is still Maya) instead of a merely 
 illusory existence ^ Brahma and Maya (Illusion) in the 
 Vedanta, Purusha and Prakriti (Maya) in the Sankhya, must 
 be united in the act of creation. The external world is the 
 product of two principles (which some compare to Know- 
 ledge and Ignorance, Light and Darkness). The chief dif- 
 ference between the two systems lies in the unity of Spirit 
 taught by the Vedanta, as distinguished from the plurality 
 of spirits taught by the Sankhya. 
 
 Yet the Vedantist virtually believes in three conditions of 
 being, viz, the real, the practical, and the illusory; for while he 
 affirms that the one Spirit Brahma alone has a real (paramar- 
 thika) existence, he allows a practical (vyavaharika) separate 
 existence to human spirits, to the world, and to the personal 
 God or gods, as well as an illusory (pratibhasika) existence. 
 
 Hence every object is to be dealt with practically as if 
 it were really what it appears to be. A god is practically a 
 god ; a man, a man ; a beast, a beast ; so that when a man 
 feeds a horse he does not feed him as a portion of God, but 
 as an animal kept for riding. The Vedanta theory, like the 
 Sankhya, has taken deep root in the Indian mind. A mixture 
 of both is the source of the popular religion and mythology of 
 the Hindus. Both permeate their literature and give a colour 
 to every thought and feeling of their daily lives. 
 
 ' Perhaps the only true monistic theory is that of the Buddhist, who 
 affirms that nothing exists but the self-creative Universe, which, however, 
 he also calls Maya, ' Illusion.' A Vedantist is Brahma-vadi, ' one who 
 affirms that Brahma " Spirit " is the only reality ; ' a Buddhist is Sunya- 
 vadi, ' one who affirms a blank for God ; ' and a Saiikhya is Pradhana- 
 vadT, ' one who affirms that all material things proceed from Pradhana 
 (Prakriti).' 
 
Philosophical Brahmanism. 39 
 
 And hence it is not difficult to understand how a people 
 imbued with the idea that the world is an illusion should have 
 neglected all historical investigations. No such thing as 
 genuine history or biography exists in Sanskrit literature. 
 Historical researches are to a Hindu simple foolishness. 
 
 The third philosophical system, called Nyaya— or the act' 
 of going into any subject analytically (opposed to Sankhya 
 or synthetic enumeration) — is not so closely connected with 
 religion and metaphysical speculation as the Sankhya and 
 Vedanta. Yet it offers more interesting parallels to European 
 philosophical and scientific ideas. It is much studied in 
 modern Sanskrit schools of learning, as an analytical inquiry 
 into all the objects and subjects of human knowledge, in- 
 cluding, among others, the process of reasoning and logic. 
 
 In regard to the subject of reasoning, the Nyaya proper, as 
 I have shown in 'Indian Wisdom' (p. 73), propounds in its 
 first Sutra sixteen topics, the first of which is Pramana, that 
 is, the means or instrument by which knowledge or the right 
 measure (prama or pramiti) of a subject is to be obtained. 
 The means are four, viz. perception by the senses (pratyaksha) ; 
 inference (anumana) ; comparison (upamana) ; verbal or trust- 
 worthy authority (sabda or aptopadesa), including revelation ^. 
 
 Of these four processes, ' inference ' is divided into five 
 members (avayava). 1. The pratijna, or proposition (stated 
 hypothetically). a. The hetu, or reason. 3. The uda- 
 harana, or example ( = major premiss). 4. The upanaya, or 
 application of the reason ( = minor premiss). 5. The niga- 
 mana, or conclusion, i. e. the proposition re-stated as proved. 
 Thus : I. The hill has fire ; a. for it smokes ; 3. whatever 
 smokes has fire, as a kitchen-hearth ; 4. this hill smokes ; 
 5. therefore this hill has fire. 
 
 ' The Sankhya rightly includes the third of the four Pramanas in the 
 second, and the Vedanta adds two others to the four, viz. negative proof 
 (an-upalabdhi, abhava) and inference from circumstances (arthapatti). 
 The Vaiseshika includes both the third and fourth in the second. 
 
40 Philosophical Brahmanism. 
 
 Here we have a clumsy combination of enthymeme and 
 syllogism, which must be regarded not as a syllogism, but 
 rather as a full rhetorical statement of an argument. 
 
 The most noticeable peculiarity in the Indian method, 
 stamping it as an original analysis of the laws of thought, 
 is the employment of the terms ' invariable concomitance 
 or pervasion ' (vyapti), ' invariable pervader ' (vyapaka), and 
 ' invariably pervaded ' (vyapya). Fire is the pervader, smoke 
 the pervaded. The argument is thus stated : ' The mountain 
 has invariably fire-pervaded smoke ; therefore it has fire.' 
 
 The Nyaya, like the Sankhya, believes the individual spirits 
 of men (jivatman) to be eternal, manifold, eternally separate 
 from each other, distinct from the body, senses, and mind, 
 and infinite. A peculiar tenet of the Nyaya is that spirits are 
 ubiquitous, and diffused everywhere throughout space, so that 
 a man's spirit is as much in England as in Calcutta, though 
 it can only apprehend, and feel, and act, where the body 
 happens to be. 
 
 ,' Its idea of the mind (manas), which it calls an internal in- 
 / strument or organ, is that it is a substance (dravya) as eternal 
 as the spirit. Instead, however, of being diffused everywhere 
 like spirit, it is atomic, like earth, water, fire, and air, and can 
 only admit one perception or act of volition at a time. It is 
 simply an eternal insentient substance, like an atom of earth. 
 
 In its cosmogony the Nyaya is dualistic in assuming the 
 existence of eternal atoms, side by side with eternal spirits. 
 ., Atoms are not like Prakriti one, but innumerable. 
 
 We know that the true Sankhya (as distinct from the 
 Yoga) recognized no Supreme Spirit. Probably the true 
 Nyaya was in this respect like the Sankhya. In any case 
 neither of these systems admits the absolute unity of one all- 
 pervading Spirit. If they acknowledge a Supreme presiding 
 Spirit at all, it can only be as forming one of innumerable 
 other spirits— though superior to, them— and as co-eternal and 
 (in the case of the Nyaya) as co-omnipresent with them. 
 
Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 41 
 
 The foregoing three systems, with their sub-systems, con- 
 stitute the philosophical phase of Brahmanism. Clearly one 
 of its aims is to teach men to abstain from action of every kind, 
 good or bad — as much from liking as disliking, as much from 
 loving as hating. The whole external world is an illusion. 
 Actions and feelings are a mistake. They are the fetters of 
 the soul which bind it with bonds of iron to continual bodies. 
 
 Transmigration or Metempsychosis is the great bugbear — 
 the terrible nightmare and daymare of Indian philosophers 
 and metaphysicians. All their efforts are directed to the 
 removal of this oppressive scare. 'As the embodied soul,' 
 says the Bhagavad-glta, ' moves swiftly on through boyhood, 
 youth, and age, so will it pass through other forms hereafter.' 
 
 For although the human spirit is really one with the 
 Supreme, yet while it continues in ignorance it may commit 
 sins which it must get rid of by expiatory rites (prayasditta) 
 or by passing through purgatorial hells and successive births. 
 Even virtuous acts involve heaven and re-births. 
 
 The question, therefore, is not : What is truth ? The one 
 problem is : How is a man to break this iron chain of repeated 
 existences, and to shake off all separate personality ? How is 
 he to return to complete union with (sayujya) pure Spirit? 
 Or, if this object be beyond his reach, how is he to work his 
 way through 8,400,000 successive births to any one of the 
 three inferior conditions of bliss — i. living in the same heaven 
 (salokya) with the personal God ; a. close proximity to him 
 (samlpya); 3. assimilation to his likeness (sarupya)? 
 
 Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 
 
 The Mythological or Polytheistic phase of Brahmanism has 
 for its bible the two great legendary heroic poems (Itihasa) 
 Maha-bharata and Ramayana, and in later times the Puranas. 
 Its development was probably synchronous with that of 
 Buddhism. 
 
 \ 
 
42 Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 
 
 Buddhism, like philosophical Brahmanism, was a disbelief 
 in the efficacy of ritual to secure beatitude, and, like it, taught 
 the uselessness of sacrificial ceremonies and even of austerities 
 for the attainment of true knowledge, which was only to be 
 obtained through self-introspection, abstract meditation, and 
 suppression of all desires. It substituted a blank for God ; it 
 denied the existence of a separate spirit, and of everything 
 but body, mind, and sensations — earth, heavens, and hells, 
 which, according to the Buddha, are always, through the force 
 of works, tending to disintegration and re-integration in per- 
 petual cycles. But while Buddhism repudiated priestcraft, it 
 founded a monastic brotherhood and supplied the people with 
 an object of veneration in its founder Gautama — who was styled 
 ' the Enlightened ' (Buddha). Its propagation was in a great 
 measure due to the reverence which the Buddha inspired by his 
 own personal character. He was the ideal man — the perfection 
 of humanity. He practised faithfully what he preached effec- 
 tively. Adherents gathered in crowds around his person, and 
 Gautama himself became the real god of his own popular faith. 
 Everywhere throughout India thousands were drawn towards 
 his teaching. His doctrines of universal charity, liberty, 
 equality, and fraternity were irresistibly attractive. The only 
 hope of competing with the Buddhistic movement lay in in- 
 venting human gods and a religious system equally attractive, 
 equally popular, equally suited to the needs and capacities 
 of the mass of the people. 
 
 In all probability the Brahmans commenced popularizing 
 their pantheistic doctrines about the time of the rise of 
 Buddhism in the fifth century B.C. The Buddha died, and, 
 according to his own teaching, became personally annihilated, 
 but the remains of his body were enshrined as relics in 
 various parts of India, and his memory was worshipped 
 as devotedly as his person had once been revered. Of course 
 the religious instincts of the mass of the Hindus found no real 
 satisfaction in the propitiation of the forces of nature and 
 
Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 43 
 
 spirits of the air, or in the cold philosophy of pantheism, or in 
 homage paid to the memory of a teacher held to be nowhere 
 existent. They needed devotion (bhakti) to personal and 
 human gods, and these they were led to find in their own 
 heroes. The Ramayana and Maha-bharata represent the use / 
 made by the Brahmans of the martial songs of the people, as 
 well as of their local legends, traditions and superstitions. The 
 principal heroes, whose achievements were the subject of epic 
 song and recitation, underwent a process of deification. The 
 great warrior dynasties were made to trace back their origin, 
 through Brahmanical sages, to the sun-god and the moon-god. 
 Myths and stories confirmatory of the divine origin of every \ 
 great hero were invented and inserted into the body of the 
 poems. In this manner a kind of anthropomorphic religion, 
 well adapted to the popular mind, was devised. Nor was any ^ 
 amount of anthropomorphism, polytheism, polydemonism, and 
 even fetishism incompatible with pantheistic doctrines. The 
 Brahmans in their popular teaching were simply carrying out 
 their own doctrine of evolution. The only problem which 
 they set themselves to solve was : how could their theory be 
 made to adapt itself to existing superstitions and be accepted ' ^ 
 as consistent with all the ideas of a popular mythology ? 
 
 Nothing, then, was easier for them than to maintain that 
 the one sole, self-existing Supreme Spirit, the only real exist- 
 ing Essence, exercises itself, as if sportively (lilaya), in infinite | 
 expansion, in infinite manifestations of itself, in infinite crea- 1 
 tion, dissolution, and re-creation, through infinite varieties 
 and diversities of operation. The very name ' Brahma ' (de- 
 rived from the root brih, ' to increase '), given to this one j 
 eternal Essence, was expressive of this growth, this expansive! 
 power, this universal development and diffusion. 
 
 Hence all visible forms on earth, said the Brahmans, are 
 emanations from the one eternal Entity, like drops from an 
 ocean, like sparks from fire. Stones, mountains, rivers, plants, 
 trees, and animals— all these are traceable upwards as pro- 
 
44 Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 
 
 gressive steps in the infinite evolution of his being. The 
 highest earthly emanation is man, and the emanation of 
 men is in classes and also traceable upwards according to 
 a graduated scale, the highest class being that of the 
 Brahmans. 
 
 Fitly, too, are the highest human manifestations of the 
 eternal Brahma called Brahmans : for they are the appointed 
 mediators between earth and God. None of these emana- 
 tions can alter their condition in each separate state. But ac- 
 cording to their acts, they may pass into temporary heavens 
 or hells, and thence into higher or lower grades of being. 
 
 For be it observed that a series of higher forms of existence 
 above that of human beings, such as demigods, supernatural 
 beings, inferior gods, superior gods, is traceable upwards from 
 man to the primeval male god Brahma — the first personal 
 product of the purely spiritual Brahma when overspread by 
 Maya or illusory creative force ; this male god Brahma stand- 
 ing at the head of the so-called creation as the first evolution 
 out of which all other beings and objects are evolved (see iMte, 
 p. a). To draw any line of separation between stocks, stones, 
 plants, animals, men, demigods, and gods is, according to the 
 theory of Brahmanism, impossible. They are all liable to 
 pass into each other ^. The number of gods is popularly said 
 to be 330 millions, though I have not found this stated in 
 any ancient text (cf. p. 10). 
 
 But the act of creation or evolution involves the two other 
 acts of maintenance of being and disintegration. Hence the god 
 Brahma is associated with two other personal deities, Vishnu, 
 the Preserver, and Rudra-Siva, the Dissolver and Reproducer. 
 These three gods, qoncemed in the threefold operation of 
 integration (or evolution), maintenance, and disintegration 
 (srishti-sthiti-laya), are typified by the three letters composing 
 the mystic syllable Om (AUM), — three letters originally 
 
 ' The whole series of evolutions is sometimes spoken of as Brahmadi- 
 stamba-paryantam, extending from Brahma to a stump (or tuft of grass). 
 
Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 45 
 
 typical of the earlier Vedic triad (wrongly called a trinity), 
 and, in the mysticism of the Upanishads, of three personaliza- 
 tions of the Universal Spirit (Paramesvara, Hiranya-garbha, 
 and Viraj i). Like the earlier Vedic gods, the three later 
 deities were not only personifications of the three forces of 
 integration, disintegration, and reintegration. They probably 
 symbolized three principal objects in nature, Earth, Water or 
 Sun, and Fire ; or the three worlds, Earth, Air, and Sky ; or 
 the three forms of matter. Solid, Liquid, and Gaseous (p. 10). 
 They constitute the well-known Tri-murti, or triad of forms 
 which characterizes Hinduism, and their bodies, like those of 
 human beings, are composed of gross material particles though 
 of a divine and ethereal character (see p. 28). 
 
 These three deities, too, are often, as we have seen, connected 
 with the Gunas of philosophy. In its highest state the one 
 Spirit is Nirguna, ' devoid of all conditions or qualities.' It is 
 only when dominated by either activity or goodness or apathy 
 that the impersonal Spirit becomes either Brahma, the Evolver, 
 or Vishnu, the Preserver, or Siva, the Dissolver (see p. 36). 
 
 Properly, according to the true theory of Brahmanism, no 
 one of these three ought to take precedence over the other 
 two. They are equal, and their functions are sometimes inter- 
 changeable, so that each in turn may become the Supreme 
 Lord (Paramesvara), and each may take the place of the 
 other, according to the sentiment expressed by the greatest of 
 Indian poets, Kalidasa (Kumara-sambhava, Griffith, VII. 44): — 
 
 In those three Persons the one God was shown^ 
 Each first in place, each last — not one alone; 
 Gf Siva, Vishnu, Brahma, each may be 
 First, second, third, among the blessed Three. 
 
 There is a well-known Tri-murti sculptured out of the rock 
 in the caves of Elephanta, at Bombay. Three majestic heads 
 
 ^ See pp. 14, 35, and Mandukya Upanishad, which makes the whole 
 monosyllable Gm stand for the impersonal Brahma. According to some 
 A stands for Vishnu, V for Siva, and M for Brahma. 
 
46 Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 
 
 are represented springing out of one body. The triangle 
 [Trikona] is also used to symbolize this triune co-equality. 
 
 In the later mythology this co-equality was denied, the 
 difference in the characters of the three gods being well 
 illustrated by a story from the Bhagavata-purana, X. 89 : — 
 
 A dispute once arose among the sages which of the three gods 
 was greatest. They apphed to the greatest of all sages — Bhrigu — to 
 determine the point. He undertook to put all three gods to a severe 
 test. He went first to Brahma, and omitted all obeisance. The god's 
 anger blazed forth, but he was at length pacified. Next he went to 
 the abode of Siva, and omitted to return the god's salutation. The 
 irascible god was enraged, his eyes flashed fire, and he raised his 
 Trident weapon to destroy the sage. But the god's wife, ParvatI, in- 
 terceded for him. Lastly, Bhrigu went to the heaven of Vishnu, whom 
 he found asleep. To try his forbearance, he gave the god a good kick 
 on his breast, which awoke him. Instead of showing anger, Vishnu 
 asked Bhrigu's pardon for not having greeted him on his first arrival. 
 Then he declared he was highly honoured by the sage's blow. It had 
 imprinted an indelible mark of good fortune on his breast. He trusted 
 the sage's foot was not hurt, and began to rub it gently. ' This,' said 
 Bhrigu, ' is the mightiest god ; he overpowers his enemies by the most 
 potent of all weapons — gentleness and generosity.' 
 
 The three gods differ from, and are superior to, all other 
 divine and human organisms, in that they are not subject to 
 transmigrations. They are beings who have attained the 
 highest condition possible, short of absorption into Brahma. 
 
 And of these three, Vishnu, the Maintainer and Preserver of 
 all nature, is the most human, as he is also the most humane, 
 in his character, attributes, and sympathies, and therefore 
 devotion (bhakti) to him is, of all forms of Hindu religion, 
 the most popular. He has four arms, symbolical of the power 
 he exerts in the deliverance of his worshippers. Portions of 
 his divine nature have descended into earthly incarnations to 
 deliver the earth in times of danger and emergency. They 
 are still continually descending in good men and living 
 teachers (see p. 103). 
 
 Whether, in fact, Vishnu be connected with light, with heat, 
 with air, or with water, it is evident that his function is that of 
 
Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 47 
 
 a divine Pervader, infusing his essence for special purposes 
 into created things, animate and inanimate ; for example, into 
 stones, such as the black Salagrama ; into rivers, such as the 
 Ganges ; into trees and plants, such as the Tulasi ; into 
 animals, such as a fish, a tortoise, a boar ; and lastly, into 
 men (see pp. 103-116). 
 
 And here be it noted that the idea of incarnation, like 
 every other idea in religion, morality, and science, when 
 manipulated by the Brahmans, was by them subtilized and 
 exaggerated. Hence the incarnations of Vishnu are really 
 descents (avatara) on earth of portions of the essence of a 
 divine person already possessing a material form (see pp. G'l,, \ 
 103). These descents were undertaken, reasonably enough, 
 for preserving the world when in pressing danger from the 
 malice of evil demons ; and they are of four kinds and 
 degrees. 
 
 First, the full descent, as in Krishna, one of the heroes 
 of the Epic poem called Maha-bharata. 
 
 Secondly (though chronologically anterior), the half-essence 
 descent, consisting of half the god's nature, as in Rama, hero 
 of the other Epic called Ramayana. 
 
 Thirdly, the quarter-essence descent, as in Rama's brother 
 Bharata ; fourthly, the eighth-part descent, as in Rama's two 
 other brothers, Lakshmana and Satrughna. Other special 
 descents are described at pp. 107-115. 
 
 Distinct from these is the constant infusion of portions of 
 the divine essence into ordinary men, animals, and inanimate 
 objects. All men whose lives are remarkable for any pecu- 
 liar circumstances are held by the Hindus to be partial incar- 
 nations of the divine nature, and worshipped accordingly. 
 
 The other two members of the Indian triad, Brahma and\ 
 Siva, have no human incarnations exactly comparable with 
 those of Vishnu, though Brahma is, as it were, humanized in 
 his representatives the priests, called Brahmans. ^ 
 
 It is true that certain incarnations of both Brahma and 
 
48 Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 
 
 Siva are sometimes mentioned (as, for example, that of 
 Siva called Vlrabhadra, p. 79), and there are local manifesta- 
 tions of these deities and local descents of Siva in human 
 form. Moreover, Brahma and Siva resemble Vishnu in having 
 wives. Brahma's wife is Sarasvatl^, Vishnu's is Lakshml, 
 Siva's is ParvatI, and it may be noted that Siva has two 
 sons, Ganesa, lord of the demon hosts, and Subrahmanya 
 (also called Skanda and Karttikeya), general of the celestial 
 armies, whereas Vishnu has no sons except in his human 
 incarnations ^. 
 
 But it would be a great mistake to suppose that many 
 deities and divine manifestations are generally worshipped. 
 The gods of the Hindu Pantheon to whom temples are reared 
 and prayers offered are not numerous. Forms of Vishnu, Siva, 
 and their consorts, with the two sons of Siva (Ganesa and Su- 
 brahmanya, p. 211}, and Hanuman(p.zao) are the chief temple- 
 deities of India. But there are an infinite number of divine 
 and semi-divine beings, good and evil demons, every one of 
 which is held in veneration or dread, and every one of which, 
 from the highest to the lowest, is, like all the others, subject to ■ 
 the universal law of re-absorption into the one divine universal 
 Essence (Brahma). Indeed, at the end of vast periods, called 
 days of Brahma, each lasting for 4,330,000,000 human years, 
 the whole universe is so re-absorbed, and after remaining 
 dormant for equally long periods, is again evolved. 
 
 Where, then, lies the motive for self-knowledge and self- 
 discipline, if every man is really God ? It is that the One 
 Spirit, as if for diversion, ignores itself, submits to the influ- 
 ence of an illusory creative force, and permits the unity of its 
 nature to be partitioned into an infinite number of individual 
 
 • Dubois (p. 371) relates a legend which makes Brahma guilty of incest 
 in that he was both the father and husband of Sarasvati. 
 
 '^ Nor were Vishnu's incarnations prolific, unless we reckop the 108,000 
 mythical sons of Krishna (see pp. 113, 114). The great Rama had 
 twin sons, Kusa and Lava, born when Sita had been banished' to the 
 hermitage. 
 
Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 49 
 
 personal spirits, which, while they continue in ignorance, are 
 liable to commit error. And no such spirit can recover identity 
 with the Supreme Spirit except by purificatory rites and by 
 raising itself, through the exercise of self-knowledge and 
 self-discipline in many births, to a state of cessation from 
 action (vairagya). In fact, a condition of entire mental vacuity 
 (citta-vritti-nirodha) or trance (samadhi) is of all states the 
 most desirable as leading to complete identification with the 
 one universal Spirit. Not that a man need aim at immediate 
 union with that Spirit. 
 
 He may simply aspire to re-absorption into the one absolute 
 Spirit ; or may simply devote himself to one of the personal ; 
 gods, Brahma, Vishnu, or Siva, so as to become, by union 
 with them, only one degree removed from re-absorption, and 
 incapable of further transmigrations (p. 41, 11. ii-ao). Or he 
 may simply aim at admission to their heavens (p.70), or to the 
 temporary heaven Svarga (presided over by Indra), the only 
 paradise of orthodox Brahmanism ; or at escaping one of the 
 purgatorial hells (pp. 233, 293). 
 
 We may note that Svarga, as an abode of light, is mentioned 
 once in the Rig-veda (X, 95, 1 8) ; oftener in the Atharva-veda 
 and Brahmanas. ^ 
 
 And here lies the motive for religious worship addressed to ' 
 personal gods and visible forms. For the one universal Spirit 
 is manifested in such forms. Yet it is a cardinal feature^'"' 
 of the Brahmanical system, that the one universal Spirit can 
 never itself be directly worshipped, except by turning the 
 thoughts inwards. No shrine or temple to Brahma is to be 
 found throughout all India. The one self-existent Brahma 
 can only become an object of meditation and knowledge. 
 The Spirit is to be known by the spirit ; for he is enshrined in 
 every man's heart ; and this internal meditation is regarded 
 as the highest religious act. In short, Brahma is properly/ 
 only an object of internal knowledge (jneyam), not, an object 
 of external worship (upasyam). 
 
 E 
 
50 Mythological or Polytheistic Brahmanism. 
 
 And here mark the vast difference between the Hindu idea 
 of a triad and the Christian Trinity. Brahma, Vishnu, and 
 Siva are not self-existent. They have only secondaiy exist- 
 ences, though the One Spirit may be worshipped through 
 these three manifestations, or any one of the three. It is 
 even possible for the members of this triad to worship the One 
 Spirit through the worship of each other, each being in turn 
 regarded as inferior (see p. 45). 
 
 Again, it is to be noted that \homage may be paid to 
 the one Spirit by and through the worship of the inferior 
 gods, goddesses, departed ancestors, living Brahmans, heroes, 
 animals, and plants. Even stocks, stones, and images may 
 represent the divine presence, and so become media through 
 which the One Spirit may become an object of adoration. 
 Nay, the very demons may receive worship both from gods 
 and men, if by mortification and meditation they attain near- 
 ness to re-absorption into the great Spirit of the Universe. 
 
 I once asked a Brahman, residing at Thana (Tanna) near 
 Bombay, to give me some explanation of the fact that even 
 Indians of cultivated intellect who assert the unity of God, 
 appear to us Europeans to be worshippers of many gods. 
 His answer was to the following effect : — 
 
 ' All orthodox Hindus believe in one universal Spirit, who 
 becomes Supreme Lord over all (Paramesvara). At the same 
 time they believe that this one God has taken various forms, 
 all of which may be worshipped ; just as gold is one every- 
 where, though it may take different forms and names in dif- 
 ferent places and countries. Every man chooses his favourite 
 god or divine object to which he pays especial homage. Thus 
 Agnihotri-Brahmans regard fire as their favourite form of 
 the deity. They call him Agni-narayana. Vedic Brahmans 
 make a god of the Veda, calling it Veda-narayana. Different 
 places have also their favourite presiding deities. Benares is 
 specially watched over by a form of Siva (called Visvesvara) ; 
 Pandharpur, by a form of Krishna (called Vithoba). Here in 
 
Nomistic or Preceptive Brahmanism. 51 
 
 Thana we have temples of Vishnu, Rama, Krishna, Viththal, 
 Hanuman, Siva, Ganesa, and Devi. The oldest and most 
 sacred of all is one of Siva, in the character of KaupTnesvara. 
 We may propitiate every one of them with ceremonies and 
 sacrifices, but the Supreme Being present in these gods is the 
 real object of all our offerings and religious services. At the 
 end of each we say : " By this act may the Supreme Lord be 
 gratified ! " Hence, though to you we appear Polytheists, 
 we are really Monotheists. Nor are we Pantheists in your 
 sense of the term. Only our deepest thinkers look beyond 
 the personal God to the impersonal Spirit which underlies 
 everything. We educated Brahmans are practically Theists.' 
 We might add that the Rig-veda asserts that the gods are 
 one Being under different names (I. 164. 46 ; VIII. 58. a). 
 
 Nomistic Brahmanism. 
 
 The fourth phase of Brahmanism may be called the No- 
 mistic or Preceptive phase, because it represents that period 
 in Indian religious history when the Brahmans composed 
 codes of law (smriti-sastra, dharma-sastra) and laid down 
 precise precepts for the constitution of the Hindu social 
 fabric, for the due co-ordination of its different orders and 
 castes, for the regulation of every-day domestic life and for 
 the enforcement of moral conduct. 
 
 Indeed, the laxity and liberty allowed by Brahmanism in 
 regard to all forms of religious belief and philosophical 
 thought, is curiously contrasted with the strictness and rigidity 
 of its rules and ordinances in regard to every act of a man's 
 domestic life, according to his social status or caste. 
 
 These rules are contained in three principal codes — (i) the 
 code of Manu ; (a) that of Yajnavalkya ; (3) that of Parasara. 
 The first is held to be the most sacred of the three. It 
 was originally a local code, embodying rules and precepts — 
 perhaps by different authors, some of whom may have lived 
 in the fifth century B.C., others in the second century B.C., and 
 
 E 2 
 
52 Nomistic Brahmanism. 
 
 others even later. It was at first current among a particular 
 tribe of Brahmans called Manavas, who probably occupied 
 part of the North-western region between the rivers SarasvatI 
 and Drishadvati, but afterwards became generally adopted. 
 The name of the real author of this great work (which as 
 a mere literary production is one of the most remarkable 
 to be found anywhere) is concealed under the title Manu^. 
 ' The code of Yajnavalkya is founded on that of Manu, but 
 introduces many additional rules, some of which are probably 
 as late as the first or second century of our era. It is always 
 associated with its commentary, the Mitakshara. The code of 
 Parasara is a still more modern work. It enacts special laws 
 adapted to the fourth or most depraved age of the world 
 (called Kali). The three codes together constitute a kind 
 of bible of Nomistic Brahmanism, much in the same way 
 as the Brahmanas of the three Vedas are the exponent of 
 Ritualistic Brahmanism. The Brahmanas are concerned with 
 public Vedic ritual and sacrifice (sruti-karman), the law-books 
 with domestic ceremonies (smriti-karman). 
 
 In short, the three chief codes are mirrors of Indian domestic 
 customs, little affected as these have been by the lapse of 
 more than two thousand years. They illustrate very strikingly 
 the close intertwining of politicSj morality, and social life with 
 religion and religious ordinances. ' The root of all law,' says 
 Manu, ' is the Veda and the traditions of those who know the 
 Veda.' Accordingly we find that in Manu's code the rules 
 of judicature and of caste are mixed up with the dogmas of 
 religion and philosophy. 
 
 Then again, blended with these are high religious and 
 moral precepts — many of them worthy of Christianity (see 
 
 ' Manu is supposed to speak as far as I. 60, and after that another 
 sage called Bhrigu. The entire code is fully analysed and described in 
 my 'Indian Wisdom,' pp. 211-294. The late Dr. A. Burnell's opinion 
 was that the date of the vvork as we now possess it must be placed in 
 the fourth century of our era. I cannot agree with his views. 
 
Nomistic Brahmanism. 53 
 
 Chap. XXI) — while the punishment assigned to every offence 
 is carried beyond the grave into future states of existence, the 
 doctrine of transmigration of souls through celestial and ter- 
 restrial bodies from gods to stones being implied throughout. 
 Manu declares that a triple order of metempsychosis through 
 higher, middle, and lower stages of existence results from the 
 force of good, middling, or bad acts, words, and thoughts in 
 every man's present life (Manu XII. 3-40). 
 
 The theory of caste and the superiority of the Brahmans 
 is the hinge on which the whole social fabric turns. The 
 Brahmans form the central body around which all other 
 classes revolve like satellites. Not only are they invested 
 with divine dignity, but they are bound together by the 
 most stringent rules. Two other castes — viz. Kshatriyas and 
 Vaisyas — are with them called ' Twice-born,' through the 
 Initiation rite (p. 360) which admitted all three to certain 
 privileges. 
 
 The doctrine of Manu was that the deity created distinct 
 classes of men, as he did animals and plants ; and that the 
 four chief classes — Brahmans, soldiers (Kshatriyas), agricultu- 
 ralists (Vaisyas), and servants (Sudras) — were born and must 
 remain as distinct from each other as elephants, lions, oxen, 
 and dogs, wheat, barley, rice, and beans (pp. 452-474). 
 
 A Brahman was to pass through four stages of life; 
 1 . Unmarried religious student (Brahma-carin) ; 2. Married 
 householder (Grihastha) ; 3. Anchorite (Vanaprastha) ; 4. 
 Abandoner of worldly concerns (Sannyasin or Sannyasi, pp. 
 ^^, 36a). As a householder he could have four wives be- 
 longing to any of the three lower castes. Intermarriage could 
 also take place between members of all the four classes, or, 
 again, between the castes resulting from such intercourse. 
 Hence arose an endless number of mixed castes, and castes 
 within castes, each restricted to its own occupation and bound 
 by its own rules. 
 . Examples of moral precepts will be found at Chap. XXI. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 Hinduism a Development of Brahmanism. 
 
 General Observations. 
 
 We now pass on to the third stage of Hindu religious 
 thought, which has its bible in the Puranas. And we may 
 here take note of a fact illustrated by the whole history of 
 the world's religious thought, that a merely spiritual and 
 impersonal religion is quite incapable of taking hold of the 
 masses of mankind. Something more is needed for illiterate 
 unthinking populations earnestly craving for concrete objects 
 of faith and visible objects of devotion. 
 
 The chief point, then, which distinguishes Hinduism as a 
 system of creeds from Brahmanism is that it subordinates 
 the worship of the purely spiritual Brahman (nom. Brahma) 
 with its first manifestation Brahma (p. 47), to that of Siva 
 and Vishnu, or of their wives, or of some form of these deities ; 
 while each sect exalts its own god to the place of the Supreme. 
 Yet we must guard against the idea that theistic Hinduism 
 has superseded pantheistic Brahmanism ; for in India forms of 
 pantheism, theism, and polytheism are ever interwoven with 
 each other. Brahma has still the spiritual worship of the 
 thoughtful, though he has neither temple nor image ; while 
 Brahma has still two temples in India, and is represented? i 
 by four-faced images, and is also worshipped under the 
 symbol of Siva (pp. 44, 79, 83, and Chapter XXII). He has 
 also his own heaven called Brahma-loka (cf. pp. 70, 291). 
 Moreover it is certain that the worship of personal gods was 
 
Hinduism developed out of Brdhmanism. 5 5 
 
 a part of pantheistic Brahmanism long before Siva and Vishnu 
 became the exclusive favourites of particular sects. Perhaps 
 the best exponent of the Brahmanical system vi^as the great 
 teacher Sankara (Sahkaracarya), a native of Kerala (Malabar), 
 who lived about the beginning of the eighth century of our era. 
 He was a SannyasT (p. 36a) and an unmarried Smarta Brah- 
 man^ under a vow of celibacy, and is often styled Parama- 
 hansa-parivrajakacarya. For it is one of the inconsistencies 
 of the Hindu religion, that it enjoins the duty of marriage 
 upon all, yet honours celibacy as a condition of great sanctity 
 and a means of acquiring extraordinary religious merit and 
 influence. Undoubtedly Sankara was the very incarnation of 
 strict Brahmanism ; and if it be possible to name any one real 
 historical concrete personality as a typical representative of 
 Brahmanical doctrines, it is undeniable that we must point to 
 Sankara rather than to the legendary Vyasa, even though the 
 latter be the alleged author of the Vedanta-Sutra. 
 
 Yet so utterly barren is India in both history and bio- 
 graphy, that very little is known of the life of perhaps one 
 of the greatest religious leaders she has ever produced. 
 
 It is nevertheless a fact that Sankara founded the monastery 
 (matha) of Sringeri (Srihga-giri) in Mysore, as well as three 
 others in Northern, Western, and Eastern India ^ ; to the 
 Headship over which his chief disciples were appointed by 
 himself; the spiritual powers of the first Head being trans- 
 mitted through a line of successors, regularly elected. 
 
 The most noted successor of Sankara at the Sringeri 
 
 * A SannyasI may have been once a married man. But there are 
 Sannyasis (such as the late Dayananda) who have become so without 
 going through the previous stages of Grihastha and Vanaprastha. Equi- 
 valent expressions for Sannyasin are Parivrajaka, Bhikshu, Dandin, and 
 Maskarin (Panini VI. I. 154) ; but the term Bhikshu is now applied in 
 Western India to those clerical Brahmans (as opposed to lay) who per- 
 form religious ceremonies and are not engaged in worldly pursuits. 
 
 ^ That in the North is at Badrinath in the Himalayas, that in the 
 West at Dvarika in Kathiawar, that in the East at Jagannath-purl. 
 
 :y 
 
56 Hinduism developed out of Brahmanism. 
 
 monastery was Sayana (Madhava^), the well-known author 
 of the Rig-veda commentary, who lived in the fourteenth 
 century. Sankara himself, though he managed to write a 
 vast number of treatises on the Vedanta philosophy, led an 
 erratic, restless, controversial life, and died early, probably 
 at Kedarnath in the Himalayas, at the age of thirty-two. 
 
 He is thought by some to have inculcated the preferential 
 worship of the god Siva 2, of whom some declare him to have 
 been an incarnation. Others maintain that he himself had 
 a preference for Vishnu, the real fact being that he looked 
 on both these gods as equally manifestations of the one 
 Universal Spirit. For, in truth, all orthodox Brahmans are in 
 a general way both Saivas and Vaishnavas, and any Brahman 
 may have a preference for the worship of either Siva or Vishnu 
 without any necessary exclusive devotion to either, and with- 
 out identifying either — to the exclusion of the other — with 
 the one Spirit of the Universe, as many Pauranika sectarians 
 do. It is well known, in fact, that most Smarta Brahmans in 
 the present day, who are followers of Sankaradarya, have a 
 leaning towards the worship of the one personal deity Siva^ 
 
 On the other hand, very few even of the most ignorant and 
 bigoted Hindus who are exclusive worshippers of the per- 
 sonal deities Siva, Vishnu, or their consorts, and whose highest 
 spiritual aim is to be a dweller in the heaven of one of those 
 
 ^ The identity of Sayaija and Madhava is disputed ; the preponderance 
 of evidence seems now to be against the late Dr. A. Burnell's view of 
 their identity as expressed in his Vansa-brahmana. 
 
 ^ His sanctity was in such repute that he was held to have worked 
 several miracles, amongst others, transferring his own soul for a time 
 into the dead body of a king Amaru, that he might become the husband 
 of the king's, widow for a brief period, and so learn by experience how 
 to argue on amatory subjects with the wife of a Brahman named Man- 
 dana, who was the only person he had never conquered in argument. 
 This is described in a poem called Amaru-sataka, to which a mystical 
 interpretation is given. 
 
 ' Two Smarta Brahmans accompanied me round the temple of Siva 
 at Tinnevelly. They both had three horizontal lines (tri-pundra) made 
 with Vibhuti on their foreheads, which proved their preference for Siva. 
 
Hinduism developed out of Brahmanism. 57 
 
 gods, are uninfluenced by an undercurrent of pantheistic ideas. 
 Nor would it be easy to find any thoughtful Hindu who, if' 
 closely questioned, would repudiate as untenable the doc- 
 trine of an omnipresent, impersonal, bodiless and passionless 
 (nirguna) spiritual Essence, of which every being in the Uni- 
 verse is a portion. In short, the more closely the theistic 
 phase of Hinduism is examined, the more plainly will it be 
 found to rest on a substratum of pantheistic Brahmanism. 
 The one system is to a great extent a development of the 
 other, and to draw a line of separation between the two is im- 
 possible. Metempsychosis is equally the dread of both. 
 
 Nevertheless Hinduism is by no means a simple form of 
 theism, or even polytheism. It presents for our investigation 
 a complex congeries of creeds and doctrines which in its 
 gradual accumulation may be compared to the gathering 
 together of the mighty volume of the Ganges, swollen by a 
 continual influx of tributary rivers and rivulets, spreading 
 itself over an ever-increasing area of country, and finally 
 resolving itself into an intricate Delta of tortuous streams and 
 jungly marshes. 
 
 Nor is it difficult to account for this complexity. The 
 Hindu religion is a reflection of the composite character of 
 the Hindus, who are not one people but many. It i? based 
 on the idea of universal receptivity. It has ever aimed at 
 accommodating itself to circumstances, and has carried on the 
 process of adaptation through more than three thousand years. 
 It has first borne with and then, so to speak, swallowed, 
 digested, and assimilated something from all creeds. Or, like 
 a vast hospitable mansion, it has opened its doors to all 
 comers; it has not refused a welcome to applicants of every 
 grade from the highest to the lowest, if only willing to 
 adopt caste-rules ; insomuch that many regard Hindaism as 
 a system of social rules rather than of religious creeds. 
 
 In this manner it has held out the right hand of brotherhood 
 to the Fetish-worshipping aborigines of India ; it has stooped 
 
58 Receptivity of Hinduism. 
 
 to the demonolatry of various savage tribes ; it has not scru- 
 pled to encourage the adoration of the fish, the boar^ the 
 serpent, trees, plants, stones, and devils ; it has permitted a 
 descent to the most degrading cults of the Dravidian races ; 
 while at the same time it has ventured to rise from the most 
 grovelling practices to the loftiest heights of philosophical 
 speculation ; it has not hesitated to drink in thoughts from the 
 very fountain of Truth, and owes not a little to Christianity 
 itself. Strangest of all, it has dissipated the formidable organ- 
 ization which for a long period confronted Brahmanism, and 
 introduced doctrines subversive of Sacerdotalism. It has art- 
 fully appropriated Buddhism, and gradually superseded that 
 competing system by drawing- its adherents within the pale of 
 its own communion. Without doubt the most remarkable 
 fact in the history of the interaction between Brahmanism 
 and the mighty movement initiated by one of the greatest of 
 this earth's teachers, was the resolution of Buddhism into 
 Saivism and Vaishnavism. To say that these two systems in 
 their present form preceded Buddhism is inaccurate. Probably 
 they CO- existed with it in some form or other. Undeniably they 
 became amplified and modified by its absorption. 
 
 This interchangeableness between Buddhism, Saivism, and 
 Vaishnavism will be more fully explained hereafter. It will 
 be sufficient at present to note that Gautama Buddha had 
 two distinct characters. In his first and earliest character he 
 was the typical monk (Sramana^), the great teacher of the 
 power to be gained by meditation and by conquest of the 
 passions. In his second, he was the great friend of the com- 
 mon people who advocated universal brotherhood, universal 
 equality, and universal compassion for all forms of animal 
 
 ' A fish and a boar form two of Vishnu's incarnations. The former is 
 also the emblem of the Pandya kingdom in the South, and Minadi, the 
 goddess worshipped in the great temple of Madura, is said to mean fish- 
 ruler, though the Brahmans have converted it into ' fish-eyed ' (Mmakshlj. 
 
 ^ See my work on ' Buddhism,' p. 75 (John Murray, Albemarle Street). 
 
Sects of Hinduism. 59 
 
 life. In both these characters the personal god Siva and 
 the incarnated Vishnu were his counterparts, and ultimately 
 superseded him^. Siva was the Buddha in his monastic 
 character. Vishnu was the Buddha in his character of a 
 beneficent and unselfish lover and friend of the human race. 
 
 And as Saivism and Vaishnavism superseded Buddhism,'^ 
 so they became the chief constituents of modern Hinduism. 
 All the shades and subdivisions of Hindu sectarianism may 
 be included under one or other of these two heads. 
 
 Nevertheless it is customary to speak of Hinduism as 
 divided into five principal sects: i. Worshippers of Siva 
 (Saivas). a. Worshippers of Vishnu (Vaishnavas). 3. Wor- 
 shippers of the female personifications of energy, regarded 
 as the wives of the deities (Saktas, p. 180). 4. Worshippers 
 of Ganesa or Gana-pati — the god of luck and good fortune 
 (Ganapatyas, p. 315). 5. Sun-worshippers (Sauras, p. 341). 
 Besides these five, a sixth called Pasupata (or, by Ananda-giri, 
 Kapalika), chiefly found in the South of India, is occasionally 
 added, though this is nothing but a subdivision of the 
 Saivas. All these six sects are said by South-Indian 
 Pandits to have been founded by Sahkaracarya, who is 
 therefore often called Shan-mata-sthapaka, ' the establisher 
 of six forms of doctrines.' In reality that great teacher 
 was, as we have seen, utterly opposed to all sectarian 
 ideas. In the Sahkara-vijaya of Ananda-giri (a work written 
 by one of his disciples in the ninth or tenth century) he 
 is described as having traversed India in every direction 
 for the purpose of combating and refuting an immense 
 number of sectarian systems which had taken root in the 
 country. There were at that time, besides the worshippers 
 of Siva and Vishnu, votaries of Brahma, of the Sun, Moon, 
 Kubera, Yama, Varuna, Sesha, and others innumerable. 
 Many of these were extirpated through Sahkara's instru- 
 
 ' There are clear traces that the great Vaishnava temple of Jagan-nath 
 in Orissa was originally dedicated to some Buddhist tooth-relic. 
 
6o Development of Saiva and Vaishnava Sects. 
 
 mentality, and many have since disappeared ; but, curiously 
 enough, it is alleged that out of pity to the present degenerate 
 age (Kali-yuga), when men are incapable of apprehending 
 the pure unity of the Godhead, Sahkara allowed six sects to 
 remain. It was only by degrees that the sectarian character 
 of all but the first two disappeared. 
 
 What then is the present idea implied by Hindu secta- 
 rianism ? It is clear from what has been already stated that 
 every Hindu creed ought to be regarded as unorthodox which 
 exalts favourite personal deities to the position of the one 
 eternal, self-existing Spirit (Atman or Brahma), in contra- 
 vention of the dogma that even the highest divine person- 
 alities are finite beings destined ultimately to be absorbed 
 into that one infinite Spirit. 
 
 Of course it must be understood that when Saivism and 
 Vaishnavism deny this dogma they offend against orthodoxy. 
 But Saivism and Vaishnavism constitute, so to speak, the very 
 warp and woof of the later Hindu religion, and it is possible 
 to be a worshipper of Siva or Vishnu (as manifestations of 
 Brahma) without being a sectarian. Hence it seems better 
 to apply the term ' sect ' to separate religious communities 
 within the pale of these two chief systems, organized and 
 consolidated by particular teachers with the object of incul- 
 cating entire devotion towards, and exclusive dependence on 
 either Siva or Vishnu, and securing through the instrumen- 
 tality of one or other of these gods the welfare and salvation 
 of every individual among his worshippers. 
 
 At the same time, it must be carefully noted that Hindu 
 sectarianism is something more than the mere exclusive 
 worship of a personal god. It implies more or less direct 
 opposition to the orthodox philosophy of Brahmanism, in 
 ! regard to the identity of man's spirit with God's spirit. Man's 
 spirit is held to have a separate personality, but the doctrine 
 of metempsychosis or transmigration is perhaps insisted on 
 with even greater intensity in Saivism and Vaishnavism than 
 
Development of Saiva and Vaishnava Sects. 6i 
 
 in pure Brahmanism. Nevertheless it must, as we have, 
 already seen, be borne in mind that vague pantheistic ideas 
 may always be found lurking at the root of every variety of 
 Hindu sectarian doctrine. Such ideas are naturally inwoven 
 into the very texture of every Hindu mind. 
 
 But Hinduism bristles with contradictions, inconsistencies, 
 and surprises ; and it is remarkable that the generally 
 prevalent Brahmanical doctrine of the identification of the 
 living personal Spirit of man with the one universal Spirit of 
 the universe is the peculiar dogma which various sects of both 
 Saivas and Vaishnavas— especially the latter— theoretically 
 repudiate, dilute, or qualify. For indeed the spirit of man 
 if it strives to give expression to its feelings of complete and 
 exclusive devotion to a personal deity as to a Creator and 
 Saviour, cannot at the same moment assent to doctrines which 
 destroy its own separate personality. 
 
 To mark this complete and exclusive devotion more clearly, 
 and to bind each sect together by some common bond of 
 union, a short form of words called a Mantra (e. g. Om Ramaya 
 namah, reverence to Rama, see p. 117), expressive of ex- 
 clusive and absolute trust in the particular god worshipped 
 as representing the Supreme Ruler of the world, is taught 
 by each community and its repetition every day is made a 
 necessary condition of salvation through him. 
 
 Moreover, the privilege of imparting this secret (rahasya) 
 Mantra belongs to a regularly constituted order of men (Guru). 
 The communication of it (usually in a whisper) is called ini- , 
 tiation (diksha), and acquaintance with it is held to be essential ' 
 to admission within the pale of the society. When any such 
 system has been fully organized it is called a Sampradaya — 
 a word meaning a particular body of traditionary doctrines 
 handed down through a succession of teachers ^. 
 
 ' It may also be designated by such terms as Darsana or Mata — that 
 is, particular views or opinions on religion or philosophy. The term 
 
62 Doctrine of Incarnation in Hinduism. 
 
 As a matter of fact the Sampradayas or separate religious 
 denominations of the present day are nearly all mere sub- 
 divisions of Vaishnavism. Not that Siva has been dethroned 
 by Vishnu, or has lost any of his importance as one of the two 
 chief deities of modern Hinduism. What is meant is that, 
 although all Hindus pay homage to Siva, to his Consort or 
 Sakti, and to his two sons Ganesa and Skanda, few attach 
 themselves to these deities as to personal benefactors — and- 
 although many repeat their Mantras, few pray to them ex- 
 clusively as to their personal creators and saviours. 
 
 Certainly no one, sO far as I have been able to ascertain, 
 turns to these gods, or invokes their intervention and assist- 
 ance in the hour of death ^ (see p. 397). Similarly all Hindus 
 adore the Sun in their daily prayers (pp. 34a, 406), but very 
 few in the present day ever worship him exclusively or in 
 what may be called a spirit of sectarianism. Several sects of 
 Sun-worshippers are known to have once existed and to have 
 had many adherents, but they have generally died out. 
 
 In reality the principle of faith and devotion as displayed 
 towards personal gods could scarcely have taken deep root 
 in India, except in connexion with the worship of a god 
 who descended upon earth as the child of earthly parents 
 for the promotion of man's welfare, and whose nature in his 
 incarnations became quite as human as it was divine. 
 
 And here mark that the doctrine of incarnation among 
 the Hindus is in many important respects different from the 
 Christian idea. The Sanskrit language, which is the only 
 language of the Hindu religion and the only source of 
 theological terms, has no exact equivalent for incarnation^. 
 
 Darsana, however, is more usually restricted to the six regular philoso- 
 phical systems. 
 
 ^ The names invoked at death are generally those of Rama and Nara- 
 yana (p. 297). The late Dr. Burnell told me that he once witnessed the 
 execution of thirteen criminals in India who were all Saivas, and yet all 
 called on the name of Rama before being hanged. 
 
 ^ Unless it be compounds formed with deha, murtt, and sakshat. 
 
Doctrine of Incarnation in Hinduism. 6 
 
 o 
 
 The common word is Avatara, which means ' descent.' 
 Furthermore, it must be noted that intervening between the 
 one Self-existent Being and these Avataras must be placed the 
 forms of personal deities such as Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva — 
 each of whom possesses a body composed, like human bodies, 
 of gross, though divine and ethereal, particles^- Strictly, 
 therefore, the so-called • incarnations, represented by heroes 
 like Rama, ought to be regarded as incarnations of incarna- 
 tions ; for they are the descent of portions of the essence of 
 personal divinities, who, already possessing bodies composed 
 of gross, though divine particles, condescend by being born 
 of earthly parents to assume bodies composed of human gross 
 particles. Such descents are attributed, not only to the per- 
 sonal gods Vishnu, Siva, and Brahma, but even to other gods 
 such as Indra, Vayu, Sesha ; Arjuna and the heroes of the 
 Maha-bharata being also regarded as incarnated descents of 
 various deities. Yet the only universally acceptable and gene- 
 rally worshipped incarnated descents are those of Vishnu, as 
 Rama son of Dasaratha, and as Krishna son of Vasudeva. When 
 once the feeling of affection for Rama and Krishna had rooted 
 itself in the religious sense of the people, it rapidly gathered 
 strength and dominated over every other feeling. '' 
 
 It was thus that the way of devotion (bhakti-marga) 
 as propounded in the Puranas and Tantras ^ superseded the 
 other two ways of salvation — knowledge and works (jnana- 
 marga and karma-marga) ; though it must be borne in mind 
 that bhakti, ' devotion,' is really a kind of ' meritorious work,' 
 and not equivalent to ' faith ' in the Christian sense. 
 
 It even triumphed over caste ; for an enthusiastic love of 
 
 ^ See the account of the structure of the bodies of the gods at p. 28. 
 
 '^ Doubtless a form of the doctrine of bhakti may be traced back to early 
 times, but for its full development we must look to' the Bhagavad-glta, ' 
 a comparatively modern episode of the Maha-bharata,! to the Puranas 
 and Tantras, and to a scientific formulation of the doctrine in the 
 Bhakti-sutra of Sandilya probably about the twelfth century. 
 
64 Interchangeableness of Siva and Vishnu. 
 
 Rama or Krishna was theoretically a bond of union among 
 human beings stronger than all social ties, and was incom- 
 patible with differences of rank or antagonisms of interest. 
 
 In fact the leaders of religious thought in India were all 
 disciples in the school of the great Buddha, to the extent, 
 at least, of imitating his wisdom by advocating social 
 union and fraternity. They saw that their popularity 
 as reformers depended on their attracting adherents from 
 all ranks, high and low. Hence, every great religious leader 
 proclaimed the brotherhood and equality of all who enrolled 
 themselves under his leadership. Buddha was the son of a 
 petty Raja or landowner, but addressed himself to all ranks. 
 In the same way Vishnu, in his descent as Krishna, though 
 of the kingly caste, was the favourite of the common 
 people. But just as Buddhism ultimately fell back into Brah- 
 manism, so has every movement in the direction of liberty, 
 equality, and fraternity ended by a return, more or less com- 
 plete, to the original condition of subjection to Brahmanical 
 authority, ceremonial observances, and caste. 
 
 Practically, therefore, we must regard Vaishnavism as the 
 principal home of Hindu religious sectarianism. All the 
 chief modern sects have resulted more from differences of 
 opinion between various schools of Vaishnavas, than from an- 
 tagonism between Saivism and Vaishnavism. Nor are Saivism 
 and Vaishnavism in their essence antagonistic systems. They 
 represent different lines of religious thought ; such lines ex- 
 pressing a contrast rather than an opposition. So far indeed 
 from any necessary opposition between the systems, they are 
 a necessary complement of each other. For the worship of 
 the composite deity Rudra-Siva is nothing but the expression 
 of the awe felt by human beings in the presence of the two 
 mutually complementary forces of disintegration and reinte- 
 gration ; while the worship of the personal god Vishnu in his 
 descents upon earth in human form is nothing but the ex- 
 pression of the very natural interest felt by man in his own 
 
Interchangeableriess of Siva and Vishiin. 65 
 
 preservation and in the working of the physical forces which 
 resist dissolution. 
 
 Certainly in the present day Saivas and Vaishnavas are 
 tolerant of each other's creeds, both appealing to the Puranas 
 as their special bible, and each acknowledging the gods of 
 the other as proper objects of worship. This is remarkably 
 illustrated by the fact that in some parts of the country a god 
 called Hari-Hara (Vishnu-Siva) is worshipped, who represents 
 the union of the two divine personalities in one. There is a long 
 hymn in praise of this twofold deity in the Hari-vansa (i8ist 
 chapter), and images of him may be seen here and there in 
 Southern India. For example, in the great temple at Madura 
 a fine carving was pointed out to me which proved to be a 
 representation of Sankara-Narayana ( = Hari-Hara) ^. One side 
 of the figure represents half the body of Vishnu with a hand 
 holding a Sahkha, while the other represents that of Siva 
 surmounted by half a head-dress twisted into a matted coil 
 with the lunar crescent conspicuous on it. Then again, 
 wherever in any city a large temple has been erected to Siva, 
 a similar temple dedicated to Vishnu is sure to be conspicuous 
 near at hand. Indeed the shrines of the two gods are not 
 unfrequently found in close juxtaposition within the same 
 sacred enclosure. For instance, on the hill of ParvatI (wife 
 of Siva) near Poona, and in the enclosure of her temple, I 
 saw a shrine of Vishnu, another of his vehicle Garuda, and 
 images of nearly every deity of the Hindu Pantheon ^- 
 
 Nor can any student of the Maha-bharata and Puranas 
 doubt the interchangeableness of the functions of Siva and 
 Vishnu, or fail to perceive that each divine personality has 
 a tendency to blend or merge in the other. In the Linga- 
 
 ' In the South of India a legend is current which makes Vishnu assume 
 the form of a fascinating woman (mohini) and so connect himself with 
 Siva. ' By Saktas Vishnu is often held to be female. 
 
 2 So also in the precincts of the temple of Hanuman at Kaira I saw 
 a shrine of Siva and nearly every other god ordinarily worshipped. 
 
 F 
 
66 Interchangeableness of Saivism and Vaishnavism. 
 
 purana (I. i8 ff.) both Brahma and Vishnu are said to spring 
 from Siva. On the other hand, in the Maha-bharata (Vana- 
 parvan 499 ff. and Anusasana-p. 6806 ff.) Brahma is described 
 as springing from the navel of Vishnu when he was lying 
 in placid repose on the serpent of infinity, and enjoying the 
 most perfect serenity of mind ^ ; whilst Siva or Rudra is said 
 to have been produced from Brahma's (or according to some 
 Vishnu's) forehead when he happened one day to be roused to 
 anger. 
 
 Again, Vishnu, speaking of himself (Santi-parvan 13140, 
 etc.), says : ' I am the soul of all the worlds. It was myself 
 whom I formerly worshipped as Rudra. If I were not to 
 worship the boon-bestowing Siva, no one would worship 
 myself. He who knows him knows me ; he who loves him 
 loves me (Yas tam vetti sa mam vetti yo 'nu tam sa hi mam 
 anu).' But the true explanation of the homage paid by each 
 member of the Triad to the other (cf. p. 106) is to be sought 
 for in the pantheistic ideas which underlie Hinduism. 
 
 Still it must be admitted that Saivism and Vaishnavism are 
 quite distinct systems, and that each sect is inclined to lay 
 an exaggerated stress on its own particular doctrines. 
 
 In ancient times these differences not unfrequently led 
 to rancorous antagonism, and sometimes even to violent con- 
 flicts. This was especially the case in the South, where 
 Saivism generally triumphed over and displaced Vaishnavism ^. 
 Even in the present day, when universal toleration is the rule, 
 Saivas and Vaishnavas like to maintain their distinct cha- 
 racteristics, which they exhibit conspicuously to the eye by 
 a distinctive mark on their foreheads (called tilaka, pundra, 
 and, in the South of India, nama or gandha). 
 
 ^ One reason I often had given to me in India for the present merging 
 of Brahma in Vishnu was that Brahma sprang from the body of Vishnu. 
 
 ^ I noticed many traces of the conflict in the South ; for example, 
 Vaishnava sculptures have been left on the Gopuras in the Saiva temple 
 of Tanjore, 
 
Differences between Saivism and Vaishnavism. 67 
 
 That of the Saivas consists of three horizontal strokes 
 (tri-pundra) made with the white ashes of burnt substances 
 (vibhuti), to represent, perhaps, the disintegrating forces 'be- 
 longing to their god Siva^ and that of the Vaishnavas is 
 an upright mark (urdhva-pundra) made with bright red, 
 yellow, and white colouring substances (the white called 
 Gopl-dandana 2), to represent the foot-print of their human 
 and humane god Vishnu. 
 
 Again, it is important to note that both Saivas and Vaish- 
 navas differ in the mode of branding their breasts, arms, and 
 other parts of their bodies with other distinctive marks of their 
 sect. Such marks are burnt in with red-hot stamps, some- 
 times made of gold. In the case of Saivas they represent the 
 weapons and symbols of Siva, such as the trident and the 
 linga ; while the favourite brands of Vishnu are the discus, 
 the club, and the conch-shell. This practice was severely 
 denounced by Sankara \ but apparently with little effect. 
 
 In regard to rosaries, the rosary (japa-mala) used by Saivas 
 is a string of 3a rough berries (or that number doubled) of 
 the Rudraksha tree (Elaeocarpus Ganitrus), while that of the 
 Vaishnavas is made of the wood of the sacred Tulasi (Tulsi) 
 shrub, and generally consists of 108 beads (see pp. 117, 135 
 with notes). Such rosaries may be worn as necklaces, though 
 their chief use is to be employed as an aid in the recitation of 
 the names of the deity or of prayers. Occasional varieties in 
 the material and form of the rosaries may be noticed * ; for 
 example, Saiva ascetics sometimes carry rosaries formed of 
 the teeth of dead bodies (danta-mala), or sling serpents round 
 
 ' The ashes probably denote that the body must ultimately be reduced 
 to ashes. 
 
 ' This is said to be the soil of a pool near Dvarika in which the GopTs 
 drowned themselves on learning of the death of Krishna. 
 
 ' The Sankara-vijaya shows how Sankara offered the most strenuous 
 opposition to this practice of branding, stigmatizing it as a heretical and 
 ridiculous practice. 
 
 * See especially my book ' Modern India and the Indians,' p. 108. ., 
 
 F % 
 
68 Differences between Saivism and Vaisk^vism. 
 
 their necks for necklaces. On the other hand, Vaishnava 
 rosaries are occasionally but rarely made of lotus-seeds (ka- 
 
 malaksha). 
 
 ' But the most important difference to be noted between 
 Saivas and Vaishnavas is in the use they make of idols, images, 
 and symbols. Siva, we must remember, is a less human 
 and far more mystical deity than the incarnated Vishnu. The 
 character in which he is most frequently worshipped is that 
 of an omnipotent God, taking the place of Brahma the 
 Creator, and granting new life to all created things, but only 
 through death and disintegration. Hence he is not repre- 
 sented by the image of a man, but by a mystic symbol ^— 
 perhaps the best symbol of delegated creative power— which 
 is not dressed or fed or put to sleep like Vishnu's idols, but is 
 supj^osed to be in a condition of perpetual heat and excite- 
 ment, and requires to be cooled and appeased by constant 
 sprinklings (abhisheka) of cold Ganges water and cooling 
 Bilva leaves applied throughout the day by those who worship 
 him ^ (see pp. 90, 439). Moreover food is not generally offered 
 to Siva, or, if occasionally so offered, is not afterwards eaten 
 by his votaries (except in certain special localities), for the 
 obvious reason that inauspicious (amangala) ideas are sup- 
 posed to be connected with his office of causing death ^- 
 On the other hand, since Vishnu is god in his more 
 
 ^ That is, by the linga or image of the distinctive organ of the male 
 sex (the phallus), never in the mind of a Saiva connected with indecent 
 ideas nor with sexual love, though impure practices have certainly been 
 introduced in connexion with the worship of Siva's wife. In fact, sexual 
 passion is chiefly associated with the worship of Vishnu, as Krishna. It 
 is curious that Vaishnavas dislike the Saiva hnga and yet allow the most 
 impure and indecent representations on the walls of their temples. 
 
 '^ Another mode of worship is by pradakshina or circumambulation, 
 keeping the right side towards the object worshipped. In many Linga 
 shrines a space is left for this kind of homage. 
 
 ' The precept is, ' Leaves, flowers, fruit, and water must not be taken 
 after being offered to Siva.' But at the great temple of Bhuvanesvara 
 and a few other places an exception is made. 
 
Differences between Saivism and Vaishnavism, 69 
 
 human and humane aspect, sympathizing with men's trials 
 and condescending to be born of human parents, he is usually 
 represented by the complete image of a well-formed human 
 being — generally that of Krishna or Rama — which is every 
 day roused from a supposed nocturnal slumber, dressed, 
 decorated with gold and jewels, bathed, fed with offerings 
 of cooked and uncooked grain, sweetmeats and fruits, un- 
 dressed and put to sleep again like an ordinary man, while 
 the remains of the. food offered (prasada) are eagerly con- 
 sumed by the priests and attendants ^ (see p. 145). 
 
 And here I may point out that a great distinction is to 
 be made in regard to the comparative sanctity of different 
 kinds of symbols and images. Some, are called Svayam-bhu, 
 that is, existing spontaneously, and are of their own nature 
 pervaded by the essence of the deity. These are either not 
 carved at all, or very slightly moulded into shape. They are 
 merely rough stones or rocks supposed to have descended 
 direct from heaven or to have appeared miraculously on the 
 soil. They are the most sacred of all objects of adoration, 
 and when discovered, temples are built over them. The most 
 usual idols of this kind are stones supposed to represent the 
 Linga of Siva, and when shrines are built round them, a 
 Yoni (to represent the female organ) is usually added. 
 
 Not less sacred than these rough stones are certain small 
 pebbles found in rivers and polished by the action of the 
 water ^. Of these the pebbles representing the Linga of Siva, 
 called Bana-linga or Vana-linga, and apparently of white 
 quartz, are found in the bed of the Narbada river. The 
 black pebbles representing Vishnu or Krishna, called Sala- 
 grama (popularly sal-gram), and generally containing am- 
 
 > This will account for the fact that few villages can afford to keep 
 a temple dedicated to Krishna. The vestments, ornaments, decorations, 
 and paraphernalia needed are too expensive ; whereas all the requisites 
 for the worship of Siva are a stone linga, bilva leaves, and water. 
 
 2 Some of them appear to be artificially rounded and polished. 
 
70 Differences between Saivism and Vaishnavism. 
 
 monites imbedded in the stone, are chiefly found in the river 
 Gandakl. Both kinds of pebble are employed in the domestic 
 worship of Siva and Vishnu known as Pancayatana-puja (to 
 be described pp. 410-416), and performed by householders in 
 their own houses. Both are held to be of their own nature 
 pervaded by the special presence of the deity and need no 
 consecration. Offerings made to these pebbles — such for in- 
 stance as Bilva leaves laid on the white stone of Siva — are 
 believed to confer extraordinary merit. 
 
 A second form of idol is wholly artificial. This is carved 
 by masons or sculptors and not held sacred until the Brah- 
 mans have consecrated it by a long ceremony called Prana- 
 pratishtha, ' endowing with breath.' When such idols have 
 been placed in shrines they can be looked at by an unbeliever, 
 even though the consecration they have received is supposed 
 to have filled them with the spirit (prana) of the god they re- 
 present. Artificial idols and symbols of this kind are manu- 
 factured in large numbers in holy cities, not so much for 
 general worship as for votive offerings to be set up with the 
 customary form of dedication (pratishtha) in the galleries or 
 vestibules of temples, or under sacred trees, or to be kept as 
 objects of adoration in the private robms of houses. 
 
 Pious persons reckon it a work of religious merit to cause 
 such idols and symbols to be made and dedicated. I have 
 seen thousands so dedicated, and others exposed for sale in 
 the streets. Some Lingas are carved out of stone ; some are 
 made of glass. Serpents are occasionally carved round these 
 symbols, as well as round the images of Siva in human form. 
 
 An account of the ceremonies performed in worshipping 
 idols will be given subsequently (see pp. 90-94 ; 144, 145). 
 
 Another difference between Saivism and Vaishnavism must 
 be noted. Each system has its own heaven. That of Siva 
 is Kailasa ; that of Vishnu is Vaikuntha ; that of Krishna is 
 Go-loka (see pp. 118, 291). The first is supposed to be in the 
 Himalaya mountains ; while the two latter are believed (like 
 
Two Characteristics of both Systems. 71 
 
 Svarga, p. 49) to be somewhere on the mythical Mount Meru ^. 
 To these heavens the faithful worshippers of Siva, Vishnu, and ■ 
 Krishna are respectively transported. There amid eternal 
 snows and inaccessible crags they are thought to be safe from 
 future transmigrations. There, too, they may attain to the 
 highest pinnacle of beatification, not so much by absolute 
 absorption (sayujya) into the one supreme Spirit according to 
 the Vedanta doctrine (see p. 41) — for such complete union 
 would involve loss of personality — but rather by dwelling in 
 the same abode with their god (salokya), by nearness to him 
 (samlpya), by assimilation to his likeness (sarupya). / 
 
 I may mention here that the cultus of the god Siva in some 
 of his forms, as well as that of some forms of Vishnu, has 
 been held by more than one authority to be traceable to the 
 practices of pre-Aryan and non-Aryan tribes. But the ex- 
 planations I have given tend to show that Siva and Vishnu 
 are both Brahmanical gods and have their origin in the 
 Veda, though they have been often made to do duty for 
 local deities outside the true circle of Brahmanism. 
 
 Finally whatever differences exist between the sects of 
 Hinduism, there are two characteristics common to all — viz. ; 
 a pessimistic view of life and salvation by works. 
 
 Self-righteousness lies at the root of Hinduism. Let it 
 be granted that this complex system reckons three ways 
 of deliverance from the misery of life : (i) The way of sacri- 
 fices and ceremonial rites, or karma-marga ; (a) the way of " 
 devotion to personal deities, or bhakti-marga ; (3) the way of 
 spiritual knowledge, or jndfia-marga ; yet each of these three 
 systems, or all, three together, are only followed for the merit 
 (punya) to be gained through them, and Hinduism accounts 
 no man righteous except through his own works, acts, and 
 deservings. 
 
 1 The temple of SrI-rangam at Trichinopoly is supposed to be a counter- 
 part of Vaikuntha (see p. 448), and the excavated temple at Ellora is a 
 counterpart of Kailasa-(see p. 447). 
 
72 One Characteristic of both Systems. 
 
 It is true that expiatory rites, external purifications, lustral 
 washings, and ceremonial observances performed incessantly 
 by, or through, or with the aid of Brahmans, or even withput 
 their aid, purifies from natal sin (see p. 354), and delivers from 
 constantly contracted impurity and guilt and its consequences, 
 yet, for all that, the dictum of Manu (XII. 3) holds good in 
 Hinduism, and is believed in everywhere throughout India : 
 
 Action of every kind, whether of mind 
 Or speech or body, must bear fruit, entailing 
 Fresh births through multifarious conditions. 
 In highest, mean, and lowest transmigrations. 
 
 Doubtless Manu laid stress on the need of internal purity of 
 heart, but this internal purity must be self-accomplished. Then 
 as to the way of devotion to personal duties, sometimes called 
 ' the way of faith,' this again depends on the exercise of a man's 
 own will. Lastly, as to the way of knowledge, this, no doubt, 
 is held to be the highest way, according to the following state- 
 ment in the Maha-bharata (XII. 8810, etc.): — 'By works a 
 creature is bound ; by knowledge he is liberated ; wherefore 
 devotees gifted with perfect insight perform no works. Through 
 works a creature is born after death with a body of (one or 
 other of) sixteen descriptions ; by knowledge he becomes the 
 Eternal, Imperceptible, Undecaying' (Muir's Texts, V. 327). 
 But this knowledge is only obtainable through man's own 
 intuition or through abstract meditation ; for, just as Hinduism 
 knows nothing of purity of heart communicated by an infinitely 
 Pure and Holy Being external to itself, so it knows nothing of 
 any knowledge except that whieh is Self-evolved. 
 
 Thpre is a fourth way which might be included under the 
 first — namely, the way of Tapas, or self-imposed bodily morti- 
 fication common to all forms of Hinduism, but especially 
 connected with Saivism (see pp. 83, 87), and with the Yoga 
 philosophy (see my work on ' Buddhism,' p. 336). 
 
 We now pass on to a more detailed account of the divisions 
 of Hinduism. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Saivism or Worship of Siva. 
 
 Saivism 1 may be defined to be the setting aside of the 
 triune equality of Brahma, Siva, and Vishnu, and the merging of 
 Brahma and Vishnu in the god Siva. But it is also more 
 than this. It is the exaltation of Siva (whether as one person 
 or as associated with a consort) to the position of a Supreme 
 Being, exempt from subjection to the law of ultimate absorp- 
 tion into the Universal Spirit. It is his identification with 
 Brahma as well as with Brahma ; with the one impersonal 
 Spirit as well as with the one personal God ; with the Atman 
 and Maya of the Vedanta philosophy; with the Purusha and 
 Prakrit! of the Sankhya system ; with the male and female 
 generative energies operating in the Universe. 
 
 Yet it ought to be clearly understood that the identifica- 
 tion of Siva with the one impersonal Spirit of the Universe 
 . is rarely asserted categorically by Saiva sectarians ; for it 
 must always be borne in mind that the very meaning of 
 Saivism is exclusive devotion to a personal god Siva, who 
 unlike the impersonal Spirit, possesses a body, and can think, 
 feel, and act. In entering, therefore, on the subject of Saivism 
 we are passing from pantheistic to theistic ideas. 
 
 The Saiva bible or supposed inspired authority for this 
 elevation of the god Siva to the highest position in the Hindu 
 system must be sought for among the eighteen Puranas. "^ 
 These writings are more generally in favour of the supremacy 
 
 ^ Saiva and Vaishnava are the Sanskrit adjective forms of Siva and 
 Vishnu ; hence may be formed the word's ' Saivism ' and ' Vaishnavism.' 
 
74 Saivism or Worship of Siva. 
 
 of Vishnu, but a certain number, such as th£ Lihga, Siva, 
 Kurma and Skanda Furanas, make Siva supreme \ 
 
 We have already pointed out that the idea of a Tri-murti 
 or triple embodiment and triple personification of the pheno- 
 mena and powers of Nature was adumbrated in the Veda and 
 fully developed in the Maha-bharata. 
 
 In the Veda special homage is given to three gods who are 
 the representative deities of the three worlds and of the ele- 
 ments they contain, (i) To the god of Fire (Agni), who is 
 the god on the earth. (2) To the god of Rain associated with 
 the gods of Storm (Indra-Rudra), who are the gods in the 
 atmosphere. (3) To the Sun-god (Surya), who is the god in 
 , the heavens (see p. 9). In mythological Brahmanism — of which 
 the Maha-bharata is the chief exponent — these three Vedic gods 
 pass into Brahma the creator, Rudra-Siva^ the destroyer and 
 recreator, and Vishnu (p. 75) the preserver. But the act of the 
 Creator was a single act. Once completed, it received scant 
 recognition at the hands of the beings created. And, as a 
 matter of fact, the worship of Brahma fell into desuetude ^- 
 
 On the other hand, the acts of disintegration, reintegration, 
 and maintenance of being were continuous acts of the deepest 
 and most momentous interest to the whole human race. 
 Hence it happened that the homage paid to the deities 
 who presided over these operations increased in intensity and 
 developed into a system of the grossest superstition. For, 
 indeed, three remarkable phenomena could not fail to impress 
 themselves on the most superficial observers of the processes 
 of nature. First, that mysterious and awe-inspiring forces 
 are ever at work for the disintegration of every material 
 object in the universe; secondly, that vivifying forces are 
 
 ^ The colossal sculpture of the Tri-murti in the caves of Elephanta, 
 excavated twelve or thirteen centuries ago, represents Brahma in the 
 centre, Vishnu on the right, and Siva on the left (see p. 45). 
 
 ^ I use this compound for convenience. There is really no such word. 
 
 ' My visit to Brahma's temple near Ajmere is described in Chap. XXII. 
 
Saivism or Worship of Siva. 75 
 
 ever being exerted for the reintegration of material entities 
 through the disintegration of other entities; thirdly, that 
 every existing material entity is maintained in existence by 
 the agency of sustaining forces which help it to resist the 
 action of the forces of dissolution. In short, it was clear that , 
 the three processes of disintegration, reintegration, and main- 
 tenance of being are perpetually recurring in an eternal cycle 
 — that each follows on the other and that each is necessary 
 to the other. 
 
 Now, it might have been expected that the authors of 
 Hindu mythology would have placed these three distinct 
 processes under the control of three distinct deities. But so 
 close was believed to be the connexion between the work of 
 disintegration and that of reintegration that both were as- 
 signed to the presidency of one divine personification, who, 
 in this two-fold character of Destroyer and Re-constructor, 
 may most fitly be designated by the composite name Rudra- 
 Siva. For it is only as Rudra that he is the Lord of Death 
 and the active agent in dissolution ; and it is only as Siva, 
 ' the auspicious/ that he reconstructs after destruction. 
 
 And here at the outset it is important to note that, in his 
 character of both Rudra and Siva, this god enjoys a cultus 
 which reaches much further back than that of Vishnu the 
 maintainer and preserver. Of the two deities Siva is 
 manifestly the more ancient. He was the first to receive 
 special adoration ; and although in the present day he has 
 fewer exclusive adorers than the god Vishnu, his worship is 
 even now more generally extended (compare note i, p. 78). 
 
 The name of Vishnu occurs, it is true, in the Rig-veda, but 
 only as a secondary designation of the Sun, that luminary 
 being better known by other more important names — such as 
 Surya, Savitri, Aditya, Mitra. 
 
 On the other hand, Rudra appears quite early in the Veda 
 with a well-recognised and well-marked personality of his 
 own. He is an important deity, whose anger is to be dreaded 
 
76 Saivism or Worship of Siva. 
 
 and whose favour is to be propitiated. Probably the firs 
 office or function connected with him was that of directing 
 and controlling the rage of the howling storms ^. As god o 
 gale and tempest he is father of the destructive storm-winds 
 who are also called Rudras, and generally identified with thi 
 Maruts. And, in this character Rudra is closely connectec 
 with the Vedic Rain-god (Indra), and with the still mor( 
 highly esteemed Vedic deity Fire (Agni), which, as a destroy 
 ing agent, rages and crackles like the roaring tempest. H( 
 is also nearly related to Time (Kala), the all-consumer, anc 
 indeed afterwards identified with him^. But he has also ; 
 more agreeable aspect even in the Veda. He is not merelj 
 the awful and inauspicious god whose thousand shafts brinj 
 death or disease on men and cattle ^- He is present in thos( 
 health-giving winds which chase away noxious vapours. Hf 
 is addressed as a healer, as a benefactor, as a benevolent anc 
 auspicious being ; the epithet Siva being applied to him ir 
 the Veda euphemistically as a title rather than as a name. 
 
 Again, in the later Vedic period his personality become; 
 still more intensified, and his name, attributes, and function; 
 infinitely amplified, varied, and extended. For example, ir 
 the Vajasaneyi-samhita of the Yajur-veda (XVI. i, etc.) then 
 is a well-known hymn or litany called the Satarudriya, ad- 
 dressed to Rudra in his hundred aspects and surrounded bj 
 his countless hosts of attendants. In this hymn — a hymn whicl: 
 is of the greatest interest, because constantly used in the pre- 
 sent day — he is described as possessing many contradictory 
 incongruous, grotesque, and wholly ungodlike attributes ; foi 
 example, he is a killer and destroyer; he is terrible, fierce 
 (ugra), inauspicious ; he is a deliverer and saviour ; he cause 
 
 ' The root rud meaning ' to roar ' or ' howl ' as well as ' to weep.' 
 
 ^ In the Kailasa cave at Ellora I noticed that Siva in his character o 
 
 Kala was represented as a skeleton. 
 ' Death is always connected in the Hindu mind with something in 
 
 auspicious (amangala) and impure. 
 
Saivism or Worship of Siva. 77 
 
 happiness, and prevents disease ; he has a healing and aus- 
 picious body (siva tanuh) ; he is yellow-haired, brown- 
 coloured, copper-coloured, ruddy, tall, dwarfish ; he has braided 
 locks (kapardin), wears the sacred thread, and is clothed in 
 a skin; he is blue-necked and thousand-eyed; he dwells 
 in the mountains, and is the owner of troops (gana-pati) of 
 servants who traverse the earth obeying his orders; he is 
 ruler and controller of a thousand Rudras who are described 
 as fierce and ill-formed (virupa) ; he has a hundred bows 
 and a thousand quivers ; he is the general of vast armies ; 
 he is lord of ghosts, goblins, and spirits ; of beasts, horses, 
 and dogs ; of trees, shrubs, and plants ; he causes the fall of 
 leaves; he is lord of the Soma-juice; he is patron of thieves 
 and robbers ^, and is himself a thief, robber, and deceiver ; 
 he presides over carpenters, chariot-makers, blacksmiths, 
 architects, huntsmen ; he is present in towns and houses, in 
 rivers and lakes, in woods and roads, in clouds and rain, in 
 sunshine and lightning, in wind and storm, in stones, dust, 
 and earth. 
 
 If then this great deity was distinguished even in the Vedic 
 period by so great a variety of attributes, and was held 
 capable of so many functions, it was only to be expected 
 that the plasticity and all-comprehensiveness of his godhead 
 should have increased with the advance of time. It was only 
 natural, too, that the desire to propitiate him should have 
 become more generally diffused. His terrific and ungodlike 
 character was, therefore, kept well in the background, and his 
 epithet ' the blessed or auspicious one (Siva),' who brought 
 life out of death, who re-created after dissolution, passed into 
 his principal name. 
 
 ^ In the drama called Mridchakatika some burglars invoke Skanda 
 son of Siva as their patron deity. At present nearly all the degrading 
 characteristics of the god have been transferred to the form of his consort 
 called Kali. That goddess is to this day the patron of thieves, robbers, . 
 Thugs, murderers, and every kind of infamous rascal (see Chap. XXII). 
 
78 Saivism or Worskip of Siva. 
 
 Hence also Siva became to his worshippers the great god 
 (Maha-deva) and lord of the universe (jagat-pitri, visva-natha), 
 who, although he has numerous forms, is generally worshipped 
 under one mystical shape— a plain upright stone, the sign or 
 symbol (linga) of generative and creative power — scattered in 
 millions of shrines over every part of India ^. And hence, 
 too, it came to pass that, in the end, this so-called great god 
 was often identified with the one universal, all-pervading, self- 
 existent Spirit of Brahmanical philosophy ^. 
 
 Yet it is remarkable that with the increasing tendency to 
 exalt the deity Siva to the highest pinnacle in the Hindu 
 system, the desire to intensify his more human character and 
 to multiply those inferior attributes which deprive him of all 
 title to be called a god at all, increased also. In the later 
 Indian scriptures he has 1008 names (enumerated in Siva- 
 purana LXIX, Anusasana-parvan XVII, see pp. 105-107 of 
 this volume), besides local appellations and a corporeal exist- 
 ence almost as anthropomorphic as that of Vishnu. 
 
 It is true that the god Siva never passed through the 
 processes of birth, childhood, manhood, or any of the stages 
 of a recognized human existence in the way that Rama and 
 Krishna did^ yet he has his local incarnations (see p. a66), 
 and, irrespectively of these, a distinct personality of his own, 
 and a biography capable of being written with more precision 
 than that of Vishnu, by putting together the allusions and 
 descriptions in the Epic poems and Puranas. 
 
 In the first place, with regard to his supposed residence, 
 we are informed in these writings that his abode is Kailasa in 
 the Himalaya, which is also that of his countless troops 
 
 ^ The number of Lingas in India is estimated at three krores 
 (=30 millions). 
 
 " Sayana, the great commentator on the Rig-veda, in the opening 
 prayer to Siva (as identified with the Supreme) asserts that the Veda was 
 his breath (ucchvasitam). 
 
 " Only a few local South-Indian legends make him go through human 
 births. 
 
Saivism or Worship of Siva. 79 
 
 (Ganas) of servants ^ as well as of Kubera, god of wealth, 
 who is in a similar manner surrounded by his attendants the 
 Yakshas. This mountain-residence is, as we have already 
 seen, the special heaven of Siva, just as Vaikuntha is of Vishnu. 
 Thither his worshippers hope to be ultimately transported, 
 and there he lives with his wife ParvatI (also called Durga, 
 Kali, Uma, BhavanI, Sati, etc.), with the divine hero Vlra- 
 bhadra, who is a manifestation of his own energy, and with 
 his two sons Skanda and Ganesa. The latter two control 
 Siva's troops, leading some to battle against evil demons, and 
 restraining others who are themselves mischievous imps and 
 would turn the whole world into a scene of confusion unless 
 kept in check ^. It is probable that in surrounding the god\ 
 Rudra-Siva with armies of demons and impish attendants, 
 and making his sons lead and control them, Hindu mytholo- 
 gists merely gave expression to an idea inveterate in the 
 Indian mind, that all disease, destruction, and dissolution are 
 the result of demoniacal agency. 
 
 With regard to the bodily form, mode of life, and behaviour 
 attributed to Siva in his later character of lord of Kailasa, it 
 is not surprising that these should to some extent be borrowed 
 from the ancient description of him in the Satarudriya hymn 
 before quoted (p. 76). But many new and supernatural features 
 symbolical of his later functions and actions are added. 
 
 In the first place, in regard to his corporeal aspect, he has 
 sometimes five faces (Paiidanana) ^ sometimes one face, with 
 
 ' In the temple at Madura I saw a representation of Siva borne on one 
 of the Ganas. Some of his more personal attendants have special names, 
 such as Nandin (often confounded with his vehicle the bull, see p. 8i), 
 Bhringin, and Tanrlu, the last being the original teacher of dancing. 
 
 '^ It must be borne in mind that the troops of Siva are represented as 
 addicted to strong drink as well as to other excesses, and in this respect 
 their master Siva sets them an example ; see pp. 84, 85. 
 
 ' It is probable that the five faces or mouths symbolize the five Vedas 
 (Rig, Yajus, Sama, Taittiriya, and Vajasaneyin), or perhaps the five 
 Pathas (Saiphita, Pada, Krama, Jata, and_Ghana), or the five Gayatrls. 
 The Kularn'ava Tantra says that the five Amnayas (the eastern, western, 
 
8o Saivism or Worship of Siva. 
 
 three eyes, which are thought to denote his insight into past, 
 present, and future time. 
 
 The third eye is in his forehead, and a moon's crescent 
 above it marks the measuring of time by months, while a 
 serpent round his neck denotes the endless cycle of recurring 
 years, and a second necklace of skulls with numerous other 
 serpents about his person ^ symbolizes the eternal revolution 
 of ages, and the successive dissolution and regeneration of 
 the races of mankind. His body is generally covered with 
 ashes, and his hair thickly matted together, and gathered 
 above his forehead into a coil, so as to project like a horn. 
 On the top of it he bears the Ganges, the rush of which 
 he intercepted in its descent from Vishnu's foot, that the 
 earth might not be crushed by the weight of the falling 
 stream. His complexion is sometimes white ^, from the re- 
 flection of the snows of Kailasa, sometimes dark, from his 
 identification with the dark destroyer Time (Kala). His 
 throat is blue, from the stain of the deadly poison which 
 
 southern, northern, and upper) issued from Siva's five mquths. Or the 
 five elements may be symbolized. So Brahma's four faces are said to 
 symbolize the source of the four Vedas. So also many images of Buddha 
 in India and Ceylon have five rays of light issuing from the head. 
 
 ^ Serpents, as we have seen, are associated with both Siva and 
 Vishnu. The latter, as is well known, sleeps on a serpent, and I have 
 often seen Lifigas in the South with a canopy formed of a five-headed 
 serpent. Images of Krishna and of Buddha are also so represented. 
 The interchangeableness of Buddhism, Saivism, and Vaishnavism is 
 everywhere apparent, 
 
 ^ There is a, legend that Siva appeared in the Kali age, for the good 
 of the Brahmans, as Sveta ' the white one,' and that he had four dis- 
 ciples, to all of whom the epithet Sveta is applied. Possibly the attri- 
 bution of a white complexion to Siva may be due to the fact that the 
 Brahmans of Cashmere, who are almost as fair as Europeans, were the 
 first adherents of Siva. Then as his cultus passed southwards the god 
 naturally received a complexion more in keeping with that of his wor- 
 shippers there. Or it may be that white and black, like day and night, 
 symbolized the close connexion and succession of the destroying and 
 regenerative principles. Siva's wife Parvati is also often called Gauri, 
 the pale-coloured. 
 
^aivism or Worship of Siva. 8i 
 
 would have destroyed the world, had not Siva in compassion 
 for the human race undertaken to drink it up, on its pro- 
 duction at the churning of the ocean. He rides a white 
 bull (called Nandi), images of which are often placed outside 
 his shrines and probably typify generative energy. He is 
 sometimes represented clothed in a deer-skin, sometimes in 
 the skin of a tiger alleged to have been formerly killed by 
 him when created by the magical arts of some Rishis who 
 tried to destroy the god, because his beauty had attracted 
 the amorous glances of their wives. Sometimes, again, he 
 appears wearing an elephant's skin which had belonged to 
 a demon of immense power named Gaya, whom he con- 
 quered and slew. As Siva is constantly engaged in battle 
 with mighty demons (such as Pura, Tripura, Andhaka), all 
 of whom he fought and slew, he is armed with special 
 weapons, suited to his warlike needs ; for example, he carries 
 a three-pronged trident (trisula,) which may either denote 
 the three attributes of Creator, Destroyer, and Regenerator, 
 or else all-destroying Past, Present, and Future Time ; a bow 
 called Ajagava (and Pinaka), a thunderbolt (vajra), an axe, 
 and a nondescript weapon called Khatvahga, consisting of 
 a kind of staff with transverse pieces surmounted by a skull. 
 He also holds in his hand a noose (pasa) for binding his 
 enemies, and a kind of rattle or drum, shaped like an hour- 
 glass, called Damaru, which he uses as a musical instrument 
 to keep time while dancing. 
 
 It is clear from all this symbolism that the god Siva, as \ 
 depicted by his special worshippers, assumes a very bewilder- 
 ing and confusing variety of personalities at different times. 
 His functions, as indicated by his 1008 names (see p. 106), 
 are innumerable and his nature all-comprehensive. Yet 
 an attempt may be made to disentangle the confusion by 
 pointing out that there are really five chief characters of the 
 god which stand out prominently from his general portraiture 
 and are capable of being brought out into definite relief. 
 
 G 
 
82 Saivism or Worship of Siva. 
 
 I. In the first place, he is, as we have seen, the impersonation 
 of the dissolving and disintegrating powers and processes of 
 nature. These ought really to be regarded as set in action 
 by a beneficent being who performs a necessary operation, 
 but in the later phases of Hinduism the idea of dissolution is 
 invested with terror. Siva himself is converted into a fierce 
 universal destroyer (Sarva-bhuta-hara), who annihilates at the 
 end of every great age (kalpa) not only men and all created 
 things, but good and evil demons, and even Brahma, Vishnu, 
 and all the inferior gods.. He is then called Rudra, Maha-kala, 
 Hara, Anala (Fire), etc. One legend makes him wear the 
 bones and skulls of the gods as ornaments and garlands. 
 
 Another legend describes how at the end of one of the 
 early ages of the universe he burnt up the gods by a flash 
 from his central eye, and afterwards rubbed their ashes upon 
 his body; whence the use of ashes is considered of great 
 importance in his worship. Another legend accounts for the 
 use of Rudraksha berries in the rosaries of Siva by describing 
 how he once let fall some tears of rage which became con- 
 verted into these seeds. Their connexion with Siva-worship 
 is probably due to their roughness and to their possessing five 
 divisions corresponding to the god's five faces. 
 
 It is easy to see how it came to pass that the god in this 
 later character is believed to delight in destruction for its 
 own sake. He is called Smasana-vasin, ' dweller in burial- 
 places.' Cemeteries and burning-grounds are his favourite 
 haunts ; imps and demons (bhutas and pisacas) are his ready 
 servants ; ferocity and irascibility, on the slightest provocation, 
 constitute his normal condition of mind. For example, on 
 one occasion, when the sage Daksha omitted to invite him 
 and his wife SatI to a great sacrifice at which all the gods 
 were guests, he without the slightest hesitation decapitated 
 the unfortunate sage and replaced his head by that of a ram. 
 So again a sculpture in the caves of Elephanta represents him 
 with eight arms in the act. of immplating a child. In this 
 
Saivism or Worship of Siva. 8i 
 
 o 
 
 character he is called Bhairava, 'the terrible;' Vira-bhadra 
 being sometimes identified with him. But in the present day 
 these terrible attributes are generally transferred from the 
 male deity to his wife in the form Durga or Kali. 
 
 II. In the second place, Siva is the impersonation of the 
 eternal reproductive power of Nature, perpetually reintegrating 
 after disintegration (whence his names Pitri, Matri, Bhuta- 
 bhavana, Sarva-bhavakara ; see pp. io6, 107). It is especially 
 in this personality that he is worshipped as if he were Brahma 
 'the Creator' and called 'the eternally blessed one,' 'the 
 causer of blessings ' (Siva, Sada-Siva, Sankara, and Sambhu) 
 —not, however, under the form of a man, but under the often 
 misunderstood symbol of the Linga^ (see p. 68 and note), which 
 is sometimes represented with four faces (see Chap, XXII). 
 
 III. In the third place, Siva is the typical ascetic and self- 
 mortifier (Yogi, Tapasvl), who has attained the highest per- 
 fection in abstract meditation and austerity (whence his 
 names Maha-tapah, Maha-yogi). In this character he appears 
 quite naked (Dig-ambara), with only one face, like an ordinary 
 human being, with ash-besmeared body and matted hair 
 (whence his name Dhurjati) sitting in profound meditation 
 under a Banian tree (=Vata or Bar tree), and often, like the 
 contemplative Buddha, under a canopy formed by a serpent's 
 head ^- There he is supposed to remain passionless, motion- 
 less, immovable, as the trunk of a tree (sthanu), and perhaps 
 rooted to the same spot for millions of years. 
 
 Another legend describes how Siva, when engaged in a 
 course of asceticism, scorched the god of love (Kama-deva) to 
 ashes by a flash of rage from his central eye, because that 
 
 ' The Linga (or representation of the male organ) is sometimes de- 
 nounced, as ' an abominable symbol.' Nevertheless it is never by Saivas 
 connected with the passion of love. This passion belongs to Vaishnavism 
 rather than to Saivism. Some think that the worship of the Lihga was 
 borrowed from pre- Aryan or aboriginal tribes, but see p. 71. 
 
 ^ The serpent is often five-headed, which appears to have some con- 
 nection with Siva's five faces. Compare note 3, p. 79. 
 
 G a 
 
84 Smvism or Worship of Siva. 
 
 deity attempted to inflame him with passion for his consort 
 Parvati. 
 
 It is in his character of Yogi that he teaches men by his 
 own example the power to be acquired by mortification of 
 the body, suppression of the passions, and abstract contem- 
 plation, as leading to the loftiest spiritual knowledge and 
 ultimately effecting union with himself in Kailasa. 
 
 IV, In the fourth place, the god Siva is a contemplative 
 philosopher and learned sage, the revealer of Grammar to the 
 greatest of Indian grammarians, Panini^. And in this cha- 
 racter he is represented as a Brahman wearing the Brahmani- 
 cal thread^, well-skilled in the Veda, and especially conversant 
 with the Krama arrangement of the text. So much so that 
 a saying is current among the Pandits : ' No one, who is not 
 Rudra, can repeat the Krama ' (narudrah Krama-pathakah). 
 Among his names, too, are Mantra-vid, Brahma-vid, Brahma- 
 carl, and Panditah- This, in fact, is one of many proofs that 
 at least one form of Saivism is as much the peculiar system 
 of Brahmans, learned men, and the higher classes of the 
 Hindu community, as Vaishnavism is of men of the world, 
 kings, heroes, and the lower classes ^. In fact, a verse from 
 the ancient version of Manu is often quoted: — 'Siva is the 
 god of the Brahmans, Krishna (Vishnu) of the Kshatriyas, 
 Brahma of the Vaisyas, and Ganesa of Sudras.' 
 
 V. In the fifth place, Siva is exactly the opposite of an 
 ascetic and philosopher. He is a wild and jovial moun- 
 taineer (Kirata), addicted to hunting and wine-drinking, fond 
 of dancing (Nritya-priya, also called Natesvara, ' lord of 
 
 ^ The first fourteen sutras of Panini are called the Siva-sutras, and 
 the whole grammar is believed to be a revelation from Siva, whence one 
 of Siva's names is Vyakaranottarah. The miracle is made more remark- 
 able by representing the reputed author Panini as naturally stupid. 
 
 '^ I noticed that a carving of Siva in the caves of EUora represents him 
 with the Brahmanical thread. His son Ganesa also wears this thread. 
 
 ' There is another common saying, Navishnut prithivl-patib, ' No one 
 except he resemble Vishnu ought to be a king.' 
 
Saivism or Worship of Siva. 85 
 
 dancers'), often dancing with his wife the Tandava dance, 
 and surrounded by dwarfish, bufifoon-like troops (gana) of 
 attendants, who, like their master, are fond of good living 
 and occasionally inebriated by intoxicating liquors. The 
 worshippers of Siva in this character usually (but not invari- 
 ably) belong to the sect called Saktas, who are devoted to 
 the wife of the god, and are given to self-indulgence and 
 sensual gratification. Their religious books are called Tan- 
 tras, and their tenets will be explained under the head of 
 Saktism (see p. 180). 
 
 A still more remarkable aspect of the god is as a being 
 half-male, half-female (Ardha-nari) 1. This seems to be con- 
 nected with the second of the characters just described. It 
 symbolizes both the duality and unity of the generative act and 
 the production of the universe from the union of two eternal 
 principles (Prakriti and Purusha, Maya and Brahman), accord- 
 ing to the Sankhya and Vedanta systems (see p. 1 83). 
 
 Further, it should be noted that, according to some Puranas, 
 there are eight principal personal manifestations of Siva, called 
 Rudra, Bhairava (or Bhlma), Ugra, Isvara ( or Isana or Isa), Maha- 
 deva (or Mahesvara), Pasu-pati, Sarva (Sarva), and Bhava. 
 
 Again, he is specially manifested in eight material forms 
 (Tanus) — Fire, Water, Earth, Air, Ether (which are the five 
 elements, typified by his five faces), the Sun, Moon, and the 
 sacrificing Brahman. By these he upholds the world. 
 
 In Southern India Siva is celebrated as the worker of 64 
 special miracles. He raised the dead, healed the blind, deaf, 
 lame, etc., and gave similar powers to 6'}, of his saints. The 
 story of these miracles is given in the Madhura-sthala-purana, 
 and I saw many representations of them both at Madura and 
 Tanjore. (For other names of Siva, see pp. 106, 107.) 
 
 ' In the caves of Elephanta I saw a fine carving of Siva and Parvati 
 thus united in one body. The female side forms the left side of the god, 
 and is represented holding a looking-glass. It is noticeable that the wife 
 is always on the left side, except as a bride at the nuptial ceremony. 
 
86 ■ Saivism. Saiva Sects. 
 
 The great variety of Siva's characters does not seem to 
 have led to a corresponding variety of Saiva sects. We find 
 that Saivism has not, like Vaishnavism, resolved itself into 
 many separate organized societies under great religious 
 leaders. It would in truth be difficult to name any con- 
 spicuous apostle and teacher of pure Saivism (certainly not 
 Basaba, p. 88), like the celebrated Vaishnava teachers Rama- 
 nuja, Madhva, Vallabha, and daitanya (pp. 1 19-145). For 
 we have already seen that the great Sahkara, though held by 
 some to have Saiva proclivities, abstained from inculcating 
 devotion to any one god more than to another. 
 
 Unquestionably all Hindus, even the strictest Vaishnavas, 
 are ready to pay homage to Siva in his first and second 
 characters of Dissolver and Regenerator. It is clear, too, 
 that in the days of Sankara several sects of Saivas existed 
 and became the object of his controversial onslaughts. In 
 the Sahkara-vijaya six are named : to wit, i. the Saivas, par 
 excellence, who had the Linga branded on both arms ; a. the 
 Raudras, who had the trident branded on the forehead; 
 3. the Ugfas, who had the Damaru (see p. 81) branded on 
 the two arms; 4. the Bhattas, who had the Linga on the 
 forehead ; 5. the Jahgamas, who bore the trident on the head 
 and carried a Linga made of stone on their persons ; 6. the 
 Pasupatas, who had the latter symbol branded on the fore- 
 head, arms, breast, and navel. 
 
 These sects are described in the Sahkara-vijaya as hostile 
 to the doctrine of Non-duality (Advaita-drohinah)- Their 
 practice of branding is denounced by Sahkara on the ground 
 that various gods are present in the limbs of the human body^, 
 who are driven away by the burning (tapana) of the skin. 
 
 Of the six sects named only the two last are numeroijs in 
 the present day, and both these have altered not a few of their 
 tenets and practices. In modern times Saiva sectarians are 
 
 ' May we not compare the Christian idea of the sanctity of the body 
 as the temple of the Holy Ghost ? 
 
Saivism. Bodily Mortification or Tapas. 87 
 
 generally followers of Siva in his third character of an ascetic. 
 They profess to practise, like their god, severe austerities and 
 bodily mortifications. Numbers of them may be seen at 
 sacred places of pilgrimage, where their appearance as self- 
 mortifying mendicants is often revolting to Europeans. 
 
 Those who call themselves Sannyasis are the most respect- 
 able. Indeed all twice-born men towards the close of their lives 
 ought to abandon their wives and all worldly ties and become 
 Sannyasis (p. 53). But the ordinary Sannyasis are not of the 
 orthodox type. They are often confounded with other orders 
 of mendicant devotees such as Vairagis (held to be Vaishnavas), 
 Gosains, and Yogis (Jogis) ; the latter being a general name 
 for all Tapasvis who seek by their austerities (tapas) to achieve 
 union (yoga) with the deity ^. 
 
 Self-mortification (tapas, tapasya), in fact, and the practice 
 of Yoga is not confined to Saivism (see p. 73) or even to 
 Hinduism (see my book on Buddhism, p. 226). 
 
 The theory is that a Hindu who aims at perfection ought 
 to go through six successive courses of austerity (tapas) for 
 twelve years each, rising by degrees up to the highest order of 
 all — the Parama-hansa, who is supposed to be wholly absorbed 
 in meditating on Brahman, and to do nothing else whatever. 
 
 Then there is an order of Saiva ascetics called Dandin, 
 or staff-bearers, ten divisions of whom — called Dasa-nami 
 Dandins, said to carry ten different forms of staff— are alleged 
 to have been founded by Sankaracarya. 
 
 There are also the Aghora-panthis (panthl from Sanskrit 
 pathin), who propitiate Siva by their revolting diet, feeding ^, 
 on filth and animal excreta of all kinds. It is asserted that 
 some eat corpses stolen from Muhammadan burial-grounds, 
 and that the head of the Aghorls near Siddhapur subsists on 
 
 > They are sometimes called Sadhus, and often Fakirs. The latter name 
 ought to be restricted to Muhammadan mendicants. Bhagat (probably 
 for Bh^kta) is sometimes used for Vaishnava devotees. Mahant is apphed 
 to a leader of one of these sects, or to the head of a monastery. 
 
88 Saivism. Saiva Sects. 
 
 scorpions, lizards, and loathsome insects left to putrefy in a 
 dead man's skull (Agama-prakasa, p. 7)- Happily the number 
 of these disgusting ascetics is decreasing. I only met one in the 
 whole course of my travels— a revolting creature at Benares. 
 
 Then there are the tJrdhva-bahus, who extend one or both 
 arms over the head and hold them in that position for years. 
 This kind of devotee, too, is not so common as in former 
 days. During the whole course of my travels I only saw two 
 examples, one at Gaya and the other at Benares. The arm 
 of the former was quite withered, and his fist was so tightly 
 clenched that the nails were growing through the back of his 
 hand. The latter looked like a piece of sculpture, sitting in 
 a niche of the Anna-purna temple, perfectly motionless and 
 impassive, with naked body smeared all over with white ashes, 
 matted hair, and the forefinger of the upraised hand pointing 
 to the heaven to which in imagination he seemed to be already 
 transporting himself. 
 
 There are also the Akasa-mukhins, who keep their necks 
 bent back looking up at the .sky ; the Kapalikas, who use a 
 dead man's skull for a drinking-cup ^. (See also Chap. XXII.) 
 
 Most of these Saiva ascetics are disreputable in character 
 and decidedly dirty in their habits. Cleanliness is said to be 
 next to godliness, and Hindus in their general habits are quite 
 as cleanly as Europeans ; yet dirt appears to be regarded as a 
 necessary accompaniment of particular forms of sanctity^. 
 
 We may also note that a sect of Saivas exists in the South 
 of India — mostly in the Mysore and Kanarese country — who 
 were formed into a religious community about the eleventh 
 or twelfth century by a leader named Basaba (for Sanskrit 
 Vrishabha), and are called Lingavats (popularly Lingaits), 
 because they wear the Linga in a silver or metallic casket 
 
 ^ This order is said to have been founded by Sankara ; compare p. 59. 
 
 ''■ But only in the case of ascetics. The late Lord Beaconsfield was 
 right when he said that Moses, Muhammad, and Manu all make cleanli- 
 ness a religious duty. 
 
Saivism. Siaiva Sects. 89 
 
 suspended round their necks with a cord like a necklace. 
 They are usually identified with the Jangamas of Sankara's 
 day, described as utterly unorthodox. 
 
 In fact, this sect is opposed to all the orthodox practices 
 and usages of the Hindus, such as caste-distinctions 1, the 
 authority of the Brahmans, the inspiration of the Veda, and 
 Brahmanical sacrifices ; and they bury instead of burning their 
 dead. Their tenets are embodied in the Basaba-purana. 
 
 With regard to Saiva philosophical doctrines it should be 
 observed that, like those of the Vaishnava sects, they deviate 
 more or less from the orthodox Vedanta doctrine of the 
 identity of the Supreme and human Spirit, the amount of 
 deviation depending of course on the intensity of the person- 
 ality attributed to Siva. 
 
 A particular Saiva philosophy, which may be called the 
 Saiva-darsana par excellence, was taught in India about the 
 eleventh century. It was handed down in twenty-eight books, 
 called Agamas, almost all of which are lost. This philosophy 
 is followed by a sect in the South, and is opposed to the non- 
 duality of the Vedanta. It taught a kind of VisTshtadvaita — 
 like that of the Vaishnava teacher Ramanuja (see p. 119) — the 
 distinctive feature of which was that three entities have a 
 separate existence, i. The Lord (Siva) called Pasu-pati, ' lord 
 of the soul ' (Pasu). a. The human soul called Pasu, ' an 
 animal.' 3. Matter called Pasa, 'a fetter.' The soul which 
 belongs to the Lord as to a master, is bound by matter as a 
 beast (pasu) is by a fetter ; and of course the great aim of this 
 Saiva philosophy is to set it free and restore it to its rightful 
 owner. These doctrines have evidently much in common with 
 the theistic Sankhya. 
 
 Another Saiva sect, called Pasupata, already noticed (pp. 59, 
 
 ^ The Lingaits of the present day are said to be returning to caste- 
 rules, and only to disregard caste on certain days of the week. I have 
 heard some declare that they belong to a fifth caste (pancama) which is 
 superior to the four castes of the Brahmanical system. 
 
90 Saivism. Saiva Ceremonies. 
 
 86) is connected with the preceding, much as the Madhva is 
 with the Ramanuja ; for instead of affirming the separate ex- 
 istence of three entities they only distinguish between two-r- 
 Pati and Pasu. The former (Pati) is the Lord (Isvara), the 
 cause and evolver (karta) of all things ; the latter is the effect 
 (karya) or that which is evolved out of the cause and wholly 
 dependent on it. The Pasupatas induce ecstatic union with 
 their lord by singing, dancing, and gesticulations. 
 
 I defer to a subsequent chapter a description of the 
 principal Saiva temples visited by me (see p. 434). 
 , Nevertheless, an account of the ceremonies I saw performed 
 at a Lihga shrine near Bombay may be introduced here. 
 
 It has been already stated that on ordinary occasions the 
 form of worship consists in simply pouring water over the 
 Linga and offering Bilva leaves (see p. 68). On great festi- 
 vals a more complicated ceremonial is observed. In the year 
 1877 I visited the temple dedicated to Siva at Walkesvar, 
 near Bombay, on the morning after the Siva-rat (rat = ratri) 
 or fast kept in honour of the god. The Lihga shrine there is 
 not large, and the symbol is not too sacred to be exposed 
 to observation. I was permitted, in fact, to stand close to 
 the entrance of the small sanctuary and to note down all I 
 witnessed. In the centre of the shrine was the Liriga, a plain 
 upright stone, which on the occasion of the Siva-rat cere- 
 mony was covered with a pile of Bilva (Bil ^) leaves. Near 
 it there were several high candlesticks with lights kept con- 
 tinually burning. Behind, in a niche, was the image of Siva's 
 wife Parvati, which on the occasion of my visit was loaded 
 with sacred flowers resembling marigolds. In front, looking 
 into the sanctuary, was the image of a bull made of brass ; 
 the bull being Siva's vehicle, and, like the Lihga, symbolical 
 of reproductive energy. Above the upright stone was hang- 
 ing a large vase full of water. It had a perforation in its 
 
 ' The Bilva, corrupted into Bll, is the i^gle Marmelos, a very astringent 
 plant. 
 
Saivism. Saiva Ceremonies. 91 
 
 lowest part through which the liquid trickled out, drop by 
 drop, falling at regular intervals on the symbol underneath. 
 When I asked a bystander the meaning of this constant 
 dripping (see p. 68), he replied with much naifvete : ' Holy 
 water from the Ganges is falling on the head of God.' No 
 further explanation appeared to him to be needed. In front 
 of the porch before the door of the sanctuary were three long 
 rows of bells, and above them a line of svastikas or sacred 
 crosses ^ interspersed with trees and figures of elephants, and 
 over all the hood of a cobra snake. Above the door itself 
 was the image of Siva's son Ganesa. 
 
 Outside the shrine, on the morning of my visit, stood a row 
 of male worshippers (three or four women standing near), and 
 in front of them a priest, holding a tray of Bilva leaves, sup- 
 posed to possess cooling properties grateful to the god Siva. 
 Some of these the priest placed in the hands of each wor- 
 shipper, at the same time muttering prayers and texts. Next 
 he dipped his finger in a vase of holy water and touched the 
 two eyes and breasts of each. To me, a spectator, it seemed 
 exactly as if he were making the sign of a cross on their 
 bodies. Then each of the worshippers heaped the leaves 
 received from the priest on the head of the bull. I noticed 
 that some also besprinkled it with saffron (kunkuma) powder, 
 which they purchased from a man standing near. 
 
 This preliminary ceremony ended, all entered the shrine, 
 and after ringing the bells at the entrance, prostrated them- 
 selves before the central symbol, touching the ground with 
 their foreheads. Their next act was to pile more Bilva 
 leaves on the stone symbol. Then taking small lotas of holy 
 water, they poured abundance of the sacred liquid over both 
 leaves and symbol. All the worshippers then seated them- 
 selves in a circle round the central stone while the priest 
 
 ^ The Svastika mark is an auspicious symbol with four arms in the 
 form of a Greek cross, the termination of each arm being bent round m 
 the direction of the sun's course. See note I, p. 104. 
 
92 Saivism. Saiva Ceremonies. 
 
 lighted lamps and waved them before it. Every now and 
 then a fresh worshipper entered the shrine, ringing one of the 
 bells at the door before entering. Moreover, in the shrine 
 there was a constant ringing of small portable bells and clap- 
 ping of hands, as if to draw the attention of the deity wor- 
 shipped to the prayers muttered by his worshippers, while a 
 number of priests in another part of the sanctuary intoned 
 texts and chanted hymns in chants very like Gregorian. 
 
 Outside the shrine, on one side, sat a nearly naked ascetic, 
 with long matted hair coiled round and round into a high 
 peak, his face and body covered with white ashes. On the 
 other side sat a Brahman with a little wooden table before 
 him, on which was a lota of holy water, several implements 
 of worship, and a copy of one of the Puranas or ancient 
 sacred scriptures. He had three white streaks on his fore- 
 head and the same on his shoulders to denote his devotion 
 to Siva. Hanging over his left shoulder and under his right 
 arm was the sacred cord of three coils of cotton — the mark 
 of his second birth — and his right hand was inserted in a 
 Gomukhl or rosary bag. I asked what he was doing. ' He is 
 counting the beads of his rosary,' said a bystander, ' and each 
 time he tells his beads he repeats one of the 1008 names of the 
 god Siva over and over again, but this operation must on no 
 account be seen, and so the hand and rosary are concealed in 
 the bag.' 
 
 No doubt he was muttering to himself, but in so low a tone 
 that no sound was audible ; and his eyes were intently fixed, 
 as if in profound meditation, which neither my presence nor 
 anything passing around appeared to distract for a single 
 instant. 
 
 Another devotee was also seated cross-legged outside the 
 entrance to the shrine, whose intoning of one of the Siva- 
 puranas and muttering of prayers (japa) was audible to every 
 one. He had before him a low wooden table, on which was 
 a Rudraksha rosary (see p. 82), a Lifiga-purana, a little 
 
Saivism. Saiva Ceremonies. 93 
 
 metal saucer of rice, a small lota of holy water on a three- 
 legged stand, a little spoon, a heap of Bilva leaves, a sacred 
 conch-shell (sankha) — sometimes blown like a horn or used 
 as a Saiva symbol, though usually appropriated to Vishnu — 
 three green mangoes, a small bell, a leaf full of dates, and a 
 little bag containing the Vibhuti or white ashes for marking 
 his forehead with the three Saiva streaks. While I was 
 taking this catalogue he took no notice of my proceedings, 
 but continued muttering his prayers with intense earnestness, 
 as if quite abstracted from the world around him. 
 
 Though greatly interested in all I was allowed to witness, 
 I came away sick at heart. No one could be present at such 
 a scene without feeling depressed by the thought that, not- 
 withstanding all our efforts for the extension of education 
 and the diffusion of knowledge, we have as yet done little to 
 loosen the iron grip of idolatry and superstition on the masses 
 of the people. Indeed it would be easy to show that other 
 forms of Siva-worship are characterized by superstitious 
 observances of a still lower type. Turn we, for example, to 
 the ceremonies performed at the great Saiva temple of 
 Bhuvanesvara in Orissa. These are so unique that I may 
 be pardoned for giving some idea of them before concluding 
 this chapter. My authority is Dr. Rajendralala Mitra, who 
 has described the ceremonial in the second volume of his 
 work on Orissa. Siva is worshipped at that particular locality 
 under the form of a large uncarved block or slab of granite, 
 about eight feet long, partly buried in the ground, partly 
 apparent above the soil to the height of about eight inches. 
 The block is believed to be a Linga of the Svayam-bhu class 
 (see p. 69), and is surrounded by a rim, supposed, of course, 
 to represent the female organ (Yoni). The daily worship 
 consists of no less than twenty-two ceremonial acts. 
 
 (i) At the first appearance of dawn bells are rung to rouse 
 the deity from his slumbers ; {%) a lamp with many wicks is 
 waved in front of the stone ; (3) the god's teeth are cleaned 
 
94 Saivism. Saiva Ceremonies. 
 
 by pouring water and rubbing a stick about a foot long 
 on the stone ; (4) the deity is washed and bathed by empty- 
 ing several pitchers of water on the stone ; (5) the god is 
 dressed by putting clothes on the stone ; (6) the first break- 
 fast is offered, consisting of grain, sweetmeats, curd, and 
 cocoanuts; (7) the god has his principal breakfast, when 
 cakes and more substantial viands are served ; (8) a kind of 
 little lunch is offered ; (9) the god has his regular lunch ; 
 (10) the mid-day dinner is served, consisting of curry, rice, 
 pastry, cakes, cream, etc., while a priest waves a many- 
 flamed lamp and burns incense before the stone; (11) strains 
 of noisy discordant music rouse the deity from his afternoon 
 sleep at 4 P.M., the sanctuary having been closed for the pre- 
 ceding four hours ; (la) sweetmeats are offered ; (13) the 
 afternoon bath is administered; (14) the god is dressed as 
 in the morning; (15) another meal is served; (16) another 
 bath is administered; (17) the full-dress ceremony takes 
 place, when fine costly vestments, yellow flowers, and per- 
 fumery are placed on the stone; (18) another offering of 
 food follows; (19) after an hour's interval the regular supper 
 is served ; (30) five masks (p. 79) and a Damaru (p. 81) are 
 brought in and oblations made; (21) waving of lights (arti; 
 Sanskrit, arati) is performed before bedtime ; (aa) a bedstead is 
 brought into the sanctuary and the god composed to sleep. 
 
 Of course the offerings are ultimately eaten by the priests 
 and attendants, the superfluity being sold as sacred food. 
 
 This Bhuvanesvara ceremonial seems to be an imitation of 
 the forms of worship offered to the images of Krishna. 
 
 It is satisfactory to find that many enlightened Brahmans 
 in the present day are not afraid to express their disapproval 
 of idol-offerings. In a GujaratI work written by a learned 
 Brahman (Agama-prakasa, p. 162) we read : ' When one 
 remembers the greatness of the perfect God who is Existence, 
 Thought, and Bliss (p. 34), how can any idea be formed of 
 offering food and oblations to such a Being?' ' 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 Vaishnavism or Worship of Vishnu. 
 
 The preceding chapters of this work will, I trust, have 
 made it clear that, in respect of religious belief, the Hindus 
 of the present day may be broadly divided into three principal 
 classes ^ namely, (i) Smartas, (a) Saivas, (3) Vaishnavas. 
 
 The first (p. 55) believe that man's spirit is identical with i. 
 the one Spirit (Atma, Brahma^) which is the essence and sub- 
 stratum of the Universe and only cognizable through internal 
 meditation and self-communion. They regard that Spirit as 
 the highest object of all religious knowledge and aspiration. 
 They are also believers in the Tri-murti ; that is, in the three 
 personal gods, Brahma, Sivaj and Vishnu — with their train of 
 subordinate deities — but only as coequal manifestations of 
 the one eternal impersonal Spirit, and as destined ultimately 
 
 ' These, of course, are capable of subdivision. 
 
 ^ It is worthy of note that Atman (which is the earlier word for the 
 one Spirit of the Universe) is masculine, while Brahman, the later word, 
 is neuter. The etymology of Atman is doubtful. Some derive it from 
 at, to move ; others from ah, connected with aham, I ; others from va, 
 to blow as the wind ; and others (as we have seen) from an, to breathe 
 (compare p. 20). No doubt atman was originally the breath of life — the 
 breath that animates the Universe and man's living soul — the power in 
 which and by which man lives, and moves, and has his being. In the 
 well-known hymn Rig-veda I, 115. 1, the Sun (Surya) — interpreted _by ad- 
 vanced Pandits to mean the Supreme Being — is called the Soul (Atman) 
 of the Universe (that is, of all that moves and is immovable) ; and in the 
 Taittirlya Aranyaka, VIII. I, the ethereal element called Akasa (supposed 
 to fill and pervade the Universe and to be the vehicle of life) is said to 
 be produced from Atman. The name Brahman, which is the most usual 
 name for the one Spirit of the Universe in later writings, was at first 
 connected with the spiritual power inherent in the Vedic hymns and 
 prayers. The Veda itself is often called Brahma, and described as the 
 breath (ucchvasita) of the Supreme. ^ 
 
96 Vaishnavism or Worship of Vishnu. 
 
 to be reabsorbed into that Spirit and so disappear ^ This, is 
 the only orthodox form of Brahmanical religious thought, 
 and those Brahmans who follow it claim Sankara (see p. 55) 
 as their authoritative guide. It is a form of Pantheism, but 
 differs widely from that of European philosophical systems. 
 
 The second great religious class of the Hindus consists of 
 Saiva sectarians, who, as we have seen, are believers in the 
 
 \ one god Siva, not only as Dissolver and Regenerator, but as 
 
 Creator and Preserver, and as the one self-existent Being, 
 
 identified with the one Universal Spirit, and therefore not 
 
 liable to lose his personality by reabsorption into that Spirit. 
 
 The third class consists of Vaishnava sectarians, who are 
 
 \ believers in the one personal god Vishnu, not only as Preserver, 
 but as Creator and Dissolver. It should be noted, too, that 
 both Saivas and Vaishnavas agree in attributing an essential 
 form and qualities to the Supreme Being. Vishnu as the 
 Supreme reposes upon his serpent-couch ; till affected with 
 the quality of activity he awakes, and, as Brahma (p. 105), 
 creates the world. See Vishnu-purana, Chap. II. 
 
 ~ Vaishnavism then is, like Saivism, a form of Monotheism. 
 It is the setting aside of the triune equality of Brahma, Siva, 
 and Vishnu, in favour of one god Vishnu (often called Hari), 
 especially as manifested in his two human incarnations Rama 
 and Krishna. ' Brahma and Siva,' said the great Vaishnava 
 teacher Madhva, ' decay with their decaying bodies ; greater 
 than these is the undecaying Hari.' And here, at the outset, 
 it may be well to point out that Vaishnavism, notwithstanding 
 the gross polytheistic superstitions and hideous idolatry to 
 which it gives rise, is the only Hindu system worthy of being 
 called a religion. At all events it must be admitted that it has 
 more common ground with Christianity than any other form 
 of non-Christian faith. Vedism was little more than reveren- 
 
 ' Brahma, Siva, and Vishnu are manifested by the simple will of the 
 Supreme, whereas in the creation of living human beings (jiva) the 
 influence of karma, ' act,' is an important element. 
 
Vaishnavism or Worship of Vishnu: 97 
 
 tial awe of the forces of Nature and a desire to propitiate 
 them. Brahmanism was simply an Indian variety of pantheism. 
 Buddhism was a product and a reform of Brahmanism, and 
 gained many followers by opening its arms to all castes and 
 by offering deliverance from the slavery of passion and from 
 the miseries of life and the burden of ritualism and priest- 
 craft ; but, in its denials of the existence of both a Supreme 
 and human spirit, was no religion at all; and in its nega- 
 tions never commended itself generally to the Indian mind. 
 Saivism, though, like Vaishnavism, it recognized the eternal 
 personality of one Supreme Being, was too severe and cold 
 a system to exert exclusive influence over the great majority. 
 Vaishnavism alone possessed the elements of a genuine religion. 
 •' Who can doubt that a God of such a character was needed 
 —z. God who could satisfy the yearnings of the heart for, 
 a religion of faith, love and prayer rather than of knowledge 
 and works? Such a God was believed to be represented 
 by Vishnu, who evinced his sympathy with mundane suffering, 
 by frequent descents on earth, for the delivery of men from the 
 threefold miseries of life, viz. (i) from the diseases incident t0(^ 
 body and mind, such as those resulting from lust, anger, avarice,- 
 etc. ; (2) from the miseries inflicted by material environment, 
 ^by beasts, snakes, wicked men, etc. ; (3) from those inflicted 
 by unseen demoniacal agency. Indian philosophy, however, , 
 claimed the power of getting rid of all these three miseries 
 (see Sankhya-karika, i). 
 
 Hence teachers arose (among whom was Sandilya the author 
 of the Bhakti-sutra) who insisted on the doctrine of salvation % 
 by love and devotion (Bhakti) — a doctrine dimly adumbrated 
 in portions of the Veda, and fully propounded in the Bhaga- 
 vad-glta and Bhagavata-purana (see p. 6c^. 
 
 Intense devotion, then, to a personal god Vishnu, and be- 
 lief in his power to elevate his worshippers to eternal bliss in 
 his own heaven (Vaikuntha, see p. 118), is the chief character- 
 istic of Vaishnavism ; for Vaishnavism, like Saivism, dissents 
 
 H 
 
98 Vaishnavism or Worship of Vishnu. 
 
 from the vague impersonal Pantheism of Brahmanical philo- 
 sophy, whose one God is the substratum of everything and 
 himself nothing. Nor can we wonder that devotion to 
 Vishnu in his two human incarnations, Rama and Krishna, 
 became the most popular religion of India. These two heroes 
 were of the kingly or Kshatriya caste, and greatly beloved as 
 ' popular leaders. It is usual to assert that the Brahmans are 
 the highest objects of worship and honour among the Hindus. 
 This is not the case among the countless adherents of the 
 Vaishnava religion. The mass of the people of India exalt 
 the divine right of kings and the divine right of the govern- 
 ment of the day above all other forms of power, and worship 
 every great and heroic leader as an incarnation of the deity. 
 
 Yet, with all its popularity, Vaishnavism is not an example " 
 of a house at peace within itself. It has split up into various 
 subdivisions, which display no little of the odium theolo- 
 gicum in their opposition to each other. Possibly antagonism 
 of some kind is a necessary condition of religious vitality. 
 At any rate in India all religious systems inevitably break 
 up into sects, and seem to gather strength and vigour from 
 the process. 
 
 It is not uncommon, indeed, to hear it asserted that 
 Hinduism is rapidly falling to pieces, and destined soon to 
 collapse altogether. One reason given for the doom sup- 
 posed to be impending over its future is, that it is not a 
 proselyting religion. And the truth certainly is that no 
 stranger can be admitted as a convert to Hinduism either by 
 making any particular confession of faith, or by going through 
 any prescribed forms. The only acknowledged mode of 
 admission is by birth. To become a Hindu one must be 
 born a Hindu. Yet Hinduism is continually growing within 
 itself. In its tenacity of life and power of expansion it may 
 be compared to the sacred banian-tree, whose thousand 
 ramifications, often issuing from apparently lifeless stems, 
 find their way into walls, undermine old buildings, or them- 
 
Vaishnavism or Worship of Vishnu, 99 
 
 selves send down roots which become fixed in the soil, and 
 form fresh centres of growth and vitality. 
 
 And it cannot be doubted that one great conservative 
 element of Hinduism is the many-sidedness of Vaishnavism. 
 For Vaishnavism is, like Buddhism, the most tolerant of reli- 
 gious systems. It is always ready to accommodate itself to 
 other creeds, and delights in appropriating to itself the religious 
 ideas of all the nations of the world. It admits of every 
 form of internal development. It has no organized hier-\ 
 archy under one supreme head, but it may have any number 
 of separate associations formed by separate teachers, who are 
 ever springing up and extending their religious authority over 
 ever-increasing masses of the population. It has no formal 
 confession of faith, but it has an elastic creed capable of 
 adaptation to all varieties of opinion and practice. It has no 
 one bible — no one collection of writings in one compact 
 volume, with lines of teaching converging towards one great 
 central truth ; yet, while making use of the Veda it has a 
 series of sacred books of its own (such as the Puranas, the 
 Bhagavad-gita, etc.), each of which professes to be a revela- 
 tion from the Supreme Being, and claims to constitute an 
 authority for the establishment of almost any kind of doctrine. 
 It can, like Brahmanism, be pantheistic, monotheistic, dual- 
 istic, polytheistic. It can, like Saivism, enjoin asceticism, 
 self-mortification, and austerity. It can, like Saktism, give 
 the reins to self-indulgence, licentiousness, and carnality. It 
 can, like Buddhism, preach liberty, equality, fraternity; or 
 inculcate universal benevolence, and avoidance of injury to 
 others. It can proclaim Buddha or any other teacher or re- 
 markable man to be an incarnation of Vishnu. It can even 
 set itS' face against idolatry ^, and can look with sympathizing 
 condescension on Christianity itself, or hold it to be a develop- 
 
 ' There can be no doubt that the anti-idolatrous sect founded by Kabir 
 (see p. 158) grew out of Vaishijavism. 
 
 Ha 
 
lOO Vaishnavism or Worship of Vishnu. 
 
 ^ ment of its own theory of religion suited to Europeans, 
 is owing to this all-comprehensiveness of the Vaishn; 
 system that any new doctrine, or any new view of 
 doctrines, may be promulgated with an almost certain pi 
 pect of success. And indeed the theological laxity of 
 inhabitants of India increases in proportion to the tenacity 
 their adherence to caste customs and traditions. Broken 
 as they are into a multitude of separate peoples, compa 
 tively few individuals have any desire for national union 
 intellectual progress, and these few owe their ideas to the ec 
 cation we have imparted. Few wish to leave the path trodd 
 by their forefathers, or deviate from the old indurated ru 
 The masses can neither read nor write. They care nothi 
 for science. History, biography, and political economy i 
 to them a terra incognita. Their whole desire is to be 1 
 undisturbed in their social customs, family traditions, a 
 caste usages — constituting as these do their chief religion. 
 
 It seems, indeed, as if religion of this kind is the or 
 force which has power to rouse the masses from their norrr 
 condition of torpor. The stern necessity of conforming 
 domestic usages is ever present to a Hindu's mind, colourii 
 all his ideas, running through every fibre of his being, ai 
 constituting the Alpha and Omega of his earthly career, 
 this be religion, he is born religious, and dies religious. \ 
 is religious in his eating and drinking, in his sleeping ar 
 waking, in his dressing and undressing, in his rising up ar 
 sitting down, in his daily work and daily amusement. Na 
 religious ceremonies anticipate his birth, prolong his marriag 
 rite into a triple act lasting for years (p. 379), and follow hi: 
 
 ^/ after death. Yet any social innovation he utterly repudiate 
 It is only in religious doctrine that he evinces credulity ar 
 receptivity. Let any earnest preacher of any new crepd appe; 
 in any assemblage of ordinary Hindus — let him announc 
 that he has come as a messenger from heaven, and he ma 
 generally reckon on being believed. And if to his oth( 
 
Vaishnavism or Worship of Vishnu. loi 
 
 qualifications he adds a character for self-denial and asceti- 
 cism, he cannot fail to attract disciples ; for nowhere in the 
 world are family ties so binding as in India, and yet nowhere 
 is such homage paid to their abandonment. The influence of 
 any new religious teacher (acarya) who is known to live a life of 
 abstinence, bodily mortification, and suppression of the passions, 
 is sure to become unbounded, either for good or evil. 
 
 Probably, during the leader's lifetime, he is able to restrain 
 the enthusiasm of his converts within reasonable limits. It 
 is only when he dies that they are apt to push his opinions 
 to extremes never intended by himself. Eventually they 
 develop his teaching into an overgrown unhealthy system, 
 the internal rottenness of which disgusts all sensible men, 
 even among its own adherents. Then some new teacher 
 arises to re-establish purity of doctrine. He is, of course, 
 in his turn a man of earnestness and energy, with a strong 
 will, and great powers of persuasion. He collects around 
 him with equal facility a number of followers, and those in 
 their turn carry his teaching to preposterous lengths. 
 
 Hence the condition of Vaishnavism, which depends far 
 more than Saivism on personal leadership and influence, is 
 one of perpetual decay and revival, collapse and recovery. 
 Its fluctuations resemble those of a vast ocean heaving this 
 way and that in continual flux and reflux. 
 
 It is doubtless true that all human systems are liable to 
 similar alternations. But in India every tendency of humanity 
 seems intensified and exaggerated. No country in the world 
 is so conservative in its traditions, yet no country has under- 
 gone so many religious changes and vicissitudes. To follow 
 out in detail the whole drama of Vaishnavism would require 
 volumes. Even the first act presents us with a succession 
 of shifting scenes. 
 
 In all likelihood the primary idea of a god Vishnu (a name 
 derived from root vish, ' to pervade '), permeating and infusing 
 his essence into material objects, was originally connected with 
 
 ix 
 
I02 
 
 VaishnavisM or Worship of Vishnu. 
 
 the personification of the infinite heavenly space. We know 
 that in the Rig-veda Vishnu is a form of the ever-moving 
 solar orb, and in a well-known hymn (I. 22, i6, 17), still 
 commonly used by the Brahmans, he is described as striding 
 through the seven worlds ^ in three steps, and enveloping the 
 universe with the dust of his beams. A later work, the Aitareya- 
 brahmana of the Rig-veda, opens with the following remark- 
 able statement : ' Fire (Agni) has the lowest place among the 
 gods, Vishnu the highest; between them stand all' the other 
 deities.' (Haug's edition, 1.) 
 
 Elsewhere the god Vishnu is connected with water. In 
 Manu's Law-book (I. 10) the Universal Spirit is called Nara- 
 yana, as moving on the waters ; in harmony with which idea 
 Vishnu is often represented in sculptures, images, and pictures 
 as Narayana in human form, reposing on the thousand- 
 headed serpent and floating on the ocean. 
 
 In the later mythology of Brahmanism, when the doctrine 
 of the triad of personal gods (Tri-murti) had been fully deve- 
 loped and Vishnu had taken his place as the second person of 
 that triad, he has a less distinctly marked human personality 
 — antecedent to his incarnated descents — than the god Siva. 
 
 To write a biographical account of the god Vishnu's life 
 in his own heavenly abode, like the life of his rival Siva 
 (p. 78), would be difficult. The truth is that the development 
 of his personality, which is really greater than that of any 
 other god in the Hindu pantheon, must be looked for on 
 earth in his descents (avatara) as Rama and Krishna. 
 
 Nevertheless, it must be borne in mind that the god Vishnu 
 really possesses a corporeal character of his own quite irrespec- 
 tive of and anterior to his incarnated descents. He is described 
 
 " There are seven lower regions, viz. Atala, Vitala, Sutala, Rasatala, 
 Talatala, Mahatala, and Patala ; above which are the seven Lokas or 
 worlds, called Bhur (the earth), Bhuvar, Svar, Mahat, Jana^i, Tapat, and 
 Brahma or Satya. Sometimes the first three of these, the earth (BhQ), 
 atmosphere (Bhuvar), and heavens (Svar), are supposed to comprehend 
 all the worlds (see p. 403). For the hells see pp. 232-233. 
 
Vaishnavism or Worship of Vishnu. 103 
 
 as living in his heaven Vaikuntha — a locality more inaccessible 
 and less easy to identify with any definite spot on earth than 
 Siva's abode Kailasa (p. 79). He has a wife Lakshmi or Sri, 
 the goddess of fortune and beauty, who is fabled to have 
 sprung, with other precious things, from the froth of the 
 ocean when churned by the gods and demons (see p. ic8). 
 And as Vishnu in his non-Avatara condition lives a life 
 which has fewer features in common with humanity than 
 that of Siva, so is his wife Lakshmi less human than Siva's 
 wife Parvatl. In fact the more human side of both Vishnu ^ 
 and Lakshmi is reserved for their descents in human form 
 —Vishnu as Rama and Krishna, Lakshmi as Sita and 
 Rukmini. Nevertheless some details of Vishnu's separate 
 personality, as distinct from his Avataras, may be gathered 
 from the Puranas. For example, we are told that he has 
 a peculiar auspicious mark (SrI-vatsa) on his breast^. He 
 has four arms, and holds a symbol in each of his four hands ; 
 namely, a wheel or circular weapon (6akra) called Sudarsana, 
 a conch-shell ^ (sankha) called Pancajanya, a club (gada) 
 called KaumodakI, and a lotus-flower (padma). Of these the 
 circular symbol may possibly have been borrowed from 
 Buddhism. If so, it was originally significant of the wheel 
 
 ^ Described as a peculiar twist of curl of the hair. In one form of 
 Krishna (as Vitho-ba in the Maratha country) his breast has a foot-mark, 
 believed to be the indelible impress of the blow from the sage Bhrigu's 
 foot (see the story at p. 45). 
 
 ^ One account describes the sacred conch-shell as thrown up by the 
 sea when churned by the gods and demons (see p. 108). Another account 
 makes Vishnu's shell consist of the bones of the demon Paiicajana. 
 According to the Vishnu-purana (V. 21), 'this demon lived in the form 
 of a conch-shell under the ocean. Krishna (Vishnu) plunged into the 
 waters, killed him, took the shell which constituted his bones, and ever 
 afterwards used it for a horn. When sounded it fills the demon-hosts 
 with dismay, animates the gods, and annihilates unrighteousness.' Vishnu 
 is believed to take such delight in this shell, that a small shell of the 
 same species is used in pouring holy water over his idols and symbols 
 in the performance of his worship. It is also frequently branded on the 
 arms of his worshippers. 
 
I04 Vaishnavism or Worship of Vishnu. 
 
 of the Buddhistic law, or of the cycles of existence peculiar tc 
 that system. Or, bearing in mind Vishnu's connection with 
 the Sun, we may regard it as emblematical (like the Svastika^; 
 of the Sun's circular course in the heavens. In the latei 
 mythology, however, it represents a missile weapon hurled by 
 Vishnu, like a quoit, at the demons who are ever plotting 
 evil against gods and men, and with whom he is always at 
 war^. Similarly the conch-shell is blown by him like a 
 trumpet in his battles ; its miraculous sound filling his ene- 
 mies with terror and helping him to secure victory. The 
 club is also used in Vishnu's conflicts with his demon-foes, 
 Moreover he is armed with a wonderful bow called Sarnga 
 and a sword Nandaka. He has a jewel on his wrist named 
 Syamantaka, and another on his breast called Kaustubha, 
 When he moves through space to the aid of his worshippers 
 ■^ he is borne on the mythical bird Garuda^, closely related 
 to the Sun and compared to an eagle, but represented as 
 semi-human in form and character, with a bird-like face. 
 Possibly this Garuda may be a personification of the sky 
 
 ^ The Svastika mark may be a kind of curtailed form of this wheel) 
 consisting of four spokes crossing each other at right angles and a portion 
 of the circumference which is left to denote the direction in which it must 
 turn to symbolize the Sun's course in the heavens. This conjecture, 
 which I formed long ago, is confirmed by the late Mr. Edw. Thomas's 
 article in the Numismatic Chronicle. 
 
 ^ The names of some of the chief demons thus destroyed by Vishnu 
 (or Krishna identified with Vishnu) are Madhu, Kansa, Bana, Bali, 
 Mura, etc. 
 
 ' In some parts of India (especially in the South) Garuda is an 
 -object of worship. I frequently came across images of him in Vaishnava 
 temples. He is the son of Kasyapa and Vinata, and hence Aruna the 
 Dawn, regarded as charioteer of the Sun, is his younger brother. Most 
 of the Hindu deities are described as associated with or attended bj 
 ^ their own favourite animals, which they sometimes use as vehicles 
 (yahana). Brahma is attended by a goose or swan (hansa) ; Siva b) 
 a bull (see p. 8i); Karttikeya or Skanda by a peacock; Indra by ar 
 elephant ; Yama by a buffalo (mahisha) ; Kama, ' god of love,' by a 
 parrot ; Ganesa by a rat ; Agni by a ram ; Varuna by a fish ; Durga b) 
 a tiger. Serpents are associated with both Siva and Vishnu. 
 
Vaishnavism. Names of Vishnu and Siva. 105 
 
 or ethereal element which supports Vishnu — identified with 
 the Sun — one of whose names is ' Air-borne ' (Vayu-vahana). 
 It is noteworthy that Garuda, like the Krishna form of Vishnu, 
 is the destroyer of serpents which typify destruction and evil 
 (compare p. 113). Yet serpents have also their contrary 
 character, and even divine attributes ; for at the dissolution 
 of the Universe and between the intervals of creation, Vishnu, 
 as the Supreme Being, floating on the waters (p. 10a), reclines 
 in profound repose on the thousand-headed serpent Sesha— 
 typical of infinity^while his wife Lakshml chafes his feet, 
 and out of his navel grows the lotus which supports Brahma, 
 the active agent in reproducing the world. Finally, Vishnu 
 has the river Ganges issuing from one of his feet, whence 
 it flows through the sky before it falls on Siva's head (p. 80). 
 
 And here it may be noted that the devotional enthusiasm 
 of Vishnu's worshippers has endowed him with a thousand 
 names and epithets ^. This is exactly eight less than the 
 Saivas have lavished on Siva, and, considering the rivalry 
 between the followers of the two deities, must be regarded as 
 a modest allowance. The repetition of any or all of these 
 names (nama-sanklrtana), either with or without the help of 
 a rosary, constitutes an important part of daily worship, and 
 is productive of vast stores of religious merit. They are all 
 enumerated with those of Siva in the Anusasana-parva of 
 the Maha-bharata (i 144-1266, 6950-7056)^. 
 
 ' Of course the greater number of the names are simply epithets. 
 The Muhammadans reckon ninety-nine names and epithets of God, and 
 make the repetition '(zikr) of them a work of enormous religious merit. 
 In the same way the Jews attach great efficacy to the repetition of the 
 Divine epithets. Christianity reckons, I believe, about ninety epithets 
 of Christ, but no Christian thinks of repeating them as a meritorious 
 exercise. Aristotle, it is said, enumerates more than a hundred names 
 and epithets applicable to Zeus ; but the Greeks and Romans do not 
 appear to have believed in any religious advantage attending the mere 
 mechanical recital of such names. 
 
 '^ I notice several repetitions of the same name in the catalogue ; for 
 instance, Aditya, Sthanu, Srashtri. 
 
io6 Vaisknavism. Names of Vishnu and Siva. 
 
 In comparing the two catalogues it is interesting to obsen 
 how many names are common to both deities. Vishn 
 especially, has a large number of names which he shan 
 with the rival god, and is even called Siva ' the Auspicious 
 while Siva is called Vishnu, 'the Pervader,' each in fact usurj 
 ing the functions of the other. Moreover, to both deities 
 allotted an ample assortment of the usual titles expressive ( 
 almighty power — such as 'all-creating,' 'all-seeing,' 'all-knov 
 ing,' 'infinite,' 'self-existent,' 'all-pervading' — mixed up wit 
 many which are unworthy of beings claiming divine homagi 
 Vishnu has certainly fewer objectionable epithets than Siva. 
 
 Many names of both gods are simply taken from those ( 
 the Sun, Fire, and Wind ; and many are expressive of loft 
 divine attributes — once believed to be the peculiar propert 
 of Christian theology. For example, Vishnu is called ' th 
 holy Being' (Pavitram, also applied to Siva), 'the True 
 (Satyah), ' the Pure Spirit ' (or ' having a pure spirit,' Putatma 
 ' the Way ' (Margah), ' the Truth ' (Tattvam), ' the Life ' (Prj 
 nah), ' the Physician ' (Vaidyah), ' the World's Medicine 
 (Aushadham or Bheshajam Jagatah), ' the Father ' (Pita), an 
 even ' the Holy of the Holy ' (Pavitram Pavitranam) ^ — a 
 epithet which it is difficult to reconcile with some of tli 
 actions of his Krishna manifestation. 
 
 On the other hand, Siva is called by the following name 
 in addition to those already mentioned at pp. 81-85 :^'tl) 
 Mother' (Mata, as well as Pita, 'the Father'), ' Extinctior 
 (Nirvanam), ' the Year-causer' (Samvatsara-karah), ' the grez 
 Illusionist ' (Mahamayah), ' the Night-walker ' (Nisa-(iarab 
 
 ' Other remarkable names and epithets of Vishnu are the following :- 
 'the Bridge' (Setuh), 'the Guide' (Neta), 'the All''(Sarvah), 'the Refugi 
 (Saraijam), 'the Friend' (Suhrid), 'the Affectionate' (Vatsalat), 'tl 
 Benefactor' (Priya-krit), 'the Witness' (Sakshi), 'the Patient' (Sahisi 
 nuh), 'the Peace-giver' (Santi-dati), 'the Authority' (Pramanam), 'tl 
 Mysterious one' (Guhyab), 'the Undying-bodied one' (Amrita-vapul 
 'the Holy' (Brahmanyah), 'the Winkless' (Animishah), 'the Desin 
 one ' (Ishtat), ' the Who ? ' (Kalj), ' the What ' (Kim). 
 
Vaishnavism. Ten Incarnations. 107 
 
 'the Submarine Fire' (called Badava-mukhah, 'Mare-faced'), 
 'the White One' (Suklah), 'the Enraged' (Mahakrodhah), 
 'the Root' (Mulam), 'the Ill-formed' (Virupah), 'the Mule' 
 (Haya-gardabhili, mixture of the qualities of horse and ass ?). 
 'Again, some of Vishnu's designations as Krishna, such as 
 Partha-sarathi, 'Charioteer of Arjuna' (under which title he 
 is worshipped at Madras), and Venkatesa, ' Lord of the hill 
 Venkata,' are, like those of Siva, merely local epithets ; and 
 some (as for example Vitho-ba, worshipped at Pandharpur) 
 are the result of his identification with particular local heroes. 
 
 I need scarcely repeat that the chief distinguishing cha- 
 racteristic of the god Vishnu is his condescending to infuse 
 his essence into animals and men with the object of delivering 
 his worshippers from certain special dangers or of otherwise 
 benefiting mankind. The peculiar nature of these descents 
 (Avatara), and the vast difference between the Hindu and 
 Christian idea of incarnation, have been already described 
 (p. 6^). Vishnu, in fact, is believed to exist in an eternal 
 body antecedent to his earthly incarnations. In some of the 
 Puranas Vishnu's ten incarnations are multiplied to twenty-two, 
 twenty-four, and twenty-eight. The ten best known are : — 
 
 I. 'The Fish' (Matsya). Vishnu is believed to have infused ' 
 a portion of his essence into a fish — or rather perhaps to have 
 taken the form of a fish — to save Manu^, the primeval man 
 and progenitor of the human race, from the universal deluge. 
 This Manu, like Noah, conciliated the Deity's favour by his 
 piety in an age of depravity. Hence he was warned of the 
 approaching deluge, and was commanded to build a ship and 
 go on board with the seven Rishis, or patriarchs, and the seeds 
 of all existing things. Manu did so. The flood came, and 
 Vishnu took the form of a vast fish with a horn on its head, to 
 which the ship's cable was fastened. The ship was thus 
 
 ' That is, the Manu of the present period— not to be confounded with , 
 Brahma's grandson, the supposed author of the well-known Law-book. 
 The name Manu is from the root man, ' to think.' 
 
io8 Vaishmvism. Ten Incarnations. 
 
 supernaturally drawn along and secured to a high crag till the 
 flood had passed. 
 
 a. 'The Tortoise' (Kurma). Vishnu infused a portion of 
 his essence into the body of an immense tortoise to aid in 
 producing or recovering certain valuable articles, some of 
 which had been lost in the deluge. For this purpose he 
 stationed himself at the bottom of the sea of milk— one of 
 the seven concentric circular seas surrounding the seven 
 concentric circular continents of the earth — that his back 
 might serve as a pivot for the mountain Mandara, around 
 which the gods and demons twisted the great serpent 
 Vasuki. They then stood opposite to each other, and using 
 the snake as a rope and the mountain as a churning-rod, 
 churned the milky ocean violently, till, one by one, fourteen 
 inestimably valuable and typical objects emerged ^. i. The 
 nectar conferring immortality (Amrita). %. The physician 
 of the gods and holder of the nectar (Dhanvantari). 3. The 
 goddess of good fortune and beauty, wife of Vishnu (Lakshmi 
 or Sri). 4. The goddess of wine (Sura)^. 5. The moon 
 (dandra). 6. The nymph Rambha, celebrated as a kind 
 of prototype of lovely women. 7. A fabulous high-eared 
 horse (Udcaih-sravas), the supposed prototype of the equine 
 race. 8. The miraculous jewel Kaustubha, afterwards appro- 
 priated by Krishna. 9. A celestial tree (Parijata) yielding 
 all desired objects. 10. The cow of plenty (Kama-dhenu 
 or Surabhi), granting all boons, ii. A mythical elephant 
 (Airavata) — afterwards appropriated, as a vehicle, by the god 
 
 '^ When I asked an Indian Pandit how it was possible to believe in 
 what to us appears an extravagant fable, I was told that it was simply 
 allegorical, and only intended to typify the truth that nothing valuable 
 can be produced without extraordinary exertion. 
 
 ^ This is one proof out of many that the drinking of wine and spirits 
 was once not only common in India, but also sanctioned by religion. 
 In Vedic times wine appears to have been preserved in leathern bottles, 
 see Rig-veda I. 191. 10 (Rajendralala Mitra's Essays, VII). Unhappilythe 
 sect of Saktas (see pp. 192, 193) may claim scriptural authority for their ' 
 orgies, and appeal to the example of their gods Siva and Bala-rama. 
 
Vaishnavism. Ten Incarnations. 109 
 
 Indra— prototype of the elephantine race. 13. A sacred 
 conch-shell (Saiikha), afterwards the property of Vishnu (or 
 Krishna), and supposed, when blown as a horn, to insure 
 victory over his enemies (see note, p. 103). 13. A miraculous 
 unerring bow (Dhanus)^- 14. A deadly poison (Visha). 
 
 3. 'The Boar' (Varaha). Vishnu infused a portion of his' 
 essence into the body of a huge boar— symbolical of strength 
 — to deliver the world from the power of the demon Hira- 
 nyaksha, who had seized the earth and carried it down into 
 the depths of the ocean. The divine boar dived down into 
 the abyss, and after a contest of a thousand years, slew the 
 monster and brought back the earth to the surface. Another 
 variety of this legend (given in the Vana-parva of the Maha- 
 bharata) represents the earth as submerged by a deluge — 
 pressed down by an ever-increasing and superabundant popu- 
 lation — ^till the boar descended into the waters, upheaved it 
 on one of his tusks, rescued it from its watery grave, and 
 made it fit to be reinhabited. 
 
 4. 'The Man-lion' (Nara-sinha). Vishnu assumed the shape' 
 of a creature, half man, half lion, to deliver the world from 
 the tyrant Hiranya-kasipu, who had obtained a boon from 
 Brahma that he should not be slain by either god or man or 
 animal. Hence he became powerful enough to usurp the 
 dominion of the three worlds. He even appropriated the 
 sacrifices intended for the gods and necessary for their sup- 
 port. When his pious son Prahlada praised Vishnu, the 
 tyrant tried to destroy the boy ; but Vishnu appeared sud- 
 denly out of the centre of a pillar in a shape neither god, nor 
 man, nor animal, and tore Hiranya-kasipu to pieces. 
 
 These first four incarnations are said to have taken place 
 in the first atid best (satya) of the four ages of the world. 
 
 ' Two such bows are mentioned in Hindu mythology, one the property 
 of Siva and the other of Vishnu. It was by bending Siva's bow— which 
 no other merely human suitor was able to do— that Rama won Janaka's 
 daughter Sita (see Ramayana I. 57). 
 
no Vaishnavism. Ten Incarnations. 
 
 5. 'The Dwarf (Vamana). In the second (Treta) age of 
 the world S Vishnu infused a portion of his essence into the 
 body of a dwarf to wrest from the tyrant-demon Bali (the 
 analogue of Ravana and Kansa, the two opponents of the 
 Rama and Krishna incarnations respectively) the dominion of 
 the three worlds. The apparently contemptible little dwarf 
 presented himself one day before the Tyrant, and solicited as 
 much land as he could step in three paces. No sooner was 
 his request granted than his form expanded, and he strode in 
 two steps over heaven and earth, but out of compassion left 
 the lower world in the demon's possession. 
 
 6. ' Rama with the axe ' (Parasu-rama). Vishnu infused a 
 portion of his essence into the axe-armed Rama, son of the 
 Brahman Jamadagni and descendant of Bhrigu, in the second 
 age, to prevent the military caste (see p. 370) from tyrannizing 
 over the Brahmanical. Parasu-rama is said to have cleared 
 the earth twenty-one times of the whole Kshatriya race. 
 
 Vishnu's essence seems to have deserted this hero before his 
 death, as implied in the account of the great Rama's victory 
 over Parasu-rama, given in Rama^ana I. 75, 76. 
 
 7. In the seventh descent Vishnu infused half of his essence 
 into the great Rama, commonly called Rama-candra, ' the 
 moon-like Rama^.' This celebrated hero was believed to 
 have been manifested at the close of the second or Treta age 
 to destroy the tyrant-demon Ravana who reigned in Ceylon. 
 India was never under one monarch, and in ancient times its 
 kings were simply petty princes and chieftains, who ruled over 
 districts of more or less extended area, and Oudh (Ayodhya) 
 was probably one of the more powerful principalities. As a 
 historical fact Rama was no doubt one of the four sons of a king 
 of Oudh, named Dasa-ratha, of the so-called Solar race, and 
 
 ■^ This would be the third age reckoning backwards, and is therefore 
 called Treta. 
 
 ''■ In paintings he is represented with a peculiar greenish complexion. 
 The word dandra is often added to names to express beauty. 
 
Vaishnavism. Ten Incarnations. 1 1 1 
 
 therefore a Kshatriya. The real date of Rama's birth, in the 
 absence of all trustworthy historical records, can only be a 
 matter of the most uncertain conjecture. He is celebrated 
 throughout India as the model son, brother, and husband, who 
 was banished by his father to the southern forests. There his 
 pattern wife Sita was carried off by Ravana, the tyrant-king 
 of Ceylon, and recovered by Rama after making a bridge of 
 rocks to the island. He was aided by Hanuman — a powerful 
 chief of one of the aboriginal tribes, poetically compared to 
 monkeys. This story forms the subject of one of the two 
 great Indian Epics — the Ramayana — and no story in the world 
 has obtained a wider circulation and celebrity. Every man, 
 woman, and child in India is familiar with Rama's exploits for 
 the recovery of his wife, insomuch that a common phrase for 
 an ignorant person is ' one who does not know that Sita was 
 Rama's wife.' From Kasmir to Cape Comorin the name of 
 Rama is on every one's lips. All sects revere it, and show their 
 reverence by employing it on all occasions. For example, when 
 friends meet it is common for them to salute each other by utter- 
 ing Rama's name twice. Then no name is more commonly 
 given to children, and no name is more commonly invoked at 
 funerals and in the hour of death. It is a link of union for all 
 classes, castes, and creeds. And yet it is highly probable that, 
 during his lifetime, Rama received little more than the usual 
 homage offered to every great, good, and brave man. His 
 apotheosis did not take place till after his death, when he was 
 converted into one of the most popular incarnations of Vishnu ; 
 his servant Hanuman also receiving divine honours. 
 
 8. The eighth descent was as Krishna, 'the dark hero-god' ; 
 the most popular of all the later deities of India. This descent 
 of Vishnu at the end of the Dvapara or third age of the 
 world, as the eighth son of Vasu-deva and DevakI, of the Lunar 
 race of Kshatriyas (called Yadavas), was for the destruction 
 of the tyrant Kansa, the representative of the principle of 
 evil— the analogue of Ravana in the previous incarnation. 
 
112 Vaishnavism. Ten Incarnations. 
 
 According to some, Krishna ought not to be reckoned as 
 one of the ten Avataras or descents of portions of Vishnu's 
 essence ; for he was nothing short of Vishnu's whole essence. 
 
 Those who hold this doctrine substitute Bala-rama, 'the 
 strong Rama,' an elder son of Vasudeva and DevakI, and 
 therefore elder brother of Krishna, as the eighth incarnation 
 of Vishnu. This Bala-rama is more usually regarded as an 
 incarnation of the great serpent Sesha. He is sometimes 
 called the Indian Hercules, but without any very good reason, 
 No special prodigies of strength are recorded of him, though 
 he wields a formidable weapon in the shape of a plough- 
 share, as well as a pestle-shaped club (musala). He is 
 chieily remarkable for his love of strong drink, in which, with 
 his wife Revati, he frequently indulges to the verge of inebria.. 
 tion (p. io8, note i ; p. 'i^o)■ When he died a serpent came out 
 of his mouth and entered the ocean (Maha-bharata XVI. 117). 
 
 The details of the later life of Krishna are interwoven with 
 the later portions of the Maha-bharata, but do not belong to 
 the plot, and might be omitted without impairing its unity. 
 He is certainly not the hero of the great epic. He merely 
 appears as a powerful chiefs who takes the side of the real 
 heroes — the Pandavas — and his claims to divine rank are 
 often disputed during the progress of the story. Even since 
 his apotheosis Krishna has always been peculiarly the god 
 of the lower classes ; for, although of the kingly caste, he 
 was brought up among cowherds, cowherdesses, and the 
 families of peasants. His juvenile biography is given with 
 much minuteness of detail in the Bhagavata-purana, from 
 which we learn that Vasudeva of the Lunar -race of princes 
 — who probably occupied the part of India now called 
 
 ^ Krishna was no doubt a powerful chief of the Yadava tribe, who were 
 probably Rajputs occupying a district of Central India south of Muttra 
 (Mathura) and east of the Jumna. The real date of his birth, though 
 kept as a holy day and holiday throughout a great part of India, cannot 
 be fixed with any more certainty than that of Rama ; but in all probability 
 he lived in more recent times than Rama. 
 
Vaishnavism. Ten Incarnations. 113 
 
 Rajputanai— had two wives, RohinI and Devaki. The latter 
 had eight sons, of whom the eighth was Krishna. It was pre- 
 dicted that one of them would kill Kansa, chief of Mathu'ra 
 (Muttra), and cousin (not brother) of Devaki. Kansa there- 
 fore imprisoned Vasudeva and his wife, and slew their first 
 six children. Bala-rama, the seventh, was abstracted from 
 Devaki's womb, transferred to that of RohinI, and so saved. 
 The eighth was Krishna, born with a black skin, and the mark 
 SrI-vatsa on his breast^. His father Vasudeva escaped 
 from Mathura with the child, and, favoured by the gods, 
 found a certain herdsman named Nanda, whose wife had 
 lately had a child. To his care he consigned the infant 
 Krishna. Nanda settled first in Gokula or Vraja, and after- 
 wards in Vrindavana, where Krishna and Bala-rama grew up 
 together, roaming in the woods, and joining in the sports of 
 the. herdsman's sons and daughters. While still a boy, 
 -Krishna gave proof of his divine origin by working a few 
 startling miracles. Thus he destroyed the serpent Kaliya 
 — probably a type of evil and malignity — by trampling and 
 dancing on his head. He lifted up the mountain-range Go- 
 vardhana on his finger to shelter the herdsmen's wives from 
 the wrath of Indra. Yet in spite of these evidences of his 
 supramundane powers, Krishna was addicted to very mundane 
 practices. He constantly sported with the Gopis or wives and 
 daughters of the cowherds ; on one occasion stealing their 
 clothes when they were bathing and making them come to him 
 naked. Eight were his favourites, especially Radha. In time 
 Krishna migrated to Gujarat, built Dvarika on the coast, and 
 thither transported the inhabitants of Mathura after killing 
 
 ' The two most powerful lines of Indian princes, those of Oudh and 
 Rajputana, were careful to trace back their pedigree to superhuman •-■ 
 origins, the former claiming the Sun-god and some of the latter the Moon- 
 god as their primeval progenitors. Udaipur and others daim the Sun. 
 
 " Compare note i, p. 103. The day of his birth is called Janmashtaml. 
 It is kept on the eighth day of the dark half of the month Bhadra in some 
 places, and of Sravana in others. 
 
 I 
 
114 Vaishnavism. Ten Incarnations. 
 
 Kansa. He is fabled to have had c&untless wives and to8,ooo 
 sons, and one called Pradyumna by Rukminl. It is said that 
 while Krishna was lying on the ground in meditation, a 
 hunter, named Jara, mistook him for game and killed him 
 by piercing the sole of his foot (Maha-bharata XVI. ia6). 
 
 9. Buddha. The adoption of Buddha as one of the ten 
 incarnations of Vishnu appears to have been the result of a 
 wise compromise with Buddhism ; the Brahmans asserting 
 that Vishnu, in his compassion for animals, descended as the 
 sceptical Buddha that he might bring discredit on Vedic 
 sacrifices (see Gita-govinda I. 13) ; or, according to another 
 theory, that wicked men might bring destruction on them- 
 selves by accepting Buddhism and denying the supremacy of 
 the gods. The fact was that the Brahmans appropriated 
 Buddha much as some of them are willing to appropriate 
 Christ, and make Him out to be an incarnation of Vishnu. 
 
 10. Kalki or Kalkin. The descent of Vishnu in this cha- 
 racter has not yet taken place. Nor is he to appear till the 
 close of the fourth or Kali age, when the world has become 
 wholly depraved. He is then to be revealed in the sky, 
 seated on a white horse, with a drawn sword blazing like a 
 comet, for the final destruction of the wicked, for the re- 
 demption of the good, for the renovation of all creation and 
 restoration of the age of purity (Satya-yuga). From the 
 fact of the horse playing an important role in this incar- 
 nation, it is sometimes called Asvavatara. Some of the 
 degraded classes of India comfort themselves in their pre- 
 sent depressed condition by expecting Kalki to appear as 
 their future deliverer, and as the restorer of their social 
 position. Indeed it is a remarkable fact that a belief in a 
 coming Redeemer seems to exist in all religions, not ex- 
 cepting Buddhism and Muhammadanism ^. 
 
 Looking more closely at these ten special incarnations, 
 
 ' In Buddhism there is the future Buddha ; in Islam the MahdI. The 
 succession of Buddhas may be compared to that of Vishnu's descents. 
 
Vaishnavism. Ten Incarnations, 115 
 
 we may observe that the god Vishnu, in conformity with 
 his character of a Maintainer of Hfe, discharges his func- 
 tions in his first three descents by pervading the bodies 
 of animals. It is remarkable, too, that these three zoomor- 
 phic incarnations ail have reference to the tradition of a 
 general deluge. In his fourth descent Vishnu takes the 
 form of a being half animal, half man. Possibly this com- 
 bination may be intended as a kind of intermediate link, to 
 connect the deity with higher forms. From half a man, 
 the transition is to a complete man, but the divine essence 
 on passing into human forms commences with a dwarf — 
 the smallest type of humanity. Thence it advances to mighty 
 heroes, sent into the world to deliver mankind from the 
 oppression of tyrants — represented as evil demons — whose 
 power increases with the increase of corruption and depravity 
 during the four ages. The eighth is the highest and so to 
 speak culminating incarnation ; for in this Krishna is believed 
 to be, not a part of Vishnu's essence, but a complete mani- 
 festation of Vishnu himself. The ninth may be passed over 
 as a mere device on the part of the Brahmans to account for 
 the existence of Buddhism. The tenth and final incarnation, 
 which remains to be revealed, will surpass all the others in im- 
 portance. In it evil and wickedness are to be entirely rooted 
 out, and the age of purity restored. Possibly this progressive 
 series of what to us appear exceedingly absurd metamorphoses 
 may be connected with the idea of continuous development ; 
 and just as the souls of men, regarded as emanations from the 
 Deity, pass into stones, plants, and animals, or rise to the 
 bodies of higher beings, so portions of the essence of Vishnu 
 pass through progressive stages of embodied existence for the 
 maintenance of the order of the universe. 
 
 As we have already seen, Vishnu's essence divided itself 
 into male and female, but he had no children In his Non- 
 avatara condition, as Siva had, unless Kama-deva, god of love, 
 said to have been his mind-born son (afterwards incarnate in 
 
 I a 
 
ii6 Vaishnavism. Division into Sects. 
 
 Pradyumna, p. 114), be so regarded. When the male essence 
 descended as Rama, the female was born as Rama's faithful 
 wife Sita ; and when the male descended as Krishna, the 
 female became Krishna's favourite, Radha. ^ 
 
 We now proceed to give a description of /the more im- 
 portant Vaishnava sects, — beginning with those founded by 
 Ramanuja, Madhva, Vallabha, and dlaitanya; and first we 
 may direct attention to some points in which they all agree. 
 
 In the first place, it must be understood that all the sects 
 agree in maintaining, at least theoretically, that devotion to 
 Vishnu supersedes all distinctions of caste (compare p. 64). 
 As a matter of fact, however, it is not to be supposed that 
 a Vaishnava Brahman ever really gives up his claim to 
 superiority over the inferior classes. 
 
 Next, it must be borne in mind that all the Vaishnava sects 
 are more or less opposed to the non-duality (advaita) doctrine 
 of Sankara(5arya (see p. 55) which makes the spirit of man 
 identical with the one Spirit of the Universe (Atma, Brahmi). 
 
 Further, we may note that the bible of all worshippers 
 of Vishnu in his most popular manifestation — that of the 
 hero Krishna, with his favourite wife Radha — consists of 
 two chief books, the Bhagavata-purana and the Bhagavad- 
 gita portion of the Maha-bharata ; and that those who pay 
 exclusive adoration to the other popular manifestation — 
 the hero Rama — also acknowledge two special bibles in 
 Valmiki's Ramayana, and in the Ramayana of Tulsi-das 
 (Tulasl-das). Undoubtedly these four books ought to find a 
 place among the ' Sacred Books ' of our Indian Empire. 
 
 Then it must not be forgotten that all agree in the wor- 
 ship of existing religious teachers who are supposed to be 
 embodiments, not only of divine wisdom, but of the very 
 essence of divinity. In the foremost rank must always come 
 the original founder of each particular sect, whose title is 
 Adarya. He is regarded as little inferior to Krishna him- 
 self, and may even be identified with him. As to the livihg 
 
Vaishnavism. Division into Sects. 117 
 
 teacher of the day, if not elevated to equal rank, he is a 
 greater reality. He receives homage as a visible and tangible 
 mediator between earth and heaven. He is to the mass of 
 Vaishnavas even more than a mediator between themselves 
 and God. He is the living embodiment of the entire essence 
 of the deity (sarva-deva-mayah). Nay, he is still more. He 
 is the present God whose anger is to be deprecated and favour 
 conciliated, because they make themselves instantly felt. 
 
 Next, all the Vaishnava sects agree, as we have seen 
 (p. 61), in requiring a special ceremony of initiation (diksha) 
 into their communion, accompanied by the repetition of a 
 formula of words, significant of reverence for either Krishna or 
 Rama, such as, ' homage to the divine son of Vasudeva ' (Om 
 namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya), 'homage to the adorable Rama ' 
 (Sri Ramaya namah), or the eight-syllabled formula, 'adorable 
 Krishna is my refuge ' (Sri Krishnah Saranam mama). 
 
 Children are admitted to the religion of Vishnu at the 
 age of six or seven years or, by some sects, earlier. A rosary 
 or necklace (kanthi) of one hundred and eight beads ^ usually 1 
 made of tulsl wood (pp. 67, ^^^), is passed round their necks 
 by the priest (Guru), and they are taught the use of one of 
 the foregoing formulas, which is repeated by the Guru, very 
 much as the sacred words 'In nomine Patris,' etc. are re- 
 peated by the priest at the Christian rite of baptism. 
 
 Then, at the age of twelve or thirteen, another rite is 
 performed, corresponding to our confirmation. With the ' 
 Vallabha sect it is called the ' Dedication rite ' (Samarpana) ; 
 that is, the consecration of body, soul, and substance (tan, 
 man, dhan) to Krishna ; the formula taught being to the 
 following effect : — ' I here dedicate to the holy Krishna my 
 bodily organs, my life, my inmost soul, and its faculties, 
 with my wife, my house, my children, with all the wealth 
 
 ' According to Dr. Rajendralala Mitra this is merely to aid the possessor 
 in repeating any one of Vishnu's names 800 times, the eight additional 
 beads marking each hundred recitation. 
 
ii8 Vaishnavism. Division into Sects. 
 
 I may acquire here or hereafter, and my own self. 
 Krishna, I am thy servant.' These ceremonies may, in the 
 case of all but Brahmans, take the place of the initiatory rite 
 of orthodox Brahmanism, performed by investiture with the 
 sacred thread (to be described at p. 360). 
 
 Another general characteristic of all the Vaishnava sects 
 is tenderness towards animal life. In this respect Vaish- 
 navism contrasts favourably with Saivism. No life must be 
 taken by a worshipper of Vishnu, not even that of a minute 
 insect, and not even for sacrifice to a deity (as, for example, 
 to Kali), and least of all must one's own life be taken. 
 It is usual for missionaries to speak with horror of the self- 
 immolation alleged to take place under the Car of Jagan- 
 nath (Krishna). But if deaths occur, they must be acci- 
 dental, as self-destruction is wholly opposed both to the 
 letter and spirit of the Vaishnava religion. 
 
 Then, of course, the several sects agree in enjoining the 
 use of the perpendicular coloured marks on the forehead, 
 called Urdhva-pundra (described at p. 67). They are sup- 
 posed to denote the impress of either one or both the feet 
 of Vishnu, and to possess great efficacy in shielding from 
 evil influences and delivering from sin. In addition to these 
 frontal marks, most of the sects brand the breast and arms 
 with the circular symbol and conch-shell of Vishnu. 
 
 Finally, all the sects believe that every faithful and vir- 
 tuous worshipper of Vishnu is transported to his heaven, 
 called Vaikuntha, or to that of Krishna, called Go-loka (in- 
 stead of to the temporary Svarga of orthodox Brahmanism, 
 p.' 49), and that when once admitted there, he is saved from 
 the misery of further transmigration. There, according to the 
 merit of his works, he may enjoy any of the three conditions 
 of bliss, Salokya, Samlpya, or Sarupya (p. 41 ; compare 
 p. 334). Whether a Vaishnava may be supposed capable of 
 achieving the highest condition of beatification — conscious 
 absorption into the divine essence (Sayujya) — depends of 
 
Vaisknavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 119 
 
 course on the philosophical views of the sect to which he 
 belongs (see p. 95). One point requires to be well under- 
 stood in comparing the Vaishnava religion with Christianity— 
 namely, that God, with Hindu Theists, can only be propi- 
 tiated by works. He may be called merciful, but He only 
 shows mercy to those who deserve it by their actions, and 
 if He accepts faith it is only because this also is a meritorious 
 act. Every man's hope of heaven, and of salvation from the" 
 misery of successive births, depends on the amount of merit he 
 has accumulated during life. We must also bear in mind that 
 although Vishnu is supposed to be a Creator as well as a 
 Saviour, yet he is not so in the Christian sense of the word ; 
 for all the sects believe in some material cause (upadana)— 
 some eternal substance out of which the Universe is evolved. 
 Let us now advert to the principal Vaishnava sects. 
 
 Sect founded by Ramanuja. 
 
 The Vaishnava form of the Visishtadvaita philosophy ^ was 
 taught by Ramanuja, or as he is called Ramanujacarya, who 
 was born about A. D. 1017 at Sri Parambattur, a town about 
 twenty-six miles west of Madras. He is believed to have 
 been an incarnation of Sesha or Ananta (pp. 105, ^i'^ and is 
 known to have taught at Kafidi-puram (KanjTvaram, p. 446), 
 to have travelled twice through India, and to have finally 
 settled at SrI-rangam, near Trichinopoly. He is said to have 
 lived for one hundred and twenty years and died in 1137. He 
 is buried in the great temple of Sriranga-nath (see p. 447). 
 The distinctive point of his teaching, according to the Sarva- 
 darsana-sangraha (Cowell and Gough), was his assertion of 
 the existence of a triad of principles (padartha-tritayam), — 
 namely, i. the Supreme Spirit (Para-brahman or Isvara); 
 
 ' There is also a Saiva form ; see above, p. 89, and see ' a catechism of 
 the Visishtadvaita ' printed and published in 1887 by N. Bhashyadarya, 
 Pandit of the Adyar Library, Madras, who is my authority for some state- 
 ments here. 
 
I20 Vaishnavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 
 
 2. the separate spirits (Cit) of men ; and 3. non-spirit (A-dit). 
 Vishnu is the Supreme Being ; individual beings are separate 
 spirits ; the visible world (drisyam) is non-spirit. All three 
 have an eternal existence arid. are inseparable, yet Cit and 
 A-dit are different from Isvara and dependent on Isvara. 
 
 This doctrine was clearly antagonistic to that of the great 
 Brahmanical revivalist Sankara, who lived three or four cen- 
 turies before (see p. ^S)- According to Sankara, as we have 
 seen, the separate existence of the spirit of man, as distinct 
 from the one Universal Spirit, was only illusory. Illusion 
 (Maya), too — existing from all eternity — was the only mate- 
 rial or substantial cause (upadana-karana) of the external 
 world, though this eternally creative Illusion was powerless 
 to create the world except in union with the one Spirit. 
 Ramanuja, on the other hand, contended that the spirits of 
 men are truly, essentially, and eternally different from the 
 one Spirit, though dependent on it. With regard to the 
 external world his views appear to have been less dualistic 
 than those of the Sankhya, and even than those of the 
 Vedanta, for in these systems we have either Prakriti or 
 Maya, as the material cause (upadana) out of which the 
 Universe was created ; whereas Ramanuja held that God is 
 himself both the creator (Karta) of the world and the sub- 
 stantial cause or material out of which it is formed. He 
 appears, too, to have asserted that the world and God stand 
 towards each other in the relation of body and spirit, and 
 that body and spirit are virtually one. It will be found, in 
 fact, that the doctrine ' ex nihilo nihil fit ' in some form or 
 other holds good in every religious system which India has 
 produced independently of Christian influences. 
 
 In support of the doctrine that the spirits of men are 
 really and eternally distinct from the one Universal Spirit 
 he appealed to a passage in the Mundaka Upanishad, which 
 rests on a well-known text of the Rig-veda (I. 164.26): 
 ' Two birds— the Supreme and Individual Spirits — like closely 
 
Vaisknavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 121 
 
 associated friends, occupy (cling to) the same tree (abide in 
 the same body). One of them (the Individual Spirit) enjoys 
 the sweet fruit of the fig (or consequences of acts), the other, 
 without eating, looks on as a witness.' 
 
 As Ramanuja admitted the dependence of the human 
 spirit on the divine, so he urged the duty of striving after 
 complete, though conscious, union with the Supreme- 
 identified with Vishnu:— 'Cut is the knot of man's heart, 
 solved are all his doubts, ended are all his works, when he 
 has beheld the Supreme Being 1.' 
 
 A good account of Ramanuja's opinions is given by the 
 late Dr. K. M. Banerjea (' Dialogues on Hindu Philosophy '). 
 His account is founded on Ramanuja's own commentaries on 
 the Vedanta-sutras (called Sarlraka-bhashya, Vedanta-dlpa, 
 Vedanta-sara, Vedartha-sahgraha), and his commentary on the 
 Bhagavad-gita, etc. 
 
 We may suppose Ramanuja himself to be speaking as 
 follows : — 
 
 'All the Sastras tell us of two principles —knowledge and 
 ignorance, virtue and vice, truth and falsehood. Thus we 
 see pairs everywhere, and God and the human spirit are also 
 so. How can they be one } I am sometimes happy, some- 
 times miserable. He, the Spirit, is always happy. Such is 
 the discrimination. How then can two distinct substances 
 be identical ? He is an eternal Light, pure, without anything 
 to obscure it — the one superintendent of the world. But 
 the human spirit is not so. Thus a thunder-bolt falls on 
 the tree of non-distinction. How canst thou, O slow of 
 thought, say : — I am He, who has established this immense 
 sphere of the universe in its fulness? Consider thine own 
 capacities with a candid mind. By the mercy of the Most 
 
 ' This is given in the Sarva-darsana-sangraha as one of Ramanuja's 
 precepts. Compare a similar precept at the end of the Kathopanishad. 
 I once heard an excellent sermon on this text delivered by Professor Bhan- 
 darkar in the house of prayer of the Prarthana-Samaj in Bombay. 
 
122 Vaishnavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 
 
 High a little understanding has been committed to thee. 
 It is not for thee, therefore, O perverse one, to say, I am 
 God. All the qualities of sovereignty and activity are eter- 
 nally God's. He is therefore a Being endowed with qualities, I 
 but not under the influence of illusion (maya). You cannot, 
 if you believe Him to be all truth, allow the possibility of His 
 projecting a deceptive spectacle. Nor can you, if you believe 
 Him to be all knowledge and all power, assent to the theory 
 of His creating anything under the influence of Avidya, or 
 Ignorance.' 
 
 Yet, notwithstanding the manifestly dualistic teaching of 
 Ramanuja in regard to the Supreme and human spirit, he 
 is usually credited with a modified acquiescence in the non- 
 duality doctrine of Saiikara. According to some, in fact, he 
 merely propounded a new view of the Vedanta non-duality 
 (a-dvaita) doctrine ; that is, the non-duality of the one Spirit 
 qualified by its connexion with Cit and A-dit, and therefore 
 called ' qualified non-duality ' (visishtadvaita). In the Sarva- 
 darsana-sangraha it is stated that Ramanuja's teaching, re- 
 garded from different points of view, was open to the charge 
 of admitting the three ideas of unity, duality, and plurality. 
 Unity, it alleges, was admitted by him in saying that all 
 living beings and visible forms constitute the body of the 
 one Supreme Spirit. Duality was admitted in saying that 
 the Spirit of God and of man are distinct. Plurality was 
 admitted in saying that the Spirit of God, the spirits of men 
 which are multitudinous, and the visible world are distinct. 
 (Cowell and Gough's translation, pp. '^'3,, 75.) The first of 
 these admissions is said to amount to qualified unity, and is 
 therefore styled Visishtadvaita. 
 
 Ramanuja also held that at great periodical dissolutions of J ^ 
 the Universe human spirits and the world are re-absorbed into 
 God, but without losing their separate identity and con- 
 sciousness. In the Tattva-muktavali (see Dr. Banerjea's 9th 
 Dialogue) we find Ramanuja represented as saying, 'Many 
 
Vaishnavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 123 
 
 flavours of trees there are in honey, and they are separable 
 from it. How otherwise could it remove the three-fold disor- 
 ders (p. 97) ? Spirits, in like manner, are absorbed in the Lord 
 at^ the dissolution of all things, but are not unified with 
 Him, for they are again separated at the creation. As there 
 is a difference between rivers and the sea, between sweet and 
 salt waters, so is there a difference between God and human 
 spirits, because of their characteristic distinctions. Rivers, 
 when joined with the sea, are not altogether unified with it[ 
 though they appear inseparable. There is a real diff"erence 
 between salt and sweet waters. Even milk, when mixed 
 with milk, and water with water, do not obtain unification, 
 merely because they are supposed to be unified ^' 
 
 With regard to the various manifestations of the Supreme 
 Being and the duty of worshipping Him, Ramanuja held 
 that God is present on earth in five ways : i. in forms 
 and images (murti) ; a. in partial divine embodiments (as 
 Rama); 3. in full divine embodiments (as Krishna); 4. in 
 the subtle (sukshma) all-pervading spirit ; 5. in the internal 
 spirit controlling the human soul (antaryamin). The 
 worshipper may be incapable of rising at once to any high 
 act of adoration ; in which case he must begin by adoring 
 Vishnu as manifested in the first of these five ways— that 
 is to say, in images and idols. He may afterwards ascend 
 by regular steps through the other four modes of worship 
 till he reaches the fifth. If he ever succeeds in attaining 
 to this highest stage and so becomes capable of worshipping 
 the internal Spirit enshrined in his own heart, then Vishnu 
 identified with that Spirit raises him to his own heaven 
 Vaikuntha, whence there is no return to human existence, 
 and where he enjoys the exquisite bliss of conscious assimi- 
 lation to the God whom he has adored on earth, and even 
 
 ' The twenty-ninth Sutra of Sandilya (translated by Prof. E. B. Cowell) 
 mentions a sage Kasyapa who appears to have held doctrines coinciding 
 to a certain extent with those of Ramanuja. 
 
124 Vaishnavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 
 
 of conscious absorption into that God i. Possibly this theory 
 of conscious absorption may constitute another reason for 
 attributing the doctrine called ' qualified non-duality ' (visishta- 
 dvaita) to Ramanuja. Nevertheless the impression left on 
 the mind by the account of his system in the Sarva-darsana- 
 sahgraha is that Ramanuja was even more opposed to the 
 doctrine of unity in regard to the divine and human spirits 
 than his brother sectarian Madhva. This impression is borne 
 out by the fact that his system is treated of before that of 
 Madhva, and so placed lower down in that ascending scale 
 which is supposed to culminate in the orthodox Advaita. 
 Probably the real reason for its being so placed is that he 
 asserts three principles — the Spirit of God, the spirit of man, 
 and the visible world — as his first axiom ; whereas Madhva 
 only asserts two (see p. 131). 
 
 Ramanuja had numerous disciples, and among them 
 
 - seventy- four special teachers called Acarya-purushas ap- 
 pointed by himself. These were all married men, and the 
 children of some of them succeeded to the Acaryaship. One 
 of the most celebrated of his followers was Vyasacarya, who 
 wrote a commentary on Ramanuja's works. Of course many 
 of these followers modified his teaching in the usual manner, 
 introducing doctrines and practices which the founder of the 
 
 , sect had not enjoined and would not have sanctioned. Then, 
 in the 13th century or about six hundred years ago, another 
 of his followers — a learned Brahman of Kaiijivaram. named 
 Vedantadarya — put himself forward as a reformer; giving 
 out that he was commissioned by the god Vishnu himself 
 to purify the faith ; that isj to sweep away incrustations, and 
 restore the doctrines of the original founder. These doctrines, 
 he affirmed, had been more carefully preserved by the 
 Northern Brahmans than by the Southern. Hence arose 
 irreconcilable differences of opinion, which resulted in two 
 
 ^ See Sarva-darsana-safigraha (Prof. A. E. Cough's translation of the 
 Ramanuja system), p. 79. 
 
Vaishnavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 125 
 
 great antagonistic parties of Ramanujas— one called the 
 northern school, Vada-galai (for Vada-kalai, Sanskrit kala), 
 the other the southern school, Ten-galai (for Ten-kalaii). 
 They are far more opposed to each other than both parties 
 are to Saivas. The northern school accept the Sanskrit Veda.'^ 
 The southern (Ten-galai) have compiled a Veda of their own, 
 called 'the four thousand verses' (Nalayira), written in Tamil, 
 and held to be older than the Sanskrit Veda, but really based 
 on its Upanishad portion. According to Pandit N. Bhashya-^, 
 carya this work is called Divya-prabandha. In all their 
 worship they repeat selections from these Tamil verses. 
 
 An important difference of doctrine, caused by different 
 views of the nature of the human spirit's dependfence on Vishnu, 
 separates the two parties. The view taken by the Vada-galais 
 corresponds, in a manner, to the Arminian doctrine of ' free- 
 will.' The human spirit, say they, lays hold of the Supreme 
 Being by its own will, act, and effort, just as the young 
 monkey clings to its mother. This is called the monkey- 
 theory (markata-nyaya). The view of the Ten-galais is a 
 counterpart of that of the Calvinists. It is technically styled 
 'the cat-hold theory' (marjara-nyaya). The human spirit, 
 they argue, remains passive and helpless until acted on by 
 the Supreme Spirit, just as the kitten remains passive and ^^ 
 helpless until seized and transported, nolens volens, from 
 place to place by the mother-cat. 
 
 Again, the Ten-galais maintain that the Sakti, or wife of 
 Vishnu, is a created and finite being, though divine, and 
 that she acts as a mediator or minister (purusha-kara), not 
 as an equal channel of salvation ; whereas the Vada-galais 
 regard her as, like her consort, infinite, and uncreated, and 
 equally to be worshipped as a channel or means (upaya) by 
 
 ' The Satani branch of the Ramanujas is not a separate school. It 
 consists of a body of Sudras who are opposed to Brahmanical usages. 
 It represents, in fact, the low-caste or out-caste converts to Vaishnavism. 
 It is among the Ramanuja Vaishnavas what the Lingait sect is among 
 Saivas (see p. 88). 
 
126 Vaishnavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 
 
 which salvation may be attained. I heard it remarked by 
 a learned Ten-galai Brahman that no educated men believe 
 Vishnu to be really married. ' What most Ten-galais hold,' 
 he said, ' is that Lakshml is an ideal personification of the 
 deity's more feminine attributes, such as those of mercy, 
 love, and conapassion ; while some philosophers contend 
 that the Hindu gods are only represented with wives to 
 typify the mystical union of the two eternal principles — 
 spirit and matter — for the production of the Universe. The 
 central red mark, therefore, is, in the one case, the mere ex- 
 pression of trust in God's mercy; in the other, of belief in 
 the great mystery of creation and re-creation.' 
 
 No Arminians and Calvinists have ever fought more ran- 
 corously over their attempts to solve insoluble difficulties 
 than have Vada-galais and Ten-galais over their struggles, 
 to secure the ascendency of their own theological opinions. 
 The fight has ended in a drawn battle. The two opposite 
 parties, exhausted with their profitless logomachy and use- 
 less strivings after an impossible unity of opinion, have 
 agreed to differ in abstruse points of doctrine. 
 
 Their disputes are now chiefly confined to externals of 
 the most trivial kind. It is the old story repeated. The 
 Sibboleths are intolerant of the Shibboleths. The Vada-galais 
 contend that their frontal mark (pundra, pp. 66, ii8, 40c) 
 ought to represent the impress of the right foot of Vishnu (the 
 supposed source of the Ganges), while the Ten-galais maintain 
 that equal reverence is due to both the god's feet. It is 
 certainly convenient from a social point of view that a man's 
 religious idiosyncrasies should be stamped upon his forehead. 
 Accordingly, the two religious parties are most particular 
 about their frontal emblems, the Vada-galais making a simple 
 white line between the eyes (curved like the letter U) to re- 
 present the sole of one foot, and adding a central red mark- 
 emblematical of Lakshml ; while the Ten-galais employ a more 
 complicated device symbolical of both feet, which are sup- 
 
Vaisknavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 127 
 
 posed to rest on a lotus throne, denoted by a white line 
 drawn half down the nose. The complete Ten-galai symbol 
 has the appearance of a trident, the two outer prongs (painted 
 with white earth) standing for Vishnu's two feet, the middle 
 (painted red or yellow) for his consort, LakshmT, and the 
 handle (or white line down the nose) representing the lotus 
 throne. The worst quarrels between the two divisions of the 
 sect arise from disputes as to which mark is to be impressed 
 on the images worshipped in the Vaishnava temples, to which 
 all Ramanujas resort indifferently. Tedious and expensive 
 law- suits are often the result. 
 
 Both sects, however, agree in stamping or branding the 
 same emblems of Vishnu — the discus, the conch-shell, the 
 club, and the lotus — but more generally the former two only, 
 on their breasts, shoulders, and arms (p. 118). 
 
 Another point which distinguishes the Ten-galais is that 
 they prohibit their widows from shaving their heads. Every 
 married woman in India rejoices in long, fine hair, which 
 she is careful to preserve intact. In the case of men, regular 
 shaving is not only a universal custom, it is a religious duty. 
 But for women to be deprived of any portion of their hair is 
 a shame. A shorn female head is throughout India the chief 
 mark of widowhood. The general rule is that every widow 
 should submit her growing locks periodically to the family 
 barber, though child-widows among the Marathas are exempt. 
 I believe also that in Northern India widows are not obliged 
 to shave. It is certain that the Ten-galai widows are exempted 
 from all obligation to dishonour their heads in this manner ^ 
 (compare i Cor. xi. 5). 
 
 Again, a peculiarity common to both Ramanuja sects is 
 the strict privacy with which they eat and even prepare their 
 
 ^ The Ten-galais quote a verse of Vriddha-Manu, which declares that 
 if any woman, whether unmarried or widowed, shave her head, she will 
 be condemned to dwell in the hell called Raurava for one thousand times 
 ten million ages. 
 
128 Vaishnavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 
 
 meals. No Indians like to be looked at while eating. They 
 are firm believers in the evil influence of the human eye 
 (drishti-dosha). 
 
 Cooking is an affair of equal secrecy. We Europeans can- 
 not understand the extent to which culinary operations may 
 be associated with religion. The kitchen in every Indian 
 household is a kind of sanctuary or holy ground — almost 
 as hallowed as the room dedicated to the, family gods. No 
 unprivileged person must dare to intrude within this sacred 
 enclosure. The mere glance of a man of inferior caste makes 
 the greatest delicacies uneatable, and if such a glance hap- 
 pens to fall on the family supplies during the cooking opera- 
 tions, when the ceremonial purity of the water used^ is a 
 matter of almost life and death to every member of the 
 household, the whole repast has to be thrown away as if 
 poisoned. The family is for that day dinnerless. Food 
 thus contaminated would, if eaten, communicate a taint to 
 the souls as well as bodies of the eaters — a taint which 
 could only be removed by long and painful expiation. In 
 travelling over every part of India, and diligently striving 
 to note the habits of the natives in every circumstance of 
 their daily life, I never once saw a single Hindii, except of 
 the lowest caste, either preparing or eating cooked food of 
 any kind. The Ramanujas carry these ideas to an extra- 
 vagant extreme. They carefully lock the doors of their 
 kitchens and protect their culinary and prandial operations 
 from the gaze of even high-caste Brahmans of tribes and 
 sects different from their own. 
 
 / Each of the present chiefs (acaryas) of the two Rama- 
 nuja sects lays claim to be the true descendant of the 
 founder himself in regular, unbroken succession. The Vada- 
 
 ' Caste-rules are an essential part of the Hindu religion. It is the fashion 
 for enlightened men who still keep up caste to excuse themselves on the plea 
 that many of the rules originated in social convenience, or the need of 
 sanitary precautions. Nothing is so necessary for the preservation of 
 health in India as attention to the purity of water. 
 
Vaishnavism. The Ramanuja Sect. 129 
 
 galai successor (named Ahobala) lives at a monastery (Matha) 
 in the Kurnool district. The Ten-galai successor (named 
 Vanamamala) lives in the Tinnevelly district. Though they 
 preside over monasteries, they are both married ; whereas 
 the successors of the orthodox Brahman Sankara (who live 
 at Sringeri in Mysore) are celibates. The two Ramanuja 
 Adaryas, however, are strict Ayengar Brahmans, and will 
 probably in their old age become Sannyasis, according to th^' 
 teaching of the ancient lawgiver Manu, who ordained that the 
 discharge of household duties is incompatible with the attain- 
 ment of greater nearness to the Supreme Being, and that 
 therefore every twice-born man as he advances in life is bound 
 to give up all family ties (p. 362, Manu VI. i). 
 
 Each Adarya makes a periodical visitation of his diocese, 
 and holds a kind of confirmation in every large town. That 
 is to say, every child or young person who has been initiated ^ 
 is brought before him to be branded or stamped as a true 
 follower of Vishnu. Boys may be branded at the age of 
 seven or upwards ; girls only after their marriage. A sacred 
 fire is kindled, two golden instruments are heated, and the 
 symbols of the wheel-shaped discus and conch-shell of Vishnu 
 are impressed on the breast, arms, or other parts of the 
 body. I was informed by an intelligent Brahman at Ma- 
 dura that the Adarya, or chief of the sect from the Aho- 
 bala Matha, visits that town once every eight or ten years, 
 when as many young persons as possible take the oppor- 
 tunity of being branded. Even those who have been in- 
 vested with the Brahmanical thread require the addition of 
 the Vaishnava brand. The Adarya is put to no expense. 
 He is the guest of some well-to-do Brahman in the town, 
 and reaps a rich harvest of fees. 
 
 We pass on to the second great Vaishnava sect— that 
 founded by Madhva— whose adherents are called Madhvas. 
 They are chiefly found in Southern India. 
 
 K 
 
■0 
 
 o Vaishnavism. Madhva Sect. 
 
 Sect founded by Madhva. 
 The next most important of the Vaishnava sects is that of 
 the Madhvas. They were founded by a Kanarese Brahman 
 named Madhva— otherwise called Ananda-tirtha— said to 
 have been born about the year laoo of our era, at a sacred 
 place called Udipi, in South Kanara (sixty miles north of 
 Mangalore), and to have been educated in a convent at 
 Anantesvar. His doctrine is commonly called Duality 
 (Dvaita), and is well known for the intensity of its opposition 
 to the Non-duality (Advaita) doctrine of the great Vedantist 
 Saiikaracarya. The school he founded is sometimes called 
 Purna-prajna — a name also applied to its founder. 
 
 In fact the teaching of Madhva is by some thought to owe 
 no little of its distinctive character to the influence of Chris- 
 tianity, which had made itself felt in the South of India before 
 the thirteenth century. No evidence whatever is forthcoming 
 on this subject. Nor has his system really much common 
 ground with Christianity. Nor would it be easy to give a 
 thoroughly exhaustive account of his doctrines ^. Still their 
 general drift may be correctly gathered from the Sarva-dar- 
 sana-sangraha, though the points in which he differs from 
 Ramanuja are rather obscurely stated in that work. 
 
 Of course Madhva, like Ramanuja, taught that there was 
 only one God, whose principal name was Vishnu (or Hari), 
 and who was the one eternal Supreme Being, all other gods 
 being subject to the law of universal periodical dissolution. 
 
 ' Brahma, Siva, and the greatest of the gods decay with the 
 decay of their bodies ; greater than these is the undecaying 
 Hari.' (Professor Gough's translation.) 
 
 Perhaps the chief distinctive feature of Madhva's teaching 
 was that his first axiom asserted categorically that there 
 
 ' I repeatedly questioned some of Madhva's more intelligent followers 
 whom I met in the South of India as to the exact distinction between 
 his views and those of Ramanuja, but no one was able to give me any very 
 satisfactory reply. 
 
Vaisknavism. Madhva Sect. 131 
 
 are two separate eternal principles (instead of three, as 
 asserted by Ramanuja, p. 119), and that these two are related 
 as independent and dependent, as master and servant, as king 
 and subject. The one is the independent principle, God 
 (identified with Vishnu), the other is the dependent principle \ 
 consisting of the human spirit, or rather spirits ; for these are 
 innumerable as in the Nyaya and Saiikhya. 
 
 It was Madhva's unqualified denial of the unity of the 
 Supreme and human spirits which made him the opponent \ 
 of the followers of Sahkara. 
 
 The Vedantists maintained, as we have seen, that the dif- 
 ference between one thing and another and between one spirit 
 and another was wholly illusory and unreal. Madhva affirmed 
 that a real and inextinguishable duality was to be proved both 
 by perception and by inference ^. 
 
 'The Supreme Lord,' said Madhva, 'differs from the in- 
 dividual spirit because the Lord is the object of its obedience. 
 A subject who obeys a king differs from that king. In their 
 eager desire to be one with the Supreme Being, the followers 
 of Sankara lay claim to the glory of his excellence. This is a. 
 mere mirage. A man with his tongue cut off might as well 
 •attempt to enjoy a large plantain.' 
 
 Again, according to Madhva the Vedic text, ' This is Self — 
 That art thou,' points to similarity, not identity. 
 
 ' Like a bird and the string ; like the juices of various trees ; 
 like rivers and the sea ; like fresh and salt water ; like a 
 robber and the robbed ; like a man and his energy ; so are 
 the human spirit and the Lord diverse and for ever different.' 
 
 Nor have these two principles a qualified unity comparable \ 
 to the union of spirit and body, as affirmed by Ramanuja. 
 They are absolutely distinct. With regard to the visible 
 world, he taught that its elements existed eternally in the 
 Supreme Being, and were only created by Him in the sense 
 of being shaped, ordered, and arranged by His power and will. 
 ^ See pp. 88, 90 of Cowell and Cough's ' Sarva-darsana-saiigraha.' 
 
 K a 
 
T32 Vaishnavism. Madhva Sect. 
 
 Practically he seems to have asserted three principles quite as 
 plainly as Ramanuja did ; for his doctrine was that, when once 
 the world had emanated from the Supreme essence, it remained 
 a distinct entity to all eternity. ' There is a difference,' he 
 affirmed, ' between human souls and God, and a difference be- 
 tween insentient matter (jada) and God.' Probably, like 
 Bishop Berkeley, he saw the difficulty of proving the existence 
 of matter externally to the mind, and therefore contented 
 himself with asserting two distinct principles, the Supreme 
 and the human spirit. In short, his dogma was that as the 
 visible world emanated from God it was not distinguishable, 
 as an original principle, from God, and was not even as distinct 
 as the human spirit and body, though, when once produced, it 
 was as distinct from its Producer as an effect from its cause ^. 
 
 According to Madhva the Supreme Being is to be honoured 
 in three ways — by naming, by worship, and by branding. 
 
 The act of naming (nama-karana) is performed by giving a 
 child one of the thousand names of Vishnu — such as Kesava — 
 as a memorial of his dedication to the service of the god. 
 
 The act of worship is threefold : — (i) with the voice— by 
 veracity, right conversation, kind words, and repetition of the 
 Veda ; (a) with the body — by giving alms to the poor, by 
 defending and protecting them ; (3) with the heart— by mercy, 
 love, and faith. This is a mere repetition of the old triple 
 division of duties, according to thought, word, and deed. 
 
 With regard to the rite of branding (called ankana), the Ma- 
 ^ dhva sect, like the Ramanujas and other Vaishnavas, lay great 
 stress on marking the body indelibly with the circular discus 
 and shell of Vishnu. They firmly believe that it is the duty of 
 Vaishnavas to carry throughout life a memorial of their god on 
 their persons, and that such a lasting outward and visible sign 
 of his presence helps them to obtain salvation through him. 
 
 ' This was very much the doctrine of the Kabbalists, who equally 
 held that nothing could be produced from nothing. It resembles also the 
 theory of the Stoics. 
 
Vaishnavism. Madkva Sect. 133 
 
 ' On his right arm let the Brahman wear the discus, on his 
 left the conch-shell ! ' 
 
 When I was at Tanjore I found that one of the successors 
 of Madhva had recently arrived on his branding-visitation. 
 He was engaged throughout the entire day in stamping his 
 disciples and receiving fees from all according to their means. 
 
 Texts are recited at the time of branding, and in Sayana- 
 Madhava's time the following prayer was said : — ' O Discus 
 (Sudarsana), brightly blazing, effulgent as ten million suns, 
 show unto me, blind with ignorance, the everlasting way of 
 Vishnu. Thou, O Conch-shell, aforetime sprangest from the 
 sea, held in the hand of Vishnu, adored by all the gods, 
 to thee be adoration.' (Sarva-darsana-saiigraha, Cowell and 
 Gough, p. 92.) 
 
 I learnt, too, that no less than eight Adaryas, established in 
 eight different monasteries (Maths) with temples attached, 
 claim to be successors of Madhva. There are also two . 
 principal religious parties among the Madhvas, who, no 
 doubt, quarrel over their Shibboleths like the two divisions 
 of Ramanujas. At Udipi itself (p. 130), there are eight 
 Maths, and the place is much frequented by pilgrims from 
 Mysore. 
 
 The frontal mark of all the Madhvas is the same, consisting 
 of two thin vertical lines meeting below in a curve, like that of 
 the Vada-galai Ramanujas. But a central black line is gener- 
 ally made with charcoal taken from incense burnt before the 
 idols of Vishnu. 
 
 So much for the doctrines of two sects which have some 
 common ground with Christianity and are therefore worthy of 
 especial attention. Perhaps Madhva's system is the more 
 interesting in its relation to European thought, but his Theism, 
 like that of Ramanuja and of every other Hindu Theistic 
 system, differed widely in many important points from the 
 Theism of Christianity, especially in making God the sub- >^ 
 stantial as well as efficient cause of the visible world. 
 
134 Vaishnavism. Vallabha Sect. 
 
 Sect founded by Vallabha. 
 
 The third great Vaishnava sect is that founded by Vallabha, 
 or, as he is called by his followers, Vallabhadarya (Maha-prabhu), 
 said to have been born in the forest of (^amparanya about 
 '^ A.D. 1479. He was beheved to have been an embodiment 
 of a portion of Krishna's essence, and various stories are 
 fabled about him. For instance, his intelligence is alleged 
 to have been so great that when he began learning at seven 
 years of age, he mastered the four Vedas, the six systems of 
 Philosophy, and the eighteen Puranas in four months. 
 
 After precocity so prodigious he was able at the age of 
 twelve to formulate a new view of the Vaishnava creed, but 
 one which was to a great extent derived from a previous 
 teacher named Vishnu-svaml. Soon he commenced travelling 
 to propagate his doctrines. When he reached the court of 
 Krishna-deva, King of Vijaya-nagar, he was invited to engage 
 in a disputation with a number of Smarta Brahmans. In this 
 he succeeded so well that he was elected chief Acarya of the 
 Vaishnavas. He then travelled for nine years through different 
 parts of India, and finally settled in Benares, where he is said 
 to have composed seventeen works, among which was a 
 commentary on the Bhagavata-purana. This last, especially 
 its tenth book — descriptive of the early life of Krishna — is 
 the authoritative source of the doctrines of the sect. Val- 
 labhacarya's view of the Vaishnava creed has been called 
 Pushti-marga, the way of eating, drinking, and enjoying one- 
 self But in real fact he simply dissented from the doctrine 
 \ that asceticism was a mode of commending man to God. 
 He maintained that worship of the Deity ought not to be 
 accompanied with fasting and self-mortification, because every 
 individual soul was a portion of the Supreme Soul, and 
 every man ought therefore to reverence, and even foster, 
 his own body which contained it. 
 
 He held, in short, that individual human spirits were like 
 
Vaishnavism. Vallabha Sect. 135 
 
 sparks from the Supreme Spirit, and, though separate, identical 
 in essence with it. His doctrine is called pure non-duality 
 (Suddhadvaita), to distinguish it from the qualified non- 
 duality (Visishtadvaita) of Ramanuja ; but, when closely ex- 
 amined, it seems to be a nominal distinction without much 
 real difference. He is known to have died at Benares ; but, 
 according to his disciples, was transported to heaven while 
 performing his ablutions in the Ganges. 
 
 His followers are numerous in Bombay, Gujarat, and Central 
 India, particularly among the merchants and traders called 
 Baniyas and Bhatiyas. He left behind him eighty-four princi-/ 
 pal disciples, who disseminated his doctrines in various direc- 
 tions. But the real successor to his GadT (gaddi) or chair was 
 his second son, Vitthal-nath, sometimes called Gosainji from 
 his having settled at Gokul, Krishna's abode near Muttra. 
 This Vitthal-nath had seven sons, each of whom established 
 a GadI in different districts, especially in Bombay, Kutch, 
 Kathiawar, and Malwa. The influence of Vallabhadarya's 
 successors became so great that they received the title Maha- 
 raja, ' great king,' the name Gosain (for Go-svamin — lord of 
 cows— an epithet of Krishna) being sometimes added. 
 
 As was naturally to be expected, his followers exaggerated 
 his teaching, especially in regard to his non-ascetical view of 
 religion. They have been called ' the Epicureans of India.' 
 Their spiritual leaders, the Maharajas, dress in the costliest 
 raiment, feed on the daintiest viands, and abandon themselves 
 to every form of sensuality and luxury. 
 
 The children of the Vallabha(iaryans are admitted to mem- 
 bership at the age of three or four years, or, in some parts 
 of India, later. A rosary, or necklace (kanthi) of one hundred 
 and eight beads ^ made of tulsi wood, is passed round their 
 necks by the Maharaja, and they are taught the use of the 
 
 ■y 
 
 1 These help in the recitation of the chief names of Krishna as the 
 Supreme Being (see p. 105), or of similar epithets applied to the successors 
 of Vallabha ; but see note to p. 1 17. 
 
1/^ 
 
 136 Vaishnavism. Vallabha Sect. 
 
 eight-syllabled prayer, 'The adorable Krishna is my soul's 
 refuge ' (Sri-Krishnah saranam mama). 
 
 . The god worshipped is the Krishna form of Vishnu, as he 
 appeared in his boyhood, when, as a mere child, he gave him- 
 self up to childish mirth, and condescended to sport with the 
 Gopis or cowherdesses of Mathura (Muttra). 
 
 I was once present at a kind of revivalist camp-meeting 
 near Allahabad, where a celebrated Hindu preacher ad- 
 dressed a large assembly of people and magnified this 
 condescension as a proof of Krishna's superiority to all other 
 gods. 
 
 Then, again, images used in the temples of the sect represent 
 Kj-ishna in the boyish period of his life (in the form called 
 Bala- Krishna), supposed to extend to his twelfth year. Ac- 
 cording to the higher Vaishnava creed, Krishna's love for 
 the GopTs — themselves the wives of the cowherds — and the 
 love of the Gopis for Krishna are to be explained allego- 
 rically, and symbolize the longing of the human soul for union 
 with the Supreme (Brahma-sambandha). When I have asked 
 strict Vaishnavas for an explanation of Krishna's alleged 
 adulteries, I have always been told that his attachment to the 
 Gopis was purely spiritual, and that, in fact, he was only a 
 child at the time of his association with them. 
 
 Yet it is certain that the followers of Vallabha interpreted 
 that attachment in a gross and material sense. Hence their 
 devotion to Krishna has degenerated into the most corrupt 
 practices, and their whole system has become rotten to the 
 core. It is even said that the male members of the sect 
 sometimes seek to win the favour of their god by wearing 
 long hair and assimilating themselves to females ; and even 
 their spiritual chiefs, the Maharajas, the successors of Valla- 
 bhacarya, sometimes simulate the appearance of women (that 
 is, of Gopis) when they lead the worship of their followers. 
 
 But the real blot, or rather foul stain, which defaces and 
 defiles the system, remains to be described. These Maharajas 
 
, Vaishitavism. Vallabha Sect. i^y 
 
 have come to be regarded as representatives of Krishna upon 
 earth, or even as actual incarnations or impersonations of the 
 god. So that in the temples where the Maharajas do homage 
 to the idols, men and women do homage to the Maharajas, 
 prostrating themselves at their feet, offering them incense, 
 fruits and flowers, and waving lights before them, as the 
 Maharajas themselves do before the images of the gods. 
 One mode of worshipping the boyish Krishna is by swinging 
 his images in swings. Hence, in every district presided over 
 by a Maharaja, the women are accustomed to worship not 
 Krishna but the Maharaja by swinging him in pendent seats. 
 The Pan-supari ejected from his mouth, the leavings of his 
 food, and the very dust on which he has walked, are eagerly 
 devoured by his devotees, while they also drink the water / 
 rinsed from his garments, and that used in the washing of his 
 feet, which they call Caranamrita, 'feet nectar.' Others, 
 again, worship his wooden shoes, or prostrate themselves 
 before his seat (gadi) and his painted portraits. Nay, infinitely 
 worse than all this : it is believed that the best mode of 
 propitiating the god Krishna in heaven is by ministering to 
 the sensual appetites of his successors and vicars upon earth. 
 Body, soul, and property (in popular language tan, man, dhan) 
 are to be wholly made over to them in a peculiar rite called // 
 Self-devotion (samarpana, see p. 117), and women are taught 
 to believe that highest bliss will be secured to themselves and 
 their families by the caresses of Krishna's representatives. 
 
 The profligacy of the Maharajas was exposed in the cele- \ 
 brated trial of the Maharaja libel case, which came before 
 the Supreme Court of Bombay on the 26th of January, 1862. 
 The evidence given, and the judgment of the judges, have 
 acted as some check on the licentious practices of the sect, 
 but it is still held to represent the worst and most corrupt 
 phase of the Vaishnava religion. 
 
 The reformation of the Vallabhadarya system effected by 
 Svami-Narayana will be afterwards described (see p. 148). 
 
138 Vaishnavism. Caitanya Sect. 
 
 Sect founded by Caitanya. 
 
 The fourth principal sect of Vaishnavas is found in Bengal. 
 They are the followers of a celebrated teacher named Caitanya, 
 and their precepts and practices have a close community with 
 "^Ihose of the Vallabhadaryans already described. The bio- 
 graphy of (Jaitanya, as given by native writers, is, as usual, 
 chiefly legendary. Only scattered elements of truth are 
 discoverable amidst a confused farrago of facts, fiction, and 
 romance. What respect, indeed, for chronological or historical 
 accuracy can be expected in a people who are firmly con- 
 vinced that their own existence and that of every one else 
 is an illusion? 
 
 I believe it is pretty certain that Caitanya was born at 
 t/' Nadlya ( = NavadvIpa) in Bengal in the year 1485 of our 
 era, two years after Luther in Europe. His father was an 
 orthodox Brahman named Jagan-nath Misra. His mother 
 was the daughter of Nilambar Cakravarti. Since Caitanya 
 is held to have been an incarnation of Krishna, various pro- 
 digies are described as having marked his first appearance 
 in the world. He was thirteen months in the womb. Then 
 soon after his birth, at the end of an eclipse, a number of 
 holy men (among whom was his future disciple Advaita) 
 arrived at the house of his parents to do homage to the 
 new-born child, and to present him with offerings of rice, 
 fruits, gold and silver. In his childhood he resembled the 
 young Krishna in condescending to boyish sports (lila). Yet 
 his intellect was so acute that he rapidly acquired a complete 
 knowledge of Sanskrit grammar and literature. His favourite 
 subject of study was the Vaishnava bible, consisting of the 
 Bhagavata-purana, and Bhagavad-glta. 
 
 Yet Caitanya, notwithstanding his devotion to religious 
 study, did not shrink from what every Hindu believes to 
 be a sacred obligation — the duty of marrying a wife, and 
 becoming a householder (grihastha). He even married again 
 
Vaishnavism. Caitanya Sect. 139 
 
 when his first wife died from a snake-bite, At the age of 
 twenty-five (a. d. 1509) he resolved to abandon all worldly 
 connexions, and gave himself up to a religious life. Accord- 
 ingly, like Vallabha6arya and at about the same period, he 
 commenced a series of pilgrimages. His travels occupied 
 six years, and he is known to have visited some of the most 
 celebrated shrines of India, especially those of Benares, Gaya, 
 -Mathura, Srirahgam, and ultimately the temple of Jagan-nath 
 at Purl in Orissa. 
 
 Having thus prepared himself for his mission, he addressed 
 himself to the real work of preaching and propagating his 
 own view of the Vaishnava creed. It is noteworthy that just 
 about the time that Luther was agitating the minds of men 
 in Europe, Caitanya was stirring the hearts of the people of 
 Bengal. After making many converts he seems to have 
 appointed his two most eminent followers, Advaita and 
 Nityananda, to preside over his disciples in that part of 
 India. He himself settled for twelve years at Katak in 
 Orissa. There he lived for the rest of his life in close 
 proximity to the great temple of Jagan-nath, and contributed 
 to the reputation of the shrine by his presence at the annual 
 festivals. 
 
 His success as a preacher was remarkable. Even his 
 enemies were attracted by the persuasiveness of his manner 
 and the magnetic power of his eloquence. The lower classes 
 flocked to him by thousands. Nor was their admiration of 
 him surprising. The first principle he inculcated was that all 
 the faithful worshippers of Krishna (= Vishnu) were to be 
 treated as equals. Caste was to be subordinated to faith in 
 Krishna ^- ' The mercy of God,' said Caitanya, ' regards 
 neither tribe nor family.' 
 
 ^ This was his theory, but among his numerous followers of the present 
 day the doctrine of equahty does not overcome caste-feeling and caste- 
 observances except during religious services. The food presented to the / j 
 idol of Jagan-nath is distributed to all castes alike, and eaten by all indis- 
 criminately at the annual festival. 
 
140 Vaishnavism. Caitanya Sect. 
 
 By thus proclaiming social equality he secured popularity. 
 ; In this respect he wisely imitated the method of Buddhists and 
 Saktas. The doctrine of the latter, who abounded everywhere 
 in Bengal, was that magical powers might be acquired by the 
 worship of the female principle or generative energy (sakti) 
 in nature, personified as Siva's wife. They believed that the 
 male principle, personified as the male god Siva, the great 
 Reproducer, was helpless in the work of Reproduction with- 
 out the energizing action of the female principle. Hence the 
 union of the sexes was thought by some to be typical of a 
 great cosmical mystery. This will be more fully explained 
 in the chapter on Saktism (p. 180). 
 
 Caitanya professed to oppose these Sakta doctrines, both as 
 tending to licentious practices, and as ignoring the supremacy 
 of the god Vishnu over Siva. Yet his system, like that of 
 Vallabha, had a tendency in the same direction. He taught 
 that the devotion of the human soul to Vishnu was to be 
 symbolized Under the figure of human love. '"Thou art 
 dear to my heart, thou art part of my soul," said a young 
 man to his loved one ; " I love thee, but why, I know not." 
 So ought the worshipper to love Krishna, and worship hiiji 
 for his sake only. Let him offer all to God, and expect no 
 remuneration. He who asks for a return acts like a trader.' 
 Such are the words of a modern exponent of this Vaishnava 
 system'. 
 
 I have already pointed out that the idea of devotion (bhakti) 
 as a means of salvation, which was formally taught by the 
 authors of the Bhagavad-glta, Bhagavata-purana and Sandilya- 
 sutra, was scarcely known in early times. The leading doc- 
 trine of the Vedic hymns and Brahmanas is that works 
 '' (karma), especially as represented . by the performance of 
 sacrifices (yajna), constitute the shortest pathway to beati- 
 tude, while the Upanishads insist mainly on abstract medita- 
 tion and divine knowledge (jnana) as the true method. 
 ,. Caitanya affirmed that intense devotion— displayed by com- 
 
Vaishnavism. Caitanya Sect. 141 
 
 plete union of the spirit with Krishna — was the only real 
 salvation. Devotion, in fact, superseded all other duties. 
 ' Whatever is accomplished by works, by penance, by divine 
 knowledge, by suppression of the passions, by abstract me- 
 ditation, by charity, by virtue, by other excellences,— all this 
 is effected by devotion to me. Paradise, Heaven, beatitude, 
 union with the Supreme Spirit, — every wish of the heart is 
 obtainable by devotion to me.' Such are Krishna's own words, 
 according to the belief of Caitanya and other Vaishnava 
 teachers. (Bhagavata-purana XI.) 
 
 But the devotional feelings of Krishna's votaries are sup- 
 posed to be susceptible of five phases, or rather, perhaps, 
 to be exhibited in five different ways, which are thus enu- 
 merated : — I. Calm contemplation of the godhead (santi) ; 
 3. Active servitude (dasya) ; 3. A feeling of personal friend- 
 ship (sakhya) ; 4. A feeling of filial attachment like that of 
 a child for its parent (vatsalya) ; 5. A feeling of tender affec- 
 tion like that of a girl for her lover (madhurya). 
 
 The last of these is held to be the highest feeling. Indeed, ' 
 Caitanya taught that the great aim of every worshipper of 
 Krishna ought to be to lose all individuality and self-conscious- 
 ness in ecstatic union with his god ; and it is on this account 
 that he is. believed to have held the dualistic non-duality 
 doctrine (dvaitadvaita of Nimbaditya, see p. 147). To bring 
 about a condition of intense religious fervour various practices 
 were enjoined — for example, incessant repetition of the deity's 
 name (nama-kirtana), singing (sankirtana), music, dancing, or 
 movements of the body allied to dancing, such as were also 
 practised by certain Saiva devotees ^. Caitanya was himself 
 
 ^ These correspond to the Zikr and religious dancing of the Muham- 
 madan dervishes. For even cold Islam has its devotees who aim at 
 religious ecstasy, resorting to expedients very similar to those of the 
 daitanyas. I have been twice present at the weekly services of the 
 Cairo dervishes. One sect repeat the name of God with violent ejacu- 
 lations and contortions of the body, while another fraternity whirl 
 themselves round till they swoon away in the intensity of their fervour. 
 
142 Vaishnavism. Caitanya Sect. 
 
 in the constant habit of swooning away in paroxysms of ecstatic 
 emotion, which at last affected his reason. His biographers 
 assert that in one of these fits he was translated directly to 
 Vishnu's heaven (Vaikuntha). According to some accounts 
 he ended his life by walking into the sea near Purl in Orissa, 
 fancying he saw a beatific vision of Krishna sporting on the 
 waves with his favourite Gopis. Certain it is that he disap- 
 peared mysteriously about A.D. 1527, at the age of forty- two. 
 
 Then happened what has constantly taken place in the 
 religious history of India. Men of high aspirations, who have 
 laboured for the revival or reformation of religion, and re- 
 ceived homage as inspired teachers from crowds of disciples 
 during life, have been worshipped as actual deities at death. 
 The only question in the minds of Caitanya's devoted fol- 
 lowers was as to whether he was a full manifestation of the 
 Supreme Being (Krishna) or only a descent of a portion (ansa) 
 of his essence. The difficulty seems to have been settled by 
 deciding that Caitanya was none other than very Krishna 
 ' incarnate, and that his two principal disciples, Advaita and 
 Nityananda, were manifestations of portions of the same 
 deity. These three leaders of the sect are therefore called 
 the three great lords (Prabhus). They constitute the sacred 
 triad of this phase of Vaishnavism. 
 
 But a fourth leader, named Hari-das, who during his life- 
 time was a companion of Caitanya, is worshipped as a sepa- 
 rate divinity in Bengal. Indeed, all the living successors and 
 "^the present leaders of the sect, called Gosains( = Gosvamins), 
 are venerated as little less than deities by the Vaishnavas of 
 ' this school. For the worship of living religious leaders and 
 teachers (usually called by the general name Guru) is a 
 marked feature of this, as of all forms of Vaishnavism. The 
 Guru with Vaishnavas is indeed more than a teacher, and even 
 more than a mediator between God and men. He is the 
 present god — the visible living incarnation of the deity. His 
 anger and favour make themselves instantly felt. He' is on 
 
Vaishnavism. Caitanya Sect. 143 
 
 that account even more feared and honoured than the very- 
 god of whom he is the representative and embodiment. 
 
 Another feature of the system is the extraordinary value 
 attached to the repetition of Krishna's names, especially of his 
 name Hari. The mere mechanical process of constantly 
 repeating this name Hari — though the mind be vacant or 
 fixed on some other object — secures admission to Vishnu's 
 heaven. Religious ceremonies are comparatively useless. 
 This idea, however, prevails among all Vaishnavas. Hari-das 
 is said to have retired to a secluded place for the purpose of 
 repeating the word Hari 300,000 times daily. 
 
 Even a blasphemous repetition of Krishna's name may secure 
 beatitude. In the Maratha country there is a form of devotion 
 called Virodha-bhakti, which consists in a man's pretending to 
 oppose the deity with the sole object of achieving the bliss of 
 being killed by him, and so transported to the god's heaven. 
 So it is said that Sisu-pala was saved by constantly thinking of 
 Krishna through enmity ; and the cowherdesses by thinking of 
 him through lust (kamat). 
 
 It is related of a certain wicked godless man that he had 
 a son named Narayana (one of the principal names of 
 Vishnu). On his death-bed, and just before breathing his 
 last, the father called out his son's name without the most 
 remote intention of invoking the god. The effect was that 
 Yama's messengers, who stood ready to convey the repro- 
 bate's soul to a place of punishment, were obliged to make 
 way for the emissaries of Vishnu, who carried the spirit off in 
 triumph to the god's paradise. 
 
 The repetition of particular Vedic texts is by some regarded 
 as equally efficacious. A story is told of a certain converted 
 Hindu who took occasion to recount his experiences before 
 becoming a Christian. It appears that he had been troubled 
 with a constant longing for a vision of Vishnu, and in his 
 distress consulted a Brahman, who informed him that to 
 obtain the desired vision he would have to repeat a particular 
 
144 Vaishnavism at Dakar and Poona. 
 
 text (Mantra) 800,000 times. This he accomplished by difit 
 of hard work night and day in three months, and, on com- 
 plaining to his friend the Brahman that no result followed, 
 was told that he must have made some slight verbal mistake 
 in the repetition of some one text, and that any such slip 
 necessitated his going through the whole process again. 
 
 Many treatises held in high repute have been written 
 by the disciples of (faitanya in support of his tenets (e.g. the 
 daitanya-daritamrita by Krishna-das in 1590). 
 
 The ceremonial acts practised in worshipping the image of 
 Krishna (described at pp. 90-94) have many points of resem- 
 blance to those of Siva, but I had few opportunities of 
 witnessing them. 
 
 I visited the temple of Dakor in Gujarat, where there is a 
 noted idol of Krishna (or Ran-chor, see p. 152) brought from 
 Dvarika (p. 1x3). I was made to take off my shoes before 
 ascending the steps of the temple, but was not permitted to 
 see the image closely or to note the process of worshipping it. 
 
 On one occasion, however, I was allowed to look through an 
 accidental crevice into the shrine of a Vaishnava temple at 
 Poona while the early morning service (puja) was performed. 
 The idol of the god Krishna first underwent a process of being 
 roused from its supposed nocturnal slumbers by the attendant 
 priest, who invoked the deity by name. Then a respectful 
 offering of water in a boat-shaped vessel was made to it. 
 Next the whole idol was bathed and holy water poured over 
 it from a small perforated metal lota. Then the attendant 
 priest standing near applied sandal-paste (candana) with his 
 finger to the idol's forehead and limbs, and, taking a brush, 
 painted the face with a bright colouring substance, probably 
 saffron. Next, the idol was dressed and decorated with costly 
 clothes and ornaments. Then the priest burnt camphor and 
 incense and waved lights before the image, at the same time 
 ringing a small bell (ghanta). Then flowers (pushpa) and the 
 leaves of the sacred tulsl plant were offered, followed by an 
 
Vaishnavism. Idol-worship. 14c 
 
 oblation of food (naivedya), consisting of cooked rice with 
 sugar. Next water was taken out of a snjall metal vessel 
 with a spoon and was presented for sipping (adamana). The 
 god was of course supposed to consume the food or feast on 
 its aroma, receiving at the end of the meal an offering of betel 
 for the supposed cleansing of the mouth after eating, and 
 a spoonful more water for a second sipping. Finally the 
 priest prostrated himself before the idol, and terminated the 
 whole ceremony by putting the god to sleep for the day. 
 
 While he was going through these ceremonial acts, he 
 appeared to be muttering texts, and I observed that during 
 the whole service a Brahman was seated on the ground not 
 far off, who intoned portions of the tenth book of the Bhaga- 
 vata-purana, descriptive of the life of Krishna, from a copy of 
 the work placed before him. At the same time a band over 
 the entrance to the temple played a loud accompaniment with 
 tom-toms, fifes, and drums. 
 
 In the evening the process of waking, undressing, redressing 
 the image, and putting it to sleep was repeated, but without 
 bathing. Flowers and food were again offered, texts intoned, 
 and musical services performed. 
 
 The cooked food offered to the idol is ultimately eaten by 
 the priests. In large temples it is also distributed to the 
 worshippers, who receive it eagerly as divine nutriment, called 
 '^rasada (p. 69), and at some places (for example at a parti- 
 cular temple in Benares) considerable portions are sold at high 
 prices to outside applicants. 
 
 The water in which the idol is washed is called tirtha (or 
 sometimes caranamrita), and is drunk as holy water. 
 
 Sometimes the mode of worship by Pradakshiha (or Pradak- 
 shina) — that is, circumambulation, with the right side kept 
 towards the object (following the course of the sun) — is per- 
 formed. The same sort of circumambulation — but often on the 
 knees — is performed round the holy house at Loretto in Italy. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Minor Vaishnava Sects. Reforming 
 Theistic Movements. 
 
 We cannot quit the subject of Vaishnavism without giving 
 some account of its more important minor sects, as well as 
 of certain reforming theistic movements which may be said 
 to have grown out of it. We may begin with the 
 
 Sect founded by Nimbarka or Nimbaditya. 
 
 This is perhaps one of the oldest of the known minor sects. 
 Its founder Nimbarka or Nimbaditya, whose followers are 
 sometimes called Nlmanandls, sometimes Nimavats, is held 
 to have been identical with the astronomer Bhaskaracarya, 
 who flourished about the twelfth century. The poet Jaya- 
 deva, who is also supposed to have lived in the tA^elfth cen- 
 tury, may have been his disciple. If sO, it is certain that the 
 disciple did more than his master to promote the doctrine of 
 devotion to Krishna- In Jaya-deva's mystical poem, called 
 the Gita-govinda (compared by some to our Song of Solo- 
 mon), are described the loves b£ Krishna and the Gopis (wives 
 and daughters of the Cowherds), and especially of Krishna 
 and Radha, as typical of the longing of the human spirit or 
 soul for union with the divine. 
 
 Others again believe Nimbarka to have been an actual 
 incarnation of the Sun-god, and maintain that he derived his 
 name of ' Nimb-tree-Sun ' from having one day stopped the 
 course of the sun's disk, dislodged it from the heavens, and 
 confined it for a brief season in a Nimb (Nim) tree. This re- 
 markable miracle was worked to enable Nimbarka to offer 
 
Minor Vaishnava Sects. Ramananda. 147 
 
 food just before sunset to a holy guest whose religious vows 
 prevented his eating after dark. 
 
 Nimbarka propounded a philosophical theory which, like 
 that of Ramanuja, amounted to a compromise between dualism ^ 
 and non-dualism, and was called dualistic non-dualism (Dvait- 
 advaita). He held that every man's spirit was capable of 
 being absorbed into God's Spirit, and that such an end was 
 to be aimed at. His followers, who are not very numerous, 
 are devoted to the worship of the goddess Radha in con- 
 junction with Krishna. 
 
 Sect founded by Ramananda. 
 
 Ramananda is said to have been born in the thirteenth 
 century. The sect founded by him in the fourteenth cen- 
 tury has many adherents in Gangetic India, especially around 
 Agra. They are often called Ramanandis or Ramavats, 
 and are sometimes confounded with the Raminujas, the fact 
 being that Ramananda was probably one of Ramanuja's 
 disciples. The Ramananda Vaishnavas, however, have dis- 
 tinctive doctrines of their own. They worship Vishnu under 
 the form of Rama (the hero of the Ramayana) either singly 
 or conjointly with his wife Sita, and they are not, like the 
 Ramanujas, hyper-scrupulous about the privacy of their meals. , 
 Their favourite book is the Bhakta-mala of Nabhaji— a work 
 interesting for its biographies of certain Vaishnavas and ad- 
 herents of the sect, among whom are included two well- 
 known poets, Sur-das and Tulasi-das (commonly Tulsl-das). 
 The former was blind. He wrote a great many stanzas in 
 praise of Vishnu, and is regarded as a kind of patron of blind 
 men, especially if they roam about as wandering musicians. 
 
 Tulsi-das, whose verses are to this day household words in 
 every town and rural district where the Hindi language is 
 spoken, ranks as a poet of higher order. He was born near 
 (^itra-kuta about A.D. 1544, and settled at Benares, where he 
 
 L % 
 
148 Minor Vaishnava Sects. Svami-Narayana. 
 
 became an enthusiastic worshipper of Rama and Sita. His 
 Hindi poem, the Ramayana, or history of Rama, is no mere 
 translation of Valmlki's great work. It has all the freshness 
 of an independent and original composition. He died about 
 1624. 
 
 But Ramananda is chiefly noted for his twelve immediate 
 disciples, the most celebrated of whom were Kabir, Plpa, and 
 Ravi-das. Of these again by far the most remarkable was 
 Kablr. He was an enthusiastic reformer, who founded a dis- 
 tinct theistic sect to be described hereafter (see p. 158). 
 
 Let us first conclude our description of strictly Vaishnava 
 sectarianism by giving some account of the comparatively 
 modern Vaishnava sect founded by Svami-Narayana. This 
 sect is worthy of notice, both because it affords a good ex- 
 ample of the best aspect of modern Vaishnavism, and because 
 the efforts of its founder to deliver the system of Vallabh- 
 acarya from the corrupting influences of the profligate Maha- 
 rajas (see pp. 136, 137) is worthy of all praise. 
 
 Sect founded by Svami-Narayana. 
 
 Svami-Narayana, whose proper name was Sahajananda, 
 was a high-caste Brahman. He was born at Chapal, a village 
 one hundred and twenty miles to the north-west of Lucknow, 
 about the year 1780. He was a Vaishnava, but disgusted 
 with the manner of life of the so-called followers of Vallabh- 
 acarya, whose precepts and practice were utterly at variance, 
 and especially with the licentious habits of the Bombay Ma- 
 harajas (see p. 137), he determined to denounce their irregu- 
 larities and expose their vices. He himself was a celibate, 
 virtuous, self-controlled, austere, ascetical, yet withal large- 
 hearted and philanthropic, and with a great aptitude for 
 learning. He left his home about the year i8co, and took 
 up his abode at a village within the jurisdiction of the 
 Junagarh Nawab. There he placed himself under the pro- 
 
Minor Vaishnava Sects, Svami-Narayana. 149 
 
 tection of the chief Guru, named Ramananda-Svaml. When 
 that holy man removed to Ahmedabad, in 1804, Sahajananda 
 followed him. 
 
 In a large and populous city a man of evident ability and 
 professed sanctity could not fail to attract attention. Soon 
 Sahajananda collected about his own person a little band of 
 disciples, which rapidly multiplied into an army of devoted 
 adherents. Some attribute his influence to a power of mes- 
 merizing his followers, but he probably owed his success to a 
 remarkable fascination of manner combined with consistency 
 of moral character, and other qualities which singled him 
 out for a leader. His disciples increased so rapidly that the 
 Brahmans and magnates of Ahmedabad began to be jealous 
 of his popularity. He was obliged to fly, and sought refuge 
 at Jetalpur, twelve miles south of Ahmedabad. There he 
 invited all the Brahmans of the neighbourhood to the per- 
 formance of a great S9,crifice. The native officials no sooner 
 heard of the proposed assemblage than, fearing a collision 
 between his followers and other religious parties, they had 
 him arrested on some frivolous pretext and thrown into 
 prison. Such an act of tyranny defeated its own object. 
 It excited universal sympathy, and increased his influence. 
 He was soon released. Hymns were composed in which 
 his merits were extolled. Verses were written descriptive of 
 his sufferings. Curses were launched against the heads of his 
 persecutors. 
 
 Jetalpur then became the focus of a great religious gather- 
 ing. Thousands flocked to the town and enrolled themselves 
 as the followers of Sahajananda, who took the name of 
 Svami-Narayana. 
 
 Bishop Heber, in his Indian Journal, gives the following 
 
 interesting account of an interview with him at this period of 
 
 his career : — 
 
 About eleven o'clock I had the expected visit from Svami-Narayana. 
 The holy man was a middle-sized, thin, plain-looking person, about my 
 
150 Minor Vaishnava Sects. Svami-Narayana. 
 
 own age, with a mild and diffident expression of countenance, but 
 nothing about him indicative of any extraordinary talent. He came 
 in somewhat different style from all I had expected, having with him 
 nearly two hundred horsemen. When I considered that I had myself 
 an escort of more than fifty horse I could not help smiling, though my 
 sensations were in some degree painful and humiliating at the idea of 
 two religious teachers meeting at the head of little armies, and filling 
 the city which was the scene of their interview with the rattling of 
 quivers, the clash of shields, and the tramp of the war-horse. Had our 
 troops been opposed to each other, mine, though less numerous, would 
 have been doubtless far more effective, from the superiority of arms and 
 discipline. But in moral grandeur what a difference there was between 
 his troops and mine ! Mine neither knew me nor cared for me, though 
 they escorted me faithfully. The guards of Svami-Narayana were his 
 own disciples and enthusiastic admirers, men who had voluntarily 
 repaired to hear his lessons, who now took a pride in doing him honour, 
 and who would cheerfully fight to the last drop of blood rather than 
 suffer a fringe of his garment to be handled roughly. In my own parish 
 of Hodnet there were once, perhaps, a few honest countrymen who felt 
 something like this for me, but how long a time must elapse before 
 a Christian minister in India can hope to be thus loved and honoured.— 
 Chap. xxv. 
 
 It sooit became clear to Sahajananda that the success of 
 his future operations would depend on the consolidation of 
 his party. He therefore retired with his followers to the 
 secluded village of Wartal, where he erected a temple to 
 Narayana (otherwise Krishna, or Vishnu, as the Supremfe 
 Being) associated with the goddess Lakshml. It was from 
 this central locality that his crusade against the licentious 
 habits of the Vallabhacaryans was principally carried on. 
 His watchword seems to have been 'devotion to Krishna 
 (as the Supreme Being) with observance of duty and purity 
 of life.' 
 
 He was in the habit of making periodical tours in Gujarat, 
 like a bishop visiting his diocese. It was in one of these that 
 Svami-Narayana was struck down by fever at Gadada in 
 Kathiawar, where he died. 
 
 His disciples now number more than 200,000 persons. 
 They are broadly divided into two classes— Sadhus, 'holy 
 men,' and Grihasthas, 'householders.' These correspond to 
 
Minor Vaishnava Sects. Svami-Narayana. 151 
 
 clergy and laity; the former, who are all celibates, being 
 supported by the latter. Those Sadhus who are Brahmans 
 are called Brahma-carls (cf. p. 362 of this volume). Of these 
 there are about 300 at Wartal, the whole body of Sadhus, or 
 holy men, numbering about 1,000. A still lower order is 
 called Pala. Of these there are about 500. 
 
 The two principal temples of the sect are at Wartal (for 
 Sanskrit Vrittalaya or better Vratalaya, ' abode of religious 
 observances ') about four miles to the west of the Baroda rail- 
 way, and at Ahmedabad. The former is the most important 
 and best endowed, but both are presided over by Maharajas, 
 neither of whom is willing to yield the precedence to the 
 other. Jealousies are already springing up between them. 
 Probably, in process of time, a schism will take place, and 
 perhaps two antagonistic parties be formed, as in the other 
 Vaishnava sects. 
 
 In company with the Collector of Kaira I visited the Wartal 
 temple on the day of the Purnima, or full moon of the month 
 Karttik — the most popular festival of the whole year. The 
 Maharaja greeted us at the Borehavi station of the Baroda 
 railway with a choice of conveyances — an elephant, a bullock- 
 carriage, a palanquin and four saddle-horses, with a mounted 
 guard. I chose the palanquin and found myself moving com- 
 fortably forward, while my companion's vehicle oscillated 
 violently in response to the inequalities of the road. The 
 Svami-Narayana sect are a wealthy community, but clearly 
 object to spend their money on improving their access to 
 their chief temple. One reason for this may be that a shrine's 
 inaccessibility enhances the merit of pilgrimage. 
 
 We were met at the entrance to the court of the temple 
 (mandira) by the Maharaja himself, attended by his minister— 
 an old Brahmadari, or unmarried Brahman. The temple 
 dedicated to Lakshmi-Narayana, erected about sixty years 
 ago, is a handsome structure. It has the usual lofty cupolas, 
 and stands in the centre of a courtyard, formed by the 
 
152 Minor Vaishtiava Sects. Svami-Narayana. 
 
 residences of the Maharaja and his attendants, the great hall 
 of assembly, and other buildings. 
 
 We were conducted by the Maharaja through a crowd of at 
 least ten thousand persons who thronged the quadrangle and 
 all the approaches to the temple. They were waiting to 
 be admitted to the ceremony of the day — the one object 
 that had drawn so many people to the spot — the privilege of 
 Darsana ; that is, of seeing and adoring the idol. It was a 
 moment of intense excitement. Let a man but bow down 
 before the jewelled image on this anniversary of its mani- 
 festation to the multitude, and the blessing of the god attends 
 him for the whole year. The vast concourse swayed to and 
 fro like the waves of a troubled sea, each man vociferating to 
 his neighbours in a manner quite appalling. I could not help 
 thinking of our apparent helplessness in the surging crowd, 
 and asking myself how two solitary Europeans would be likely 
 to fare, if, from some accidental circumstance, the religious 
 fanaticism of a myriad of excited Hindus were to break loose 
 and vent itself upon us. 
 
 But the ten thousand people were docile as children. At a 
 signal from the Maharaja they made a lane for us to pass, and 
 we entered the temple by a handsome flight of steps. The 
 interior is surrounded by idol shrines. On the occasion of the 
 present festival the principal images were almost concealed 
 from view by rich vestments and jewelry. 
 
 The two principal shrines have three figures. One of them 
 has an idol of Krishna in his character of Ran-chor, ' deliverer 
 from evil ^', — a form of Krishna specially worshipped at Dvarika 
 and throughout Gujarat (see p. 144), — on the left of the spec- 
 tator. An image of Narayana (Vishnu as the Supreme Being) 
 is in the middle ; and LakshmT, consort of Vishnu, is on the 
 
 ' So the name was interpreted to me, but it properly means 'fight- 
 quitter,' and rather refers to Krishna's declining to take part in the 
 great war of the Maha-bharata, between the sons of Pandu and Dhrita- 
 rashtra. 
 
Minor Vaishnava Sects. Svami-Narayana. 153 
 
 right. A gong to be struck in the performance of worship 
 (puja) hangs suspended before the shrine. The other prin- 
 cipal sanctuary has Krishna in the middle, his favourite Radha 
 on the right, and Svami-Narayana, the founder of the sect, on 
 the left. The latter is here worshipped, like other great reli- 
 gious leaders, as an incarnation of a portion of Vishnu — that 
 is, he is held to be one of the numerous Naravataras or de- 
 scents of parts of the god's essence in the bodies of men. In 
 an adjacent shrine are his bed and clothes, the print of his 
 foot, and his wooden slippers. 
 
 We were next conducted to the Sabha-mandapa, or great 
 hall of assembly, on one side of the quadrangle. Here about 
 three thousand of the chief members of the sect, including 
 a number of the Sadhus or clergy, were waiting to receive us. 
 Chairs were placed for us in the centre of the hall, and before 
 us, seated on the ground, with their legs folded under them 
 in the usual Indian attitude, were two rows of about thirty of 
 the oldest Sadhus, three or four of whom had been actually 
 contemporaries of Svami-Narayana. These old men were 
 delighted when we questioned them as to their personal 
 knowledge of their founder. The only inconvenience was 
 that they all wanted to talk together. I felt indisposed to 
 check their garrulity, but the Maharaja had no such scruples 
 and invited us to another hall in the story above, where a select 
 number of their best Pandits and officials were assembled to 
 greet us. The regular Darbar or formal reception took place 
 in this room. Here we were garlanded with flowers, be- 
 sprinkled with rosewater, and presented with fruits, sweet- 
 meats, and pan-supari, in the usual manner. I found the 
 Pandits well versed in Sanskrit. One or two astonished me 
 by the fluency with which they spoke it, and by their readi- 
 ness in answering the difficult questions with which I tested 
 their knowledge. 
 
 The Maharaja's last act was to conduct us to an adjacent 
 building, used as a lodging-house or asylum (dharma-sala) 
 
154 Minor Vaishmva Sects. Svami-Narayana. 
 
 for the clergy. On the present anniversary at least six 
 hundred of these good men were collected in long spacious 
 galleries called Asramas (places of retreat). They were all 
 dressed alike in plain salmon-coloured clothes, each man 
 being located in a small separated space not more than seven 
 feet long, by three or four broad. Above his head, neatly 
 arranged in racks, were his spare clothes, water-jar, &c. When 
 we were introduced to the six hundred Sadhus they were 
 all standing upright, motionless, and silent. At night they 
 lie down on the hard ground in the same narrow space. 
 These holy men are all celibates. They have abandoned all 
 worldly ties, that they may go forth unencumbered to dis- 
 seminate the doctrines of their founder. They itinerate in 
 pairs, to cheer, support, and keep watch on each other. They 
 travel on foot, undergoing many privations and hardships, 
 and taking with them nothing but a staff, the clothes on their 
 back, their daily food, their water-jar, and their book of 
 instructions. They may be seen here and there in the or- 
 dinary coarse salmon-coloured dress of ascetics, striving to 
 win disciples by personal example and persuasion rather than 
 by controversy. Surely other proselyting societies might gain 
 some useful hints by a study of their method. 
 
 What I saw of their whole system convinced me that the 
 Svami-Narayanas are an energetic body of men and their 
 sect an advancing one. Notwithstanding the asceticism of 
 their clergy, the leading members of the community have 
 a keen eye to worldly wealth and the acquisition of land, and 
 are perhaps not over-scrupulous in carrying out their plans 
 of aggrandisement. Without doubt the tendency of their 
 doctrines is towards purity of life, which is supposed to be 
 effected by suppression of the passions (udasa), and complete 
 devotion to the Supreme Being in his names of Narayana, 
 Vishnu, and Krishna. In an honest desire to purify the 
 Vaishnava faith the sect has done and is doing much good; 
 but there can be no question that its doctrines, like its gods, 
 
Minor Vaishnava Sects. Svami-Narayana. 155 
 
 its idols, and its sectarian marks, are part and parcel of genuine 
 Hinduism. At any rate the system lacks the true vivifying 
 regenerating force which can alone maintain it in vigour, and, 
 like other Indian reformations and religious revivals, is, I fear, 
 destined in the end to be drawn back into the all-absorbing 
 vortex of corrupt Hinduism. 
 
 After my discussion with the Pandits I was presented with 
 their Siksha-patri, or manual of instructions, written in San- 
 skrit (with a long commentary), and constituting the religious 
 directory of the sect. It was compiled by their founder, with 
 the aid of a learned Brahman named Dina-nath, and is a col- 
 lection of two hundred and twelve precepts — some original, 
 some extracted from Manu and other sacred Sastras, and 
 many of them containing high moral sentiments worthy of 
 Christianity itself. Every educated member of the sect ap- 
 peared to know the whole collection by heart ^- 
 
 Some of the verses were recited to me by the Pandits in 
 the original Sanskritj and as they fairly represent the purer 
 side of Vaishnavism (which has been much corrupted by recent 
 teachers), as well as its confused ideas on all religious and 
 philosophical subjects, I here append a translation of a few 
 selected specimens. The figures at the end of each precept 
 refer to the number of the verses in the Siksha-patri. 
 
 No disciples of mine must ever intentionally kill any living thing what- 
 ever, not even a flea or the most minute insect (n). 
 
 The killing of any animal for the purpose of sacrifice to the gods is for- 
 bidden by me. Abstaining from injury is the highest of all duties (12). 
 
 Suicide at a sacred place of pilgrimage, from religious motives or from 
 passion, is prohibited (14). 
 
 No flesh meat must ever be eaten, no spirituous or vinous liquor must 
 ever be drunk, not even as medicine (15). 
 
 All theft is prohibited, even under pretence of contributing to religious 
 objects (17). 
 
 No male or female followers of mine must ever commit adultery (18). 
 
 No false accusation must be laid against any one from motives of 
 self-interest (20). 
 
 1 The text has been edited by me with a complete translation, and 
 is published in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society for October 1882. 
 
156 Minor Vaishnava Sects. Svami-Narayana. 
 
 Profane language against the gods, sacred places, Brahmans, holy men 
 and women, and the Vedas, must never be used (21). 
 
 A truth which causes serious injury to one's self or others ought not to 
 be told. Wicked men, ungrateful people, and persons in love are to be 
 avoided. A bribe must never be accepted (26). 
 
 A trust must never be betrayed. Confidence must never be violated. 
 Praise of one's self with one's own lips is prohibited (37). 
 
 Holy men should patiently bear abusive language, or even beating, 
 from evil-minded persons, and wish good to them (201). 
 
 They should not play at any games -of chance, nor act as informers or 
 spies ; they should never show love of self, or undue partiality for their 
 relations (202). 
 
 Wives should honour their husbands as if they were gods, and never 
 offend them with improper language, though they be diseased, indigent, 
 or imbecile (159). 
 
 Widows should serve the god Krishna, regarding him as their only 
 husband (163). 
 
 They should only eat one meal a day, and should sleep on the 
 ground (168). 
 
 Every day let a man awake before sunrise, and, after calling on the 
 name of Krishna, proceed to perform the rites of bodily purifica- 
 tion (49). 
 
 Having seated himself in some place apart, let him cleanse his teeth, 
 and then, having bathed with pure water, put on two well-washed 
 garments, one an under garment, and the other an upper (50). 
 
 My male followers should then make the vertical mark (emblematical 
 of the footprint of Vishnu or Krishna) with the round spot inside it 
 (symbolical of Lakshml) on their foreheads. Their wives should only 
 make the circular mark with red powder of saffron (52). 
 
 Those who are initiated into the proper worship of Krishna should 
 always wear on their necks two rosaries made of Tulsi wood, one for 
 Krishna and the other for Radha (4). 
 
 After engaging in mental worship, let them reverently bow down 
 before the pictures of Radha and Krishna ^, and repeat the eight- 
 syllabled prayer to Krishna (Sri-Krishnah saranam mama, 'Adorable 
 Krishna is my soul's refuge ') as many times as possible. Then let them 
 apply themselves to secular affairs (54). 
 
 Devotion to Krishna unattended by the performance of duties must 
 on no account be practised (39). 
 
 The duties of one's own class and order must never be abandoned, 
 nor the duties of others meddled with (24). 
 
 Nowhere, except in Jagan-nath-purl, must cooked food or water be 
 accepted from a person of low caste, though it be the remains of an 
 offering to Krishna (19). 
 
 ' It is a characteristic of the Svami-Narayana sect that pictures, instead 
 of images, are used in some of their temples. 
 
Minor Vaishriava Sects. Svami-Narayana. 157 
 
 Duty (dharma) is that good practice which is enjoined both by the 
 Veda (Sruti) and by the law (Smriti) founded on the Veda. Devotion 
 (bhakti) is intense love for Krishna accompanied with a due sense of 
 his glory (103). 
 
 An act promising good reward, but involving departure from proper 
 duties, must never be committed (73). 
 
 If by the great men of former days anything unbecoming has been 
 done, their faults must not be imitated, but only their good deeds (74). 
 
 If knowingly or unintentionally any sin, great or small, be committed, 
 the proper penance must be performed according to ability (92). 
 
 Every day aU my followers should go to the Temple of God, and there 
 repeat the names of Krishna {63). 
 
 The story of his life should be listened to with the greatest reverence, 
 and hymns in his praise should be sung on festive days (64). 
 
 All males and females who go to Krishna's temple should keep 
 separate and not touch each other (40). 
 
 Vishnu, Siva, Gana-pati (or Ganesa), ParvatI, and the Sun; these 
 five deities should be honoured with worship (84). 
 
 Narayana and Siva should be equally regarded as part of one and the 
 same Supreme Spirit, since both have been declared in the Vedas to be 
 forms of Brahma (47). 
 
 On no account let it be supposed that difference in forms (or names) 
 makes any difference in the identity of the deity (112). 
 
 That which abides within the living human spirit in the character of 
 its internal regulator {antaryamitaya) should be regarded as the self- 
 existent Supreme Being who assigns a recompense to every act (107). ' 
 
 That Being, known by various names — such as the glorious Krishna, 
 Param Brahma, Bhagavan, Purushottama — the cause of all manifesta- 
 tions, is to be adored by us as our one chosen deity (108). 
 
 Having perceived, by abstract meditation, that the spirit is distinct 
 from its three bodies (viz. the gross, subtle, and causal bodies) and that 
 it is a portion of the one Spirit of the Universe (Brahma), every man 
 ought to worship Krishna by means of that soul at all times (116). 
 
 Towards him alone ought all worship to be directed by every human 
 being on the earth in every possible manner. Nothing else except devo- 
 tion (bhakti) to him can procure salvation (113). 
 
 The philosophical doctrine approved, by me'is the Visishtadvaita (of 
 Ramanuja, see p. 122), and the desired heavenly abode isGoloka. There 
 to worship Krishna and be united with him as the Supreme Soul is to be 
 considered salvation (121). 
 
 The twice-born should perform at the proper seasons, and according 
 to their means, the twelve purificatory rites-' (sanskara), the (six) daily 
 
 ^ Of these only six are now generally performed, viz. : — (l) the birth- 
 ceremony, or touching the tongue of a new-born infant with clarified 
 butter, etc. ; (2) the name-giving ceremony on the tenth day ; (3) ton- 
 sure ; (4) induction into the privileges of the twice-born, by investiture 
 
1 58 Theistic Sect of Kablr. 
 
 duties S and the Sraddha offerings to the spirits of departed ances- 
 tors (91). 
 
 The eleventh day of the waxing and waning moon should be observed 
 as fasts, also the birthday of Krishna ; also the night of Siva {Siva-ratri) 
 with rejoicings during the day (79). 
 
 A pilgrimage to the Tirthas, or holy places, of which Dvarika 
 (Krishna's city in Gujarat) is the chief, should be performed according 
 to rule. Almsgiving and kind acts towards the poor should always be 
 performed by all (83). 
 
 A tithe of one's income should be assigned to Krishna; the poor 
 should give a twentieth part (147). 
 
 Those males and females of my followers who will act according to 
 these directions shall certainly obtain the four great objects of all human 
 desires — religious merit, wealth, pleasure, and beatitude (206). 
 
 We now pass on to the reformed theistic sects founded by 
 
 Kabir and Nanak. 
 
 Theistic Sect founded by Kablr. 
 
 There can be no doubt that the teaching of Kablr exer- 
 cised a most important influence throughout Upper India in 
 the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. That it formed the 
 basis of the Sikh movement in the Panjab is clear from the 
 fact that Kabir's sayings are constantly quoted by the Guru 
 Nanak and his successors, the authors of the sacred writings 
 which constitute the bible (Grantha) of the Sikh religion. 
 
 Kablr was a weaver, and in all probability a Musalman by 
 birth. He is believed to have lived partly at Benares and 
 partly at Magar, near Gorakhpur, in the reign of Sikandar 
 Shah Lodi, between 1488 and 1.513. According to a legend 
 he was miraculously conceived by the virgin widow of a 
 Brahman. His name Kablr — an Arabic word meaning 
 ' Great ' — gives support to the now generally accepted opinion 
 
 with the sacred thread ; (5) solemn return home from the house of a 
 preceptor after completing the prescribed course of study ; (6) marriage. 
 They are described at p. 353. 
 
 ^ The six daily duties (called Nitya-karma) according to Parasara 
 are : — (l) bathing ; (2) morning and evening prayer (sandhya) ; (3) offer' 
 ings to fire (homa) ; (4) repetition of the Veda ; (5) worship of ancestors ; 
 (6) worship of the gods. 
 
Theistic Sect of Kabtr. 159 
 
 that he was originally a Musalman. But he never had any 
 sympathy with Muhammadan intolerance and exclusiveness. 
 It is certain that in the end he became a pupil of Ramananda 
 (see p. 147), and for a time a true Hindu, and, what is im- 
 portant to bear in mind, a true Vaishnava, who, like other 
 Vaishnava leaders, had much of the democratic, tolerant, and 
 liberal spirit of Buddhism. No wonder, then, that he laboured 
 to free the Vaishnava creed from the useless and senseless in- 
 crustations with which it had become overlaid. But he did 
 more than other Vaishnava reformers. He denounced all 
 idol-worship and taught Vaishnavism as a form of strict 
 monotheism. True religion, according to Kabir, meant really 
 nothing but devotion to one God, who is called by the name 
 Vishnu, or by synonyms of Vishnu such as Rama and Hari, 
 or even by the names current among Muhammadans. For 
 Kabir, in his tolerance, had no objection to regard Muham- 
 madans as worshipping the same God under a different name. 
 In this way he was the first to attempt, a partial bridging -^ 
 of the gulf between Hinduism and Islam. Nor did he reject 
 all the pantheistic ideas of Brahmanism. 
 
 We have already noted how in India all phases of religious 
 belief are constantly meeting and partially fusing into each 
 other. Polytheism is continually sliding into Monotheism,, 
 Monotheism into Pantheism, and this back to Polytheism. 
 Vaishnavism and Saivism in their universal receptivity are 
 open to impressions from Islam ; Islam, notwithstanding its 
 exclusiveness, is adulterated with Vaishnavism and Saivism. 
 Hence it happens that Vaishnavism and Saivism, however 
 decidedly they may insist on the separate personality of the 
 Godhead, are perpetually slipping back, like a broad wheel, 
 into old pantheistic and polytheistic ruts. And Islam, however 
 uncompromising its views of the Unity of the Deity, has its 
 school of Sufi philosophers, who hold opinions almost identical 
 with those of the Vedanta Pantheists. It is no wonder, 
 therefore, that Kabir — while asserting the Unity of God, the 
 
1 60 Theistic Sect of Kahr. 
 
 Creator of the world, who is admitted to have attributes- and 
 qualities and to assume any shape at will — also maintained 
 that God and man are parts of one essence, and that ' both 
 are in the same manner everything that lives and moves and 
 has its being.' 
 
 Kabir's adherents — still very numerous in Northern India — 
 are generally called Kabir-panthTs. His doctrines and pre- 
 cepts are embodied in the Sukh-nidhan and other Hindi 
 works, as well as in the Sikh Grantha. His successors have 
 added precepts of their own, many of which are attributed 
 to Kabir. His alleged sayings are innumerable. 
 
 I here subjoin a few specimens ^ : — 
 
 Hear my word ; go not astray. 
 
 My word is from the first. Meditate on it every moment. 
 
 Without hearing the word, all is utter darkness. Without finding the 
 gateway of the word, man will ever go astray. 
 
 There are many words. Take the pith of them. 
 
 Lay in provender sufficient for the road while time yet serves. Evening 
 comes on, the day is flown and nothing will be provided. 
 
 With the five elements is the abode of a great mystery. When the 
 body is decomposed has any one found it ? The word of the teacher 
 is the guide. 1 
 
 That a drop falls into the ocean all can perceive ; but that the drop 
 and the ocean are one, few can comprehend. 
 
 The dwelling of Kablr is on the peak of a mountain, and a narrow 
 path leads to it. 
 
 No act of devotion can equal truth ; no crime is so heinous as false- 
 hood ; in the heart wherfe truth abides, there is my abode. 
 
 Put a check upon the tongue ; speak not much. Associate with the 
 wise. Investigate the words of the teacher. 
 
 When the master is blind, what is to become of the scholar ? When 
 the blind leads the bhnd both will fall into the well. 
 
 It is evident from these examples that the key-note of 
 Kabir's teaching was the duty of obeying spiritual teachers. 
 He maintained, in fact, that every man was bound to search 
 for a true and trustworthy spiritual pastor (Guru), and, having 
 found one, to make him his master — to submit mind, con- 
 science, and even body to his will and guidance. Yet he 
 
 ' Selected from H. H. Wilson's ' Hindu Religious Sects.' 
 
The Sikh Sect. i6i 
 
 never claimed infallibility for his own utterances. He con- 
 stantly warned his own disciples to investigate for themselves 
 the truth of every word he uttered. 
 
 And this leads us to the religious system founded in the 
 Panjab by Kabir's most celebrated follower Nanak, about the 
 time of the Emperor Babar. 
 
 The Sikh Theistic Sect, founded by Nanak. 
 
 It is well known that certain sects of Christians call them- 
 selves ' brethren,' to denote their relationship to each other 
 and to their Head as members of a religious society typified 
 by a family. Much in the same way the sect founded by 
 Nanak styled themselves Sikhs or ' disciples ' to express their 
 close dependence on their teachers or Gurus. For if the 
 ' diapason ' of Kabir's doctrine, and, indeed, of all Vaishnava 
 teaching, was, ' Hear the word of the Guru, the word of the 
 Guru is the guide,' much more did Nanak insist on a similar 
 submission. Literally interpreted, the Sanskrit terms Guru 
 (derived from the Sanskrit root gri, ' to utter words '), and 
 Sishya — corrupted into Sikh — meaning in Sanskrit ' one who 
 is to be instructed,' are merely correlatives like teacher 
 and taught. Hence, the system might as suitably be called 
 Guruism as Sikhism. 
 
 Great light has been thrown on its religious aspect by the 
 labours of the late Professor Trumpp, of Munich. He was 
 commissioned by our Government to translate what is called 
 the Adi-Granth, or first Sikh bible, and his work appeared in 
 1877 with valuable introductory essays. It is chiefly by study- 
 ing this book that we are able to form an accurate idea of one 
 of the most interesting and important religious and political 
 movements in the history of India. With some diflficulty 
 I myself procured a copy of the Adi-Granth at Amritsar. 
 
 In the light, therefore, of Professor Trumpp's investigations, 
 and my own inquiries at Lahore, I proceed to give a brief 
 
 M 
 
1 62 The Sikh Sect. 
 
 account of Nanak and the characteristic features of Nanak's 
 teaching. 
 
 It appears to be a well-ascertained fact that this great 
 teacher was born, not in Lahore itself, but in a neighbour- 
 ing village, called Talvandi, on the river Ravi, not far from 
 Lahore, in the year 1469, a few years before Caitanya in 
 Bengal and Martin Luther in Europe. Of course the various 
 biographies of Nanak — called Janam-sakhTs, and written in 
 the Panjabi dialect — are filled with myths and stories of 
 miraculous events, invented to justify the semi-deification of 
 the founder of the sect soon after his death. That all the 
 Hindu gods appeared in the sky and announced the birth 
 of a great saint (Bhagat) to save the world, is not quite 
 capable of proof. Nor can we quite accept as a fact another 
 statement of his chroniclers, that one day angels seized him 
 while bathing, and carried him bodily into the presence of 
 the Deity, who presented him with a cup of nectar and 
 charged him to proclaim the one God, under the name of 
 Hari, upon earth. But we need not disbelieve the statement 
 that at an early age he became a diligent student of .Vaish- 
 nava religious books, and that in his youth he imitated the 
 example of other incipient reformers, wandering to various 
 shrines in search of some clue to the labyrinth of Hinduism. 
 It is even affirmed that his travels included the performance 
 of a hajj to Mecca, and that on being reproved by the KazI 
 for lying down with his feet towards the Ka'bah, he replied : 
 ' Put my feet in that direction where the house of God is not.' 
 
 Nanak, however, laid no claim to be the originator of a new 
 religion. His teaching was mainly founded on that of his 
 predecessors, especially on that of Kabir, whom he constantly 
 quoted. He was simply a Guru, or teacher, and his followers 
 were simply Sikhs or disciples. But he was also a reformer 
 who aimed, as other reformers had done before him, at deli- 
 vering Hinduism, and especially the Vaishnavism of Northern 
 India, from its incubus of caste, superstition, and idolatry. 
 
The Sikh Sect. 
 
 163 
 
 Yet it does not appear that Nanak directly attacked caste 
 or denounced it in violent language. He simply welcomed 
 persons of all ranks as his followers, and taught that the 
 Supreme Being was no ' respecter of persons.' 
 
 The plain fact was that Nanak found himself in a part 
 of India where Muhammadans formed the majority of the 
 population. Though himself originally a Hindu, he became 
 partially Islamized, to the extent at least of denouncing 
 idolatry. His idea was to bring about a union between 
 Hindus and Muhammadans on the common ground of a 
 belief in one God. Yet the creed of Nanak was really more 
 pantheistic than monotheistic. God, he said, is Supreme Lord "" 
 over all (Paramesvara). He may be called Brahma, or by 
 other names, such as Govinda, etc., but his especial name is 
 Hari (=Vishnu). This Supreme Being does not create the 
 Universe out of nothing, but evolves it out of himself. It is 
 a kind of expansion of his own essence which takes place 
 for his own amusement (khela)— such expansion being made 
 up of the three Gunas — Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas — in perfect 
 equilibrium (see p. 31). It is Illusion or Maya which dis- 
 turbs this equilibrium and causes the apparent separation 
 between God, the world, and the human soul. All this is 
 pure Brahmanism. We find also that, except in denouncing 
 idolatry, Nanak differed very little from a pure Vaishnava, 
 for he taught that in the present age (Kali-yuga) the repetition 
 of the name of Hari is the only means of salvation from the 
 misery of successive births — notwithstanding the merit to be 
 gained by works and ceremonies — and that the knowledge 
 of this name is only to be acquired through a properly 
 ordained teacher (Guru). It is curious, too, that a religious 
 movement which commenced in an effort to draw the ad- ^ 
 herents of Sikhism and Muhammadanism together, should 
 have ended in exciting the bitterest animosity between them. 
 Nanak's death is known to have occurred on the loth of 
 October, 1538. One of his sons expected to succeed him, \ 
 '^ M 3 
 
164 The Sikh Sect. 
 
 but to the surprise of those who were present at his death, he 
 passed over his own son and nominated, as second Guru, his 
 disciple Lahana, whose name had been changed to Angada 
 because of his devotion. He had, so to speak, given up his 
 person (a;riga) to the service of his master. This appears to 
 have been his chief merit. He was quite illiterate, though 
 tradition makes him the inventor of the peculiar alphabet 
 called Guru-mukhl (a modification of the Deva-nagarl) in 
 which the Sikh bible was written. Angada nominated Amar- 
 das to succeed him as third Guru. Seven others were ap- 
 pointed to the succession in a similar manner. These make 
 up the ten chief Gurus of the Sikh religion. They were, 
 4. Ram-das ; 5. Arjun ; 6. Har-Govind ; 7. Har-Rai ; 8. Har- 
 Kisan (for Har- Krishna) ; 9. Teg- Bahadur ; and 10. Govind- 
 Sinh. 
 
 Professor Trumpp has given an interesting account of each, 
 though he does not vouch for the truth of the native biogra- 
 phies from which his details are taken. One thing is certain, 
 that notwithstanding the agreement of Sikhs and Muhamma- 
 dans in regard to the great doctrine of the Unity of the God- 
 head, a violent political antagonism soon sprang up between 
 them. The truth was, that when the Sikhs began to combine 
 together for the promotion of their worldly as well as spiritual 
 interests, they rapidly developed military tastes and abilities. 
 This was the signal for an entire change of attitude between 
 Sikhs and Muhammadans. So long as the former were a 
 mere religious sect they were left unmolested ; but when they 
 began to band themselves together for purposes of political 
 aggrandizement, they encountered opposition and persecution. 
 The Muhammadan Government naturally took alarm. It 
 could not permit the growth of an imperium in imperio. 
 Internecine struggles followed. Both parties treated each 
 other as deadly enemies ; but the hardy and energetic Sikhs, 
 though occasionally vanquished and dispersed, were not to be 
 driven off the field. Nor is it surprising that they gradually 
 
The Sikh Sect. 
 
 165 
 
 developed a taste for rapine and spoliation. The decaying 
 Mogul Empire was quite unable to hold its own against their 
 aggressiveness. Ultimately, they combined into powerful"', 
 associations (misals) under independent marauding chiefs, 
 seized large tracts of land, and took possession of the whole 
 Panjab. 
 
 The first to inspire the Sikhs with a desire for political 
 union was the fourth Guru, Ram-das. He was himself a 
 quiet unassuming man, but he understood the value of money 
 and the advantage of organization. His affable manners 
 attracted crowds of adherents, who daily flocked to his house 
 and voluntarily presented him with offerings. With the con- 
 tributions thus received he was able to purchase the tank 
 called Amrita-sar (Sanskrit, Amrita-saras, ' lake of nectar '\ 
 and build the well-known lake-temple at the place now known 
 as Amritsar (Umritsur), which afterwards became a rallying- 
 point and centre of union for the whole Sikh community. 
 
 Ram-das conveyed his precepts to his followers in the form 
 of verses. Many of his stanzas, together with the sayings of 
 the previous Gurus, and especially of the first Guru, Nanak, 
 were for the first time collected by his son, the fifth Guru; 
 Arjun, who was appointed by his father to the Guruship just 
 before his death in 1581. From that time forward the suc- 
 cession was made hereditary, and the remaining five Gurus ,, 
 were regarded as rulers rather than as teachers. 
 
 With regard to the fifth Guru, Arjun, it may be observed 
 that he was a worthy successor of his father. He perceived 
 that to keep his Sikhs or disciples together, it would be 
 necessary to give them a written standard of authority, and 
 some sort of machinery of government. It is to him, there- 
 fore, that the Sikhs owe the compilation of their first bible — . 
 called the Granth, or book (Sanskrit, Grantha) — and to him is 
 due the establishment of an organized system of collecting 
 a regular tax from all adherents of the sect in different 
 localities. Moreover, under him the sacred tank and temple 
 
1 66 The Sikh Sett. 
 
 founded by Ram-das became the nucleus of the sacred town 
 Amritsar, which is still the metropolis of the Sikh religion. 
 He was the first Sikh Pope who aimed at temporal as well 
 as spiritual power. It is not surprising, then, that his death is 
 said to have been brought about by the Emperor Jahanglr. 
 
 The lives of the sixth, seventh, and eighth Gurus may be 
 passed over as unimportant. The ninth Guru, Teg-Bahadur, 
 attracted the attention of the Emperor Aurangzib. This 
 fanatical monarch, who was bent on forcing the whole world 
 to embrace Islam, did not long leave the Sikhs undisturbed. 
 He imprisoned Teg-Bahadur, and tortured him so cruelly 
 that the Guru, despairing of life, induced a fellow-prisoner to 
 put an end to his sufferings. But Aurangzib's tyranny was 
 quite powerless to suppress the Sikh movement. It was rather 
 the chief factor in Sikh progress. The murder of the ninth 
 Guru was the great turning-point in the history of the sect. 
 Thenceforward the Sikhs became a nation of fighting men. 
 
 Teg-Bahadur's son, Govind-Sinh, succeeded as tenth Guru. 
 Burning to avenge his father's death, he formed the am- 
 bitious design of establishing an independent dominion on the 
 ruins of the Muhammadan Empire. He was a man of 
 extraordinary energy and strength of will, but, born and 
 brought up at Patna, was deeply imbued with Hindu super- 
 stitious feelings. The better to prepare himself for what he 
 felt was too gigantic a task to be accomplished without 
 supernatural assistance, he went through a course of severe 
 religious austerity. He even so far abjured the principles of 
 his predecessors as to propitiate the goddess Durga. Nay, it 
 is even affirmed that, instigated by the Brahmans to offer one 
 of his own sons as a sacrifice, and unable to obtain the 
 mother's consent, he allowed one of his disciples to be be- 
 headed as a substitute at the altar of the bloody goddess. 
 The story is noteworthy as pointing to the probable preva- 
 lence of human sacrifice at that time in Upper India. 
 
 In fact, it was the tenth Guru, Govind, who converted the 
 
The Sikh Sect. 167 
 
 Sikhs into a nation of fighting men. His character was a 
 curious compound of pugnacity, courage, superstition, and ! j 
 fanaticism. If Nanak, the first Guru, was the founder of the 
 Sikh religion, Govindj the tenth Guru, was the founder of the 
 Sikh nationality. Many reformers had attempted to abolish 
 caste as a part of religion, but Govind regarded its evils from 
 a purely political standpoint. He perceived that great 
 national weakness resulted from the disunion caused by caste. 
 He therefore proclaimed social equality in the Sikh com- 
 munity. 
 
 Nor was this all. They were to add the name Sinh (' lion ') \ 
 to their other names. They were to be distinguished by long ^ 
 hair, they were always to carry a sword — in token of engaging 
 in perpetual warfare with the Musalmans — to refrain from 
 smoking tebacco, and to wear short trowsers, instead of the ^ 
 ordinary Dhoti. They were to be called Khalsa, or the pecu- 
 liar property of the Guru, and were to be admitted to disciple- 
 ship by a kind of baptismal rite called Pahul — that is to say, \ 
 sugar was dissolved in water, consecrated by the repetition of 
 certain texts taken from the Granth, and stirred with a two- 
 edged sword. Then part of this decoction — euphemistically 
 styled nectar — was administered to each new disciple, and the 
 rest sprinkled on the head, mouth, eyes, and other parts of his 
 body, while he was made to take an oath not to mix with 
 certain excommunicated persons, not to worship idols, not to 
 bow to any one, except a Sikh Guru, and never to turn his \ 
 back on a foe. 
 
 He was enjoined to repeat the Granth during meals and at 
 other times (both the Jip-ji of Nanak and that of Govind). 
 The Vedas, Sastras, Puranas, and the Kuran were not to be 
 credited; no Hindu ceremonies were to be observed, no 
 Sraddhas performed, no mark was to be applied to the fore- 
 head (see p. 66), no sacred cord was to be worn, no rosary to be 
 used, no tobacco to be allowed, no animal to be eaten, unless 
 killed by a Sikh, and no beef was to be touched. Especial 
 
1 68 The Sikh Sect. 
 
 care was to be taiken in preparing the Karah-Prasad. This 
 corresponded to the Hindu Prasada (see p. 145), and the eating 
 of it in common is compared by Professor Trumpp to the Chris- 
 tian Communion. It was made of flour, sugar, and ghl. When 
 prepared it was distributed to the people who sat round it, 
 praying. 
 
 Moreover the Sikh was never to wear a cap, nor to shave 
 ^his head or beard ; nor to take ofThis turban while eating. 
 
 Govind even composed a second bible (Granth), which was 
 added as a supplement to the first, and called the book of 
 the tenth Guru. The precepts of Nanak and his successors, 
 which had been compiled by Arjun, were too full of passages 
 suggestive of meekness and pacific feelings. In his own, sup- 
 plement Govind adhered to the religious teaching of the Adi- 
 Granth, but he introduced precepts the direct object of which 
 was to rouse the martial ardour of his followers ; he substi- 
 tuted war for peace as a religious duty, — reversing the order 
 followed in the Christian Bible, which advances from the 
 sanction of war in the Old Testament to the inculcation of 
 universal peace in the New. Thenceforward they were to 
 imitate the Muhammadans — they were to spread their religion, 
 not by persuasion, but by the sword. Nay, they were to live 
 by the sword, and even to worship the sword. 
 
 Govind was himself more of a military than a religious 
 leader. He was not only a brave soldier, but a daring and 
 resolute commander, and his fighting propensities were in- 
 tensified by his innate superstition and fanaticism. 
 
 It need not, therefore, be matter of astonishment that the 
 greater part of Govind's own life was passed in strife and 
 warfare. But he was no match for the Emperor Aurangzlb, 
 who was his equal in fanatical intolerance, and greatly his 
 superior in ability and military resources. Forced to with- 
 draw from a hopeless contest, he retired to Central India and 
 built himself a residence in Malwa (called Damdama), which is 
 still a point of resort for the Sikh community. On Aurangzlb's 
 
The Sikh Sect. 169 
 
 death, Govind gained the goodwill of his successor, Bahadur 
 Shah, and even accepted a military command in the Dekhan. 
 There a Pathan, who owed him a grudge, attempted his 
 assassination and wounded him so severely that he died at the 
 town of Nader, near the Godavarl (a.d. 1708). 
 
 Perhaps the most remarkable feature of the later Sikh 
 system was the quasi-deification of the sacred book, or 
 Granth. Govind refused to appoint a successor to the Guru- 
 ship, but he well knew that to maintain the Sikh religion as a 
 distinctive creed some visible representative and standard of 
 authority was needed. He therefore constituted the Granth 
 a kind of permanent religious Guru, endowing it with person- 
 ality, and even with the title Sahib (Lord). ' After me,' he said, 
 ' you shall everywhere mind the book of the Granth-Sahib as 
 your Guru ; whatever you shall ask it will show you.' 
 
 It may be worth while, therefore, to inquire a little more 
 closely into the nature of the book thus exalted to the 
 position of an infallible guide, and made to do duty as a kind 
 of visible vicegerent of God upon earth. 
 
 It consists, as we have seen, of two parts, the Adi-Granth 
 or first book, which is the portion most generally revered, and 
 the book of the "tenth Guru, Govind, which finds greater 
 favour with the more fanatical section of the community. We 
 can only here glance at the form and contents of the Adi- 
 Granth. The translator (Professor Trumpp) considers it to 
 be ' an extremely incoherent and wearisome book, the few 
 thoughts and ideas it contains being repeated in endless 
 variations.' Nor will this estimate of its merits be matter of 
 wonder when it is found that the Adi-Granth is, in fact, a 
 jumbling together of metrical precepts and apophthegms sup- 
 posed to have been composed by at least thirty-five different 
 authors, among whom were six of the ten chief Gurus (Nanak, 
 Angada, Amar-das, Ram-das, Arjun, and Teg-Bahadur), four- 
 teen Bhagats or saints (Ramanand, Kablr, Plpa, Ravi-das, 
 Dhanna, Namdev, Sur-das, etc.), and fifteen Bhats or pro- 
 
170 The Sikh Sect. 
 
 fessional panegyrists, whose names are not worth recording. 
 These latter were employed to write eulogies on the Gurus, 
 and their panegyrics, introduced into the Granth, are curious 
 as specimens of abject adulation, though absolutely worthless 
 in themselves. It is noticeable that one verse by Govind- 
 Sinh has been appended to the Adi- Granth, and is regarded 
 as an integral portion of the volume. 
 
 The language in which the whole work is written is not so 
 much the old Panjabi dialect as the old Hindi, This ancient 
 dialect was probably used by the Sikh Gurus, though natives 
 of the Panjab, that they might be better able to commend 
 their utterances to the whole Hindu community. It may be 
 conveniently called Hindu-I to distinguish it from the modem 
 Hindi'- The graphic system used by the writers was a modi- 
 fication of the Deva-nagarl alphabet, called Guru-mukhl, the 
 peculiarity of which is that it preserves the forms of some 
 Sanskrit letters, but changes their phonetic power. 
 
 Perhaps it is as unjust to disparage the Granth as to exalt 
 its merits unduly. To say that it contains many noble 
 thoughts is as true as to say that it abounds in much silly 
 twaddle and inane repetition. Nor can it be fairly accused 
 of absence of arrangement. The verses, though unconnected, 
 are arranged in six divisions : — (1) we have the Japu (com- 
 monly called Jap-ji), which consists of introductory verses by 
 Nanak; (a) then follows the So-daru ; (3) the So-purkhu; 
 (4) the Sohila, three short sections, consisting chiefly of 
 verses adapted for evening devotion ; lastly come (5) the 
 Rags, verses sung in particular Rags or musical keys, thirty- 
 one in number, which constitute the great body of the 
 Granth, especially the first four, called Sirl Rag, Rag Majh, 
 Rag Gaurl, and Rag Asa; and (6) the Bhog, consisting of 
 verses by Nanak, Arjun, and the earlier Gurus, besides others 
 
 1 I believe I was one of the first to recommend its being so distinguished, 
 in the Preface to the first edition of my Sanskrit-English Dictionary, 
 published by the University of Oxford in 1872. 
 
The Sikh Sect. 171 
 
 by Kablr, whose sayings are also scattered everywhere through 
 every section of the Granth. 
 
 I select a few^ examples from the book, slightly abridged 
 and altered from Professor Trumpp's version : — 
 
 At the begrinning is the True One. 
 
 Know, that there are two ways (that of Hindus and that of Musal- 
 mans), but only one Lord. 
 
 By thyself all the creation is produced ; by thyself, having created, 
 the whole is caused to disappear. 
 
 Thou, O Hari, alone art inside and outside ; thou knowest the secrets 
 (of the heart). 
 
 Mutter the name of Hari, Harij O my heart, by which comfort is 
 brought about ; by which all sins and vices disappear ; by which poverty 
 and pain cease. 
 
 Thou art I, I am thou, of what kind is the difference ? Like gold and 
 the bracelet, like water and a wave. 
 
 By the perfect Guru the name of Hari is made firm in me. Hari is 
 my beloved, my king. If some one bring and unite (him with me), my 
 life is revived. 
 
 Thou art my father, my mother, my cousin, my brother, my protector 
 in all places. Then what fear and grief can there be to me ? By thy 
 mercy I have known thee. Thou art my support, my trust. Without 
 thee there is none other ; all is thy play and thy arena, O Lord ! 
 
 The Lord is my dear friend. He is sweeter to me than mother and 
 father, sister, brother, and all friends ; like thee there is none other, 
 Lord ! 
 
 Be united with the Lord of the Universe. After a long time this (human) 
 body was obtained. In some births thou wast made a rock and mountain. 
 In some births thou wast produced as a pot-herb. In the eighty-four 
 lakhs (of forms of existence) thou wast caused to wander about. 
 
 No hot wind touches those who are protected by the true Guru. The 
 Guru is the true creator. 
 
 Protected by the Guru he is admitted to the true house and palace (of 
 Hari). Death cannot eat him. 
 
 I am continually a sacrifice to my ovm Guru. 
 
 I am become a sacrifice to my own Lord. From the Veda, from the 
 book (the Kuran), from the whole world he is conspicuous. The King 
 of Nanak is openly seen. 
 
 Having forgotten all things meditate on the One ! Drop false conceit, 
 offer up (thy) mind and body ! 
 
 The following are examples of Kabir's sayings quoted in 
 the Granth : — 
 . Kablr says : I am the worst of all, every one is good except me. 
 
 Death, of which the world is afraid, is joy to my mind. 
 
172 The Sikh Sect. 
 
 The gate of salvation is narrow, not wider than the tenth part of 
 a mustard-seed. 
 
 If I make the seven oceans ink, if I make the trees my pen, if I make 
 the earth my paper, the glory of God (Hari) cannot be written. 
 
 Hope should be placed on God (Ram), hope in others is useless. 
 
 What thou art doing to-morrow do now ; what thou art doing now do 
 - at once. Afterwards nothing will be done when death descends on thy 
 head. 
 
 It will be sufficiently evident from these passages that 
 Sikhism was a great religious reform, and yet in its essence 
 very little better than either Vaishnavism or Brahmanism. 
 The Granth declares the Oneness of the Deity, but when we 
 sound the depths of its inner doctrines we find that this unity 
 is based on a substratum of pantheistic ideas. There is but 
 One God, but He manifests Himself everywhere and is every- 
 thing. From various passages of the Granth it is clear that 
 the Vaishnava names Hari, Krishna, Rama, and Govinda are 
 accepted by the Sikhs as names of the Supreme. They are 
 even willing to regard the different divine personalities repre- 
 sented by these names as manifestations of the one Supreme 
 Being. The point on which they pride themselves is the 
 prohibition of image-worship. Yet they make an idol of 
 their own sacred book, worshipping it as truly as the Hindus 
 do their idols, dressing it, decorating it, fanning it, putting it 
 to bed at night, and treating it much in the same manner as 
 the idols of Krishna are treated. 
 
 We have seen that one great distinguishing feature of their 
 system is that war is made an essential part of religion. To 
 indicate their belief in this doctrine they worship the military 
 weapons of the Gurus. In some respects they conform to 
 the customs of the Hindus. They even surpass the ordinary 
 Hindu in some of his most inveterate superstitions; as, for 
 , example, in ascribing divine sanctity to the cow. The killing 
 of a cow is, with Sikhs, the most heinous of crimes ^ meriting 
 
 ^ At one time in the Panjab it was infinitely more criminal to kill a cow 
 than to kill a daughter. 
 
The Sikh Sect. 173 
 
 nothing less than capital punishment — not, however, from 
 any injunction to that effect in the Granth, but from simple 
 opposition to the Musalmans, who, whenever they conquered 
 any district peopled by Hindus, invariably slaughtered cows, 
 both to ratify their victories and to show their contempt for 
 Hindu superstitions. 
 
 Then again they accept in all its fulness the Hindu doc- 
 trine of metempsychosis, believing that there are eighty-four 
 lakhs (or eight million four hundred thousand) of forms of 
 existence through which all souls or spirits— represented as 
 flames emanating from the fountain of life — are liable to pass 
 before returning to their source. These forms of life are 
 supposed to consist of 2,300,000 quadrupeds ; 900,000 aquatic 
 animals; 1,000,000 feathered animals; 1,100,000 creeping 
 animals ; 1,700,000 immovable creatures (such as trees and 
 stones); 1,400,000 forms of human beings. Deliverance from 
 all individual existence (Nirvana) is the summum bonum. 
 
 But, after all, the chief distinctive feature of Sikhism is 
 that, accepting the Vaishnava doctrine of complete submis- 
 sion to the Guru or ordained religious teacher, the Sikh Guru 
 is made, so to speak, to out-Guru all other Gurus. His word 
 is to be law in every single matter, human and divine. First, 
 he baptizes the novice with a decoction of sugar and water, 
 which he has previously consecrated and stirred with a two- 
 edged dagger. Then he imparts the name of Hari to his 
 disciple in a particular sacred text, which loses all its efficacy 
 unless orally communicated. He tells him to mutter it per- 
 petually, enjoins him to fix his mind on Hari-S excellences, 
 and never to rest until he has merged his own existence in 
 that of Hari. In return for the instruction thus imparted, the 
 disciple, even in the earliest period of Sikhism, had to render 
 a certain amount of personal and even menial service to his 
 Guru. Then as Sikhism advanced and the Guru gained 
 temporal as well as spiritual authority, he became to his 
 disciples exactly what Muhammad became to his followers 
 
174 The Sikk S&cL 
 
 va. Arabia— not only teacher and spiritual pastor, but master, 
 military leader, and king. Finally, when he had ceased to 
 act as a military leader, he was regarded as an all-powerful 
 mediator between God and man, and even as an actual god to 
 whom prayers were to be addressed as to the Supreme Being 
 Himself. 
 
 Before concluding this sketch of one of the most interest- 
 ing religious movements that has ever taken place in India, 
 I ought to state that I visited the tombs of Ranjit Sinh and 
 Guru Arjun at Lahore, the birth-place of Govind at Patna, 
 and the sacred metropolis or Jerusalem of Sikhism at 
 Amritsar. 
 
 I noticed that the mausoleum which contains the ashes of 
 Ranjit Sinh at Lahore had idols of the Hindu gods Ganesa 
 and Brahma over the entrance. Inside, resting on a small 
 elevated platform, was the sacred Granth, and all around 
 were eleven small tombs, mere mounds of earth, under which 
 are preserved the ashes of Ranjit's eleven wives, who became 
 Satis at his death. 
 
 It may be worth while here to mention that it is against 
 the practice of the Hindus to preserve the remains of their 
 deceased relatives in tombs. The body is burnt, and, 
 however illustrious the man may have been, the ashes are 
 scattered on sacred rivers. The Sikh leaders were, like 
 the Muhammadans, ambitious of perpetuating their own 
 memories after death. They continued the Hindu practice of 
 burning their dead, but, like the Muslims, spent larger sums 
 in erecting magnificent tombs for the reception of their own 
 ashes than in building palaces for their own ease and self- 
 indulgence during life. 
 
 The temple dedicated to the tenth Guru Govind, at Patna/ 
 was rebuilt by Ranjit Sinh about forty years ago. I found it, 
 after some trouble, in a side street, hidden from view and 
 approached by a gateway, over which were the images of the 
 first nine Gurus, with Nanak in the centre. The shrine is 
 
The Sikh Sect. 
 
 175 
 
 open to the air on one side. Its guardian had a high-peaked 
 turban encircled by steel rings (dakra), used as weapons. 
 He was evidently an Akali — or 'worshipper of the time- 
 less God' — a term applied to certain Sikh zealots who be- 
 lieve themselves justified in putting every opponent of their 
 religion to the sword. As I entered the court of the temple, 
 accompanied by a Musalman friend, this Akall displayed 
 great excitement, and I began to fear an outburst of fana- 
 tkisfli which might have been dangerous to us both. Happily 
 my companion knew the man we had to deal with, and, under 
 a process of judicious handling, the fiery zealot cooled down, 
 and even allowed us to inspect the interior of the tenth Guru's 
 shrine. 
 
 On one side, in a small recess^supposed to be the actual 
 room in which Govind was bom more than two centuries 
 before — were some of his garments and weapons, and what 
 was once his bed, with other relics, all in a state of decay. 
 On the other side was a kind of low altar, on which were 
 lying under a canopy a beautifully embroidered copy of the 
 Adi-Granth and of the Granth of Govind. In the centre, 
 on a raised platform, were numerous sacred swords, which 
 appeared to be as much objects of worship as the sacred 
 books. 
 
 As to the golden temple at Amritsar, called Hari-mandira, 
 ' the temple of Hari,' or sometimes Durbar Sahib, it may be 
 said to rank next to the Taj at Agra as one of the most 
 striking sights of India. To form an idea of the unique 
 spectacle presented by this sacred locality, one must picture 
 to one's self a large square sheet of water, bordered by a 
 marble pavement, in the centre of a picturesque Indian 
 town. Around the margin of this artificial lake are clustered 
 many fine mansions, most of them once the property of 
 Sikh chiefs who assembled here every year, and spent vast 
 sums on the endowment of the central shrine. One of the 
 houses is occupied by Sirdar Mangal Sinh Ramgharia, a well- 
 
176 The Sikh Seci. 
 
 known and much esteemed member of the Sikh community.. 
 It has two lofty towers, from one of which I enjoyed a grand 
 panoramic view of the lake and its vicinity — one of those 
 rare sights seen at intervals during life, which fix themselves" 
 indelibly on the memory. In the centre of the water rises 
 the beautiful temple with its gilded dome and Cupolas, ap- 
 proached by a marble causeway. It is quite unlike any other 
 place of worship to be seen throughout India, and in structure 
 and appearance may be regarded as a kind of compromise 
 between a Hindu temple and a Muhammadaa mosque, re-i 
 minding one of the attempted compromise between Hinduism 
 and Islam, which was once a favourite idea with both Kablr 
 and Nanak. 
 
 In point of mere size the shrine is not imposing, but its 
 proportions strike one as nearly perfect. All the lower part 
 is of marble, inlaid, like the Taj, with precious stones, and " 
 here and there overlaid with gold and silver. The principal 
 entrance facing the causeway looks towards the north. The 
 interior is even more gorgeous than the exterior. On the 
 ground-floor is a well-proportioned vaulted hall — its richly 
 gilded ceiling ornamented with an infinite number of small 
 mirrors, and its walls decorated with inlaid work of various, 
 designs, flowers, birds, and elephants. Four short passages, 
 entered by carved silver doors, one on each of its four sides, 
 lead to this vaulted chamber, giving it a shape not unlike 
 that of a Greek cross. All around on the outside is a narrow 
 corridor. In the interior, opposite the principal entrance, sits 
 the presiding Guru— his legs folded under him on the bare 
 ground — with the open Granth before him. He is attended 
 by other officials of the temple, who assist him in chanting 
 the sacred texts. The Brahmans maintain that God may 
 infuse his essence into images, but they never make an idol of 
 the written Veda, which, according to their theory, is divine 
 knowledge communicated orally to inspired sages, and by 
 them orally transmitted— not written down. Sikhism, on the 
 
The Sikh Sect. 177 
 
 contrary, denies that God associates himself with images, but 
 believes that he is manifested in a written book (Granth). 
 
 Hence, although the temple is free from images, and is 
 dedicated to the one God under his name Hari (applied 
 also to Krishna or Vishnu), a visible representation of the 
 invisible God is believed to be present in the sacred book. 
 The Granth is, in fact, the real divinity of the shrine, and 
 is treated as if it had a veritable personal existence. Every 
 morning it is dressed out in costly brocade, and reverently 
 placed on a low throne under a jewelled canopy, said to have 
 been constructed by Rafijit Sinh at a cost of 50,000 rupees. 
 All day long chowries are waved over the sacred volume, 
 and every evening it is transported to the second temple on 
 the edge of the lake opposite the causeway, where it is made 
 to repose for the night in a golden bed within a consecrated 
 chamber, railed off and protected from all profane intrusion 
 by bolts and bars. Of this I was myself a witness. 
 
 On the occasion of my first visit to the Golden Temple 
 two or three rows of temple officials and others were seated 
 in a circle round the vaulted chamber, to the number of about 
 a hundred, listening to the Granth which was being chanted 
 by the presiding Guru and his assistants in a loud tone, with 
 an accompaniment of musical instruments. The space in the 
 centre' was left vacant for offerings, and was strewn with 
 flowers, grain, and small coin. A constant line of wor- 
 shippers, male and female, entered one after the other, cast 
 down their offerings, bowed their heads to the ground before 
 the Granth and before the presiding Guru, and reverently 
 circumambulated the corridor of the temple. I noticed that 
 one poor old woman threw in two small coins, and then, 
 bending low, touched the marble floor with her forehead. 
 
 On leaving the temple I talked for a time with an in- 
 telligent Sikh who had received an English education. 
 Pointing to an idol of Krishna which had been set up on 
 the margin of the lake, I asked whether the Sikhs were 
 
 N 
 
lyg The Dadu-panthts. 
 
 returning to the worship of Vaishnava images. ' Yes,' he 
 said, 'we are gradually lapsing back into our old habits. 
 Our first Guru abolished caste and forbad the worship of 
 idols. Our tenth Guru was a thorough Hindu at heart, and 
 by his own example encouraged the return to Hindu practices ; 
 so that of the Sikhs now found in the Panjab a large number 
 adopt caste, wear the Brahmanical thread, keep Hindu fes- 
 tivals, observe Hindu ceremonies (such as the Sraddha), and 
 even present offerings to idols in Hindu temples.' 
 
 In short, a careful observation of the present condition of 
 Sikhism must lead to the conclusion that the Sikh reforming 
 movement, like others which preceded it, is gradually being 
 drawn back into the all-absorbing current of ordinary Vaish- 
 navism. Yet the possession of a distinct rule of faith and 
 standard of doctrine in the Granth must have a prophylactic 
 effect. It must keep the crumbling elements of Sikhism 
 together for a time. Nor need the process of reabsorption 
 involve the obliteration of all distinctive marks. For just 
 as the strength of Hinduism is Vaishnavism, so the strength 
 of Vaishnavism is its tolerance of an almost infinite diversity 
 within its own pale. Probably, in the end, the Granth itself 
 will be accepted by the whole body of Vaishnavas as a 
 recognized portion of their sacred literature. 
 
 The census of ten years ago made the number of Sikhs in 
 India amount to 1,853,426, of whom only 806,938 were females. 
 
 In regard to the sect called Kukas see p. 268. 
 
 But Sikhism was not the only offshoot of the school founded 
 by the great reformer Kabir. He is said to have had twelve 
 disciples, like his predecessor Ramananda ; and each disciple 
 is supposed to have taken a distinct line (panthab) of his own, 
 and to have originated a distinct school of religious thought. 
 
 Two of these may be singled out for special notice— the 
 Dadu-panthls and the Satnamis. 
 
 The Dadu-panthls, as their name implies, were founded by 
 Dadu, a cotton-cleaner of Ahmedabad, who flourished about 
 
The Satnamzs. lyg 
 
 A.D. 1600. They are really Vaishnava Theists like the Sikhs ; 
 that is, worshippers of the one God under some of the names 
 of Vishnu, according to the doctrine of Kablr, on whose 
 precepts the religious works of the sect are all founded. 
 
 In the same way the Satnamis are only Vaishnava Theists, 
 who call the one God by a peculiar name of their own 
 (Satnam), and base their doctrines like the Sikhs on Kabir's 
 school of theology. 
 
 According to Professor H. H. Wilson, the founder of the 
 Satnamis was Jag-jivan-das (for Jagaj-jlvana-das), a native of 
 Oudh, whose samadh or tomb is at Katwa, between Lucknow 
 and Ajudhya. He is said to have flourished about A.D. 1.750, 
 and to have written certain tracts in Hindi, called Jfiana- 
 prakasa, Maha-pralaya, and Prathama-grantha. When I was 
 last in India I heard of a branch of the Satnamis at Chatlsgarh, 
 in the Central Provinces. They are the followers of a low- 
 caste Chamar named Ghasi-das and his son Balak-das, who 
 flourished about the beginning of this century. I was able 
 to obtain some account of their tenets and practices from the 
 missionaries of the Church Missionary Society at Madras^ 
 They are also described in one or two numbers of the Madras 
 Missionary Record for 1873. 
 
 Like other varieties of Hindu Unitarians, all of whom mix 
 up pantheistic ideas with monotheistic dbctrines, they submit 
 implicitly to their Gurus, regarding them as vicegerents of 
 God upon earth, and occasionally as actual incarnations of 
 the Deity. 
 
 The following are a few of their precepts and rules : — 
 
 God pervades the universe. He is present in every single thing. The 
 title Lord (Sahib) should be added to every object in which God is 
 present. God is the spring and source of everything good and evil. 
 Idols must not be worshipped. The ordained religious teacher (Guru) 
 is holy. Even the water in which his feet are washed is holy, and 
 should be drunk by his disciples. Distinctions of caste are not to be 
 observed. Fasts need not be kept. Feed the poor. Wound no one's 
 feelings. When the dead are burned let no one cry or weep ; let them 
 only exclaim, ' The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away ! ' 
 
 N 2 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 Saktism in the simplest acceptation of the term is the 
 worship of force (Sanskrit Sakti) personified as a goddess and 
 subordinately in all women. Doubtless there may be some 
 educated Hindus whose worship of this goddess amounts to 
 little more than reverence for a personification of the energy 
 of Nature ; but a true Sakta adores her with a view to the 
 acquisition of supernatural faculties through her help, or to 
 the destruction of enemies through her co-operation. 
 
 Of course it is alleged by all Saiva and Vaishnava secta- 
 rians that the gods Siva and Vishnu, as identified with the 
 Supreme Being, are themselves the source and spring as well 
 as the controllers of all the forces, energies and phenomena 
 of nature. Yet we must bear in mind that it is a rooted 
 idea with all Hindu theologians, of whatever denomination, 
 that the highest condition of the Self-existent Being is a 
 condition of complete quiescence and inactivity, as well as 
 of complete oneness, solitariness, and impersonality. 
 
 In fact Brahmanism holds that the One Universal Self- 
 existent Spirit is Existence, Thought, and Joy— or, in other 
 words — is Life without anything to live for. Thought without 
 anything to think about, Joy without anything to be joyful 
 about. But the moment this one Self-existent pure Spirit 
 begins to be conscious (in our sense) of existence and to 
 exercise thought and feel joy — it assumes personality and 
 material organization. It becomes, in fact, a personal God; 
 and when this personal God wills to put forth energy for the 
 creation or evolution of a world out of himself his nature 
 becomes duplex. Evidently the absolute unity and strictly 
 
Saktism, or Goddess-worship. i8i 
 
 masculine character of that nature might have been preserved 
 in his personal development, but the idea of a kind of duality 
 in unity very soon suggested itself to the Hindu mind. He 
 was held to possess a double nature, partly male and partly 
 female, the female constituting his left side. 
 
 Then, again, this duality might have been evenly balanced, 
 or the preponderance of active energies might have been 
 assigned to the male side. The Hindus, however, in dividing 
 the divine nature into two halves, had no idea of any due co- 
 ordination of working power between man and woman. The 
 male side of the god was believed to relegate his more 
 onerous executive functions to the female. Hence the female 
 side of the personal god is often more propitiated than the 
 male, and the worshipper is inclined to turn with greater 
 devotion to the goddess than to the god when he supplicates 
 any powerful intervention on his own behalf in circumstances 
 of unusual exigency or peril. 
 
 The Kumarl-tantra says : ' The whole world is embodied 
 in the woman. One should be a woman one's self. Women 
 are gods. Women are vitality.' 
 
 This I believe to be the true theory of Saktism in its 
 simplest and most general aspect. It is a theory which is 
 certainly more closely connected with Saivism than with any 
 other system. Like Saivism, too, it traces back its origin to 
 philosophical Brahmanism, and through Brahmanism to the 
 earliest conceptions foreshadowed in the Veda. 
 
 Perhaps the first dawn of the idea of duality in unity is to 
 be found in the well-known 139th hymn of the loth Mandala 
 of the Rig-veda already quoted (p. 13). In that hymn we 
 find it stated that in the beginning when the universe was 
 about to be developed there arose in the One Being Desire 
 which produced Mind and all existing things (p. 29). 
 
 But the idea of a universe proceeding from a female prin- 
 ciple brought into union with a male is more fully developed 
 in other Vedic texts. 
 
1 82 Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 Probably Heaven (Dyaus) and Earth (Prithivi) are the 
 most ancient of all Vedic gods, and from their fancied union, 
 as husband and wife, the other deities and the whole Uni- 
 verse were at first supposed to spring. They are often de- 
 scribed as parents (janitrl, Rig-veda X. no. 9; pitara, III. 
 3. II ; matara, I. 155. 3). Or Heaven alone is called father 
 (pita) and Earth mother (mata). On the other hand, else- 
 where in the Veda the female deity Aditi— probably a 
 personification of the sky or of universal nature— seems to 
 stand alone, taking the place of both Heaven and Earth 
 as parent of the deities, her counterpart being Diti the 
 mother of the demons. Another important goddess in the 
 Rig-veda is the Dawn^ (Ushas, 'Hws), the Sky's daughter, 
 who is of course closely connected with the Sun-god ; biit 
 is not described as married to him, though followed by him, 
 as a mistress is pursued by her lover. 
 
 And here it may be noted as remarkable that the wives 
 of two chief Vedic gods, Indra and Agni (Indrani and 
 Agnayi), are not associated with their husbands or exalted 
 to equal rank as objects of worship. Nor is the popular 
 goddess Lakshml, afterwards wife of Vishnu, mentioned at 
 all in the Rig-veda ^. Nor is Sarasvati held to be the con- 
 sort of Brahma. She is rather a river-goddess, though often 
 invoked in other characters, and once associated with a 
 river-god Sarasvat (VII. 96. 4, 6). It is only when we come 
 to the Brahmanas and Upanishads that we find the duality 
 of the divine nature clearly enunciated. For example, in the 
 Satapatha-Brahmana (XIV. 4. 3. 4, etc.), before noticed, 
 and Brihad-aranyaka Upanishad (3) we read to the following 
 
 ' Sometimes spoken of as plural. 
 
 " Dr. Muir shows this (Sanskrit Texts, V. 337), and points out that 
 Lakshmi is once. used for good-fortune in Rig-veda X. 71. 2, and that in 
 Atharva-veda VII. 115. i a plurality of Lakshmls is spoken of. Five are 
 often mentioned. At Madura I noticed carvings of seven or eight different 
 Lakshmls who preside over different kinds of good-luck. They are often 
 found over the doors of houses. 
 
Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 183 
 
 effect: 'The One Being did not enjoy happiness when 
 alone. He was desirous of a second. He divided himself 
 into two. Hence were husband and wife produced. There- 
 fore was this (second) only a half of himself, as the half of 
 a split pea is.' It is then related how all beings were pro- 
 duced by the union of the divine male and divine female. 
 Saiikara, in his comment on the Upanishad, observes, in 
 relation to the above passage: 'Because this male half is 
 void as wanting the female half, therefore after taking a 
 wife it is completed by the female half, as a split pea is by 
 being joined with its other half (see Roer's translation). 
 
 If we pass on to Manu, we find that the Self-existent is 
 described as dividing his own substance and becoming half 
 male and half female (I. 5, etc. ; see p. 30). 
 
 Turning next to the Sankhya philosophical system; we 
 know that it teaches the separate existence of eternal Spirit 
 called ' the Self or ' Male' on the one side and of an eternal 
 productive force or prolific germ (Prakriti fem., or Maya) on 
 the other. The union of the two was believed to be indis- 
 pensable before any creation could result. 
 The Vedanta system is virtually very similar (see p. 37). 
 Of course ordinary thinkers gave a concrete reality to all 
 such metaphysical speculations. The Spirit — which was 
 called 'the Self (Atman) in one system and 'the Male' 
 (Purusha) in the other — became in the popular creed a sepa- 
 rate male god, while the productive prolific force became a 
 separate female god. The union of the two was expressed vcy 
 the later mythology by the Ardha-narl or androgynous form 
 of Siva — in which the right side of the god is represented 
 as male, and the left side as female (see p. 85) — or by the 
 united male and female symbols (Linga and Yoni) set up in 
 innumerable shrines throughout every part of India. (Com- 
 pare the union of Hermes and Aphrodite.) 
 
 The same doctrine is often repeated in the Puranas ; but 
 even in those writings it is to be noted that although they 
 
1 84 Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 often countenance and even promote Sakta views by making 
 the active power of the goddess a subject of special lauda- 
 tion, and by according greater honour to the female deity 
 (as for example in placing the goddess first in such com- 
 pounds as Lakshmi-Narayanau, Sita-Ramau, Radha-Krish- 
 nau *), yet no exclusive or extravagant worship of the goddess 
 is inculcated. 
 / It was reserved for the latest sacred writings called Tantras 
 (see p. ao5) to personify Energy or Force as a female deity, 
 and to teach an undue adoration of the wives of Siva and 
 
 V Vishnu to the neglect of their male counterparts. 
 
 Practically, as we shall see, the Saktism of the present day 
 is a mere offshoot of Saivism. It inculcates an exclusive 
 adoration of Siva's wife as the source of every kind of super- 
 natural faculty and mystic craft. This, in fact, is the central 
 '^ doctrine and leading idea of all Tantrik writings. For the 
 Tantras, believed as they are to be a direct revelation from 
 Siva to his wife ParvatI (p. 305), are the bible of Saktism, just 
 as the Puranas are the bible of ordinary Saivism and Vaish- 
 
 V navism. That they are regarded by some as of equal 
 authority with the Puranas, and even as a kind of secondary 
 revelation, is evident from a passage in Kulluka's commen- 
 tary on Manu II. 1. There he asserts that divine truth is of 
 two kinds — ' that revealed in the Vedas and that found in the 
 Tantras.' It is even alleged that Sankaradarya was a Sakta. 
 
 Unhappily a vast proportion of the inhabitants of India, 
 especially in Bengal, are guided in their daily life and practices 
 by Tantrik teaching, and are in bondage to the doctrines in- 
 culcated in these writings. 
 
 It is noteworthy, too, that the system is closely connected 
 with the mysticism of the Yoga philosophy and with the cor- 
 rupt forms of Buddhism prevalent in Tibet (see my volume 
 
 ^ According to a Varttika on Panini II. 2, 34 (Kasika Vritti) the 
 more honourable should stand first in a compound, as in Mata-pitaiau, 
 Sraddha-medhe, Brahmana-Kshatriya-Vit-Sudrat. 
 
Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 185 
 
 on Buddhism, p. 223). Its demoralizing effect on the life and 
 conduct of the HindOs cannot be doubted. 
 
 And indeed it can scarcely be doubted that Saktism is 
 Hinduism arrived at its worst and most corrupt stage of 
 development. To follow out the whole process of evolution , 
 would not be easy. Suffice it to say thatj just as Hinduism 
 resolved itself into two great systems — Saivism and Vaish- 
 navism — so the adherents of those two systems respectively 
 separated into two great classes. The first are now called 
 ' followers of the right-hand path ' (Dakshina-margis). These 
 make the Puranas their real Veda (Nigama), and are devoted 
 to either Siva or Vishnu in their double nature as male and 
 female. But they do not display undue preference for the 
 female or left-hand side of the deity ; nor are they addicted 
 to mystic or secret rites. The second class are called ' fol- 
 lowers of the left-hand path ' (Vama-margis). These make the 
 Tantras their peculiar Veda (Agama), tracing back their doc- 
 trines to the Kaula Upanishad, which is held to be the original 
 authority for their opinions ; whence their system is called 
 Kaula, as well as Sakta, and they themselves Kaulikas. 
 
 And it is these left-hand worshippers who, I repeat, devote 
 themselves to the exclusive worship of the female side of Siva 
 and Vishnu ^ ; that is, to the goddess Durga or Kali ( — Amba, 
 Devi) rather than to Siva ; to Radha rather than to Krishna ; 
 to Sita rather than to Rama ; but above all to Amba or 
 Devi, the mother-goddess, sometimes confounded with Siva's 
 consort, but rather, in her more comprehensive character, the 
 great Power (Sakti) of Nature, the one Mother of the 
 Universe (Jagan-mata, Jagad-amba) — the mighty mysterious 
 Force, whose function is to direct and control two quite 
 distinct operations ; namely, first, the working of the natural 
 appetites and passions, whether for the support of the body 
 
 * The wives of the deities are generally placed on their left. The only 
 exception is in representations of the marriage ceremony. On that occasion 
 the bride takes her station on the right of the bridegroom. 
 
1 86 Sdktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 by eating and drinking, or for the propagation of living organ- 
 isms through sexual cohabitation ; secondly, the acquisition 
 of supernatural faculties (siddhi), whether for a man's own in- 
 dividual exaltation or for the annihilation of his opponents. 
 
 And here it is necessary to observe that the Sakta form of 
 Hinduism is equipped with a vast mythological Personnel of 
 its own — an immense array of female personalities, consti- 
 tuting a distinct division of the Hindu Pantheon. 
 
 Yet the whole array, spreading out as it does into count- 
 less ramifications, has its root in the wife of Siva. By 
 common consent she is held to be the source or first point 
 of departure of the entire female mythological system. She 
 also stands at its head ; and it is remarkable that in every 
 one of the male god Siva's characteristics, his consort is not 
 only his counterpart, but a representation of all his attributes 
 intensified. We haVe already pointed out (pp. 76-78) how 
 it came to pass that the male god gradually gathered under 
 his own personality the attributes and functions of all other 
 divinities, and thus became to his own special worshippers 
 the great god (Maha-devah) of Hinduism ^- Similarly and in 
 a much greater degree did his female counterpart become the 
 one great goddess (Maha-devI) of the Sakta hierarchy; re- 
 presenting in her own person all other female manifestations 
 of Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, and absorbing all their func- 
 tions. For this reason even the wives of Brahma and Vishnu 
 were said to be her daughters. As to the contradictory 
 qualities attributed to her, these are no source of difficulty 
 to a Hindu mind. She is simply in all respects a duplicate 
 of her husband, painted in deeper or more vivid colours. 
 
 And just as Siva (p. 80) is at one time white (Sveta, sukla) 
 both in complexion and character, at another black (Kala) ; 
 so his female nature also became one half white (whence her 
 name Gaurl) and the other half black (whence her name Kali). 
 
 ^ At Pokhar and on the road to Amber in Rajputana I passed two tem- 
 ples where the Liiiga of Siva has four faces and is worshipped as Brahma. 
 
Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 187 
 
 Then,, again, each of these opposite characters became 
 variously modified and endlessly multiplied. The white or 
 mild nature ramified into the Saktis called Uma, GaurT, 
 Lakshml, Sarasvati, etc. ; the black or fierce nature into 
 those called Kali, Durga, Candi, (^amunda, etc. And just 
 as Siva has ioo8 names or epithets, so his wife possesses a 
 feminine duplicate of nearly every one of his designations. 
 At least one thousand distinct appellations are assigned to 
 her, some expressive of her benignant, some of her ferocious "^ 
 character. Notably it is declared in the Tantras that if any 
 one repeats eight of her names containing the letter m, kings 
 will become his servants, all men will love him, and all his 
 diificulties come to a happy termination. 
 
 In short, all the other Saktis came to be included by the 
 Saktas under the Sakti or female energy of Siva, which eventu- 
 ally developed into innumerable separate personifications. 
 
 These personifications, following the analogy of some of 
 Vishnu's incarnations, are sometimes grouped according to a 
 supposed difference of participation in the divine energy, such 
 for example as the full energy (purna sakti), the partial (ansa- 
 rupini), the still more partial (kala-rupini), and the partial of 
 the partial (kalansa-rupini), this last including mortal women 
 in various degrees, from Brahman women downwards, who are 
 all worshipped as forms of the divine mother manifesting 
 herself upon earth ; for it must not be forgotten that in the , 
 Sakta creed every female is a present divinity. 
 
 The more usual classification, however, begins with the 
 Maha-vidyas. These are held to be ten in number, that 
 number being probably selected to match the ten chief in- 
 carnations of Vishnu. They are called Maha-vidyas as sources 
 of the goddess's highest knowledge ; that is to say, of the 
 knowledge which confers preternatural powers. They have 
 all different attributes, and are thus designated:^!. Kali 
 (sometimes called Syama), black in colour, fierce and irascible 
 in character. 2. Tara, a more benign manifestation, worshipped 
 
1 88 Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 especially in Kasmir. 3. Shodasi, a beautiful girl of sixteen 
 (also called Tripura, worshipped in Malabar). 4. Bhuvanesvarl. 
 5. Bhairavl. 6. (fhinna-mastaka, a naked goddess holding in 
 one hand a blood-stained scimitar and in the other her own 
 severed head, which drinks the warm blood gushing from 
 her headless trunk. 7. Dhumavati. 8. Vagala or Bagala or 
 Bagala-mukhl. 9. MatangT, ' a woman of the Bhangi caste.' 
 10. Kamalatmika or Kamala. Of these the first two are 
 especially Maha-vidyas, the next five Vidyas, and the last 
 three Siddha-vidyas. 
 
 The next class of personifications or manifestations of the 
 goddess are the Matris or Matrikas (or Maha-matris), the great 
 mothers of the Universe. These are more important than the 
 Maha-vidyas in their connexion with the prevalence of Mother- 
 worship, a form of religion which, among the peasantry of 
 India, often takes the place of every other creed. This will be 
 more fully explained in the chapter on tutelary deities (p. 209). 
 
 The Matris or Mothers are — i. Vaishnavi. 2. Brahml or 
 BrahmanI, often represented with four faces or heads like the 
 god Brahma. 3. Karttikeyi, sometimes called Mayurl. 4. 
 IndranT. 5. Yami. 6. Varahl, connected with the boar in- 
 carnation of Vishnu. 7. Devi or IsanI, represented with a 
 trident in one hand as wife of Siva. 8. Lakshmi^. Each of 
 these divine Mothers is represented with a child in her lap. 
 
 Closely related to the Mothers is a class of female personi- 
 fications called the eight Nayikas or mistresses. These, of 
 course, are not necessarily mothers. In fact no other idea is 
 connected with them than that of illegitimate sexual love. 
 They are called Balini, Kamesvari, Vimala, Aruna, Medin!, 
 JayinT, Sarvesvarl, and Kaulesl. 
 
 Another class of manifestations is that of the Yoginls. 
 
 ^ Some lists give nine Matrikas (viz. i. Narasinhi ; 2. (famunda; 3. 
 Varahl; 4. Varuni; J. Lakshml; 6. Kali; 7. Kapali; 8. Kurukulya ; 9. 
 Indrani), some sixteen, and some fifty-two, among vi'hom are enumerated 
 Narayani, Kaumari, Aparajita, Durga, Mahesvari, etc. 
 
Saktism, or Goddess-worship. igo 
 
 These are sometimes represented as eight fairies or sorceresses 
 created by and attendant on Durga, sometimes as mere forms 
 of that goddess, sixty or sixty-five in number, and capable of 
 being multiplied to the number of ten millions. 
 
 Other classes not worth enumerating are the Dakinis and 
 Sakinis. These are simply female fiends or ogresses of most 
 repulsive habits, and are not so much manifestations of the 
 goddess as impish servants always attendant on her. 
 
 But it is in the form Kali — the form under which the 
 goddess is worshipped at Calcutta— that she is most terrible. 
 
 The following is a free translation of two passages in the 
 Tantras descriptive of Kali's appearance ^ : — 
 
 'One should adore with liquors and oblations that Kali 
 who has a terrible gaping mouth and uncombed hair ; who 
 has four hands and a garland formed of the heads of the 
 demons whom she has slain and whose blood she has drunk ; 
 who holds a sword in her lotus-like hand ; who is fearless 
 and awards blessings ; who is as black as the large clouds 
 and has the whole sky for her clothes ; who has a string 
 of skulls round her neck and a throat besmeared with blood ; 
 who wears ear-rings (consisting of two dead bodies); who 
 carrries two dead bodies in her hands ; who has terrible teeth 
 and a smiling face ; whose form is awful and who dwells in 
 burning-grounds (for consuming corpses) ; who stands on the 
 breast of her husband Maha-deva ^.' 
 
 ' A Kaulika (i. e. a Sakta) should worship Kali, who lives 
 amongst dead bodies ; who is terrible and has fearful jaws ; 
 who has uncombed hair and a glowing tongue ; who constantly 
 drinks blood ; who stands over her husband Maha-kala ^ and 
 
 ' All my extracts from the Tantras are taken from the Hon. Rao Bahadur 
 Gopal Hari Deshmukh's work called Agama-prakasa, where the original 
 Sanskrit of all the passages quoted in this chapter will be found. 
 
 ''■ The images of Kali at Calcutta represent her trampling on her 
 husband. The explanation of this is that she had a contest with the 
 thousand-headed Ravana (whose story is told in the Adbhuta-Ramayana) 
 for ten years, and, having conquered him, became so elated and danced so 
 
I90 Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 wears a garland of skulls on her blood-besmeared throat ; who 
 has prominent breasts ; who is waited on by all the Siddhas 
 as well as by the Siddhls.' 
 
 It is this goddess who thirsts for blood, and especially for 
 human blood ; and if the blood of animals is not oiifered to her, 
 she takes that of men. In one of the Tantras kings are 
 directed to appease her by blood and even by human sacriiice 
 (nara-bali). The blood of a tiger is said to satisfy her for 
 100 years, and that of a man for looo years. 
 
 It might have been expected that a creed like this, which 
 admits of an infinite multiplication of female deities and 
 makes every woman an object of worship, would be likely to 
 degenerate into various forms of licentiousness on the one 
 hand and of witchcraft on the other. But if such consequences 
 might have been anticipated, the actual fact has been worse 
 than the most gloomy pessimist could possibly have foretold^ 
 In Saktism we are confronted with the worst results of the 
 worst superstitious ideas that have ever disgraced and degraded 
 the human race. It is by offering to women the so-called 
 homage of sensual love and carnal passion \ and by yielding 
 free course to all the grosser appetites, wholly regardless of 
 social rules and restrictions, that the worshippers of the female 
 power (Sakti) in Nature seek to gratify the goddess represent- 
 ing that power, and through her aid to acquire supernatural 
 faculties, and even ultimately to obtain union with the Supreme 
 Being. Incredible as it may appear, these so-called worship- 
 pers actually affect to pride themselves on their debasing 
 doctrines, while they maintain that their creed is the grandest 
 
 energetically that the Universe would have collapsed under her movements 
 had not Siva mercifully interposed his body. When the goddess found 
 that she was treading on her husband's sacred person, she suddenly ceased 
 dancing, and, as is not unusual with Hindu women when struck with horror 
 or shame, protruded her red tongue in a manner not altogether consonant 
 with European ideas of womanly dignity. 
 
 ^ The Tantras make no secret of the fact that the virile retas itself is 
 regarded as the offering most pleasing to the goddess. 
 
Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 191 
 
 of all religions, because to indulge the grosser appetites and 
 passions, with the mind fixed on union with the Supreme 
 Being, is believed to be the highest of all pious achievements. 
 Indeed, according to the distorted ideas and perverted phrase- 
 ology of the sect, all who are uninitiated into this system are 
 styled ' beasts ' (pasu i), the initiated being called Siddha, ' the 
 perfect ones.' 
 
 The rite of initiation (Diksha) must be perforrhed by a proper 
 Guru or teacher, who does little more than impart a know- 
 ledge (upadesa) of certain mystic texts and syllables to the 
 candidate, but the rite ought never to take place unless moon, 
 planets, and stars are favourable. If a pupil can be initiated 
 during the occurrence of a solar eclipse wonderful advantages 
 may be expected to accrue to both teacher and taught. 
 
 Of course, the principal rites, or rather orgies, of Sakta wor- 
 shippers take place in secret and with closed doors. This secrecy 
 is strictly in accordance with Tantrik precept. Thus, we read : — 
 
 ' One should not practise the Kaula system in the presence 
 of the uninitiated (Pasus or beasts), any more than one should 
 recite the Veda in the presence of a Sudra. 
 
 ' One should guard the Kaula system from the Pasus just as 
 one guards money and grain and clothes from thieves. 
 
 ' One should conceal the Kaula system like the water in the 
 cocoa-nut ; one should be a Kaula internally, a Saiva ex- 
 ternally, and a Vaishnava when talking at public meetings. 
 
 'The Vedas, the Sastras, and the Puranas are clearly like a 
 common woman (open to all), but this mystical Saiva science 
 is like a high-born woman (kept secluded).' 
 
 Hence no one who has been initiated into the practices of 
 the sect can be persuaded to speak of them to the uninitiated. 
 Probably the spread of education and the influence exercised 
 by Christian men and women throughout India are gradually 
 operating to abolish all the grosser forms of Saktism, as they 
 
 ' Another name for an uninitiated person is Kantaka, ' a thorn.' 
 
192 Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 have already helped to do away with SatT, female infanticide, 
 human sacrifices, and other monstrous evils. Still it is well 
 known that even in the present day, on particular occasions, 
 the adherents of the sect go through the whole ceremonial in 
 all its revolting entirety. When such occasions occur, a circle 
 is formed composed of men and women seated side by side 
 without respect of caste or relationship ^. Males and females 
 are held for the particular occasion to be forms of Siva and 
 his wife respectively, in conformity with the doctrine pro- 
 pounded in one of the Tantras, where Siva addressing his wife 
 says : ' All men have my form and all women thy form ; 
 any one who recognizes any distinction of caste in the mystic 
 circle (Cakra) has a foolish soul.' 
 
 The actual performance of the ceremonial then follows. It 
 consists of five separate actions : — i. The drinking of wine and 
 liquors of various kinds (madya) ; %. the eating of meat 
 (mansa) ; 3. the eating of fish (matsya) ; 4, the eating of 
 parched or fried grain (mudra) ; 5. sexual union (maithuna)^. 
 
 With regard to the first four of these acts the Tantras 
 prescribe twelve sorts of liquors, three sorts of wine, and three 
 sorts of meat. Pulastya, one of the ancient sages who are the 
 supposed authors of certain law-books, also enumerates twelve 
 kinds of liquors as follow : — i. liquor extracted from the 
 bread-fruit (panasa), called Jack-liquor; 3. from grapes 
 (draksha) ; 3. from date-palm (kharjuri) ; 4. from common 
 palm (tall), or toddy; 5. from cocoa-nut (harikela) ; 6. from 
 
 ' The verse cited as the authority for the temporary suppression of 
 caste at these meetings is as follows : — Prapte hi Bhairave dakre sarve 
 varna dvijatayati Nivritte Bhairave dakre sarve varna^ prithak prithak. 
 ' On entering the circle of Bhairava, all castes are on an equality with 
 the best of the twice-born ; on leaving it, they are again separated 
 into castes.' 
 
 ''■ The five acts are called the five Ma-karas, because the letter M 
 begins each Sanskrit word. ' The assemblage of five things beginning 
 with the letter M,' says one of the Tantras, ' satisfies the gods.' 
 
 The term Mudra, which here means 'fried grain,' is also used to denote 
 mystical intertwinings of the fingers. 
 
Saktism, or Goddess-worship.' 193 
 
 sugar-cane (ikshu) ; 7. from the Madhvika plant; 8, long- 
 pepper liquor (saira) ; 9. soap-berry liquor (arishta) ; 10. liquor 
 from the Bassia Latifolia (madhuka) ; 11. a kind of rum or 
 liquor prepared from molasses, etc. (called GaudI, or some- 
 times Maireya); la. arrack, or liquor prepared from rice or 
 other grain (sura, or varum, or paishti). 
 
 Besides the above twelve kinds of spirituous drink others 
 are frequently mentioned ; for example, Tanka, made from 
 wood-apple ; Koll, made from the jujube ; and Kadambari ; 
 the last being the favourite beverage of Bala-rama. 
 
 The meat may be that of birds, beasts, or fish. The 
 parched grain is eaten, like dry biscuit, as a relish with the 
 wine and spirituous liquors. The drinking of each kind of 
 drink is supposed to be attended with its own peculiar merit 
 and advantage. Thus one liquor gives salvation, another 
 learning, another power, another wealth, another destroys 
 enemies, another cures diseases, another removes sin, another 
 purifies the soul. 
 
 The Matrika-bheda Tantra (quoted by Dr. Rajendralala 
 Mitra) makes Siva address his own wife thus : — ' O sweet- 
 speaking goddess, the salvation of Brahmans depends, on 
 drinking wine. I impart to you a great truth, O mountain- 
 born, when I say that the Brahman who devotes himself to 
 drinking and its accompaniments, forthwith becomes a Siva. 
 Even as water mixes with water, and metal blends with 
 metal ; even as the confined space in a pitcher merges into 
 the great body of surrounding space on the destruction of the 
 confining vessel, and air mingles with air, so does a Brahman 
 melt into Brahma, the universal Soul. 
 
 'There is not the least doubt about this. Likeness to 
 the divinity and other forms of beatitude are designed for 
 Kshatriyas and others; but true knowledge can never be 
 acquired without drinking spirituous liquor ; therefore should 
 Brahmans always drink. No one becomes a Brahman by 
 repeating the Gayatrl, the mother of the Vedas ; he is called 
 
 O 
 
194 Sdktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 a Brahman only when he has knowledge of Brahma. The 
 ambrosia of the gods is their Brahma, and on earth it is 
 arrack (or liquor distilled from rice) ; and because one attains 
 through it the condition of a god (suratva), therefore is that 
 liquor called sura.' 
 
 It is not surprising, therefore, that in Bengal some respect- 
 able mothers of families, who believe the above passage 
 to be a direct revelation from Siva and who would not dream 
 of drinking spirits for their own gratification, never say their 
 prayers without touching their tongues with a pointed instru- 
 ment dipped in arrack, and never offer flowers to their god 
 without sprinkling them with a few drops of that liquor.. 
 
 In short, the drinking of spirituous liquor is as much an 
 essential part of the Sakta ceremonial as the drinking of Soma 
 juice was of the Vedic sacrifices, and the drinking of arrack 
 (sura) was of the Sautramani and Vajapeya and other sacri- 
 ficial rites. Indeed these ancient rites are appealed to in 
 the Tantras as a justification for the Sakta practice. 
 
 Nor can there be any doubt that at one time the drinking 
 of wine and spirituous liquors was prevalent all over India^ 
 
 ^ This is well shown by Rajendralala Mitra in one of his Essays on the 
 Indo-Aryans. The reason given for the cessation of the custom of wine- 
 drinking among the Hindus is that wine and spirituous liquors were on 
 two particular occasions cursed by the gods Sukra and Krishna. The 
 cause of Sukra's curse is related in the First Book of the Mahabharata 
 (ch. j6)._ It appears that Kada, son of Vrihaspati, had become a pupil of 
 Sukra Acarya with a view to learn from him the charm (mantra) for 
 restoring dead men to life, which none else knew. The Asuras came to 
 know of this, and, dreading lest the pupil should obtain, and afterwards 
 impart, the great secret to the Devas, assassinated him, and mixed his 
 ashes with_the wine drunk by his tutor, thus transferring him to the bowels 
 of Sukra Acarya. It happened, however, that during his pupilage Kaia 
 had_ won the affection of Deva-yani, the youthful and charming daughter 
 of Sukra Adarya, and that lady insisted upon her father's restoring the 
 youth to her, threatening to commit suicide if the request was not granted. 
 Sukra, unable to deny any favour to his daughter, repeated the charm, 
 and forthwith, to his surprise, found the youth speaking from his own 
 stomach. The difficulty was now to bring the youth out, for this could 
 not be accomplished without ripping open his tutor's abdomen. Sukra 
 
Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 195 
 
 Some of the gods were supposed to set the example — notably 
 Siva^ with his wife Durga, and Balarama elder brother of 
 Krishna with his wife RevatI— and we find that one of the 
 products of the ocean when churned by the gods and demons 
 was Sura, or spirit distilled from rice, and that one of the 
 seven seas encircling the earth was believed to be composed 
 entirely of that liquor 2. Drunkenness in fact became such " 
 an evil that to remedy it a kind of temperance movement 
 appears to have been eventually organized, leading to a 
 complete reaction to the other extreme of total abstinence. 
 Hence we find that in Manu's time the penalty for drinking 
 spirits was to commit suicide by drinking them when in a 
 boiling state (XI. 91). 
 
 In the same way the eating of meat was once universal in 
 India ; cows were sacrificed * and the flesh eaten, especially at 
 Sraddhas, where the aroma of beef was thought to be an 
 excellent aliment for the spirits of the dead. Manu allows 
 all sorts of animal food to be eaten, provided that small 
 portions are first offered to the gods and to the spirits of 
 
 Adarya thereupon taught the youth the great charm, and then allowed 
 himself to be ripped open, and Kaca, in grateful acknowledgment for his 
 own restoration to life, immediately repeated the Mantra and resuscitated 
 his tutor. But Sukra Adarya, seeing that it was spirituous liquor which 
 had made him swallow the ashes of his pupil, and that pupil a Brahman, 
 prohibited for ever afterwards the use of any kind of strong drink by 
 Brahmans. 'From this day forward,' said he, 'the Brahman, who, 
 through infatuation, drinks arrack (sura) shall lose all his religious merit. 
 The wretch shall be considered guilty of the sin of killing Brahmans, and 
 be condemned in this as well as in a future world.' 
 
 With regard to the curse pronounced by Krishna on all spirituous liquor, 
 the reason assigned for it is that his kinsmen the Yadavas had brought 
 great trouble on themselves by their potations. 
 
 ^ It is said that even in the present day if is not uncommon for the ad- 
 herents of the Sakta sect to sprinkle spirituous liquor instead of water on 
 the linga of Siva. 
 
 '^ See Vishnu-purana. 
 
 ^ The Taittiriya-brahmana mentions various ceremonies at which 
 cattle had to be sacrificed. All this is well shown by Dr. Rajendralala 
 Mitra. 
 
 o a 
 
196 Saktism, or Goddess-worship. 
 
 departed ancestors (V. 32) ; aiid Valmiki, when he entertained 
 Vasishtha at his hermitage (as described in the Uttara-Rama- 
 'earitra), regaled him with the 'fatted calf.' The Saktas, 
 therefore, have good ground for asserting that, in drinking 
 wine and eating meat, they are merely reverting to the prac- 
 tice of their ancestors. Yet it is curious that they think it 
 necessary to go through the form of neutralizing the curse 
 of the great Sukra A(iarya (see note, p. 194) before beginning 
 their potations. This they do by repeating three particular 
 Mantras and certain magical formulae, after drawing a triangle 
 on the ground with the finger dipped in spirituous liquor. 
 
 The fifth act of the Sakta ceremonial— the union of the 
 actual man and woman — is held to be the most important of 
 all' In the minds of some it is supposed to symbolize a great 
 eosmical mystery — the production of the universe through 
 the union of Purusha and Prakriti (see pp. 30^ 31)— a mystery 
 constantly kept before the mind by the worship of the two 
 stone symbols Liriga and Yoni. 
 
 ' The only salvation,' says a Tantra, ' is that which results 
 from spirituous liquOrs, meat, and cohabitation with women,' 
 
 The holy circle (sri-cakra) or meeting of the members of the 
 sect on solemn occasions (represented by a mystical diagram) 
 is said to be ' the door to the highest form of salvation — com- 
 plete union with the Supreme Being (sayujya-mukti, p. 41).' 
 
 These circles are of different kinds according to the differ- 
 ence in the rank, character, and occupation of the women 
 (saktis) present at them. Thus there is the Vlra-dakra ; then 
 the Maha-cakra, the Deva-dakra, the Raja-cakra, etc. 
 
 It is to be observed, however, that all the five acts we have 
 described do not necessarily take place at every meeting. 
 
 Moreover, besides the five so-called ceremonial acts per- 
 formed by Saktas at their secret meetings, there are six other 
 methods of propitiating the goddess with a view to acquire 
 superhuman powers (siddhi) — namely, by the use of Mantras,, 
 Bljas (or Vljas), Yantras, Kavadas, Nyasas, Mudras. 
 
Mantras and Btj as. 197 
 
 The subject of the employment of Mantras or sacred texts, 
 their use, misuse, and prostitution to the worst purposes, is one 
 of the greatest interest and importance in its bearing on the 
 past and present religious condition of the Hindus. 
 
 A Mantra, as most persons know, is properly a divinely 
 inspired Vedic text, but with the Saktas, and indeed with the 
 great mass of the Hindus in the present day, it loses this 
 character and becomes a mere spell or charm. Even though , 
 the text be taken from the Rig, Yajur or Atharva-veda (p. 8), 
 and be generally employed as a prayer or invocation with 
 a definite meaning and application attached to the words, 
 it becomes with the Saktas a mere collection of magical 
 letters and sounds, which, if properly uttered and repeated 
 according to prescribed formularies, possesses in itself a 
 mystical power capable of causing every conceivable good 
 to one's self or evil to one's enemies. 
 
 The Bijas, again, are mystical letters or syllables invented 
 for the sake of brevity to denote the root (mula) or essential 
 part of such Mantras, or the name of the deity to whom it 
 may be addressed, or some part of the body over which that 
 deity presides. For example: — Am is said to denote Siva,/ 
 U Vishnu, Hrim the sun. Lam the earth. Nam the mind, 
 Dham both the goddess Bhuvanesvari and the tongue. Nam 
 both the goddess Anna-purna and the nose, Pam the ear, etc. 
 
 Perhaps the following abridgment of a passage from a little 
 
 work by Pratapa-dandra Ghosha, descriptive of the worship of 
 
 Durga (Durga-puja) in Bengal, and giving directions for the 
 
 performance of a preparatory rite called Bhuta-suddhi, 
 
 ' removal of evil demons,' will give the best idea of the uses 
 
 to which the Bijas are applied : — 
 
 Holding a scented flower, anointed with sandal, on the left temple, 
 repeat Om to the Gurus, Om to Ganesa, Om to Durga. Then with Om 
 phat rub the palms with flowers, and clasp the hands thrice over the head, 
 and by snapping the fingers towards ten different directions, secure im- 
 munity from the evil spirits. Next utter the Mantra Ram, sprmkle water 
 all around, and imagine this water as a wall of fire. Let the priest identify 
 
198 Mantras and Bijas. 
 
 himself with the living spirit (jlvatman) abiding in man's breast, in the 
 form of the tapering flame of a lamp, and conduct it by means of the 
 Sushumna nerve through the six spheres within the body upwards to the 
 Divine Spirit. Then meditate on the twenty-four essences in nature; 
 viz. the Producer, Intellect, Egoism, the five subtle and five gross ele- 
 ments, the five external orgaiis of sense, the five organs of action, with 
 mind. Conceive in the left nostril the Mantra Yam, declared to be 
 the Bija or root of wind ; repeat it sixteen times while drawing air by 
 the same nostril ; then close the nose and hold the breath, and repeat the 
 Mantra sixty-four times. 
 
 Then meditate on the Matrika, and say, ' Help me, goddess of speech : ' 
 Am to the forehead, Am to the mouth, /m to the right eye, Im to the 
 left eye, Um to the right ear, Um to the left ear, Im to the right cheek, Im 
 to the left cheek, ^tm to the right nostril, ^tm to the left nostril, Lrim to 
 the right cheek, Lnm to the left cheek, Em to the upper lip, Aim to the 
 lower lip, Om to the upper teeth, Aum to the lower teeth. Tarn, Tham, 
 Dam, Dham, and Natn to the several parts of the left leg, Pam to the 
 right side, Pham to the left. Bam to the back, Mam to the stomach, Yam 
 to the heart. Ram to the right shoulder. Lam to the neck-bone, Vam to 
 the left shoulder, Sam from the heart to the right leg. Ham from the 
 heart to the left leg, Ksham from the heart to the mouth. 
 
 To US it may seem extraordinary that intelligent persons 
 can give credence to such absurdities, or lend themselves to 
 the practice of superstitions so senseless ; but we must bear 
 in mind that with many Hindu thinkers the notion of the 
 eternity of sound — as propounded in Patanjali's Mahabhashya 
 (I. I. i) and in the Purva-mimansa of Jaimini — is by no 
 means an irrational doctrine. According to the well-known 
 Mimansa aphorisms (I. i. 18-23), sound is held to have 
 existed from the beginning. Hence the letters of the alphabet, 
 being the ultimate instruments by which sounds are uttered 
 and thoughts expressed, are considered to possess supernatural 
 qualities and attributes and to contain within themselves an 
 occult magical efficacy. 
 
 Let a man only acquaint himself with the proper pronun- 
 ciation and application both of the Mantras and of their Bijas 
 or radical letters, and he may thereby propitiate the Saktis so 
 as to acquire through them superhuman power (siddhi)— nay, 
 he becomes, through their aid, competent to accomplish every 
 conceivable object. 
 
Mantras and Btjas. 199 
 
 At the same time it is to be observed that for any ordinary- 
 man to make himself conversant with the Mantras is no easy 
 task ; if at least we are to believe a statement in the Tantras 
 that the primary Mantras are seventy millions ^ in number, 
 while the secondary are innumerable. 
 
 This, no doubt, is an absurd exaggeration ; but it must be 
 borne in mind that only a certain number are regarded as 
 efficacious, and that in the present day there are Brahmans 
 called Mantra-sastris who make a knowledge of these Mantras 
 their peculiar business, learning them by heart with the sole 
 object of using them as spells and charms. Only a few, how- 
 ever, are believed to have acquired perfect mastery over the 
 most powerful Mantras, which must be pronounced according 
 to certain mystic forms and with absolute accuracy, or their 
 efficacy is destroyed. Indeed, this kind of craft, though 
 supposed to endow the possessor of it with very enviable 
 omnipotence, is not unattended with unpleasant risks and 
 drawbacks ; for if in the repetition of a Mantra the slightest 
 mistake is made, either by omission of a syllable or de- 
 fective pronunciation, the calamity which it was intended to 
 bring down on an enemy will inevitably recoil on the head of 
 the repeater. Then, again, there are various methods of ob- 
 structing or neutralizing the effect of Mantras used by Mantra- 
 sastris for the destruction or humiliation of others. The 
 difficulty, of course, is to find out the exact Mantra which is 
 being employed for one's injury; but, having done so, every 
 such Mantra is rendered powerless by uttering it with one's 
 face bending over a vessel full of milk and then swallowing 
 the milk, or by writing it on the leaf of a banian tree and 
 throwing the leaf into a river ^. 
 
 It must be noted, too, that Mantras are not always repeated 
 without a knowledge of their meaning, though the meaning is 
 
 ^ The same number is given in the Saiva-darsana of Madhava's Sarva- 
 darsana-sangraha. 
 " Full directions are given in the Tantra-sara. 
 
200 Mantras and Btjas. 
 
 .of little importance compared with the magical force of the 
 letter and sound. Their efficacy also is greatly increased if 
 they are employed on lucky days or at particular times and 
 seasons. One Tantra teaches that Mantras should be repeated 
 in the month daitra to give valour ; in Vaisakha to obtain 
 jewels ; in Magha for intelligence ; on Sundays for wealth ; 
 on Mondays for tranquillity; on Tuesdays for long life, and 
 so on. The intercalary month ought always to be avoided ^ 
 A few translations of common Mantras ^ are here given : — 
 
 ' Cause stupefaction (stambhana) of the enemy, paralyze his 
 mouth and tongue ; confuse his senses, arrest his speech.' 
 
 ' Om — reverence to the Lord — svaha. Let everything be 
 auspicious ; let everything opposed to me perish ; let every- 
 thing be favourable.' 
 
 ' Let Brahmani, Mahesvarl, Kaumari, Indrani, Camunda, 
 Varahi, and Vaishnavi protect my head, mouth, neck, hands, 
 heart, waist and feet, together with my whole body; protect 
 me, O great goddess, Bhadra-Kall.' This Mantra is worn as 
 a kavaca or amulet ; see p. 304. 
 
 ' I invoke Bhavani, accompanied by her husband, attended 
 by her subordinates, by her retinue, by her power (sa-saktika), 
 by her vehicle, by her weapons, and by all defensive things.' 
 
 ' Salutation to the god of love (Kama-deva) with his five 
 arrows : — the arrow that puts to flight (dravana-bana) ; the 
 arrow that enchants (sammohana) ; the arrow that fascinates 
 (vaslkarana) ; the love-kindling arrow (sandlpana) ; the love- 
 inflaming arrow (santapana).' 
 
 The Gayatri or holiest text of the Rig-veda (see p. 19) is of 
 course the most potent of all Mantras. It is not surprising, 
 therefore, that many Mantras employed by the Saktas are 
 composed after the model of that text. The following are 
 translations of Gayatri Mantras :^- 
 
 ' The Tantra-sara gives full directions on this subject. 
 " The original Sanskrit text of these, as of all _the extracts from the 
 Tantras, will be found in.Gopal Hari Deshmukh's Agama-prakasa. 
 
Mantras and Bljas. 20 r 
 
 'We meditate on that being who has ashes for weapons; 
 we think of that being who possesses sharp teeth; let 
 our fever (jvara) incite him.' This is called the fever- 
 gayatrl. 
 
 'We meditate on the goddess of nectar; we think of the 
 goddess of love (Kamesvarl) ; let our affection incite him.' 
 This is called the nectar-gayatrl. 
 
 'We meditate on the lord of water (Jalesvara) ; we think 
 of the fish-net ; let the fish (mlna) incite him.' This is called 
 the fish-gayatrl. 
 
 ' We meditate on that being who has a snare for snaring 
 animals ; we think of the act of cutting off the victim's head 
 (Siras-(5heda) ; let our offering (ball) incite him.' This is called 
 the bali-gayatri. 
 
 No magician, wizard, sorcerer or witch whose feats are re- 
 corded in history, biography, or fable, has ever pretended to 
 be able to accomplish by incantation and enchantment half of 
 what the Mantra-sastrl claims to have power to effect by help ■ 
 of his Mantras. For example, he can prognosticate futurity, 
 work the most startling prodigies, infuse breath into dead 
 bodies, kill or humiliate enemies, afflict any one anywhere 
 with disease or madness, inspire any one with love, charm 
 weapons and give them unerring efficacy ^^ enchant armour 
 and make it impenetrable, turn milk into wine, plants into 
 meat, or invert all such processes at will. He is even superior 
 to the gods, and can make gods, goddesses, imps and demons 
 carry out his most trifling behests. Hence it is not surprising 
 that the following remarkable saying is everywhere current 
 throughout India : — 
 ' The whole universe is subject to the gods ; the gods are 
 
 ^ Warlike weapons when thus charmed were supposed to possess super- 
 natural powers, and to assume a kind of divine personality like the genii 
 of the Arabian Nights. Certain spells had to be learnt for their restraint 
 as well as for their use. When once let loose, he only who knew the secret 
 Mantra for recalling them could bring them back. 
 
202 Mantras and Btjas. 
 
 subject to the Mantras ; the Mantras to the BrShmans ; there- 
 fore the Brahmans are our gods ^.' 
 
 Often these Mantra-sastrls are mere fortune-tellers. 
 
 I may mention as an illustration that a Sakta Brahman of 
 this type came to see me one day at Patna. He asked to 
 look at my hand, and, after examining it for a minute, prophe- 
 sied that my stay in India would be happy and prosperous, 
 except that on that day fortnight I should meet with a great 
 disappointment. I smiled at the absurdity of his attempting 
 to forecast my future biography, but it is certain that I only 
 met with one unexpected and most mortifying contretemps 
 from the day of my departure from England to the day of my 
 return, and that happened on the very day predicted. It must 
 at least be acknowledged that the coincidence was remarkable. 
 
 I may also give an outline of a story told to me by a 
 Maratha Pandit, which well illustrates the sort of use these 
 Mantra-sastrls are supposed to make of their magical powers. 
 A certain Sakta Brahman, named Bhaskaradarya, well-versed 
 in the Mantras, expected to be asked to a dinner-party given 
 by a wealthy frieiid, but received no invitation. This so irri' 
 tated the Brahman that he determined to revenge himself on 
 the householder who had ventured so imprudently to slight 
 him. Having waited till the moment when the assembled 
 guests, with appetites stimulated by the fragrance of an array 
 of choice dishes, were about to feast on the delicacies prepared 
 for their consumption, he quietly in his own house selected a 
 particular Mantra, and by simply repeating it turned all the 
 viands into foul and fetid excrementitious matter. The story 
 goes on to relate how the householder, suspecting the cause of 
 this disastrous metamorphose, sent a messenger in hot haste to 
 implore the immediate presence of the offended Brahman, 
 
 ^ The Sanskrit version of this saying is given incorrectly by Dubois 
 (p. 77). I have heard it variously rendered. Perhaps the following is the 
 most usual : — Devadhlnam Jagatsarvam Mantradhlnas-da Devatati Man- 
 tras-c'a Brahmanadhina Brahmana mama Devatah, 
 
Yantras, or mystic diagrams. 203 
 
 who thereupon becoming mollified, obligingly consented to 
 repeat another Mantra which reconverted all the filth into the 
 most delicious ambrosial food. 
 
 We now pass on to the Yantras. These are mystical dia- 
 grams drawn on metallic tablets, often of copper— generally 
 combinations of triangular figures like the inverted triangles 
 of the Freemasons — supposed to possess occult powers. 
 
 Each of the goddesses worshipped by the Saktas has a 
 Yantra assigned to her, which is sometimes placed in the 
 centre of a lotus-diagram, the Bija belonging to the goddess 
 being also inscribed a certain number of times on each petal. 
 
 The SrI-dakra or holy circle is delineated in a diagram of 
 this kind and then worshipped. It is supposed to represent the 
 orb of the earth, nine triangles being drawn within the circle 
 to denote the nine continents. In the centre is the drawing 
 of a mouth, which is believed to typify the female energy 
 (Sakti) presiding over the circle. According to some authori- 
 ties, even the orthodox Sankaracarya must have been a Sakti- 
 worshipper ; for he is known to have placed a representation of 
 the Sri-cakra in each of the four monasteries founded by him. 
 
 These Yantras or mystic diagrams are thought to be quite 
 as effective in their operation as the Mantras, and of course 
 a combination of both is held to be absolutely irresistible. 
 An enemy may be killed or removed to some other place, 
 or a whole army destroyed, or salvation and supreme felicity 
 in a future state obtained by drawing a six-sided or eight- 
 sided diagram and writing a particular Mantra underneath. 
 If this be done with the blood of an animal^ killed sacrificially 
 in a place where corpses are burned (Smasana), no power in 
 earth or heaven can resist the terrific potency of the charm. 
 Triangular, pentangular, and nine-triangled Yantras are 
 equally efficacious. 
 
 ' It may give an idea of the depths of superstition and degradation to 
 which Saktism can lead if we note here that the Retas (semen) of either 
 male or female is believed to be still more efficacious. 
 
?04 Kavacas, Nyasas, and Madras. 
 
 . Let us pass to a brief explanation of the Kavadas. I need not 
 tell Sanskrit scholars that the word kavaca properly means a 
 kind of cuirass, breast-plate, or similar armour worn as a de- 
 ' fence in battle. With the Saktas a kava<5a is an amulet or 
 talisman worn as a preservative against evil influences, or to 
 \ bring about the attainment of some desired object. It may 
 consist of a stone, piece of paper, metal, leaf or other material 
 on which Mantras, Yantras, mystical words and formulae of 
 various kinds are inscribed. It is then worn on the neck, 
 breast, arms, or loins, especially in times of pestilence and 
 sickness. Women often wear kavadas with the object of 
 propitiating the goddess, and so inducing a condition of body 
 favourable to the production of rnale offspring. 
 
 The term kavaca is also applied to whole hymns when 
 they are used as charms. 
 
 As to the Nyasas, these consist in mentally assigning 
 various parts of the body to the protection of tutelary pre- 
 siding deities, with imposition of the hand or fingers, and 
 repetition of texts, mystical words, and syllables. 
 
 The Mudras, on the other hand, are intertwinings of the 
 fingers supposed to possess an occult meaning and to have 
 extraordinary efficacy. Their use as well as that of the 
 Nyasas will be more fully explained in treating of the morn- 
 ing and evening religious services called Sandhya. 
 
 It may be noted here that four days, or rather nights, are 
 kept as principal festivals by the left-hand worshippers:— 
 namely, (i) the night of the Krishna-janmashtamI (see note a, 
 p. 113), called the Kala-ratri; {%) the Moha-ratri, or Kali- 
 caturdasl, kept on the fourteenth day of the second half of 
 Asvina; (3) the Siva-ratri or Maha-ratri, kept on the four-^ 
 teenth of the dark half of Magha ; (4) the DarunI Ratrih, 
 kept on the day before the Holl festival, which is on the 
 fifteenth day of the first half of Phalguna. But besides 
 these four festivals, nine nights in each of the months Asvina, 
 Caitra, Pausha, and Ashadha are also observed as holy 
 
The Tantras, 205 
 
 nights. It is declared that ceremonies performed on any 
 of these nights must of necessity confer superhuman power 
 (siddhi). 
 
 Before concluding this part of our subject, it may be well 
 to note a few more particulars in regard to the works we have 
 so often quoted as the chief authority for the doctrines and 
 practices of the Saktas. 
 
 The Tantras, I repeat, are the bible of Saktism. Like the 
 Puranas, they are sometimes called a fifth Veda. Very com- 
 monly, too, the name Agama, ' that which has come down ' 
 (also applied to the Brahmana portion of the Veda), is given to 
 them in contradistinction to Nigama, which is a general name 
 for the Vedas, Dharma-sastras, Puranas, and other Smriti 
 works. Sometimes the authorship of the Tantras is attributed 
 to Dattatreya, who is worshipped as an incarnation of Brahma, 
 Vishnu, and Siva (p. 267), but the general opinion is that they 
 were revealed by Siva alone. None of them have as yet been 
 printed or translated in Europe. They are said to be sixty- 
 four in number, without counting a large collection of works of 
 a Tantrik character and Sakta tendency. As a general rule 
 they are written in the form of a dialogue between the god Siva ' 
 and his wife ; and every Tantra ought, like a Purana, to treat 
 of five subjects — the creation, the destruction of the world, the 
 worship of the gods, the attainment of superhuman power, and 
 the four modes of union with the Supreme Spirit (given at 
 p. 41), to which is sometimes added a fifth, Sarshti, ' attaining to 
 the same rank as that of the Deity.' In some of the Tantras 
 it is stated that five Amnayas or sacred systems of teaching 
 have been handed down from primeval times, one having 
 issued from each of Siva's five mouths. As a matter of fact 
 very few conform to any systematic arrangement. Those I 
 have examined seem to be mere hand-books for the practices 
 I have attempted to describe, which to Europeans appear so 
 monstrous that the possibility of any persons believing in 
 their efficacy seems in itself almost incredible. 
 
2o6 The Tantras. 
 
 Whole Tantras teach nothing but various methods of 
 making use of spells for acquiring magical power. 
 
 Some give collections of charms for making people enamoured, 
 for destroying enemies and rivals, for producing or prevent- 
 ing diseases, for curing blindness, for injuring crops. Others 
 simply describe the most effectual modes of worshipping the 
 Saktis, Maha-vidyas, Matris, Yoginfs, Vatukas, or by whatever 
 name the innumerable manifestations of Siva and his wife 
 may be called. Others confine themselves to an explanation 
 of the Yantras, Bijas, and Mudras (intertwining of the fingers) 
 belonging to each manifestation, the places suited for the 
 worship of each, the names of trees and plants sacred to each, 
 or permeated by each, and the days of the year allotted to 
 each. Some few touch on nearly every conceivable topic of 
 human knowledge, and contain here and there really interest- 
 ing matter. 
 
 Even alchemy comes in for a share of attention ; but the 
 Sakta idea of this pretended science (Rasayana, Rasesvara- 
 vidya) is that its only use is to enable the devotee to trans- 
 mute the decaying particles of his body into an incorruptible 
 substance by means of elixirs compounded of mercury and 
 mica, supposed to consist of the essences of Siva and his wife 
 Gauri respectively. After long persistence in the practice of 
 swallowing these elixirs the candidate for beatitude becomes 
 immortal, and not merely united with Siva but identified 
 with him. This kind of transformation is called Jivan- 
 mukti, ' salvation during life ^.' 
 
 So little is known about the composition of the Tantras 
 that it is not possible to decide at present as to which are the 
 most ancient, and still less as to the date to be assigned to 
 
 ' One of the systems described by Madhava in his Sarva-darsana- 
 sangraha is called the Rasesvara-darsana, or the system which teaches the 
 use of mercury or quicksilver as a means of strengthening the body and 
 giving it divine stability capable of resisting death and preventing further 
 transmigration. Mercury is said to be named Para-da because it gives 
 para, or the farther shore of Metempsychosis. 
 
The Tantrcts. •2.Q)'j 
 
 any of them. They are all said to be founded on the Kaulo- 
 panishad. It may, however, be taken for granted that the 
 extant treaties are, like the extant Puranas, based on older 
 works ; and if the oldest known Purana is not older than the ^^^ 
 sixth or seventh century, an earlier date can scarcely be 
 attributed to the oldest known Tantra. Perhaps the Rudra-/ 
 yamala is one of the most deservedly esteemed and most 
 encyclopedic in its teaching ^ Others are the Sakti-sangama, 
 Visva-sara, Maha-nirvana, Vira, Kularnava (a text-book of 
 the Kaulas), Syama-rahasya, Sarada-tilaka, Uddlsa, Kama- 
 khya, Vishnu-yamala. 
 
 Full as the above works are of doubtful symbolism, they 
 are not all necessarily full of impure allusions, though the 
 teaching contained in the best of them unquestionably tends 
 towards licentiousness. When they are better known, their 
 connection with a distorted view of the Sankhya philosophy, 
 and with some of the corrupt forms of Buddhism, will pro- 
 bably be made clearer. Doubtless they have greatly in- 
 fluenced the later Buddhist literature of Nepal, and would 
 probably throw much light on the magical hymns and spells 
 of the Atharva-veda. 
 
 There are also works called Vaishnava Tantras, such as 
 the Gautamlya and the Sanat-kumara, but even in these 
 'Siva is the narrator and his wife the supposed listener. 
 Moreover their teaching, which makes Radha, the wife of 
 Krishna, take the place of Durga as the chief object of 
 adoration, has the same tendency as that of the other Tantras, 
 and equally leads to licentiousness. 
 
 Happily the worst abominations of Saktism are gradually 
 dying out in British India; and its true character is im- 
 pressing itself on the convictions of the more highly edu- 
 cated Hindiis. 
 
 ' It is said to consist of 100,000 verses. A section of it, called Jati- 
 mala, treating of caste, has been printed at Calcutta. 
 
2o8 The Tantras. 
 
 Nor can the power of the Mantra-sastrls stand against the 
 moral and intellectual revolution which is slowly but surely 
 upheaving the whole fabric of superstition. That power is' 
 already much weaketied, and the field for its exercise among 
 a people, steeped for centuries in debasing arid degrading re- 
 ligious and social ideas, is daily becoming narrower. Still in 
 most of the native States, where all the grosser forms of 
 Hinduism are still rampant, the whole system is as firmly 
 established as ever. Even those in high positions, who have 
 no faith in it themselves^ find themselves unable to offend 
 the prejudices of their subordinates by venturing to engage 
 in any work or perform the most ordinary act without the 
 sanction of crafty and ignorant Brahmans claiming divine 
 authority and professing to work miracles through their 
 knowledge and application of the Mantras. 
 
 Well may the enlightened Brahman before quoted (see 
 p. 189) give expression to his indignation thus : — 
 
 'All sensible people ought to say to the Mantra-sastris,. 
 We have suffered much misery through your deceit, we have 
 been taxed very heavily by you, and you have involved us in 
 the results of all your wickedness. It is true your ancestors^ 
 had some knowledge of different sciences and imparted some 
 of that knowledge to us. In return for these benefits we have 
 fed you and supported you and promoted your interests. 
 When you found your power established over us you aban- 
 doned the duty of seeking after knowledge, and worked only 
 mischief. Your teaching is now a mere reflection of your 
 ignorance, wickedness, folly, and hypocrisy. You harass and 
 injure us in a thousand ways. If our knowledge increases, 
 you try to prevent it, thinking that, if inquiry is encouraged, 
 your customers will decrease. We begin to see through your 
 artifices. Begone, every one of you, and don't attempt to 
 deceive us any more.' 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 Tutelary and Village Deities. 
 
 It may be said that all deities ought to be called tutelary, 
 and no doubt the idea of protecting from harm is essential to 
 the later idea of a god. But among rude, uncultivated races 
 the first conception of a god is never that of a beneficent 
 saviour. Primitive man, just emerging from the depths of a 
 merely animal existence, finds himself face to face with 
 mighty mysterious natural forces. He sees, feels, and dreads 
 their operation. He personifies and deifies them, and gives 
 them names expressive of the awe with which their power has 
 impressed him, or of his desire to propitiate them. It is ^ 
 question whether any of the primary names for God in any 
 country are significant of his attributes as a Guardian, 
 Saviour, and Deliverer. In India tutelary functions were 
 no doubt ultimately associated with both Siva and Vishnu, 
 but in the case of Vishnu they were delegated, as we have 
 seen, to his incarnations or descents on earth, and in the case 
 of Siva to his sons Ganesa and Skanda and to his consort the 
 great goddess Devi, regarded as the mother of the world and 
 worshipped under a great variety of different names in 
 different localities. In the South of India another tutelary 
 god named Ayenar, the reputed son of Vishnu and Siva 
 (see p. a 18), is very popular among the peasantry. 
 
 Whether the worship of these village deities (grama- 
 devata) is a mere offshoot or ramification of the religion • 
 of Siva and Vishnu is very doubtful. It is much more ^ 
 probable that the village gods represent far earlier and more 
 primitive objects of vlrorship. Possibly they may even be 
 
2IO Tutelary and Village Deities. 
 
 developments of local fetishes once held in veneration by 
 uncivilized aboriginal tribes and afterwards grafted into the 
 Hindu system by the Brahmans, whose wise policy it has 
 ever been to appropriate and utilize all existing cults, cus- 
 toms, and superstitions. It is certain that even in the present 
 day scarcely a village, and indeed scarcely a household in 
 India, is without its tutelary divinity, usually represented by 
 some rudely carved image or symbol, located in homely 
 shrines or over doorways, or, it may be, denoted by simple 
 patches of red paint on rocks or under sacred trees or in 
 cross-ways, and always taking the place of the superior gods 
 in the religion of the lower orders. 
 
 The question however arises : — In what sense are these 
 homely village deities tutelary? From whom or what are 
 they believed to protect ? 
 
 A Christian, when he prays for deliverance from evil, means 
 not only deliverance from a personal evil spirit, but from the 
 evil of sin and from the general evil existing in the world 
 around him. 
 
 An ordinary Hindu peasant's religion consists mainly in 
 seeking deliverance from the evil inflicted by demons. The 
 religiously-minded are no doubt sincere in their desire to 
 be freed from inborn sin and its effects through ceremonial 
 washings and purificatory rites (sanskaras), but the majority 
 are much more eager to escape the calamities which may over- 
 take them through demoniacal, planetary, and atmospheric 
 influences. In truth I am convinced that those Europeans 
 who have lived in closest contact with the Hindu mind will 
 bear me out in my assertion that the great majority of the 
 inhabitants of India are, from the cradle to the burning- 
 ground, victims of a form of disease which is best expressed 
 by the term demonophobia. They are haunted and oppressed 
 by a perpetual dread of demons. They are firmly convinced 
 that evil spirits of all kinds, from malignant fiends to merely 
 mischievous imps and elves, are ever on the watch to hfirm, 
 
Worship of Ganesa and Su-brahmanya. 
 
 211 
 
 harass and torment them, to cause plague, sickness, famine 
 and disaster, to impede, injure and mar every good work. 
 
 Hence a tutelary god among the Hindus is simply one 
 that delivers from the calamities, actual and potential, be- 
 lieved to be due to demons. 
 
 Worship of Ganesa (Gana-pati) and Su-brahmanya, 
 
 At the head of tutelary village deities I place the two sons 
 of Siva:— I. Ganesa (p. 59)— also called Gana-pati (commonly 
 Gan-pati, and in Southern India Puliyar, 'the son') ; 3. Skanda 
 —often called Karttikeya, and still more commonly Su-brah- 
 manya. But in so placing these two gods I must explain 
 that my investigations in India have led me to take a view of 
 their character and functions somewhat different from that 
 hitherto propounded by European writers on HindQ Mytho- 
 logy. It is usual for such writers to describe Ganesa as the 
 god of learning and patron of letters ^ ; whereas the whole 
 province of speech, language, and literature is really placed 
 under the presidency of the goddess Sarasvati^. The only 
 possible ground I have been able to discover for connecting 
 Ganesa with the patronage of learning is the circumstance 
 that every Indian book opens with the formula Sri Ganesaya 
 namab. 
 
 But the real explanation of this is that the writing of a 
 book is among Hindus a very serious and solemn under- 
 taking, peculiarly liable to obstruction from spiteful and 
 jealous spirits of evil, and the favour of Ganesa is invoked 
 to counteract their malignity. It seldom occurs to an 
 ordinary Hindu writer to suppose that the failure of his 
 literary efforts is likely to be due to his own incapacity. In 
 
 ' I find that even M. Barth, in his recent excellent work on the religions 
 of India, falls into this mistake. 
 
 ^ Thus we find the first verse of the Mahabharata addresses homage 
 to Sarasvati, not to Ganesa. 
 
 P 2 
 
212 Worship of Ganesa dnd Su-brakmaiiyd. 
 
 this, as in all other enterprises, want of success is attributed 
 not to want of skill, energy, or persistency, but to negligence 
 in taking proper precautions against demoniacal jealousy and 
 obstruction. 
 
 So far indeed is Ganesa from being the god of learning, he 
 is peculiarly the god of the lower orders and uneducated 
 classes. Hence in a verse said to be extracted from the old 
 version of Manu he is called the god of the Sudras^. 
 
 Again, it is usual to describe Skanda as the god of war, as 
 if he were a kind of Hindu Mars, whereas his martial quali- 
 ties are only displayed in leading the armies of the gods 
 against the countless host of their enemies the evil demons. 
 
 With a view then to a fuller explanation of the history and 
 character of two gods so generally honoured and propitiated 
 throughout India, I must begin by pointing out that the cultus 
 of both Ganesa and Su-brahmanya is a mere offshoot of 
 Saivism. The very name Ganesa (Gana-Isa) or Gana-pati, 
 meaning 'lord of hosts,' belonged originally to Siva (see 
 p. 77), for Siva is, as we have seen, surrounded by countless 
 troops or hosts (gana) of servants and officers, who are con- 
 stantly in readiness to traverse earth and air for the execu- 
 tion of his orders. 
 
 And just as Siva is ever engaged in two opposite duties — 
 on the one hand, as Rudra and Kala, directing and control- 
 ling dissolution and death, on the other hand, as Siva and 
 Sambhu, presiding over re-integration and new life — so by a 
 figment of mythology, those of his emissaries who are charged 
 with carrying out the former operation are converted into evil 
 demons, imps, and devils, while those who are agents in the 
 latter are held to be good angels, ministering spirits, and 
 beneficent genii. 
 
 And hence it is that two entirely opposite classes of de- 
 moniacal beings are believed to be continually roaming about 
 
 ^ The verse is — Vipranam daivatam Sambhuh Kshatriyanaiji tu Madha- 
 va^L Vaisyanam tu bhaved Brahma SudranamGana-nayakah, 
 
Worship of Ganesa and Su-brahmanya. 213 
 
 earth, air and sky — the one ill-disposed towards all forms of 
 life, human and divine, the other well-disposed ; the one 
 destroyers, the other protectors ; the one instruments of 
 calamity and disaster, the other agents of good-fortune and 
 prosperity. 
 
 It is to be observed, too, that differences of rank/character,V 
 and function are supposed to separate both good and bad 
 spirits 1 into various subdivisions. For example, the highest/ 
 order of evil demons, who may be called arch-fiends, disdain 
 any lower aim than the humiliation and subjugation of the 
 gods ; and, to effect this, they will sometimes undergo long 
 courses of austerity and self-mortification, in the hope of 
 making themselves omnipotent. The next in order vent 
 their rancour and hostility upon human beings. Of these, 
 again, some destroy life, some inflict diseases, some disturb 
 religious rites. Another class are mere demons of mischief 
 and obstruction who delight in hindering good works or 
 frightening women and children, like the ghosts, hobgoblins, 
 elves, and bogies of nursery tale and fable. 
 
 Similar differences are supposed to divide good demons 
 into various orders and degrees of rank and power. 
 
 It is over these countless hosts of good and evil demons 
 that the god Siva exercises sovereignty. They are all 
 primarily subject to his authority; but the actual command 
 over them is delegated to his two sons, Ganesa and Skanda. 
 
 As for Skanda, although the younger and less generally 
 worshipped, lie holds the more ambitious office. He is 
 called the god of war, because he is commander-in-chief or ^ 
 generalissimo (Sena-pati) of the good demon armies. These 
 he leads against the hosts of their enemies the evil demons ; 
 notably against those rebellious and arrogant arch-fiends 
 who seek to overcome and enslave the gods. He is often 
 called Karttikeya, from his foster-mothers, the six Krittikas 
 
 * The use of the term ' spirit ' for demon is not intended to imply that 
 demons are incorporeal spiritual beings. 
 
214 Worship of Ganesa and Su-brahmafj.ya. 
 
 or Pleiades, and then has six heads ^ and twelve arms. These 
 are to enable him to hold weapons, of different kinds, like 
 a person armed with the many-chambered revolver of modern 
 
 times. . 
 
 But he is not seldom represented in other characters. For 
 example, in some places he appears as simply a beautiful 
 youth (Kumara) riding on a peacock, divested of all martial 
 attributes. Again, in the South of India, where his cultus 
 prevails most extensively, he is not worshipped as presiding 
 over war, but under the name Su-brahmanya, ' very pious or 
 sacred.' He is sometimes held to be unmarried, but I found 
 that his temples are either frequented by those who seek 
 through his intervention to be delivered from evil spirits, or else 
 by women who hope by propitiating him to obtain handsome 
 sons. He is himself married, and has two wives popularly 
 called Devayani and Valll-amman. These, like their hus- 
 band, are believed to grant children, to prevent the attacks 
 and thwart the malice of devils, and when evil spirits have 
 actually taken possession of any one, to be capable of casting 
 them out. At Tanjore and other places in the South of 
 India I found the temples of Skanda in his character of 
 Su-brahmanya side by side with those of his brother Ganesa, 
 and in some districts Su-brahmanya is the more popular. 
 He has a celebrated temple on the Pulney hills. 
 
 As to Ganesa,' it is certain that he has no pretensions 
 whatever to be regarded as a martial deity. On the con- 
 trary! he is essentially a homely village-god. , Fighting and 
 activity of any kind are repugnant to his nature, which, 
 however, appears to be somewhat contradictory and full of 
 curious enigmas. His form resembles that of a bloated, 
 well-fed Brahman seated at his ease with legs folded under 
 him on a lotus-throne, the very beau-ideal of satiated appetite 
 and indolent self-complacency, but with the head of an 
 
 ' The six heads were to enable him to be nursed by his six nurses. 
 
Worship of Ganesa and. Su-brakmanya. 215 
 
 elephant to denote shrewdness or wisdom, and with four 
 arms, holding an elephant-hook, a noose, a mace\ and a 
 cake, one in each .of his hands. Not unfrequently . he- is 
 represented riding on a rat, and is always associated with 
 images of that animal, proBably as emblematical of sagacity. 
 In Southern India I occasionally found his idols in company 
 with those of Nagas or snakes. Sometimes he has a garland 
 round his neck, sometimes the sacred Brahmanical cord. 
 Unlike Su-brahmanya or Skanda, he is not generally repre- 
 sented as married ; though according to some he has two 
 wives called Riddhi and Siddhi^, 'Prosperity' and 'Success.' 
 
 Contrasting Ganesa then with Su-brahmanya, we must 
 always bear in mind that Ganesa is not the commander 
 and leader, but rather the king and lord of the demon-host, 
 ruling over both good and bad alike, and controlling those 
 malignant spirits who are ever plotting evil and causing 
 hindrances and difficulties. But he controls them, not as 
 Skanda does, by the exercise of bravery and physical energy, 
 but by artifice and stratagem, very much after the manner of 
 some indolent, wily Brahman who, skilled in the Mantras, sits 
 comfortably at home and by the simple repetition of a few 
 texts, spells and cabalistic words, compels good and evil 
 spirits to obey his behests. 
 
 Nor is it out of harmony with this theory of the true 
 character of the god that the Ganesa of modem mythology 
 is thought by some Pandits to be a development of the 
 Vedic Brahmanas-pati or Brihaspati, ' lord of prayer '—once 
 the personification of religion and devotion — who by the 
 simple force of his supplications protects the pious from 
 the machinations of the impious. It is certain that the 
 
 * Instead of a mace he has sometimes a lotus, and sometimes a frag- 
 ment of one of his own tusks which he once broke off in a fit of uncon- 
 trollable passion. 
 
 . 'f Others make his two wives Buddhi and Siddhi, ' Intelligence ' and 
 'Success.' 
 
2i6 Worship of Ganesa and Su-brahmanyd. 
 
 modern popular Ganesa has no place in the Veda, the epi- 
 thet Gananam Gana-patih, which occurs in Rig-veda II, 
 33. I, having reference to Brahmanas-pati as lord of the 
 Ganas or troops of divinities ^- 
 
 What the Ganesa or Gana-pati of the present day really 
 represents is a complex personification of sagacity, shrewd- 
 ness, patience, and self-reliance — of all those qualities, in short, 
 which overcome hindrances and difficulties, whether in per- 
 forming religious acts, writing books, building houses, making 
 journeys, or undertaking anything. He is before all things 
 the typical embodiment of success in life; with its usual 
 accompaniments of good-living, plenteousness, prosperity, and 
 .peace. This is the true secret of his popularity. This is why 
 his images and shrines smeared with red paint are seen every- 
 where throughout India. In all ceremonies, except funeral 
 rites, and in all undertakings Ganesa is first invoked. 
 
 It should be noted, however, that although his principal 
 office is to remove impediments, especially from religious 
 rites, he may also cause hindrances ; and this in fact is implied 
 in his names Vighnesa and Vighna-raja, ' lord of obstacles.' 
 So also, although he is essentially a god who presides over 
 domestic happiness and rural prosperity, driving away evil 
 demons from houses, fields, crops, and herds, he may also, if 
 not propitiated, allow malicious imps to haunt houses, infest 
 roads, mar harvests, and cause a murrain among cattle. 
 
 When I was nearly dashed to pieces by restive horses, one 
 of which broke away from my carriage and was precipitated 
 over a precipice on the Ghat between Popna and Mahaba- 
 lesvar, I was told by a wrise-looking native who witnessed the 
 accident that the road in that district was infested by demons 
 who often caused accidents, and that if I had taken care to 
 propitiate Ganesa before starting I should have escaped all 
 molestation and all risk of being upset. 
 
 ' The same expression Gananam Gana-patiti occurs also in the Vaja- 
 saneyi-Samhita of the Yajur-veda, XXIII. 19. 
 
Worship of Gahesa and Su-brahmanya. 2 1 7 
 
 Altogether, the god Ganesa represents a being who is a 
 curious mixture of divine add demoniacal, benevolent and 
 malevolent, intellectual and animal propensities, all of which 
 are typified by the somewhat grotesque and bizarre assem- 
 blage of symbols noticeable in his image. 
 
 Notably, too, his worship is combined with that of every 
 other god. For all sects unite in claiming him as their own. 
 It is on this account that his shrines and images are generally 
 found in association with those of other deities, and are 
 usually to be seen in the approaches or vestibules of large 
 temples. Often, however, they stand alone, and are then to 
 be found outside villages, under trees, or in cross-ways, or 
 indeed in any kind of locality, but always smeared with red 
 paint in token of good-luck and auspiciousness. Solitary 
 temples of large size dedicated to Ganesa are rare. The 
 largest I saw anywhere in India was at Wa-i, between Poona 
 and Mahabalesvar. It contained a colossal image of the god, 
 and in this temple I noticed a singularly simple and easy 
 method of doing him honour. A man entered with a small 
 vessel of holy water from the neighbouring river. He re- 
 peated no prayers, but with a diminutive spoon poured a little 
 of the water two or three times on the lower extremities of 
 the huge image and then retired. Another large Ganesa 
 temple which I visited is on the summit of the rock of 
 Trichinopoly, Ganesa being there called Ujjhi Puliyar }. 
 
 In point of fact Ganesa has in the present day few ex- 
 clusive adorers ; that is to say, there are few sectarians who 
 trust to him alone for salvation, though all propitiate him 
 for success. In former times the Ganesa or Ganapatya sect, 
 as it was called (see p. 59), was divided into six sub-sects who 
 worshipped six different forms of the god, named respectively 
 (according to the Sankara-vijaya) Maha-Ganapati, Haridra- 
 
 ^ There is also a shrine to Su-brahmanya on this celebrated rock, and 
 I noticed as a peculiarity that the image of a peacock was represented 
 looking into Ganesa's shrine, not into that of his brother. 
 
2i8 Worship of Ay enar. 
 
 Ganapati, Ucchishta-Ganapati (also called Heramba), Nava- 
 nlta-Ganapati, Svarna-Ganapati, and Santana-Ganapati i- 
 
 Worship of Ayenar. 
 
 Closely allied to the worship of Ganesa and Skanda (Su- 
 brahmanya), and generally to Saivism, is the worship of 
 Ayenar; a village-god very popular in the extreme South 
 of India, but little known in other parts. One distinction, 
 however, may be noticed between the worship of Ayenar 
 and that of Siva's two sons. He is never asked for any 
 positive good. He only protects from harm, and his wor- 
 ship consists solely in propitiation. His name Ayenar is 
 said to be a corruption of Hari-hara (= Vishnu and Siva, 
 see p. 65), and he is believed to be the son of both these 
 deities ; that is, he is the product of the marriage of Siva 
 and Vishnu when the latter took the form of a beautiful 
 woman. He is popularly called Ayenar-appan ^, and some- 
 times has another name, Sasta, ' the ruler or governor.' 
 
 Like Ganesa and Skanda, the popular deity Ayenar is a 
 lord and leader of the demon-host, and his province is to 
 guard the fields, crops, and herds of the peasantry, and drive 
 away their enemies the devils and fiends, who are ever on the 
 watch to inflict disease, blight, and other calamities. Accord- 
 ingly, outside every village in Southern India, and generally 
 among a group of trees to the west of the village, may be 
 seen the shrines of Ayenar, surrounded with rude clay or 
 
 ' Dhundhi-raja, said to mean ' king of Siva's hosts,' is another popular 
 form of Ganesa at Benares. I noticed numerous worshippers at his 
 shrine, as well as at that of another shrine of the same god in his 
 character of Sakshin or witness. In this latter character he is usually 
 called Sakshi-Vinayaka (vulgarly Sakhi-Vinayaka). Every pilgrim who 
 has been the round of the shrines in the PandakosI of Benares must 
 finish up by a visit to Ganesa, ' the witness,' who then bears testimony to 
 the completeness of the difficult task he has accomplished. 
 
 ^ Appan is the Tamil for ' father,' as Amman is for 'mother.' 
 
Worship of Ayenar. 2 1 9 
 
 terra-cotta figures of horses and other animals— often of life- 
 size— on which he is supposed to ride when keeping guard. 
 His image is that of a human form painted a reddish colour 
 and very roughly carved, sometimes in a sitting posture, 
 sometimes on horseback. When properly represented, he 
 ought to have a crown on his head, the Saiva mark on his 
 forehead, a sceptre in his hand, and ornaments on his person. 
 Often images of Ganesa are placed near him. He has two 
 wives (known by the names PuranT and Pudkala), who 
 generally sit on ,each side of him, and take an active part 
 in driving away demons, especially at night, when like their 
 husband they ride about the fields on horses. It is on this 
 account that no villager in Southern India likes to be out in 
 the fields at night, and on no account will any one pass near 
 the shrines of Ayenar and his wives after dark. If any 
 venturesome person happens to cross their path when they 
 are careering about the fields, he is liable to be taken for an 
 evil spirit and slain. 
 
 After recovery from sickness, or to commemorate any piece 
 of good-fortune, the villagers place fresh clay horsies round 
 the shrine of Ayenar, as thank-offerings or in fulfilment of 
 vows. He is also at such times propitiated by offerings of the 
 blood of swine, goats, sheep, cocks and other animals, or by 
 cooked food and libations of strong liquor. 
 
 If cholera or pestilence of any kind breaks out, the villagers 
 redouble their offerings to the priests of the shrine, who are . 
 generally very poor and of the lowest caste, and are very glad 
 to receive any money or consume any eatables that may be 
 offered to the god. 
 
 I examined with great interest many shrines of Ayenar in 
 Southern India, and particularly one at Permagudy, on my 
 way from Madura to Ramesvaram. It was situated close to 
 a grdve of small trees not far from the village. Under a 
 rough stone canopy was a rudely carved stone male idol. 
 The wives of the god were not represented, but about twenty- 
 
220 Worship of Hanuman, 
 
 five toy-like terra-cotta horses, some as large as life, were 
 ranged on each side of the shrine. Several of these fictile 
 animals had grotesque images upon them representing n'ders, 
 and some of them were so badly formed that it was difficult 
 to say whether they were intended for lions or horses. In 
 the front of the shrine was a rude stone altar for sacrifices 
 and oblations, but I saw no signs of any recent offerings, nor 
 was a single worshipper of the god to be seen anywhere. I 
 noticed indeed that all the shrines of Ayenar had a deserted 
 appearance, the fact being that he is never worshipped in our 
 sense of the word. He is only propitiated in emergencies. 
 Every year after harvest-time a festival is kept in his honour, 
 when numerous animals are sacrificed, and images of the god 
 are decorated with ornaments and drawn about through the 
 village streets on the rude clay horses which I have described. 
 
 Worship of Hanumdn. 
 
 In connexion with the subject of local tutelary deities it 
 ought to be mentioned that a very common villagergod in the 
 Dekhan, Central and Upper India, is Hanuman (nom. case 
 of Hanumat, a name meaning ' possessing large jaws '). This 
 god derives his popularity from the part he took in assisting 
 Rama to recover his wife Sita after she had been carried 
 away to Ceylon by the demon Ravana. He is one of the 
 chiefs of a host of semi-divine monkey-like beings who, ac- 
 cording to the Ramayana (I. 16}, were created to become 
 Rama-candra's allies. In point of fact, there can be little 
 doubt that Hanuman was originally a mere poetical deifi- 
 cation of some well-known .leader of the wild aboriginal 
 tribes, whose appearance resembled that of apes, and who 
 really rendered effective assistance to Rama in his battles with 
 Ravana. There were several of these powerful aboriginal 
 chiefs, who, from their accomplishing apparently supernatural 
 feats of strength, were held to be the progeny of various 
 
Worship of Hanumdn. 
 
 221 
 
 gods. Thus the Simian king Sugrlva was said to be a son of 
 the Sun, and another chief named Bali was a son of Indra. 
 
 Hanuman, on the other hand, was believed to be a son of 
 the wind (Pavana or Maruta). He could assume any form at 
 will, wield rocks, remove mountains, dart through the air, 
 seize clouds, and rival Vishnu's divine bird Garuda in swift- 
 ness of flight. His devotion to Rama's service was so great 
 that he is worshipped over a great part of India as the type 
 and model of a faithful devoted servant. Many believe that, 
 when propitiated, he can confer supernatural muscular strength 
 and bodily power. His images, which, to denote the reverence 
 in which they are held, are always smeared with vermilion 
 (sindura) and oil, are generally rudely formed. I noticed, 
 however, that they were most common in the Dekhan, where 
 they are generally found outside villages. Not that there is ^ 
 any lack of them in large towns. In the centre of Poona, 
 I came across a shrine containing a shapeless idol, which was 
 said to be an image of Hanuman several hundred years old. 
 It was set up under a Banian tree. A man was in the act of 
 painting it with bright red paint as I passed, and another 
 man was prostrating himself at full length on the ground 
 before it. 
 
 Again, I visited a large temple dedicated to Hanuman 
 outside the town of Kaira. It is said to be well endowed. 
 Offerings of oil are constantly presented to Hanuman, and -^ 
 eighty Maunds. of oil had recently been offered to this idol. 
 Within the enclosure of his temple were shrines to Rama 
 and Krishna, both of which occupied subordinate positions. 
 Of course the worship of Hanuman is usually connected 
 with that of Vishnu, but here in this enclosure was also a 
 Linga shrine ^, and another of the goddess of small-pox, 
 and all around was a cloister which served as a Dharma- 
 sala, or lodging for travellers. 
 
 ^ According to some legends, Hanuman was a son of Siva. 
 
222 Mother-worship. 
 
 ^ The veneration in which apes and monkeys of every kind 
 are held throughout India cannot fail to strike a stranger as 
 remarkable. This is doubtless connected with the homage 
 paid to Hanuman. It is not, however, identified with that 
 homage ; for although monkeys are believed to be his near 
 relations, they were probably independent objects of worship 
 from the earliest times ^ Yet these animals are veiy ungod- 
 like in their habits, and not one whit superior to the most 
 mischievous monkeys in any other part of the world. Often a 
 troop will make its appearance in an Indian village, tear off 
 the roof of a native house, or do even worse damage out of 
 sheer wantonness. Yet no householder would ever dream of 
 reprisals. The sacred character of the monkey shields him 
 from all harm. 
 
 Mother-worship. 
 
 Undoubtedly the most popular tutelary deities of India are 
 the divine Matris or Mothers. The propitiation of Ayenar 
 and his wives is confined to the South, but mother- worship is 
 extended everywhere throughout India. In the first place, 
 every living mother is venerated as a kind of deity by her 
 children. Then every village has its own special guardian 
 mother, called Mata or Amba. Generally there is also a 
 male deity, who protects like the female from all adverse and 
 demoniacal influences. But the mother is the favourite object 
 of adoration ; and no wonder ; for, as we have seen in the 
 preceding chapter, activity, power, and force (sakti) are sup- 
 posed to be her peculiar attributes. Perhaps however the real 
 reason for her attracting more homage than the god is that 
 she is held to have a thoroughly feminine nature. She is 
 more easily propitiated by prayer, flattery, and offerings ; more 
 
 ' It seems not unlikely that the Vrishakapi of Rig-veda X. 86 may 
 point to a very early veneration of apes, arising, perhaps, from their 
 mysterious resemblance to men. 
 
Mother-worship. 223 
 
 ready to defend from evil ; more irritable, uncertain, and way- 
 ward in her temper and moods ; more dangerously spiteful, 
 and prone to inflict diseases, if offended by neglect. 
 
 In point of fact, the worship of the divine Mothers (Matris) 
 is, as already pointed out, a branch of Saivism, and particu- 
 larly of that form of Saivism called Saktism (p. 181). 
 
 Indeed, one of the most remarkable features of the multi- 
 form and many-sided Hindu religion is the efficacy supposed 
 to belong to this form of worship. Probably the idea of 
 Mother-worship had its origin in the patriarchal constitution 
 of ancient Aryan society. Among the early Aryans the 
 paternal and maternal tie, and, indeed, the whole family bond, 
 was intensely strong. If the father was regarded with awe 
 as the primary source of life, the mother was an object of 
 devotion to the children of the family as the more evident 
 author of their existence. And again, if the father was vene- 
 rated as the food-supplier and protector (pita), the mother 
 was beloved as the meter out (mata) of daily nourishment — the 
 arranger of the household, measuring and ordering its affairs 
 as the moon (also called mata) measured the time. To the 
 Aryan family the father and mother were present gods. 
 
 Can we wonder that, with the growth of devotional ideas 
 and the increasing sense of a higher superintending pro- 
 vidence, the earliest religious creed was constructed on what 
 may be called paternal and maternal lines ? At first the sky 
 (Dyaus, Zeus), bending over all, was personified as a Heavenly 
 Father (Dyaus-pitar, Jupiter), and the Earth as the Mother 
 of all creatures. Then, in place of the Earth, Infinite Space \ 
 (A-diti) was thought of as an eternal Mother. Then Prakriti 
 was the germinal productive principle— the eternal Mother, 
 capable of evolving all created things out of herself, but never 
 so creating unless united, with the eternal spiritual principle 
 called the eternal Male (Purusha). 
 
 To the prevalence of such ideas must, I think, be attri- 
 buted the fact that everywhere throughout India are scattered 
 
2 24 Mother-worship > 
 
 shrines which on inspection are found to contain no images or 
 idols shaped like human beings, but simply stone symbols of 
 a double form, intended to typify the blending of the male 
 and female principles in creation. The casual tourist, whose . 
 notions of propriety are cast in a European mould, is shocked 
 by what he considers an evidence of the utter degradation of 
 Indian thought. He turns away in disgust, and denounces 
 the Hindu religion as simple abomination. 
 
 My own researches into Indian religious thought have led 
 me to view in these symbols a proof of the hold which the 
 ancient dualistic philosophy has on the Hindu mind. It is 
 common to say that Brahmanism is Pantheism, and no doubt 
 it is, broadly speaking, true that Brahmanism is a kind of 
 Pantheism ; but to apply the term Pantheism, without any 
 qualification, to the ordinary religion of the Hindus^ is alto-i 
 gether misleading. A small minority of orthodox Brahmans 
 are strict Pantheists according to the Vedantic doctrine (sed 
 p. 36), but a large majority of the Hindus are believers in 
 one personal God — that is to say, in either Siva or Vishnu or 
 their manifestations — and are therefore Theists. Yet it is 
 true that their Theism is no stern belief in the unity of God. 
 It constantly tends to pantheistic or polytheistic superstitions, 
 and especially to the mystical theory of a duality in unity 
 before explained (see p. 181). Such a theory restSj as we 
 have seen, on the philosophical doctrine of two distinct eter- 
 -nally existing essences — Spirit regarded as a male principle; 
 and Matter or the gerrti of the external world regarded as a 
 female. Without the union of the two no creation takes place; 
 To any one imbued with these dualistic conceptions the Linga 
 and the Yoni are suggestive of no improper ideas. Thfey are 
 either types of the two mysterious creative forces — the efficient 
 and material causes of the universe^or symbols of one divine 
 power delegating procreative energy to male and female organj 
 isms. They are mystical representatives, and perhaps the best 
 
 ^ As I have heard it applied by Missionaries arid others.' 
 
Mother-worship. 225 
 
 possible impersonal representatives, of the abstract expres- 
 sions ' paternity ' and ' maternity.' 
 
 Of course, such ideas are too mystical for the masses of the 
 people. Yet the ordinary Hindu finds no difficulty in ac- 
 cepting the theory of a universe proceeding from a divine 
 father and mother. Hence, as we have already seen, some 
 images of Siva (called Ardha-narlsa) represent him as female 
 on one side of his body and male on the other, to indicate 
 that he combines in his own person maternal as well as 
 paternal qualities and attributes, and that all the mothers of 
 India are simply manifestations of portions of his essence. I 
 need not repeat here that the god's energy is supposed to be 
 located more especially in the female half of his nature, and 
 that the divine mothers are variously classified according to 
 various degrees of participation in that energy, the highest 
 being identified with different forms of his supposed consort, 
 the lowest including human mothers downwards, who are all 
 worshipped as incarnations of the one divine productive 
 capacity of nature. Compare p. 183. 
 
 There are about one hundred and forty distinct Mothers 
 in Gujarat, besides numerous varieties of some of the more 
 popular forms. In all likelihood every one of these, though 
 declared by the Brahmans to be separate forms of Siva's 
 consort Kali, is really the representative of some local 
 deity (Grama-devata), worshipped by the inhabitants from 
 time immemorial. Some are represented by rudely carved 
 images, others by simple symbols, and others are remarkable 
 for preferring empty shrines and the absence of all visible 
 representation. 
 
 The first genuine country village I visited on reaching 
 Bombay in 1875 was in Gujarat. It had as usual two 
 shrines, one to Siva and his son Ganesa, the other to the 
 local Mata or Mother, believed to be a manifestation of 
 Siva's wife and called Khodiyar, or ' Mischief.' The attitude 
 of mind and usual disposition of this Mother towards the 
 
 Q 
 
226 Mother-worship. 
 
 villagers appears to be anything but maternal. Her shrine 
 when I visited it was of a very rough and ready character, 
 little better than a mere mud shed, open to all the winds of 
 heaven and accessible to all comers — even to unbelievers like 
 myself, quite as much as to her faithful votaries. Her image 
 too was by no means attractive in its contour and accom- 
 paniments. It was carved in the rudest manner, and might 
 have done duty for an African fetish. I noticed that in some 
 villages the Mother is represented by a simple unworked 
 stone, but always recumbent, never erect, and occasionally a 
 wall or some markings on it are believed to symbolize the 
 presence of the goddess. It is a mistake to suppose that every 
 Hindu temple has an anthropomorphic idol. I passed a shrine 
 near Allahabad dedicated to a local Mother euphemistically 
 called Alopi or ' Non-destroyer,' who here takes the place 
 of the goddess worshipped in the South under the name of 
 Mari-amman, the ' Destroying Mother,' or goddess of small- 
 pox (see p. aa8). There was no image in Alopi's shrine, only 
 a flat stone slab, on which, in consequence of a late outbreak 
 of small-pox, an immense number of offerings of flowers, 
 cocoa-nuts, and grain were being laid by a succession of 
 worshippers, both Hindu and Muhammadan. 
 
 On the other hand, when I visited the village over which 
 Khodiyar presides, I found no offerings near her image ; or if 
 any had been placed there before my arrival they had dis- 
 appeared. Most probably the few that had been offered had 
 been already appropriated by the village priest, who was 
 nowhere to be seen. The name Khodiyar, ' Mischief,' is 
 very significant of this particular Mother's character, for 
 although her function is to shield from harm, she is more 
 inclined to turn mischievous and cause harm, and will cer- 
 tainly do so if her temper is ruffled by any remissness in the 
 daily process of coaxing and conciliating her. 
 
 Hence it is no matter of surprise that an outbreak of sick- 
 ness in the village was attributed entirely to a little temporary 
 
Mother-worship. 227 
 
 slackness in supplying her with her daily nutriment. Extra- 
 ordinary offerings, therefore — some of them accompanied by 
 the killing of animals and pouring out of blood — had to 
 be made till the disease had abated. When no sickness 
 remained it was believed that the Mother's anger was 
 appeased, no further trouble was taken, and everything 
 returned to the old routine. 
 
 Had any native of the district, who happened to have been 
 educated at the Bombay Presidency College, suggested a little 
 attention to sanitary rules as a more effective remedy against 
 cholera or small-pox, he would have been laughed to scorn by 
 his fellow-villagers. 
 
 Each of the remaining 139 Mothers of Gujarat has some 
 speciality. One, named Becarajl, has numerous imageless 
 shrines. The shrine most frequented is at a place seventy-five 
 miles north of Ahmedabad. Sometimes she is represented by 
 a coloured square figure, divided into six compartments. 
 
 Another, named Untai, causes and prevents whooping- 
 cough; another, named Berai, prevents cholera; another, called 
 MarakI (popularly Marki), causes cholera ; another, Hadakai, 
 controls mad-dogs and prevents hydrophobia ; another, Asa- 
 pura, represented by two idols, satisfies the hopes of wives 
 by giving children. Others are Kalka and Hingraj. 
 
 Not a few are worshipped either as causing or protecting 
 from demoniacal possession as a form of bodily disease. The 
 offering of goats' blood to some of these Mothers is supposed 
 to be very effectual ; the animals are not always killed. 
 
 A story is told of a Hindu doctor who cured a whole 
 village of an outbreak of virulent influenza, attributed to the 
 malignant influences of an angry goddess, by simply assem- 
 bling the inhabitants, muttering some cabalistic texts, and 
 solemnly letting loose a pair of scape-goats into a neigh- 
 bouring wood as an offering to the offended deity. ^ 
 The small-pox goddess is a form of divine mother universalljA 
 adored under different names through every part of India. 
 
228 Mother-worship. 
 
 In the upper provinces she is called Sitala Devi, or simply 
 Devi. In the South her name is Marl-ammah, ' Mother of 
 Death.' This goddess may either avert small-pox — of which 
 there are three different kinds — cause small-pox, or be herself 
 small-pox. In some parts of the country persons who die of 
 small-pox are not burnt, lest the goddess herself should be 
 burnt too. She also presides over cholera and other diseases 
 causing death. Her shrines are generally found outside vil- 
 lages, under trees, or in groves, and are often associated with 
 the shrines of Ganesa. 
 
 Some of the most important local Mothers in the South are 
 deifications of celebrated women who were great benefac- 
 tresses and came to be regarded after death as manifestations 
 or forms of Siva's wife. Such are MinadI (for MinakshI, 
 worshipped at Madura), KamadI, VisalacI, and others. 
 
 In the South of India the Mothers are called Ammans. 
 
 Notably a Mother named Ella-amman presides over boun- 
 daries, and is supposed to have great power over serpents and 
 to be particularly fond of fish. 
 
 Another, called Pidarl, is said to be ' a queen among the 
 devils,' because all who hang or poison themselves, or die any 
 violent death, are turned into malignant demons who would 
 destroy the whole human race if not kept in check by Pidarl. 
 
 Other Mothers dreaded for their fierce nature are them- 
 selves simply demons; for example, damunda, Marudayl, 
 and Kateri. The last is an evil spirit inhabiting the air, and 
 is thought to be too aerial in character to be represented by 
 an image. 
 
 All these Mothers are believed to delight in blood and to 
 drink it. Hence the blood of swine, goats, and cocks, besides 
 all kinds of cooked grain, are offered to them. One Mother 
 called Kulumandl-amman is said to have a special fancy for 
 black kids, and can only be appeased and prevented from 
 causing sickness and. death if the blood of at least three or 
 four thousand such kids is presented to her every year. 
 
Mother-worship. 229 
 
 Sometimes she is personated by a man who is carried on 
 the shoulders of two other men and sucks up some of the 
 blood of the slaughtered animals. 
 
 When a woman dies unpurified within fifteen days after 
 childbirth she becomes a demon called (^udel (Churel). She 
 is then always on the watch to attack other young mothers. 
 
 On the other hand, the power of at least one well-disposed 
 Mother in Gujarat is exerted in a remarkable way for the 
 benefit of women after childbirth. Among a very low-caste 
 set of basket-makers (called Pomla) it is the usual practice of 
 a wife to go about her work immediately after delivery, as if 
 nothing had happened. The presiding Mata of the tribe is 
 supposed to transfer her weakness to her husband, who takes 
 to his bed and has to be supported with good nourishing food. 
 
 The goddess ShashthI (Chathi) protects infants, and is 
 therefore worshipped on the sixth day after delivery. She is 
 represented by a simple stone set up under some tree. 
 
 The eight Mothers worshipped by the Tantrikas of Bengal 
 are each represented with a child in her lap, and it is remark- 
 able that Uma, wife of Siva, when worshipped as a type of 
 beauty and motherly excellence, is always regarded as a 
 virgin ^. 
 
 All the Mothers are believed to have control over magical 
 powers, and especially over the secret operations of nature 
 and all those mysterious occult agencies which are intensi- 
 fied by darkness and invisibility. These powers and preter- 
 natural faculties they can impart to their worshippers, if 
 properly propitiated. This is a proof of the intimate con- 
 nexion subsisting between Mother-worship and the doctrines 
 of Saktism as described in the preceding chapter. 
 
 ^ So in particular churches at Munich and elsewhere the shrines of 
 the black Virgin are frequented by vast numbers of pilgrims, who hang 
 up votive offerings, often consisting of waxen arms and legs, around her 
 altar, in the firm belief that they owe the restoration of broken limbs and 
 the recovery from various diseases to her intervention. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 This subject has already been to some extent anticipated 
 in the previous chapter. There I have endeavoured to point 
 out that the universal prevalence of the worship of tutelary- 
 deities among the great mass of the population in India is 
 the result of a perpetual dread of evil demons — a dread which 
 haunts Hindus of all ranks and stations, from the highest 
 to the lowest, with the exception of those fortunate persons 
 whom a European education has delivered from the dominion 
 of superstitious ideas. 
 
 My object in the present chapter will be to show that 
 the very demons and evil spirits are as much objects of wor- 
 ship as the gods who defend men from their malice ; just as 
 the tutelary deities themselves may under aggravating cir- 
 cumstances turn into angry demons who require to be 
 propitiated (see p. 345). 
 
 In fact, a belief in every kind of demoniacal influence has 
 always been from the earliest times an essential ingredient 
 in Hindu religious thought. The idea probably had its origin 
 in the supposed peopling of the air by spiritual beings — the 
 personifications or companions of storm and tempest. Cer- 
 tainly no one who has ever been brought into close contact 
 with the Hindus in their own country can doubt the fact 
 that the worship of at least ninety per cent, of the people 
 of India in the present day is a worship of fear. Not that 
 the existence of good deities presided over by one Supreme 
 Being is doubted ; but that these deities are believed to be 
 too absolutely good to need propitiation ; just as in ancient 
 histories of the Slav races, we are told that they believed 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship, 231 
 
 in a white and a black god, but paid adoration to the last 
 alone, having, as they supposed, nothing to apprehend from 
 the beneficence of the first or white divinity. 
 
 The simple truth is that evil of all kinds, difficulties, 
 dangers, and disasters, famines, diseases, pestilences, and 
 death, are thought by an ordinary Hindu to proceed from 
 demons, or, more properly speaking, from devils, and from 
 devils alone. These malignant beings are held, as we have 
 seen, to possess varying degrees of rank, power, and male- 
 volence. Some aim at destroying the entire world, and 
 threaten the sovereignty of the gods themselves. Some 
 delight in killing men, women, and children, out of a mere 
 thirst for human blood. Some take a mere mischievous plea- 
 sure in tormenting, or revel in the infliction of sickness, injury, 
 and misfortune. All make it their business to mar or impede 
 the progress of good works and useful undertakings. 
 
 And the remarkable thing is, that the power wielded by 
 certain arch-demons over men, and even gods, is supposed 
 to have been acquired by the practice of religious austerities. 
 It is said of the demon Ravana, that after undergoing severe 
 austerities in a forest for ten thousand years, standing in 
 the midst of five fires with his feet in the air, he obtained 
 from the god Brahma powers greater than those possessed 
 by the gods themselves. 
 
 We must, however, at the outset guard against the idea 
 that in Hindu mythology the expressions devil and demon — 
 any more than the Greek bid^oXos and batjxaiv — are con- 
 vertible terms; or that these two words at all adequately 
 express the immense variety of spiritual beings supposed to 
 hold communication with man or liable to be brought into 
 relationship with him. 
 
 It is well known that Indian literature makes constant 
 mention of numerous regions above and below the earth which 
 serve as the abode of such beings. Thus we learn from the 
 Epic poems and Puranas that there are seven upper and 
 
232 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 seven lower worlds ^ (see p. 102, note), and beneath the latter 
 are twenty-one hells. They are enumerated in Manu IV. 
 88-90, and others are added in Vishnu-purana II. 6 ^. 
 
 The hells are for the infliction of various degrees of suf- 
 fering on sinful men. Yet they are not places of eternal 
 punishment. They are merely temporary purgatories. One 
 is a place of terrific darkness ; another consists of heated 
 caldrons (tapta-kumbha) ; another of red-hot iron (tapta- 
 loha) ; another contains pits of red-hot charcoal ; another of 
 blood ; another is a dense forest whose leaves are sharp swords ; 
 another is a hell of pincers (Sandansa) ; another is a sea of 
 fetid mud ; another is a plain paved with iron spikes ^. In 
 
 ' All fourteen worlds are believed to rest on the thousand heads of the 
 great serpent Sesha ; or the earth which is the lowest of the seven upper 
 worlds is supposed to be supported at the quarters and intermediate 
 quarters of the sky by eight male and eight female mythical elephants. 
 ,, Then, again, the earth is thought to be composed of seven great circular 
 islands (most of which are known by the name of some tree or plant, 
 such as Jambu, Kusa, Plaksha, Salmali), surrounded by seven circular 
 seas, all of which are described in Maha-bharata VI. 236, etc., and in the 
 Vishnu-purana II. 2, etc. See also my ' Indian Wisdom,' p. 419. 
 
 ^ This Purana and the Bhagavata make twenty-eight hells. 
 
 ' In a recent number of a Chicago paper I find the following curiously 
 parallel ideas quoted from a Roman Catholic book for children, by the 
 Rev. J. Furniss : ' The fourth dungeon is the boiling kettle. Listen ; 
 there is a sound hke that of a kettle boiling. The blood is boiling in 
 the scalded brains of that boy ; the brain is boiling and bubbling in his 
 head ; the marrow is boiling in his bones. The fifth dungeon is the red- 
 hot oven, in which is a little child. Hear how it screams to come out ; 
 see how it turns and twists itself about in the fire ; it beats its head 
 against the roof of the oven ; it stamps its feet upon the floor of the 
 oven.' The idea of terrific torture lasting to all eternity seems a wholly 
 Western conception. The same Chicago paper goes on to quote from 
 another author : ' The world will probably be converted into a great lake 
 or liquid globe of fire, in which the wicked shall be overwhelmed, which , 
 shall always be in tempest, in which they shall be tossed to and fro, 
 having no rest day nor night .... their heads, their eyes, their tongues, 
 their hands, their feet, their loins and their vitals shall for ever be full of 
 a glowing, melting fire, fierce enough to melt the very rocks and elements.' 
 So, again, a celebrated preacher is reported to have said in a sermon : 
 'When thou diest thy soul will be tormented alone; that will be hell 
 for it ; but at the Day of Judgment thy body will join thy soul and thou 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship, 233 
 
 the same way the Svarga or heaven of Brahmanism is merely 
 a temporary paradise (pp. 49 ; 71). 
 
 On the other hand, the seven worlds immediately below 
 the earth are not places of punishment at all. According 
 to the Vishnu-purana (II. 5) they are regions adorned with 
 beautiful palaces, groves and streams, where the sun diffuses 
 light, not heat, and the moon shines for illumination, not 
 for cold ; where the air is resonant with the song of birds, and 
 where are all kinds of delicious food and beverages. 
 
 All seven lower regions (which are not to be confounded 
 with the hells), and especially the one called Patala, are in- 
 habited by demoniacal creatures — such as the Daityas and 
 Danavas (p. 238), of a nature not necessarily wicked, and in 
 some respects superior to that of men. According to one 
 legend, the Demon Bali reigns in these regions^ (see p. no), 
 but, if this be accepted, he is not to be confounded with 
 Yama (p. 290). Notably they are peopled by a race half men, 
 half serpents, called Nagas. These serpent-demons (see pp. 
 321-323), who are described as having jewels in their heads, 
 are fabled to have sprung from Kadru wife of Kasyapa, and 
 some of the females among them (naga-kanyas) are even 
 said to have married human heroes^- They are ruled over 
 by three chief serpents called Sesha, Vasuki, and Takshaka, 
 who also exercise control over the ordinary snakes which 
 infest the earth. 
 
 Again, the seven upper worlds, including the world which is 
 
 wilt have twin hells ; thy body sweating drops of blood, and thy soul 
 sufTused with agony. In fierce fire, exactly like that we have on earth, 
 thy body will be, asbestos-like, for ever unconsumed ; all thy veins roads 
 for the feet of pain to travel on ; every nerve a string on which the devil 
 shall for ever play his diabolical tune of hell's unutterable lament.' 
 
 ' At the Calcutta Exhibition of 1 883-1 884, I was greatly amused by 
 coming across an image of the Demon Bali, which had been labelled by 
 a native clerk ' King of the Netherlands.' 
 
 ^ In this way UlupJ became the wife of Arjuna, and, curiously enough, 
 a tribe of Rajputs, now existing, claims descent from the Nagas. 
 
2 
 
 4 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 the peculiar abode of man, are inhabited by countless hosts of 
 superhuman and semi-divine creatures of all kinds. Apparently- 
 some of the highest worlds are set apart for the exclusive occu- 
 pation of those beatified creatures who have attained a state 
 of absolute perfection ; for example, the Siddhas and others. 
 But the regions just above the earth — especially the region 
 corresponding to the atmosphere, called Bhuvar — are tenanted 
 by numerous demonized spirits of dead men and superhuman 
 beings, who, like the inhabitants of the lower worlds, may 
 fitly be designated by the general name 'demons^.' They 
 have been already alluded to in chapter VIII (p. 209). Like 
 men, they are generally gifted with free-will, and may have 
 good or evil proclivities, and even the best of them may fall 
 away from religion and virtue. They may be pious or im- 
 pious, benevolent or malevolent, merciful or cruel. They may 
 be obedient to the gods as their servants or followers, or may 
 be opposed to them as enemies. Similarly they may be 
 the friends or foes of man. Some of these beings are con- 
 stantly traversing the earth and the world immediately above 
 the earth. They are innumerable and constitute a vast 
 Pandemonium, for ever balancing, as it were, the equally vast 
 Pantheon of 330 million gods. Moreover, this Pandemonium 
 is constantly replenished, as we shall see, with new inhabitants 
 from the world of human beings. 
 
 And here again we must guard against the notion that 
 the demons, whether good or bad, of Hindu mythology are 
 in their nature and organization wholly spiritual and im- 
 material. Though they are sometimes called by English 
 writers on Hindu mythology 'spirits,' and though they are 
 certainly endowed with frames of a finer and more ethereal 
 structure than the bodies of men^ and not necessarily visible 
 to men, yet these frames have for their essential elements 
 gross (sthula) material particles. In point of fact, according 
 
 ^ The Sanskrit term Bhuta, though often restricted to evil demons and 
 devils, may be used generally in the same way. Compare p. 242. 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 235 
 
 to Hindu ideas, the corporeal organization of the generality 
 of demons stands midway between that of men and gods. 
 For it is must be borne in mind that, in accordance with the 
 theory before explained, even the gods have forms, composed 
 of material atoms requiring the support of daily food (see 
 pp. 22, 28, Bhagavad-glta III. 11), that they are capable of 
 undergoing austerities (see Manu XI. 243, 244), that they are 
 liable to passions and affections like men and animals, and 
 that all, not excepting the one Supreme Personal God, are ' 
 subject to the inexorable law of disintegration and ultimate 
 absorption into the one universal and sole eternal Essence. 
 In short, gods, demons, and men are so closely connected 
 and inter-related that it is difficult to draw any line of de- 
 marcation between them. All three are subject to distinc- 
 tions of sex ; all three have bodies made up of gross 
 elementary (sthula) particles — these bodies being ethereal 
 in the case of gods, less ethereal in the case of demons, and 
 earthly in the case of men. 
 
 It is noticeable, too, that all men living on the earth are 
 said to fall under two categories, those who have divine 
 (daiva) natures, and those who have demoniacal (asura), and 
 that instances are recorded of demons allying themselves with 
 mortal women. These ideas are quite in keeping with the 
 theory of transmigration (pp. 26-29). 
 
 Moreover, it is to be observed that, as it is common to find 
 the bodies of even secondary deities possessed of an extra 
 number of hands and arms, the same is true of the demons. 
 Again, as all the gods have the power of assuming any shape 
 they like and of moving through the air in all directions, so 
 also have the generality of demons. In epic poetry the bodies 
 of the gods are described as very similar to those of men. 
 They differ only in the power of walking above the surface of 
 the ground, in being shadowless, in being free from per- 
 spiration, in having eyes that never wink, and flowery orna- 
 ments that never wither (Nala V. 24). Whether these latter 
 
236 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 attributes belong also to all demon-frames is not so clear. 
 Some classes of demons have shapes peculiarly their own which 
 they cannot alter. In general they are dwarfish and shorter 
 than men ^, but the majority enjoy the faculty of assuming any 
 shape suited to their needs, and even that of human beings. 
 
 It would be difficult in fact to enumerate all the varieties 
 of these beings, separable as they are, both good and bad, 
 into numberless classes according to differences of rank, 
 powers, and functions. 
 
 Nevertheless, it is important to note that they all fall 
 under two grand divisions. The first division embraces all 
 demons created by God at the creation of the world, or 
 brought into existence by the act of superior deities at other 
 times. 
 
 The second comprehends all demons whose creation or 
 existence is due to men, that is to say, to the spirits of men 
 who have once lived upon the earth. 
 
 To begin with the first of these grand divisions, although 
 it is said to comprise seven principal classes of beings cor- 
 responding to the seven worlds — seven demon-kings, with 
 frames in stature equal to a palm-tree, being mentioned in 
 the Sahkara-vijaya (chap. LI) — yet it would be easy to show 
 by extracts from both the earlier and later sacred literature 
 that no clearly definite classification or arrangement of 
 demoniacal creatures in any regular series or gradation is 
 possible. 
 
 Probably the earliest Sanskrit expression for a ' demon ' is 
 Asura ; and we know that although this word is used in the 
 later literature as a general term for evil demons of malignant 
 disposition, it was originally restricted to beings of a god-like 
 nature, and even applied to the gods themselves. 
 
 Thus in the Rig-veda the word Asura is used as the epithet 
 of Indra, the Maruts, Rudra, and other deities, and is espe- 
 
 ^ I noticed that all Siva's troops of demons are represented as dwarfish 
 in the sculptures of the caves of Elephanta. 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 237 
 
 cially an attribute of the ancient deity Varuna, who is first 
 an impersonation of the vault of heaven, and then identified 
 with the Supreme Being. 
 
 Furthermore, in the Taittiriya-Samhita (VI. 4. 10. i) it is 
 said that there was an original equality in goodness and 
 power between the gods and Asuras ^. 
 
 In the Taittirlya-Brahmana, Praja-pati, or 'the Lord of 
 Creation,' creates the Asuras with his breath (asu). In the 
 Satapatha-Brahmana the seventh Manu (or Manu of the 
 present period) is made to produce gods, Asuras, and men. 
 In other passages of the Brahmanas they are said to have 
 their own priests and sacrificial rites. 
 
 On the other hand, in the Veda various orders of evil 
 beings are spoken of under the name of Dasyus, Rakshasas, 
 Yatudhanas, Kimidins, and are described as without religious 
 rites, godless, haters of prayer (brahma-dvish), eaters of 
 flesh (kravyad), monstrous in form, and possessors of magical 
 powers ^. 
 
 Then, again, in Manu's law-book (I. 37) we find it stated 
 that the ten Praja-patis or secondary creators, after creating 
 the gods and great sages, afterwards created various orders of 
 beings, such as the Yakshas, Rakshasas, Pisacas, Gandharvas, 
 Apsarasas (pi. of Apsaras), Asuras, Nagas, etc. It is not af- 
 firmed that any of these beings were aboriginally evil-minded, 
 though they were certainly capable of becoming so. In 
 the Ramayana constant mention is made of beings hostile 
 to gods and men called Rakshasas. They are the haters and 
 disturbers of religious rites, they change their shapes at will, 
 harass holy men and devotees, and utter frightful sounds 
 in the ears of the faithful. 
 
 Most Rakshasas are men-eaters, and one, called Viradha, is 
 described as resembling a mountain-peak, with long legs, a 
 crooked nose, hideous eyes, pendant belly, and an open 
 
 ^ Hair's Sanskrit Texts, v. 230. "^ Ibid. ii. 418. 
 
238 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 mouth like that of death. At the head of them is the Demon 
 Ravana, who is an impersonation of selfish ambition. It does 
 not appear, however, that in other respects he was innately 
 wicked. On the contrary, it was only by severe religious 
 austerities carried on for ten thousand years that he acquired 
 unbounded power over gods and men. Others, too, of these 
 same Rakshasas are described as virtuous and pious, and 
 among them especially Vibhishana, who is the brother of 
 Ravana, and exactly his opposite in character and conduct. 
 In the Maha-bharata, again, Kansa, Kali, and numerous other 
 demons are, like Ravana in the Ramayana, impersonations 
 of evil. Kansa is the implacable enemy of Krishna, and 
 Kali is for ever instilling evil thoughts into men's hearts 
 in an age of universal degeneration. 
 
 We may note, too, that in epic poetry frequent mention is 
 made of another class of beings who are more especially 
 hostile to the gods, and for ever engaged in warfare with 
 them. They are called Daityas, as the supposed children 
 of the goddess Diti by Kasyapa (the gods being children of 
 Aditi). Others, too, are often alluded to under the name 
 of Danavas, as daughters of Danu. Both of these classes 
 of beings are said in the Vishnu-purana to occupy some of 
 the seven regions below the earth of which Patala is one 
 (II. 5)) and appear to belong to a higher order of creation 
 than the Rakshasas, whose nature is of a type inclined to 
 baser forms of wickedness, and whose malignity is more 
 particularly directed against men. 
 
 Then there are troops (ganas) of beings called Pramathas, 
 who constitute the armies of the god Siva. There are also the 
 Yakshas, who wait on Kubera (Kuvera), and the Gandharvas 
 (Atharva-veda XL 5. a) or heavenly choristers, and their 
 wives the Apsarasas, who attend on Indra. To these may 
 be added the Kinnaras (with human figure and equine head), 
 the Kimpurushas, the Vidya-dharas, Pannagas, &c. 
 
 Most of these creatures are good and benign in character ; 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 239 
 
 but all were created free agents, and are therefore liable to 
 fall away, and, after committing acts of sin or disobfedience, 
 may become malignant beings animated with a spirit of 
 bitter hostility towards gods and men. 
 
 It is in consonance with the theory of a contiiiual conflict 
 between the powers of good and the powers of evil that we 
 find the chief gods of the Hindu Pantheon constantly repre-^ 
 sented in the act of crushing their demon foes. Thus Krishna 
 is seen bruising the head of the great demon serpent Kaliya, 
 while Siva tramples on the arch-fiend Tripura, and holds 
 venomous serpents in his hands in token of his supremacy 
 over all malignant influences. 
 
 Hence, too, a great number of the t,ooo names of both 
 Vishnu and Siva will be found to be simple epithets — like 
 Murari ' enemy of Mura,' Purari ' enemy of Pura ' — significant 
 of their victory over certain typical demon antagonists. 
 Furthermore, the symbols held in the hands of both deities, 
 the discus and club of Vishnu, and the trident and bow of 
 Siva, are merely weapons of supposed irresistible efficacy in 
 their conflicts with the spirits of evil. 
 
 We pass on now to the second great division of the demon 
 world — that which is said to owe its creation to man. This 
 is by far the more important of the two great divisions in its 
 bearing on the subject of the present chapter, for it is chiefly 
 to those demons whose existence is derived from the departed 
 spirits of human beings that adoration and propitiation are 
 commonly offered. 
 
 And, indeed, it is a noteworthy point in the religious creed 
 of all ordinary Hindus that the majority of malignant devils 
 are believed to have been originally human beings. 
 
 If any man is killed by a tiger or the bite of a snake, or 
 has died a sudden violent death of any kind, away from his 
 relations and out of reach of proper funeral ceremonies, he 
 forthwith becomes an unquiet spirit, roaming about with 
 malevolent proclivities. In one place I found people wor- 
 
240 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 shipping the ghost of a milkman who was killed by a tiger 
 and became a devil. In another place the ghost of a potter 
 became a devil and a terror to the neighbourhood. The priests 
 of these demons werfe milkmen and potters respectively. 
 
 And a curious notion prevails in some parts of India that, 
 the better the man, the more mischievous will his ghost turn 
 out to be, if his body has not received proper cremation, 
 or if from any accident the succeeding funeral rites have not 
 been carefully performed or partially omitted. 
 
 Again, a still more remarkable doctrine is rife in India, 
 especially in the South. There it is a fixed article of belief 
 that when a man notorious for any particular vices dies, the 
 man himself may become extinct, but his evil nature never 
 dies ; nay, every one of his vices may then assume personality 
 and live after him as a demon. 
 
 And this applies equally to women, so that the resulting 
 demons may be of either sex, and the female is not unfre- 
 quently more spiteful and malignant than the male. It also 
 applies to persons of all castes, high or low, so that the 
 demons created may be of all ranks, and may have either 
 refined or low tastes. 
 
 It is thus that legion after legion of foul fiends and un- 
 clean spirits, bearing names corresponding to such expressions 
 as deceit-devils, lying-devils, gambling-devils, pride-devils, 
 cruelty-devils, lust-devils, gluttony-devils, strife-devils, drunk- 
 enness-devils, are supposed to have originated. 
 
 The same applies to a man who has been guilty of great 
 crimes or sins. His crimes and sins live after him in the 
 shape of malignant demons. 
 
 Hence have arisen any number of murder-devils, theft- 
 devils, perjury-devils, adultery-devils, blasphemy-devils, who 
 are always on the look-out for weak-minded victims, and ever 
 instigating them to the commission of similar crimes. 
 
 Nay, a man may sometimes become a demon without 
 dying ; for example, we read in the Maha-bbarata and Vishpu- 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 241 
 
 purana that Nahusha son of Ayus was changed into a serpent- 
 demon, in consequence of a curse pronounced on him by the 
 sage Agastya for his excessive pride in having gained by 
 penance the rank of Indra and then insulted some of the 
 Rishis (Maha-bh. V. 343 ; Vishnu-purana, p.413 ; ManuVII. 41). 
 
 Furthermore, all the diseases that either human or bestial 
 flesh is heir to are personified and converted into demons — 
 such as the demons of small-pox, of cholera, and of various 
 forms of typhus and jungle fever, and of cattle-disease. And 
 this idea of personifying and demonizing diseases is extended 
 to unseasonable calamities and disasters, such as hail-storms, 
 drought and blight, which all do duty in the devil army. 
 
 Indeed, I found that some villages in India possess a pro- 
 fessional exerciser or charmer, called Garpagarl (probably for 
 Gar-apakari, gar in MarathT meaning ' hail '), whose peculiar 
 business is to repeat incantations for warding off the hail- 
 storm-demon from the growing crops. 
 
 It is important, however, to bear in mind that there is in 
 Hinduism a per-contra side to the vastness of the demon-host. 
 For if it is an awful thought that year after year, and even day 
 by day, men and women are themselves through their sinful 
 habits causing fresh accessions to the demon-armies, it is, on 
 the other hand, a comforting reflection that the ranks of good 
 demons and benevolent spirits are continually recruited by^ 
 the deaths of righteous men, saints and sages, who are ranged 
 with the gods on the opposite side of the battle-field, and 
 are ever contending with their fiendish antagonists'. 
 
 It is, then, these lower forms of evil demons — once the 
 occupants of human bodies — that are most dreaded by the 
 generality of Hindus, and therefore most worshipped. Such 
 demons fitly take rank with devils. 
 
 According to some authorities they may be grouped under 
 the three classes of Bhuta, Preta, and Pisada, each class 
 having a distinct origin. 
 
 A Bhuta, they say, is a spirit emanating from a man 
 
 R 
 
242 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 who has died a violent death either by accident, suicide, or 
 capital punishment, and has not had proper funeral cere- 
 monies performed afterwards. 
 
 A Preta is the spirit of a deformed or crippled person, 
 or of one defective in some limb or organ, or of a child that 
 dies prematurely, owing to the omission of ceremonies during 
 the formation of the embryo. It is not necessarily wicked or 
 malicious or evil-disposed towards living men. 
 
 A Pisada is a demon created by a man's vices. It is the 
 ghost of a liar, drunkard, adulterer, or criminal of any kind, 
 or of one who has died insane. 
 
 In real truth, however, this kind of triple classification is 
 nowhere universally accepted, and is never consistently main- 
 tained. My own inquiries led me to the conclusion that the 
 terms Bhuta and Preta are as a general rule applied to ail 
 demons and ghosts indifferently, and the term Pisaca to 
 ^ malicious and mischievous imps and fiends. Such demons 
 and malicious beings haunt cemeteries or take up their abode 
 in trees, and are addicted to roaming about between the 
 hours of I a and 3 in the morning. They may take either 
 hideous or beautiful shapes, and even the form of men. 
 They require, as we have seen, the support of food ; and 
 what satiates their appetites more than any other kind of 
 nutriment is the blood of living animals. But according to 
 popular belief they may also feed on corpses, ordure and 
 carrion, and may even occupy and vivify dead bodies. Nay, 
 they may enter living bodies through the open mouth, if it 
 happen to be opened imprudently wide. Thus, if a man in an 
 ,. unguarded moment yawns or gapes without holding his hand 
 or snapping his fingers before his face, they may promptly 
 dart in and take up their abode in his interior, feeding on 
 the refuse of the food as it passes through the intestines. 
 
 When malignant demons thus take possession of the 
 bodies of living men, they may cause diseases and un- 
 pleasant affections of all kinds, or , they may agitate the 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship . 243 
 
 limbs of the person possessed, and impel him to frantic 
 movements, in which all devils take particular delight. 
 
 Occasionally they may take the shape or character of a 
 dog, cat, serpent, or other animal. It is fully believed that 
 if a person happens to be possessed by a dog-demon he will 
 take to barking like a dog. 
 
 With regard to so-called demon-worship, it must be noted \ 
 that there is no real worship. Nor has any demon — not even 
 one of the highest class — any imposing temple-like structure 
 erected to him. Often a mere heap of earth piled up in 
 pyramidal shape near some tree, or a similar erection formed 
 with bricks and painted with streaks of white, constitutes the 
 only shrine, while another heap in front with a flat surface 
 does duty for the altar. Sometimes the whole is covered 
 with a wooden roof supported on rough columns. There is 
 rarely any idol ; though sometimes, if the demon's origin be 
 traceable to the ghost of some high personage, whose elevation 
 of rank or office made him during lifetime formidable to his 
 followers, he may be represented by a rude image of some of 
 the terrible forms of Siva. No real prayers are said at such 
 shrines, though incantations may be recited. The propitia- "^ 
 tion consists in offerings of food, as mentioned in the preceding 
 chapter (p. aai), and in various ceremonies which differ in 
 different localities. 
 
 A spirit of one of these classes highly reverenced and very 
 commonly propitiated by villagers in some parts of India 
 is one popularly called Bhumya, or the ' earth-spirit.' He is 
 supposed to be the spirit of the founder of the village. If 
 a village is deserted by its inhabitants, no new colony of 
 people will dare to settle there without going through a 
 careful process of propitiating the earth-spirit, who never, 
 under any circumstances, quits his old haunts. 
 
 Another class consists of the spirits of young men who 
 have died without becoming fathers. These wander about ' 
 in a restless miserable manner, like people burdened with 
 
 R a 
 
244 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 an enormous debt which they are quite unable to discharge. 
 They are euphemistically called Pitas, ' fathers,'— that is, 
 by the name to which they are least entitled, — and are 
 propitiated by offerings presented at small shrines of a very 
 simple construction erected near rivers or pools of water. 
 Often these shrines are formed by merely setting up two 
 bricks with a little interval between them covered by another 
 brick. 
 
 And here it should be noted that although nearly every 
 village has its own special demon, whose cultus may not 
 only have existed from time immemorial, but may have an 
 origin antecedent to the introduction of Hinduism, yet it is 
 always possible to connect every form and variety of such 
 .worship with that of the god Siva, his consort Durga (or 
 Devi) and his two sons Ganesa and Su-brahmanya (see p. 21a). 
 ' It is important, too, to bear in mind that as the South of 
 India is the region in which Saivism is particularly prevalent, 
 so also it is among the inhabitants of the South that devil- 
 worship is most systematically practised. No one who has 
 travelled in that region can doubt that demonophobia is a 
 disease with which the whole Southern population is almost 
 hopelessly and incurably afflicted. Possibly one reason of 
 this may be that when the Dravidians invaded India they 
 found the South inhabited by wild aboriginal savages, whose 
 whole aspect and demeanour appeared to them to resemble 
 those of devils. Again, the Aryans as they advanced towards 
 the South found it occupied by hostile Dravidian races, as 
 well as by apparently aboriginal tribes, and their excited 
 imaginations converted these powerful enemies into super- 
 natural giants, and the most formidable of them into veritable 
 demons (Rakshasas). 
 
 In due time Aryans, Dravidians, and aborigines blended 
 amicably together, but the dread of demon-foes remained, 
 and this dread still prevails not only in the South, but over 
 every part of India. In fact, so deep-seated and ineradicable 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 245 
 
 is the fear of evil spirits in the minds of the lower orders, that 
 in many villages of India the doors of the houses are never 
 allowed to face the South, lest the entrance of some dreaded 
 demon should be facilitated. Perhaps, however; the true 
 devil-region is the extreme Southern peninsula, near the 
 Island of Ceylon. The nearer indeed we approach that 
 island, the more do we find the people (like the Shanars of 
 Tinnevelly) steeped in demonolatry and saturated with every 
 form of superstitious fear of evil spirits, ghosts, and goblins. 
 
 Every village has its own peculiar devil or devils, to the 
 attacks of which it is constantly in imagination exposed. 
 Happily every village has also, as we have already pointed out, 
 its own tutelary deities. Curiously, too, many good spirits 
 are believed to be equestrian in their tastes. Possibly the 
 villagers suppose that by turning them into a kind of cavalry 
 regiment they give them an advantage over their impish op- 
 ponents, who prowl about on foot, and sneak into the village 
 domain at unguarded corners. 
 
 Certain it is that to propitiate these tutelary divinities the 
 villagers set up horses of baked clay in their fields — often as large 
 as life, and generally ten or twenty in a row or in a semicircle 
 round a shrine — and present them as offerings to the good 
 divinity of the shrine, in token of gratitude for deliverances. 
 
 They are especially presented — though not without other 
 oblations — to the male guardian God Ayenar (see p. 219), 
 who is believed to be a daring horseman capable of clearing 
 hedges and ditches and riding down the most active demon- 
 antagonist. 
 
 As to the female tutelary deities called Mothers (see p. 323), 
 we have already seen that if not propitiated by constant 
 offerings, and especially with blood, .they will themselves 
 assume the personality of the very demon dreaded by the 
 villagers, and inflict the very plague from which they usually 
 protect them. 
 
 The most terrible of all demons are thought to be those 
 
246 Demon-worship ,and Spirit-worship. 
 
 created by Europeans. Of course the propitiating process 
 must vary according to the character of the man whose 
 demonized spirit is to be coaxed into good-humour. His 
 tastes and idiosyncrasies during life must be carefully inquired 
 into and judiciously indulged. The story is told of a certain 
 choleric Englishman who was a terror to the inhabitants of a 
 district in the South of India, and whose ghost after his death 
 had to be constantly appeased by offerings of good cooked 
 meat, brandy, soda-water, and cigars placed daily on his 
 tomb. The same was done to secure the continued good-will 
 of a philanthropic sportsman, who when he was alive delivered 
 a large tract of country from the ravages of tigers. 
 
 And here we may note other methods of neutralizing the 
 evil influences of demons prevalent in Southern India. Male 
 and female devils are supposed to delight in dancing, particu- 
 larly when accompanied with wild cries, violent gesticulations 
 ringing of bells, and noisy discordant music. Hence it happens 
 that, when pestilence is rife in any district, professional 
 wizard-like exorcisers, or persons selected for the purpose, 
 paint their faces, put on hideous masks, dress up in fantastic 
 garments, arm themselves with strange weapons, and com- 
 mence dancing. Their object is to personate particular 
 demons, or to induce demoniacal spirits to leave the persons 
 of those possessed by them and to occupy the persons of the 
 dancers, who shriek, fling themselves about, and work them- 
 selves up into a phrenzy of excitement, amid beating of tom- 
 toms, blowing of horns, and ringing of bells. When the 
 dancers are thoroughly exhausted by their gesticulations they 
 sink down in a kind of trance, and are then believed to be 
 actually possessed by the spirit of the demon and are turned 
 for a time into demon-mediums, gifted with clairvoyance 
 and a power of delivering prophetic utterances. The spec- 
 tators ask them questions about missing relatives or future 
 events, and their deliverances are supposed to be oracular 
 This is akin to Shamanism. 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 247 
 
 I witnessed such a dance on a dark night in a garden near 
 Colombo in Ceylon. The dancers represented the demons of 
 various forms of typhus fever, carried flaring torches, wore 
 hideous masks, and had jingling bells on their legs. Their 
 wild cries and horrible antics will remain indelibly impressed 
 on my recollection. (See my 'Buddhism,' p. 317.) 
 
 When I was at Tanjor the late learned Dr. Burnell, then 
 judge of that district, gave me some interesting information in 
 regard to the demon-festivals which recur periodically in the 
 district of Mangalor, where he held office for some time. 
 
 One of the most popular of these festivals, called Illecichida 
 Nema, is celebrated every fifteen or twenty years. At 
 another called Kallyata, a wild dance is performed every 
 sixtieth year before a particular rock or stone, which is sup- 
 posed to tremble and shake periodically. 
 
 Sometimes the performance takes place in a large shed in 
 the middle of which burns a common lamp under a canopy. 
 Around are images of the Bhutas. At the distance of about 
 a foot in front of the lamp is placed a common wooden 
 tripod-stand, two or three feet high, on which is constructed 
 a square frame of cocoa-nut leaves. Inside this frame rice 
 and turmeric are piled up in the form of a pyramid into 
 which a three-branched iron lamp is inserted. Around are 
 arranged offerings consisting of fruits and living victims, such 
 as fowls and goats. The latter are adorned with garlands, 
 and both fowls and goats are afterwards decapitated, the 
 warm blood being either poured out on the ground or on the 
 altar, or else drunk by the officiating priest. The idea is that 
 the demon thirsts for blood, and becomes irritated if his 
 cravings are not satisfied. The sole object of sacrificing 
 animals is to assuage his thirst and appease his anger. 
 
 All this is preliminary to the principal performance, which 
 takes place in an open space in front of the slaughtered 
 victims. The priest, or some other devotee who has under- 
 gone a long preparatory fasting, comes forward to personate 
 
248 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 a. particular demon. He is dressed up in a fantastic costume, 
 often covered with grotesque dangling ornaments and jingling 
 bells. Sometimes he wears a hideous mask ; sometimes his 
 faced is daubed with paint of different colours. In one hand 
 he holds a sword, trident, or other implement, and perhaps a 
 bell in the other. He then commences dancing or pacing up 
 and down in an excited manner, amid beating of tom-toms, 
 blowing of horns, and all kinds of noisy music, while an 
 attendant sings songs, or recites rude poems descriptive of 
 the deeds of the demons. Meanwhile spirituous liquor is 
 distributed, the performer becomes violently excited, and the 
 demon takes complete possession of him. Finally he suc- 
 cumbs in an hysterical fit, and gives out oracular responses to 
 any inquiries addressed to him. Most of the bystanders 
 consult him as to their several wants and destinies, or the 
 welfare of absent relatives, but are not allowed to do so with- 
 out first presenting offerings. 
 
 Of course, variations occur in different districts. 
 
 According to Mr. Walhouse, in his paper read before the 
 Anthropological Institute, the structures and observances con- 
 nected with devil-worship on the Western coast of India are 
 both domestic and public. In villages, and very generally in 
 towns, there is in every house a wooden cot or cradle, placed 
 on the ground or suspended by ropes or chains, and dedicated 
 to the Bhuta of the spot. On these are deposited a bell,- a knife 
 or sword, and a pot filled with water, all which are collectively 
 called the Bhandara of the Bhuta, and kept either in a part 
 of the house itself, or in a small separate building. The 
 object seems to be to propitiate the spirit that haunts the spot 
 by making a sort of abode for it. 
 
 On the last day of every lunar month flowers are laid on 
 the cot, and perfume burnt before it ; and once a year, towards 
 the end of April, a ceremony called Tambila is performed. 
 A fire is lit on the spot where the cot and paraphernalia 
 stand, then fried rice, mixed with coarse sugar and grated 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 249 
 
 cocoa-nut kernel, is heaped on two plantain leaves, which are 
 placed on the cot, together with some young cocoa-nuts, 
 pierced ready to drink from. A ball is then formed of boiled 
 rice, coloured yellow with turmeric, and laid on a piece of 
 plantain-leaf on a small stool, which is placed before the cot, 
 with a lighted torch upon it. A fowl is held above the rice- 
 ball and torch, its throat cut, and the blood allowed to drop 
 upon the ball ; some perfume is burnt, and the ceremony ends. 
 Should a member of the family be stricken with any unusual 
 attack, a fowl is turned three times round before the patient's 
 face, its neck then twisted, and the blood let fall upon him ; 
 the meaning being to offer life for life — the fowl in lieu of the 
 man. The family priest is then consulted, who recommends 
 alms to be given to himself to satisfy the hostile stars, with 
 a promise to perform a special ceremony to the Bhuta. 
 
 Mr. Walhouse informs us that these demons have shrines 
 called Bhuta-sthans, sometimes of considerable size, but far 
 more commonly small plain structures, four or iive yards deep 
 by two or three wide, with a door at one end, covered by a 
 portico supported on two pillars with a thatched roof, and 
 windowless. Inside the Bhuta-sthan a number of brass images 
 roughly made in human shape, or resembling animals 
 such as pigs, tigers, fowls, etc., are usually found. The 
 Bhutas themselves are commonly represented by mere rough 
 stones. These rustic fanes are thickly scattered over the face 
 of the country — under a green-tree, on hill-sides, down in hol- 
 lows, in jungles, on plains, by roadsides, in villages, amid rice- 
 fields, but always on a small plot of waste ground. 
 
 Once a year a festival called Kolla is held. The festival 
 always takes place at night, and about nine o'clock all the 
 villagers assemble in their best attire. Then the Pujari, or 
 priest, takes the Bhuta sword and bell in his hands, and whirls 
 round and round, imitating the supposed gestures of the demon. 
 A Dher (Dheda), or man of the lowest caste— at other times 
 regarded with contempt, but now advanced to the foremost 
 
250 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 post — comes forward naked, except round the loins, his 
 head and body being grotesquely and frightfully besmeared 
 with white, yellow, and red paint. Meanwhile a dozen or 
 more tom-toms are beaten with a continually increasing 
 din, and the Dher (Dheda) presently breaks into a maniac 
 dance, capering, bounding, and spinning vehemently. At 
 length he stops ; he is full of the demon, and stands fixed and 
 rigid, with staring eyes. Presently he speaks, or rather the 
 demon speaks through him, in loud, hoarse, commanding tones, 
 wholly unlike his own, or indeed any natural voice. Various 
 disputes and litigated matters, especially when evidence and 
 ordinary means of adjustment fail, are then brought forward 
 and submitted to the decision of the Bhuta, and his award, 
 pronounced through the Dher, is generally, though not al- 
 ways, submitted to. After this the demon desires to have 
 food, and the Dher eats fried rice and drinks the milk of 
 young cocoa-nuts ; or, if the demon he represents be one of 
 low degree, he eats animal food and drinks arrack. 
 
 Among the demons most feared in Kanara are Kalkatti, 
 Kallurti, and Panjurli. 
 
 The story of the former two is as follows : — Kalkatti and 
 Kallurti were respectively the son and daughter of one 
 Kalkuda, a sculptor, who must have lived in the fifteenth 
 century of our era. Kalkatti was a mason, and one day found 
 fault with his father's work, which so distressed him that he 
 forthwith killed himself. The son then followed his father's 
 trade, and succeeded so well that he made the celebrated 
 Jain statue at Karakal. After completing this masterpiece 
 he wanted to go elsewhere, but the king of the country 
 forbad him, and to prevent his producing any similar statue 
 cut off his left hand and right leg. Notwithstanding this 
 mutilation he went to Yenur and made a still larger statue 
 there. His sister Kallurti determined to join him at Yenur. 
 There they lived together for some time, and then both 
 committed suicide. It was thus that they became formidable 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 251 
 
 demons, who revenged themselves on the king of Karakal by 
 burning down his palace and town and annoying people 
 throughout the country in various ways. Their story is a 
 long one, and the books which recount it give directions for 
 appeasing their anger. 
 
 The story of Panjurli is also a long one. He is a terrible 
 pig-faced demon, created, it is said, through a curse of Siva 
 pronounced on some young pigs which had laid waste his 
 garden, and were thereupon collectively transformed into a 
 single mischievous demon. 
 
 In South Kanara, according to Mr. Walhouse, there is a 
 noted temple, whicli is believed to be the residence of seven 
 most dreaded demons. Certain devil-stones are sold there in 
 which the powers of the Bhutas are held to be inherent. 
 These are taken home and used by the purchasers against 
 their enemies. 
 
 I add an extract from Bishop Caldwell's account of the 
 Religion of the Shanars, a tribe in the South of India, whose 
 occupation consists in cultivating and climbing the palmyra 
 tree for the sake of its juice. They have been largely con- 
 verted to Christianity, and chiefly through the Bishop's 
 devoted labours among them. 
 
 In his description of their devil-worship, he says : — ' Every 
 malady, however trivial, is supposed by the more superstitious 
 to be inflicted by a devil, and a sacrifice is necessary for 
 its removal ; but the unusual severity or continuance of any 
 disease, or the appearance of symptoms which are not re- 
 corded in the physician's Sastra, are proofs of possession of 
 which no Shanar can entertain any doubt. The medical 
 science of so rude a people not being very extensive, cases 
 of unquestionable possession are of frequent occurrence. 
 When a woman is heard to weep and laugh alternately, 
 without any adequate cause, or shriek and look wild when 
 no snake or wild beast can be perceived, what Shanar can 
 suppose anything but a devil to be the cause of the mischief? 
 
252 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 The native doctor, himself a Shanar, is sent for to give his 
 advice. He brings his library with him (he cannot read, 
 but it is all in his memory), his complete science of medicine 
 in one hundred stanzas, as revealed by the sage Agastya to 
 his disciple Pulastya ; but in vain he recites his prescriptions, 
 in vain he coins hard words. As no description of hysterical 
 complaints is contained in his authorities, what can he do 
 but decide that a devil has taken possession of the woman, 
 and recommend that a sacrifice be offered to him forthwith, 
 with a cloth and a white fowl to the doctor ? 
 
 ' Sometimes the friends are not desirous of expelling the 
 evil spirit all at once, but send for music, get up a devil-dance, 
 and call upon the demon to prophesy. 
 
 ' If they desire to expel the devil, there is no lack of 
 moving ceremonies and powerful incantations, each of which 
 has been tried and found successful innumerable times. If 
 the devil should prove an obstinate one and refuse to leave, 
 charm they never so wisely, his retreat may generally be 
 hastened by the vigorous application of a slipper or a broom 
 to the shoulders of the possessed person, the operator taking 
 care at the same time to use the most scurrilous language he 
 can think of. After a time the demoniac loses his downcast, 
 sullen look. He begins to get angry and writhe about under 
 the slippering, and at length cries, " I go, I go." Then they 
 ask him his name, and why he came there. He tells them 
 he is such and such a devil, whom they have neglected, 
 and he wants an offering ; or he calls himself by the name 
 of some deceased relative, who, as they now learn for the 
 first time, has become a demon. As soon as the demon 
 consents to leave, the beating ceases ; and not unfrequently 
 immediate preparations are made for a sacrifice, as a com- 
 pensation to his feelings for the ignominy of the exorcism. 
 The possessed person now awakes as from a sleep, and 
 appears to have no knowledge of anything that has hap- 
 pened.' 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship, 253 
 
 I must not omit to note one or two other facts connected 
 with a belief in demoniacal influences and their counteraction. 
 
 Demons or evil spirits in India are supposed to be often 
 the cause of what in Europe is called ' an evil eye,' that is, 
 a mysterious power of fascinating, bewitching, or inflicting 
 some injury on others by a fixed look, gaze, or glance. 
 Indeed, a look of admiration from friend or foe is'believed 
 to be fraught with great danger and possibly serious calamity 
 to any individual who is the object of it. 
 
 Europeans who are often unaware of the universal pre- 
 valence of this superstition are occasionally the innocent 
 cause of great distress to the parents of Indian children 
 by looking at them approvingly and uttering some exclama- 
 tion of praise. 
 
 A story was told me with the utmost gravity — as if 
 its truth was beyond all dispute — of a person who was born 
 a twin, but whose twin brother was a spirit who cqnstantly 
 attended him and gifted him with various preternatural 
 faculties, and amongst others the power of an evil eye. 
 It was declared to be a fact, that whatever this person 
 looked at with admiration instantly faded away and perished. 
 Old women who are believed to have this power are par- 
 ticularly dreaded and shunned as dangerous witches. 
 
 Another story was told me of a man who fell in love with 
 his neighbour's wife. By calling in demoniacal aid he was 
 able to fix his gaze on her, and after successfully bewitching 
 her to cause her death. Then he managed to get possession 
 of a hair or two from her head. These he handed over to 
 a well-known sorcerer at Lahore, who, once possessed of a 
 portion of her person, had no difficulty in bringing her to 
 life again by his incantations, and in return for a good sum 
 of money delivered her to her lover, who married her. 
 
 Some sorcerers, if called upon to get rid of an enemy, • 
 mould a human effigy in wax, pronouncing over it a few 
 mysterious cabalistic words. The waxen figure is then placed 
 
254 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship, 
 
 before a fire, and, as it melts, brings down deadly calamities 
 on the head of the person to be. destroyed. Or, if a human 
 bone from a cemetery can be procured, and certain Mantras 
 recited over it, very fatal results will ensue (compare p. aoi), 
 
 Many charms are used against the misfortunes which may 
 at any time be brought about by malicious spirits, or by evil 
 influences connected with the human eye. In some parts 
 of India a tiger's claw or tooth is worn on the neck and held to 
 be very efficacious. In other places an image of the linga^ is 
 worn, or some bright ornament — such as a string of white 
 cowries — which is supposed to arrest evil glances, or divert 
 them from the person wearing such a necklace. A small 
 iron ring is also commonly carried about as an amulet. It is 
 particularly effective if inlaid with pearls. Frequently a lime 
 is carried in the turban, and great faith is reposed in its pro- 
 phylactic properties. Or again, any ornament with a figure 
 of Hanuman (p. %%6) engraved on it makes an admirable 
 charm which few demons can withstand. 
 
 In some districts — especially in the South — I have often 
 remarked white pots, with black marks or grotesque objects 
 covered with streaks of white paint, placed here and there 
 in the fields, and intended to catch the eye so as to avert 
 envious glances or the malignant influences of demons 
 from the growing crops. In remote villages, too, was oc- 
 casionally to be observed an apparatus for curing cattle- 
 disease, when caused (as universally believed in India) by 
 the machinations of evil demons. At the entrance to the 
 village were two upright posts with a cord stretched between 
 them, on which were hung rude models of ploughs, etc., and 
 in the centre dangled a large pot-cover. On inquiry I found 
 that charms resembling physicians' prescriptions in rather 
 unreadable hieroglyphics were written on this cover, and all 
 the afflicted cattle driven under them. The power of such 
 
 ^ In Southern Italy an ornament with a finger pointing downwards is 
 to this day used as a charm against the evil eye. 
 
Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 255 
 
 charms is supposed to depend a good deal on the reputation 
 of the sorcerers employed to write them, and every village 
 does not possess such men. They are sometimes sent for 
 from great distances, and, in my opinion, a long period must 
 elapse before any filtering down of education from the upper 
 classes will avail to undermine the faith of the simple vil- 
 lagers in the efficacy of a pot-cover inscribed with the charms 
 of the more noted sorcerers ^- 
 
 ^ The following abridgment of an article on Indian ' Haunted Bunga- 
 lows,' taken from the ' Graphic' newspaper (June 9, 1883), will be inter- 
 esting in connexion with the subject of the chapter here concluded : — 
 
 ' The notion of Indian houses being haunted is, on first thought, rather 
 ridiculous. Nevertheless, there is scarcely a station in Hindostan which 
 has not its haunted bungalow. The spirits appear to the appalled be- 
 holders by sunlight as well as by night, and are apparently indifferent to 
 the time of day. A curious and very well authenticated instance of this 
 disregard of the hour is that of an afternoon ghost, which punctually ap- 
 pears at sunset in a certain house at Madras. 
 
 ' But there are evil and beneficent spirits in India. There is a well- 
 known haunted house in one of the stations of the North of India, 
 where the "house-ghost," if we may so call him, evinces malicious and 
 malignant idiosyncracies. It is this wretched spirit's mundane amuse- 
 ment to try and upset the charpoy, or bed, on which the bewildered 
 tenant seeks repose ; and so persistent are his efforts in this direction, 
 that they have been compared to shocks of earthquake, and to the 
 explosions of subterraneous mines. People laugh, but no one particularly 
 cares to sleep twice in that haunted bungalow. 
 
 ' ' Another species of malignant spirit which becomes most intimately 
 associated with an Indian house is a disease. There are houses in 
 Indian towns and stations of which the citizens say it is as much as 
 any man's life is worth to enter them. C, who was superior to super- 
 stition, went into a house of this character, just to show the absurdity of 
 ibelieving " in such rot," and speedily lost his wife and three children. 
 It cannot be denied that the mortality in some Indian bungalows of an 
 unlucky reputation is unaccountable. 
 
 'It is a relief to turn from the vagaries of evil spirits to the beneficence 
 of the good. 
 
 ' In England one seldom hears of a good ghost, or of a ghost who 
 puts himself out of his way to oblige any one ; but, in India, ghosts of 
 this cheerful temperament are quite common. Sometimes they assume 
 the appearance of Europeans ; sometimes that of natives. These ghosts 
 have done the living no end of good. The warnings and other informa- 
 tion they have imparted have been endless.' 
 
256 Demon-worship and Spirit-worship. 
 
 I also add a statement of one part of the creed of American Spiritual- 
 ists in the present day (written by the Rev. C. Ware, and quoted in the 
 ' Religio-Philosophical Journal'), as offering many curious analogies to 
 ideas current in India for centuries before ' Spiritualism ' was ever heard 
 of in either Europe or America : — 
 
 ' It is a fact that myriads of disembodied human beings are living in a 
 world that is merely the duplicate or counterpart of the earth, a realm 
 as closely connected with the earth's atmosphere as the atmosphere is 
 with the earth itself ; all above it and below it being links of one endless 
 chain. This is what we mean by earth-bound spirits ; they are so earthly, 
 their nature is so unrefined, so material in its tendencies, that they can- 
 not rise above their surroundings. They cannot rise to those spheres of 
 light, and love, and blessedness ; because the external surroundings of 
 a spirit always correspond with its inward condition ; they must remain 
 in that first sphere, which is only a step higher than the earth, until they 
 become spiritually developed. 
 
 ' Religious professors talk about going on the wings of faith to the 
 home beyond the skies, but, unfortunately for them, everything in the 
 infinite universe is determined by immutable laws, laws which cannot 
 be set aside, laws which are self-operating ; and by these laws is the 
 relative position of every individual spirit determined. You will pass 
 into the spirit-world with your spiritual body, but your position there 
 will be determined by the degree of refinement which characterizes that 
 same spiritual body. The tippler, the smoker, the glutton and the 
 sensualist, are, whether they recognize it or not, constantly defiling 
 themselves with the elements which will keep them down to earth. 
 It is such habits and tendencies that make spirits "earth-bound." If 
 these habits are not conquered and overcome here, they will have to 
 be there, before the spirit can rise to association with the pure and 
 the holy. 
 
 'This immense realm, then, which is earth's counterpart, surrounds 
 this earth, and its myriads of inhabitants constantly exert an influence 
 upon this world ; and this is a solemn thought, when you remember 
 that here dwell millions of ignorant, debased, degraded souls, where 
 they remain exerting their baneful influence, until they are enlightened, 
 purified and reformed. 
 
 ' More particularly we mean by earth-bound spirits, not only those 
 who, through ignorance, sensual habits, and material tendencies are 
 kept down by their own specific gravity, but also those who are fettered 
 to the earth by wrong-doing, crime and injustice committed. Thousands 
 of such are here wandering, full of remorse ; they have to repent, to do 
 their best to repair the wrong and to make atonement, before they can 
 rise.' 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 Hero-worship and Saint-worship. 
 
 The worship of great men, saints and sages, who have 
 been remarkable for the possession of unusual powers or 
 striking qualities, of any kind, is a phase of religious deve- 
 lopment which perhaps more than any other is the natural 
 outcome of man's primitive devotional instincts. In India 
 a tendency to this kind of worship has always prevailed from 
 the earliest period. Nascent in Vedic times, it speedily grew 
 with the growth of a belief in the doctrine of divine incarna- 
 tion and embodiment. For although it is true that Indian 
 philosophers disparage the body and invent elaborate schemes 
 for getting rid of all corporeal encumbrances, yet it is equally 
 true that nowhere in the world has the conception of God's 
 union with man, and of His ennobling the bodily frame, 
 not only of men but of animals and plants, by taking it 
 upon Himself, struck root so deeply in the popular mind 
 as in India. 
 
 We know indeed that, according to the pantheistic creed 
 of Brahmanism, God and the Universe are One. His pre- 
 sence pervades inanimate as well as animate objects, and 
 every human being is a manifestation of His energy; but 
 He is believed to be specially manifested in all great, good, "^ 
 and holy men. All such men are held to be entitled to worship 
 at the hands of their less-favoured fellow-men, in virtue of,, 
 their being embodiments in a higher degree of portions of His 
 essence. The homage they receive may not always amount to 
 actual worship during life, but after their decease their claim 
 
 S 
 
258 Hero-worship and Saint-worship, 
 
 to a position in the celestial hierarchy is pretty sure to be 
 fully recognized ; and if their lives have been marked by 
 any extraordinary or miraculous occurrences, they soon be- 
 come objects of general adoration. It is not merely that a 
 niche is allotted to them among the countless gods of the 
 Hindu Pantheon (popularly 330,000,000, see p. 44). A 
 shrine is set up and dedicated to their deified spirits upon 
 1 earth, and generally in the locality where they were best 
 known. There they are supposed to be objectively present — 
 not indeed visibly to men, and not always represented by 
 visible images or symbols — but as ethereal beings possessed 
 of ethereal frames which need the aroma or essence of food 
 for their support (see p. la). The idea seems to be that 
 the localizing of a deified or canonized spirit involves the 
 duty of its maintenance. Hence oblations are daily offered, 
 and if by a happy accident some miraculous event, such as 
 the unexpected recovery of a sick man, occurs in the neigh- 
 bourhood, the celebrity of the new god rapidly rises, till he 
 takes rank as a first-class divinity, and his sanctuary be- 
 comes a focus. to which tens of thousands of enthusiastic 
 devotees annually converge. 
 
 There seems indeed to be no limit to this kind of deifi- 
 cation, and it is often a mere device for making some locality 
 popular. 
 
 Volumes might be written in describing instances that 
 have occurred and are constantly occurring in all parts of 
 the country. And it is remarkable that the rank or import- 
 ance to which a canonized or deified human being may 
 attain in the world of spirits does not always depend, as a 
 matter of course, on the estimation in which he was held, 
 or even on the measure of divinity attributed to him while 
 on the earth. Any man of the lowest rank, whose influence 
 during life was perhaps quite insignificant, may be elevated 
 to the highest pinnacle of honour when severed from ter- 
 restrial ties, if his relatives can show that his career was 
 
Hero-worshij) and Saint-worship. 259 
 
 marked by any extraordinary act of self-sacrifice or heroism, 
 or so-called miracle. Nevertheless, it is important to note 
 that the idea of divinity seems to be specially associated with 
 five classes ofliving persons— kings, warriors, Brahmans, saints, , 
 and sages — and that these enjoy a kind of a-priori claim to 
 subsequent apotheosis. 
 
 And first in regard to kings — every king is regarded 
 as little short of a present god. In Manu's law-book a king 
 is said to be created by drawing eternal particles from the 
 essence of the eight guardian deities (VII. 4). Again, he says, 
 'A king, even though a mere child, must not be treated 
 with contempt, as if he were a mortal ; he is a great divinity 
 in human shape ' (VII. 8). 
 
 In proof of the hold which these ideas still have on the 
 people, it is stated in a recent number of a native newspaper, 
 that there is now a sect of persons in Orissa who worship the 
 Queen of England as their chief divinity. 
 
 The transition from the worship of kings to that of mili- 
 tary heroes and conquerors is of course easy. Great war- 
 riors have always in India commanded a large share of 
 popular homage, though their full apotheosis has generally 
 been deferred until after death, and until their human origin 
 has become obscured in the mists of tradition. The most 
 noteworthy instances of such deification have been Rama 
 and Krishna, both of whom, notwithstanding their human 
 parentage and human career, were ultimately^, as we have 
 seen (pp. 110-114), exalted by their worshippers to the first 
 rank among Vishnu's incarnations. 
 
 And, to this day, all living persons remarkable for great per- 
 sonal valour and strength, or for supposed miraculous powers, 
 run the risk— like Paul and Barnabas at Lystra— of being 
 converted into gods. Even any unusual deformity or strange 
 eccentricity may be an evidence of divinity. 
 
 ^ In the Maha-bharata the divinity of Krishna is occasionally disputed, 
 as by Sisu-pala and others. 
 
 S % 
 
26o Hero-worship and Saint-worship. 
 
 The story has often been told of a number of Hindus in 
 the Panjab who formed themselves into a sect of Nikkal 
 Sen worshippers. The explanation of this was, that General 
 Nicholson was a soldier of such unexampled bravery and hero- 
 ism, that neither argument nor force could prevent his native 
 admirers from worshipping him. ' This man,' they said, ' is 
 the great power of God.' He endeavoured by punishing 
 them to put a stop to the absurdity, but this only filled them 
 with greater awe, and made them persist in their puja with 
 more obstinate determination. 
 
 Nor is the object of such adoration always really worthy 
 of honour, or even decently respectable. It is well known 
 that a certain tribe in India worship a notorious robber, 
 whose deeds merit nothing but general execration. Perhaps, 
 however, a sufficient explanation of this circumstance may 
 be found in the fact that the tribe in question is itself 
 addicted to occasional plundering on its own account. 
 
 It was on a similar principle that the Thugs (Thags) wor- 
 shipped Kali as goddess of destruction, and strangled their 
 victims in her honour (see chap. XXII). 
 
 Another robber, who was hung at Trichinopoly, became 
 so popular, as a demon, that children were constantly named 
 after him. 
 
 Turning next to Brahmans, we find it affirmed by Manu 
 that a ' Brahman is a mighty god, a supreme divinity 
 whether he be learned or unlearned, and even if employed 
 in inferior occupations' (IX. 317, 319). 'From his birth 
 alone a Brahman is regarded as a divinity even by the gods ' 
 (XI. 84). 
 
 With regard to a Brahman who is also a Guru or teacher, 
 his person is still more sacred, and he is everywhere the 
 object of divine honours (see p. 117). 'The teacher (Guru) 
 is God, and the teacher is a refuge (gati). If Siva be angry 
 the teacher becomes a protector, but there is no other refuge 
 if the teacher be offended. Any one who worships another 
 
Hero-worship and Saint-worship. 261 
 
 god or goddess when his preceptor is at hand incurs terrible 
 perdition. The preceptor alone is the divine power, whether 
 he be learned or unlearned. His ways may be good or 
 bad, but he is the only safe guide' (Tantra-sara, p. i). 
 
 In illustration of this I may mention, that I was admitted 
 as a great favour to a sort of religious camp-meeting which 
 took place at one of the most sacred places in all India— 
 the confluence of the Ganges and the Jumna. There I found 
 that a celebrated preacher was addressing a congregation of 
 about one hundred persons, who hung upon his lips in rapt 
 attention. The subject of the sermon, which was delivered 
 with great eloquence, was the condescension of Krishna in 
 becoming first a child and then a man for the benefit of the 
 human race. No sooner was the sermon over than certain 
 persons in the audience took lighted lamps, and standing up 
 before the preacher, waved them before him in homage as 
 before the chief deity of the place ^ 
 
 Perhaps the most readily conceded of all claims to apo- 
 theosis is that of the saint or holy sage who has become 
 a SannyasI — that is to say, has renounced all family ties, 
 and lives a life of asceticism, self-denial, and austerity. 
 When such a man dies in India, his body is not burnt but . 
 buried, because in fact he is not supposed to die at all. 
 He is believed to lie in a kind of trance, called Samadhi ; 
 sanctity exhales from his body, and his tomb — popularly 
 called a Samadh — often becomes a noted place of pilgrimage, 
 resorted to by myriads from all parts of India. 
 
 Very similar is the adoration paid to the faithful wife, 
 commonly called Suttee ( = Sanskrit Sati), who in former 
 days burnt herself on her husband's funeral pile. Monu- 
 ments are erected over her ashes, and within the shrine is 
 
 . ' I witnessed a similar proceeding in a Roman Catholic Cathedral not 
 long ago. During the mass, and after waving the censer full of incense 
 before the altar, one of the officiating attendants waved it before the 
 chief-priests who were present, in token, I presume, of homage. 
 
262 Hero-worship and Saint-worship. 
 
 often a representation of her foot-prints, which are wor- 
 shipped with the greatest veneration. 
 
 Of course jealousies and rivalries occasionally spring up 
 between the adherents and admirers of various departed 
 saints or heroes, especially if much expense has been in- 
 curred in erecting shrines and monuments in the hope of 
 attracting pilgrims to particular localities. Nor is there any 
 dominant ecclesiastical authority in India capable of arbi- 
 trating between competing claims or fixing the relative rank 
 of fresh accessions to the celestial sphere. 
 
 It seems that such things are managed better in China. 
 In that country, according to Sir A. Lyall, ' The Emperor 
 — himself a sacred and semi-divine personage — seems to 
 have gradually acquired something like a monopoly of dei- 
 fication, which he uses as a constitutional prerogative, like 
 the right of creating peers.' In fact, ' The government not 
 only bestows on deceased persons its marks of posthumous 
 approbation and rank in the State Heaven ; it also decorates 
 them with titles.' The Peking Gazette of May, 1878, contains 
 a decree conferring a great title upon the dragon spirit of 
 Han Tan Hien, in whose temple is the well in which the iron 
 tablet is deposited. ' This spirit has from time to time mani- 
 fested itself in answer to prayer, and has been repeatedly in- 
 vested with titles of honour. In consequence of this year's 
 drought prayers were again offered up, and the provinces 
 (mentioned) have been visited with sufficient rain. Our grati- 
 tude is indeed profound, and we ordain that the Dragon Spirit 
 shall be invested with the additional title of the Dragon Spirit 
 of the Sacred Well.' Another spirit had already obtained the 
 title of ' Moisture-diffusing, beneficial-aid-affording, universal- 
 support-vouchsafing-Prince,' and received additional titles in a 
 Gazette of 1877 1. 
 
 It might have been conjectured that in India a crafty 
 
 ' ' Asiatic Studies,' by Sir Alfred Lyall (John Murray), pp. 138, 139. 
 
Hero-worship. Vitho-ba. 263 
 
 priesthood would have taken care to lay its hands on a 
 prerogative so valuable and far-reaching in its effects as that 
 thus exercised by the Chinese government. But we do not 
 find that the Brahmans have ever claimed the excliisive 
 privilege of converting men into gods, or even of conferring 
 honorary degrees and titles of distinction on departed 
 spirits. The origin of the popularity of many celebrated 
 shrines is lost in remote antiquity, and without doubt it has 
 often been due to a happy hit on the part of the relatives 
 of some well-known character, who have erected a tomb 
 over his ashes or a monument to his memory on simple 
 speculation, and then sent agents everywhere to advertise . / 
 its virtues or spread reports of great miracles worked in the 
 neighbourhood. 
 
 Such shrines may often bring in a large revenue to their 
 proprietors, and may even be more frequented than those 
 of Vishnu's two most celebrated incarnations, Krishna and 
 Rama ; but it must be borne in mind that in almost every 
 case where a local hero or remarkable person of any kind ^ 
 has attained to deification, he ends by being worshipped as 
 a form of either Vishnu or Siva. 
 
 To give a few instances of local deifications which fell 
 under my own observation in India : — It is well known that 
 at Pandharpur in the Deccan (on the Bhima, about iia miles 
 south-east of Poona) and in the surrounding districts the 
 favourite god is Vitho-ba (also called Viththal). Very little is 
 known of his origin, but he is said to have been a Brahman 
 named Pundarlka (sometimes corrupted into Pundallka), who 
 gained a great reputation for filial piety, and so pleased 
 Vishnu that the god, in recognition of his merits, infused into 
 him a large portion of his own essence. Vitho-ba is now every- 
 where regarded as a form of Krishna. Idols of him are com- 
 mon, and have this peculiarity, that he is represented standing 
 on a brick (vit for It) with his arms akimbo, the hands resting 
 on the hips. A legend has been framed to account for this 
 
264 Hero-worship. Vitho-ba. 
 
 position. Probably it was a favourite attitude of the man 
 before his deification^. Some of his images have the impres' 
 sion of a kick given by the sage Bhrigu's foot clearly marked 
 on the breast (see p. 45). 
 
 Pandharpur is one of the most sacred places in the Maratha 
 country, and vast numbers of pilgrims flock to the shrine of 
 Vitho-ba twice a year — once in the month Ashadha, and 
 once again in Karttika. The place was probably at one 
 time a stronghold of the Buddhists. Indeed it was stated 
 to me, as one reason for the great popularity of Vitho-ba, 
 that his principal idol took the place of an image of the 
 Buddha, and so became acceptable to all castes. Others 
 believe it to have been a Jaina idol. There is no doubt that 
 caste is still to a great extent ignored by the worshippers 
 of Vitho-ba at times of pilgrimage. It is remarkable, too, 
 that worshippers make him no offerings, nor ask the god for 
 special benefits. He is supposed to love all mankind, and 
 require nothing but love in return ; so people simply praise 
 him, and sometimes even embrace his image. The idol, 
 which is said to be svayambhu (p. 69), is dressed every day 
 in jewelled dresses, and hymns are sung before it. It is 
 supposed to change its appearance and look like a child in 
 the morning, a man at noon, and an old man in the evening. 
 Doubtless Vitho-ba owes much of his celebrity to the songs 
 of the Maratha national poet Tuka-rama. A common de- 
 votional service among the pilgrims is a Kirtana or ' song 
 of praise ' extracted from his poems. Hundreds of men and 
 women sit in a circle on the ground, while behind the sitters 
 are many standing. The principal singers form a kind of 
 inner semicircle. The leader thereupon gives out a verse, 
 such as the following : ' All earthly things are vanity ; there- 
 fore draw thy heart away and elevate it to Vitho-ba.' These 
 
 1 One of Tuka's Abhatgas begins, ' Beautiful is that object, upright on 
 the brick, resting his hands on his loins.' I cannot agree in thinking it 
 . possible that the name Vitho-ba may be derived from mi' a. brick,' and 
 u6ka ' upright.' 
 
Hero-worship. Tuka-rama. 265 
 
 words are caught up by the other performers, and then 
 chanted enthusiastically by all with a vigorous accompani- 
 ment of lutes (vTnas), cymbals, and drums. Sometimes a 
 discourse on the vanity of human life follows the singing. 
 
 Even a woman may be the preacher. When Dr. Murray 
 Mitchell visited Pandharpur a widow named Salu-bal ad- 
 dres-sed a large audience, commencing her discourse by utter- 
 ing the names Rama, Krishna, Hari, which were caught up by 
 her hearers in a prolonged shout (Indian Antiquary, June ] 882). 
 
 A ceremony is also performed which consists in breaking 
 a large black clay-vessel fastened on a tree. The contents, 
 consisting of curdled milk and grain, fall on the ground and 
 are eagerly snatched up by the struggling crowd. 
 
 The celebrated national poet of the Marathas, Tuka-rama, 
 was a Sudra of the trading caste who lived in the days of 
 Siva-jl, about 250 years ago, at Dehu near Poona, and wrote 
 about 5)0°o hymns. Though he devoted his genius to the 
 extolling of Vitho-ba as a form of God, he is himself also an 
 object of adoration, and is believed to have worked many 
 miracles — amongst others ascending in bodily shape to heaven 
 in Vishnu's car. Dehu is now a much-frequented place of 
 pilgrimage, especially at an annual festival when the poet's 
 ascension is commemorated. People of all castes who worship 
 at this place and at Pandharpur are called Varkari. The follow- 
 ing is a specimen of the religious sentiments in Tuka-rama's 
 songs translated by Sir A. Grant : — 
 
 Sing the song with earnestness, making pure the heart ; 
 If you would attain God, then this is an easy way : — 
 Make your heart lowly, touch the feet of Saints, 
 Of others do not hear the good or bad qualities. 
 Tuka says : Be it much or little, do good to others '. 
 
 ' A musician performed before me on the Sitar at Poona, and sang a 
 song from Tuka-rama, which may be thus translated : ' O God, grant this 
 boon that I may never forget Thee, and that I may sing Thy praise 
 with zest. This is all the wealth I ask. I desire not extinction, nor 
 riches. I want not emancipation from existence. I pray that I may live 
 to praise Thee, and enjoy the company of the good.' 
 
266 Hero'worship. Khando-ba, 
 
 Another deification, Khando-ba (also called Khande-Rao), 
 was a personage who lived in the neighbourhood of the hill 
 Jejuri ( = Sanskrit Jayddri), thirty miles from Poona. He 
 is probably a deification of some powerful Raja or aboriginal 
 chieftain who made himself useful to the Brahmans. He is 
 now regarded as an incarnation of Siva in his form MalHri. 
 The legend is that the god Siva descended in this form to 
 destroy a powerful demon named Mallasura, who lived on the 
 hill and was a terror to the neighbourhood. ParvatI descended 
 at the same time to become Khando-ba's wife. His worship is 
 very popular among the Kolis and people of low caste in the 
 Maratha country. I was informed that he is the family god 
 of Holkar, who is of the shepherd caste. Sheep are sacrificed 
 at the principal temple on the Jejuri hill, where there is an 
 image of the Linga ; and a bad custom prevails of dedicating 
 young girls to the god's service. They are called Muralis 
 (or Murlis), and although nominally wives of the god, are 
 simply prostitutes. Khando-ba is sometimes represented 
 with his wife on horseback attended by a dog ^- 
 
 As to another local deification called Jnanesvara (pro- 
 nounced in MarathI Dnyanesvara and popularly Dilyano-ba), 
 he was a learned Brahman, living at a place called Alandi, 
 twelve miles from Poona, who wrote a commentary in verse 
 on the Bhagavad-glta called Jnanesvari. Towards the end of 
 his life he became a Sannyasi, and on dying, or appearing 
 to die, his body was, as usual, not burnt, but buried, and a 
 tomb (Samadh) erected over it. The belief, of course, is 
 that he merely lies in a trance, and that he occasionally 
 shows himself alive to his worshippers. He is held to have 
 been an incarnation of Vishnu, and is said to have given 
 evidence of his divinity while he lived as a Brahman on the 
 earth by one or two notable miracles. For example, he one 
 day caused a buffalo to speak and recite a hymn from the 
 
 ' A sect existed in Sankara's time who worshipped Mallari as ' lord of 
 dogs ' (see Saiikara-vijaya, chap. 29). So Rudra is lord of dogs (see p. 77)' 
 
Saint-worship. Dattatreya. 267 
 
 Veda. On another occasion, he commanded a wall on which 
 he was sitting to transport him for a mile into the presence 
 of a holy person who wished to see him. The wall obeyed, 
 and remains to this day at some distance from the town, but 
 the old mouldering erection seemed likely to disappear under 
 the plundering hands of relic-seekers, and the piety of the 
 inhabitants has therefore recently cased it with stone. It is 
 still, however, greatly venerated, and a hole has been made in 
 the stone-casing to enable pilgrims to express their faith hy 
 touching the original structure. Indeed, in the belief of the 
 generality of Hindus, such miracles are of common occur- 
 rence all over India. No one is troubled by any misgivings 
 as to their improbability, or supposes for a moment that a 
 saint of any pretensions could be incapable of working them. 
 
 Again, I found that in certain localities in the Maratha 
 country a holy Brahman, named Dattatreya (vulgarly 
 Dattatre), who lived about the tenth century of our era, is 
 worshipped as an incarnation of all three gods, Brahma, 
 Vishnu, and Siva, or, according to some, especially of Vishnu^ 
 He was greatly revered for his wisdom and self-mortification, 
 and before his death became a Sannyasi. His shrines are 
 scattered here and there in the districts around Poona. 
 I visited a remarkable one at Wai — a sacred town on the 
 Krishna (Kistna) near Sattara — where the image of Datta- 
 treya has three heads, to represent the Hindu triad. Two 
 Qr three worshippers of the male sex appeared to be en- 
 gaged in earnest devotion before this idol. 
 
 Another deification is that of Vyankatesa (Veiikatesa) or 
 Tri-pati (for Sanskrit Sri-pati), a name given to Vishnu or 
 Krishna when he became incarnate in a man popularly 
 called Bala-jl. Little is known about this man, except 
 that he was a person remarkable for many extraordinary 
 
 ^ There is a strange legend connected with Dattatreya current in some 
 parts of India. Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva are said to have visited the 
 wife of a holy man and tried to seduce her, but without success. 
 
268 Hero-worship. Venkaiesa. 
 
 qualities, and that he lived in the neighbourhood of a 
 hill called Seshadri in the Madras presidency. It is cer- 
 tain that a celebrated temple dedicated to him has been 
 erected at that place — usually called the Hill of Tri-pati or 
 Vyankata (Venkata) — and that pilgrimages are made to it 
 from every part of the country. It is especially resorted to 
 for religious shaving. 
 
 Of more recent deifications and canonizations a few ex- 
 amples may be given. I have already described how the 
 followers of a Brahman named Sahajananda or Svami- 
 Narayana, who flourished about the beginning of the present 
 century, regard him as a portion of Vishnu (see p. 153). 
 
 The same may be said of the followers of the cotton^ 
 bleacher Dadu, who lived in less recent times (see p. 178). 
 
 Then Mira-bai, a princess who lived in the time of Akbar, 
 and married the Rana of Udayapur (Udaipur), is worshipped 
 by a sect, who believe that she disappeared one day into her 
 tutelary idol^ — an image of Krishna — which opened to receive 
 her and protect her from persecution. She is the authoress 
 of some religious odes. 
 
 Again, Ram-singh, the son of a carpenter, was a man who 
 founded a small sect of Sikhs called Kukas, which had to be 
 repressed not long since with an iron hand, because in their 
 fanaticism they took to murdering the butchers who killed oxen 
 for food. His followers scarcely worshipped him as a god, yet 
 they fully believed in his power of working miracles. (Com- 
 pare the last paragraph at p. 17a of this volume.) 
 
 Another founder of a sect — Ram-das — was the Guru of 
 Siva-jl. His followers, who are numerous in the Maratha 
 country, adore him in connexion with the worship of the 
 great Rama, and therefore also worship Hanuman. His 
 tomb or Sarnadh is at Parali, near Sattara. 
 
 I may add, that in a village of Gujarat called Sarsa there 
 lives (or did live in 1878) a man named Kubera. This man 
 is of the Koli caste. He has been a teacher of religion 
 
Saint-worship. Santa-ram. 269 
 
 for more than thirty-five years, and gives himself out to be 
 a portion of the god Krishna. He has gathered around 
 him at least ao,ooo disciples, and formed them into a re- 
 ligious society who call themselves Hari-jana. They are 
 also called Kuber-bhaktas. They worship or worshipped 
 Kubera their founder, as a living incarnation, in his own 
 dwelling, but they have temples or meeting-houses in many 
 villages, and send missionaries to all parts of Gujarat. Like 
 the Svami-Narayana sect, they are divided into Sadhus and 
 Grihasthas, or Clergy and Laity (see p. 150). At one of 
 their temples (Mandirs) in the town of Nariad, two of 
 their clergy minister daily. Several members of the sect 
 attend and listen to expositions of their sacred books, but 
 worship no idols. 
 
 Another considerable temple which I saw at Nariad is 
 dedicated to a holy man named Santa- Ram (probably = Santa- 
 rama, or perhaps Santosha-rama). His body is buried in the 
 precincts of the temple, and I observed that the courtyard 
 around was kept scrupulously clean. He has no very large 
 number of disciples, but they appeared to be very devoted in 
 their homage. 
 
 I heard of another man in Gujarat, named Hari-Krishna, 
 who not very long ago proclaimed himself to be a mani- 
 festation of the Supreme Being, and attracted a few disciples ; 
 but he is now dead,' and the sect has also, I believe, died out. 
 
 Again, when I was at Kaira I visited a small shrine, dedi- 
 cated to a Sadhu or holy man whose name I understood to 
 be Parinama. There was no image, but only the empty seat 
 which he had once occupied as a religious teacher, with some 
 of the vestments which he wore at the time of his decease. 
 Yet the place was regarded as so sacred that I was not 
 allowed to enter without taking oif my shoes. 
 
 I believe the followers of this man are gradually decreasing, 
 and will ultimately disappear. In fact, it ought to be noted 
 that the most astounding exploits of great heroes and the 
 
'270 Hero-worship. Para'su-rama. 
 
 most startling miracles of eminent saints are liable to be 
 eclipsed by still greater wonders, wrought by still greater 
 heroes and saints, who are always appearing on the scene and 
 engrossing the attention of an ignorant and superstitious 
 multitude. 
 
 In no other way can we account for the little honour now 
 paid to such an eminent hero as Bala-rama, 'the strong 
 Rama,' who was an elder brother of Krishna and brought up 
 with him (see p. iia)^. 
 
 Again, as to the well-known Parasu-rama, or Rama with the 
 axe — he was a Brahman who achieved so great a reputation 
 in conflicts with the Kshatriyas that his admirers converted 
 him into one of Vishnu's ten principal incarnations (see 
 p. no). Yet he is little worshipped except in some parts of 
 the western coast of India. The story of his clearing the 
 earth twenty-one times of the Kshatriya race and of his ulti- 
 mate defeat by his rival the great Rama-dandra, who was the 
 Kshatriya incarnation of Vishnu and also one of the god's 
 ten principal descents, proves that the axe-Rama was at one 
 time a man of pre-eminent valour and renown (see p. 110, 
 and Maha-bharata Vana-p. IT071; Santi-p. 1707; Bhagavata- 
 purana, book IX). Tradition ascribes the colonizing of the 
 Konkan — called Parasu-rama-kshetra — and the creation of 
 the whole country of Malabar (Kerala) to Parasu-rama. 
 
 He must have been a very extraordinary personage, for he 
 is believed to have compelled the ocean to retire for the 
 formation of the Malabar coast, and to have caused vast 
 fissures in the Western Ghats and other mountains by blows 
 of his axe^. At the same time he is said to have reared 
 great stone cairns on the Travancore mountains, and to have 
 scattered small spangle-like gold coins everywhere on the soil. 
 
 ' Both Bala-rama and Krishna refused to take any part as warriors in 
 the great war between the Pandava and Kaurava princes. 
 
 "^ Unusual formations in hills and other curious physical phenomena 
 are often attributed to Parasu-rama, and sometimes to Bhima. 
 
Hero-worship. Five Pandavas. 271 
 
 It is certain that earthen vessels containing coins are often 
 dug up on the hills. No wonder that he has many followers 
 in Malabar and the Konkan^, but I met with no actual 
 worshippers in other places who adore him as a god. 
 
 Similarly the five Pandava princes, Yudhi-shthira, Bhima, 
 Arjuna, Nakula, and Sahadeva, who are all great heroes of 
 the Maha-bharata, receive little actual worship at the present 
 day, though Krishna, another gi-eat hero of the same poem, 
 is universally adored. The five brothers were the reputed 
 children of Pandu and his wife KuntI (or Pritha), but are 
 believed to have really derived their origin from the gods 
 Yama ( = Dharma-raja), Vayu, Indra, and the two Asvins 
 respectively. These deities infused portions of their essences 
 into Kunti's children, and great prodigies occurred at their 
 birth. When grown up they had one wife in common, called 
 Draupadl. Draupadi (in Southern India Draupadi-Amman) 
 has several shrines, but her five husbands receive little adora- 
 tion. This story proves the prevalence of polyandry ^. 
 
 Nevertheless, any marvel or prodigy, any rock of fantastic 
 shape, or any wonderful work the performance of which 
 appears to be beyond human power, is often ascribed to 
 the Pandavas. I visited some remarkable Buddhistic caves 
 
 ^ A tribe of Brahmans in the Konkan called (Sit-pavans is said to 
 have been created by Parasu-rama thus : — After his contest with the 
 Kshatriyas he took up his abode in the mountains of that part of India. 
 There he had a quarrel with some Brahmans who resided with him in 
 the same region. Then to spite them he went to the sea-shore, and 
 finding fotirteen funeral piles (citas = daityas) with the remains of a 
 number of persons who had been burnt, resuscitated them and converted 
 them into Brahmans. 
 
 '^ Certain hill-tribes in the Himalaya mountains are still given to 
 polyandry. It is practised also among the Todas and the Nayars in 
 Malabar, and among certain tribes in New Zealand, the Pacific islands, 
 the Aleutian islands, Africa, Australia, as well as among the Kalmucks, 
 Iroquois, and in Bhotan and other barren regions where a large popula- 
 tion is not easily supported. The ancient Britons, according to Cassar, 
 were addicted to the same practice. See De Belle Gallico, v. 14. Com- 
 pare Lubbock's * Origin of Civilization,' p. 139. 
 
2/2 Hero-zvorskip. Five Paniavas.. 
 
 excavated at a considerable height from the ground in the hills 
 near Nasik. The people of the country fully believe them to 
 have been the work of the Pandavas, and call them Pandu-lene. 
 It is therefore surprising that so few shrines dedicated to these 
 heroes are found in any part of India. 
 
 In one of the galleries of the temple at Tinnevelly I 
 observed well-carved images of all the five brothers ; Arjuna 
 being especially conspicuous with his bow Gindiva, and 
 Bhima with his club. It is worthy of note, too, that five 
 rough stones smeared with red paint may occasionally be 
 seen set up in fields. These are probably intended to repre- 
 sent the five Pandava princes who are supposed to guard 
 the crops. Such stones abound in various parts of India, 
 but are not always five in number, sometimes as many as 
 twenty being ranged together in a kind of circle. 
 
 Again, I saw images to the honour of the Pandavas at 
 Madura, and at Buddha-gaya, but no worshippers were near 
 them^. Yet the characters of these heroes are quite as much 
 venerated now as they ever were in ancient times, and their 
 virtues, as narrated in the Maha-bharata, are to this day pro- 
 verbial throughout India. Arjuna, who is the most renowned, 
 is a pattern of bravery and generosity ; Yudhi-shthira of 
 justice, passionless self-command, and cold heroism ; Nakula 
 and Sahadeva of wisdom, temperance, and beauty ; while 
 Bhima is a type of brute courage and physical strength. 
 
 Representations of Bhima's gigantic form are not uncommon, 
 but are rather curiosities to excite wonder, than objects to 
 attract worship. I saw a huge image of him on one of the 
 Ghats at Benares, and another near the Agra fort, and another 
 in a corridor of the Linga temple at Tinnevelly. This last is 
 about 20 feet high and holds a huge club. It is painted 
 bright red and made for moving about in processions. 
 
 Bhima's great strength is illustrated by a curious story. 
 
 ^ In the Maratha country a single rudely-carved figure, especially if 
 mounted, is called a Vir {vlra, hero), or sometimes a Dev (deva, god). 
 
Hero-worship. Karna. 273 
 
 Soon after his birth his mother, who was carrying him in her 
 arms up a mountain, accidentally let him fall over a precipice, 
 and on descending in great agony of mind, expecting to 
 find her baby dashed to pieces on the rock beneath, she 
 found to her amazement and delight that the boy was 
 unhurt, and the rock shivered to atoms by contact with his 
 body. 
 
 Karna, too, another of the Maha-bharata heroes (also son 
 of Kunti by the Sun-god), is greatly revered, and often cited 
 in proverbial expressions, as a model of liberality, chivalrous 
 honour, and self-sacrificing generosity. I saw one or two 
 images of him in Southern India, but met with no shrines 
 dedicated to his worship. 
 
 Clearly the hero-worship of India is subject to constant 
 changes and fluctuations. Worshippers are capricious ; great 
 warriors, great saints, and great sages have their day and find 
 themselves gradually pushed into the background, while their 
 places are taken by rival warriors, saints, and sages who claim 
 to be still greater ^. 
 
 ' That man-worship is not confined to India may be proved by 
 numerous examples drawn from all countries. In Africa the King of 
 Loango is honoured as a god. His person is so sacred that no one is 
 allowed to see him eat. In Peru a particular Inca was adored as a god 
 during his lifetime. In New Zealand the warrior chief, Hongi, was called 
 a god by his followers. At the Society Islands, King Tamatoa was 
 worshipped, and in the Marquesas there are several men named atua 
 believed to possess the power of gods. At Tahiti the king and queen 
 were once held so sacred that the sounds forming their names could 
 not be used for ordinary words. See ' Origin of Civilization,' by Sir J. 
 Lubbock, p. 355. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 In the two preceding chapters we have had occasion to 
 state incidentally the Hindu doctrine in regard to the spirits 
 of the dead. We have seen that they are supposed to pass 
 into one or other of two very different conditions. They may 
 be degraded to the state of evil -demons or elevated to the 
 position of divinities ^. In the former case they are rather 
 feared and propitiated than worshipped ; in the latter they 
 are rather reverenced and worshipped than propitiated. In 
 the present chapter I have to point out how far this varying 
 condition of deceased persons depends on the performance of 
 funeral and ancestral rites by living relatives and descendants. 
 
 Of all forms of religious devotion homage to dead relations 
 is the most widely extended ^. It forms a part of nearly all 
 religions, and is an element in the creed of nearly every race ^■ 
 Perhaps the one exception is Protestant Christianity. The 
 Roman Catholic Church, as is well known, teaches that suppli- 
 cations and prayers may avail to improve the condition of 
 departed spirits in purgatory. Not only therefore does it 
 
 ^ In the same way among the Romans some souls of the dead were 
 good, pure, and bright, and therefore called Manes ; while others, called 
 Larvse and Lemures, wandered about as unquiet ghosts, and were often 
 regarded as evil spirits. Compare also the Roman ideas respecting the 
 Penates. With regard to the ideas prevalent among the Greeks, the 
 following passages bear on the existence of the "^vxq after death as an 
 eiSmXoi/ in Hades : II. xxiii. 72, 104 ; Od. xi. 213, 476 ; xx. 355 ; xxiv. 14. 
 
 ^ I refer any one who doubts this fact to Mr. E. B. Tylor's ' Primitive 
 Culture,' vol. ii. chap, xviii. 
 
 ' The Bishop of Madagascar stated not long ago, that when he had to 
 descend a dangerous stream in that island, the boatmen made offerings to 
 the spirits of their ancestors before attempting to shoot the rapids. 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 275 
 
 permit special masses to be offered for the souls of deceased 
 relations, it introduces a prayer for the dead into the regular 
 daily mass ^. 
 
 According to the Protestant creed, on the other hand, the 
 condition of the dead is irrevocably fixed. To think of ame- 
 liorating it by human intercession is nothing short of heresy. 
 Nor is it customary to perpetuate by any kind of act, peri- 
 odipally repeated, the memory of one's nearest and dearest 
 relatives. It is no doubt true that tombs are occasionally 
 visited, and, in the case of royal personages, memorial ser- 
 vices performed ; and an eminent Bishop ^ once gave it as his 
 opinion that the Church of England does not condemn special 
 services for the spirits of the dead ^ ; provided, I presume, 
 that their condition is not supposed to be thereby altered. 
 
 It is also true that every respectable man who has had a 
 respectable father or mother will be careful to reverence their 
 memory *, but I question whether the same man ever feels it 
 his duty to bestow a single reverential thought on either of 
 
 ' Our prayer for the Church militant has, I believe, taken the place of 
 this. In some Roman Catholic countries it is customary to exhume 
 skeletons at intervals of several years, and to place their skulls in a 
 small chapel adjoining the parish church. This chapel is in German 
 Switzerland called the Schadel-haus, ' Skull-house,' and is used as an 
 oratory where people pray for their dead relations and friends. 
 
 ^ According to the late Bishop of Peterborough, the belief was once 
 general in the early Church that the souls of the faithful, though free 
 from all suffering, were capable, while awaiting their final consummation 
 and bUss, of a progress in holiness and happiness ; and that prayers for 
 such progress might lawfully be made in their behalf. Accordingly, 
 prayers for ' the rest and refreshment of the departed ' abound in the 
 early liturgies of the Church. See the Bishop's letter to the Rev. J. 
 Mason's parishioners who complained of Mr. Mason's having given 
 notice that he intended celebrating the Holy Communion for the repose 
 of Dr. Pusey's soul. 
 
 ' All Souls' day is observed as a festival (on Nov. 2) in the Church 
 of Rome. It is said that in countries where superstition is rife feasting 
 takes place, and the souls of the dead are supposed to join in the fes- 
 tivities and consume the essence of the food before it is eaten. 
 
 * The feeling seems to find expression in putting periodical advertise- 
 ments ' in loving memory ' in the obituary of modem newspapers. 
 
 T 1 
 
2 76 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 his departed grandfathers and grandmothers, and whether the 
 world would feel quite sure of the sanity of any one who was 
 in the habit of offering periodical homage to his two great- 
 grandfathers and great-grandmothers. 
 
 This utter neglect of one's ancestors, which seems to spring 
 not so much from any want of sympathy with the departed as 
 from a disbelief in any interconnexion between this world and 
 the world of spirits, is perhaps with good reason regarded as 
 a defect in our religious character and practice. 
 
 In Eastern countries, especially India, China, and Japan, 
 the opposite extreme prevails. We know that in India, every 
 religious duty is magnified and intensified. There, to speak 
 of mere reverence for the dead is a very inadequate expres- 
 sion. The constant periodical performance of commemora- 
 tive obsequies is regarded in the light of a positive and 
 peremptory obligation. It is the simple discharge of a solemn 
 debt due to one's forefathers — a debt consisting not only in 
 reverential worship, but in the performance of acts necessary 
 to their support, happiness, and progress onward in the spirit- 
 world. A man's deceased relatives, for at least three genera- 
 tions, are among his cherished divinities, and must be 
 honoured by daily offerings (see p. 410), or a Nemesis of some 
 kind is certain to overtake his living family. 
 
 Nothing, in fact, seemed to me more noteworthy in com- 
 paring Hinduism with other religions, than the elaborate 
 nature of its funeral rites and the extraordinary importance 
 attached to marriage, with a view to providing sons for the 
 due performance of these rites and of the subsequent cere- 
 monial worship called Sraddha. 
 
 And here at the outset it may be well' to point out that the 
 main object of a Hindu funeral is very different from that 
 of European obsequial rites. 
 
 It is nothing less than the investiture of the departed 
 spirit with a kind of intermediate body — a peculiar frame 
 interposed, as it were parenthetically, between the terres- 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 277 
 
 trial gross body which has just been destroyed by fire, and 
 the new terrestrial body which it is compelled ultimately to 
 assume. The creation of such an intervenient frame — com- 
 posed of gross elements, though less gross than those of 
 earth — becomes necessary, because the individualized . spirit 
 of man, after cremation of the terrestrial body, has nothing 
 left to withhold it from re-absorption into the universal soul, 
 except its incombustible subtle body, which, as composed 
 of the subtle elements, is not only proof against the fire 
 of the funeral pile, but is incapable of any sensations in 
 the temporary heaven or temporary hell (p. 49), through one 
 or other of which every separate human spirit is forced to 
 pass before returning to earth and becoming reinvested with 
 a terrestrial gross body. 
 
 Were it not for this intermediate frame — believed to be 
 created by the offerings made during the funeral ceremonies 
 — the spirit would remain with its subtle body in the con- ' 
 dition of an impure and unquiet ghost (preta) wandering 
 about on the earth or in the air among demons and evil 
 spirits, and condemned itself to become an evil spirit ^- Its 
 i-eception of the intervenient body converts it from a Preta 
 or ghost into a Pitri or ancestor ; but this does not satisfy 
 all its needs. The new body it has received, though not ' 
 so gross as that of earth, must be developed and sup- 
 ported. It must, if possible, be rescued from the fire of 
 purgatory. It must be assisted onwards in its course 
 from lower to higher worlds and back again to earth. 
 And these results can only be accomplished by the cere- 
 monies called Sraddha — ceremonies which may in somey 
 
 ^ It is curious that the Hindu notion of the restless state of the soul 
 until the Sraddha is performed agrees with the ancient classical super- 
 stition that the ghosts of the dead wandered about as long as their 
 .bodies remained unburied, and were not suffered to mingle with those 
 of the other dead. See Od. xi. 54 ; II. xxiii. 72 ; and cf. ^n. vi. 325 ; 
 Lucan, i, ii ; Eur. Hec. 30. 
 
/ 
 
 278 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 respects be compared to the Roman Catholic masses for 
 the dead. The first Sraddha— to be described (at p. 303, etc.) 
 —is performed very soon after the funeral rites, and is always 
 a costly affair. 
 
 In England, the religious services at a funeral occupy 
 about half an hour, and the entire ceremony, with all its 
 attendant circumstances, is performed in the present day at 
 little cost. 
 
 In India, the funeral ceremonies of the older members of a 
 family^ occupy ten days, and with the succeeding Sraddha 
 rites — carried on with the help of Brahmans and including 
 the feasting of numberless guests and the distribution of 
 presents — may involve an enormous expenditure. I found 
 that the cost to even the poorest respectable person was 
 forty rupees, and that any one well-to-do in the world 
 would incur the everlasting obloquy of his family and friends 
 and be almost excommunicated from society if he spent 
 less than six thousand or seven thousand rupees on the 
 funeral of a father and in the carrying out of all the other 
 necessary ceremonies consequent on his death. It is well 
 known that the expenditure incurred on such occasions by 
 rich Bengal Rajas and Zamlndars of high family has often 
 impoverished them for the remainder of their lives. In- 
 stances are on record of a single funeral and Sraddha costing 
 a sum equivalent to ;^iao,ooo, the greater part of that amount 
 being squandered on worthless Brahmans, indolent Pandits, 
 hypocritical devotees, and vagabond religious mendicants. 
 
 In truth, the expenditure of time, money, and energy- 
 needed to satisfy public opinion before a man is held to 
 have discharged the debt due to a deceased father, and 
 before he is relieved from the long course of fasting and 
 mourning he is expected to undergo, constitutes an evil 
 which has gradually grown till it has become a veritable 
 ciirse to the country, and one of the principal bars to any 
 
 ^ The funeral rites of children are much simpler and shorter. 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 279 
 
 advance in its social condition (compare p. 53 a). Nor is 
 there any warrant for the system in the more ancient books 
 held sacred in India as authoritative guides. 
 
 Let us try to ascertain the ancient practice by a reference 
 to the Veda and Sutras. 
 
 The ceremonies in Vedic times must have been very 
 simple. We gather from the i8th hymn of the 10th Man- 
 dala of the Rig-veda that the dead body was, in all proba- 
 bility, not burnt but buried. It was deposited near a grave 
 dug ready for its reception, while the widow lay down or 
 seated herself by its side, and the relatives— female as well 
 as male— ranged themselves in a circle all around. Their 
 first concern seems to have been to propitiate Death, sup- 
 posed to be personally present and to be naturally eager 
 to take the opportunity of laying his hands on any other 
 member of the family, who might be brought, by the necessity 
 of attending the funeral, within easy and tempting reach of 
 his clutches. Hence the person appointed to perform the 
 ceremony addressed Death, calling upon him to keep clear 
 of the path of the living, and deprecating any attack on 
 the survivors, who were assembled to perform pious rites 
 for their dead relative, but had no idea of yielding them- 
 selves up into his power, or renouncing the expectation of 
 a long life themselves. The leader of the funeral next 
 placed a boundary of stones between the dead body and 
 the living relations^ to mark off the limits of Death's au- 
 thority. Then followed a prayer that none of those present 
 might be removed to another world before attaining to the 
 full period of a life lasting for a hundred years. This 
 prayer was no doubt accompanied with oblations in fire, 
 after which the widow's married female relatives were di- 
 rected by the performer of the ceremony to prepare for the 
 return home. They were to lead the way without weeping 
 or any signs of grief, and without taking off their jewelry i. 
 
 ' The words of the hymn are, Anasravo 'namivaJi su-ratna a rohantu 
 
28o Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 Then the widow herself was told to leave the corpse of her 
 dead husband in the inner circle assigned to Death, and 
 join her surviving relations outside the boundary line. She 
 was addressed in words to the following effect : ' Rise up, 
 O woman (udlrshva nari), come back to the world of the 
 living; thou art lying by a dead man; come back. Thou 
 hast sufficiently fulfilled the duty of a wife to the husband 
 who formerly wooed thee and took thee by the hand' 
 (Rig-veda X. i8. 8). Next, the performer of the ceremony 
 took a bow, previously placed in the hand of the deceased, 
 and gave it to his relatives in token that the manly courage 
 he had displayed during life was not to perish with him, 
 but to remain with his family. Addressing the dead man 
 he said : ' I take the bow out of thy hand for our own pro- 
 tection, for our glory, and for our strength ; remain thou 
 here, we will remain here as heroes, so that in all battles 
 we may conquer our foes' (X. i8. 9). The body was then 
 tenderly committed to its ' house of clay ' (mrin-mayam gri- 
 ham, Rig-veda VII. 89. i), with the words : ' Return to thy 
 mother Earth, may she be kind to thee and lie lightly on 
 thee, and not oppress thee ; ' and with other similar words, 
 which may be thus freely translated : — 
 
 Open thy arms, O earth, receive the dead 
 With gentle pressure and with loving welcome. 
 Enshroud him tenderly, e'en as a mother 
 Folds her soft vestment round the child she loves. 
 
 (X. 18. II.) 
 
 Finally, a mound or column (sthiina) of earth was reared 
 over the grave, and the Pitris or deified ancestors and the 
 god Yama were entreated to preserve it. 
 
 janayo yonitn agre, ' without tears, without sorrow, bedecked with jewels, 
 let the wives go to the house first.' It is said that the Brahmans 
 fraudulently substituted agnefi, ' of fire,' for agre, ' first,' and that this 
 verse was then quoted as the Vedic authority for the burning of widows ; 
 whereas neither the Veda nor Manu directed or even hinted at the con- 
 cremation of the living wife with her dead husband. 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 281 
 
 It is remarkable that in some passages of the hymns (X. 
 58. 7; 16. 3) there are dim hints of a belief in the possible 
 migration of the spirits of the deceased into plants, trees, and 
 streams. Compare pp. 18 ; 24. 
 
 It is to be noted, however, that no very distinct account 
 of the condition of the virtuous dead is to be found in the 
 oldest hymns of the Rig-veda, although a future life is fully 
 recognized, and although the Pitris or departed ancestors 
 are addressed with the utmost reverence (VI. 52. 4 ; VII. 
 35. 12 ; X, 14. 7, 8, etc.). Nor do we find any clear mention 
 of hells or places of torment for the wicked, although we 
 read of dark and deep abysses into which bad men are 
 thrown along with the evil demons^. 
 
 Passing from Vedic times to the period when the Asva- 
 layana and other collections of domestic rules (Grihya-sutras) ^ 
 were composed, probably about five or six centuries before 
 Christ, we find that funeral rites, though still conducted with 
 much simplicity, were beginning to be more elaborate and 
 more in unison with present custom. If the practice of cre- 
 mation was doubtful in Vedic times it was now invariable,/ 
 except in the case of infants and of great saints. As far 
 as can be gathered from a study of the rules laid down, 
 the ceremonial must have been much as follows: — 
 
 When a man died, his immediate family, headed by the 
 eldest son or other near relative, formed a procession to a 
 properly prepared place in the Smasana or ' burning ground,' 
 carrying the sacred fires and sacrificial implements. The 
 younger walked first, the elder behind — the men separated 
 from the women ^ — bearing the corpse, the hair and nails of 
 which had been clipped, and leading the sacrificial animal, 
 
 1 '1 
 
 ' Indfa and Soma plunge the wicked in inextricable darkness, so that 
 not one of them may again issue from it.' See Rig-veda VII. 104. 3, 
 and compare IV. 5. 5 ; IX. 73. 8. 
 
 " In the present day the only part women take in funeral ceremonies 
 is that of weeping and wailing and uttering loud cries of grief at home. 
 
282 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 either a cow ^ or a black she-goat. The remaining relatives 
 followed with their garments hanging down and their hair 
 dishevelled— the elder in front, the younger behind. When 
 they reached the funeral ground, the son or brother or other 
 near relative appointed to perform the ceremony, taking a 
 branch of the Sami-tree, sprinkled holy water on the spot 
 excavated and prepared for the pile, repeating Rig-veda 
 X. 14. 9: 'Depart (ye evil spirits), slink away from here; 
 the Fathers (his departed ancestors) have made for him this 
 place of rest.' 
 
 Then the sacred fires were deposited around the margin 
 of the excavated place, and a heap of fire-wood was piled 
 up inside the sacrificial ground (antar-vedi). Next, a layer 
 of Kusa grass was spread over the pile along with the black 
 skin of the goat. Then the clipped hair and the dead body 
 were placed upon it, with the feet towards one of the fires 
 and the head towards the other. Next, the widow was 
 made to lie down on the funeral pile north of the body, 
 along with the bow of her deceased husband, but was not 
 allowed to remain there long. Soon the leader of the 
 funeral called upon her to rise, repeating Rig-veda X. 18. 8, 
 already quoted (see p. 380). 
 
 Next, he took back the bow, repeating Rig-veda X. 18. 9 
 (quoted at p. 380). 
 
 Then he placed the various sacrificial implements and 
 portions of the sacrificial animal in the two hands and on 
 different parts of the body of the corpse. This being 
 done, he kindled the three sacred fires. While the body 
 was burning, portions of hymns of the Rig-veda (such as 
 
 ^ The sacrifice of a cow (called Anustarani) at ancient funeral cere- 
 monies proves, according to Dr. Rajendra-lala Mitra, that in early times 
 there was no law against the eating of flesh, and even of beef. A cow 
 was killed, that the dead might have a supply of the essence of beef for 
 their journey ; and when the spirits of the departed had feasted on the 
 aroma of the immolated animal, the actual flesh was left for the living. 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 283 
 
 X. 14. 7, 8, 10, II ; 16. 1-4; 17. ^-e-, 18. II ; 154. 1-5) were 
 repeated. 
 
 The following are free translations of some of the verses :— 
 
 Soul of the dead ! depart ; take thou the path— 
 The ancient path— by which our ancestors 
 Have gone before thee ; thou shalt look upon 
 The two kings, mighty Varuna and Yama, 
 Delighting in oblations ; thou shalt meet 
 The Fathers and receive the recompense 
 Of all thy stored-up offerings above. 
 Leave thou thy sin and imperfection here ; 
 Return unto thy home once more ; assume 
 A glorious form. By an auspicious path 
 Hasten to pass the four-eyed brindled dogs— 
 The two road-guarding sons of Sarama ; 
 Advance to meet the Fathers who, with hearts 
 Kindly disposed towards thee, dwell in bliss 
 "With Yama ; and do thou, O mighty god. 
 Intrust him to thy guards^ to bring him to thee. 
 And grant him health and happiness eternal. 
 
 (X. 14. 7-1 1.) 
 
 When a dead body was thus burnt the spirit— invested 
 with its incombustible subtle frame — was supposed to rise 
 along with the smoke to heaven. 
 
 Then the performer of the cereniony repeated the verse 
 (Rig-veda X. 18. 3) :— 
 
 We living men, survivors, now return 
 And leave the dead; may our oblations please 
 The gods and bring us blessings ! now we go 
 To dance and jest and hope for longer life. 
 
 After this they proceeded homewards, the younger walking 
 in front, the elder behind. But before re-entering the house 
 they purified themselves by chewing leaves of the Nimba- 
 tree ^, and by touching fire, grains of barley, oil, and water. 
 During one night they cooked no food, and for three nights 
 ate nothing containing salt. 
 After the tenth day the bones and ashes of the deceased 
 
 ^ These are the two four-eyed watch-dogs mentioned at p. 289. 
 ^ This, however, is not mentioned in the Asvalayana Sutras. 
 
284 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 were gathered together and placed in a plain undecorated 
 funeral vase. This particular act, which in modern times is 
 generally performed on the fourth day, was called Asthi- 
 saiicaya, 'bone-collection.' A hole was excavated and the 
 vessel placed in it, while Rig-veda X. 18. 10 was repeated: 
 'Return to thy mother Earth, the Widely-extended, the 
 Broad, the Auspicious ; may she be to thee like a young 
 maiden, soft as wool (urna-mrada) ! may she protect thee 
 from the embrace of the goddess of corruption ! ' 
 
 Then earth was scattered over the excavation, with re- 
 petition of the twelfth verse of the same hymn. Lastly, a 
 cover was placed over the vase and the hole was filled up 
 with earth, while the thirteenth verse was repeated : ' I raise 
 up the earth around thee for a support, placing this cover 
 on thee without causing injury. May the Fathers guard this 
 funeral monument for thee ! May Yama establish a habitation 
 for thee there ! ' 
 
 The principal rite being thus brought to a close, the re- 
 lations returned home, and after performing an ablution 
 offered the first Sraddha to the deceased person. 
 
 I may mention here that, being one day on the Bombay 
 burning-ground, I was a spectator of a ' bone-gathering ' cere- 
 mony (see p. 30a), which had many features in common with 
 the ancient rite. A Brahman and five women were seated 
 in a semicircle round the ashes and bones of a young mar- 
 ried girl of low caste, whose body had recently been burnt. 
 Before them was an earthenware vase, and around it were 
 flowers, fruits, and betel-leaves. The Brahman had a metal 
 vase shaped something like a tumbler in his hand containing 
 consecrated or holy water. With a small round spoon or ladle 
 he took out a small portion of the water and poured it into 
 the hands of the woman, at the same time muttering texts 
 and prayers. Then he poured water into the vase, and on 
 the top of the water placed the fruit, flowers, and leaves. 
 Next, he collected the half-calcined bones, and having put 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 285 
 
 them carefully and reverentially into the vase, he made a 
 hole in the ground a few yards off and buried it. I was 
 told that the vase would be left there for ten days, when a 
 Sraddha would be performed in the same place. 
 
 Turning next to the law-books (see p. 51), which follow 
 on the Sutras and are based on them, we find, as might be 
 expected, that the practice they inculcated differed little 
 from that enjoined in the Sutras. Funeral rites are called 
 'the last sacrifice' (antyeshti), that is to say, the sacrifice 
 of the body in fire. They are regarded as inauspicious 
 (amangala), because impurity is thought to result from con- 
 tact with a dead body and from connexion with the departed 
 spirit, which, though released by the burning of the body, 
 is still regarded as impure until the Sraddha ceremonies are 
 performed. Manu even declares that' some implication of 
 impurity attaches to the sound of the Sama-veda because 
 it is chanted at funeral services. 
 
 The Sraddha, on the other hand, is held to be auspicious 
 (mangala), because it is performed for the bfnefit of a de- 
 ceased person after he has received an intermediate body 
 and become a Pitri or beatified father. It is true that 
 both funeral and Sraddha ceremonies consist in the offering 
 of balls (pinda) of rice or flour and libations of water, with 
 texts and prayers ; but in the funeral rites the ball of rice 
 is for the nourishment of the ghost and for the formation 
 of a body as its vehicle, whereas in the Sraddha the Pinda 
 is said to represent the body so formed, and is offered as 
 an act of homage. Nevertheless it is plainly declared in 
 Manu (III. 337) and elsewhere that the embodied Pitris 
 require the periodical offering of these Pindas and water for 
 their continual nourishment and refreshment. 
 
 A large number of relatives are supposed to partake in the 
 benefits of the Sraddha. They are as follow:— (i) Father, 
 father's father, father's grandfather; {%) Mother, mother's father, 
 mother's grandfather ; (3) Stepmother, if any ; (4) Father's 
 
2 86 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 mother, his grandmother, and his great-grandmother; (5) 
 Father's brothers; (6) Mother's brothers; (7) Father's 
 sisters; (8) Mother's sisters; (9) Sisters and brothers; (10) 
 Fathers-in-law. We know, in fact, that the Hindu family 
 (gotra) is held to be a corporate society, bound together 
 by a right of participation in the Sraddha offerings. This 
 right furnishes the principal evidence of kinship, on which 
 the title to share in the patrimony is founded, no power of 
 making wills being recognized in Manu or any other autho- 
 ritative code of Hindu jurisprudence. All who unite in 
 presenting to their deceased ancestors the balls (pinda) . of 
 rice or flour and libations of water (udaka), are called Sa- 
 pindas^ and Samanodakas to each other, and a kind of 
 intercommunion and interdependence is thus continually 
 maintained between the dead and living members of a family 
 — between past, present, and future generations. Practically, 
 however, the closeness of the interconnexion extends only 
 to three generations on each side. In this way a kind of 
 family chain, consisting of seven links, is formed. The 
 householder represents the central link, and is himself linked 
 to father, grandfather, and great-grandfather on one side, 
 and to son, grandson, and great-grandson on the other 
 (Manu V. 60). The first three are supposed to be de- 
 pendent on the living paterfamilias for their happiness and 
 support, through the constant offering of the ball-like cakes 
 and water; and he himself, the moment he dies, becomes 
 similarly dependent on the three succeeding generations. - 
 
 The connexion which is kept up by the common offering 
 of water lasts longer, and ends only when the family names 
 are no longer known (V. 60). Manu's law-book, however, 
 which stands at the head of all the others and is the earliest 
 in date, makes no positive statement as to the precise dis- 
 
 ^ According to the Mitakshara school, Pinda may also signify body, and 
 some interpret sa^inda to mean persons united by bodily relationship. 
 The other school is that of the Daya-bhaga, which prevails in Bengal. 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 287 
 
 tinction between the funeral or Sraddha ceremonies. Nor 
 does it discrimirtate clearly between the subtle, the terres- 
 trial, and the intermediate bodies. It merely affirms that a 
 Sraddha means an oblation of grain, water, or other sub- 
 stances offered with faith (sraddha), and that the perform- 
 ance of Sraddhas by a son is necessary to deliver a father 
 from the hell called Put (IX. 138) ; whence a son is called 
 Put-tra, 'rescuer from Put^.' This, of course, sufficiently 
 explains the desire of every Hindu for the birth of a son 
 rather than a daughter. 
 
 The law-book of Yajiiavalkya is later in date. The pre- 
 cepts it lays down (Book III) prove that in the early centuries 
 of our era funerals were conducted in a simple manner. Still, 
 much of the practice was in harmony with modern usage, 
 as well as with that of the Grihya-sutras (p. 281). 
 
 For example, a child under two years of age was not burnt 
 but buried, and no offering of water was made to it. (See 
 also Manu V. 68.) The corpse of any other deceased per- 
 son, except that of a great saint or ascetic, was accom- 
 panied by a procession of relations to the burning-place, 
 and there burnt with common fire (laukikagnina), while a 
 hymn to Yama was repeated. Next, the relatives poured 
 out a single libation of water to the deceased, uttering his 
 name and family. Then, instead of shedding tears or giving 
 way to grief, the relatives, after performing their ablutions, 
 seated themselves on a spot covered with soft grass, while 
 the elder repeated to the younger some verses from the 
 ancient Itihasas, such as the following (freely translated) : — 
 
 Does it not argue folly to expect 
 Stability in man, who is as transient 
 As a mere bubble and fragile as a stalk? 
 
 ' It is wholly inconsistent with the true theory of Hinduism that the 
 Sraddha should deliver a man from the consequence of his own deeds. 
 Manu says, ' Iniquity once practised, like a seed, fails not to yield its 
 fruit to him that wrought it' (IV. 173) ; but Hinduism bristles with such 
 inconsistencies. 
 
288 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 Why should we utter wailings if a frame, 
 
 Composed of five material elements, 
 
 Is decomposed by force of its own acts, 
 
 And once again resolved into its parts ? 
 
 The earth, the ocean, and the gods themselves 
 
 Must perish, how should not the world 
 
 Of mortals, light as froth, obey the law 
 
 Of universal death and perish too ? 
 
 After hearing verses of this kind they set out homewards, 
 
 the younger ones leading the way. On reaching the house 
 
 they made a solemn pause outside the door. Then they 
 
 all chewed leaves of the Nimba-tree (popularly, Nim), rinsed 
 
 their mouths with water, touched fire, water, cow-dung, and 
 
 white mustard-seed, and placed their feet on a stone; then 
 
 they slowly re-entered the house. Impurity caused by the 
 
 ceremonies connected with touching the corpse (savam 
 
 asaucam) lasted for either three nights or ten nights. In 
 
 later times the season of mourning and impurity lasted 
 
 longer (see p. 306, note 3). 
 
 Turn we now to the more modern practice. 
 
 Perhaps the best authority for the present creed of the 
 Hindus in regard to the future state of the soul, and the 
 best guide to the right performance of funeral and Sraddha 
 ceremonies, is the Garuda-purana. This is a comparatively 
 modern work — probably not older than the seventh or eighth 
 century, and possibly still more modern. It is written, like 
 other Puranas, in the form of a dialogue ; and is the more in- 
 teresting, as portions of it are recited at funerals and Sraddhas 
 in the present day. The dialogue is between Vishnu and 
 Garuda — the divine bird represented as always attendant on 
 the god and serving as his vehicle (see p. 104). Questioned 
 by Garuda, Vishnu reveals the secrets of the future world and 
 the nature of the punishment in store for the wicked. He also ^ 
 prescribes the proper ceremonies. As a matter of fact, how- 
 ever, the forms now observed do not always agree with the 
 directions in the Garuda-purana, or in any other guide. They 
 vary according to different localities and different castes. 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and AnUstor-'worship. 289 
 
 To describe all the variations within the limit of a single 
 chapter would be impossible. I can only advert to some 
 principal usages in the case of the death of persons of 
 higher caste. And to make the Hindu theory of a future 
 state clearer — complicated as it is by numerous contra- 
 dictory statements and inconsistencies — it will be necessairy 
 to trace the development of the prevalent ideas concerning 
 the character and functions of the god of death, Yama. i 
 
 Probably the name Yama in the Veda is to be connected 
 with an obsolete verb yam, meaning ' to double ' (Lat. gemino). 
 At any rate, the Vedic meaning of the word seems to have 
 been ' twin,' and Yama himself, with his twin sister Yami, 
 were held to be the first pair of mortals born into the 
 world, being both children of Vivasvat the Sun (see p. 11 of 
 this volume, and compare Rig-veda X. 10). As he was sup- 
 posed to be the first of men who died, it was only natural 
 that the earliest myths should invest him with the office 
 of conducting the spirits of other men who die to the spirit- 
 world — a world which, according to some later authorities, 
 is to be regarded as divided into three regions, the upper, 
 sky, middle air, and the atmosphere just above the earth ; 
 the ancient patriarchs occupying the highest region, and the 
 more recently deceased, the lowest. 
 
 The next of the ancient ideas concerning Yama was that 
 he reigned as a kind of president of the dead (Pitri-pati) 
 in the upper sky. There the spirits of the just, invested 
 with celestial lustre, wafted by gentle breezes or borne in 
 heavenly cars, continually arrived, and became themselves 
 gods to be worshipped under the title of Pitris. There 
 they enjoyed the society not only of Yama, but of the god 
 Varuna, also supposed to dwell there. The road to this 
 abode was guarded by two four-eyed watch-dogs, called 
 Syama, ' dark,' and Sabala (or sometimes Karbura), ' spotted ' 
 (see Rig-veda X. 14. 10-12, and pp. 283, 422). Death, and 
 sometimes Agni (fire), were regarded as Yama's messengers 
 
 u 
 
290 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 charged with the duty of conducting the spirits of the dead 
 heavenward, while Yama himself was not so much the god 
 as the friend of departed spirits. He was looked up to with 
 veneration, but not by any means with terror, as if he were 
 the god of punishment. (Compare p. i6 of this volume.) 
 
 Turning now to the period of the Epic poems and Pura^ 
 nas, we find Yama developed into a much more terrific 
 being. He is now the Judge and punisher of the dead, who 
 sits in judgment upon them, and, so to speak, holds the 
 keys of heaven and hell. Hence he is called ' the !R.estrainer 
 or Punisher' (Yama, from yam, to restrain), or ' the King of 
 Justice' (Dharma-raja), or simply 'Justice' (Dharma), or 
 ' the Rod-bearer ' (Danda-dhara), or ' Noose-bearer ' (Pasin). 
 Sometimes he is represented as acting in these characters 
 on behalf of Rudra-Siva, who is the real god of the dead; 
 Many descriptions of his appearance may be found in the 
 Epic poems and Puranas. There he is usually depicted as 
 grim and awe-imposing in aspect, green in colour, clothed 
 in red, riding on a buffalo, and holding a club in one hand 
 and a noose in the other. He is also one of the eight 
 guardians of the quarters of the sky, his own quarter being 
 the South, in which direction in some region of the lower 
 world and somewhere on the confines of the places of tor- 
 ment, which are called the ' terrific provinces ' of his kingdom 
 (Vishnu-purana II. 6), are his city and palace called Yama- 
 pura and Yama-sadana. Between the earth and this abode 
 flows the terrible river Vaitaranl^, which all departed spirits 
 must cross. In the later Puranas — and especially in the Garuda 
 — Yama is generally regarded as a stern and terrible god 
 of punishment only. He is a kind of Hindu Pluto or Minos, 
 and nothing more. But there is this inconsistency in his 
 position, that although he is appointed to punish every man 
 according to his works, he has, in the creed of many Hindiis, 
 
 ^ Baitarani (or Vaitarani) is the name of a river in Orissa 45 miles N.E. 
 of Kuttack. On its bank is a shrine called ' Yama's abode.' 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 291 
 
 no power over those worshippers of Siva, Vishnu, Krishna, 
 and Brahma, who have lived virtuous hves, and who when 
 they die are transported to the heavens Kailasa, Vaikuntha, 
 Go-Ioka and Brahma-loka respectively 1. Nor has he power 
 over those whose death-beds are protected by the due per- 
 formance of the requisite ceremonies and by the payment of 
 sufficient fees to the Brahmans who superintend such cere- 
 monies. Compare p. 118. 
 
 In attempting, therefore, to give some idea of the present 
 creed of the Hindus in regard to death and a future state, 
 it will be necessary to begin by describing the career and 
 history of a deceased mortal who, from his evil deeds during 
 life or from some defect in the proper ceremonies at his 
 decease, becomes subject to Yama's penalties. 
 
 We are told in the Garuda-purana that when such a man 
 dies his spirit takes a downward course through , the intes- 
 tines and emerges in the same manner as the excreta ; 
 whereas — as we shall see in the sequel — the spirit of a good 
 man finds its way through the tenth aperture of the body, 
 which is a suture at the top of the skull, called the Brahma- 
 randhram, ' Brahma's crevice.' 
 
 No sooner has death occurred and cremation of the ter- 
 restrial body taken place, than Yama's two messengers 
 (Yama-dutau), who are waiting near at hand, make them- 
 selves visible to the released spirit, which retains its subtle 
 body composed of the subtle elements, and is said to be 
 of the size of a thumb (angushtha-matra). Their aspect is 
 terrific ; for they have glaring eyes, hair standing erect, 
 gnashing teeth, crow-black skin, and claw-like nails, and 
 they hold in their hands the awful rod and noose of Yama. 
 Then, as if their appearance in this form were not suffici- 
 ently alarming, they proceed to terrify their victim by terrible 
 visions of the torments (yatana) in store for him. 
 
 ^ 'The servants and ministers of Yama and his tortures are unavailing 
 against one who places his reliance in Vishnu.' Vishnu-purana III. 7. 
 
 U 3 
 
2 9 2 Death, Funeral Rites, and A ncestor-worship. 
 
 In a story told in the Vana-parva of the Maha-bharata 
 (16,754), Yama himself appears before a dying man. He is 
 clothed in blood-red garments with a glittering crown upon 
 his head, and, like Varuna, holds a noose in his hand, with 
 which he binds the spirit and its subtle frame after drawing 
 it from the sick man's body. 
 
 The usual theory, however, is that his two messeiigers 
 perform this office. They then convey the bound spirit 
 along the road to Yama's abode. There being led before 
 Yama's judgment-seat it is confronted with his Registrar or 
 Recorder named ditra-gupta ^. This officer stands by Yama's 
 side with an open book before him. It is his business to 
 note down all the good and evil deeds of every human being 
 committed during his life, with the resulting merit (punya) 
 and demerit (papa), and to produce a debtor and creditor 
 account made up and balanced on the day of his death, when 
 that being is brought before Yama^. According to the 
 balance on the side of merit or demerit is judgment pro- 
 nounced. 
 
 Truly the prospect of so terrible an ordeal to a man con- 
 scious of his sins might appear absolutely unbearable, were 
 it not for his belief in the doctrine that the ceremonies per- 
 formed on his behalf by his relations after his death, have 
 power, if properly carried out, to turn the scale and perhaps 
 place a considerable balance to his credit. 
 
 As however a disembodied spirit can neither enjoy heaven 
 nor suffer the pains of hell until reinvested with a physical 
 frame, composed — as already pointed out — of gross though 
 ethereal particles, it is instantly after its sentence hurried 
 , back to the place of cremation ; where it acquires a frame of 
 the necessary sensibility by feeding on the oblations of rice 
 
 Mt is remarkable that the enterprising and intelligent Writer caste 
 (Kayastha) of Bengal claim to be descended from a Brahman, named 
 (f itra-gupta ; and secretaries are sometimes called by that name. 
 
 ^ Compare Rev. xx. 12, ' And the dead were judged out of those things 
 which were written in the books, according to their works.' 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 293 
 
 and libations of water offered for ten consecutive days after 
 the burning of the terrestrial body ^. 
 
 On the first day the ball (Pinda) of rice offered by the 
 eldest son, or other near relative, nourishes the spirit of the 
 deceased in such a way as to furnish it with a head; on 
 the second day the offered Pinda gives a neck and shoulders ; 
 on the third, a heart ; on the fourth, a back ; on the fifth, 
 a navel; on the sixth, a groin, and the parts usually con- 
 cealed ; on the seventh, thighs ; on the eighth and ninth, 
 knees and feet. On the tenth day the intermediate body 
 is sufficiently formed to produce the sensation of hunger and 
 thirst. Other Pindas are therefore put before it, and on the 
 eleventh and twelfth day^ the embodied spirit feeds vora- 
 ciously on the offerings thus supplied, and so gains strength 
 for its journey to its future abode (Garuda-purana I. 51, etc.). 
 Then on the thirteenth day after death it is conducted either 
 to heaven or to one of the hells. If to the latter, it has need 
 of the most nourishing food to enable it to bear up against 
 the terrible ordeal which awaits it. 
 
 The road by which Yama's two ofiicers force a wicked man 
 to descend to one or other of the twenty-one hells (p. aga) is 
 described in the first two chapters of the Garuda-purana. The 
 length of the way is said to be 86,000 leagues (yojanas). The 
 condemned soul, invested with its sensitive body and made to 
 travel at the rate of aoo leagues a day, finds no shady trees, no 
 resting-place, no food, no water. At one time it is scorched 
 by a burning heat, equal to that of twelve meridian suns, at 
 another it is pierced by icy cold winds ; now its tender frame 
 is rent by thorns ; now it is attacked by lions, tigers, savage 
 dogs, venomous serpents, and scorpions. In one place it has 
 
 ^ This frame is sometimes called ' the upward-going body ' (urdhva- 
 deha), whence the obsequial ceremonies that produce it are sometimes 
 called Aurdhva-dehikam. Another name for this body is Adhishthana- 
 deha (see p. 28). 
 
 " In some parts of India these are also the days on which the relations 
 who are performing the funeral rites have their festive dinners. 
 
294 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 to traverse a dense forest whose lekves are swords ; in another 
 it falls into deep pits; in another it is precipitated from 
 precipices ; in another it has to walk on the edge of razors ; 
 in another on iron spikes ; here it stumbles about helplessly 
 in profound darkness ; there it struggles through loathsome 
 mud swarming with leeches; here it toils through burning 
 sand ; there its progress is arrested by heaps of red-hot 
 charcoal and stifling smoke. Compelled to pass through 
 every obstacle, however formidable, it next encounters a 
 succession of terrific showers not of rain, but of live coals, 
 stones, blood, boiling water and filth. Then it has to descend 
 into appalling fissures, or ascend to sickening heights, or lose 
 itself in vast caves, or wade through lakes seething with fetid 
 ordure. Then midway it has to pass the awful river VaitaranI, 
 one hundred leagues in breadth, of unfathomable depth; 
 flowing with irresistible impetuosity, filled with blood, matter, 
 hair, and bones ; infested with huge sharks, crocodiles, and 
 sea-monsters ; darkened by clouds of hideous vultures and 
 obscene birds of prey. Thousands of condemned spirits 
 stand trembling on the banks, horrified by the prospect 
 before them. Consumed by a raging thirst, they drink the 
 blood which flows at their feet, then tumbling headlong into 
 the torrent they are overwhelmed by the rushing waves. 
 Finally, they are hurried down to the lowest depths of hell, 
 and yet not destroyed. Pursued by Yama's officers they are 
 dragged away and made to undergo inconceivable tortures, 
 the detail of which is given with the utmost minuteness in 
 the succeeding chapters of the Garuda-purana. 
 
 A description so monstrous would be scarcely worth re- 
 producing in any form, did it not profess to represent an 
 important article of the creed of a vast majority of our ^ ^ ^ 
 fellow-subjects in regard to a future state. It might indeed 
 be thought that a belief in such horrors and in the possibility 
 of undergoing a fate so awful would be calculated to produce 
 a salutary deterrent effect oh wicked persons, did we not 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 295 
 
 find that^ however intense is a Hindu's belief in the reality 
 of hell's most excruciating torments, as described in the 
 Garuda and other Puranas, he is equally ready to accept 
 the doctrine laid down in the same works, that by performing 
 certain religious rites and giving gifts to the Brahmans all 
 the terrific penalties of sin may be avoided and the god of 
 hell disappointed of his victims (compare p. 291, first line). - 
 What, then, is the nature of the various modern ceremonies 
 which secure this immunity from future punishment and make 
 the course of the departed spirit— however guilty — peaceful 
 and pleasant ? We can only give an outline of some of those 
 most usually practised in the present day among religious 
 families of the higher classes. 
 
 In the first place, when a man becomes seriously ill, it is 
 common for his relatives to assume rather prematurely that 
 his case is hopeless. They therefore make preparations for 
 performing the last offices of religion, in anticipation of his 
 decease, in a manner which to us Europeans would appear 
 not unlikely to hasten on the crisis. Perhaps his only chance 
 of warding off the approach of death may depend on perfect ; ' 
 repose of body and mind. Yet how can his kinsmen allow 
 him to run the risk of falling into the hands of the god of 
 punishment, when by a little exertion they may secure for 
 him the protection of the sacred river which flows perhaps 
 not more than ten miles from his abode ? Hence, his eldest * , 
 son and other near relatives lose no time in placing him on ' 
 a litter and conveying him to the banks of the nearest holy 
 stream. If such a river as the Ganges or Narmada or Goda- 
 varl or Krishna (Kistna) happen to be within reach, the 
 relatives of the dying man are the more eager to bring him 
 into close proximity to the sacred waters. At Calcutta this 
 is often done two or three days before death supervenes. 
 According to Mr. S. C. Bose, ' Persons entrusted with the 
 care and nursing of a dying man at the burning-ghat [on 
 the Ganges] soon get tired of their charge, and rather than 
 
296 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 administer to his comfort, are known to resort to artificial 
 means, whereby death is accelerated. They unscrupulously 
 pour the unwholesome, muddy water of the river down his 
 already choked throat, and in some cases suffocate him to 
 death 1.' 
 
 Of course the Ganges is of all rivers held to be the most 
 divine and the most potent in its efficacy. If simply looked 
 upon during the death-agony, the messengers of Yama, who 
 are eager to seize and bind the soul, are powerless to harm it. 
 
 But neither the Ganges nor any other sacred stream is 
 always to be reached. In such cases various other preventive 
 measures calculated to keep the officers of Yama at bay or 
 force them to retire, may be resorted to, according to the 
 practice believed to be most efficacious in different localities. 
 
 For example, in many families it is thought enough to 
 scatter Sesamum seed and Kusa grass around the sick man's 
 ' couch or to encircle it with a kind of cordon of cow-dung ; or 
 a Salagrama stone (see p. 69) is brought and placed on a 
 stand close to the dying man's side, while at the same time 
 a Tulasi plant is deposited near him. Or again, a sprig of 
 that sacred plant is wound round his head ; or its leaves are 
 placed in his mouth ^ ; or a piece of gold ^ is inserted between 
 the teeth ; or a little mud from a sacred stream may be 
 brought from a distance and plastered on his forehead ; or 
 Ganges water may be poured down his throat. 
 
 Then again a cow duly decorated is brought close to the 
 moribund man's bed, and he is made to grasp its tail, under 
 
 ' ' The Hindoos as they are,' p. 252. 
 
 2 According to the Garuda-purana (IX. 7, 8), 'The house in which 
 there is a single- sprig of the Tulasi is like a holy place of pilgrimage, 
 Yama's messengers cannot enter it. ' Yama cannot look upon the man 
 who dies with the Tulasi in contact with his body, even though he may 
 have committed hundreds of crimes.' In verse 1 1 the same efficacy is 
 ascribed to Kusa grass, which is said to be pervaded by Brahma, Vishnu, 
 and Siva. 
 
 ^ To secure the presence of gold in the mouth at death, a healthy man 
 wiU sometimes have it inserted in his teeth. 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 297 
 
 the notion that by the sacred animal's assistance he will be 
 safely transported over the terrible river of death, VaitaranI 
 (see also p. 290). This, however, is a precautionary measure 
 which will be quite ineffectual unless the cow is afterwards 
 handed over as a gift to the Brahmans. 
 
 Others again who believe that the passage of the Hindu 
 Styx is compulsory on all, and that it cannot be accomplished 
 without direct Brahmanical aid, take care to send for two or 
 three priests for the performance of the Vaitaranl-rite. This 
 ceremony, which is very usual in Bengal, consists mainly in 
 paying money to the Brahmans, who in return mutter a few 
 texts and prayers, supposed to be efficacious in helping the 
 deceased man across the dreaded river. 
 
 Of course Mantras or texts from the Vedas are repeated, 
 and hymns to Vishnu and Siva are occasionally recited. 
 Then at the last moment the dying man is made if possible 
 to repeat the Taraka-mantra or ' saving-text,' according to 
 the sect to which he belongs. In most cases it consists in 
 uttering one of the names of Vishnu, such as Rama, or 
 Narayana (p. 62), or Hari, or the eight-syllabled Mantra, 
 ' Blessed Krishna is my refuge.' One common formula or 
 cry uttered by the attendants is ' Hari bol ' 1 
 
 When the moment of death arrives the spirit is supposed 
 to escape, invested only with its lihga-sarira (see p. 38), 
 through the top of the head or through one of the upper 
 or lower apertures of the body S according to the character 
 for good or evil it achieved during life (see p. 291). 
 
 The corpse has now to be transported to a place where its 
 cremation may be accomplished in due form and according 
 to prescribed rules, but not until certain other rites have been 
 performed. And first the eldest son or his nearest repre- 
 sentative carefully shaves the body^. This he does without 
 
 ^ The seven upper apertures are the mouth, the eyes, the nostrils, and ears. 
 '^ This is according to the directions in the Garuda-purana. At Benares 
 the shaving process generally takes place at the burning-ghat. 
 
 l^' 
 
298 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 removing the hair from under the arms and without clipping 
 the nails. Next he bathes it with water from a sacred 
 stream and decorates it with sandal-wood and garlands ; or 
 in place of decoration he may plaster it with mud from the 
 Ganges. Then it is covered with new vestments and placed 
 on the litter ; a rice-ball (Pinda) being offered to the guardian 
 deities of the soil, who protect the road to the burning- 
 ground from the attacks of evil spirits. At the same time 
 the name and family of the deceased man are pronounced 
 by his son, while his son's wife and the other women of the 
 household reverently circumambulate the corpse and utter 
 lamentations. The body is now ready to be borne to the 
 place of cremation, which ought, if possible, to be near a 
 river ^. And here a great difficulty has sometimes to be 
 overcome in finding proper persons to carry the dead body. 
 If the deceased happens to be a Bi-ahman, font men of his 
 own caste — and, if possible, chosen from his own relations — ' 
 ought to perform this office, walking behind the son, who 
 leads the funeral procession, holding in his hand an earthen 
 vessel containing fire. Or, according to the Garuda-purana 
 (X. 13), the son himself should help to carry the corpse on 
 his shoulder, the other relatives with bare heads following 
 in the rear. 
 
 It may be noted here that the rule which prevents Brah- 
 mans from touching the bodies of persons of inferior caste is 
 often a cause of great trouble and difficulty. 
 
 Not long ago a very respectable man of the Kayastha caste 
 died in Khandesh at a place where no male members of his 
 own caste lived. The body had to be burnt immediately, 
 but no one of superior caste could be induced to touch it, and 
 had any one of a lower caste done so, the family would have 
 suffered irretrievable degradation. The difficulty was only 
 
 ■^ If a place near a river is to be found anywhere within ten or fifteen 
 miles of the dead man's residence the corpse is generally carried there, 
 unless, as we have seen, this is done before the breath leaves the body. 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 299 
 
 surmounted by the payment of an exorbitant sum to some 
 Brahmans who at length consented to bear the body to the 
 burning-ground. 
 
 This explains the unwillingness of the Hindus to leave 
 their own country and caste. 
 
 The burning of the corpse is the next act in the drama. 
 
 A proper spot for the erection of the funeral pile must be 
 chosen. It must be well purified by the sprinkling of holy 
 water. A kind of altar is then made with earth, and the 
 Homa ceremony is performed by casting grain into the sacred 
 fire with repetition of certain Mantras. Then the pile ought, 
 strictly, to be constructed with TulasI and Palasa and sandal- 
 wood. Five Pindas or balls of rice are placed on the body, 
 which is made to face the north, and its orifices filled with 
 ghee. The eldest son or his representative applies the fire to 
 the wood, reciting Rig-veda X. 17. 3 : — 'May the guardian 
 deity Pushan convey thee hence on thy distant road ; may 
 he deliver thee to the Fathers etc' 
 
 Not long ago (and even under our rule till the Act of 1839, 
 p. 481), if the dead man had a faithful wife (sati) she often 
 gave proof of her devotion by allowing her living body to be 
 burnt with her husband's corpse ; and the Garuda-purana 
 eulogizes the devoted woman who thereby secures bliss for 
 herself and her husband. Sometimes a widowed mother 
 burnt herself with the body of an only son. 
 
 When the body is half-burnt the skull ought to be cracked 
 with a blow from a piece of sacred wood. The idea is that 
 the soul may not have been able to escape through the 
 aperture at the top of the head, and that the cracking of 
 the skull may open a crevice and facilitate its exit. 
 
 In the case of the death of a holy man whose body is 
 buried and not burnt, the necessary blow is given with a 
 cocoa-nut (sri-phala) or with a sacred conch-shell (sahkha). 
 
 A story was told me with great seriousness of a sorcerer at 
 Lahore who made it the business of his life to make a coUec- 
 
30O Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 tion of the skulls of dead men, which had not been properly 
 cracked in this manner at death and so retained the spirits of 
 the deceased inside. The peasantry in the neighbourhood 
 fully believed that he was able to make use of these spirits 
 for magical purposes, and force them to obey him. 
 
 During the process of cremation an oblation of clarified 
 butter ought to be offered in the fire and a Mantra repeated, 
 entreating the god of fire to convey the deceased man to 
 heaven. When the body has been consumed, all present at 
 the funeral bathe or purify themselves with ablutions. Sesa- 
 mum and water are then offered, while the name and family 
 of the deceased are again repeated. 
 
 Finally, a few leaves of the Nimba-tree (Nim) are chewed 
 by all and the funeral procession returns home, the women 
 walking first and the men behind. Meanwhile the pyre and the 
 products of combustion are left undisturbed to a future day. 
 
 The Garuda-purana directs that if a man dies in a remote 
 place, or is killed by robbers in a forest and his body is not 
 found, his son should make an effigy of the deceased with 
 Kusa grass and then burn it on a pile with similar rites. 
 
 The Brahmans who repeat Mantras and officiate at funeral 
 ceremonies are not held in high repute. On the fourth day 
 after cremation the relatives return to the burying-ground, 
 and assembling at the pyre perform the ' bone-gathering ' 
 (asthi-saiidaya) ceremony. Three circumambulations are made 
 around the ashes and a Mantra from the Yajur-veda (beginning 
 Yamaya tva, XXXVIII. 9) is repeated. The calcined bones 
 are then placed in a kind of urn or earthen vessel ; a cavity is 
 dug in the ground and the vessel deposited in it. Next a 
 Pinda is offered over the ashes for the removal of the suffering 
 supposed to have been caused by the act of cremation. Then 
 after a few days the vessel is removed from the cavity in 
 order that the ashes and bones may be carried away and 
 thrown into some sacred river — if possible the Ganges. 
 ' Whatever sins,' says the Garuda-purana (X. 84), ' a man may 
 
Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 301 
 
 have committed during life, if his bones are cast into the 
 Ganges he must certainly go to heaven.' 
 
 In illustration of this a story is related in the same Purana 
 of a certain hunter, notorious for his crimes, who was killed 
 by a tiger in an inaccessible corner of a forest. There his 
 body lay for many years and his disembodied spirit became 
 a troublesome devil (compare p. 239), till fortunately the 
 bleached skeleton was spied by a crow, who picking up bone 
 after bone dropped it into the Ganges. Whereupon the 
 demon was suddenly converted into a saint, and transported 
 in a celestial chariot to the mansions of the blessed. This 
 story is narrated with all seriousness by the author of the 
 Purana as if he were recording an historical fact. 
 
 In connexion with the same subject I may repeat an 
 anecdote told me by a late member of the Indian Civil 
 Service— once a Magistrate and Collector in North-western 
 India. He was once on a tour of inspection through his 
 district when he overtook a poor old woman trudging along 
 the road with evident difficulty. He inquired in a kindly 
 voice where she was going. ' To the Ganges with my husband,' 
 was the prompt reply. Involuntarily the Magistrate looked 
 back, expecting to see some old man following her, when 
 she calmly opened a handkerchief which she had been carrying 
 slung over her shoulder, and showed him all that remained 
 of her defunct lord and master in the shape of a few half- 
 calcined bones, an old tooth or two, and a little dust and 
 ashes. These she was transporting to the river with the pious 
 object of scattering them on the sacred waters. 
 
 I may also put on record how greatly struck I was with 
 the peaceful aspect of a spot of ground called the Asthi- 
 vilaya-tlrtham, 'sacred place for the dissolution of bones,' 
 at Nasik— the Benares of Western India. There surrounded 
 by trees, temples, and lovely scenery is a consecrated pool, 
 formed by the waters of the Godavarl, which are here par- 
 tially diverted from their course and made to flow into a 
 
302 Death, Funeral Rites, and Ancestor-worship. 
 
 receptacle lined with stone in a secluded bend of the river. 
 This is the cemetery or ' sleeping-place ' of myriads of human 
 beings whose ashes are brought at particular holy seasons 
 and scattered on the tranquil waters. 
 
 I was also much impressed by another 'bone-gathering' 
 ceremony which I witnessed on the burning-ground at 
 Bombay (see p. 284). On the morning of one of my visits to 
 that place twenty-four men were gathered round the ashes of 
 a man whose body had been burnt two or three days before. 
 The ceremony commenced by one of their number examining 
 the ashes, and carefully separating any portions of the bones 
 that had not been calcined by the flames on the previous 
 day. These he collected in his hands and carried outside the 
 burning-ground, with the intention, I was told, of throwing 
 them into the sea near at hand. This being done, the whole 
 party gathered round the ashes of the pyre in a semicircle, 
 and one of the twenty-four men sprinkled them with water. 
 Then some cow-dung was carefully spread in the centre of 
 the ashes so as to form a flat circular cake of rather more 
 than a foot in diameter, around which a stream of cow's urine 
 was poured from a metal vessel. Next, one of the men 
 brought a plantain-leaf, and laid it on the circle of cow-dung 
 so as to form a kind of dish or plate. Around the edge of 
 the leaf were placed five round balls (Pindas), probably of 
 rice-flour, rather smaller than cricket-balls, mixed with some 
 brown substance. Sprigs of the Tulsl plant and fresh leaves 
 of the betel, with a few flowers, were inserted in each ball, 
 and a coloured cotton cord loosely suspended between them. 
 Next, one of the relations covered the five Pindas with the 
 red powder called gulal. Then five flat wheaten cakes were 
 placed on the plantain-leaf inside the circle of the five Pindas, 
 and boiled rice was piled up on the cakes, surmounted by a 
 small piece of ghi mixed with brown sugar. 
 
 The ceremony being so far completed, the son or next 
 nearest relative took an empty earthenware vase, filled it with 
 
Sraddha Ceremonies Proper. 30-' 
 
 water, and held it on his right shoulder. Starting from the 
 north side he commenced circumambulating the five Pindas 
 and the five wheaten cakes, keeping his left shoulder towards 
 them, while one of the relatives with a sharp stone made a 
 hole in the jar, whence the water spouted out in a stream as 
 he walked round. On completing the first circuit and coming 
 back to the north, a second incision was made with the same 
 stone, whence a second stream poured out simultaneously 
 with the first. At the end of the fifth round, when five 
 streams of water had been made to spout out from five holes 
 round the five Pindas, the earthenware vase was dashed to 
 the ground on the north side, and the remaining water spilt 
 over the ashes. Next, one of the relatives took a small 
 metal vessel containing milk, and, with a betel-leaf for a 
 ladle, sprinkled some drops over the rice piled on the 
 wheaten cakes. After which, taking some water from a small 
 lota — or rather making another relative pour it into his hand 
 — he first sprinkled it in a circle round the Pindas, and then 
 over the cakes. Finally, bending down and raising his hands 
 to his head, he performed a sort of puja to the Pindas, which 
 were supposed to represent the deceased man and four other 
 relations. This was repeated by all twenty-four men in turn. 
 After the completion of the ceremony, the balls and cakes 
 were left to be eaten by animals. The men who performed it 
 probably belonged to a low caste or to some aboriginal tribe. 
 
 An account of the late Maharani of Nuddea's cremation and 
 of the subsequent ceremonies is given further on (Chap. XXII) 
 and is well worthy of attention. 
 
 Of course the Sraddha ceremonies proper (as already shown 
 at pp. 378-285) have many points in common with the 
 antecedent funeral obsequies (antyeshti), especially in the 
 nature of the oblations offered and texts repeated, but the 
 balls of rice, etc. (Pindas) are said to represent the deified 
 bodies of the Pitris. 
 
 According to the Nirnaya-sindhu a Sraddha is a gift given 
 
304 Sraddha Ceremonies Proper. 
 
 to the Pitris, offered with faith (Sraddha) and with sorre 
 auspicious exclamation (such as svadhd'^), and followed by 
 gifts to the Brahmans (compare p. 387). 
 
 A Sraddha, then, is a reverential offering to deceased ances- 
 tors. But Sraddhas are not only acts of homage, they are 
 believed to minister to the welfare of those deceased relatives 
 who through the previous funeral rites have obtained ethereal 
 bodies (divya-deha). Until the Sraddha is performed the 
 spirit is a Preta, after its performance (pp. 307-313) the spirit 
 takes its place among the Pitris or divine Fathers in their 
 blissful abodes called Pitri-loka. And the Sraddhas do this, 
 not so much by supplying them with nutriment in the balls of 
 rice, cakes of meal, and daily water offered ^, as by accumu- 
 lating merit (punya) for them and so accelerating their progress 
 through the heavens to future births and final union with the 
 Supreme. And this accumulation of merit is mainly accom- 
 plished by feasting and feeing the Brahmans, who are held for 
 \the time to represent the Pitris. 
 
 But a Sraddha is also performed on one's own account. 
 Propitiation and gratification of the Manes are acts fraught 
 with reflex benefits to any one who performs them properly, 
 and may become a means of storing up merit or procuring 
 some advantage for himself and his family. Probably this is 
 the main idea in the minds of those who go through some of 
 the ceremonies so earnestly. 
 
 Nor is a Sraddha by any means necessarily connected with 
 funerals. It may be performed every day, and especially on 
 various occasions of rejoicing. According to the Vishnu- 
 purana (III. 13) : 'A householder should worship the Pitris at 
 
 ^ Requiring the dative case of the object to which the oblation is 
 offered. . Other similar exclamations are svaha, sraushat, vaushat. 
 Svadha is also a name for the oblation or for its personification. 
 
 ^ Yet it is true, as before seen, that Manu and others make the Pitris 
 actually feed on the essence of the offerings. In the same way it is said 
 that in Europe in ancient times asphodels were planted near groves to 
 supply the Manes of the dead with nourishment. 
 
Sraddha Ceremonies Proper. 305 
 
 the marriage of a son or daughter, on entering a new 
 dwelling, on naming a child, on performing tonsure, on seeing 
 the face of a son.' 
 
 It is on this account that the Nirnaya-sindhu distinguishes 
 Sraddhas under twelve heads, as follows : — ^ 
 
 I. Nitya, 'daily,' 'constant,' consisting of offerings of water 
 to ancestors generally at the daily Tarpana ceremony forming 
 part of the Sandhya (p. 410). This cannot be performed vica- 
 riously, but only by every man in his own person. 
 
 a. Naimittika, ' special,' performed on special occasions as 
 at funerals, and having reference to one person (ekoddish- 
 tam) recently deceased. An odd nuniber of Brahmans (for 
 instance, one, three, five, etc.) are to be feasted at the close 
 of the rite. In contradistinction to Nitya, Naimittika cere- 
 monies admit of being performed through a deputy or repre- 
 sentative. 
 
 3. Kamya, ' voluntary,' performed for the accomplishment of 
 some desired object ; as, for instance, the obtaining of a son. 
 
 4. Vriddhi-Sraddha, ' for the increase of prosperity.' 
 
 5. Sapindana, 'for the benefit of all kinsmen who are 
 Sapindas,' that is, connected by the offering of the Pinda. 
 This may be performed by women. 
 
 6. Parvana, 'performed at the conjunction of sun and 
 moon,' that is, at new moon and at other periods of the 
 moon's changes. 
 
 7. Goshthi-Sraddha, 'performed at any large assembly or 
 family gathering.' 
 
 8. Suddhy-artha, 'for the sake of purification,' and con- 
 sisting mainly in the feeding of a certain number of Brahmans, 
 as representatives of the Pitris. 
 
 9. Karmanga, ' performed at certain Sanskara rites.' 
 
 10. Daivika, ' on behalf of the gods,' especially the Visve 
 devah, or ' deities collectively.' 
 
 11. Yatrartha, ' for success' on undertaking a journey. 
 13. Pushty-artha, ' for health and well-being of body.' 
 
 X 
 
3O0 l^rdddha Ceremonies Proper. 
 
 Other, forms of Sraddha were described to me while I was 
 in India ; for example, the one called Hiranya-Sraddha, ' gold 
 Sraddha,' is said to be performed by giving money to a 
 Brahman, when no Brahman can be found who wishes to be 
 fed with cooked food. 
 
 Again, D'arbha-Sraddha is where, in the absence of 
 Brahmans as representatives of the Pitris, an tSi%y of a 
 Brahman is made with Kusa grass and worship offered to it. 
 
 Of all these Sraddhas, that" performed for a parent recently 
 deceased (and therefore falling under the class Naimittika 
 and called Ekoddishta, ' directed towards one person ') is the 
 most interesting, as it is the only one accompanied with 
 elaborate ceremonial, cosl^ly gifts, and festivities. It must 
 not be deferred too long after the termination of the funeral 
 proper, and must in all cases take place before the end of 
 the first month after death. It ought to be performed by a 
 son and repeated in a simple form every succeeding month 
 for a year \ and again at every anniversary. 
 
 In Bengal, according to Mr. S. C Bose ^, a son from the 
 hour of his father's death to the conclusion of the funeral 
 ceremony is religiously forbidden to shave, wear shoes, shirts, 
 or any garment other than the piece of white cloth, his food 
 being confined to a single meal consisting of rice, pulse, milk, 
 ghee, sugar, and a few fruits. A Brahman must continue thig 
 course of fasting for ten days ^, a Kshatriya longer. (See the 
 Maharaja of Nuddea's description. Chap. XXII.) 
 
 Then fifteen or sixteen days after the demise of his father 
 the son makes preparation for the approaching Sraddha. 
 About the twentieth day he walks barefoot to the house of 
 each of his relations to announce that the Sraddha is to take, 
 
 1 So in Ireland a mass for the dead is celebrated one month after death. 
 
 ^ See 'The Hindoos as they are,' pp. 254-257. 
 
 ^ According to the Vishnu-purana, the time of mourning and impurity 
 is, for a Brahman, ten days ; for a Kshatriya, twelve ; for a Vaisya, 
 fourteen ; for a Siidra, a whole month or thirty-one days. The higher ., 
 the caste the less the inconvenience imposed. ." 
 
Sraddha Ceremonies Proper. 307 
 
 place on the thirty-first day after death. On the thirtieth day, 
 the son and other near relatives shave, cut their nails, and put 
 on new clothes, giving the old to the barber. Invitations 
 are sent round to the Brahmans and Pandits requesting their 
 presence, at the feast. On the thirty-first day, early in the 
 morning, the son, accompanied by the officiating priest, goes 
 to the river-side, bathes, and performs certain preliminary 
 rites. A quantity of silver and brass utensils, besides shawls, 
 cloth, and hard silver in cash are required for the ceremony 
 and to serve as gifts for the Brahmans, Pandits, and other 
 guests. From eight in the morning to two in the afternoon 
 the house is crammed to suffocation. The guests arrive early, 
 and are asked to take their seats according to their caste. 
 About ten o'clock the son begins the rite ; the officiating priest 
 reciting the formularies (which ought to include Pitri-suktas 
 from the Sama-veda), and the son repeating them. Meanwhile 
 female singers of questionable character entertain the guests 
 with their songs, while garlands and sandal-paste are dis- 
 tributed. 
 
 About one in the afternoon the ceremony is brought to a 
 close by the Brahmans aind. Pandits receiving their customary 
 gifts. The first in the list gets, in ordinary cases, about five 
 rupees in cash, and one brass vessel valued at four or five 
 rupees; the second, third, and others in proportion. The 
 Guru or religious teacher and the Purohita or officiating 
 priest carry off the lion's share. 
 
 . On the following day, according to Mr. Bose, an entertain- 
 ment is given to the Brahmans, and until this is done no 
 Hindu can be released from the restrictions of mourning, 
 nor regain his former purity. About twelve, the guests begin 
 to assemble, and when the number reaches two or three 
 hundred, seats of Kusa grass in long rows are arranged for 
 them, and each man receives a plantain leaf on which are 
 placed fruits and sweetmeats, such as ' ghee- fried loochees ' 
 and other delicacies, besides various kinds of confectionery in 
 
 X 3 
 
3o8 Srctddha Ceremonies Proper. 
 
 earthen plates. Every Brahman before leaving the house is 
 presented with a money gift (dakshina) of one or two annas. 
 
 The next day, a similar entertainment with similar gifts' is 
 given to Kayasthas and members of inferior classes. 
 
 And here it may be noted that time and place are im- 
 portant factors in the due performance of Sraddhas. As to 
 time, the month Bhadra — from the middle of August to the 
 middle of September — and especially the Pitri-paksha (Pitri 
 fortnight) in that month or in the beginning of Asvina, are 
 believed to be the most auspicious seasons for Sraddhas. 
 
 As to locality, the banks of sacred streams or pools, and 
 places consecrated by the footsteps of Vishnu, are sought for 
 as the most favourable spots. Sraddhas are also performed 
 in cow-houses. No place can surpass in suitability the 
 neighbourhood of some of the holy tanks at Benares, except 
 it be the temple built over the footstep of Vishnu at Gaya, 
 which is more frequented than any other spot in India for 
 the performance of particular Sraddhas. 
 
 At Benares on the Ghat near the pool of Mani-karnika, on 
 the day I visited it, a man was performing a Sraddha (perhaps 
 the Kamya, p. 305) for his mother. The officiating Brahman 
 began by forming a slightly elevated piece of ground with 
 some sand. This was supposed to constitute a small altar 
 (vedi). It was of an oblong form, but not more than ten 
 inches long by four or five broad. Across this raised sand he 
 laid three stalks of Kusa grass. Then taking a number of 
 little earthenware platters or saucers, he arranged them round 
 the sand, putting tila oi: sesamum seed in one, rice in another, 
 honey in a third, areca or betel-nut in a fourth, candana or 
 sandal in a fifth. Next, he took flour of wheat or barley and 
 kneaded it into one large Pinda, rather smaller than a 
 cricket-ball, which he carefully deposited in the centre of the 
 sand-altar, scattering over it jasmine flowers, khaskhas grass, 
 and wool, and placing on one side of it a betel-leaf with 
 areca-nut and a single copper coin. Then having poured 
 
$raddka Ceremonies Proper. 309 
 
 water from a lota into his hand, he sprinkled it over all the 
 offerings, arranged in the manner described. Other similar 
 operations followed : — thus, for instance, an earthenware 
 platter, containing a lighted wick, was placed near the 
 offerings; ten other platters were filled with water, which 
 was all poured over the Pinda ; another small platter with 
 a lighted wick was added to the first ; then some milk was 
 placed in another platter and poured over the Pinda, which 
 was once more sprinkled with water. Finally, the Brahman 
 joined his hands together and did homage to the Pinda. The 
 ritual lasted about fifteen minutes, and while it was proceed- 
 ing, the man for whose mother it was performed repeated 
 prayers under the direction of the officiating Brahman, quite 
 regardless of my presence and of much loud talking going on 
 around him. The ceremony ended by the 'feeding of a 
 Brahman,' who was made to sit on the ground near the 
 oblations, and fed with flat cakes, ghee, sweetmeats, vegetables, 
 and curds placed in a plate of palasa-leaves. 
 
 The Brahmans who assist at Sraddhas are not considered 
 particularly respectable. 
 
 With regard to Gaya, which I visited in 1876, I may 
 mention that the city is most picturesquely situated on 
 the river Phalgu, about sixty miles south-west of Patna, 
 near some short ranges of hills rising abruptly out of the 
 plain. The Vishnu-pada temple, where the principal Sraddhas 
 are performed, is built of black stone, with a lofty dome and 
 golden pinnacle. It contains the alleged footprint of Vishnu 
 in a large silver basin, under a silver canopy, inside an 
 octagonal shrine. Pindas and various kinds of offerings are 
 placed by the pilgrims inside the basin round the footprint, 
 and near it are open colonnades for the performance of the 
 Sraddhas. 
 
 Let no one suppose that the process of performing 
 Sraddhas at Gaya is either simple or rapid. To secure the 
 complete efficacy of such rites, a whole round of them miist 
 
3IO $raddha Ceremonies Proper. 
 
 be performed at about a hundred distinct places in and 
 around Gaya^ as well as at the most holy spot pf all— the 
 Vishnu-pada temple— the time occupied in the process being at 
 least eight days, and sometimes protracted to fifteen, while the 
 sums spent in fees to the officiating priests (who at Gaya are 
 called Gayawals, abbreviated into Gaywals =: Gaya-palas, re- 
 garded as an inferior order of Brahmans) are often enormous. 
 
 The efficacy of Sraddhas performed at Gaya is this, that 
 wherever in their progress onwards departed relatives may 
 have arrived, the Sraddhas take them without further im- 
 pediment or delay to Vishnu's heaven (Vaikuntha, p. 70). 
 
 One or two examples witnessed by me will suffice. A 
 party consisting of six men and one Gaywal entered one of 
 the colonnades of the temple and seated themselves on their 
 heels in a line, with the officiating priest at their head. 
 Twelve Pindas or balls of rice and milk, not much larger 
 than the large marbles used by boys (called ' alleys '), were 
 formed and placed with sprigs of the sacred TulasI plant in 
 small earthenware platters. Then on the top of the Pindas 
 were scattered Kusa grass and flowers. I was told that the 
 Pindas in the present case were typical of the bodies of the 
 twelve ancestors for whom the Sraddha was celebrated. The 
 men had Kusa grass twisted round their fingers, to purify 
 their hands for the due performance of the rite. Next, water 
 was poured into the palms, part of which they sprinked on 
 the ground, and part on the Pindas. One or two of the men 
 then took threads off their clothes and laid them on the 
 Pindas. This act is alleged to be emblematical of presenting 
 the bodies of their departed ancestors with garments. 
 
 Meanwhile, texts and prayers were repeated, under the 
 direction of the Gaywal, and the hands were sometimes ex- 
 tended over the Pindas as if to invoke blessings. The whole 
 rite was concluded by the men putting their heads to the 
 ground before the officiating Brahman and touching his feet. 
 
 The number of Pindas varies with the number of ancestors 
 
Sraddha Ceremonies. Pilgrimages. 311 
 
 for whom the Sraddhas are celebrated, and the size of the 
 balls and the materials of which they are composed differ 
 according to the caste and the country of those who perform 
 the rite. I saw one party in the act of forming fourteeii 
 or fifteen Pindas with meal, which were of a inuch larger 
 size than large marbles. This party was said to have come 
 from the Dekhan. Sometimes the Pindas were placed on 
 betel-leaves with pieces of money, which were afterwards 
 appropriated by the priests ; and sometimes the water used 
 was taken out of little pots by dipping stalks of Kusa grass 
 into the fluid and sprinkling it over the balls. At the end of 
 all the ceremonies a prayer was said for pardon lest any 
 minute part of the ceremonial had been unintentionally 
 omitted. Then finally all the earthen platters employed 
 were carried to a particular stone in the precincts of the 
 temple and dashed to pieces there. No platter is allowed to 
 be used a second time. The Pindas are left to be eaten by 
 birds and other animals, or reverently deposited in the river. 
 
 It is remarkable that some of the most enlightened men of 
 India are unable to resist the impulse which takes every 
 Hindu on a pilgrimage once in his life, if possible, to both 
 Benares and Gaya, though they are perfectly aware that from 
 the moment of their arrival within ten miles of these sacred 
 localities they are certain to become the prey of a well- 
 organized army of rapacious priests. Mr. Deshmukh gave 
 me a brief account of his visit to Gaya in 1876I- He went 
 there, like others of his fellow-countrymen, with the object of 
 performing some of the Sraddha ceremonies. 
 
 He is a dlit-pavan Brahman (see note i, p. 271), and gene- 
 rally opposed to all superstitious practices, yet he thinks it 
 right to maintain his influence by conforming, as far as 
 practicable, to old customs. Starting from Patna, he had 
 
 ' I mean Mr. G. H. Deshmukh, who was then judge at Nasik and has 
 been quoted before. The Government, in recognition of his services, 
 has conferred on him the personal title of Rao Bahadur. 
 
312 Sraddha Ceremonies. Pilgrimages. 
 
 to go through the ceremony of shaving (Kshaura) at a 
 river called Punah-punah, about ten miles distant on the 
 road. On reaching Gaya he was surrounded on all sides by 
 thousands of persons offering Pindas, some of whom were 
 persons of high rank — Rajas and Maharajas, on their way to the 
 great imperial assemblage at Delhi. Many went through the 
 entire round of ritual observances, necessitating the perform- 
 ance of at least a hundred Sraddhas at different shrines. 
 Mr. Deshmukh had to tell the Gaywal priests that he was 
 expected in a few days at Delhi, and had little time to spare 
 for Gaya. He was therefore allowed to dispense with all but 
 three ceremonies. These were — i. the Phalgu-Sraddha, per- 
 formed on the banks of the river ; 2. the Vishnu-pada-Sraddha, 
 at the temple containing Vishnu's footprint ; and 3. Vata- 
 Sraddha, performed under a Banian tree. Two whole days 
 were occupied in going through the necessary ritual of these 
 Sraddhas, which was most elaborate and tedious, and the 
 fees were of course proportionately large. The Maharaja of 
 Kashmir, who visited Gaya in the same year and stayed 
 rather longer than Mr. Deshmukh, is said to have expended 
 at least 15,000 rupees on the Gaywal priests before their 
 demands were satisfied. 
 
 I must confess that I myself came away from the Vishnu-: 
 pada temple profoundly impressed by the solemnity and 
 earnestness of manner displayed by some of the worshippers, 
 their unfaltering faith in the efficacy of the acts in which they 
 were engaged, and their intense anxiety to carry out every 
 tittle and iota of the ceremonial in obedience to the directions 
 of their priestly guides. 
 
 It was, however, a melancholy spectacle; for it seemed 
 to make clear that, while the acquirement of European know- 
 ledge has acted like a solvent on the faith of the Hindus, 
 a long period must elapse before the influence of Christianity 
 can prevail to uproot the time-honoured and inveterate super- 
 stitions of ages. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Worship of Animals, Trees, and Inanimate Objects. 
 
 Sir John Lubbock in his work on the ' Origin of Civiliza- 
 tion ' has some interesting remarks on the subject of animal- 
 worship, and shows that zoolatry has always prevailed among 
 uncivilized and half-civilized races in every part of the globe. 
 Mr. E. B. Tylor in the second volume of his 'Primitive 
 Culture/ and Mr. Fergusson in his ' Tree and Serpent Wor- 
 ship,' go ably into the same subject. 
 
 It is found, for example, that serpents either have been 
 or still are objects of worship in Egypt ^, Persia, Kashmir, 
 India, China, Tibet, Ceylon, Babylonia, Phoenicia, Greece, 
 Italy, Lithuania, and among the Kalmucks and other un- 
 cultured tribes. I notice, too, that in the ' St. James's Gazette ' 
 for June i, 1891, there is a curious account of a 'holy trout,' 
 which is to be seen in a tank near Westport in Ireland, and 
 is held sacred by the peasantry. 
 
 My remarks in the present chapter must of course be 
 limited to India, but a difficult question meets us at the 
 very threshold: — Can any satisfactory account be given of 
 the origin of zoolatry in that country? 
 
 I need scarcely point out that, because animal-worship 
 is common among numerous races in other parts of the 
 world, it does not follow that it may not have originated 
 
 ^ The Egyptians, who were the first educators of the world, adored, 
 as every one knows, the bull Apis, the bird Ibis, the hawk, the crocodile, 
 and many other animals. The mummified cat is a familiar object in the 
 British Museum. 
 
314 Worship of Animals. 
 
 independently in India. The human mind, like the body, 
 goes through similar phases everywhere, develops similar pro- 
 clivities, and is liable to similar diseases. It is certain that 
 every form of Fetishism and Totemism, of stone-worship, 
 tree-worship, and animal-worship, as well as every variety 
 of polytheistic and pantheistic superstition, have sprung up 
 spontaneously and flourished vigorously on Indian soil. 
 
 The motives, too, which have prompted men to worship 
 animals in India, are probably similar to those which have 
 actuated them elsewhere. It is thought by some that an 
 animal may receive adoration for any one of three reasons. 
 I. Because, like an elephant or lion, it happens to possess 
 superhuman strength and courage; 2. because it is believed 
 to be an incarnation of the deity; 3. because it is regarded 
 as a totem or representative of a tribe or family, the word 
 totem being derived from an American Indian word dodaim, 
 which signifies the patron or typical animal of a tribe. For 
 it is remarkable that in America every member of a tribe 
 or clan may be called by the name of some animal, as, for 
 example, a bear, or a tortoise; pictures of these animals 
 standing for the whole clan, very much as animals are used 
 typically in the armorial bearings of some English families 
 in England, and just as in South Africa we hear of men of 
 the fish, men of the crocodile, etc. (Tylor's ' Primitive Cul- 
 ture,' ii. 235.) 
 
 One writer is inclined to lay great stress on Totemism as 
 a motive for zoolatry. He thinks that an individual or 
 family called after a bear would be inclined to worship the 
 bear. I cannot believe that such a motive had much weight 
 in India. It is true that the word sink (for Sanskrit sinha) 
 is often appended to the names of men (as in Amara-sinha, 
 Ran-jit-sinh) ; and in other parts of India the expressions 
 * man-lion,' ' man-tiger,' ' man-bull,' etc. denote a man re- 
 markable for courage or strength ; but as a matter of fact 
 the names of the animals most worshipped in India — with 
 
Worship of Animals. 3 1 5 
 
 the exception, perhaps, of Naga — are not generally applied to 
 human beings. It seems to me more probable that Indian 
 animal-worship is to be accounted for by the working of 
 one or other of the motives, gratitude, fear, or awe, operating ■ 
 separately, in separate cases. 
 
 For instance, a Hindu worships a cow because he is pro- 
 foundly sensible of the services it renders him ; he worships 
 a serpent because he dreads its power of destroying him by 
 the slightest puncture ; and he worships a monkey because 
 he stands in awe of the marvellous instinct it displays. In 
 short, his zoolatry is simply the expression of an exaggerated 
 or intensified feeling of admiration for the three qualities, 
 utility, brute strength, and instinct, manifesting themselves in 
 animal nature. It must not be forgotten, too, that with a Hindu 
 all organic life is sacred. Even plant-life is to be respected, 
 and must not wantonly be destroyed. 
 
 Without doubt this feeling is strengthened by the intense 
 hold which the doctrine of metempsychosis has on the 
 Hindu mind. It is difficult, as we have already seen, for 
 any believer in Hinduism to draw a line of demarcation 
 between gods, men, and animals. If men depend on animals, 
 so also do the gods; if men are. associated with animals, so 
 also are the gods. Brahma is carried on a goose (hansa); 
 Vishnu on an eagle (Garuda), which is also half a man ; 
 Siva on a bull (Nandi). 
 
 Other deities are associated with other animals ^- Nor 
 must we forget that Vishnu's first three incarnations are 
 zoomorphic. He infuses his essence into the fish, the tor- 
 toise, and the boar (see pp. 107-109), with the object of 
 delivering the world, or aiding it in certain special exigencies. 
 This seems absurd to our ideas, but not to a Hindu who 
 
 ^ The association of great heroes and saints with animals is not 
 confined to India, for we find three of the Evangelists (St. Mark, 
 St. Luke, and St. John) associated with a lion, ox, and eagle, respec- 
 tively.. 
 
3i6 Worship of Animals. 
 
 firmly believes that the supreme soul of the universe, like 
 the soul of man, may pass into any kind of animal form. 
 
 It is said of Dr. Duff— to whose labours in the cause of 
 education India is so deeply indebted — that he was once 
 examining an Indian school, and wishing to ridicule this idea 
 of animal incarnations, said to the boys : ' Can any boy tell 
 me whether it is likely that God's spirit would associate itself 
 with a snail ? ' No one answered for some time ; at last an 
 intelligent lad said : ' I think He might condescend to do so, 
 if any useful purpose were to be served thereby for the good 
 of His creatures.' 'Then,' said Dr. Duff, 'you think as a 
 fool.' But did the boy really think so very foolishly? and 
 had he altogether the worst of the encounter in his little 
 brush with the Scotch giant ? 
 
 Again, it is owing to a belief in this same doctrine of 
 metempsychosis that a Hindu has no difficulty in believing 
 that a beast, bird, or reptile may at any moment develop 
 human faculties and functions. According to popular belief 
 there are eighty-four lakhs of different species of animals 
 through which a man is liable to pass. Even a noxious insect, 
 therefore, may enclose the soul of some person who was once 
 a sage, a saint, or an orator. It is on this account that the 
 excellent stories about talking animals and their sayings 
 and doings, everywhere current in India, are to the generality 
 of unthinking Hindus not mere fables, but true narratives. 
 A beast or bird may on special occasions speak with a human 
 voice, engage in long arguments, acquire profound learning, 
 and be troubled with a sense of right and wrong, without 
 violating any law of organized life, or outraging any of the 
 usual ideas of probability. 
 
 It is on this account, too, that no true religiously minded 
 Hindu delights in killing animals, and certainly not for sport. 
 India teems with animal life, and animals of every description 
 appear to live on terms of the greatest confidence with human 
 beings. Everywhere they dispute possession of the earth 
 
Worship of the Cow. 317 
 
 with man. Birds build their nests and lay their eggs in the 
 fields, untroubled by fears or misgivings, before the very eyes 
 of every passer-by, and within the reach of every village 
 school-boy. Animals of all kinds rove over the soil as if 
 they were the landlords. It is true that every thrifty farmer 
 drives them from his crops ; yet he would scarcely dare to 
 question their claim to a portion of the food he eats and the 
 house he occupies ; while everywhere in the towns they are 
 admitted, so to speak, to the privileges of fellow-citizens. 
 Bulls walk about independently in the streets, and jostle 
 you on the pavements; monkeys domesticate themselves 
 jauntily on the roof of your house ; parrots peer inquisitively 
 from the eaves of your bedroom into the mysteries of your 
 toilet ; crows make themselves at home on your window-sill, 
 and carry off impudently any portable article of jewelry that 
 takes their fancy on your dressing-table ; sparrows hop about 
 impertinently, and take the bread off your table-cloth ; a 
 solitary mongoose emerges every morning from a hole in 
 your verandah, and expects a share in your breakfast; swarms 
 of insects claim a portion of your midday meal, and levy 
 a tax on the choicest delicacies at your dinner table; bats 
 career triumphantly about your head as you light yourself to 
 your bed-room ; and at certain seasons snakes domicile them- 
 selves unpleasantly in the folds of your cast-off garments. 
 
 It should be added, however, that although in the eyes 
 of orthodox Hindus every animal is more or less sacred, 
 ill-treatment of such useful animals as draught-oxen is by no 
 means uncommon in India. 
 
 I next proceed to note some of the more interesting ex- 
 amples of actual animal-worship, turning first to three classes 
 of animals, the adoration of which probably results from the 
 operation of the three motives I have already suggested. 
 
 In the forefront must be placed the worship of the cow 
 and the bull. The utility of the cow as a source of nourish- 
 ment to a people who never kill animals for food, and of the 
 
3i8 Worship of the Cow. 
 
 ox and bull to agriculturalists who have no cart-horses for 
 draught, is manifest. The cow is of all animals the most 
 sacred. Every part of its body is inhabited by some deity or 
 other. Every hair on its body is inviolable. All its excreta 
 are hallowed. Not a particle ought to be thrown away as 
 impure. On the contrary, tjie water it ejects ought to be pre- 
 served as the best of all holy waters — a sin-destroying liquid 
 which sanctifies everything it touches, while nothing purifies 
 like cow-dung. Any spot which a cow has condescended to 
 honour with the sacred deposit of her excrement is for ever 
 afterwards consecrated ground, and the filthiest place plastered 
 with it is at once cleansed and freed from pollution, while 
 the ashes produced by burning this hallowed substance are 
 of such a holy nature, that they not only make clean all 
 material things, however previously unclean, but have only 
 to be sprinkled over a sinner to convert him into a saint. 
 
 In an underground passage of the Agra fort there is an 
 image of a man named Mukunda. The Brahman who was 
 my guide when I visited this place gravely informed me 
 that it represented a celebrated saint who felt himself com- 
 pelled to commit suicide by jumping into the neighbouring 
 river as a penalty for having accidentally swallowed the 
 hair of a cow by drinking milk without straining it. But 
 even this was not deemed sufficient punishment, for he was 
 condemned to become a Muhammadan in his next birth, 
 though the sentence was mitigated by his being born again 
 as the Emperor Akbar. We cannot wonder, therefore, that 
 the heaven of Krishna is called Go-loka, 'cow-world^ (p. ii8). 
 
 It is worthy of note that the Hindus believe in the exist- 
 ence of a typical divine cow called Surabhi or Kama-dhenu, 
 ' the cow of plenty,' yielding all desired objects, representa- 
 tions of which are to be seen in temples, or are kept in 
 houses for purposes of domestic worship. This typical animal 
 was produced from the ocean when it was churned by the 
 gods and demons (see p. io8). Yet I nowhere saw any temple 
 
Worship of Serpents. 319 
 
 dedicated exclusively to Surabhi or to any other cow. It 
 is rather the living animal which is a perpetual object of 
 adoration. As to the bull, he is dedicated to Siva, and 
 constantly associated with the god as typical of generative 
 power. Images of him are to be found near all Lihga shrines. 
 The letting loose of a bull (vrishotsarga, brishotsarga) — 
 stamped with Siva's trident — in cities like Benares (p. 436) 
 and Gaya (p. 309) is fraught with the highest merit. This 
 setting free of a bull to roam about at will often takes place 
 at Sraddhas. 
 
 Passing on to the second class of animals, or those wor- 
 shipped out of motives of fear, we must, of course, place the 
 serpent at the head of the list. Much has been written on 
 ophiolatry, and on the vexed question of its origin. The 
 subject seems inexhaustible. Some writers maintain that 
 snake-worship was the earliest form of religion prevalent 
 among men in all parts of the globe, its general diffusion 
 being partially accounted for by the fact that serpents are 
 indigenous almost everywhere, and not, like monkeys and 
 elephants, in certain localities only. All writers, however, 
 are agreed that, the chief factor in the universality of this 
 phase of superstition is the dread inspired by a mysterious 
 creeping creature, silent and stealthy in its movements, ap- 
 parently quite unprovided with the most ordinary means of 
 offence and defence, yet found to have at its command the 
 most deadly of all known destructive weapons, and able to 
 cause almost instantaneous death by merely pricking the 
 skin of its adversary. 
 
 In India, as is well known, the habit of walking barefoot 
 exposes the half-clad natives to constant peril from this 
 source, so that, according to some authorities, at least 35,000 
 perish annually from snake-bites (many deaths being un- 
 registered). Nevertheless, the feeling of antipathy that leads 
 a man to recoil from contact with a snake of any kind does 
 not seem to depend entirely on its power of doing harm. 
 
320 Worship of Serpents. 
 
 A lafge majority of these animals are quite innocuous. Yet 
 to many persons their sinuous movements, their habit of 
 shunning observation, their conceahnent of themselves in 
 holes, the cold fixity of their gaze, and the constant pro- 
 trusion of their forked tongues, are in themselves typical of 
 subtlety and malevolence; while to. others these operations 
 are not merely types of evil qualities, but evidences of actual 
 demoniacal possession. 
 
 On the other hand, it is certain that to some Indian minds 
 the beautiful markings, spiral movements, and generally 
 striking aspect of many species of harmless snakes, are sug- 
 gestive of reverential ideas. They ■ are typical of divine 
 beauty and beneficence, while the coiling of their bodies in 
 rings and circles, and their annual rejuvenescence by the 
 renewal of their skins, symbolize immortality and the never- 
 ending cycles of eternal time. When they are accidentally 
 killed they even sometimes receive funeral honours like human 
 beings. 
 
 Hence serpents are either worshipped or propitiated in 
 India under the most opposite characters even to the present 
 day. Nor does a Hindu appear to see any inconsistency in 
 regarding snakes as embodiments of the contradictory ideas 
 of destruction and regeneration, malevolence and benevolence, 
 demonism and divinity, death and immortality. 
 
 No authority, however, for any such diversified concep- 
 tions of serpent-nature is to be found in the more ancient 
 sacred writings of India ; nor is there any proof that the 
 early Aryan immigrants were in any sense serpent-worship- 
 pers. On the contrary, their only feeling towards the serpent 
 was one of dread and dislike. Hence in the Rig-veda (see 
 
 VI. 20. a) the demon of cloud and darkness, called Vritra, 
 
 is either identified or associated with the serpent Ahi ("0(|)ty) ; ^ 
 and the god Soma is described as delivering over all evil 
 speakers and slanderers into the power of this serpent (see 
 
 VII. 104. 9, and compare Vajasaneyi-samhita VI. la). We 
 
Worship of Serpents. 321 
 
 know, too, that even to this day the sight of a snake in the 
 early morning is to a Brahman so bad an omen, that after 
 seeing it he will desist for the moment from the prosecution 
 of any work in which he may be engaged ^. Yet so elastic 
 was the creed and practice of Brahmanism, that, finding 
 serpent-worship, like other aboriginal cults, established on 
 Indian soil, it had no difficulty in adopting it, and ended by 
 incorporating every superstitious idea connected with ophio- 
 latry into the complex fabric of Hinduism. 
 
 In fact the gradual intertwining of serpent-worship with 
 Saivism, Vaishnavism, and even Buddhism and Jainism, but 
 more especially with Saivism (see pp. 80, 105, and 113), is 
 one of the most interesting features of this complex subject. 
 Siva has five heads, and a great majority of serpent images 
 are five-headed also. Then I have often seen images of 
 serpents coiled round the Linga, and five-headed snakes 
 forming a canopy over it. A similar canopy is also found 
 over idols of Krishna and Buddha ; Vishnu, too, is repre- 
 sented as sleeping on the thousand-headed serpent Sesha, the 
 symbol of Infinity, which also forms a canopy over him 
 
 (P- 323)- 
 
 On the other hand, Garuda, the mythical bird of Vishnu, 
 half eagle, half man, destroys serpents in their character of 
 representatives of evil. Krishna does the same ; and the 
 Maha-bharata — that greatest of all repositories of Hindu 
 belief— opens with a long account of Janamejaya's sacrifice for 
 the annihilation of the serpent or Naga race (I. 1547-2 '97)- 
 Buddhism and Jainism, no doubt, became connected with 
 serpent-worship not from any affinity with it, but because, like 
 Hinduism, they adapted themselves to pre-existing cults. ^ 
 
 And here it must be observed that the worship of serpents 
 in India is closely connected with that of the Nagas; or 
 rather, is generally inixed up and confounded with that 
 
 ' Yet a snake (as oviparous) is, like a Brahman, called Dvi-ja, 'twice- 
 born.' Birds for the same reason are ' twice-born.' 
 
32 2 Worship of Serpents^ 
 
 worship. Indeed the word Naga frequently denotes an 
 ordinary serpent, though it properly signifies a being half 
 human, half serpentine in form ^, not necessarily evil, but 
 often beautiful, wise, and good, and, although armed with 
 a deadly venom, possessing also the elixir of life and im- 
 mortality, and able to bestow it upon others (Maha-bh. I. 
 1500-1505, 5018-5035). 
 
 The race of Nagas is fabled to have sprung from Kadru, 
 one of the wives of the old patriarch Kasyapa (her sister 
 Vinata being also a wife of Kasyapa, and mother of Garuda). 
 Kadru gave birth to looo Nagas, who became the progenitors 
 of the serpent-race. Some of their females married human 
 heroes (as Ulupl married Arjuna, after carrying him off to 
 the bottom of the Ganges, p. 233), and to this day there 
 are tribes called Nagas ^, and ancient families who claim to 
 be of Naga descent. The whole race of mythical Nagas 
 is sometimes represented as dwelling at the bottom of the 
 ocean, or in the depths of rivers and lakes, but also as 
 inhabiting the regions under the earth (see p. 0^0,% and my 
 ' Buddhism,' p. 220), and more especially Patala, or that por- 
 tion of it called Naga-loka, of which the capital is Bhogavatl. 
 
 The following curious story is told in the Maha-bharata 
 (I. 5006) :— 
 
 The Pandu princes in their boyish sports excelled the sons 
 of Dhrita-rashtra. This excited much ill-feeling ; and Dur- 
 yodhana, spiteful even when a boy, tried to destroy Bhima 
 
 ^ According to Dr. K. M. Banerjea, the theory of a race of Nagas, half 
 serpents, half men, confirms the Biblical account of the serpent, which 
 was originally perhaps of a species corresponding to the Nagas, till the 
 sentence was pronounced by which it became a creeping reptile. 
 
 I noticed, when at Rome, that Michael Angelo's fresco of Adam and 
 Eve in the roof of the Sistine chapel, represents the serpent as shaped * 
 like an Indian Naga ; that is— the lower part of the body is coiled round 
 the stem of the tree in serpent fashion, while the upper part in human 
 form offers the fruit to Eve. 
 
 ^ For example, the Nagas of Manipur, but they are not found to be 
 snake-worshippers. 
 
Worship of Serpents. 323 
 
 by mixing poison in his food, and then throwing him into 
 the water when stupefied by its effects. Bhlma, however, 
 was not drowned, but descended to the abode of the Nagas, 
 who freed him from the poison (I. 505a), and gave him an 
 eHxir to drink which endued liim with the strengtli of ten 
 thousand Nagas, and made him a kind of Hercules. 
 
 The kings of the Nagas are Sesha, Vasuki, and Takshaka. 
 Of these, the most conspicuous is the thousand-headed Sesha, 
 also called An-anta, ' the Infinite,' sometimes represented as 
 forming the couch and canopy of Vishnu, while sleeping 
 during the intervals of creation ; sometimes as bearing the 
 world on his thousand heads ; sometimes as supporting Patala ; 
 and sometimes as having become man in the form of Bala- 
 rama, Ramanuja, etc. (pp. 112, 119). According to popular 
 belief all earthquakes are caused by his shaking one of his 
 thousand heads. 
 
 A particular day called Naga-pandamT, about the end of 
 July (Sravana), is held sacred to the Nagas, and in the 
 districts of India where serpent-worship is especially rife, 
 numbers flock to Naga-shrines on that day. I should state, 
 however, that temples dedicated to serpents are by no means 
 common in Northern India. The only one I visited was that 
 sacred to Vasuki at Dara-ganj, near Allahabad. This is a 
 noted shrine, and pilgrims resort to it in large numbers on 
 the Naga-paricamI festival. I found that the priest of this^ 
 temple was not a Brahman, but a man of low caste ^ On 
 my expressing a wish for some memorial of the place, he 
 tore off a rude drawing of a many-headed serpent which was 
 fastened to the door of the shrine, and presented it to me. 
 
 Other shrines in the neighbourhood of Nagpur and cer- 
 tain districts of the central provinces (such as Chanda-pur, 
 Bhandhak, etc.) are much frequented at certain seasons. In 
 
 ' This is, I believe, the case in all serpent-temples, and it is one 
 evidence that Brahmanism had originally no connexion with ophiolatry. 
 
 Y 3 
 
324 Worship of Serpents, 
 
 \ Southern India the whole of Kanara may be regarded as 
 steeped in serpent-worship. 
 
 Mr. Walhouse informs us that one of the highest mountains 
 of the South Kanara Ghats, named Su-brahmanya, has a 
 very celebrated serpent-temple. There great numbers of the 
 ' coiling folk ' reside in holes and crevices made for theifi. 
 To propitiate these creatures, persons who have made vows 
 roll and wriggle round the temple serpent-fashion, and some 
 will even roll their bodies up to it from the foot of the hill, 
 a mile distant. They also take home with them portions 
 of earth from the sacred serpent-holes. This earth is believed 
 to cleanse from leprosy (compare % Kings v. 17), if rubbed on 
 the parts affected ; it will moreover cure barrenness in women, 
 if a little be daily put in the mouth. Serpentine body-wrigr 
 gling is also practised further south, where small snake-temples 
 {Ndga-kovil in Tamil) are common. Near one of these, not 
 far from Madura on the bank of the Vaiga river, there are 
 men who for a few rupees will perform any number of wrig- 
 glings and rollings round the shrine, as proxies for persons 
 who have vowed them ■^- 
 
 Indeed it seems to be a fixed article of belief throughput 
 . Southern India, that all who have wilfully or accidentally 
 killed a snake, especially a cobra, will certainly be punished 
 either in this life or the next in one of three ways : — either 
 by childlessness, or by leprosy, or by ophthalmia. It behoves 
 all persons, therefore, who are afflicted with such diseases, 
 or feel that they may have to undergo the inevitable penalty 
 hereafter, to visit serpent-shrines and conciliate the serpent- 
 gods by the most abject homage. In connexion with these 
 ideas, I may mention that on the banks of the river Tamra- 
 parnl, near a bridge connecting Tinnevelly with Palamcottab, ^ 
 I noticed two or three Plpal trees, under which were depo- 
 sited hundreds of stone images of Krishna, and of the Linga 
 of Siva, each image having a five-headed Naga so carved 
 
 ^ See ' Indian Antiquary,' for February 1878. 
 
Worship of Serpents. 325 
 
 as to form a canopy over \i. It is the custom in the South 
 of India for any woman who is childless, and believes her 
 barrenness to be caused by having killed a cobra in a former 
 life, to perform the ceremony called Naga-pratishtha ; that 
 is to say, she sets up a stone Naga under a tree, taking care 
 to have it duly consecrated by the repetition of texts and 
 prayers. On the occasion of my visit to the Tamra-parni, 
 several women were assembled in the neighbourhood of the 
 largest Pipal tree. Some performed reverential circumambu- 
 lation round the images, and some sprinkled them with water 
 from vessels which they held in their hands. 
 
 In the same way childless women are in the habit of going 
 to lioles in the earth where snakes are supposed to dwell, and 
 depositing offerings of milk with invocations and prayers. 
 
 I may note here another curious superstition connected 
 with this subject. The heads of all Nagas and of all ser- 
 pents — especially cobras — are believed to contain precious 
 stones and gems of magical properties. These, if extracted 
 and carried about on the person, are capable of working as 
 astounding miracles for their owners, as the wonderful lamp 
 did for Aladdin. I met with no one who could show me a 
 specimen of these so-called miraculous snake-stones, but they 
 are described as dark and shining, and shaped like a horse- 
 bean. A similar superstition exists in some parts of England 
 in regard to supposed stones in the heads of toads. 
 
 As an example of other superstitious ideas about snakes, 
 it is related that a certain village in Northern India was not 
 long ago suddenly deserted by all its inhabitants. No per- 
 suasions would induce the people to return, and on inquiry 
 it was found that the panic among the villagers was caused 
 by an unexpected visitation of snakes, who had established 
 themselves comfortably in the precincts of the village, and 
 that these harmless immigrants were believed to be a colony 
 of malevolent demons. 
 
 Again, it is said that a man once bought a piece of ground 
 
326 Worship of Monkeys. 
 
 and sat down to contemplate his purchase under a tree in 
 the centre of his newly-acquired property. Suddenly he 
 heard the hissing of a snake coiled in the branches above 
 his head. Panic-struck, he ran off and escaped unharmed, 
 but never dared to show his face on the ground again, 
 being firmly convinced that the serpent was the indignant 
 spirit of the former proprietor, whom he had imprudently 
 neglected to propitiate before taking possession. 
 
 So much for the complex and difficult subject of serpent- 
 worship in India. 
 
 Probably the best representative of the third class of 
 animals whose worship originally arose from a deep rever- 
 ence for instinct is the monkey. And here a difficult question 
 presents itself as to the precise meaning of the term ' instinct.' 
 Is it possible to define its exact nature and to give any reason 
 for its claim to adoration ? Without pretending to mathe- 
 matical accuracy in attempting to solve insoluble problems, 
 we may perhaps describe instinct, in a general way, as the 
 mysterious exercise of certain powers and faculties of mind 
 and body in obedience to the laws of organized life without 
 conscious will. The working of these powers in the lower 
 animals may well excite amazement and admiration, if not 
 worship. What can be more wonderful than the sight of a 
 feeble timid mother-bird suddenly transformed by instinct 
 into a very tigress, and ready to fight hopelessly in defence of 
 her young against an opponent immeasurably her superior ? 
 
 To a Hindu such a sight would be an intense confirmation 
 of his belief that the divine soul may occupy animals as well 
 as men. And if instinct in the lower animals fills him with 
 so deep an awe, he is the more inclined to attach sacredness 
 to a higher order of animals in whom instinct almost impinges 
 upon the domain of reason. 
 
 With regard to the actual worship of monkeys little need 
 be added to what has already been stated in relation to 
 Hanuman (see p. 320). In Hindu mythology apes and 
 
Worship of Various Animals. 327 
 
 monkeys are as intimately connected with the worship of 
 Vishnu, as the bull is with that of Siva ; though the reverence 
 for these animals probably preceded the full development of 
 both Vaishnavism and Saivism (see note, p. 23a). Indeed 
 the idea of a close interconnexion between gods, demons, 
 men, and animals dates from the earliest times ; and the hold 
 which such ideas have gained on the Hindu mind is often 
 illustrated in a remarkable manner by present customs. 
 
 In Ward's ' Hindoos ' an account is given of what to Euro- 
 peans would appear an incredible occurrence: — A certain 
 Bengal Raja spent 100,000 rupees in marrying a male and 
 female monkey, with all the paraphernalia, pageant, and 
 expense usual at the weddings of high-caste human beings. 
 The male monkey was borne along in a costly vehicle, had 
 a crown fastened on his head, and a whole array of servants 
 to wait on him. The festivities lasted for twelve days. Pro- 
 bably, after all, this remarkable proceeding .was merely a 
 mode of offering homage to Hanuman, whose worship, as 
 already explained at p. azo, is prevalent everywhere. 
 
 I may note here as a curious circumstance that there is at 
 Benares a well-known temple, commonly called the ' monkey- 
 temple,' which is not really dedicated to Hanuman, but to 
 Durga. I witnessed the sacrifice of a goat in honour of the 
 goddess outside the door of the shrine, while several intelli^ 
 gent monkeys, with true simian and mock-human curiosity, 
 leaped from the neighbouring trees, took up a position on 
 the vantage-ground of the roof, and seemed to be quite as 
 interested in the ceremony as I was. These animals are 
 daily fed by pious persons who frequent the temple. To 
 feed one is a highly meritorious act ; to injure one would 
 be the most heinous of crimes. 
 
 I can only advert briefly to other animals usually held 
 sacred in India. A large number are, as we have seen (p. 104, 
 note 3), associated with gods, as their vehicles, servants, or 
 companions, and worshipped accordingly. 
 
328 Worship of Various Animals. 
 
 Vishnu's attendant, the divine Garuda (see p. 104), is re- 
 presented by a species of eagle or similar bird, common in 
 some parts of India, and held in great honour. 
 
 In some country districts, villagers are in the habit of 
 invoking Garuda's protection against snakes every night before 
 going to sleep. Again, in the North Konkan, I heard of a 
 tribe called Warali, who worship Vagho-ba, the 'tiger-lord' 
 (Sanskrit Vyaghra, 'a tiger'), from similar motives. 
 
 Then the goose (hansa) is, as we have seen, sacred to 
 Brahma, the elephant to Indra, the tiger to Durga, the buffalo 
 to Yama, the rat to Ganesa, the ram to Agni, the peacock 
 to Skanda, the parrot to Kama-deva (god of love). 
 
 With regard to the sacredness of the elephant, it is notable 
 that the earth is not only supported on Sesha (p. 333), but 
 also on the vast heads and backs of eight male and eight 
 female elephants, who all have names and distinct person- 
 alities. They are called the elephants of the eight quarters. 
 When any one of these shakes its body the whole earth 
 quakes (see Ramayana I. 41). Sometimes they are described 
 as roaming about in the neighbourhood of their stations. 
 
 The fish, the tortoise, and the boar are worshipped as 
 incarnations of Vishnu (pp. 107-109). Fish are often fed as 
 a religious duty. At Mathura (Muttra) I noticed a number 
 of sacred tortoises and turtles. They swarm in the river and 
 are daily fed by the pilgrims. The crocodile or alligator 
 (makara) is sometimes held sacred to Kama-deva. Children 
 were at one time thrown into the Ganges as a sacrifice to 
 these animals. The wag-tail (Khaiijana) is regarded as a 
 form of Vishnu, the mark on its throat having some resem- 
 blance' to a Sala-grama stone. The cat is sacred to the 
 goddess Shashthi (p. 229), who is supposed to use it as her 
 vehicle. The dog is connected with Siva (p. 266, note) in 
 his character of a Kirata or mountaineer (p. 64), or rather 
 perhaps with Rudra, who also presides over horses. Hence 
 in the Satarudriya hymn of the Yajur-veda (p. 76) we have 
 
Worship of Various Animals. 329 
 
 'Reverence to dogs and to the lords of dogs,' 'Reverence 
 to horses and to the lords of horses.' Hence, too, the name 
 Krita-jfia, 'the grateful one,' is applied equally to Siva and 
 to dogs. In Western India dogs are sometimes fed as a 
 sacred duty once a month. In the Bali-harana (or Kaka- 
 bali) ceremony (see p. 289), offerings of food are placed on 
 the ground for Yama's two dogs, crows, etc. (see pp. 289, 
 433). Again, crows are fed at the end of the Sraddha cere- 
 monies (p. 311). On the other hand, dogs are sometimes 
 described as unclean animals, and crows as birds of ill-omen. 
 So also Sva-paca, ' dog-cooker,' and Tirtha-kaka, ' crow at a 
 place of pilgrimage,' Kupa-manduka, 'frog in a well,' or Kupa- 
 kacchapa, ' tortoise in a well,' are terms of reproach (Panini 
 II. I. 4a). There is a natural enmity between cat and mouse, 
 dog and jackal, serpent and mongoose, crow and owl. 
 
 As to horses, in some parts of India at the Dasa-hara 
 (Dasara) festival, they are decorated with garlands. The 
 mythical horse, Udcaih-sravas, 'high-eared' (p. 108), supposed 
 to be the prototype of all horses, is assigned to the god Indra. 
 The Asva-medha, 'horse-sacrifice,' was a very ancient cere- 
 mony (hymns 160, and 163 in Rig-veda I. being used at it). 
 It was the chief animal sacrifice, and a hundred horse-sacrifices 
 entitled the sacrificer to displace Indra from heaven. Indra, 
 therefore, always tried to capture the horse which was allowed 
 to roam about before immolation (see Ramayana I. 13, and 
 Maha-bharata XIV, Asvamedhika-parvan) ^. 
 
 ^ A horse was selected by a prince who aimed at supremacy and was 
 let loose to roam at large for a year. Those who disputed his claim tried 
 to capture the roving horse and to hold it against the original owner 
 and all comers. If no one succeeded the horse was brought back and 
 sacrificed with long ceremonies, and the prince who held it was acknow- 
 ledged as paramount sovereign. Yudhishthira in the Maha-bharata let 
 loose a horse in this way, which wandered through many countries, 
 having Arjuna for its champion. Among the places to which it came in 
 its rovings was Manipur, whose king is described as virtuous, and who 
 gave his daughter, Citrangada, to Arjuna in marriage. 
 
330 Worship of Trees and Plants. 
 
 Worship of Trees and Plants. 
 
 We learn from the numerous examples adduced by Sir 
 John Lubbock, Mr. Tylor, and Mr. Fergusson, that the 
 adoration of trees, shrubs and plants, in virtue of the 
 supernatural qualities or divine essence supposed to be in- 
 herent in them, is - almost as universally diffused over the 
 globe as the worship of animals, and that both forms of 
 religion are of the greatest antiquity. Every one is familiar 
 with such instances as the prophetic oak of Dodona, the 
 myrtle of Venus, the poplar sacred to Hercules, the oaks 
 of the British Druids, and the sacred groves of Germany 
 mentioned by Tacitus ^ ; but every one does not know that 
 there existed quite recently a particular oak-copse in the 
 island of Skye which the inhabitants held inviolably sacred; 
 and that here and there in remote parts of Europe simple- 
 minded peasants are to be found who still pay homage to 
 certain trees, still hang offerings on their branches, and still 
 believe in willows that bleed, and in trees that speak when 
 about to be cut down. 
 
 Tree-worship, we are told, was once common in Greece, 
 France, Poland, Assyria, and many other countries. It has 
 continually prevailed among uncultivated tribes in Africa, 
 America, and Polynesia. In Persia travellers occasionally 
 come across trees hung with offerings of rags and garments, 
 and throughout the greater part' of Asia a belief in a kind 
 of divinity inherent in certain trees has always been a re- 
 cognized element of the popular creed. 
 
 In India, as already observed, all life is sacred. It might 
 even be affirmed that the Hindus were the iirst believers in 
 the law of continuity; for in their creed the life of gods 
 is connected with that of demons, the life of demons with 
 
 ' Pliny asserts that the earliest form of temple or church was a tree, 
 and some think that the word kirk is cognate with quercus. 
 
Worship of Trees and Plants. 331 
 
 that of men, the life of men with that of animals, the life 
 of animals with that of plants, the life of plants with a sup- 
 posed life in rocks and stones, and the divine soul is thought 
 to permeate all. In obedience to this law there is no break 
 of any kind anywhere, and plant-worship follows, as a neces- 
 sary consequence, on animal-worship. In fact, according to 
 the Hindu theory of metempsychosis all trees and plants are 
 conscious beings, having as distinct personalities and souls of 
 their own as gods, demons, men, and animals (see Manu I. 49). 
 But it must be borne in mind that although trees may in 
 their turn become the receptacle of the spirits of gods, men, 
 and animals ^ they are peculiarly liable to be occupied by 
 demons. That is to say, these beings may not only occupy 
 a tree as its spirit or soul ; they may often resort to it as 
 guests, or take up their abode in it as tenants, when it is 
 already furnished with a soul of its own. The idea seems to be 
 that demons require protection from the weather like human 
 beings, and occasionally betake themselves to trees as con- 
 venient and agreeable places of shelter. 
 
 This explains the close connexion between tree-worship, 
 serpent-worship^, demon-worship, and Siva-worship. Demons 
 are believed to be fond of occupying both serpents and 
 trees, and Siva is lord of demons, of serpents, and of plants 
 (see p. 77). 
 
 In relation to this subject, it may be noted that in India 
 a tree is sometimes planted and then confided to the 
 guardianship of a demon, who from that moment considers 
 himself responsible for the safe-keeping of the tree, and if 
 any one is rash enough to cut it down or even steal its fruit, 
 punishes him by afflicting him with sickness^. 
 
 ^ The great Buddha is said to have occupied trees forty-three times in 
 the course of his transmigrations (see my ' Buddhism,' p. 112). 
 
 "^ The connexion of serpent-worship with tree-worship may have 
 originally arisen from the fact that many snakes like to establish them- 
 selves in the roots of trees, especially in those of the sandal-wood tree. 
 
 ' This is mentioned by Colonel Sleeman. 
 
332 Worship of Threes and Plants. 
 
 In Birbhum the entire population does homage once a year 
 to a cluster of three trees in the jungle, which are supposed to 
 be the abodes of as many demons i. In the Madura district 
 there is a solitary Mimosa tree, growing near a tank. This 
 tree always has numerous pieces of rag and cloth tied to its 
 branches. The explanation given by the peasantry is that a 
 traveller was once found dead near the tank and that his spirit 
 has become a malignant demon which resides in the tree and 
 requires to be propitiated by offerings ^. 
 
 Of course, however, adoration paid to the demons in such 
 trees must not be confounded with the worship of plants and 
 trees which are themselves deities, or are in themselves per- 
 meated by the essence of certain deities. 
 
 For instance, I need scarcely repeat that in the Vedic 
 period the Soma plant was personified, and made an object 
 of adoration (see pp. 12, 13, 368). It. was not merely the 
 abode of divinity, but itself a god. 
 
 Then just as the divine cow Surabhi (granting all desires) 
 and the typical horse Udcaih-sravas arose out of the ocean, 
 when churned for the production of certain valuable objects, 
 so arose also a divine tree called Parijata (see p. 108), which 
 afterwards became the property of the god Indra, and was 
 transferred to his heaven. This tree was called Kalpa- 
 druma, as granting all desires to those who did homage to its 
 divinity. So in the Sakuntala the trees of the sacred grove 
 are described as yielding beautiful robes and costly ornaments 
 for the adornment of the heroine (see my translation, p. 99). 
 
 Moreover, just as a portion of the godhead or essence of 
 Vishnu descended in the fish, the tortoise, and the boar, so 
 certain plants are embodiments of portions of the essence 
 of particular deities. 
 
 ' See Hunter's 'Annals of Rural Bengal,' p. 131. 
 
 ^ Mr. Walhouse states that he saw this tree. So also the tombs of 
 Musalman saints are often encircled by upright poles, to which are 
 fastened streamers of many-coloured rags. 
 
Worship of the Tulasl Shrub. 333 
 
 For example, the Tulasl, or holy Basil (popularly TulsT, 
 botanlcally Ocymum Sanctum), is not merely sacred to Vishnu 
 or to his wife Lakshml ; it is pervaded by the essence of 
 these deities, and itself worshipped as a deity and prayed to 
 accordingly. Many regard the Tulasi as a metamorphosis 
 of Sita, wife of Vishnu's incarnation Rama-candra ; others 
 identify this plant with Rukmini, wife of Krishna 1, while 
 others hold it to be an embodiment of all the deities together. 
 It is certain that in whatever light regarded, the Tulasl is the 
 object of more adoration than any other plant at present ' 
 worshipped in India, and the following prayer is often ad- 
 dressed to it : — ' I adore that Tulasl in whose roots are all the 
 sacred places of pilgrimage, in whose centre are all the deities, 
 and in whose upper branches are all the Vedas ^.' 
 
 Possibly its sanitary properties may have been the original 
 cause of the homage it receives. Its leaves are believed to heal 
 the sick, and to be a remedy against the poison of serpents ^. 
 
 But the great estimation in which the Tulasi is held is best 
 indicated by the fact that it is to be found in almost every^^ 
 respectable Hindu household throughout India. It is a small 
 shrub, not too big to be cultivated in a good- sized flower-pot, 
 and often placed in rooms. Generally, however, it is planted in 
 the court-yard of a well-to-do man's house, with a space round 
 it for reverential circumambulation. In real fact the Tulasi 
 is par excellence a domestic divinity, or rather, perhaps, a 
 woman's divinity. The generality of Indian women are, 
 unhappily, still shut out from the chief avenues leading to 
 enlightenment. The great majority are unable to read and 
 
 ' In Kalidasa's celebrated drama Vikramorvasi, the nymph Urvasi 
 is metamorphosed into a creeping plant, just as Daphne was into a 
 laurel and the sisters of Phaethon into poplars. 
 
 ^ Yan-mule sarva-tlrthani yan-madhye sarva-devatah | yad-agre sarva- 
 vedas-ca Tulasim tam namamy aham. 
 
 ' Sir H. Yule (who sojourned some time in Sicily) informed me that 
 the Basil is venerated in Sicily for its sanitary properties. The in- 
 habitants keep it in the windows of their houses. 
 
334 Worship of the Tulasi Shrub. 
 
 write their own mother-tongue ; yet, like the women in other 
 countries, they are far more religious than the men, and have 
 great influence. Their ignorance and narrow-mindedness 
 make their religion take the form of unmitigated superstition. 
 The ancient law-giver Manu affirms that women were created 
 to be mothers and men to be fathers, and that religious rites 
 ought to be performed by husbands with their wive.s (IX. 96). 
 But in the present day women perform their religious services 
 apart from their husbands, and as a rule, their one daily 
 religious rite consists in walking round the Tulasi plant — 
 considered as a form of either Vishnu's wife Lakshml or of 
 Rama's faithful wife Sita, or of Krishna's wife RukminI — 
 in saying prayers to it, or in placing offerings of flowers and 
 rice before it. 
 
 In a central space in most of the villages I visited in India, 
 I noticed a small raised platform of rough masonry on which 
 grew a Pipal tree and a Tulasi shrub, and on particular 
 occasions I observed poor women, who were probably not 
 rich enough to possess the Tulasi plant in their own houses, 
 .performing circumambulation round the village shrub. In 
 one village, especially, I watched a woman who was in the 
 act of walking 108 times round the sacred plant with her 
 right shoulder always turned towards it^. Her simple object, 
 no doubt, was to propitiate the goddess with a view to 
 securing long life for her husband and gaining a large family 
 of sons for herself. 
 
 I should note that as animals are made to go through 
 the ceremonial of marriage (see p. 327), so also are plants. 
 The ceremony of marrying the Tulasi shrub to the idol of 
 the youthful Krishna takes place annually in every Hindu 
 family in the month Karttika. In Western India an idol of 
 the young Krishna is often brought in procession from the 
 house of one of the Vallabhacarya Maharajas (see p. 'i^l^), to 
 
 ' Hence -this reverential circumambulation is called pradakshina. It 
 must follow the course of the sun, or all its efficacy is destroyed. 
 
Worship of the, Pippala or Alvattha Tree. 335 
 
 some residence where the Tulasi is kept. The idol is placed 
 in a gorgeous palanquin and followed by a long train of 
 attendants. Then the marriage festivities are celebrated at 
 the cost of, perhaps, several thousand rupees. 
 
 Similarly in other parts of India the Tulasi is married to 
 the black Sala-grama pebble (see p. 69), which even more 
 than the idol represents the god Krishna, for the god is 
 present in the stone, even without consecration. 
 
 Sleeman describes a marriage of this kind. There was a 
 procession of eight elephants, aoo camels, and 400 horses. The 
 pebble-bridegroom was placed on the leading elephant sump- 
 tuously decorated, and about 100,000 persons were present at 
 the nuptials. It is usual to maintain the supposed matrimonial 
 union between the Tulasi and Krishna by keeping a Tulasi 
 leaf always resting on the Sala-grama stone. 
 
 The marriage of other trees — as of a mango with a Nimba 
 (or Nim) or of a mango with a jasmine (compare my transla- 
 tion of Sakuntala, p. 17) — is frequently celebrated with similar 
 rejoicings. In my journey from Mirzapore to Vindhyadal 
 I passed a Nim tree (p. 339) and a Pipal growing together by 
 the road-side. This was the result of a marriage celebrated 
 many years before. 
 
 The next most noteworthy example of sacred plant-life in 
 India is certainly the Pippala or Asvattha tree (popularly 
 Plpal, botanically the Ficus Religiosa, or holy fig-tree). This 
 also is held to be a most holy tree. It has a divine personality 
 of its own. It is occupied by the essence of the god 
 Brahma ^, and is sometimes invested with the sacred thread,, 
 as if it were a Brahman, all the ceremonies of investiture 
 (Upanayana) being performed over it. The mysterious 
 
 ' Others say that the Pipal is pervaded by the three gods Brahma, 
 Vishnu, and Siva, but especially by the latter in his Krishna manifesta- 
 tion. In the Bhagavad-glla Krishna says :— ' I am Asvattha among the 
 trees.' It is believed that spirits delight to sit in the branches of this 
 tree and listen to the rustling of the leaves. 
 
336 Worship of the Bilva Tree. 
 
 rustling of its tremulous leaves, which resemble those of 
 the poplar, is no doubt one cause of the superstitious awe 
 with which this tree is regarded. Its roots also display a 
 kind of miraculous power of undermining thick walls, and 
 houses built of the strongest masonry, causing in this way 
 much serious damage to property. Yet no native of India 
 would venture to cut down or in any way injure or interfere 
 with the growth of this tree. It is remarkable, too, that no 
 native would venture to tell an untruth or deviate from the 
 strictest rectitude of conduct while standing under a Pipal 
 tree. The following amusing circumstance illustrative of this 
 point came to my knowledge when I was in India : — 
 
 A certain magistrate, well known for his energy and good 
 nature, knowing that all Hindus regard it as a work of 
 immense religious merit to plant these trees, hit upon the 
 clever idea of trying to conciliate the good-will of the inhabi- 
 tants of his district by planting some Pipal trees in the market- 
 place of a large town where a number of traders were in 
 the habit of transacting their business. This he accordingly 
 proceeded to do, fully expecting to entitle himself to their 
 gratitude, but imagine his surprise when a deputation of 
 these traders made its appearance one day and entreated 
 him to desist, urging with the most naive candour that their 
 business could not be carried on without a certain amount 
 of deception, and that the neighbourhood of the Pipal trees 
 would paralyze all their negotiations'' 
 
 The third most sacred tree in India is the Bilva or Vilva 
 (popularly called Bel, botanically JEgle Marmelos, or wood- 
 apple). Its leaf is of a triple form — with three leaflets — and 
 probably on that account consecrated to Siva with his triple 
 
 ^ In the same way, although the telling of untruths for the good of < 
 one's caste or village is justifiable under certain circumstances — as, for 
 example, the saving of life — no native would venture to tell a falsehood 
 with a piece of gold in his mouth. (Compare Manu VIII. 103, 104.) In 
 all countries a loose code of morality prevails in regard to shielding caste- 
 fellows and companions by untruthful statements. 
 
Worship of the Bilva and Banyan Trees. 337 
 
 functions. Offerings of these leaves are constantly placed 
 on the Linga and on the Bull (see last line of p. 90). 
 
 ► Of other holy trees and plants, the Vata or Banyan 
 (popularly Var for Vad, botanically Ficus Indica) is sacred to 
 Kala or Time. This and the Pipal tree already described are 
 supposed to enjoy a kind of immortality. When a man 
 plants either of these trees he repeats a prayer to the 
 following effect: — 'May I abide in heaven as many years 
 as this tree continues growing on the earth.' The method 
 by which the Banyan tree propagates itself is too well 
 known to require description. A tree of this kind called 
 the Kabir-Var, on the banks of the Narbada near Broach, 
 continued multiplying itself every year by sending down roots 
 from its branches till it became a forest capable of sheltering 
 an army of 7000 men. This tree, though gradually decaying^, 
 is still at. particular seasons a great resort of pilgrims. 
 
 I Again, in the underground passage of the Allahabad fort 
 there is the stump of a tree called the Akshaya-vata, or 
 ' undecaying Banyan,' which once overhung the river and 
 is said to be the same as that mentioned by the Chinese 
 traveller Hiouen Thsang. Whether this be the real tree 
 or not, it is still an attractive rendezvous for pilgrims, and 
 was formerly a favourite place for committing suicide. Hun- 
 dreds have at different times thrown themselves from that 
 overhanging stern into the river. When I visited the place 
 I could detect no life in what appeared to me a mere decaying 
 stump. I was gravely informed by the priest who accompanied 
 me that a further underground passage conducts from the tree 
 to Laksha-griha (Lacha-gir), the ' lac-house,' twenty miles 
 distant on the Ganges, and again another thence to Benares. 
 
 ^ At any rate it had lost its forest character when I visited Broach in 
 1876. It was not the pilgrimage season, and only one solitary devotee 
 then occupied a hut under one of the branches. The tree is believed to 
 have grown from a twig which the sage Kabir used as a tooth-brush and 
 then threw away as impure. The largest Banyan trees seen by me were 
 in the South of India. 
 
338 Worship of Flowers and Plants. 
 
 With reference to the long life of the Pipal tree, I may 
 mention that when I visited Bodh-Gaya (six miles from the 
 city of Gaya), in 1876, I saw growing there on a terrace 
 behind the celebrated tower-like Buddhist monument said to 
 be more than 3,000 years old, a very old Pipal which was 
 alleged to be the identical Bo-tree (Bodhi-druma) under which 
 Gautama Buddha attained supreme knowledge in the fifth 
 century B.C. No doubt a succession of trees was secured by 
 planting new shoots inside the old decaying stem (see my 
 'Buddhism,' pp. 39a, 393). An off-shoot from the tree 
 was conveyed in the time of Asoka (nearly three hundred 
 years B.C.) to Anuradha-pura in Ceylon, and its descendant 
 is said to be still growing there. 
 
 Of the other trees, the Asoka (botanically Jonesia Asoka) 
 is sacred to Siva, the Arka or sun-plant to the Sun (Surya), 
 while the Sami or Acacia is a goddess on her own account 
 and is supposed to contain fire^ 
 
 The Durva grass (popularly Panic grass, botanically 
 Paniaim Dactylon) is sacred to Ganesa. 
 
 But of all the grasses the Kusa or Darbha {Poa Cytio- 
 stiroides) is the holiest. It is used at all religious ceremonies 
 and strewn on the ground before all sacrificial rites ; it sanctifies 
 the soil, forms the most sacred of all seats, cleanses everything 
 it touches, purifies the impure, and when wound around the 
 fingers makes them fit to engage in the most sacred acts. 
 
 The lotus (pad ma), which is a species of water-lily, is con- 
 stantly alluded to in Indian poetry^. It is not directly 
 worshipped, but is perhaps more sacred, as a symbol, than 
 any other flower. The Creator — Brahma himself— was born 
 
 ^ The following prayer is addressed to the SamI tree : — Saml sama- 
 yate papam Saml satru-vinasim, ' the Sami removes guilt, the Sami is the , 
 destroyer of enemies.' 
 
 ^ It is curious that the rose is scarcely ever mentioned in Indian 
 literature, though it is the favourite flower of Persia. In point of fact 
 the rose is not indigenous in India, though found in the Himalaya 
 mountains. 
 
Worship of Material and Natural Objects. 339 
 
 in the lotus which sprang from the navel of Vishnu, and the 
 goddess Lakshml arose out of the ocean holding a lotus in her 
 hand. She is connected with the lotus in other legends, and 
 appeared at the creation floating over the water on the 
 expanded petals of a lotus-flower. In short, the lotus is 
 typical of perfection (see my ' Buddhism/ p. 533). 
 
 The Amra or Mango, the Nimba or- Nim, the Bakula 
 [Mimusops Elengi), and the Amalaki {Emblic Myrobalan) 
 are also sacred trees. Some Pandits assert that the Amra 
 is an incarnation of the god of love. 
 
 Of all fruits the cocoa-nut (narikela) is perhaps the most 
 sacred. It is called the fruit of the goddess of prosperity 
 (SrI-phala). The custard apple is the fruit of Sita (Sita-phala). 
 
 Worship of Material and Natural Objects. 
 
 The worship of inanimate natural objects opens out a wide 
 field of inquiry. I can only direct attention to some of the 
 most interesting and important phases of the subject. 
 
 We must bear in mind that objects which are inanimate to 
 us are animate to the Hindus. According to their belief every 
 material or natural object is pervaded by a spirit. In fact the 
 same doctrine of metempsychosis, which has continually forced 
 itself upon our notice throughout our investigations, meets 
 us again here. The spirit of a man in whom the dark 
 quality (tamas, see p. 36) dominates is liable to pass into 
 inert (jada) motionless matter (see Manu XII. 9, 4a), and to 
 occupy a rock, a stone, a post, or any similar material form. 
 Even the divine Spirit may infuse itself into images and objects 
 of stone, metal, and wood, into idols such as those of Krishna, 
 Rama and Durga, into symbols like the Linga and Yoni, or 
 into pebbles like the Sala-grama (sometimes written Sali- 
 grama) and Bana-linga (see p. 69). And it does this not 
 merely in its character of a universal Spirit pervading all matter. 
 It is present in a special manner in all such material forms. 
 
 But it is to be observed that material objects which are thus, 
 
 Z 3 
 
340 Worship of Material and Natural Objects. 
 
 as it were, animated and endowed with personal souls, do not 
 necessarily, when worshipped, become mere fetishes. Fetishism 
 may be described as the expression of the spiritual instinct of 
 a child and of a savage. A doll, or a ball, or any plaything 
 is made a kind of fetish when it is endowed with personality 
 and addressed as if it were alive. A savage makes a fetish of 
 a lucifer match when, believing it to be occupied by a spirit, 
 he stands in awe of it or tries to control it for his own benefit. 
 In the same way he may make fetishes of his tools or weapons 
 — of his axe, his knife, or his bow— or of any particular idol. 
 
 But a fetish, as Sir John Lubbock has pointed out, is not 
 necessarily an object of worship. It is only worshipped if it 
 answers prayers or confers benefits. If it appears to neglect 
 the interests of its possessor, it is itself neglected, and if 
 misfortunes occur it is abused or ill-treated. In short, it is 
 essential to the idea of a fetish that, consisting in the first 
 instance of some peculiar form of material object with a 
 distinct individuality and special character of its own, it 
 should be occupied by a spirit devoted to the interests of the 
 person possessing it, and pledged, like the genius of Aladdin's 
 lamp, to execute his behests. Hence, any stone idol which; 
 in corhmon with a number of other idols, represents a deity 
 invariably held in honour, is not a fetish in the proper sense 
 of the term. 
 
 It is difficult, however, to draw any hard and fast line 
 between Animism and Fetishism, or to say where one ends 
 and the other begins. It is certain that much true Fetishism 
 and much of a kind of half-fetishism co-exist with higher 
 religious ideas in most of the religions of the world. 
 
 I believe that in India some images (such as those of 
 Khando-ba) are exposed to actual ill-treatment, when any 
 calamity occurs which is attributed to the neglect of the god, 
 but I have never verified this by personal observation. 
 
 It must be admitted that what may be called Animistic 
 and Fetish ideas run through the whole of Hinduism. For 
 
Worship of the Sun. 341 
 
 instance, in Atliaiva-veda (XVIII. 4. 5) the sacrificial ladles, 
 the oblation, the sacrificial grass (IV. ^^. 3-6 ; XIX. 32. 9), 
 and even the remains of the sacrifice are described as animated 
 and as possessing divine powers. We know, too, that on par- 
 ticular holy days, the merchant worships his books, the writer 
 his inkstand, the husbandman his plough, the weaver his 
 loom, the carpenter his axe, chisel, and tools, and the fisher- 
 man his net. Every object that benefits its possessor and 
 helps to provide him with a livelihood becomes for the time- 
 being his fetish. Nevertheless, I doubt whether the religion 
 of the Aryan Hindus has ever shown any great tendency to 
 lapse into the worst forms of fetish-worship, such as those 
 which undoubtedly prevailed among the aboriginal inhabitants, 
 and are common everywhere among uncultivated races. Placed 
 in the midst of striking physical phenomena and feeling them- 
 selves surrounded by mighty material forces, the Aryans on 
 their arrival in India were simple nature- worshippers, and 
 those natural objects and natural forces which had motion 
 appeared to them more especially instinct with divinity. 
 Hence the Sun, the Moon, Fire, Wind, and the Waters were 
 the chief deities in Vedic times (pp. 9; 16). 
 
 Worship of the Sun. 
 
 Without doubt the great luminary to which the world owes 
 light, heat, and vegetation, has always been one of the earUest 
 objects of the world's adoration. In the Rig-veda (X. 88. 11) 
 the Sun is said to be a son of Aditi, and has two chief 
 names— Surya ("HXios) and Savitri (p. 16)— both significant 
 of his generative power. Probably his more ancient title 
 was Praja-pati, 'lord of creatures.' He is represented as a 
 golden deity borne along in a chariot drawn by seven ruddy 
 horses or mares, and his charioteer is the Dawn. By his 
 wife Samjiia he had twin children, the Asvins (p. 9), who are 
 called heavenly physicians. The Sun himself is also described 
 
342 Worship of the Sun. 
 
 as a healer of diseases. In the Epic poems he is ' the eye of 
 the world ' and ' the soul of all.' 
 
 Passing on to medieval times, it is clear that in the days of 
 Sankara there were distinct sects of Sauras or Sun-worshippers 
 (see p. 59); that is, a large number of persons adored the 
 Sun as their exclusive divinity. They were divided, as we 
 learn from the Sankara-vijaya (chap. 13), into six sub-sects as 
 follow : — I. Worshippers of the rising Sun as identified with 
 Brahma. 2. Worshippers of the meridian Sun as identified 
 with Siva. 3. Worshippers of the setting Sun as identified 
 with Vishnu. 4. Worshippers of the Sun in all three of the 
 above phases as identified with the Tri-murti (p. 45). 5. Wor- 
 shippers of the Sun regarded as a material being in the form 
 of a man with a golden beard and golden hair ^. Zealous 
 members of this sect refused to eat anything in the morning 
 till they had seen the Sun rise. 6. Worshippers of an image 
 of the Sun formed in the mind. These spent all their time in 
 meditating on the Sun. They were in the habit of branding 
 circular representations of his disk on their foreheads, arms, 
 and breasts. 
 
 Coming now to modern times, we find that, although the 
 sect of Sun- worshippers has apparently died out and although 
 the Sun-god has few temples like those of Siva or Vishnu, he 
 still continues to be the object of universal adoration. Every 
 Hindu — be he Saiva or Vaishnava, or to whatever sect he may 
 belong — does homage to the rising Sun every morning by 
 repeating the Gayatri (Rig-veda III. 62. 10), a prayer addressed 
 to the Sun's vivifying essence (see pp. 19, 403 ; 406). Then 
 at the midday service he ought to repeat the Surya-sukta or 
 Saura-sukta (Rig-veda I. 50, partly translated at p. 16). 
 
 It certainly surprised me that I saw so few temples or 
 
 ^ It is remarkable that the Hindus talk of the god in the Sun (called 
 by them Surya-Narayana) rather than of the man in the Moon. The 
 spots in the Sun are supposed to give the idea of a man's face, while 
 those in the Moon are compared to the markings on a rabbit. 
 
Worship of the Moon. 343 
 
 shrines dedicated to the Sun in any part of India. His most 
 celebrated temple was at Konarak (for Konarka, 'corner- sun') 
 in Orissa. It is said that a sum equal to twelve years' 
 revenues of Orissa was spent on this temple. Yet it is now 
 deserted and in ruins. I visited a well-known sacred temple 
 of the Sun at Gaya near to a tank consecrated to the same 
 luminary. No one appeared to be worshipping in the shrine, 
 but rude images of the disk of the Sun made of red cotton 
 were affixed by women to the walls above the door-way. 
 
 The hymn to the Sun called Surya-sukta (Rig-veda X. 85) 
 is still in common use at marriage-ceremonies (p. ofi'3^ note). 
 
 Worship of the Moon. 
 
 Passing from the Sun to the Moon, we find that the latter 
 seems never to have had any exclusive adorers in India. Yet, 
 like the Sun, the Moon is often regarded as one of the nine 
 planets, and is treated as a male deity. In the Puranas he is 
 said to be borne along in a chariot with three wheels drawn 
 by ten horses. Poets are never tired of alluding to the 
 Moon's beauty, its brilliancy being far greater in India than 
 in Europe ; but the only worship it receives in the present 
 day is in conjunction with the Sun and the other planets. 
 
 The sphere of the Moon is sometimes regarded as the 
 abode of the spirits of deceased ancestors (Pitris) ; and its 
 orb is usually held to consist of sixteen digits (Kalas), which 
 are composed of nectar (amrita) supplied to it from the Sun 
 for the support of the gods. In Rig-veda X. 85. 5 there is an 
 allusion to the gods drinking up the nectar and so causing the 
 Moon to wane. 
 
 The name Soma, which first belonged to the plant only, 
 came to be applied to the Moon in post-vedic mythology, 
 traces of this application being also observable in Rig-veda 
 X. 85, in Atharva-veda XL 6, 7, and in several passages of 
 the Satapatha-Brahmana. In the later mythology (see 
 
 v^ 
 
344 Worship of the Planets. 
 
 Vishnu-purana I. 2a) Brahma is said to have appointed Soma, 
 or the Moon to be the ' monarch of planets, of plants, of 
 sacrifices, and penances,' and one of the names of the Moon 
 is Oshadhi-pati or Oshadhlsa, ' lord of plants and herbs,' which 
 he is supposed to nourish with his light. Again, at the 
 churning of the ocean, as described in the Puranas, after all 
 sorts of medicinal plants and healing herbs had been thrown 
 into the waters, three of the precious things produced were 
 the Moon (Soma), nectar (amrita), and spirituous liquor (sura), 
 though in other legends this nectar is said to be preserved in 
 the body, of the Moon, or even to constitute its substance. 
 In Manu V. 96 Soma is called one of the eight Loka-palas or 
 guardians of the world. 
 
 Worship of the Planets. 
 
 The Sun and Moon, Mercury (Budha), Venus (Sukra), 
 Mars (Mangala or Angaraka), Jupiter (Vrihaspati), Saturn 
 (Sani), Rahu and Ketu ^^the former being fabled as a planet 
 with a head and no body, the latter as a planet with a body 
 and no head — together form the group of what is called the 
 Nava-graha, nine planets, the first seven giving names to the 
 days of the week ^. In the Puranas they are all represented 
 as deities borne in cars. Thus the car of Mars is of gold 
 drawn by eight red horses, that of Jupiter is drawn by eight 
 pale horses, that of Saturn is a slow-going car drawn by pie- 
 bald horses, those of Rahu and Ketu are drawn by eight dark 
 horses. Rahu is thought to have a spite against the Sun and 
 Moon, and occasionally displays his enmity by swallowing 
 them for a time and so causing eclipses, while Ketu gives 
 birth to an awful progeny of comets and fiery meteors. 
 
 ^ These are sometimes identified with the Moon's ascending and 
 descending nodes. 
 
 ^ The planets, however, are variously mentioned as five; seven, and 
 nine in number. 
 
Worship of the Planets. 345 
 
 The whole array of nine luminaries constitutes in the eyes 
 of every Hindu a most formidable group of deities, whose 
 power over every living person's career from the first moment 
 of his coming into the world, and over the whole course of 
 mundane events, no one for an instant thinks of doubting. 
 
 The influences of Saturn, Rahu and Ketu are supposed to 
 be sinister, and these planets are therefore most propitiated. 
 If they are in the ascendant when a man is born they are sure 
 to shorten his life or cause him trouble of some kind. Their 
 anger, therefore, must be deprecated, and counteracting in- 
 fluences must be sought for by astrologers in drawing up horo- 
 scopes. They cause diseases, such as influenza, fevers, etc. 
 
 On the other hand, Jupiter, Venus, Mercury, Mars, and the 
 Sun exert favourable influences only, and the first three are 
 thought to be special sources of knowledge and wisdom. 
 The favour of all must be conciliated before marriages and 
 other auspicious events can be successfully accomplished. 
 
 I saw a celebrated temple dedicated to the nine planets at 
 ■Benares, and another sacred to Saturn and to the bodiless \ 
 Rahu. Numbers of people as they passed these temples cast 
 flowers and offerings before the images, but did not stop to 
 worship. 
 
 The Nakshatras, or twenty-seven constellations through 
 which the Moon passes^, and which separate his path into 
 twenty-seven divisions— as the signs of the Zodiac do. that 
 of the Sun into twelve — are, like the planets, regarded in the 
 present day as deities who exert a vast influence on the 
 destiny of men, not only at the moment of their entrance 
 into the world, but during their whole passage through it. 
 These formidable constellations are consulted at births, mar- 
 riages, and on all occasions of family rejoicing, distress, or 
 
 ' In the Rig-veda the word Nakshatra has the general sense of a 
 constellation. In the Yajur and Atharva-veda the Nakshatras are dis- 
 tinctly connected with the path of the Moon, and in the latter (XIX. 8. i) 
 their number is given as twenty-eight. 
 
346 Worship of Fire and Water. 
 
 calamity. No one undertakes a journey or any important 
 matter except on days which the aspect of the Nakshatras 
 renders lucky and auspicious. If any constellation is un- 
 favourable, its anger must by all means be appeased by a 
 ceremony called Santi, ' propitiation.' 
 
 Worship of Fire. 
 
 The worship of Fire, like that of the Sun, was, as we have 
 already seen, one of the earliest cults of India (see p. 9), and 
 Fire is still a general object of homage ^- Further allusions 
 to this homage will be made subsequently. I will only here 
 draw attention to the remarkable idea prevalent in India that 
 fire is produced from water. In the Veda fire is called 
 Apam-napat, ' son of the waters,' and this name is also once 
 applied to the Sun (I. 33. 6) 2. Doubtless the idea arose 
 from the apparent production of lightning from rain-clouds*. 
 
 Worship of Water and Rivers. 
 
 Passing on to the worship of Water, especially running 
 water, it is to be observed that river-water is throughout India 
 held to be instinct with divinity^. It is not merely holy, it is 
 pervaded by the divine essence. We must, however, be care- 
 ful to distinguish between the mere sacredness of either fire 
 or water and their worship as personal deities. 
 
 In Rig-veda X. 30, X. 9, VII. 47, and other passages of 
 the Veda, the Waters are personified, deified, and honoured 
 as goddesses, and called the Mothers of the earth. In 
 
 1 As the medium of bearing the sacrifice to heaven it is always sacred, 
 even when not worshipped as a personal god. The adoration of fire in 
 Assyria, Phoenicia, Persia, etc., is well known. No doubt the difficulty of 
 generating fire led to its adoration among uncivilized tribes. 
 
 ^ Some see a connexion between Apam-napat and Neptunus. 
 
 ' The worship of water is by no means confined to India, as the number 
 of holy wells in our own country proves. 
 
Worship of Water and Rivers. 347 
 
 X. 17. 10 their purifying power, and in VI. 50. 7 their healing 
 power, is celebrated. They cleanse their worshippers from 
 sin and untruthfulness (I. 23. 2a) ; and, as noted above, they 
 give birth to Fire (X. 2. 7, X. 91. 6). 
 
 Of course some rivers are more sacred than others, and as 
 the Ganges, which issues from Vishnu's foot and falls on 
 Siva's head (p. 80), is the most majestic, so it is the holiest of 
 all rivers. No sin is too heinous to be removed, no character 
 too black to be washed clean by its waters. Hence the 
 countless temples with flights of steps lining its banks ; hence 
 the array of priests, called ' Sons of the Ganges,' sitting on the 
 edge of its streams, ready to aid the ablutions of conscience- 
 stricken bathers, and stamp them as white-washed when they 
 emerge from its waters. Hence also the constant trafific 
 . carried on in transporting Ganges water in small bottles to 
 all parts of the country. The river SarasvatI — called ' the 
 purifier' in Rig-veda I. 3. 10 — was to the earlier Hindus what 
 the Ganges was to the later ; she was instinct with divinity, 
 and her influence permeated the writers of the Vedic hymns. 
 Sometimes she is identified with the Vedic goddess Vad, 
 ' speech,' and invoked as the patroness of science. 
 
 The river Indus (Sindhu) is also celebrated very early in 
 the Rig-veda (see X. 75. 4). 
 
 But the confluence of the Ganges with the Jumna (Yamuna) 
 and SarasvatI (supposed to flow underground) at Allahabad 
 (Prayaga) is perhaps one of the most hallowed spots in all 
 India. These three sacred streams form a sort of Tri-murti, 
 or triad of rivers, often personified as goddesses, and called 
 ' Mothers.' Then other celebrated rivers — such as the Godavarl 
 (also called Goda and Vriddha-gahga, ' the ancient Ganges '), 
 Narbada (properly Narma-da, ' bliss-giver,' also called Reva), 
 Tapti (properly Tapati, also called Tapi), Sabarmati (possibly 
 for Subhramati), GandakI, Kistna (properly Krishna), Vena, 
 Sarayu, Tunga-bhadra (called ' the Ganges of the South '), and 
 Kaverl — became rivals of this original sacred triad. 
 
348 Worship of Water and Rivers. 
 
 The Narbada has its special admirers, who exalt it even 
 ^bove the Ganges. It is said to have sprung from the per- 
 spiration of the god Rudra (p. "J^. ' One day's ablution,' 
 they say, ' in the Ganges frees from sin, but the mere sight 
 of the Narbada purifies from guilt.' The sanctity of the 
 Ganges will, it is predicted, cease in 1895. The Narbada 
 will then supersede it and become the most sacred river of 
 India. Moreover, all water thirty miles from the Narbada's 
 bank northward and eighteen miles southward is sanctified by 
 it. Furthermore, either bank may be used for burning the 
 dead, whereas only the northern bank of the Ganges is effectual 
 for that purpose. 
 
 At Mahabalesvar I visited the source of the Krishna 
 (Kistna) which flows into a sacred tank after issuing from 
 a Go-mukha (representation of a cow's mouth). Both are 
 under the cover of a temple, and while I was there a pilgrim 
 who had walked all the way from Benares, entered the build- 
 ing and taking off his dust-soiled garments began repeating 
 his Mantras before performing his ablutions. 
 
 Chapters called Mahatmyas, assigning special sacredness 
 to particular rivers and waters, have been at various times 
 introduced into the Puranas. 
 
 At Kumbha-konam is a sacred pool which cleanses from 
 guilt all those who are able to crowd into it at a particular 
 vXnoment once in twelve years. On the other hand, a river 
 called Karma-nasa, ' destroyer of good works,' which falls into 
 the Ganges not far from Benares, is an unholy and accursed 
 stream, and if a man touches its water he loses all his store of 
 religious merit accumulated for years. 
 
 And here we may note that the whole length of the banks 
 of all the chief rivers of India, from their source to the sea, 
 is regarded as holy ground. To follow their course on foot 
 is considered a highly meritorious act. A pilgrim, for ex- 
 ample, sets out from the source of the Ganges, at Gafigotrl in 
 the Himalayas, and walks by the left bank of the river to its 
 
Worship of Mountains, Rocks, and Stones. 349 
 
 mouth at Ganga-sagara ; then, turning round, he proceeds by 
 the right side back to Gangotri, whence he departed. This 
 is called Pradakshina, or Parikrama of the river, and takes 
 six years to accomplish. In the same way a pilgrim starts 
 from the source of the Narbada, at Amara-kantaka,— a peak 
 of the Vindhya chain in Gondwana,— and walks to the mouth, 
 near Broach, and back. This pilgrimage takes nearly three 
 years. The rivers Godavarl and Krishna require only two 
 years for the same process. As these rivers often pass through 
 wild country, the pilgrims who perform such tasks are exposed 
 to many hardships. Of course, the merit accumulated is in 
 proportion to the length and difficulty of the pilgrimage 
 (yatra) and the ground traversed. 
 
 The sea is also held sacred, and on special occasions pro- 
 pitiated. When any one is compelled to take a voyage, it 
 is not uncommon for his nearest relatives to throw milk into 
 the sea as an offering to the waves. 
 
 Worship of Mountains, Rocks, and Stones. 
 
 With regard to the worship of immovable objects, many 
 mountains and hills are holy ground. Of course the Hima- 
 laya range takes the lead. It is personified and extolled as 
 a god. (Compare the first verses of Kalidasa's Kumara- 
 sambhava.) There are temples (especially of Siva) among 
 its eternal snows, and pilgrims often perish in their efforts to 
 reach the loftiest heights. Among other hills regarded as 
 specially sacred are Citra-kuta (commonly called Chateerkot) 
 in the Banda district, the Pulney hills, Parasnath, Mount Abu, 
 and Girnar in KathiawarK In short, nearly every hill in 
 India is consecrated by temples and shrines. 
 
 There are some sand-hills in the Satpura range dedicated 
 
 ' Citra-kuta was the first residence of Rama-candra after his banish- 
 ment. Abu (corrupted from Sanskrit arbudd), Parasnath, and Girnar are 
 hills more particularly celebrated for their Jaina temples. 
 
350 Worship of Mountains, Rocks, and Stones. 
 
 to Mahadeva, supposed, as Mahakala,. to preside over destruc- 
 tion. From a rock on these hills many youths have pre- 
 cipitated themselves, because their mothers, when childless, 
 dedicated their first-born sons to the god. This mode of 
 suicide is called Bhrigu-pata, 'throwing one's self from a 
 precipice.' It was once equally common at the rock of 
 Girnar, and has only recently been prohibited. 
 
 Particular rocks all over India are treated as^ divine. They 
 are not only pervaded by the divine soul of the Universe 
 which permeates all nature, God is specially present in them, 
 just as he is in the Sala-grama pebble found in the GandakI 
 river, and in the Bana-linga found in the Narbada (see pp. 69, 
 41a). A great deal of fraud is practised in selling these 
 stones. If they come from other rivers they enjoy no special 
 presence of the deity. 
 
 A simple Bilva-leaf offered on a true Bana-lihga brought 
 from the Narbada is an act of enormous merit (punya), but if 
 offered on a spurious pebble is inefificacious. 
 
 I might continue the enumeration of sacred objects almost 
 indefinitely, but enough has been said to make it clear that 
 '^there is not an object in heaven or earth which a Hindu is 
 not prepared to worship — sun, moon, and stars ; rocks, stocks, 
 and stones ; trees, shrubs, and grass ; sea, pools, and rivers ; 
 his own implements of trade ; the animals he finds most 
 useful, the noxious reptiles he fears ; men remarkable for any 
 extraordinary qualities — for great valour, sanctity, virtue, or 
 even vice ; good and evil demons, ghosts and gobliji's ; the 
 spirits of departed ancestors ; an infinite number of semi- 
 human and semi-divine existences ; inhabitants of the seven 
 upper and the seven lower worlds — each and all come- in 
 for a share of divine honour or a tribute of more or less 
 adoration. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 The Hindu Religion in Ancient Family-life. 
 
 It has been well said that common life is the proper field 
 for the exercise of Christianity; or, in other words, that true 
 religion is not to be separated from every-day actions. 
 
 Turning to India we find a similar doctrine taught, 
 although of course a different meaning is attached to the 
 word ' religion.' 
 
 Without doubt it must be admitted that the actual life 
 of a large number of Hindus is not so complete a falling away 
 from the moral standard set up in their sacred books (see 
 PP- i'i'^i 533)) ^s some have represented. At the same 
 time it must be confessed that! the religion of a modern Hindu 
 mainly consists in domestic rites, ceremonies and usages, all 
 of which are superintended or carried out by the Brahmans, 
 although no central ecclesiastical government exists which has 
 any power to impose or enforce any particular observances. 
 
 In fairness, too, it must be admitted that a genuine Hindu 
 does not lead two lives. His religion, such as it is, may be 
 described as bound up in the bundle of his every-day exist- 
 ence. The religion of a Hindu is his constant companion. 
 Nor does he think it necessary, as a Christian does, to satisfy 
 the claims of a corporate as well as of a personal and domestic 
 religion. Any idea of congregational religious duties has no 
 place in his mind. A Hindu never enters a place of worship 
 with the object of offering up common prayer in company 
 with his fellow-men. He has no conception of performing 
 
352 The Hindu Religion in Ancient Family-life. 
 
 the kind of religious act which a Christian performs when he 
 ' goes to church/ Occasionally, it is true, and on stated days, 
 he visits idol shrines. But he does not go there with any idea 
 of praying with others. He goes to the temple to perform 
 what is called Darsana ; that is, to look at the idol, the sight 
 of which, when duly dressed and decorated by the priest, is 
 supposed to confer merit. After viewing the image he may 
 endeavour to propitiate the favour or avert the anger of the 
 god it represents, by prostrations of the body, repetitions 
 of its name, or presentation of offerings. But this is not an 
 essential duty. His real religion is an affair of family usage, 
 domestic ritual, and private observance:. Not that his domestic 
 worship is free from priestly interference. Sacerdotalism, ■ 
 uncontrolled by any central authority, exerts a strong power 
 over personal and family religion in India, and all the stronger 
 from the absence of congregational religion. 
 
 Nevertheless it is immemorial usage rather than ecclesi- 
 astical law which governs every operation in Indian home life. 
 Each man finds himself cribbed and confined in all his move- 
 ments, bound and fettered in all he does by minute traditional 
 regulations. He sleeps and wakes, dresses and undresses, sits 
 down and stands up, goes out and comes in, eats and drinks, 
 speaks and is silent, acts and refrains from acting, according 
 to ancient rule. And by the same rule the intervention of the 
 priestly caste begins with his first unconscious existence as a 
 living organism. From that moment to death, and even long 
 after death, every Hindu is held to be the lawful property of 
 the priests, who exact fees for innumerable ofifices performed 
 on his behalf. 
 
 It is on this account that nearly evety village has first 
 its religious teacher (Guru), who teaches the Vedic Gayatrl or 
 the initiatory prayer (p. 6i) to those whose caste or sect re- 
 quires them to repeat it, and secondly its ceremonial priest, 
 who serves as a domestic chaplain (Purohita) to all the families 
 of the village. Not a single religious rite can be performed 
 
Twelve Purificatory Rites. 353 
 
 without this latter functionary, and though other priests may 
 be asked to be present and assist at some of the ceremonies 
 (such as marriage and initiation), the regular village priest 
 must always take the lead and have his appointed duties and 
 customary fees. In fact in no country of the world are^ 
 domestic religion and sacerdotalism so curiously associated 
 together and carried to such extremes as in India. There a 
 complicated religious code has always been as necessary to 
 the priest as an intricate civil code to the lawyer. It has sup- 
 plied him with his meat, drink, and whole means of livelihood. 
 We must, however, be careful not to speak of Brahmanism 
 and Sacerdotalism in India as if these expressions were con- 
 vertible terms. Every Brahman is not a priest, though every 
 priest is a Brahman. The Brahmans are simply an order of 
 men divided into clergy and laity, and in ancient times a lay- 
 man did many religious acts now performed by priests only. 
 
 To begin, then, with ancient times. 
 / Twelve purificatory rites, called Sanskaras, were prescribed 
 in the ancient collections of domestic rules (Grihya-sutras) and 
 in the code of Manu, for the purification of the three higher 
 castes — Brahmans, Kshatriyas, and Vaisyas — from the taint 
 transmitted through the womb of the mother. They were, i . Im- 
 pregnation (Garbhadhana or Garbha-lambhana) ; %. Male-pro- 
 duction (Pumsavana) ; 3. Hair-parting (Simantonnayana) ; 
 4. Birth-ceremony (Jata-karman) ; 5. Name-giving (Nama- 
 karana) ; 6. Carrying out (Nishkramana) ; 7. Food-giving 
 (Anna-prasana) ; 8 and 9. Tonsure or shaving and cutting off 
 the hair (Caula or Kshaura and Kesanta)i; 10. Initiation 
 (Upanayana); 11. Return from the house of the preceptor 
 (Samavartana) ; i a. Marriage (Vivaha). See Manu II. 27, etc. 
 Some account of these twelve ceremonies— supposed to 
 purify from original or rather natal sin — ought to precede 
 a description of the householder's daily observances ; for no 
 
 ^ Manu places Caula 8th and Kesanta loth, with Upanayana between, 
 but the first two may be taken together as kindred ceremonies. 
 
 A a 
 
354 Marriage. Garbhadhana or Impregnation-rite. 
 
 one whose body (tainted by its abode in the womb) has not 
 been purified by these rites is held qualified to perform the 
 ordinary religious duties of domestic life. 
 
 Turning then to one of the most important of the San- 
 skaras— marriage— we find that it stands last. It will be 
 necessary, however, to begin by supposing the recent union of 
 a young couple in wedlock, so that every one of the Sanskaras 
 — beginning with that which is believed to be essential to the 
 purification of the human embryo from its earliest origin in the 
 womb — may be successively described. It must also be taken 
 for granted that the newly-married pair in ancient times were 
 of good family, that they were bent on acting up to the pre- 
 cepts of their religion, and that they brought with them to 
 their own home a portion of the sacred fire which witnessed 
 their union (see p. 363) and which, when once kindled on their 
 own family hearth, had to be maintained ever afterwards 
 for use in all domestic ceremonies and sacrifices, including 
 the last sacrifice of all, the final burning of their own bodies 
 at death. 
 
 The first Sanskara, which as a matter of course followed 
 immediately on every matrimonial union, was called the ' Im- 
 pregnation-rite ' (Garbhadhana). In ancient times no bride- 
 groom approached the bride till the fourth night after the 
 completion of the marriage ceremony ^. Hence the consumma- 
 tion-rite was sometimes called Caturthi-karma. During the 
 previous day the young married woman was made to look 
 towards the sun, or in some way exposed to its rays. In the 
 evening she was required to bathe. Her husband also per- 
 
 ^ This interval is prescribed by Gobhila. The present interval of two, 
 three, or four years in the case of child-marriages is quite unsupported by 
 the authority of ancient lawgivers. Dhanvantari (in the Susruta) declares 
 that the Garbhadhan^ should not take place till a girl is sixteen. Dr. 
 Biihler has shown (from the Vivaha-mantras) that in olden times girls 
 were married long after they had reached the age of puberty, and infant- 
 marriages were unknown ; moreover, that the human husband is the 4th 
 husband, the three gods, Soma, Visva-vasu, and Agni, being the first three 
 at the period of a girl's becoming marriageable. 
 
Male-production Ceremony. 355 
 
 formed his ablutions and went through other prescribed forms. 
 Before approaching his wife he was careful to secure the 
 solemn imprimatur of religion on an act which might lead to 
 the introduction of another human being into the world. He 
 therefore repeated two Mantras or texts of Rig-veda X. 1 84, 
 the first of which may be thus translated : — ' Let (all-pervad- 
 ing) Vishnu prepare her womb ; let the Creator shape its 
 forms; let Prajapati be the Impregnator; let the Creator 
 give the embryo.' 
 
 The Impregnation-rite was followed after an interval of 
 three months by that called ' Male-production ' (Purnsavana). 
 This is not unusual even in the present day. We Euro- 
 peans can scarcely understand the craving of Asiatic parents 
 for the birth of a male child. The very word for a son 
 (put-tra) is fancifully said to mean one who delivers a parent 
 from a hell called Put. Whether any intelligent Hindu 
 married man in modern times seriously looks forward to 
 punishment in a place of torment hereafter as the penalty for 
 not having sons or for having only daughters may be doubtful. 
 We have seen, however, that the well-being of the parent's 
 soul after death is believed to depend on the proper perform- 
 ance of the Sraddha ceremonies by a son, and that the parti- 
 tion of the family inheritance is by law made dependent on 
 that performance. Hence the craving for sons. 
 
 In short, a son is to every pious Hindu the first and last of 
 all necessary things. Through a son he pays his own father 
 the debt he owes him for his own life, and secures similar 
 payment for the gift of life bestowed by himself. 
 
 What says the Aitareya-Brahmana of the Rig-veda (VII. 
 3. 13) ? ' When a father sees the face of a living son he pays 
 a debt in him, and gains immortality. The pleasure which a 
 father has in his son exceeds all other enjoyments. His wife 
 is a friend, his daughter an object of compassion, his son 
 shines as his light in the highest world.' What says Manu ? 
 ' A man is perfect when he consists of three— himself, his wife, 
 ^ A a a 
 
356 Maleyprodudion Ceremony. 
 
 and his son' (VII. 3). What says Yajnavalkya ? 'Immortality 
 in future worlds and heavenly bliss are obtained by means of 
 sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons.' 
 
 A story is told in some Brahmana of a certain pious man of 
 ascetical temperament who determined to shirk the religious 
 duty of taking a wife. Quietly skipping over the second pre- 
 scribed period of life, during which he ought to have become 
 a householder (grihastha), he entered at once upon the third 
 period — that is to say, he became an ascetic, abjured all 
 female society, and retired to the woods. Wandering about 
 one day, absorbed in meditation, he was startled by an 
 extraordinary spectacle. He saw before him a deep and 
 apparently bottomless pit. Around its edge some unhappy 
 men were hanging suspended by ropes of grass, at which here 
 and there a rat was nibbling. On asking their history, he 
 discovered to his horror that they were his own ancestors 
 compelled to hang in this unpleasant manner, and doomed 
 eventually to fall into the abyss, unless he went back into the 
 world, did his duty like a man, married a suitable wife, and 
 had a son, who would be able to release them from their 
 critical predicament. 
 
 It is not, therefore, difficult to understand the object of the 
 ' Male-production ' ceremony (Pumsavana). It was performed 
 in the third month of gestation and before the period of 
 quickening. According to Asvalayana the wife was to keep 
 a solemn fast. She was then fed by her husband with two 
 beans and a grain of barley ^ mixed with a handful of curds, 
 and made to pray three times for the production of male- 
 offspring. 
 
 A further supplementary rite for the prevention of mis- 
 carriage was customary in some localities. It was performed 
 by sprinkling the juice of a stalk of fresh Durba grass in the 
 wife's right nostril, with the repetition of certain Mantras. 
 This ceremony was called Anavalopana (or Anavalobhana). 
 
 ' Symbolical of the Liiiga. 
 
Hair-parting. Birth-ceremony. 357 
 
 The next purificatory rite was called ' Hair-parting' (Slman- 
 tonnayana). 
 
 First an oblation was made in fire, with repetition of the 
 Vedic texts from Atharva-veda VII. 17. i, Rig-veda III. 
 59. I, V. 35. 3, II. 3a. 4-5. Then the woman performed her 
 ablutions in pure water ; fragrant oil was poured on her head, 
 and a line or parting (sTmanta) was drawn three times through 
 her hair from the forehead upwards with three stalks of Kusa 
 grass bound together — the three sacred words called Vya- 
 hritis (Bhur, Bhuvar, Svar) and the hallowed syllable Om 
 being uttered during each operation (pp. 403, 403)- Certain 
 medicinal substances supposed to have a purifying efficacy 
 were also given, and a particular regimen prescribed for 
 the remaining period of gestation. Musical performances 
 also took place during the ceremony, the promotion of cheer- 
 fulness in the mind of the mother being thought essential to 
 the proper development of the unborn child. 
 
 This rite was only performed at a woman's first pregnancy, 
 and though, like the preceding, it purified the whole person of 
 the wife, it also had reference to the well-being of the unborn 
 child. The idea was that the body of the mother should be 
 consecrated and protected from evil influences at the most 
 critical period of gestation, the proper time for the ceremony 
 being the fourth month, though it might be deferred until the 
 sixth or eighth. 
 
 Immediately after the birth of the infant and before 
 the severing of the umbilical cord the father performed the 
 next Sanskara, called the 'Birth-ceremony' (Jata-karman). 
 Honey and clarified butter were mixed together and stirred— 
 if possible, with a golden rod or spoon— to symbolize good- 
 fortune. Then a small portion of the mixture was introduced 
 into the mouth of the new-born infant and certain texts were 
 repeated (Rig-veda II. 3i. 6, III. 36. 10, Kaus.-Up. II. n), 
 with the following prayer : ' O long-lived one, mayst thou live 
 a hundred years in this world, protected by the gods ! ' Both 
 
358 Name-giving. Carrying out. Food-giving. 
 
 the ears of the infant were then touched with the golden rod, 
 and another prayer repeated : ' May Savitri, may SarasvatI, 
 may the Asvins grant thee wisdom.' Lastly, the shoulders 
 were rubbed and these words uttered : ' Become firm as 
 a rock, sharp as an axe, pure as gold ; thou art the Veda 
 called a son, live thou a hundred years. May Indra bestow 
 on thee his best treasures.' 
 
 The next Sanskara, called ' Name-giving ' (Nama-karana), 
 took place on the tenth day after the birth of the child. 
 
 The Hindus regard the giving of a name as a solemn 
 religious act fraught with important consequences in its 
 bearing on the future prospects of the child. The sound and 
 meaning of the name must be auspicious. Asvalayana laid 
 down the rule that a boy's name should either consist of two 
 or of four syllables, not of an odd number, and have a soft 
 consonant for its first letter and a semi-vowel in the middle 
 (for example, Bhadra, Deva, Bhava, Naga-deva, Bhadra-datta, 
 Deva-datta, Yajila-datta). Lawgivers prescribed that the word 
 Sarman, ' prosperity,' should form part of a Brahman's name ; 
 Varman, ' armour/ of a Kshatriya's ; Gupta, ' protected,' of 
 a Vaisya's ; and Dasa, ' slave,' of a Sudra's (compare Manu 
 IL 33). The names of women were required to be agreeable, 
 soft, clear, captivating, auspicious, and ending in long vowels. 
 
 The next ceremony, called ' Carrying out ' (Nishkramana), 
 was of less importance. In the fourth month after birth the 
 child was carried out into the open air to look at the rising 
 sun, while the following prayers were said : ' That eye-like 
 luminary, the cause of blessings to the gods (or placed in 
 the sky by the gods), rises in the east ; may we behold it 
 for a hundred years.' ' May we hear, may we speak, may we 
 be free from poverty for a hundred years and more' (Rig- , 
 veda Vn. 66. \6 ; Vaj.-Samhita XXXVI. 34). 
 
 The sixth Sanskara, called 'Food-giving' (Anna-prasana), 
 performed in the sixth month after birth, was of more im- 
 portance. The child was carried in the arms of its father and 
 
Tonsure and Shaving. 3 en 
 
 placed in the midst of a party of friends, including the family 
 priest, who offered prayers for its welfare and presented it 
 with gifts. A little solid food (generally rice) was then for the 
 first time put into its mouth, and various qualities were sup- 
 posed to be imparted, according to the nature of the food given, 
 whether rice, butter, honey, milk, or the flesh of partridges or 
 goats (see Asvalayana Grihya-s. I. 17). At the same time a 
 verse from the White Yajur-veda (II. 83) was recited. 
 
 After this sixth ceremony there was a pause, and the child 
 was allowed to develop in peace for two or three years. 
 
 The next important Sanskaras were those of ' Tonsure,' 
 'Shaving,' and 'Cutting off the hair' ((^laula, (iuda-karma, Ke- 
 santa, Kshaura). These were kindred operations, and may be 
 explained together 1. ' When performed for the first time they 
 were held to have a purificatory effect on the whole character. 
 In the case of a Brahman the ceremony of tonsure was per- 
 formed in the third year, but was often delayed, and sometimes 
 did not take place till the seventh or eighth year. According 
 to Asvalayana the child was to be placed on the lap of its 
 mother to the west of the sacred fire. The father was to 
 take up his station to the south of the mother, holding in his 
 hand twenty-one stalks of Kusa grass. He was to sprinkle the 
 head of the child three times with a mixture of warm water, 
 butter and curds. He was to insert three stalks of Kusa 
 grass seven times into the child's hair on the right side, 
 saying: ' O divine grass, protect him!' Then he was to cut off 
 a portion of the hair and give it to the mother, with recitation 
 of various texts, leaving one lock (sikhd or cuda) on the top of 
 the head, or occasionally |:hree or five locks, according to the 
 custom of the family. The operation of shaving was some- 
 
 ' Manu makes Kesanta, ' cutting off the hair,' a later Sanskara than 
 (faula or Kshaura, ' shaving ;' see note, p. 353. In the Roman Cathohc 
 Church the ceremony of tonsure is the first ceremony for devoting a 
 young man to the service of God. In England this is done by cutting off 
 a single lock ; actual shaving is dispensed with. 
 
360 Ear-boring. Initiation. 
 
 times regarded as a different ceremony from that of cutting. 
 It had to be continued after the age of puberty at regular 
 intervals throughout Hfe. 
 
 Another ceremony followed, called 'Ear-boring' (Karna- 
 vedha). This was treated by some as a distinct religious rite, 
 and had to take place after tonsure at three or five years of 
 age. Paraskara made it a Sanskara, but not so Asvalayana. 
 or Gobhila. The boy was fed with honey or something sweet, 
 and made to sit down with his face towards the eaSt. Then 
 two perforations were made in his right ear, and a particular 
 Mantra from the last hymn of the Sama-veda was recited. 
 Its first words may be thus translated : ' Let us hear what is 
 good with the ears, let us see what is good with the eyes.' 
 A similar operation was performed on the left ear, except that 
 three perforations were made and a different Mantra from the 
 Rig-veda (VI. 75. 3) recited. The text maybe thus translated ; 
 ' This bowstring drawn tight upon the bow and leading to suc- 
 cess in battle, repeatedly approaches the ear ^, as if embracing 
 its friend, and wishing to say something agreeable, just as a 
 woman makes a murmuring sound (in her husband's ear).' 
 
 The next Sanskara was ' Initiation ' (Upanayana). Brahmans 
 underwent this at eight years of age, Kshatriyas at eleven,' 
 Vaisyas at twelve, though it might be delayed to 16, 21, and 
 24 respectively. This and marriage were perhaps the most 
 important of all the Sanskaras. The nature of initiation 
 could scarcely be inferred from its name, Upanayana, which 
 simply means ' leading or bringing a boy to his Guru or 
 spiritual preceptor.' But in real fact, until the boy was so 
 brought, he could not be invested with the sacred thread, and 
 until he was so invested he could not be reckoned among the 
 ' twice-born,' and until he was spiritually regenerated by the 
 act of investiture he could not be permitted to use a single 
 
 ^ The only apparent reason for reciting this Mantra at the Karna-vedha 
 Sanskara is that the word Karjta occurs in it. 
 
The Sacred Thread or Cord. 361 
 
 prayer, or repeat the Veda, or engage in any single religious 
 service or sacrificial rite. Nor was any ceremonial observance 
 effectual unless the thread was worn. Indeed even in the 
 present day a Brahman before initiation has no right to any 
 other name than Vipra. It is only when he has been invested 
 with the sacred thread that he has a right to the title Dvi-ja, 
 ' twice-born.' Nor ought the name Brahman to be applied to 
 him until the assumption of the thread has qualified him to 
 learn the Veda (Brahma) by heart. 
 
 If we inquire a little closely into the nature of the sacred 
 symbol supposed to be capable of effecting so vast a trans- 
 formation in a human being's condition, we find that now, as 
 formerly, it consists of three slender cotton threads — white in 
 colour to typify purity, and tied together in one spot by a 
 sacred knot of peculiar construction (called brahma-granthi), 
 each of the three threads also consisting of three finer threads 
 tightly twisted into one. The construction of this cord is no 
 doubt simple, but it must be borne in mind that the thread when 
 formed is of no use unless blessed by Brahmans and consecrated 
 by the recitation of Vedic texts. The texts usually repeated 
 during the process of arranging the threads are the Gayatri 
 and certain other texts from the Black Yajur-veda. At the 
 same time holy water is repeatedly sprinkled on the cord 
 by means of Kusa grass. So soon as the Hindu boy had 
 been made regenerate by the solemn putting on of this mystic 
 symbol his religious education and spiritual life really began. 
 And now for the first time he was taught to repeat that 
 remarkable Vedic prayer for illumination called Savitri, or 
 Gayatri (from Rig-veda III. 6a. 10), thus translatable: 'Let 
 us meditate on that excellent glory of the divine Vivifier, may 
 he illumine our understandings,' — that most ancient of all 
 Aryan prayers, which was first uttered more than three 
 thousand years ago, and which still rises day by day 
 towards heaven, incessantly ejaculated by millions of our 
 Indian fellow-subjects. Then, again, every initiated boy was 
 
362 Four Stages of a Brahman's Life. 
 
 admitted to the privilege of reading and reciting other por- 
 tions of the Veda. He was taught to pronounce the sacred 
 syllable Om, the names of the seven worlds (Bhur, Bhuvar, 
 Svar, etc.), and other Vedic texts. He was furthermore re- 
 quired to learn by heart certain moral precepts taken from 
 Manu or other Sanskrit law-books, enjoining abstinence 
 from injury to others, unselfishness, truth, honesty, chastity, 
 and self-control (see Chap. XXI). The whole process of 
 teaching him these various formularies was by some re- 
 garded as a separate Sanskara called Vedarambha-sanskara, 
 or sometimes Vaidika upade.sa or Gayatrl upadesa. When 
 he had been thus initiated he was for the first time permitted 
 to perform other religious acts, such as the worship of 
 gods, saints, spirits and ancestors, but these were generally 
 deferred until, as a married man, he had a house of his own 
 and was able to undertake a householder's duties. 
 
 According to Manu a Brahman's life was properly to be 
 divided into the four states or stages (called Asramas) of 
 ' unmarried religious student ' (brahma-cari), ' married house- 
 holder' (grihastha), 'anchorite' (vana^rastha), ' religious mendi- 
 cant' (bhikshu) or ' abandoner of all worldly concerns ' (sannyasi). 
 Hence on investiture with the sacred thread (p. 360) he had to 
 leave his father and reside with a religious preceptor for 
 several years as an unmarried student, till he had acquired a 
 knowledge of the Veda, unless he took the vow of perpetual 
 [naishthika] celibacy or of a life-long brahma-cari. On leaving 
 his preceptor he performed the SaQskara called 'Return' 
 (Samavartana). This was formerly a solemn religious ob- 
 servance in which prayers were recited, ablutions performed, 
 and gifts given to his spiritual teacher. After its celebration 
 the youthful Brahman returned to his father's house, and not 
 till then was he supposed to take a wife and commence life as 
 a householder. This proves that early marriages were not 
 the rule in ancient times (compare p. 379). In real fact the 
 next Sanskara, or Marriage (Vivaha), was not performed till a 
 
Ancient Form of Marriage Ceremony. 363 
 
 man and woman were able to live in a house of their own. 
 According to Manu (IX. 90. 91), Gautama, Bodhayana, and 
 others, the postponement of marriage till three years after 
 puberty is not sinful. The whole detail of the ancient 
 marriage rite is given in the domestic rules (Grihya-sutras) of 
 Asvalayana, Gobhila, Paraskara, and others. A wife was to 
 be selected after proper inquiry as to family and condition. 
 Before the marriage ceremony an oblation of clarified butter 
 was to be offered in fire, with repetition of a Vedic text (Rig- 
 veda V. 3. 2). The following are some particulars of the 
 wedding ceremonial taken from Asvalayana (I. 7). 
 
 West of the sacred fire was placed a stone (for grinding 
 corn and condiments such as is used by women in all house- 
 holds), and north-east a water-jar. The bridegroom offered 
 an oblation, standing towards the west, and taking hold of 
 the bride's hands, while she sat down and looked towards the 
 east. If he wished only for sons he clasped her thumbs, and 
 if for daughters the fingers alone. Then, whilst he led her 
 towards the right three times round the fire and round the 
 water-jar, he said in a low tone : ' I am male, thou art female ; 
 come ; let us marry, let us possess offspring ; united in 
 affection, illustrious, well-disposed towards each other, let us 
 live for a hundred years.' Every time he led her round he 
 made her ascend the mill-stone, and said : ' Ascend thou this 
 stone, be thou firm as a rock.' Then the bride's brother, 
 after spreading melted butter on the joined palms of her 
 hands, scattered parched grains of rice on them twice. Then, 
 after pouring the oblation of butter on the fire, Vedic texts 
 were recited (especially from Rig-veda X. 85 i). Then the 
 
 ^ This is the Surya-sukta, or well-known Marriage-hymn of the Rig- 
 veda, translated by Prof. A. Weber in Ind. Studien, v. 177, etc., and 
 discussed in full by Dr. Haas. In that hymn we have a description 
 of the marriage of Surya daughter of the Sun to Soma (here probably 
 personified as the Moon), whereas in Rig-veda IV. 43. 6 the two Asvins 
 • are said to be Surya's husbands (compare p. 271). The Atharva-veda 
 has also many marriage-hymns and texts (see I. 14, and many in 
 Book XIV). 
 
364 Ancient Fire-worship. 
 
 bridegroom unloosed the two braided tresses of hair, one on 
 each side of the top of the bride's head, repeating the Vedic 
 text : ' I loose thee from the fetters of Varuna with which, the 
 very auspicious Savitri has bound thee ' (Rig-veda X. 85. 34). 
 Then he caused her to step seven steps towards the north- 
 east quarter, saying to her : ' Take thou one step for the 
 acquirement of force ; take thou two steps for strength ; take 
 thou three steps for the increase of wealth ; take thou four 
 steps for well-being ; take thou five steps for offspring ; take 
 thou six steps for the seasons ; take thou seven steps as a 
 friend ; be faithfully devoted to me ; may we obtain many 
 sons; may they attain to a good old age.' Then bringing 
 both their heads into close juxtaposition, some one sprinkled 
 them with water from the jar. 
 
 The fire used in the ceremonial was kindled by the friction 
 of two pieces of sacred wood called Aram (Rig-veda VII. 1. 1),- 
 and this same fire which witnessed the union of the young 
 couple was brought by them to their own home. There a 
 room on the ground-floor was consecrated as a sanctuary for 
 its reception and perpetual maintenance. Great reverence 
 was shown to the fire so kindled. It was never blown 
 upon with the mouth. Nothing impure was ever thrown 
 into it, nor was it ever used for warming the feet (Manu 
 IV. Si). 
 
 For what was the pious Brahman's idea of fire.' Two 
 texts of the Rig-veda assert that the Supreme Being deve- 
 loped the whole order of existing entities {ritam-ca satyam- 
 ia) through the operation of heat. Another verse of the 
 Rig-veda says : 'All gods are comprehended in fire ' (V. 3. t) ; 
 ' He surrounds them all as the circumference of a wheel does 
 the spokes' (V. 13. 6). In fact, fire was to a Hindu a visible 
 embodiment not only of heat but of all the other forces of 
 nature. It had three forms, as fire on earth, as lightning- 
 associated with rain and water— in the air, as the sun in the 
 heavens. And yet these three forms were often regarded 
 
Ancient Fire-worship. 365 
 
 as comprehended in the one form of earthly fire (see p. 16). 
 Hence fire was not merely a symbol of the Supreme Being's 
 presence among men. It was an emblem of His creative, 
 fostering, and disintegrating energies, a type of His three 
 eternal attributes, Life, Thought, and Joy. 
 
 The Sun, too, as fire in the Heaven, had a triune aspect. 
 It was called the ' three-stepped ' (tri-vikrama). It differed in 
 its attributes and qualities as the morning, the mid-day, and 
 the evening sun (see p. 34a). It was adored every day in the 
 oft-repeated Gayatrl prayer, which was in three measures, 
 though all three measures were connected in sense. And 
 yet there were not three Suns worshipped, but only three 
 forms of one Sun. 
 
 The Sun, however, was inaccessible and not always visible. 
 Fire could always be maintained, or, if extinguished, could be 
 rekindled whenever religious rites were performed. As a 
 general rule the householder was content with kindling the 
 sacred fire in a single hearth or circular clay receptacle. This 
 was called the Grihyagni, ' household fire,' and was sufficient 
 for all domestic ceremonies (smarta-karman). Those how^ 
 ever who were more pious, or who wished to engage in Vedic 
 sacrificial rites (srauta-karman) which were of a more com- 
 plicated character, took care to construct a more elaborate 
 Homa-sala, or room for fire-sacrifices, on the ground-floor. 
 In that sanctuary fire was kindled in three differently-shaped 
 receptacles, the fire in each having a different name [Aha- 
 •vanlya, Gdrhapatya, and Dakshina). When the sacred fire 
 was thus lighted it was regarded as a symbol of God present 
 in the house, — as the ' brilliant guest ' who lived in the midst 
 of the family (Rig-veda X. 91. a), the divine mediator who 
 bore the savour of daily offerings towards heaven, the golden 
 link of union between men on earth and the celestial denizens 
 of air and sky. 
 
 Every morning and evening the head of the family, with 
 his wife and children, went together into the room dedicated 
 
366 Ancient Fire-worship. 
 
 to worship ^- There they seated themselves around the sacred 
 
 hearth, saying : ' We approach thee, O fire, daily both morning 
 
 and evening, with reverential adoration in our thoughts.' 
 
 Then they fed the sacred fire^ with pieces of consecrated 
 
 wood (samidh), generally taken from the Palasa tree, and 
 
 with offerings of rice and butter, eating portions of this 
 
 offering themselves. The oblation thus cast into the flame 
 
 was supposed to ascend to the Sun. ' From the Sun,' says 
 
 Manu, ' it falls again in rain, from rain comes food, and from 
 
 food animals subsist' (III. 76). Then while they fed the 
 
 fire they chanted hymns ; they sang the glories of their 
 
 divine guest, calling him Father, King, Protector, Illuminator 
 
 of truth. They spoke of his subtle essence, of his universal 
 
 presence in all nature, in water, in plants, in the bodies of 
 
 men and animals. They prayed for forgiveness, saying: — 
 
 Deliver, mighty lord, thy worshippers. 
 Purge us from taint of sin, and when we die, 
 Deal mercifully with us on the pyre, 
 Burning our bodies with their load of guilt, 
 But bearing our eternal part on high 
 To luminous abodes and realms of bliss, 
 For ever there to dwell with righteous men. 
 
 They prayed also for prosperity in their worldly affairs, and, 
 if they were soldiers, for warlike sons and success in battle, 
 saying : ' Be ever present with us, O God of fire, for our good'.' 
 
 And here observe that as every religious idea was exag- 
 gerated by Brahmanism, so it was not enough for a pious 
 Hindu to be born twice during his earthly career. Even 
 when regenerated by the sacred thread, he was held to be 
 
 ' In Manu IX. 96 we read that religious rites are ordained in the Veda 
 to be performed by the husband together with the wife. 
 
 ''■ This was called the Homa Sacrifice. In the intervals of feeding the 
 flame the fire was allowed to smoulder. 
 
 ' Mr. M. M. Kunte has given a good account of ancient family fire- 
 worship in his Shad-darsana-dntanika, and many of my statements in 
 this chapter are based on his authority. For the Vedic texts used in the 
 worship of Fire and here paraphrased, see Muir's Texts, v. 197-220, 
 303-305, and my Indian Wisdom, p. 18. 
 
Ancient Sacrificial Rites. 367 
 
 again regenerated by his performance of the Homa or daily 
 sacrifice to fire. Manu says : ' The first birth is from the 
 natural mother, the second from the sacred thread, the third 
 from due performance of the sacrifice' (II. 169). 
 
 Of course, it was most important to keep the smouldering 
 embers of the sacred element perpetually burning. If through 
 any accident the flame was extinguished, the whole house- 
 hold fell into confusion. Everything went wrong until an 
 expiatory ceremony (prayascitta) — sometimes consisting of a 
 solemn fast observed by both husband and wife— had been 
 performed, and the fire was rekindled. 
 
 And this daily service was not all. Every fourteenth day 
 was to every pious and orthodox Hindu a high and holy 
 day. It was set apart for special religious observances. 
 Every new-moon day (darsa) and every full-moon day 
 (paurnamasa) the head of the family — whatever his rank 
 or occupation — laid them both aside. Clad in humble attire 
 and accompanied by his wife, he went into the woods. There 
 he collected fuel (samidh) and sacred sacrificial grass, placed 
 them on his head, carried them home, and made preparation 
 for the solemn fortnightly ceremonial. First he consecrated 
 the fuel, constructed seats and a kind of broom out of the 
 grass, spread deer-skins, and arranged the sacrificial instru- 
 ments, made of a particular kind of wood {khadir a' or sami), 
 on the domestic altar. Then, with the assistance of his wife, 
 he prepared the sacrificial cake. Having consecrated a cer- 
 tain quantity of rice — called nirvdpa — and pounded it in a 
 mortar with a proper pestle, he kneaded the flour with his 
 own hands into a ball. This was laid on eight fragments 
 of brick [kapala), taken up in a particular order, and placed 
 in a circle on the fire. The ball of flour was then shaped 
 into a rounded sacrificial cake {puro-ddsa) resembling the 
 back of a tortoise, and, when baked, taken off the fire. 
 Clarified butter was next poured by means of wooden ladles 
 five times into the fire — such oblations being called the 
 
368 Ancient Soma-sacrifices. 
 
 panca-praydga — and other oblations of butter — called Ajya — 
 were made to various gods. The consecrated cake was then 
 cut up, and the pieces {avaddna) were sprinkled with butter 
 and thrown into the flames in the name of various deities, 
 including the god of fire himself. Other portions were also 
 reverently eaten by the assembled family, hymns were 
 chanted, the sins of the past fortnight confessed, repent- 
 ance expressed, and forgiveness asked. The whole cere- 
 monial was not always performed by husband and wife alone. 
 If they were rich they sent for regularly ordained priests — 
 generally four in number — who kindled fire from two pieces 
 of sacred wood (arani) by friction, and carried out the detail of 
 the ritual with great elaboration and with all the sacrificial im- 
 plements — including a sacred sword for keeping off demons — 
 and, of course, with greater merit to the householder. 
 
 Then every four months another ceremony, called the Ca- 
 turmasya sacrifice, was performed at the beginning of the 
 three seasons. Probably this was solemnized, like a harvest- 
 thanksgiving, in gratitude for the fruits of the earth, gathered 
 in at the end of the three seasons of summer, autumn, and 
 winter. It was conducted with as much solemnity as the 
 fortnightly rite, and in much the same manner. Another 
 special sacrificial ceremony on a grander scale, with the 
 addition of animal sacrifice (Manu IV. 26, VI. 10), was usually 
 performed half-yearly at the summer and winter solstice 
 [tittardyana, dakshindyana). 
 
 Finally, every householder instituted once a year a Soma- 
 sacrifice (Jyotishtoma), when the first hymns, called Pavamana, 
 from Mandala IX. of the Rig-veda (beginning Svadishthaya 
 Madishthaya) were recited. This was a ceremony requiring 
 at least sixteen different priests, who were well paid for its 
 effective celebration. The simplest annual Soma-sacrifice, 
 called Agnishtoma, lasted for five days. Others were protracted 
 for weeks and months, and there were even sacrificial sessions 
 {sattrd) which lasted for years. And in these public rites^ 
 
Soma-sacrifices. Funeral Ceremonies. 369 
 
 usually called Srauta-karman, to distinguish them from 
 Smarta-karman, or domestic rites — two entirely new elements 
 were introduced ; first the flesh of slaughtered animals, and 
 secondly the juice of the Soma plant mentioned before (pp. 
 la ; 13 ; 32 ; 0,0,0). At one time all kinds of animals were 
 sacrificed, as, for example, horses (see p. 329), but in the end 
 a goat was usually selected. Parts of the flesh were burned 
 as offerings to the gods, and parts were eaten by the priests. 
 
 But the great central act of the whole ceremony was the 
 presentation of the exhilarating Soma-juice to the gods, some 
 of it being poured out for the deities and some being drunk 
 by the performers and institutors of the sacrifice. This was 
 done on the fifth day at the morning, midday, and evening 
 libations {savana). In fact the animal sacrifice, though it 
 preceded the Soma-libation, was really subordinate to it. 
 The idea seems to have been that the sacrificer killed the 
 animal instead of sacrificing himself; and as the body of the 
 animal when sacrificed in the fire was borne upwards to 
 the gods, so did the sacrificer — represented by the animal — 
 ascend to the skies. It was only after he had been thus 
 admitted to the society of the gods in heaven that he be- 
 came fit to quaff the divine beverage, and to become one 
 with the heavenly king Soma himself. 
 
 Indeed this purifying and invigorating juice, supposed 
 to confer physical strength and to make the heart of men 
 and gods glad, came to be regarded as the water of life — 
 the nectar which purified body and soul and conferred 
 immortality. It was then itself personified and deified. The 
 god Soma was the Bacchus of India, and the fermented 
 juice of the Soma plant was in ancient times to the Indian 
 community very much what the juice of the grape was to 
 the Greeks and Romans (compare p. la). Happily for 
 Indian households, the drinking of stimulating liquor has 
 never been permitted except at special religious ceremonials. 
 
 Bb 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 The Hindu Religion in Modern Family-life. 
 
 Turn we now to the daily life of the modern householder. 
 And what I shall have to say will refer mainly to the castes 
 corresponding to Brahmans, Kshatriyas, and Vaisyasi ^j^q 
 alone have a right to the title ' twice-born,' and to go through 
 the Sanskaras supposed to purify the child from the taint con- 
 tracted in the womb. It will be seen that Hinduism is still 
 an affair of minute ceremonial and elaborate purificatory rites, 
 yet without any central ecclesiastical authority having power 
 to enforce or regulate their appUcation. 
 
 Of the twelve Sanskaras only a few remain in force. Passing 
 over the first four, which have now fallen into desuetude, 
 we come to the Name-giving ceremony (Nama-karana), per- 
 ^ formed about the tenth or twelfth day after birth. 
 
 It is worth while to take note here of a superstitious idea 
 which prevails very generally throughout India, that on the 
 sixth day after birth the Creator writes the child's future 
 destiny on its forehead. Yet I know of no special ceremony 
 instituted to mark this particular day, or to propitiate the 
 deity on so momentous an occasion. 
 
 With regard to the present custom of Name-giving, the 
 ceremony is performed in some parts of India on the day 
 when the child is first fed with a little rice. Then to 
 secure good fortune a boy is usually called after some 
 favourite god (ishta-devata) ^ ; for example, Krishna, Gopala, 
 
 ' These are Manu's three chief castes. The Brahmans claim to be the 
 only pure one left. See pp. 53, 452 of this volume. 
 
 ^ But not so usually in former days. Witness such names as Panini, 
 Patafijali, Saunaka, Asvalayana, etc. 
 
Modern Name-giving. 371 
 
 (Gopal), Rama, Rama-candra, Narayana, Siva, Sahkara^, 
 Ganesa ; or the name may indicate that he is to be the god's 
 servant, as, for instance, Rama-dasa (Ram-das), Krishna-dasa, 
 Narayana-dasa (Narayan-das), Lakshml-dasa. Often the ho- 
 norific affix Ji (probably thought to be auspicious as derived 
 from either the root jiv, ' to live,' or ji, ' to conquer ') is added 
 to the name, as in Rama-jl (Ram-ji), Siva-jl, Deva-ji. Candra, 
 the moon — corrupted into Candar and Cand — is believed to 
 bring good luck when used in a name (Moti-cand, etc.). 
 
 Again, in the present day as in ancient times, the names of 
 girls, like those of boys, are often taken from those of god- 
 desses, such as Lakshmi, Durga, Sita, Radha ; or from cele- 
 brated women, such as Savitrl, Yasoda, Subhadra, Sumangala ; 
 or from rivers, such as Ganga, Yamuna, Bhagirathl, Godavari, 
 Narmada, Krishna ; or from jewels, such as Manak (for San- 
 skrit Manikya), a ruby ; Moti (Sanskrit Mukta), a pearl ; 
 Rattan (Sanskrit ratna), a precious stone ; Mani, a gem ; or 
 from ilowers, such as Padma, a lily ; Phulli, a blossom ; or 
 from words like Sundari, beautiful ; Prema, love, etc. 
 
 It is often considered unlucky, and not unlikely to bring 
 down a judgment on a child, if the name it receives is in- 
 dicative of any good quality it may happen to possess at 
 birth. Therefore it is not uncommon for a fair child to be 
 called ' Black' (Krishna). Moreover, a parent will sometimes 
 , give an infant an ugly or inauspicious name from a super- 
 stitious fear that the child's beauty may excite the envious 
 glances or ' evil eye' of malicious persons ; for it is remarkable 
 that when a family has suffered early bereavements by death 
 these are attributed, to evil influences exerted through the 
 instrumentality of the human eye (see p. 353). 
 
 As a general rule, the name given on the tenth day is only 
 that by which the child is commonly known and addressed 
 
 ^ Narmada-saiikar is the name of a celebrated living GujaratI 
 poet. 
 
 B b a 
 
372 Birth-record and Horoscope. 
 
 in conversation. But the infant often receives a second or 
 private name, which is considered to be its real name, and is 
 whispered inaudibly by its parent or the family preceptor 
 (guru), and not revealed to others. The idea is that a man's 
 name is in some mysterious manner connected with his per- 
 sonality, and the object of concealing it is to protect him 
 from the power of sorcerers, who are unable to injure him by 
 their enchantments unless they know and can pronounce his 
 real name^ 
 
 I ought to mention, too, that besides the common name 
 and the secret name, another is generally added which may 
 be called the astrological name, because it contains a letter 
 from the name of the constellation (nakshatra) under which 
 the child was born. It is well known that nothing of im- 
 portance is done by a true Hindu without consulting the 
 stars. Therefore soon after the Name-giving ceremony has 
 been performed the family Astrologer (Jyotisha, corrupted 
 into Jyoshi or Joshl) is sent for and commissioned to draw 
 up a horoscope of the exact time of the child's nativity, the 
 constellation under which it was born, with a prophecy of 
 the duration of its life, and the circumstances, good or evil, 
 of its probable career. This is called the birth-record (Janma- 
 patra). It is always written in Sanskrit, and, if the parents 
 are rich, sometimes on a roll sixty yards long, takes three or 
 four months to prepare, and costs a large sum of money. 
 The name given in the horoscope is the Nakshatra name, 
 and not the one given at the Name-giving ceremony. For 
 example, if the child's common name is Yadava dandra 
 Ghosh, this name is not mentioned in the horoscope, but a 
 different name is given, such, for example, as Raghu-natha, 
 
 ^ It is well known that no wife in India likes to utter her husband's 
 name. According to Sir J. Lubbock a Sumatran scrupulously abstains 
 from pronouncing his own name, and a similar superstition prevails among 
 the Negroes, Abyssinians, and Australians. 
 
Translation of Horoscope. 373 
 
 or Hari-hara ^. I subjoin a translation of part of a genuine 
 Janma-patra or horoscope ^ : — 
 
 Adoration to the Sun. May the Sun and all other planets and stars 
 and constellations prolong the life of him for whom this horoscope is 
 prepared. Let that series of characters which is written by the Dis- 
 poser of all things on the forehead of the child, and which is another 
 name for Astrology, be seen clearly by eyes purified by the same science. 
 May good fortune smile on the instant which came to pass after 1784 
 years, 7 months, 26 days, 22 dandas, and 27 palas of the era styled the 
 Sakabda had passed aWay, or after 1269 years, 7 months, 26 days, 22 
 dandas, and 27 palas of the era styled the Sana had passed away. 
 
 First, the measure of the day of birth is 26 dandas, 35 palas, o vipala, 
 and of the night is 33 dandas, 25 palas, o vipala; of half the day, 13 
 dandas, 17 palas, 30 vipalas, and of half the night 16 dandas, 42 palas, 
 30 vipalas ; of a fourth part of the day, 6 dandas, 38 palas, 45 vipalas ; 
 and of a fourth part of the night 8 dandas, 12 palas, 15 vipalas ; of an 
 eighth part of the day, 3 dandas, 19 palas, 22 vipalas ; and of an eighth 
 part of the night 4 dandas, 10 palas, 37 vipalas. 
 
 The moment of his birth being next after the 27th pala, after the 22nd 
 danda of the day, the child was born in that eighth part of the day which 
 was presided over by the planet Sukra (Venus), and in that danda of the 
 day which was presided over by Rahu, and consequently the aspect of 
 Rahu was then not such that it could have had its position in the same 
 degree with the constellation of the child's birth or with any of the co- 
 ordinate constellations (compare p. 345). 
 
 At the instant following the 27th pala, after 22 dandas of the 27th day 
 of the solar month of Agrahayana, being a Thursday and the 5th day of 
 the fortnight succeeding the full moon, in that lagna or period during 
 which the constellation Aries was visible in the sky, and which was ruled 
 over by Mars, in that half of the lagna which was guarded by the Moon, 
 and in that 3rd part of the lagna which was governed by Jupiter, etc., 
 the second son of * * * * * was born under the star Aslesha, and when 
 the moon had revolved to the constellation Cancer. 
 
 The child, who will live a long life and be capable of attaining to great 
 
 prosperity, belongs to the Devari-gana or demon class, and to the Vipra- 
 
 varna or Brahnian caste, and his astrological name is Harihara Devasarma. 
 
 To him doth this horoscope of happy results belong. 
 
 As the deity presiding over his birth-lagna is propitious, the child will 
 
 ' The Rev. Nehemiah Goreh (a converted Brahman) told me that each 
 Nakshatra or constellation has four divisions, and that he was born under 
 the third, in which the letter r occurs. Hence his Nakshatra name was 
 R-aghu-natha. It might just as well have been Rama or any name in 
 which the letter R occurs. 
 
 ^ The late Mr. Woodrow, Inspector of Schools, is my authority here. 
 
374 Modern Shaving. 
 
 turn out to be a person of a good disposition and a "favourite of fortune, 
 he shall beget many sons, and have ample dwelling-places, enjoy plea- 
 sures, and possess gems of various descriptions. 
 
 Now are to be described the planetary periods according to the birth- 
 star of the child. He was born under the star of Aslesha, and hence 
 2 years 4 months and 18 days of the lunar period were passed, and 
 I year 4 months and 12 days of the same remained, at the date of 
 the child's birth. The result of this shall be the gain of clothes by 
 the boy. The age of the boy will be I year 4 months 12 days at the 
 expiration of the period of the Moon ; 9 years 4 months 12 days at 
 the expiration of the period of Mars, which is 8 years ; 26 years 4 months 
 12 days at the expiration of the period of Mercury, which is 17 years; 
 36 years 4 months 12 days at the expiration of the period of Saturn, 
 which is 10 years; 55 years 4 months 12 days at the expiration of 
 the period of Jupiter, which is 19 years ; 67 years 4 months 12 days at 
 the expiration of the period of the Earth's shadow, which is 12 years; 
 88 years 4 months 12 days at the expiration of the period of Venus, which 
 is 21 years. 
 
 With regard to the right of tonsure or shaving described at 
 p. 359, it is to be observed that in modern times rich people 
 are shaved every day, ordinary people once a week, poor people 
 once a fortnight. No one, as a general rule, shaves himself, 
 or even cuts his own nails. Both these necessary acts are 
 performed by a caste of barbers (napita), and ought not to be 
 carried on in a room, for the simple reason that fragments 
 of hair and nail-parings are supposed to cause pollution. 
 The operation is usually conducted under a shed or tree, or 
 in an open verandah or street. Numbers of barbers may be 
 seen plying their occupation every morning outside the houses 
 of a native town. 
 
 In former days, as we have seen, a Brahman had to part 
 with all his hair except a tuft at the top of his head, this 
 top-knot (sikha) and the sacred thread being the two chief 
 badges of Brahmanhood. Only when he became a Sannyasi 
 (see p. 36a) was he allowed to dispense with these two badges. 
 
 In the present day few persons, except Brahmans of the 
 strictest orthodoxy, allow themselves to be reduced to a 
 single tuft on the top of their heads ; but every respectable 
 Hindu who has reached puberty gets rid of the hair on his 
 
Modern Tonsure. 372 
 
 face ^ (except his mustaches), unless he is an ascetic 2, or has 
 taken some other religious vow, or belongs to the very lowest 
 castes. It should also be noted that special religious shavings 
 are performed at sacred places of pilgrimage on the banks of 
 rivers, and are held to be very efficacious in purifying soul 
 and body from pollution. Persons who have committed great 
 crimes or are troubled by uneasy consciences, travel hun- 
 dreds of miles to Prayaga (Allahabad), Mathura (Muttra), or 
 other holy places for the sole purpose of submitting them- 
 selves to the tonsbrial skill of the professional barbers who 
 frequent such localities. There they may be released from 
 every sin by first being relieved of every hair and then plung- 
 ing into the sacred stream. Forthwith they emerge new crea- 
 tures, with all the accumulated guilt of a long life effaced. 
 
 Women, on the other hand, are most careful to preserve 
 their hair intact. They pride themselves on its length and 
 weight. For a woman to have to part with her hair is one 
 of the greatest of degradations, and the most terrible of all 
 trials. It is the mark of widowhood. Yet in some sacred 
 places, especially at the confluence of rivers, the cutting off 
 and offering of a few locks of hair (Venl-danam) by a vir- 
 tuous wife is considered a highly meritorious act. 
 
 A Brahman gentleman of high rank in India once described 
 to me how he had taken his wife for the performance of this 
 ceremonial to Prayaga, which, as the point of meeting of the 
 Ganges and Jumna, is regarded as one of the holiest places of 
 pilgrimage in India. She was escorted to the banks of the 
 river by a troop of priests — there called Prayagwal — carrying 
 cocoa-nuts, areca-nuts, flowers, kunkuma, etc. At the conflu- 
 ence she was made to sit down and offer worship (puja) to the 
 
 ' This, in most parts of India, is ' one point of distinction between 
 Hindus and Muhammadans, whose former hatred of each other made 
 them adopt opposite practices out of mere antagonism. 
 
 "^ Some Sannyasis allow all their hair to grow, some shave it all off, 
 including the Sikha. These latter are the most orthodox. 
 
376 Teeth-cleaning. Ear-boring. 
 
 Ganges. Then one of the priests recited certain texts' and 
 prayers from the Veda, and holding a pair of golden scissors 
 in his hand cut off about two inches of her long hair. The 
 locks thus severed were deposited as a precious offering in 
 a costly metal vessel, but not without the addition of five 
 rupees to make the gift more acceptable. Then the husband, 
 in ratification of the ceremony, poured water into the hand 
 of the priest, who thereupon took the money for himself and 
 cast the locks of hair into the river. The shorn woman re- 
 garded this presentation of her precious locks to the river- 
 goddess as a great privilege, for it can only be performed by 
 a devoted wife who is living virtuously with her husband, and 
 only in his presence. 
 
 I may observe here that if a really orthodox Hindu woman 
 ever loses her hair or becomes partially bald from sickness 
 or any other cause she never resorts to the artifice of using 
 false hair. She would consider herself eternally defiled and 
 condemned to prolonged suffering in a future state of existence 
 by such an act. 
 
 It may be mentioned in connection with the religious duty 
 of shaving that daily teeth-cleaning is also regarded as a re- 
 ligious act partaking of the nature of a ceremonial observance. 
 It is performed, like shaving, in the open air. Any one who 
 passes through a native village in the early morning may see 
 a large proportion of its population engaged in the serious 
 duty of cleansing their teeth. The instrument used is a twig 
 or small stick. After its application to the teeth the twig 
 serves the purpose of cleaning the tongue— another important 
 duty. It is never used a second time, but always thrown 
 away. No words can express the abhorrence with which a 
 strict Hindu regards the European practice of using a tooth- , 
 brush a second time. Saliva is of all things the most utterly 
 polluting. 
 
 Ear-boring is also a religious ceremony. Girls have their 
 ears bored about the same age as boys (see p. 360), but often 
 
Betrothal. Initiation. 377 
 
 have three perforations made in each ear, besides one in the 
 left nostril. Nose-rings are universal among women in all 
 parts of India. Even boys in some places have one nostril 
 bored, but this is an exceptional circumstance. 
 
 The ceremony of betrothal (vag-dana) generally succeeds 
 tonsure and ear-boring, but is not reckoned among the 
 Sanskaras. In India a parent's first thought for its child 
 is not for its health — not for its wealth — not for its physical, 
 moral or mental well-being — but for its betrothal and mar- 
 riage. To look out for a child's future wife, to lay by money 
 for the cost of the nuptial festivities, to fee and conciliate the 
 priests who promote the match — these are far more important 
 duties than to make arrangements for a boy's proper educa- 
 tion. When a boy attains the age of five his father deputes a 
 professional match-maker (Ghataka) to negotiate a promise of 
 marriage with the daughter of a man of at least equal caste. 
 It must be admitted that caste-equality in India is regarded 
 as a more important requisite than riches. Money is quite a 
 secondary consideration. Nor is character so important. In 
 some parts of Northern India the match-maker for some; 
 castes is the family barber ; but for the higher castes he is 
 more generally a Brahman, who goes about from one house 
 to another till he discovers a baby-girl of suitable rank. 
 Forthwith he reports to one of the parents that the young 
 lady has all her members complete — the full number of eyes, 
 teeth, fingers and toes — and to the other that the young 
 gentleman is equally perfect in every particular. Next, he 
 brings the two parents together. Genealogies are investi- 
 gated, and pedigrees certified. Then the boy and girl are 
 solemnly betrothed. This is called in Sanskrit vag-ddna, 
 and in Hindustani nisbat. 
 
 The important SanskSra of initiation (upanayana) into 
 the Brahmanical religion by investiture with the sacred 
 thread is restricted to the castes corresponding to Brahmans, 
 Kshatriyas, and Vaisyas (p. 360). Once invested with this 
 
378 Initiation. 
 
 hallowed symbol of second birth, the twice-born man never • 
 parts with it. In this respect he has an advantage over his 
 Christian brother. For the latter is admitted into the Church 
 by a single ceremony performed in his infancy, and brought 
 to his recollection by one other ceremony only; whereas the 
 Indian twice-born man has a sacred symbol always in contact 
 with his person, which ^must always be worn and its position 
 changed during the performance of his daily religious services, 
 constantly reminding him of his regenerate condition, and 
 with its three white threads, united by a sacred knot, per- 
 petually setting before him a typical representation of what 
 may be called the triads of the Hindu religion. For ex- 
 ample, it is probable that the triple form of the sacred thread 
 symbolizes that the Supreme Being is Existence, Thought, 
 and Joy (p. 34) ; that He has been manifested in three forms as 
 Creator, Preserver, and Disintegrator of all material things ; 
 that He pervades the three worlds, Earth, Air, and Heaven ; 
 that He has revealed His will in three principal books called 
 the Rig, Yajur, and Sama Vedas, with other similar dogmas of 
 the Hindu system in which the sacred number three con- 
 stantly recurs. I have heard a Brahman described as the 
 greatest of all ritualists. This is true in regard to the multi- 
 plicity of rites which he ought to perform. But his ritualism 
 in the present day is confined to private worship and domestic 
 ceremonies, and his ritualistic vestments are restricted to the 
 sacred coil of cotton thread, the name of which (yajnopavita) 
 denotes that it is put on (upavlta) during the performance of 
 devotional rites .(yajna). And just as a Roman Catholic priest 
 changes his ecclesiastical vestments according to variations in 
 his own ceremonial, so the Brahman alters the position of his 
 thread. For example, when he worships the gods he puts it , 
 over his left shoulder and under his right, being then called 
 Upavitl; when he worships" his departed ancestors he sus- 
 pends it over his right shoulder and under his left, being then 
 called Pradinavitl ; and when he worships the saints he hangs 
 
Marriage Ceremonies. 379 
 
 it round his neck like a long necklace, being then called 
 Nivlti. It would be premature to pursue the subject of 
 domestic worship until we have given some account of 
 
 Marriage Ceremonies. 
 
 We have seen (p. 36a) that in ancient times the young ^ 
 Brahman, after his initiation, left his father's house and resided 
 for several years as an unmarried student with a religious 
 preceptor. At present a boy's initiation is followed im- 
 mediately afterwards by a mere formal performance of the 
 rite called ' Return ' (Samavartana, p. 362), and generally, after 
 a day or two's interval, by the ceremony of marriage. That 
 is, he is made, while still a boy at the age of about nine or 
 ten and before he is really marriageable, to go through the 
 second matrimonial act with a girl of about seven, his previous 
 betrothal having constituted the first, and cohabitation at the 
 age of fifteen or sixteen with his child-wife at the age of twelve 
 (but see note, p. 387) constituting the third. In fact, a Hindu 
 marriage is a kind of drama in three acts. But the second is 
 the religious and legal ceremony, and is a most tedious 
 process, involving large fees to the priests and festivities 
 prolonged for many days, at a cost, in the case of rich 
 people, of perhaps 100,000 rupees. Often the savings of 
 a whole lifetime are so spent. This is one of the greatest 
 evils of Indian society. Every well-to-do parent is compelled 
 to squander large sums on mere idlers and pleasure-seekers, 
 instead of giving the money as a grant in aid to the newly- 
 married pair on first starting in life. He knows, in fact, that 
 if he were to allow the wedding to be conducted with an eye 
 to economy he would sink irretrievably in the estimation of 
 his friends and caste-fellows. He would never be able to 
 hold up his head again in his own social circle. Nor must 
 it be supposed that he spends his money unwillingly. On the 
 contrary, the more lavishly he spends the more pride and 
 
380 Marriage Ceremonies. 
 
 satisfaction he afterwards feels in looking back on what he 
 regards as the most meritorious act of his life . 
 ' As to the two persons chiefly concerned in a wedding, their 
 wishes are never consulted about any of the arrangements. 
 Yet it is thought highly important to consult the stars. A 
 wedding ought never to take place except in a fortunate 
 month and during fortunatedays. The most favourable time 
 is believed to be in spring — that is in the three or four months 
 from February to April and May. The months generally chosen 
 are Magha, Phalguna, and Vaisakha ^- It is out of the power 
 of any European, to whom the inner apartments of Indian 
 households are forbidden ground, to give a complete descrip- 
 tion of the entire marriage ceremonial. The more ancient 
 form has already been described at p. 363. The modern 
 ceremonies — which last for many days — are marked by many 
 similar acts, and especially by the following essential features : 
 the night procession of the bridegroom to the house of the 
 bride, tying the vestments of bride and bridegroom together 
 with a piece of consecrated cloth under which their hands are 
 joined, winding a cord round their necks, marking their faces 
 with paint, making them walk three times round the sacred fire, 
 each time in seven steps ^, with repetition of prayers and 
 Vedic texts. Noisy music during some part of the ceremony 
 is held to be essential. In fact no one in India would believe 
 in the validity of a marriage ceremony conducted without 
 loud and often uproarious festivities. For it is a common idea, 
 which no contact with European habits of thought has yet 
 eradicated, that the efficacy of religious services is greatly 
 enhanced by noise. 
 
 Every sort of deafening musical instrument is brought into 
 
 ^ In one way the expense of marriages acts beneficially ; for although 
 it is lawful for a Hindu to have more than one wife, scarcely any one can 
 afford to do so, 
 
 ^ In some parts of India Caitra is avoided. 
 
 ' This part of the ceremony is called the Sapta-padi, and generally 
 comes last (see p. 364). 
 
Marriage Ceremonies. 381 
 
 requisition. Players on trumpets, horns, pipes, and drums 
 are eagerly sought for, and every performer seems intent on 
 overpowering the sounds produced by his fellow performers, 
 as if his musical reputation depended on his being heard 
 above the general din. 
 
 In the higher circles of Indian society the wedding enter- 
 tainments, often repeated for several days, are on a magnificent 
 scale, and when Europeans are invited every kind of expensive 
 luxury is provided for them. 
 
 Soon after my arrival at Bombay in 1875 I was invited to 
 be present at .the wedding of Sir Marigaldas Nathoobhai's 
 two sons. The festivities and religious ceremonies lasted for 
 eight days, and were on a scale of unusual magnificence. 
 Such a wedding is rarely witnessed even in India. The 
 residence of Sir Mangaldas was called Girgaum House — a 
 magnificent mansion in the middle of a large garden. When 
 we arrived at eight o'clock in the evening of the first day of 
 the ceremonies, both house and garden were brilliantly illu- 
 minated—all the trees festooned with Chinese lanterns, all 
 the lines of the architecture sparkling with light, and every 
 bed and fountain in the garden encircled with thousands of 
 coloured lamps. A splendid drawing-room blazing with light 
 was thronged with native gentlemen and Rajas, most of whom 
 sat round in a double row, intently gazing at the movements 
 and listening to the songs of two jewel-bedecked Nach 
 girls. These girls wore bright-coloured silk trousers and 
 were decorously enveloped in voluminous folds of drapery. 
 They did not really dance, but merely sang in a mono- 
 tonous minor key with continuous trills and turns of the 
 voice, while they waved their arms gracefully to and fro, 
 occasionally lifting one hand to the ear, and frequently ad- 
 vancing a few steps up the room and then retiring again, 
 closely followed from behind by two or three musicians who 
 played accompaniments on instruments called Sarangi and 
 Tabla (tom-toms). The loves, quarrels, and reconciliations 
 
o 
 
 82 Marriage Ceremonies. 
 
 of Krishna and his wives, especially his wife Radha, formed 
 the subject of their songs, which were kept up incessantly for 
 hours, no native spectators appearing to find them tedious. 
 I was told that a fee of 1000^ rupees is sometimes paid to a 
 first-rate Nach girl for one night's performance. 
 
 The European guests congregated in the balcony. From 
 that vantage ground we looked down on a sea of turbaned 
 heads and coloured dresses, brilliantly lighted up and set off 
 by a glorious background of cocoa-nut palms, tropical plants, 
 and trees in full foliage. It was like a fairy scene on enchanted 
 ground, and our host, with his high hat and spotless white 
 dress, might have been taken for the magician by whose art 
 the marvellous spectacle had been conjured up before us. 
 
 A more human exhibition of his power followed, when, 
 after garlanding us himself with jasmine wreaths, he beckoned 
 to his servants, who feasted us with iced champagne, and pre- 
 sented every European visitor with bouquets of roses sprinkled 
 with rose-water. Then we were all formally introduced to the 
 two bridegrooms, whose ages were about twenty and eighteen 
 — for our host was too enlightened a man to allow his sons to 
 marry when mere children — the brides, respectively aged 
 fourteen and twelve, being carefully kept out of sight. 
 
 On the fourth evening, when we were again invited, there 
 was a still greater assemblage of people. On our arrival a 
 vast multitude were preparing to accompany the night-pro- 
 cession to the houses of the brides. Again the whole garden 
 was illuminated. Again it was crowded with visitors, or 
 rather on this occasion literally alive and resonant with an 
 excited throng of about 5000 people, who surged like a 
 roaring ocean, while four bands of music struck up different 
 tunes in different parts of the grounds, and the same Nach = 
 girls entertained the guests in the drawing-room. 
 
 Then the procession gradually formed to conduct the bride- 
 grooms to the houses of the brides. The two bridegrooms in 
 superb dresses of gold tissue, with high jewelled hats— each of 
 
Marriage Ceremonies. 383 
 
 which was said to be worth two or three thousand pounds — 
 and necklaces of emeralds and diamonds, were placed on richly- 
 caparisoned horses covered with white flowers. Crimson um- 
 brellas were held over their heads, and silver fans waved 
 near them. About 3000 native gentlemen and 1000 ladies — 
 Hindu and ParsI — in brilliant coloured dresses, closely packed 
 and all talking and singing together, formed themselves into a 
 procession, while the bands led the way. The men went first, 
 then came the mounted bridegrooms, then two ladies carrying 
 lanterns, and then the whole crowd of ladies followed. 
 
 We European guests wound up the procession in car- 
 riages. At length we alighted and threaded our way through 
 a lane made for us into a large tent, where we found all the 
 ladies, gorgeously arrayed, and squatting, in what to us ap- 
 peared rather unladylike positions, on the ground around the 
 youngest of the bridegrooms, who was also squatting in their 
 midst. The crushing, jostling, and heat were intense, and 
 the talking, joking, and excitement quite bewildering. Mean- 
 while one of the brides was brought in and made to sit down 
 on the ground in front of the bridegroom. She was carried 
 in the arms of her uncle, her head and face closely veiled, 
 and covered with a deep red and yellow silk shawl of great 
 value. 
 
 Leaving this curious scene before it was concluded, we were 
 taken through the crush of people to the top of a gallery, 
 -whence we viewed another stage of the marriage ceremony. 
 This took place under another canopy equally crammed with 
 people. The crowd here was in a fever of excitement waiting 
 for the appearance of the elder bridegroom, who ought to 
 have been received by his mother-in-law. This however was 
 impossible, as she was a widow. Another lady, therefore, 
 came forward on his entrance and made a red mark on his 
 forehead. Next a number of Brahmans, after placing the 
 bridegroom on a stool, proceeded to worship the god Ganesa 
 —the god who, as we have seen (p. 216), defends every under- 
 
384 Marriage Ceremonies. 
 
 taking from the lets and hindrances caused by evil demons. 
 Sacred texts were also repeated, or rather muttered in an 
 inaudible tone. Then preparations were made for receiving 
 the bride, who was brought in by her maternal uncle and 
 placed on a stool opposite the bridegroom. Her face was 
 of course completely veiled, and her body kept bent, in token, 
 I presume, of maidenly modesty and fendinine humility. 
 
 At the same time two officiating priests squatted down on 
 one side of the pair, and the acting mother and father-in-law 
 on the other side. 
 
 The principal religious ceremony now began. First of all, 
 one of the Brahmans took a piece of consecrated cloth and 
 fastened one end of it to the bridegroom's dress and the other 
 to that of the bride. Next the hands of the bridegroom and 
 bride were joined together and crossed under this cloth, and 
 two ladies made marks with red paint on their faces and threw 
 garlands of flowers round their shoulders. After this, one of 
 the priests took a sacred cord and wound it round the necks 
 of bride and bridegroom, joining them thus together while mut- 
 tering prayers and Vedic texts (see p. '^fi'i,, note). Then the 
 bridegroom's hands were placed in milk. Sundry sprinklings 
 of red powder, rice grains, cocoa-nut milk, and water followed. 
 
 The remainder of the ceremony was very complicated and 
 tedious, and we were not allowed to witness it all. 
 
 The bridegroom and bride were, I believe, taken to another 
 room, where more red marks were applied and money pre- 
 sented by the bridegroom. Then they were brought back to 
 the tent, where earthen pots were placed at the four corners 
 and a consecrated fire lighted. Afterwards the bride and 
 bridegroom walked four times round the tent hand in hand. 
 Then the bridegroom put his arm round the bride's neck, and 
 threw barley, betel-nuts, and oil-seeds into the consecrated 
 fire, the Brahmans at the same time throwing in ghee, while 
 the pair walked three times round the sacred flames, each 
 time in seven steps as in the ancient ceremony (see p. 364). 
 
Marriage Ceremonies. 385 
 
 It is easy from all this to see that some portions of the 
 ceremonial are little changed since the time of Asvalayana 
 (see p. 'i^'^, whose collection of rules (sutras) was probably 
 composed about 2500 years ago. 
 
 About midnight, when the whole day's ritual was brought 
 to a close, the bride and bridegroom played together at a 
 kind of game like that known among schoolboys as odd and 
 even, money being used instead of marbles. More cere- 
 monies followed on the succeeding days, till on the eighth 
 day the bride and bridegroom went together to the temple 
 of Lakshmi (Maha-lakshmi), near Bombay, and worshipped 
 the goddess of Prosperity there. This was the grand finale. 
 The two brides then followed their husbands, and took up 
 their abode in the house of their father-in-law. The sums 
 spent on the festivities must have been enormous. 
 
 This remarkable marriage of two young , men of high rank 
 at the respective ages of 18 and 20 was quite an exceptional 
 occurrence. The legal ceremony is generally performed eight 
 or ten years earlier. It must not, however, be supposed that, 
 when a boy is thus married in childhood, he therefore begins 
 life early as a householder on his own account. His first 
 lessons in reading and writing probably commenced at the 
 time of his betrothal. When he has been made at the age 
 of 9 or 10, or a little later, to undergo the ceremony of 
 marriage, he is old enough to understand that he must com- 
 mence learning in earnest. His boyish education is there- 
 fore carried on till he and his wife have attained puberty 
 (generally at the age of 15 or 16 in the case of the boy and 
 II or 12 in the case of the girl). Then comes the third and 
 concluding matrimonial act, when he lives with his wife as her 
 actual husband (see note, p. 387). 
 
 Even then his education is by no means ended. He is still 
 a mere schoolboy or collegian residing at home with his 
 parents, and continuing to do so long after he has children 
 of his own. I have not unfrequently examined the senior 
 
 c c 
 
386 Choice of a Profession. 
 
 classes at Indian High Schools and Colleges in which most 
 of the boys have been fathers. 
 
 And here it should be mentioned that in Brahman families 
 of the present day a boy's parents may choose for him either 
 ^a religious or secular career. Brahmans, we know, are not 
 necessarily priests, but simply a class of men divided, like our- 
 selves, into two great divisions of clergy (sometimes designated 
 by the general term Bhikshukas) and laity (Grihasthas ^). 
 The clergy may be family priests (purohita) who perform the 
 Sanskara ceremonies, but are often very ignorant, or they 
 may be spiritual teachers (Gurus) who teach the mantras 
 and prayers, or they may be men trained in sacred learning. 
 These become either Vaidik priests and are sent to special 
 schools where they are trained in Vedic lore and ritual by 
 Vaidik and Yajnika priests, or they may be sent to native 
 schools of another sort, where they learn either grammar 
 (vyakarana) or philosophy, and become Sastrls or Pandits. 
 Those who are taught grammar also read the poems (kavyas). 
 Those who are trained in philosophy usually confine them- 
 selves to the Vedanta and Nyaya systems. These and the 
 Vaidik Brahmans^ generally become bigoted members of the 
 \clerical order. 
 
 As to the laity, or Grihasthas, they either go to native 
 institutions for secular education, or to some of the numerous 
 schools, high schools, and colleges established by us. Here 
 they learn English, study Shakspeare, Milton, Tennyson, etc. 
 instead of their own literatures, and aspire to become them- 
 selves writers of English, and even of English poetry. 
 
 ■' The term Grihastha ought properly to be restricted to ' a married 
 man and householder,' but is now applied generally to those Brahmans 
 who do not hve by priestly work, but by some worldly business, such as 
 that of a clerk, etc. 
 
 2 With regard to the Vaidik Brahmans, it should be noted that they 
 have really little to do with Vedic sacrificial rites (yajna, srauta-karman), 
 which are now out of fashion. Their chief work is connected with smarta- 
 karma or domestic ritual. 
 
Status of Women. 387 
 
 In" regard to women, the. general feeling is that they are the 
 necessary machines for producing children (Manu IX. 96); 
 and without children there could be no due performance of the 
 funeral rites essential to the peace of a man's soul after death. 
 This is secured by early marriages. If the law required the 
 consent of boys and girls before the marriage ceremony, they 
 might decline to give it. Hence girls are betrothed at three 
 or four years of age, and go through the ceremony of marriage 
 at seven to boys of whom they know nothing, and if these 
 boy-husbands die they remain virgin-widows all their lives. 
 They may be taken to their boy-husbands' homes at the age 
 of 10 and may even become mothers before 11 ^. Be it 
 observed, however, that the wives of India, unless they belong 
 to the upper classes, have complete freedom and are allowed 
 to go anywhere. It is noteworthy, too, that wives do not 
 adopt their husband's name, as European wives do. It is 
 only, theoretically that they merge their individuality in his. 
 Note, too, that they are generally loved, and that cruel treat- 
 ment by brutal husbands is unknown. Nay, Indian wives 
 often possess greater influence than the wives of Europe, and 
 one old grandmother will sometimes rule a whole household 
 with a rod of iron. It is true that, theoretically, they are 
 ignored as separate units in society. It is true that they 
 abstain from pronouncing their husband's name, calling him 
 simply ' lord,' or ' master,' or ' the chosen ' (vara) ; and they 
 themselves are never directly alluded to by their husbands 
 in conversation. It is true that for a male friend to mention 
 their names or even enquire after their health would be a 
 breach of etiquette. It is true, too, that their life is spent 
 in petty household duties, in superintending the family cuisine. 
 
 ' When the previous edition of this work was published the earliest age 
 for cohabitation was lo, but the raising of the age to 12 became law on 
 March 19, i8gi. It remains to be seen whether this law will become 
 almost a dead letter like the Act of 1856 for legalizing the marriage of 
 widows (but see p. 500). 
 
 c c a 
 
388 Status of Women. Householders duties. 
 
 in a wearisome round of trivial acts. It is even true that in re- 
 ligion they are theoretically placed on the same level as Sudras. 
 They are allowed no formal initiation into the Hindu faith, no 
 investiture with the sacred thread, no spiritual second birth. 
 Marriage is to them the end and aim of life, and the only 
 medium of regeneration. No other purificatory rite is per- 
 mitted to them. They never read, repeat, nor listen to the 
 Veda. Yet, for all that, the women of India are the main-stay 
 of Hinduism. They are its principal stronghold and fortress. 
 Without their support both Brahmanism and Hinduism would 
 rapidly collapse. 
 
 Of course those women of the upper classes who are 
 cooped up behind Pardahs in secluded apartments vegetate 
 in profound ignorance of the world around them, while the 
 duty of training and forming the character of their children is, 
 r fear, neglected by all. 
 
 Still the women of India are generally satisfied with their 
 position and desire no change. 
 
 Moreover it must be noted that the seclusion and ignorance 
 of women, which was once mainly due to the fear of the 
 Muhammadan conquerors, do not exist to the same degree in 
 provinces unaffected by the influence of those conquerors. 
 
 Nor are child-widows, though generally condemned to per- 
 petual mourning and to a life of domestic drudgery, treated 
 with equal harshness in all parts of India. 
 
 And before concluding I may direct attention to some 
 of the rules laid down by the ancient Hindu sage Vatsyayana 
 (author of the Kama-sutra ^) in regard to Indian domestic life. 
 
 In the first place he recommends parents to allow their 
 children complete freedom and indulgence till they are five 
 years of age. Then from five to sixteen they are to learn , 
 some of the fourteen sciences and the sixty-four arts. Among 
 
 ' An ancient but impure work quite as old as the first century of our 
 era. A book called 'Early Ideas,' by Anaryan, gives a summary of 
 Vatsyayana's rules, which I have found useful here. 
 
The Model Wife. 389 
 
 the sciences are comprised the Vedas, Puranas, law, medicine, 
 astronomy, arithmetic, grammar, etc. Among the arts are 
 singing, instrumental music, dancing, painting, composing 
 poems, chemistry, mineralogy, architecture, gymnastics, etc. 
 
 After education a man is to become a householder. He is 
 to win a suitable wife for himself by his own efforts, and not to 
 allow others to choose for him. The sage then expatiates on 
 the most approved methods of making love, and declares that 
 no fair maiden can ever be won without a good deal of talking. 
 The house in which the husband and wife are to live should 
 be in the neighbourhood of good men. 
 
 The wife is to keep her husband's secrets, never to reveal 
 the amount of his wealth, to excel other women in attention 
 to her husband, in cookery, in ruling her servants wisely, in 
 hospitality, in thrift, in adapting expenditure to income, and 
 in superintending every minute circumstance of her family's 
 daily life. Finally, she is to co-operate with her husband 
 in pursuing the three great objects of life — religious merit, 
 wealth, and enjoyment (kama) ; and to neglect the third is 
 as sinful as to neglect the other two. 
 
 This kind of perfect woman is called a Padmini, or lotus- 
 like woman. Three other kinds are specified : the Citrini, or 
 woman of varied accomplishments ; the Sankhini, or conch- 
 like woman ; and the Hastini, or elephant-like woman. 
 
 In ancient and medieval times women were not unfre- 
 quently Sanskrit scholars. 
 
 Here is a nearly literal version of the definition of a wife 
 
 given in Maha-bharata I. 3028, etc. : — 
 
 A wife is half the man, his truest friend ; 
 
 A loving wife is a perpetual spring 
 
 Of virtue, pleasure, wealth ; a faithful wife 
 
 Is his best aid in seeking heavenly bliss ; 
 
 A sweetly-speaking wife is a companion 
 
 In solitude, a father in advice, 
 
 A mother in all seasons of distress, 
 
 A rest in passing through life's wilderness. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Religious Life of the Orthodox Hindu Householder. 
 
 Let me next direct attention to the daily religious duties 
 of the orthodox married man who has attained to the position 
 of possessing a separate house of his own. 
 
 I pass over the home-life of the anglicized Brahman of 
 advanced ideas, who has been educated under the auspices 
 of the British Government, but has not on that account been 
 able to avert the calamity of marriage with an uneducated 
 and bigoted wife of his own rank, or rid himself of all the 
 troublesome fetters of custom and caste. Such a life com- 
 bines social conditions which are incompatible. The result 
 is unpleasing. A combination is produced which is not 
 unlike the unwholesome product of a forced chemical union 
 between elements which naturally repel each other. What 
 I desire rather to describe in this chapter is the religious life 
 of the husband and wife who strive to perform their daily 
 duties according to the orthodox Brahmanical usage of 
 more modern times. 
 
 And here it may be well to introduce the subject of the 
 householder's life by glancing at the arrangements of the 
 material house which forms his abode. 
 
 Of course the houses of the poor in villages or in the 
 native quarters of even large cities need no description. 
 They are mere mud erections with bamboo roofs and thatch, 
 Those of the' grade next above the poorest are little better. 
 
Arrangement of a Modern House. 391 
 
 They may be occasionally built of brick and may be one 
 story high, but have seldom more than two or three rooms. 
 Those of the richer classes, on the other hand, are always 
 constructed of brick or some durable material, and, like the 
 houses of Pompeii, usually have an interior court or quad- 
 rangle. A door from the street, and sometimes a handsome 
 archway, opens into this quadrangle, which is surrounded on 
 all sides by high walls. Over the archway or entrance is 
 a large room, which serves as a meeting-place for the men 
 of the family and their male visitors. A similar large and 
 airy apartment occupies the whole front of the house in 
 every story. 
 
 It is a melancholy fact that, as a general rule, all the 
 well -lighted rooms with windows and verandahs looking 
 into the street are appropriated by the male members of 
 the household. On each floor a gallery running round the 
 entire court-yard leads to small chambers scarcely worthy 
 of the name of rooms, where the female members of the 
 family are to be found by those who have the right of 
 entree. When there is no court-yard the women occupy 
 the upper floor, to reach which there is usually in one corner 
 a steep wooden staircase. The women's apartments either 
 look into the quadrangle below — where the family cows 
 or goats are often the chief objects of interest — or on a 
 dead wall, never on a street. There is little or no furniture 
 anywhere in the house, but in one room is a strong box con- 
 taining the family jewelry. The ground floor has a kjtchen, 
 which is usually also the dining-room. There are also the 
 store-rooms for grain and fuel, and even stalls for cattle. In 
 one of the lower apartments, or in an adjacent enclosure, 
 there is usually a well or reservoir for water. Here there are 
 numerous shelves with a store of well-burnished brass water- 
 vessels in constant readiness. 
 
 Another room on the ground floor is dedicated to daily 
 worship. 
 
392 Religious Services. 
 
 Here there is a small wooden temple (Mandira) or some 
 sacred receptacle for the household gods — the Indian Lares 
 and Penates — which in orthodox Brahman families — more 
 especially among the Maratha people — are generally five 
 consecrated symbols representing the five principal Hindu 
 gods ; to wit, the two stones (Sala-grama and Bana-linga), 
 described at p. 69 ; a metallic stone representing the female^ 
 energy in nature (Sakti) ; a crystal representing the Sun 
 (Surya); and a red stone representing Ganesa (Gana-pati), 
 the remover of obstacles (p. an). Here domestic worship 
 is commonly performed every day by each member of every 
 respectable Hindu family. Here, too, or in an adjacent 
 court, there is generally a sacred Tulasi plant (see p. 0,0,^, 
 to which the women of the family offer adoration. 
 
 Finally, in this part of the house the few remaining orthodox 
 (Smarta) Brahmans in different parts of India sometimes 
 maintain a sacred fire. For it must be noted here that, 
 although the ancient fire-worship and sacrificial ritual have 
 almost disappeared, yet at Benares and other strongholds of 
 Brahmanism a certain number of Brahmans of the old school 
 still offer daily oblations in a sacred fire which they main- 
 tain in their own houses, while they conform also to the more 
 recent practices enjoined in the Puranas. Even the old Vedic 
 Soma-sacrifices are sometimes performed by such men on 
 great public occasions. 
 
 For example, a Soma-sacrifice was instituted not long ago 
 at Poona, and at Wai near Mahabalesvar. Again, eight or 
 nine years ago a rich man, named Dhundhiraj Vinayak Sudas, 
 had three Agnishtomas, one Vajapeya, and one Aptoryama 
 sacrifice (all of them parts of the Jyotishtoma Soma-sacrifice) 
 performed at Alibag in the Konkan. He employed a vast 
 number of Pandits, Yajiiikas, Srotriyas, and Agnihotrls, and 
 spent at least ao,ooo rupees. In the course of the cere- 
 monies forty-two goats were killed. They were cooked on 
 the fire called Samitragni, and partly eaten by the priests, 
 
Religious Services. -t^^^-}, 
 
 partly offered in the sacrificial fire. At the end of each cere- 
 mony a supplementary sacrifice (called Avabhrita) was insti- 
 tuted with the sole object of atoning for mistakes, defects, or 
 omissions in carrying out the detail of the preceding ritual. 
 The supposed aim of all these elaborate and expensive cere- 
 monies was to secure the sacrificers' admission into heaven 
 (svarga) after death. 
 
 But such Vedic sacrifices are everywhere either obsolete 
 or obsolescent, and animals are now seldom killed in India, 
 except as offerings to the bloody goddess Kali— a goddess 
 unknown in Vedic times — who is supposed, as we have 
 already seen (p. 190), to delight in drinking blood, and, if 
 not satiated with the blood of animals, will take that of men ; 
 this kind of sacrifice (bali) being quite distinct from the old 
 Vedic Yajna, Homa, and Soma sacrificial rites. 
 
 But although the daily ritual acts of a modem Brahman 
 are founded on the teaching of the later sacred works, called 
 Puranas and Tantras, yet it is remarkable that the repetition 
 of Vedic texts (mantras) is still retained and is still essential 
 to the due performance of every modei-n religious service. 
 
 And let no one suppose that a pious Brahman's daily 
 services in the present day are less irksome or tedious 
 than they were in olden times. If he was then fettered, he 
 is now enchained. A modern Brahman of the orthodox \ 
 school will sometimes devote four or five hours a day to a 
 laborious routine of religious forms. Every faculty and/ \ 
 function of his nature is bound by an iron chain of traditional 
 observance. For example, his daily duties now comprise — \ 
 1. Religious bathing ; 2. Worship of the Supreme Being ' 
 by meditation and repetition of prayers etc. at the three 
 Sandhyas, or morning, midday, and evening semces (p. 401); 
 3- Brahma-yajna, or worship of the Supreme Being by a 
 formal repetition of the first words of every sacred book 
 (regarded also as an act of homage to all those saints and 
 sages to whom the Veda was revealed); 4. Tarpana, or the 
 
394 Religious Services. 
 
 threefold daily oblation of water to the secondary gods, to the 
 sages, and to the Pitris ; 5/ Homa, or sacrifice to fire by fuel, 
 rice, clarified butter, etc. (described at p. 366) ; 6. Deva-puja, 
 or the daily worship of the gods in the domestic sanctuary or 
 in temples ; but, as before stated (p. 352), Hinduism enjoins 
 no assembling together for congregational worship. 
 
 There is, moreover, the Vaisvadeva ^ service before the mid- 
 day meal, with offerings of food (called bali-harana) to all 
 beings (bhuta), including animals. There is the daily homage 
 to men by the offering of food, etc. to guests and beggars. 
 There is the solitary visit to the neighbouring temple, not 
 necessarily for prayer or praise, but simply for bowing before 
 the idol or for merely looking at it (darsana) after its decora- 
 tion by the idol-priest. There is the observance of solemn 
 fasts twice a month, and on other special days. There is the 
 reading of passages from some of the Puranas^, held to be 
 a highly meritorious act. There is the performance, if circum- 
 stances permit, of a pilgrimage to some holy shrine. Finally, 
 there is the last great Sanskara performed at death, called the 
 last sacrifice (antyeshti), when the body ought to be burnt by 
 the same sacred fire which was originally kindled by husband 
 and wife on the domestic hearth. This is an outline of an 
 orthodox Brahman householder's life in modern times. 
 
 I now proceed to fill in the details of some parts of the 
 picture more fully. 
 
 In the first place, then, the orthodox Brahman must rise from 
 his bed before sunrise. And be it observed that his wife must 
 be up and stirring long before him. She may have to light a 
 
 ^ Parasara does not include the Vaisvadeva in his account of the daily 
 duties. According to him there are only ' shat karmani,' six acts which 
 are nitya or ahnika acts, to be performed every day. These are— i. Snana, 
 2. Sandhya-japa, 3. Svadhyaya, 4. Pitri-tarpana, 5. Homa, 6. Devata- 
 pQjana. A Brahman's six duties as enjoined by Manu (X. 75) are 
 different. They are— i. repeating the Veda, 2. teaching it, 3. sacrificing,, 
 4. conducting sacrifices for others, 5. giving, 6. receiving gifts. '''■ 
 
 "^ Especially the Durga-mahatmya of the Markandeya-purana. 
 
Ordinary Dress. 395 
 
 lamp, give the children a few sweetmeats, sweep out the rooms, 
 sprinkle them with water, and occasionally smear the floor 
 with a mixture of moist earth and the supposed purifying 
 excreta of a cow. If she lives in a village and is poor — and a 
 high-caste family may often be poor — she will probably stick 
 cakes of this last substance on the outer walls of the house to 
 dry for fuel. Then perhaps her next act may be to spin a 
 little cotton, or to examine the state of the family garments. 
 
 And here a few particulars about the dress of the house- 
 hold may be suitably introduced. 
 
 The poorer classes in India are never oppressed by a super- 
 fluity of clothing. A shred of cloth round the loins satisfies a 
 poor working man's ideas of propriety. Great ascetics and 
 pretenders to extraordinary sanctity were once in the habit of 
 going about perfectly nude, until British law interposed to 
 prevent the continuance of the nuisance. Even respectable 
 Hindus are satisfied with two garments made of white cotton 
 cloth, one called the Dhoti, or waist-cloth, tucked round the 
 waist and reaching to the feet ; the other, called the Uttarlya, 
 a shawl-like upper garment without seam from top to bottom, 
 which is thrown gracefully round the shoulders like a Roman 
 toga. Often, however, an under-jacket, or close coat, cut into 
 form and called an Angaraksha or Angarakha (body-protector), 
 is worn under this upper garment. Sometimes also a piece 
 of cloth is carried over the arm to be used as a scarf in cold 
 weather. 
 
 It has been said by some writer of homely truths in England 
 that a good wife ought never to have ' a soul above buttons.' 
 Happily for a Hindu wife's peace of mind her husband's two 
 garments are gloriously independent of all fastenings. Nor 
 need she -trouble herself to learn needle-work. Yet in some 
 parts of India she considers it a high honour to be permitted 
 to wash any article of clothing which has covered the sacred 
 person of her lord and master. 
 
 In regard to head-coverings, the greater number of people, 
 
396 Dress and Jewelry. 
 
 including the poorer Brahmans, in Bengal, the Dekhan, and 
 Southern India never wear anything, though in cold weather 
 they like to muffle up their heads and faces in their upper 
 garments. In other places the better classes wear turbans 
 (Sanskrit Ushnisha'), which in Western and Northern India 
 are often made of a piece of fine cloth from twenty to fifty 
 yards long, folded according to the caste, and called Phenta^. 
 
 As to shoes, at least three-fourths of the inhabitants of 
 India never use them at all, and even the rich — except those 
 who are thoroughly Europeanized — dispense with stockings. 
 Those who wear leather shoes like to get rid of them when- 
 ever they can, not from any idea of the inconvenience of 
 leather, but from its supposed impurity. It is common for the 
 most dignified and refined gentlemen to come into one's pre- 
 sence with naked feet, leaving their shoes outside the room. 
 
 A woman's dress, like a man's, also consists of two pieces, 
 namely, a kind of bodice, and a long garment called a sarl(satl) 
 — sometimes ten or even fifteen yards long — which is first 
 tucked round the waist with many folds in front, and then 
 brought gracefully over the shoulder, and frequently over 
 the head. A third garment is now occasionally worn under- 
 neath, and some adopt the Muhammadan fashion of wearing 
 a kind of drawers. Happily for economical husbands, no 
 such thing as fashion in women's dress exists in the East. 
 Indeed it may be safely aflSrmed that there has been little 
 change in the character of woman's apparel for 3000 years. 
 
 But what the householder gains by his wife's moderation 
 in dress he loses by her taste for expensive jewelry and 
 ornaments. No woman would dare to hold up her head 
 among her female companions unless well provided with 
 a sufficient assortment of ornaments of eight principal kinds , 
 — nose-rings, ear-rings, necklaces, bracelets (commonly called 
 
 ^ In Bombay the Baniyahs wear high hats slanting backwards, and the 
 ParsTs do the same. 
 ' When made up into a head-dress it is called Pagri. 
 
Omens. 397 
 
 bangles), armlets, finger-rings, anklets and toe-rings, and some 
 of these, notably the nose-rings, often contain costly gems. 
 
 As to children's attire, the children of the rich are for the 
 most part innocent of all clothing till about the third year, 
 while those of the poor run about as they came into the world 
 up to six or seven years of age, without a single encumbrance, 
 except possibly a waistband and a few wrist-ornaments. 
 
 To return to the duties of the householder's wife (grihini). 
 One of her earliest acts, if she is poor, will be to bruise the 
 rice, cleanse it from husk, or grind some kind of grain. Then, 
 whether rich or poor, she must above all things attend to her 
 kitchen ; and make it a model of absolute cleanliness — nay 
 more, a sacred inviolable spot which nothing impure must 
 ever enter (see: p. ia8). 
 
 With regard to the actual culinary operations, the whole 
 comfort of the family depends of course on the wife's super- 
 intendence and skill. In this respect very few mothers of 
 families in India ever fall short of the highest standard. 
 
 Omens. 
 
 Then one of a wife's duties should be to keep all bad 
 omens out of her husband's way, or manage to make him 
 look at something lucky in the early morning. I may here 
 point out that a knowledge of omens (nimitta-jnana) is in- 
 cluded among the sixty-four arts enumerated by Vatsyayana, 
 and is not the least important of them. Different lists of in- 
 auspicious objects are given which, if looked upon in the early 
 morning, might cause disaster. Thus some believe that if a 
 householder's first act should be to cast his eyes on a crow on 
 his left hand, a kite on his right, a snake, cat, jackal, or hare, 
 an empty vessel, smoky fire, a bundle of sticks, a widow, a 
 man with one eye, or even with a big nose, confusion might 
 be introduced into the household for the rest of the day. Nay, 
 grievous calamities might befall the family ; and if the good- 
 
398 Omens. Daily Religious Ceremonies. 
 
 man of the house had any intention'of undertaking a journey, 
 he must, after any such sights, by all means desist from the 
 project. On the other hand, should the householder's first 
 glance rest on a cow, horse, elephant, parrot, a lizard on 
 an east wall, a clear fire, a virgin, or two Brahmans, all will 
 go right. Again, if he should happen to sneeze once, it 
 would be a sure forerunner of good luck for the day ; but 
 if twice, it would portend some serious mishap. Finally, 
 if he should unfortunately yawn, it might lead to no less a 
 catastrophe than the entrance of an evil demon into his body. 
 
 The Adbhuta-Brahmana (forming the sixth chapter of the 
 Shadvinsa-Brahmana) treats of portents and omens ^. It is 
 to be noted, too, that both the Rig-veda and Atharva-veda 
 contain texts which prove that in Vedic times birds of ill-omen 
 were greatly dreaded and their evil influences deprecated ^. 
 
 Let us imagine then all risks arising from inauspicious 
 sights well avoided, and the householder started on his 
 tedious round of daily religious duties. And here be it ob- 
 served that one change has passed over every Indian house- 
 hold. Manu, we know, asserts that, according to a Vedic 
 ordinance, the husband and wife ought to perform religious 
 rites together (IX. 96), but the wife has now no religious 
 life in common with her husband. 
 
 I once asked a well-educated Brahman v/hy he acquiesced 
 in a different rule of religion for himself and his wife. ' Oh,' 
 he replied, ' we are now in the Kali-yuga, or age of universal 
 degeneracy. Our lawgivers have promulgated quite a new 
 code for these times ; oxen cannot be killed for sacrifices, 
 and women in all religious matters are practically degraded 
 to the position of Sudras. They are not allowed to repeat 
 the Veda, or to go through the morning and evening ^^^^^^ 
 Sandhya services. They never accompany their husbands to 
 
 ' This has been published with translation and notes, together with 
 another text on the same subject, by Professor A. Weber of Berlin. 
 " See Rig-veda II. 42, 43, X. 165 ; Atharva-veda VI. 29, VII. 64. 
 
Teeth-cleaning. Bathing. 399 
 
 any places of worship, and if they wish to visit the temples 
 they must go alone. They cannot be regenerated by in- 
 vestiture with the sacred thread. Their only sacrament is 
 marriage.' Such was his explanation of an Indian wife's 
 inferior religious status. Had he attributed her degradation 
 and seclusion to Muhammadan influences he would probably 
 have been more correct. 
 
 Alone then, and unassisted by his wife, must the Brahman 
 commence his diurnal course of ceremonial observances. His 
 first important act after rising is to clean his teeth. A 
 Brahman ought to do this according to strict rule, on pain 
 of forfeiting the whole merit of the day's religious acts. He 
 ought properly to use a twig of the sacred fig-tree (Vata), but 
 other kinds of wood are also allowed ^. Compare p. 376. 
 
 Teeth-cleaning, however, is only preliminary to l;he next im- 
 portant religious act of the day — bathing (snana). This should 
 be performed in some sacred stream, but in default of a river, 
 the householder may use a pool or tank, or even, in case 
 of dire necessity, a bath in his own house. Before entering 
 the water the bather ought to say : ' I am about to perform 
 morning ablution in this sacred stream (the Ganges or any 
 other, as the case may be) in the presence of the gods and 
 Brahmans with a view to the removal of guilt resulting from 
 act, speech, thought — from what has been touched and un- 
 touched, known and unknown, eaten and not eaten, drunk and 
 not drunk.' During the process of bathing, a hymn to the per- 
 sonified Ganges, consisting of eight verses (called Gangashtaka), 
 is often recited. Its opening words may be thus translated : — 
 
 Daughter of Vishnu, thou didst issue forth 
 From Vishnu's foot, by him thou art beloved. 
 Therefore remove from us the stain of sin — 
 From birth to death protecting us thy servants. 
 
 ^ The most common wood employed in some parts of India is that 
 of a thorny tree called Baval (commonly Babul). Sometimes the Nimba 
 (Nim) is used. 
 
400 Daily Religious Ceremonies. 
 
 After bathing comes the ceremony of Bhasma-dharana, or 
 application of ashes. This is done by rubbing ashes taken from 
 the sacred domestic hearth on the head and other parts of the 
 body, with the repetition of a prayer to Siva (from the Tait- 
 tiriya Aranyaka X. 43): — 'I offer homage to Siva (Sadyo- 
 jata). May he preserve me in every birth. Homage to the 
 source of all birth.' * 
 
 At this time, also, every pious Hindu marks his forehead 
 with the sacred mark (called pundra or tilaka) of his own 
 peculiar faith or religious views. When a man is a Siva- 
 worshipper, he does this with ashes, in which case it is merely 
 a part of the Bhasma-dharana rite just described ^. Some- 
 times a curved perpendicular mark, sometimes a circular one, 
 sometimes three horizontal lines (tri-pundra) are made with 
 white earth or pigment^- Of these markings the upright 
 (urdhva, p. 67) denotes the impress of the god Vishnu's feet^ 
 and the three horizontal the three functions of Siva (p. 80). 
 
 I once said to a Brahman who seemed proud of his curved 
 perpendicular mark : ' What's the difference between you and 
 your friend there with his three horizontal marks ? ' ' Oh,' he 
 replied, ' we are as different in opinions as the horizon from 
 the zenith. He does his religion horizontally, I do mine per- 
 pendicularly. But we are very good friends notwithstanding.' 
 
 The next act is Sikha-bandhana, or the tying up of the 
 locks on the crown of the head (p. 374), lest any hair, thought 
 to convey impurity, should fall on the ground or in the water. 
 
 ^ I am told that on Ash-Wednesday in the Roman Catholic Church 
 members of the congregation go up to the altar and are marked with 
 the sign of the cross. This, I believe, is sometimes done with the ashes 
 of palms such as are used on Palm-Sunday. I am told, too, that the 
 priest as he marks each person says : ' Dust thou art, and unto dust 
 thou shalt return.' » 
 
 ^ The worshippers of Vishnu generally use Gopi-dandana, a kind of 
 white earth brought from Dvarika. 
 
 ' It usually consists of two upright lines joined by a curve at the 
 bottom. The Ramanuja Vaishnavas, as we have seen, dispute over 
 the form of this mark (see p. 126). 
 
The Morning Sandhya Service. 401 
 
 All preliminary acts and purifications being now completed, 
 the pious Hindu proceeds to the regular Morning Service, 
 called Pratah-Sandhya, performed at the junction ^ of night - 
 .and day. Every one chooses, if possible, the side of a sacred 
 river or tank for this purpose, and every one conducts the 
 entire service by himself. Often in the early mornings or 
 late in the evenings I have watched numerous worshippers 
 seated at the water's edge and going through the Sandhya 
 ceremonial with mechanical precision — each one separately, 
 and each perhaps with slight variations, omissions, or additions 
 according to the usage of his own locality or his own school 
 of the Veda. Indeed we are so accustomed to give all our 
 attention to the Veda for purely literary or philological 
 objects that we are apt to forget that directly or indirectly, 
 for good or for evil, these ancient books — the oldest in the 
 world, except, perhaps, portions of the Christian Bible — have 
 for three thousand years moulded the faith, inspired the 
 prayers, animated the aspirations, influenced the conduct, 
 shaped the lives of a large proportion of the great Aryan race 
 to which we ourselves belong. And to this very day the 
 remarkable spectacle may be seen of millions of Indo- Aryans, 
 comprising countless tribes of various origin, scattered over a 
 vast area from the Panjab to Cape Comorin, from Bombay to 
 Assam, living distinct from each other in separate castes and 
 communities, yet all united by the common bond of this 
 Veda, which they still use as their daily prayer-book. The 
 detail of these ceremonies, practised as they still are by 
 millions who acknowledge our rule, are fraught with the 
 deepest interest to every Englishman. 
 
 The first act of the Morning Sandhya Service ^ and, as stated 
 
 ^ Some derive Sandhya from San-dha, 'to join together' (see my 
 Sanskrit-English Dictionary) ; others, with more reason, from San-dhyai, 
 ' to meditate in prayer.' Compare the Gayatri prayer, p. 403. 
 
 "^ I follow a manual called Brahma-karma-pustaka, printed at Allbag 
 in the Kohkan, and given to me, as the best authority for the ceremonies 
 
 Dd 
 
402 The Morning Sandhya Service. 
 
 before, the usual preliminary to all Hindu religious rites, is 
 sipping water (acamana) ; two or three mouthfuls being 
 swallowed for internal ablution. The water is taken up in 
 the hollowed palm of the right hand or poured from a spoon 
 into the palm, and is supposed to cleanse body and soul in its 
 downward course. This is done two or three times at the 
 commencement of the Morning Sandhya ^. During the pro- 
 cess of sipping, the twenty-four principal names of the god 
 Vishnu are invoked, thus : ' Glory to Kesava, to Narayana, to 
 Madhava, to Govinda, to Vishnu,' etc. 
 
 The second act is called the Pranayama, ' exercise or regu- 
 lation of the breath.' This includes three distinct acts : — 
 
 I. Redaka: pressing in the right nostril with the thumb 
 and expelling the breath through the left, and then pressing 
 in the left nostril and expelling the breath through the right. 
 <i. Puraka : pressing in the right nostril with the fore-finger 
 and drawing in the breath through the left, and then pressing 
 in the left nostril and drawing in the breath through the right. 
 3. Kumbhaka : pressing in both nostrils with the finger and 
 thumb, and holding in the breath for as long as possible. 
 
 These preliminary acts, which ought to be concluded before 
 the rising of the siin, are thought to be useful in fixing the 
 mind, concentrating the thoughts, and bringing the worshipper 
 into a proper attitude of attention. He is now in a position 
 to begin the recitation of his prayers. But first comes the 
 utterance of the monosyllable Om (called Pranava), the sound 
 being prolated to the length of three vowels. 
 
 This most sacred of all Hindu utterances, made up of the 
 
 of the Rig-vedi-Brahmans of the Marafha country, by Mr. Deshmukh. 
 It must be borne in mind that variations occur in different places ; and 
 that the number of Brahmans who go through all these Sandhya cere- 
 monies is constantly decreasing. At Kshetras on the banks of sacred 
 rivers, a few continue to practise the whole, and all good Brahmans go 
 through them in an abbreviated form. 
 
 ^ One manual says dvir atamya, but Manu (11. 60) enjoins three 
 sippings. It is a mistake to translate acamana by 'rinsing the mouth.' 
 
The Morning Sandhya Service^ 403 
 
 three letters A, U, M, and symbolical of the triple tnanifes- 
 tation of the Supreme Being in the Tri-murti or Triad of gods, 
 Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, is constantly repeated (pp. 44, 45, 
 with note). It is as sacred as the name Jehovah with the 
 Jews, but not too sacred for utterance. 
 
 Manu describes it as a monosyllable, imperishable and 
 eternal as the Supreme Being himself. After Om comes the 
 utterance of the names of the three worlds. Earth (Bhur), 
 Atmosphere (Bhuvah), Heaven (Svar), to which are often 
 added the four higher heavens, Mahah, Janah,Tapah, and Satya. 
 
 The utterance of these seven names — called the seven 
 Vyahritis — preceded in each case by the syllable Om, is an 
 act of homage to all the beings inhabiting the seven worlds 
 (p. 102, i). It is supposed to induce purity of thought and to 
 prepare the worshipper for offering up his first prayer. 
 
 Turning towards the Eastern sky he repeats the Gayatri or 
 Savitri (from Rig-veda III. 6a. 10): 'Let us meditate on that 
 excellent glory of the divine Vivifying Sun, may he enlighten 
 our understandings' (see p. 19). 
 
 This prayer is, as we have seen, the most sacred of all Vedic 
 utterances, and like the Lord's Prayer among Christians, or 
 like the Fatihah or opening chapter of the Kuran among 
 Muhammadans, must always among Hindus take precedence 
 of all other forms of supplication. 
 
 The next division of the ceremonial is called Marjana, 
 'sprinkling.' It is a kind of self-baptism performed by the 
 worshipper himself by sprinkling water on the head while the 
 first three verses of Rig-veda X. 9 are recited. These may be 
 thus paraphrased : — 
 
 O Waters, give us health, bestow on us 
 Vigour and strength, so shall I see enjoyment. 
 Rain down your dewy treasures o'er our path. 
 Like loving mothers, pour on us your blessing, 
 Make us partakers of your sacred essence. 
 We come to you for cleansing from all guilt, 
 Cause us to be productive, make us prosper 
 D d a 
 
404 l'^^ Morning Sandhya Service. 
 
 This is followed by another remarkable prayer from the' 
 
 Taittiriya Aranyaka (X. 25) : — 
 
 May Sun and Anger \ may the lords of anger 
 Preserve me from my sins of pride and passion. 
 Whate'er the nightly sins of thought, word, deed. 
 Wrought by my mind, my speech, my hands, my feet, 
 Wrought through my appetite and sensual organs. 
 May the departing Night remove them all! 
 In thy immortal light, O radiant Sun, 
 I offer up myself and this my guilt. 
 
 Then follows a second performance of Marjana.or ' sprinkling,' 
 and a repetition of all the nine verses of the Rig-veda hymn 
 of which the first three verses had been previously recited. 
 
 The next act is the repetition of a well-known hymn of the 
 
 Rig-veda (X. 190) called Agha-marshana, 'sin-annihilating,' 
 
 supposed to have an all-powerful effect in removing sin. 
 
 This hymn contains a curious summary of the supposed 
 
 process of creation, which may be thus paraphrased : — 
 
 From glowing heat sprang all existing things. 
 Yea, all the order of this universe (Rita). 
 Thence also Night and heaving Ocean sprang ; 
 And next to heaving Ocean rose the Year, 
 Dividing day from night. All mortal men 
 Who close the eyelid are his subjects, he 
 The great Disposer made in due succession 
 Sun, moon, and sky, earth, middle air, and heaven. 
 
 Manu (XI. 259) affirms that this short hymn thrice repeated 
 releases from the most heinous sins. 
 
 All the ceremonial up to this point is supposed to precede 
 the actual appearance of the Sun above the horizon. The 
 worshipper now prepares to render homage to the rising 
 luminary by what is called Arghya or Arghya-dana. At 
 other times this is the general name for a respectful offering 
 of water in a boat-shaped vessel, called Argha, to a Brahman ' 
 or guest of any kind. In the Sandhya it is an act of homage 
 
 ^ Anger personified = Manyu (Say. = KrodhabhimanI devah) ; the god 
 or gods who help a man to restrain his anger. 
 
the five fingers and^ 
 to various forms of 
 
 The Morning Sandhya Service. 405 
 
 to the Sun, by offering water, or throwing it into the air, 
 sometimes from a hollow vessel, but oftener from the two 
 open hands hollowed and joined together 1. The offerer, 
 standing in the water, throws a handful of it upwards towards 
 the Sun three times, each time reciting the Gayatrl prayer. 
 The more he scatters the water in throwing it the better. 
 
 The next division of the service is called Kara-nyasa, or 
 'imposition of fingers.' Its peculiar ritual is taught in the 
 more modern religious works called Tantras. 
 
 Some orthodox Brahmans omit every kind of Tantrik 
 ceremonial as not sanctioned by the Veda, but with the 
 majority of HindQs it is all important. To understand the 
 Kara-nyasa we must bear in mind that 
 the palm of the hand are consecrated 
 Vishnu, and that different gods are supposed to reside in 
 different parts of the body, the Supreme Being occupying 
 the top of the head ^ Hence the act of placing the fingers 
 or hand reverentially on the several organs is supposed 
 to gratify and do honour to the deities whose essences 
 pervade these organs, and to be completely efficacious in 
 removing sin. 
 
 The tip of the thumb is held to be occupied by Govinda, 
 the forefinger by Mahidhara, the middle finger by Hrishlkesa, 
 the next finger (called the nameless finger) by Tri-vikrama, the 
 little finger by Vishnu, the palm of the hand by Madhava— 
 all being different forms of the same god Vishnu. 
 
 The worshipper then commences the Nyasa ceremonial 
 by saying : ' Homage to the two thumbs, to the two fore- 
 fingers, to the two middle fingers, to the two nameless fingers 
 
 ^ The sacred thread (yajfiopavita), always worn as a type of regener- 
 ation, and necessary to the vahdity of every religious act (p. 361), is often 
 at the same time put round the two thumbs. 
 
 ^ The right ear is a peculiarly sacred spot with Tantrikas. Fire, 
 water, sun, and moon all reside in the right ear. Some think it is for this 
 reason that the sacred thread, which is supposed to be polluted by the 
 functions of nature, is hung, when they are performed, over the right ear. 
 
4o6 The Morning Sandhya Service. 
 
 (i. e. the ring-fingers), to the two little fingers, to the two palms 
 and the two backs of the hands.' 
 
 Then follows another division of the Nyasa ceremonial 
 called Indriya-sparsa, or the act of touching different parts of 
 the body, such as the breast, eyes, ears, navel, throat, and 
 head, with the fingers. (Compare Manu II. 60.) 
 
 Next comes the regular Gayatrl-japa, or repeated muttering 
 of the Gayatrl-prayer to the Sun (see p. 19). 
 
 Before beginning this repetition, those who follow the 
 Tantrik system go through the process of making various 
 mystical figures called Mudras, twenty-four in number, by 
 twisting, interlacing, or intertwining the fingers and hands 
 together. Each of these figures, according to its name, bears 
 some fanciful resemblance to animals or objects of various 
 kinds, as, for example, to a fish, tortoise, boar, lion (these 
 being forms in which the god Vishnu became incarnate), 
 or to a cart, noose, knot, garland ; the efficacy attributed 
 to these peculiar intertwinings and twistings of the hands 
 and fingers being enormous. 
 -^ The correct number of repetitions is 108, and to insure 
 accuracy of enumeration a rosary of 108 beads made of Tulasi 
 wood is generally used, the hand being carefully concealed in 
 a red bag (called Go-mukhl) or under a cloth. 
 
 The next division of the service is called Upasthana (or 
 Mitropasthana), because the worshipper abandons his sitting 
 posture, stands erect with his face towards the rising Sun, and 
 invokes that luminary under the name of Mitra. The prayer 
 he now repeats is Rig-veda III. 59, of which the first verse is 
 to the following effect : — 
 
 Mitra, raising his voice, calls men to activity. 
 Mitra sustains the earth and the sky. 
 Mitra with unwinking eye beholds all creatures. 
 Offer to Mitra the oblation of butter. 
 
 The use of this hymn in the morning service of every 
 Hindu is an interesting fact in its connection with the identifi- 
 
The .Morning Sandhya Service. 407 
 
 cation of the Indian Mitra with the Zoroastrian god Mithra, 
 mentioned by Herodotus, and with the same Mithra of the 
 Avesta. At the end the worshipper invokes the personified 
 Dawns in the words of Rig-veda IV. 51. 11 : 'Hail brilliant 
 Dawns, daughters of Heaven, I invoke you, bearing (or 
 having) the oblation as a sign (of my devotion). May we be 
 honoured among men, may heaven and the divine earth effect 
 that (for us).' 
 
 The last act but one is a recitation of the family pedigree 
 (gotroccara) ; for with every high-caste man the recitation of 
 his own genealogy forms an important part of the daily 
 Sandhya. For example : — 
 
 ' I belong to a particular Gotra (or tribe of Brahmans) ; I 
 have three ancestors — Angirasa, Sainya, and Gargya ; I am a 
 student of the Asvalayana Sutra, and follow the Sakala-sakha' 
 of the Rig-veda.' See also p. 435- 
 
 The ceremonial concludes with an acknowledgement that 
 the one Supreme Being is the real object of adoration , 
 throughout the whole service : ' Glory to the world of Brahma, 
 to the world of Rudra, to the world of Vishnu. May the One 
 Supreme Lord of the Universe be pleased with this my 
 morning service.' 
 
 The last act, like the first, is an internal purification of the , 
 body by acamana, or sipping of water. 
 
 In the midday Sandhya (madhyahna-sandhya, now seldom 
 performed), a different text of the Taittiriya Aranyaka (X. 33) 
 is substituted for that used before (pp. 4°°) 404), and at the 
 Arghya-dana (p. 404) two different Rig-veda texts are sub- 
 stituted (viz. I. 35. 2 and the Hansavati Rid IV. 40. 5), and at 
 the Upasthana the Surya-sukta (I. 50, see p. 16). 
 
 The evening Sandhya service (Sayam-sandhya) is like the . 
 morning, except that at the Arghya-dana the offering is made 
 to Varuna and at the Upasthana ten verses of Rig-veda I. a5 
 are recited — freely rendered thus : — 
 
 I. As often as, O Varuna, we infringe thy law, like other men, every 
 
4o8 Brahma-yajna Service. 
 
 day, 2. So often deliver us not over to death, nor to the blows of the 
 angry, nor to the wrath of the enraged. 3. As a charioteer his tethered 
 steed, so do we set free thy thoughts by our hymns, O Varuna, to turn 
 towards us graciously. 4. My wishes fly forth towards thee, as birds 
 to their nest, that I may receive thy blessing (vasyas may mean ' excel- 
 lent wealth'). 5- When shall we induce the far-seeing ruler (or leader) 
 Varuna, glorious in his sovereignty, to be propitious to us? 6. Partake 
 together (O Mitra and Varuna) of the very same oblation, being both 
 of you propitious to us ; depart not from those who present offerings 
 and remain true to their vows. 7. He (Varuna) who knows the path 
 of the birds flying through the air, he abiding in the ocean knows also 
 the ships. 8. He the maintainer of law (and order) knows the twelve 
 months with their offspring ; he knows also the month which is born 
 afterwards (i. e. the thirteenth or additional month of the Hindi! year). 
 9. He knows the path of the wind, the far-reaching, lofty, mighty (wind), 
 and those (Maruts) who are enthroned above it. 10. Varuna, the 
 maintainer of law (and order), sits in his palace to exercise universal 
 sovereignty, doing good acts, the almighty one. 
 
 We must now advert to the supplementary ceremonial 
 observances which are necessary to the completion of the 
 morning Sandhya. 
 
 The first act is Brahma-yajna, or worship of the Supreme 
 Being as represented in the sacred Veda or canon of inspired 
 knowledge. And here mark that the Sandhya service is 
 itself regarded as a part of Brahma-yajiia. Every portion of 
 it is held to be for the sake of pleasing the Supreme Being 
 (Brahma), but the use of the term Brahma-yajna is more 
 usually restricted to the Brahma-yajiia par excellence ; that is, 
 to the special worship of Brahma as identified with the Veda. 
 
 How then is this special Brahma-yajiia to be performed? 
 We must remember that in Hinduism every religious idea, 
 including that of revelation, is exaggerated. 
 
 Instead of sixty-six Books to which our own Sacred Scrip- 
 tures extend, the Hindu so-called revelation consists of a far 
 larger number of works, all of which are accepted as either 
 directly revealed or inspired. Even works on pronunciation, 
 etymology, and grammar are included in the list as part and 
 parcel of the sacred canon. 
 
 How, then, is this mass of sacred inspiration to be dealt 
 
Tarpana Ceremony. ,409 
 
 with by those religious Brahmans who wish to fulfil the duty 
 of repeating portions of it daily ? 
 
 It cannot be affirmed of any Hindu, however pious, that he 
 reads his own Bible, as a Christian does his, much less studies 
 it. The Veda is not meant to be either read or studied. We 
 have seen how portions of the first three Vedas are repeated 
 at the daily Sandhya prayers. Portions also of the Maha- 
 bharata (e. g. the Bhagavad-glta) and of the Puranas (e. g. the 
 Bhagavata and Markandeya) are occasionally recited. But, 
 the duty of paying homage to Brahma by repeating the words 
 of divine revelation is held to be sufficiently fulfilled by the 
 daily exercise of repeating the first few words of all the prin- 
 cipal books, except the first hymn of the Rig-veda, which is 
 recited throughout. Then comes the first verse of the second/ 
 hymn. These Vedic texts may be recited according to any 
 one or more of the five different Pathas, or modes of recitation, 
 called Samhita, Pada, Krama, Jata, and Ghana — wonderful 
 devices for securing the accuracy of the Vedic text. Then 
 come the first words of the Aitareya Brahmana (Agnir vai 
 devanam avamo) and, of each of the five books of the Aita- 
 reya Aranyaka. Then the first words of the Yajur-veda ; of 
 the Sama-veda ; of the Atharva-veda ; of the Nirukta ; of the 
 Chandas (Prosody) ; of the Nighantu ; of the Jyotisha ; of the 
 Siksha ; of Panini's grammar. Then certain passages from the 
 Atharva-veda ; then the first words of Yajiiavalkya's law-book, 
 of the Maha-bharata, and of the philosophical Sutras, etc. 
 
 The Brahma-yajna service is followed by the Tarpana cere- 
 mony, which is properly a triple act, consisting in offerings of 
 water for refreshment (tarpana) to the gods, inspired sages, 
 and fathers. It is accordingly divided into three parts. 
 
 In the first part, called Deva-tarpana, ' refreshing of the gods,' 
 the sacred thread is worn over the left shoulder and under the 
 right arm, the worshipper being then called Upavitl. 
 
 Water is taken up in the right hand and poured out over 
 the straightened fingers. 
 
4IO Pancayatana Ceremony. 
 
 In the second part of the Tarpana service, called Rishi- 
 tarpana, ' refreshing of the inspired sages,' the sacred thread 
 is worn round the neck like a necklace, the worshipper being 
 then called Nivlti. 
 
 The water is then offered so as to flow over the side of the 
 palm between the root of the thumb and fore-finger, the finger 
 being bent inwards ■^- 
 
 The worshipper now changes the position of his sacred 
 thread, and placing it over his right shoulder and under his 
 left arm (being then called PracinavTti) makes offerings of 
 water to the Acaryas, or inspired religious teachers. This 
 is called Acarya-tarpana, and is regarded as supplementary 
 to the Rishi-tarpana and not as a distinct division of the 
 service. 
 
 The third division of the Tarpana ceremony is called Pitri- 
 tarpana, ' refreshing of deceased fathers or departed ancestors.' 
 
 The thread is worn over the right shoulder as in Acarya- 
 tarpana, but the water is poured out over the side of the palm 
 opposite to the root of the thumb. The words uttered are, 
 ' Let the fathers be refreshed ; let this water containing tila 
 (sesamum seeds) be intended for all who inhabit the seven 
 worlds as far as the abode of Brahma (the seventh world), 
 though they exceed many millions of families. Let the water 
 consecrated by my sacred thread be accepted by those mem- 
 bers of our family who have died without any sons.' 
 
 This concludes the series of Sandhya, Brahma-yajna, and 
 Tarpana services. 
 
 Pancayatana Ceremony, - 
 
 At the conclusion of the Tarpana ceremony the worshipper 
 ought to re-enter his house and perform the Homa, or offering 
 
 ^ The part of the hand between the thumb and fore-finger is called 
 pitrya, and is sacred to the Pitris. (Compare Manu II. 51.) 
 
Pancayatana Ceremony. 411 
 
 of oblations to the gods through fire, described in a previous 
 chapter (p. 366). 
 
 In Manu's time the worship of the gods (deva or devata) 
 through the Homa was regarded as one of the five Maha- 
 yajnas, or chief devotional acts, the other four being (i) 
 homage to the Supreme Spirit and to that Spirit present in 
 the Veda, performed by the Brahma-yajiia service ; (a) homage 
 to the Pitris, or deceased progenitors, performed by the 
 Tarpana and Sraddha ceremonies ; (3) homage to all beings 
 (bhuta), including animals, performed by offerings of food 
 called bali ; (4) homage to men, performed by hospitality to 
 guests and almsgiving to beggars. Of these five acts the wor- 
 ship of the gods — deva-yajila or deva-puja — was formerly the 
 simplest. It was generally suflSciently performed by putting 
 oblations of rice or clarified butter in fire. In the present 
 day, as already stated, no one, except the most orthodox 
 Brahmans, thinks it necessary to maintain a sacred fire, and 
 the old fire ritual is gradually dying out. 
 
 Other forms of worshipping the gods are, however, sub- 
 stituted. In nearly every modern house there is a room 
 .Containing a sanctuary, called Mandira. Here the religious 
 Service called Deva-puja is generally performed by pious 
 householders, or by some member of the family deputed to 
 represent the others every morning. 
 
 It is, we know, an essential part of the theory of Brahman- 
 ism (p. 50) that all gods like Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, who 
 are manifestations of the invisible and formless Brahma, should 
 be worshipped through visible forms. In the Deva-puja, 
 therefore, homage is paid to these deities through images, or 
 more commonly, in Central and Southern India and the 
 jMaratha country, through the worship of five stones or 
 symbols which are believed to be permeated by the essences 
 of the five chief deities. 
 
 ^ The room dedicated to their worship need not be on the 
 ground-floor, like the Homa-sala. The five stones (as pointed 
 
412 Pancayatana Ceremony. 
 
 out, pp. 69, 392) are— I. the black stone ^ representing Vishnu ; 
 •2. the white stone ^ representing Siva's essence ; 3. the red 
 stone, representing Ganesa (Gana-pati) ; 4. the small piece 
 of metalUc ore, representing the wife of Siva ; 5. the piece of 
 crystal, representing the Sun. The first two stones— Sala- 
 grama and Bana-linga — are regarded as far more sacred than 
 manufactured idols, for such idols must be consecrated, 
 whereas these stones are occupied by Vishnu and Siva 
 without any consecration whatever. 
 
 All five symbols are placed on a round open metal dish, 
 called Pancayatana, and are arranged in five different methods, 
 according to the preference given to any one of the five deities 
 at the time of worship. These five methods are : — 
 
 I. Vishnu in the middle; Siva N. E. (i.e. towards the north-east 
 quarter) ; Ganesa S. E. ; Surya S.W. ; Devi N.W. 2. Siva in the mid- 
 dle ; Vishnu N.W.; Surya S.E.; Ganesa S.W ; Devi N.W. 3. Surya 
 in the middle; Siva N.E. ; Ganesa S.E.; Vishnu S.W. ; Devi N.W. 
 4. Devi in the middle ; Vishnu N.E; SivaS.E. ; Ganesa S.W. ; Surya 
 N.W. 5. Ganesa in the middle; Vishnu N.E. ; Siva S.E. ; Surya S.W. ; 
 Devi N.W. 
 
 Then, again, on one side of the Paiicayatana is a small bell, 
 and on the other side a conch-shell ^, and near at hand is a 
 water-vessel called Kalasa or Abhisheka-patra, with a small 
 hole in the bottom of it, through which the water used for 
 sprinkling the stones passes. These three objects are also 
 held sacred and receive their share of worship. 
 
 I should state that near the metal receptacle containing the 
 five sacred stones is placed another metal plate on which are 
 
 ^ Near the black Sala-grama stone there is often placed a kind of fossil 
 with circular markings, also sacred to Vishiiu and symbolising his cakra. 
 The Muhammadans also worship a kind of black stone fixed in the Ka'ba. 
 This stone-worship is doubtless a remnant of fetishism which has pre-* 
 vailed in all countries. 
 
 ' It is curious that Vishnu should be represented as of a black colour 
 and Siva as white, when the former is held to be connected with the 
 Sattva-guna and the latter with the Tamo-gupa (see p. 45). 
 
 ^ The conch-shell is specially sacred to Vishnu (see p. 103). 
 
PaMayatana Ceremony. 413 
 
 arranged the Tulasi leaves for Vishnu and the Bilva leaves for 
 Siva, besides offerings of flowers, perfumes, etc. 
 
 The worship of the five deities thus represented is per- 
 formed by sixteen acts of homage (upac^ara), one for each of 
 the sixteen verses of the Purusha-sukta, or ninetieth hymn of 
 the tenth Mandala of the Rig-veda, and the ceremony is some- 
 times called Paiicayatana-puja, from the receptacle (ayatana) 
 in which the five symbols are placed. 
 
 Before commencing the service the worshipper goes through 
 the usual sippings of water (acamana) and suppressions of the 
 breath before described (p. 403). Then after repeating certain 
 preliminary prayers he invokes the god Ganesa, employing a 
 well-known text from the Rig-veda (II. 33) : ' Om. We 
 invoke thee who art lord of the hosts of hosts (Ganapatim 
 gananam), the sage of sages; of most exalted fame, the most 
 excellent king of Vedic mantras, O Lord of prayer ^, hear us 
 with favour, and enter our dwelling to aid us (against the 
 demons of obstruction).' 
 
 This invocation is followed by Nyasa, or the reverential 
 touching of various parts of the body, in connection with 
 the recitation of a few words at the beginning and middle 
 of each of the last six verses of the Purusha-sukta (X. 90) 
 of the Rig-veda. 
 
 The next act is adoration of the water-vessel (kalasa), 
 thus : — 
 
 'In the mouth of the water-vessel abideth Vishnu, in its 
 neck is Rudra, in its lower part is Brahma, while the whole 
 company of the Mothers (matris) are congregated in its 
 middle part. O Ganges, Yamuna, Godavarl, Sarasvati, Nar- 
 mada, Sindhu, and Kaveri, be present in this water.' 
 
 Next succeeds the worship of the conch-shell, thus :— 
 
 ' Brahman is here used for the hymns, or rather mantras, of the Veda 
 which in later times were used as spells to counteract the malice of 
 demons. Ganesa in his power over the troops of demons is thus identified 
 with the Vedic Brahmanas-pati, or lord of prayer. 
 
414 Panidyatana Ceremony. 
 
 ' O conch-shell (Pandajanya, see p. 103), thou wast produced 
 in the sea, and art held by Vishnu in his hand ; thou art 
 worshipped by all the gods. Receive my homage.' 
 
 Then follows adoration of the bell, thus : — 
 
 ' bell, make a sound for the approach of the gods, and 
 for the departure of the demons. Homage to the goddess 
 Ghanta (bell). I offer perfumes, grains of rice, and flowers, 
 in token of rendering all due homage to the bell.' 
 
 Then after intertwining his fingers so as to make the 
 mystical figure called Ghanta-mudra, the worshipper must 
 ring the bell. Next, after fixing his thoughts, he says a 
 prayer to Vishnu, Siva, the son of Siva (Gana-pati), the 
 Supreme Being (Narayana) in the centre of the Sun's orb, 
 and the goddess Devi. The worshipper now commences 
 the sixteen acts of homage or offerings (upacara), each ac- 
 companied with the uttering of one of the sixteen verses of 
 the Purusha hymn of the Rig-veda (X. 90), a literal transla- 
 tion of which I here subjoin (see also pp. 17, ^'^ : — 
 
 I. Purusha has thousands of heads (thousands of arms, A.V.), thousands 
 of eyes, and thousands of feet. On every side enveloping the earth, he 
 transcended this mere space of ten fingers ^ 2. Purusha himself is this 
 vifhole (universe), whatever has been, and whatever shall be. He is also 
 the lord of immortality, since through food he expands. 3. Such is his 
 greatness ; and Purusha is superior to this. All existing things are a 
 quarter of him, and that which is immortal in the sky is three quarters, of 
 him. 4. With three quarters Purusha mounted upwards. A quarter of 
 him again was produced here below. He then became diffused every-- 
 where among things animate and inanimate. 5. From him Viraj was 
 born, and from Viraj, Purusha. As soon as born he extended beyond 
 the earth, both behind and before. 6. When the gods offered up Purusha 
 as a sacrifice, the spring was its clarified butter, summer its fuel, and 
 autumn the (accompanying) oblation. . 7. This victim, Purusha born in 
 the beginning, they consecrated on the sacrificial grass ; with him as 
 their offering, the gods, Sadhyas, and Rishis sacrificed. 8. From that 
 universal oblation were produced curds and clarified butter. He (Purusha) 
 formed the animals which are subject to the power of the air (vayavya), 
 
 ^ The world is called Dasangula, a mere span of ten fingers compared 
 with God's infinite essence. I have chiefly followed Dr. John Muir's trans- 
 lation, but not throughout (see Texts, p. 368). A.V. is for Atharva-veda. 
 
Pandayatana Ceremony. 415 
 
 both wild and tame. 9. From that universal sacrifice sprang the hymns 
 called Rid'' and Saman, the metres, and the Yajush. lo. From it were 
 produced horses, and all animals with two rows of teeth, cows, goats, and 
 sheep. II. When they divided Purusha, into how many parts did they 
 distribute him ? What was his mouth ? What were his arms ? What 
 were called his thighs and feet? 12. The Brahman was his mouth ; the 
 Rajanya became his arms ; the Vaisya was his thighs ; the Sudra sprang 
 from his feet. 13. The moon was produced from his soul ; the sun from 
 his eye ; Indra and Agni from his mouth ; the Vayu from his breath. 
 14. From his navel came the atmosphere ; from his head arose the sky ; 
 from his feet came the earth ; from his ear the four quarters ; so they 
 formed the worlds. 15. When the gods, in performing their sacrifice, 
 bound Purusha as a victim, there were seven pieces of wood laid for him 
 round the fire, and thrice seven pieces of fuel employed. 16. With sacri- 
 fice the gods worshipped the Sacrifice. These were the primeval rites. 
 These great beings attained to the heaven where the gods, the ancient 
 Sadhyas, reside. 
 
 The sixteen acts of homage or offerings are — 
 
 I. Invocation (avahana) ; 2. a seat for sitting down (asana) formed of 
 Tulasi leaves ; 3. foot water (padya) ; 4. respectful oblation (arghya) of 
 rice, etc. ; 5. water for sipping (adamanlya) ; 6. ablution or lustration 
 (snana) with milk and clarified butter, honey and sugar ; 7. clothing 
 (vastra) formed of Tulasi leaves ; 8. upper clothing or ornaments (upa- 
 vastra) formed of more Tulasi leaves ; 9. perfumes and sandal (gandha, 
 dandana) ; 10. flowers (pushpa) ; 11. incense (dhupa) ; 12. illumination 
 (dlpa) ; 13. oblation of food (naivedya) ; 14. reverential circumambula- 
 tion (pradakshina) ; 15. flowers with recitation of texts (mantra-pushpa) ; 
 16. final act of adoration (namaskara). 
 
 With each act of homage one of the sixteen verses of the 
 Purusha hymn above translated is recited. The final act of 
 adoration is as follows : — 
 
 Veneration to the infinite and eternal Male (Purusha), who has thou- 
 sands of names, thousands of forms, thousands of feet, thousands of eyes, 
 thousands of heads, thousands of thighs, thousands of arms, and who lives 
 for ten millions of ages. 
 
 great god, pardon my want of knowledge of the right way of wor- 
 shipping thee. Sin, misery, and poverty are removed ; happiness and 
 purity are obtained by thy presence. O great god, I commit thousands 
 of faults every day and night ; forgive me, as I am thy servant. There is 
 no other protection but from thee ; thou only art my refuge ; guard me, 
 therefore, and defend me by thy mercy ; pardon my mistakes and defects 
 
 ^ According to Sayana's introduction to the Rig-veda, this mention of 
 the Rid first proves the priority of the Rig-veda. 
 
41 6 Vaisvadeva Ceremony. 
 
 in syllables, words, and measure ; O mighty lord, be propitiated. I offer 
 flowers with prayers. Let the five gods, of whom great Vishnu is the 
 first, be pleased with the worship I have made. Let all this be offered to 
 the Supreme Being. I offer thee with my mouth, O Vishnu, the sacred 
 salutation Vashat. Be pleased, O §ipivishta S with my oblation ; let my 
 songs of praise exalt thee ; protect us ever with thy blessings (Rig-veda 
 VII. 99. 7, 100. 7). 
 
 Then sipping water the worshipper says : — 
 
 ' I take into my body the holy water which comes from 
 the feet of Vishnu, preventing untimely death and destroying 
 all diseases.' 
 
 This concludes the Pancayatana ceremony as performed by 
 Brahmans in the Maratha country. Doubtless here and there 
 local variations may occur. 
 
 In some districts where Siva is worshipped a form of service 
 called Siva-puja is substituted for the Pancayatana-puja, and 
 two hymns called the Rudra hymns, from the Yajur-veda 
 (Vajasaneyi-Samhita XVI ; XVIII), are recited. These two 
 hymns are still used by strict Brahmans, and familiarly called 
 Namak and (iamak, because Namas te is constantly repeated 
 in one and Ca me in the other. 
 
 Vaisvadeva Ceremony. 
 
 An orthodox Brahman's craving for religious ceremonial 
 is not by any means satiated by the tedious round of forms 
 he has gone through in the early morning. A pause of an 
 hour or two brings him to the time when preparations for 
 another solemn rite have to be made. This is the ceremony 
 which ought to precede the midday meal. 
 
 It should be stated that an Indian household is satisfied 
 with two principal daily meals — one about midday, another 
 in the evening — but no pious householder of high caste will ■ 
 sit down to the former without first performing what is 
 
 ^ This epithet of Vishnu is only applicable to him as a form of the Sun 
 displaying his rays in all directions. 
 
Vaisvadeva Ceremony. Aiy 
 
 called the Vaisvadeva ceremony, or offering to all the gods 
 (visve devah) ^. Nor is this held to be completed without the 
 addition of another rite, called Bali-harana, which is practically 
 nothing more than the concluding act of the Vaisvadeva «. 
 
 The gods worshipped in the Vaisvadeva are Vedic, and the 
 ceremony is therefore from its antiquity far more interesting 
 than the Pancayatana-puja, or any other modern form of the 
 Deva-puja. It is described in its most ancient form in Manu 
 III. 84-93. The idea involved in the entire service seems to 
 be, that before a man begins eating he ought to consecrate and 
 purify his food by making offerings of small portions of cooked 
 rice and other food to all the deities through whose favour he 
 is himself fed, and more especially to Fire, who is the bearer of 
 the offering to heaven. In point of fact the whole ceremony 
 resolves itself into a form of homage offered to the gods who 
 give the food, and to the god of fire without whose aid this food 
 could not be prepared for eating. There is also a notion that, 
 in preparing the food by cooking, animals may have been 
 accidentally destroyed, for which expiation should be made. 
 
 It should be observed that the Vaisvadeva is not, like the 
 Sandhya, incumbent on every individual separately. It may 
 be performed vicariously, like the Deva-puja, through one 
 member of the family (generally a junior member) acting 
 for the others. In performing it a small portable fire- 
 receptacle, called a Kunda, is brought into the room where 
 
 ' In reality only certain classes of deities are intended. It is curious 
 that the number of the gods is sometimes asserted in the Rig-veda to be 
 33, while elsewhere (X. 6. 3) the number 3306 is given, and elsewhere 
 (III. 9. 9) 3339. They are now popularly said to amount to 330 millions, 
 but any limitation as to number is opposed to the Brahmanical theory of 
 infinite evolution. Moreover it must be borne in mind that no god in 
 the Hindu Pantheon is eternal, except the one Brahma — the one self- 
 existent Spirit — out of which all the gods are evolved and into which 
 they will all be re-absorbed. 
 
 ^ Some manuals speak of the two in the dual, as Vaisvadeva-balikar- 
 mani. They are described by Colebrooke in his ' Religious Ceremonies 
 of the Hindus,' but in a confused and imperfect manner. 
 
 E e 
 
41 8 Vaisvadeva Ceremony.. 
 
 the eatables are collected. Consecrated fire— fed with con- 
 secrated fuel— is placed in it, sacred grass is spread around, 
 and offerings of rice, etc. are cast into the flames for all the 
 deities, with repetition of Vedic texts. 
 
 The Bali-harana which follows requires for its proper per- 
 formance an elaborate arrangement of portions of food in 
 a circle ^ each portion being allotted to a particular deity; 
 or class of superhuman beings, with the utterance of prescribed 
 formularies. 
 
 The detail of both Vaisvadeva and Bali-harana as given in 
 the most trustworthy manuals is as follows : — 
 
 The worshipper begins by the usual sippings of water 
 (adamana) and breath exercises (p. 402), and by declaring his 
 intention (sankalpa) of performing the ceremony, thus :— 
 
 ' I will to-day perform the morning and evening^ Vaisva- 
 deva with the cooked food (siddhanna) cast into the fire, 
 for the purification of that food and for my own purification, 
 and to make expiation for the five destructive domestic im- 
 plements ^ (Pafida-suna), and to obtain the reward prescribed 
 by the Sruti, Smriti, and Puranas.' 
 
 Then after bringing in a small movable fire-receptacle, the 
 service commences with an invocation (avahana) of the god 
 of fire from the Rig-veda (V. 4. 5 ; I. 72. 6), which may be 
 thus translated : — 
 
 ' O all-wise god Agni, come to this our sacrifice as a loved domestic 
 friend and household guest. Destroy all our enemies, and procure for us, 
 O Agni, the food (and other possessions) of those who bear us enmity.' 
 
 ' Come, Agni, hither and sit down here as our priest, and be to us a 
 
 ' A diagram of the circle is given in most of the Directories, with the 
 order in which the portions of food are to be arranged. 
 
 ''• The evening Vaisvadeva is never, so far as I was able to ascertain, 
 performed in the present day. « 
 
 ' The five places, or domestic implements, through the use of which 
 animals may be accidentally destroyed in the process of preparing food, 
 .are — i. the fire-place; 2. the slab for grinding grain and condiments; 
 3. the pots and pans ; 4. the pestle and mortar ; and 5. the water-pot. 
 See Manu III. 68. 
 
Vaisvadeva Ceremony. 419 
 
 trustworthy guide. May all-pervading heaven and earth defend thee ! 
 Bear our oblations to the gods for their complete satisfaction.' 
 
 After these invocations a covered dish of uncooked rice is 
 brought in and the cover removed. Then sacred fire is placed 
 in the receptacle, with these words : Om Bhur bhuvah svah, 
 ' I deposit the fire called Rukmaka ^ (bright as gold).' Con- 
 secrated fuel is next put on and the fire fanned, while the 
 following well-known and remarkable text from Rig-veda IV. 
 58. 3 is recited : ' Four are his horns, three are his feet, two 
 are his heads, seven are his hands. He the triply-bound bull 
 roars. The mighty deity enters mortals ^.' 
 
 Next comes a text from the Svetasvatara Upanishad II. 16 : 
 'This god (of fire) pervades all the quarters of the sky ; he 
 was the first-born of all things ; he is within the womb ; he 
 was born and is to be born ; he dwells in all men, and has his 
 countenance in all directions.' 
 
 The collecting together and spreading of the consecrated 
 fuel and sacred Kusa grass employed in the ceremony are 
 then made ; and water is sprinkled round in a circle. 
 
 Next, the rice about to be eaten is consecrated by the 
 sprinkling of water and placed on the fire. It is then taken 
 off and deposited between the worshipper and the fire. 
 
 ^ Fire is of various kinds and has various names, and it is requisite to 
 name the particular fire intended to be prepared. 
 
 " Prof. H. H. Wilson gives a note in his translation, showing that 
 Sayana identifies Agni here with either Sacrifice or the Sun. The four 
 horns are the Veda or the Cardinal points, the three feet are the three 
 daily Sandhyas, or morning, noon, and evening ; the heads are either two 
 particular ceremonies, or day and night ; the seven hands are the seven 
 metres or seven solar rays. The bull is sacrifice, or the Sun as the pourer 
 down of benefits ; the triple bond is Mantra, Kalpa, and Brahmana, and 
 the roaring sound is the recitation of the Veda. Patanjali in the Maha- 
 bhashya (I. I. i) explains the four horns to mean the four kinds of 
 words— nouns, verbs, prepositions and particles ; the three feet the three 
 tenses— past, present and future ; the two heads the eternal and tem- 
 porary (produced) words ; the seven hands the seven case affixes ; the 
 triple bond is composed of the chest, the throat, and the head. The 
 mighty deity is speech. (Compare St. John's Gospel, i. I.) 
 
 E e 3 
 
420 Vai'svadeva Ceremony. 
 
 The next act is called Upasthana. A prayer from the 
 Rig-veda (V. 4. 9) is addressed to the god of fire under his 
 name Jata-vedas ^, thus : — 
 
 ' Carry us, O omniscient god (Jata-vedas), through all our 
 troubles and difficulties, as if thou wert conveying us over 
 a river by means of a boat. O Fire, thou art glorified by us 
 with as great honour as (was once offered thee) by Atri, be 
 thou willing (be thou awake or active) to become the protector 
 of our persons.' 
 
 After this prayer offerings are made with the usual reve- 
 rential ejaculations, thus : ' Homage to Fire (Agni). I offer 
 fragrant sandal for unguent (vilepana), I offer flowers for 
 worship. I offer uncooked grains of rice (akshatah) for every 
 kind of offering ^.' 
 
 Next, the worshipper, after purifying his person and wash- 
 ing his hands, makes offerings to all the gods, throwing 
 portions of cooked rice — each portion about equal to a 
 mouthful — into the fire, with the following words : — 
 
 ' Om. Homage to the Sun (Suryaya-svaha). This is offered for the Sun, 
 and not for my own use ; homage to Prajapati, to Agni, to Soma Vanas- 
 pati, to Agni and Soma together, to Indra and Agni together, to Heaven 
 and Earth, to Dhanvantari, to Indra alone, to all the gods (Visvebhyo 
 devebhyah), to Brahma, to Bhur and Agni, to Bhuvar and Vayu, to Svar 
 and Surya ',' etc. 
 
 The next act is the taking up of ashes (vibhuti-grahana) 
 
 from the fire in a deep-bowled spoon called Darvi, and the 
 
 application of a small quantity with the finger to different 
 
 parts of the body, with the following prayer to Rudra (Siva) : 
 
 ' O Rudra, inflict not harm on our sons and grandsons, on 
 
 ' Jata-vedas probably means ' having knowledge of all that is born or 
 created.' The loth and i ith verses of this hymn are also recited after the 9th. 
 
 ^ That is as a substitute for all other oblations. Practically neither 
 sandal, perfumes, nor flowers are offered on ordinary occasions, but only ♦ 
 cooked rice is put into the fire in place of other offerings. 
 
 ' The manuals give a diagram of the circle, and the names of all the 
 gods to whom portions of food are offered on the ground in the conclud- 
 ing Bali-harapa ceremony. The cooked food appears to be offered in fire 
 to these same gods in the same order. 
 
The Bali-harana Service. 421 
 
 our living men, on our cows and horses ; destroy not our 
 brave men in thy anger ; we invoke thee continually, bringing 
 thee oblations.' (Rig-veda I. 114. 8.) 
 
 Then, with the prayer :—' May I enjoy the triple life (try- 
 ayusham) of Jamadagni\ of Kasyapa, of Agastya, of the 
 gods ; may I altogether live for a hundred years ' — ashes are 
 applied to the forehead, the neck, the navel, the right shoulder, 
 the left shoulder, and the head respectively. 
 
 Another prayer to the god of fire concludes the Vaisvadeva 
 portion of the service, thus :— 
 
 ' O bearer of the oblations, give me happiness, faith, understanding, 
 fame, wisdom, learning, intellect, wealth, strength, long life, dignity, and 
 health. I salute him whose name, when remembered and mentioned, 
 makes incomplete religious services complete '. Let the deity who par- 
 takes of the sacrifice and has the form of Agni-narayana be pleased with 
 this ceremony. Let it be regarded as offered to the true essence of 
 the Supreme Being (Brahma).' 
 
 TAe Bali-harana Service. 
 
 But the Vaisvadeva ceremony is not complete without the 
 Bali-harana, or offering of food to all gods and all creatures, 
 including all kinds of animals and spirits. This act is identical 
 with Manu's Bhuta-yajiia, or homage to all creatures (Manu 
 III. 70. 81-IV. %\). The offering to all animals is sometimes 
 called Kaka-bali, because crows are practically the chief 
 devourers of the offerings. In fact, the Vaisvadeva and Bali- 
 harana are complementary of each other, and are generally 
 regarded as one ceremony. 
 
 The worshipper begins by placing small mouthfuls of cooked 
 rice in a circle on the ground between himself and the fire- 
 receptacle, allotting separate portions to all the gods to whom 
 offerings have already been made in the fire, as well as to 
 other beings outside the circle, in regular order, saying : — 
 
 ^ Compare White Yajur-veda (Vajasaneyi-S.) III. 62. 
 
 " According to the manual I have followed, a Sruti enjoins that if any 
 part of the ceremony has been carelessly omitted, it is held to be com- 
 pleted by remembering and repeating the name of Vishiju. 
 
42 2 The Bali-harana Service. 
 
 ' Homage (l) to Surya, (2) to Prajapati, (3) to Agni, (4) to Prajapati, 
 (S) to Soma with Vanaspati, (6) to Agni and Soma, (7) to Indra with 
 Agni, (8) to Heaven and Earth, (9) to Dhanvantari ', (10) to Indra, (11) to 
 all the gods, (12) to Brahma, (13) to the waters, (14) to the plants and 
 trees, (15) to the house, (16) to the household deities, (17) to the gods of 
 the foundation of the house.' 
 
 Then portions are placed on the ground just outside the 
 
 circle for other gods and beings in the order of the quarters 
 
 of the compass, beginning with the East, saying : — 
 
 'Homage (18) to Indra, (19) to Indra's attendants, (20) to Yama, 
 (21) to Yama's attendants, (22) to Varuna, (23) to Varuna's attendants, 
 (24) to Soma, (25) to Soma's attendants, (26) to Brahma, (27) to Brahma's 
 attendants, (28) to all the Gods, (29) to all the Bhutas or Spirits, (30) to 
 all the Spirits who move about by day, (31) to all the Spirits who move 
 about by night, (32) to all Rakshasas and evil spirits, (33) to the 
 Pitris — the worshipper hanging his sacred thread over the right shoulder 
 (seep. 410) and becoming Pradinavltl, (34) to the dog Syama, (35) to the 
 dog Sabala, (36) to Sanaka ^ and the other Rishis (the worshipper hang- 
 ing his thread round his neck like a necklace and becoming Nivlti, see 
 p. 410).' With regard to 34 and 35, see p. 289. 
 
 While making offerings of food to the spirits and animals 
 
 he says : — 
 
 ' I who am myself desirous of being fed, offer oblations of food to 
 those spirits that move about day and night and delight in doing mis- 
 chief. Let the lord of food grant me also to be nourished by the food 
 I am about to eat.' 
 
 While offering portions of food outside the door of the 
 house he says : — 
 
 ' Let the crows that come from all the four quarters of the sky (presided 
 over by Indra, Varuna, Vayu, Yama, and Nirriti) take the portions of rice 
 placed by me on the ground.. I present a portion to the two dogs, called 
 Syama and Sabala (see p. 289), belonging to the family of Vaivasvata, 
 that they may protect me always in my path (through this world and the 
 next). I place portions on the ground for dogs, for low-born persons 
 (dandalas) and outcasts, for all animaJs and for crows (Sva-candala- 
 patita-vayasebhyah ■^).' 
 
 ■■ Dhanvantari is not the physician of the gods produced at the churn- 
 ing of the ocean, but an ancient deity. 
 
 ^ Sanaka was one of the four sons of Brahma. 
 
 ' The Rev. Nehemiah Goreh (a converted Brahman) informed me 
 that he used to repeat these words every day when he performed the 
 Vaisvadeva and Bali-harana for his family. 
 
The Ceremony of Dining. 423 
 
 The householder then waits at the door for a short interval, 
 watching for some guest (atithi) who may be passing, or for 
 some beggar to whom he may give a portion of food as alms ^. 
 
 He then washes his hands and feet, sips water, and re-enters 
 
 the house, saying : — 
 
 ' Let earth, atmosphere, and sky be favourable to us and make us free 
 from fear of danger. Let all the quarters of the sky, the waters, and 
 the lightnings protect us from all harm ! Peace, peace, peace ! homage 
 to Vishnu, homage to Vishnu, homage to Vishnu.' 
 
 The Ceremony of Dining. 
 
 After the due performance of the Vaisvadeva and Bali- 
 harana ceremonies the cooked food is considered fit to be 
 consumed, and it might be thought that after so long a 
 religious service the members of the householder's family 
 would have nothing further to do but to eat their dinner 
 without further ceremony. But not so. The process of 
 dining is itself regarded as a religious rite, and must be 
 conducted according to prescribed forms. 
 
 Most of the manuals in my possession give directions for 
 what is called Bhojana-vidhi, ' the ceremony of dining.' In 
 practice, what generally happens in the families of orthodox 
 Brahmans and other high-caste natives ^ is nearly as follows :— 
 
 The males of the family sit down in a row on the ground 
 with their legs folded under them in the usual manner. 
 They are waited on by the wives, daughters ^ and widows of 
 the family ; for no woman in any Indian household will 
 venture to eat till the men have finished. Boiled rice and 
 other kinds of grain or pulse cooked with condiments and 
 
 1 The object of waiting at the door is that the worshipper may feel he 
 has done his best to discharge the duty of performing the Manushya- 
 yajna or Atithi-pujana, 'homage to men or guests,' enjomed by Manu 
 (in Book in. 70). _, ^ .,. 
 
 2 Of course great variations occur even among Brahman families, 
 especially in large cities where anti-brahmanic influences are at work. 
 
 ■' Daughters, however, are often privileged to eat with their fathers. 
 
424 Grace before Dinner. 
 
 sometimes various kinds of sweetmeats are served up on 
 plates made of leaves ^ (often of the palasa tree or the plan- 
 tain) and placed before each person ; but no one begins 
 eating till certain religious forms have been gone through. 
 In the iirst place, there is the usual adamana or sipping of 
 water for internal purification (p. 403). Each person pours 
 water with a spoon into the palm of the hand, then some 
 one leads the others, and all sip together. Next, water is 
 sprinkled in a circle round each plate, and some one of the 
 company repeats a grace or prayer before eating. The most 
 common prayer is from two passages in the Taittiriya Brah- 
 mana ^, as follows : — ■ 
 
 ' Let rivers continue to flow, let clouds rain, let plants produce 
 good fruit (for the support of the world), may I be the lord of lands 
 (grama Com.) that produce food, rice, and curds.' 
 
 ' They extol food (saying) : that which is food is certainly a great divine 
 power, since it leads a man (him) to supreme prosperity.' 
 
 The first clause of this curious prayer seems to be a bene- 
 diction spoken for the benefit of the world at large ; the second 
 is for the good of the speaker ; the third is a glorification of 
 the food which the speaker is about to eat. Sometimes the 
 following text from the Rig-veda (X. 121. 10) precedes the 
 prayer : — 
 
 ' O Lord of all creatures, no one else but thou keepest 
 all these living beings encircled by thy care ; with whatever 
 desires we sacrifice to thee, let the fruit of that be to us ; 
 may we become possessors of wealth ^.' 
 
 ^ In large towns plates of metal are generally used. 
 
 ^ Taittiriya Brahmana II. 7. 16. 4, and I. 7. 10. 6. The foUowingis the 
 Sanskrit text : Yantu nadayo varshantu parjanyab supippala oshadhayo 
 bhavantu, annavatam odanavatam amikshavatam esham raja bhiiyasam. 
 
 Odanam udbruvate, parameshthi va eshah, yad odanalhi paramam evai- 
 nam sriyam gamayati. 
 
 ' Prajapate na tvad etany anyo visva jatani pari ta babhuva, yat-kamas 
 te juhumas tan no astu, vayam syama patayo raylnam. In KuUuka's Com- 
 mentary to Manu(II. 54) a much simpler form ofgrace before meat is given. 
 The eater is told that he is always to honour his food and never despise 
 it, and to pray that he may always obtain it (nityam asmakam etad astu). 
 
Offerings at Dinner. Funeral Ceremonies. 425 
 
 After the recitation of this grace the actual business of 
 eating may begin, but each person first places either four or 
 five small mouthfuls (grasa) of food on the ground on the 
 right side of his leaf-plate. These are called simply ahuti, 
 ' offerings \' or sometimes (^itrahuti, "■ offerings to C^itra,' or to 
 Citra-gupta, whose power in the intermediate state after death 
 is especially dreaded (see p. 39a). While placing the mouth- 
 fuls he ought to say: 'Homage to (fitra^, to (iitra-gupta ^ to 
 Yama, to Yama-dharma, to Bhur bhuvah svar.' 
 
 After the dinner is over these mouthfuls are left to be eaten 
 by cats (if there are any in the house), or together with the 
 leaf-plates and whatever is left upon them, they are thrown to 
 the cows, or simply thrown out of the house to be eaten by 
 dogs or animals of any kind. The evening family meal is 
 a less formal ceremony. 
 
 With reference to the form of salutation used at the end 
 
 of the morning Sandhya service (see p. 407), I may mention 
 
 that I was told by the Brahman, Mr. Nehemiah Goreh, that 
 
 before he became a Christian his daily form of words 
 
 addressed to his father (Guru) were : — 
 
 Bhargava - cyavanapnavanaurva - jamadagnyeti - panca-pravaranvita - 
 jamadagnyavatsa-gotrotpanno 'ham Rig-vedantargata-sakala-sakhadh- 
 yayi Raghunatha-sarma 'ham bho Guro tvam abhivadayami. ' O Father, 
 I Raghunatha-sarma, a student of the Sakala branch of the Rig-veda, 
 born in the family of the children of Jamadagni, possessing five lines of 
 progenitors — Bhargava, Cyavana, Apnavana, Aurva, and Jamadagnya — 
 salute thee.' 
 
 It might be thought that every complete account of Hindu 
 
 domestic rites would require to end with a description of 
 
 funeral and Sraddha ceremonies, but for these see p. 274. 
 
 ' In the same way, whenever a Roman family sat down to meals, a 
 portion of the food was presented to the Lares, regarded as departed 
 spirits. 
 
 ^ (iitraya namah, etc., or svaha, may be substituted for namah. 
 
 * Citra-gupta is the recorder who records the sins and merits of man- 
 kind in Yama's world. 
 
CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 Hindu Fasts, Festivals, and Holy Days. 
 
 Although Hinduism has no ecclesiastical organization 
 under any central authority it has a longer list of festivals 
 (utsava), and seasons of rejoicing, qualified by fasts (upavasa, 
 vrata), vigils (jagarana), and seasons of mortification, than 
 any other religion. Most of these take place on certain lunar 
 days (tithi), each lunation of rather more than twenty-seven 
 solar days being divided into thirty lunar days, fifteen of which 
 during the moon's increase constitute the light half of the 
 month, and the other fifteen the dark half Some festivals 
 are regulated by the supposed motions of the sun. To de- 
 scribe all the fasts and festivals would require a volume. 
 I can only indicate some of the most common. 
 
 And first, with regard to the custom of fasting, it may 
 be worth while to point out that no Christian man — be he 
 Roman Catholic or Anglican — not even the most austere 
 stickler for the most strict observance of every appointed 
 period of humiliation and abstinence, can for a moment hope 
 to compete with any religious native of India — Hindu or 
 Muhammadan — who may have entered on a course of fasting, 
 abstinence, and bodily maceration. 
 
 In point of fact, the constant action of a tropical climate, 
 and the peculiar social habits of the sons of the soil in 
 Eastern countries continued for centuries, have induced a 
 condition of body which enables them to practise the most 
 severe and protracted abstinence with impunity, and even 
 with benefit ; while European Christians, who, with a view 
 of increasing their influence, endeavour to set an example 
 of self-mortification, find themselves quite outdone and left 
 
Hindu Fasts, Festivals, and Holy Days. 427 
 
 hopelessly in the rear by a thousand devotees in every sacred 
 city of India ^. 
 
 It must of course be borne in mind that fasting is practised 
 by Indian devotees, not as a penitential exercise, but as a 
 means of accumulating religious merit. Moreover, severe self- 
 mortification is always connected with the fancied attainment 
 of extraordinary sanctity or superhuman powers. Amongst 
 other objects aimed at is the acquirement of a kind of preter- 
 natural or ethereal lightness of body. By long fasting a man 
 is believed to achieve what is called Laghima, ' lightness ' ; 
 that is to say, his frame becomes so buoyant and sublimated 
 by abstinence, that the force of gravitation loses its power of 
 binding him to the earth, and he is able to sit or float in the 
 air. It may seem the very height of credulity to give cre- 
 dence to an emaciated Hindu claiming to triumph in this 
 way over the laws of matter ; yet cool-headed and sceptical 
 Englishmen of unimpeachable sincerity have been invited to 
 witness the achievements of these so-called Yogis, and have 
 come away convinced of their genuineness and ready to testify 
 to the absence of all fraud. 
 
 Nevertheless, it must be noted that the rules of fasting, as 
 practised by natives of India in the present day, are by no 
 means so stringent as they were in ancient times. Several 
 severe forms of abstinence are specified by Manu. For ex- 
 ample, the fast called ' very painful ' (ati-kridchra) consisted 
 in eating only a single mouthful every day for nine days, and 
 then abstaining from all food for the three following days 
 (Manu XI. 213). 
 
 Another notable fast was that called ' the lunar vow ' (can- 
 
 ' The truth is that any breach of the Creator's physical laws and laws 
 of adaptation is sure to be followed by a Nemesis, and those devoted 
 Englishmen who practise protracted abstinence from food in an ex- 
 hausting Indian atmosphere cannot expect to be exempt from the 
 operation of these laws. We have recently had examples of useful 
 careers arrested through neglecting to study the account of the second 
 or 'pinnacle temptation' of Christ (St. Matthew iv. 6j. 
 
428 Hindu Fasts, Festivals, and Holy Days. 
 
 drayana-vrata). It consisted in diminishing the consumption 
 of food every day by one mouthful for the waning half of the 
 lunar month, beginning with fifteen mouthfuls at the full moon 
 until the quantity was reduced to nil at the new moon, and 
 then increasing it in like manner during the fortnight of the 
 moon's increase (Manu VI. 20, XI. 216). 
 
 In the present day every religious Hindu fasts twice in 
 every lunar month — that is on the eleventh day (ekadasi) in 
 each fortnight. These fasts are usually kept in honour of 
 Vishnu, but are not very strictly observed, as fruit and milk 
 are allowed. The Saivas usually fast on the thirteenth or 
 fourteenth day of the dark half of every month, on the day 
 and night called Siva-ratri, ' Siva's night,' in anticipation of 
 the great fast on the night of Siva, kept once a year (p. 430). 
 The evening before is called Pradosha. Some, again, fast 
 in honour of Ganesa on the fourth lunar day (caturthl) once 
 a month, in anticipation of the chief Ganesa fast once a year 
 
 (P- 431)- 
 
 An Indian friend of mine told me that, when a little boy, 
 he accidentally crushed a sparrow ; whereupon his mother 
 made him keep an eleventh-day fast, the merit (punya) of 
 which was credited to the spirit of the dead sparrow. 
 
 Other chief festivals and fasts beginning with Magha — 
 corresponding to our January-February — are as follow : — 
 
 Makara-sankranti (popularly Sankrant), in celebration of 
 the commencement of the sun's northern course (uttarayana) 
 in the heavens. To mark this, a kind of New Year's festival 
 is observed towards the end of Pausha or beginning of Magha 
 (about January xa). The sun has then reached the most 
 southern point of the ecliptic. It is a period of rejoicing 
 everywhere, especially as marking the termination of the in- 
 auspicious month Pausha (December-January) ; but it is not 
 really the beginning of a new year, which varies in different 
 parts of India. In Bengal it may be called the ' Festival of 
 good cheer.' Practically, at least, it is kept by free indulg- 
 
Hindu Fasts, Festivals, and Holy Days. 429 
 
 ence itl'tlie eating of cakes, sweetmeats, and other good things. 
 At one of the most sacred places in India, Prayaga (Allahabad), 
 where the Jumna and Ganges meet, a celebrated religious fair 
 (Mela) takes place during this season. 
 
 The same festival in the South of India is commonly called 
 Pongal (or Pungal). It marks the commencement of the 
 Tamil year, and is the day for congratulatory visits. People 
 purchase new cooking-pots and boil fresh rice in milk. Then 
 they salute each other with the question — ' Has the milk 
 boiled .' ' to which the answer is given that ' the boiling 
 (pongal) is over.' In reality the South Indian festival seems 
 to be dedicated to the glorification of agriculture. Cattle are 
 decorated with garlands, their horns coloured, and mango 
 leaves hung round their necks. Then they are led about in 
 procession, exempted from all labour, and virtually, if not 
 actually, worshipped. 
 
 Vasanta-paiidami, on the 5th of the light half of Magha 
 (January-February). This is a spring festival. In Bengal 
 SarasvatI (also, like Lakshmi, called Sri), goddess of arts and 
 learning, is worshipped at this season. The day is a holiday 
 in all public and mercantile offices. Reading and writing are 
 honoured by being suspended, but people worship an image of 
 the goddess, or ink-stands, pens, paper, and other writing im- 
 plements taken to represent the image. Sometimes an offici- 
 ating priest is called in who reads the prescribed formula:, and 
 presents rice, fruits, sweetmeats, flowers, etc., while the lay- 
 worshippers stand before the images or symbols with flowers 
 in their hands, beseeching the goddess to grant them the 
 blessings of learning, wealth, and fame. 
 
 Moreover, on this day, according to Mr. S. C. Bose, every 
 Pandit in Bengal who keeps a school sets up an image of 
 SarasvatI and invites his patrons and friends to call upon him 
 and do honour to the goddess. This they do by making 
 offerings of rupees, which really form an important part of 
 the Pandit's annual income. It is a significant fact that 
 
43Q Hindu Fasts, Festivals, and Holy Days. 
 
 females are not allowed to take parf in the worship of this 
 goddess, though she be of their own sex. 
 
 Maha-Siva-ratri, or ' great Siva-night,' is held on the 14th of 
 the dark half of Magha (about the middle or end of February). 
 A fast is observed during the day, and a vigil kept at night, 
 when the Linga is worshipped (see p. 90). At this season 
 many pilgrims flock to the places dedicated to Siva. 
 
 Holi or HutasanI festival— identified with the Dola-yatra, 
 or rocking of the image of Krishna ^ — is celebrated, especially 
 in the upper provinces, as a kind of Hindu Saturnalia or 
 Carnival, and is therefore very popular. It begins about 
 ten days before the full moon of Phalguna (February-March), 
 but is usually only observed for the last three or four days, 
 ending with the full moon. Boys dance about in the streets, 
 and inhabitants of houses sprinkle the passers-by with red or 
 yellow powder, use squirts and play practical jokes. It is 
 marked by rough sports, loud niusic, merriment, mid-night 
 orgies, obscene songs, excesses and abominations. Towards 
 the close of the festival, about the night of full moon, a bonfire 
 is lighted and games — representing the frolics of the young 
 Krishna — take place around the expiring embers. 
 
 Rama-navamI — the birthday of Rama-candra — is observed 
 on the 9th of the light half of the month Caitra (March- 
 April), and is kept by some as a strict fast. The temples 
 of Rama are illuminated, and his image adorned with costly 
 ornaments. The Ramayana is read in the temples, and dances 
 (Nautches) are kept up during the night. 
 
 Naga-pancamI is held on the 5th day of the light half of 
 Sravana, in honour of the Nagas. 
 
 Two days later comes the Sltala-saptami, in honour of the 
 Small-pox goddess (p. 228), when only cold food is eaten. 
 
 Krishna-janmashtamT, the birthday of Krishna — kept on 
 
 ^ The meaning of Holl is doubtful. It may be merely an imitation of 
 the sounds and cries made by the revellers. By some the festival is said 
 to be in commemoration of the killing of the demon Madhu by Krishna. 
 
Hindu Fasts, Festivals, and Holy Days. 431 
 
 the 8th of the dark half of the month Bhadra or (in Bombay 
 and the South) of Srayana (July-August) — is one of the 
 greatest of all Hindu holidays (see p. 113). 
 
 The variation in time in this and other festivals is caused 
 by the circumstance that the months of the Northern and 
 Southern Brahmans differ in the dark fortnight. 
 
 Ganesa-daturthi — the birthday of Ganesa — is observed on 
 the 4th of the light half of the month Bhadra (August- 
 September). Clay figures of the deity are made, and after 
 being worshipped for a few days, thrown into the water. 
 
 Sixteen consecutive lunar days are devoted to the per- 
 formance of Sraddhas in the dark half of Bhadra, which is 
 therefore called the Pitri-paksha (see p. 308). 
 
 Durga-puja, or Nava-ratra, ' nine nights,' beginning on the 
 ist and ending on the loth day of the light half of Asvina 
 (September-October), are celebrated in many places as a 
 great holiday, especially in Bengal, and connected with the 
 autumnal equinox. Nominally they commemorate the victory 
 of Durga, wife of Siva, over a buffalo-headed demon (Mahi- 
 shasur). The form under which she is adored is that of an 
 image with ten arms and a weapon in each hand, her right 
 leg resting on a lion and her left on the buffalo demon. This 
 image is worshipped for nine days — following on the sixteen 
 Sraddhas of the Pitri-paksha — and then cast into the water. 
 
 The tenth day is called Vijaya-dasamT, or Dasa-hara. 
 
 Kall-puja is a kindred festival in Bengal, lasting only for 
 one night, and that the darkest night of the dark fortnight of 
 the month Karttika. The image worshipped is that of Kali, 
 the dark and terrible form of Siva's wife described at p. 1 89. 
 The well-known temple at Kali Ghat near Calcutta and other 
 shrines of the goddess are during this night drenched with the 
 blood of goats, sheep and buffaloes, sacrificed in honour of the 
 sanguinary goddess. 
 
 Rama-llla,' Rama-play,' is celebrated in some parts of India 
 on the day when the Bengalis commit their images of Durga 
 
432 Hindu Fasts, Festivals, and Holy Days. 
 
 to the waters. It is a dramatic representation of the abduction 
 of Sita by Ravana, concluding with the death of Ravana. 
 
 Divali (properly Dipali or Dlpavali), ' the feast of lamps/ is 
 observed twenty days after the Nava-ratra on the last two 
 days of the dark half of Asvina, and on the new moon and 
 four following days of Karttika, in honour of Vishnu's wife 
 Lakshmi or of Siva's wife BhavanI (Parvati). It is marked by 
 beautiful illuminations, in the preparation of which Indians 
 far excel Europeans. 
 
 In some parts of India the Sarasvati-puja (described p. 439) 
 is kept at this season, on the 8th of the light half of Asvina. 
 
 The Divali should be seen at Benares. There its magnifi- 
 cence is heightened by the situation of the city on the bank of 
 the river and the unique grouping and somewhat bizarre out- 
 line of the buildings. At the approach of night small earthen 
 lamps, fed with oil, are prepared in millions, and placed close 
 together so as to mark out the architectural form of mansion, 
 palace, temple, minaret, and dome in lines of fire. All the boats 
 on the river are lighted up, and the city, under the serene sky 
 of an Indian autumn, is a blaze of calm effulgence. Viewed 
 from the water it presents a dazzling spectacle — a scene of fairy- 
 like splendour, which cannot be matched in any other, city of 
 the world. Indeed similar spectacles in the great European 
 capitals appear absolutely paltry by comparison. Perhaps the 
 illuminations which took place on the occasion of the Prince of 
 Wales^ visit to India in 1876 reached the climax of perfection, 
 and will never be equalled for beauty and magnificence. 
 
 Karttika-purnima is a festival kept on the full moon of the 
 month Karttika (October-November), in honour of Siva's 
 victory over the demon called Tripurasura. 
 
 It must be noted that the months are lunar and that the 
 calendar varies in different parts of India. Every^month, such 
 as Sravana, Vaisakha, and the intercalary or thirteenth month ' 
 
 ' There is an allusion to this thirteenth month in Rig-veda I. 25. 8, and 
 in Atharva-veda V. 6. 4, XIII. 3. 8. 
 
Hindu Fasts, Festivals, and Holy Days. 433 
 
 (Adhika-masa), has its Mahatmya or special excellence. 
 When the intercalary naonth comes round every third year, 
 preachers make the most of their opportunity, and recite 
 its Mahatmya, hoping thereby to stimulate the generosity 
 of the people. Then, again, if a conjunction of the moon 
 (or in some places a full moon) fall on a Monday, this is 
 an astronomical coincidence that must be turned to the 
 best account. It is a conjuncture peculiarly favourable to 
 charitable acts. The same may be said of eclipses. A single 
 rupee given at such seasons is worth a thousand rupees at 
 other times. 
 
 Moreover, every day of the week has its sacred character. 
 Monday is especially sacred to Siva (Maha-deva). Pious 
 persons often fast on this day and worship the Lihga in 
 the evening. Saturday is Hanuman's day, and offerings are 
 especially made to him on that day. Then the eighth day 
 in every lunar fortnight is sacred to Durga. This is a day 
 when no study is allowed, and therefore called An-adhyaya. 
 Indeed holy days or non-reading days may be multiplied in- 
 definitely. Thus a pupil will stop reading and go home if it 
 happens to thunder, if any person or animal chances to pass 
 between himself and his teacher, if a guest arrives, and often 
 during the greater part of the rainy season. 
 
 No less than four eras are commonly current among the 
 Hindus in India : — I. Samvat (of King Vikramaditya), rec- 
 koned from 57 B.C. ; a. Saka (of King Salivahana), reckoned 
 from 78 A.D. ; 3. San, current in Bengal, reckoned from 593 
 A.D. ; 4. The era of Parasu-rama, current in Malabar, reckoned 
 from 1 1 76 B.C. In almanacks it is usual to state how many 
 years of the present age of the world or Kali-yuga (p. 398) 
 have elapsed ; thus at present 4984 out of 432.°°° years have 
 gone by. The three previous ages are the Krita or Satya, 
 Treta, or Dvapara. Almanacks which follow the Saka era 
 begin the year with the light half of the month Caitra, but 
 the Samvat year usually commences with Karttika. 
 
 Ff 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 Temples and Sacred Places of Pilgrimage. *~ 
 
 It is well known that the principal seat and great centre 
 of the cultus of Siva is Benares (Varanasl)^ — a city whose 
 world-wide celebrity has earned for it the title of KasI, ' the 
 resplendent.' In the KasT-khanda of the Skanda-purana it is 
 recorded how the god himself chose that city for his special 
 abode, and how after having undergone severe austerities in 
 the neighbourhood he made it sacred to himself and to his 
 sons Ganesa and Skanda (p. an). 
 
 Elsewhere Benares is described as a special creation of the 
 Creator, who formed it of pure unpolluted earth, separated; it 
 from the rest of the world, and caused it to rest on one of the 
 points of Siva's trident. 
 
 No doubt Benares was one of the first cities to acquire a 
 reputation for sanctity, and is still regarded as the most 
 sacred spot in all India. It is the Hindu's Jerusalem arid 
 Mecca. Here, temples, shrines, and idols are multiplied 
 beyond all calculation. Here every inch of ground, every 
 clod of earth is hallowed, and the very air is holy. 
 
 No wonder, then, that every pious Hindu is ambitious of 
 accomplishing at least one pilgrimage to what he regards as a 
 portion of heaven let down upon earth, and if he can happily 
 manage to die within the magic circle of what is called, the 
 Paiicakosi — that is to say, within a circuit of ten miles round 
 the centre of the holy city — nay, if the most desperate * 
 
 ' The popular name is more properly written Banaras. The name 
 Varanasi, of which it is a corruption, is said to be derived from two 
 small rivers outside the city, the Varana or Varna and the Asi. 
 
>1^'T 
 
 Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Benares. 435 
 
 criminal from any part of the world — be he of any religious 
 denomination, Christian, Buddhist, or Muhammadan— die 
 there, no amount of the most heinous guilt, not even the 
 deadly sin of eating beef, can prevent his immediate trans- 
 portation to the heaven of Siva. Yet Benares is by no means 
 exclusively dedicated to Siva ; nor are its inhabitants exclu- 
 sively devoted to the worship of any one favourite deity 
 (ishta-devata). Nor is it the seat of any ecclesiastical organi- 
 zation or of any council or central sacerdotal government, 
 which indeed exist nowhere in India. Still Benares is the 
 citadel of Brahmanism — the stronghold of Hinduism. It is 
 the focus from which all the lines of the most complicated 
 religious system in the world diverge, and to which they 
 converge. Here priestcraft reigns supreme in all its pleni- 
 tude and power. Nay it is not too much to say that here 
 ^ population of about 300,000 persons and a countless number 
 of pilgrims deliver themselves up to be deluded, defrauded, 
 and kept in religious slavery by 35,000 arrogant Brahmans. 
 
 Picturesquely situated on the Ganges and stretching for 
 three or four miles along this most sacred of all rivers, with 
 magnificent Ghats or flights of steps conducting pilgrims by 
 thousands into the very midst of its hallowed waters, Benares 
 is the home of every form of Hindu religious earnestness and 
 enthusiasm, combined with every conceivable variety of hideous 
 superstition and fanaticism. 
 
 No description indeed can give the slightest idea of the 
 reality of the sight presented to the eye by this unique city. 
 The traveller bent on investigating its inner mysteries, and 
 eager to solve for himself the riddle of the grosser forms of 
 its superstition and fanaticism, finds that his only hope of 
 traversing its tortuous streets, or penetrating the living tide 
 ' which daily ebbs and flows in its leading thoroughfares, is by 
 trusting to his personal powers as a pedestrian. Pushing his 
 way through the seething throng he beholds everywhere, as 
 he advances, the most striking contrasts and curious incon- 
 
 F f 3 
 
436 Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Benares. 
 
 gruities — ^^princely mansions and mean tenements, handsome 
 edifices and fantastic freaks of architecture, crowded shrines 
 and empty sanctuaries, bright new temples and dilapidated 
 fanes, freshly gilded domes and mildewed pinnacles, graceful 
 minarets and unsightly cupolas, open streets and impassable 
 lanes, dirty squares and well-kept quadrangles— everywhere 
 and from every point of view a strange intermingling of the 
 beautiful and the grotesque, the tasteful and the bizarre, the 
 simple and the extravagant. 
 
 The living objects which meet his eye as he proceeds are 
 not less interesting, odd, and incongruous. Now he is jostled 
 by sacred bulls which wander everywhere free and uncon- 
 trolled ; now a number of impudent monkeys bound over his 
 head or spring from roof to roof; now a dozen sacred pigeons 
 fly fearlessly almost into his face, or a ilight of parrots circle 
 noisily around his head. In one part of the city he is hemmed 
 in before some sacred pool or noted temple by a motley throng 
 of pilgrims, some pressing forward to perform their ablutions, 
 some carrying Ganges water for use at the idol-shrines, some 
 vociferating the name of their favourite gods. In another 
 quarter he is surrounded by groups of half-naked mendi- 
 cants and dirty devotees, many of whom parade their bodily 
 austerities in a manner highly repulsive to European eyes. 
 Here he struggles with difficulty through streets of copper--, 
 smiths and workers in brass. There his path is obstructed 
 by the stalls of vendors of coarse sweetmeats, sellers of flower- 
 garlands, or money-changers sitting behind heaps of cowries 
 and piles of gold and silver coins. Everywhere temples, 
 shrines, mosques, images and symbols, holy wells, pools, and 
 sacred trees present themselves in bewildering confusion. 
 
 The number of principal temples is at least two thousand. 
 Smaller shrines are, of course, innumerable. Of Muham- 
 madan mosques the total is said to amount to three hundred. 
 The tale of idols is computed at about half a million. The 
 chief temple called the ' golden temple,' dedicated to Siva or 
 
Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Benares. 437 
 
 Maha-deva (see p. 78), is disappointing- to any one who has 
 seen the south Indian temples ; for although Siva is specially 
 worshipped and propitiated at Benares he has nowhere so 
 many earnest votaries as in the South, and the Benares temple 
 in respect of size, external appearance and importance is to 
 the great temples of Tanjore, Madura and Tinnevelly, what a 
 small village church is to St. Paul's Cathedral. 
 
 The fact is that the waves of Muhammadan invasion which 
 swept over the North-west and Central provinces of India, 
 and seemed at one time likely to obliterate Brahmanism 
 altogether, were either arrested in their onward course or else 
 spent themselves before reaching the South. This is remark- 
 ably illustrated at Benares, where the most conspicuous build- 
 ing is the great mosque of Aurangzlb with its lofty minarets 
 on the Ganges. Even the old original Saiva temple of Visve- 
 svara does not exist. It was pulled down by the ruthless 
 Aurangzlb and a mosque built on its foundations ^. Another 
 temple, however, speedily arose close at hand and rivalled the 
 old one in picturesque beauty, if not in size. It stands at a 
 distance of two or three hundred yards from it;s predecessor. 
 
 Between them is the Jnana-vapl, or holy well of knowledge 
 —a spot greatly frequented and held in high veneration 
 by pilgrims from all parts, of the country— a legend being 
 universally current that, when Aurangzlb destroyed the Hindu 
 temple, its idol took refuge of its own accord at the bottom of 
 this holy well. Thither therefore a constant throng of wor- 
 shippers continually resort, bringing with them offerings of 
 flowers, rice, and other grain, which they throw into the water 
 thirty or forty feet below the ground. A Brahman is per- 
 petually employed in drawing up the putrid liquid, the smell 
 or rather stench of which, from incessant admixture of de- 
 caying flowers and vegetable matter, makes the neighbourhood 
 
 ' According to Mr. Sherring— whose book on Benares is well worthy 
 of perusal— there was a still earlier temple on a site not far distant. 
 
438 Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Benares. 
 
 almost unbearable. This he pours with a ladle into the hands 
 of expectant crowds, who either drink it with avidity or 
 sprinkle it reverentially over their persons. 
 
 Another sacred well, called Mani-karnika, situated on one 
 of the chief Ghats on the Ganges, owes its origin, in popular 
 belief, to the fortunate circumstance that one of Siva's ear- 
 rings happened to fall on the spot. 
 
 This well is near the surface and quite exposed to view. 
 It forms a small quadrangular pool not more than three feet 
 deep. Four flights of steps on the four sides lead to the 
 water, the disgusting foulness of which vastly enhances — in the 
 estimation of countless pilgrims — its efficacy for the removal 
 of sin. The most abandoned criminals journey from distant 
 parts of India to the margin of this sacred pool. There they 
 pay large fees to secure the services of the Brahman officials, 
 and descending with them into the water are made to mutter 
 certain texts and mystic formulae, the meaning of which they 
 are wholly unable to understand. Then while in the act 
 of repeating the words put into their mouths they eagerly 
 immerse their entire persons beneath the offensive liquid. 
 The longed-for dip over, a miraculous transformation is the 
 result ; for the foul water has cleansed the still fouler soul. 
 Few orthodox Hindus venture to doubt that the most depraved 
 sinner in existence may thus be converted into an immaculate 
 saint, worthy of being translated at once to the highest heaven 
 of the god of Benares. 
 
 But to return to the temple of Visvesvara. I found, when I 
 visited it, a constant stream of worshippers passing in and out. 
 In fact, Siva in his character of lord of the universe (see p. 78) 
 is the supreme deity of Benares. Not that the pilgrims 
 are prohibited from worshipping at the shrines of other 
 gods, but that Siva is here paramount and claims the 
 first homage. Yet this supreme god has no image; he 
 is represented by a plain conical stone — to wit, the Liiiga 
 or symbol of male generative power. The method of 
 
Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Tanjore. 439 
 
 performing worship in this great central and typical temple 
 of Hinduism appeared to me very remarkable in its contrast 
 with all Christian ideas as to the true nature of worship. 
 All that each worshipper did was to bring Ganges water 
 in a small metal vessel and pour the water over the stone 
 Linga, at the same time ringing one of the bells hanging from 
 the roof to attract the god's attention towards himself, bowing 
 low in obeisance, and muttering a few texts with repetition of 
 the god's name. In this way the god's symbol was kept 
 deluged with water (see p. 68), while the crowds who passed in 
 and out lingered for a time close to the shrine, talking to each 
 other in loud tones. Nor did any idea of irreverence seem to 
 be attached to noisy vociferation in the interior of the sanctuary 
 itself. Nor was any objection made to an unbeliever like 
 myself approaching and looking inside ; whereas in the South 
 of India I was strictly excluded from all the avenues to the 
 inner Linga-sanctuaries (see p. 447). In the courts adjacent 
 to the Linga were other shrines dedicated to various deities, 
 and in a kind of cloister or gallery which encircled the temple 
 were thousands of stone Lingas crowded together carelessly 
 and apparently only intended as votive-offerings. I noticed 
 the coil of a serpent carved round one or two of the most 
 conspicuous symbols of male generative energy, and the com- 
 bination appeared to me very significant. 
 
 The goddess Anna-purna has a temple close at hand. She 
 is thought to be charged by the god Siva with the duty of 
 keeping the inhabitants of Benares supplied with abundance 
 of food. I found the quadrangle which surrounds this shrine 
 crowded with bulls, cows, priests, and mendicants, who are 
 daily fed by the offerings of the rich. The effluvium emitted 
 by the filth and dirt was insufferable. It was here that I met 
 with an Urdhva-bahu ascetic (described at p. 88). 
 
 Among Southern Saiva temples the finest is at Tanjore. 
 
 It is contained within a vast quadrangle, the floor of which 
 is paved with bricks and kept scrupulously clean. Two lofty 
 
440 Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Tanjore. 
 
 Gopuras or gateways surmounted by high pyramidal towers ^ 
 lead into this square, and a sort of double cloister or arcade 
 surrounds it. Then in the second or hinder part of two sides 
 of the arcade are arranged a hundred and eight black stone 
 Lingas of different sizes, one for each of the hundred and eight 
 principal names of Siva, and behind these again are sixty-four 
 frescoes painted on the wall — many of them highly grotesque- 
 representing various exploits of the god or his attendants^. 
 A catalogue of sixty-three saints or distinguished personages 
 whose devotion to Siva gave them the power of performing 
 miracles and supernatural feats is sometimes enumerated 
 (see p. 85) *. On the left of the quadrangle as you enter is 
 a pleasant grove of palms and other trees. In the centre is 
 the principal temple, containing the Garbha-griham or inner- 
 most sanctuary of the sacred Linga, a kind of holy of holies 
 to which I was not allowed access. This is an imposing 
 structure, made still more so by the fine Mandapa or open 
 hall erected in front of it as a shrine for the stone image of 
 Siva's bull (nandi), which is a magnificent specimen of Indian 
 sculpture of great size. Near the principal temple are four 
 subordinate ones, two behind and two on one side. Those 
 behind are dedicated to the two sons of Siva, one to Ganesa 
 and the other to Su-brahmanya (p. 211). In front of Ganesa 
 is the image of his vehicle, the rat, looking into the shrine, as 
 the bull does into the shrine of Siva. The rat is an emblem 
 of sagacity, as the bull is of generative power (see pp. 319,328). 
 
 ' These structures are of oblong form, and sometimes of immense 
 height. They are only pyramidal in the sense of being broader at the 
 base than at the summit. It is remarkable that Vaishnava carvings are 
 found on these Tanjore Gopuras, showing that the temple may have once 
 belonged to the Vaishnavas. Everywhere the two systems seem inter- 
 mingled. 
 
 '^ In one of these a Lihga is represented with a face inside it. 
 Another has a serpent for a canopy. In another Gandodara, an attendant 
 of Siva, is swallowing mountains of rice and drinking up a river. 
 
 ' The catalogue is given by Mr. Foulkes in his Saiva Catechism. 
 
Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Tanjore. 441 
 
 The image of Su-brahmanya or Skanda is seated on a peacock 
 and has six faces. As to Su-brahmanya, see p. 214. 
 
 One of the side temples near the entrance of the quadrangle 
 contains an image of Siva, lifting up his left leg while dancing 
 the Tandava dance and trampling on the demon Apa-smara. 
 He holds the Damaru in one hand, using it for a musical 
 instrument or rattle, as a dancer would- castanets. This 
 temple has some curious pictures on the walls. One is of 
 Bhringi, an attendant of Siva, who became so feeble and 
 attenuated through self-mortification ^ that the god furnished 
 him with a third \&g for support; another represents an 
 attendant with the lower part of his body terminating in a 
 snake ; a third depicts one of Siva's servants with the feet of 
 a tiger. In a fourth the sage Markandeya is about to be 
 carried off by the king of death (Yama), when he grasps Siva's 
 Liriga and saves himself. A fifth represents the story of Kala- 
 hasta, a pious forester who habitually did homage to Siva 
 with offerings of flowers. One day having forgotten his usual 
 oblation he without any hesitation tore out one of his own 
 eyes from its socket, and having offered it as a substitute was 
 proceeding to take out the other, when Siva prevented him. 
 
 The second side temple is an oblong chamber containing an 
 image of ParvatI at the further end, with lights always burning 
 in front. Near the entrance is a representation of Parvati's 
 darpana or mirror. On one of the walls is portrayed a large 
 Liriga, canopied by the serpent Sesha. 
 
 To describe all the principal Saiva temples of India would 
 require volumes. One thousand and eight are said to exist, 
 one for each of the one thousand and eight names of the god. 
 One hundred and eight are regarded as important. Kali's 
 temples are equally numerous; see the Kall-puja at p. 431 
 and the description of the Vindyacal temple at p. 575. 
 
 He was a model ascetic, and fasted so continuously that he became 
 not only emaciated, but an actual living skeleton. He is so represented 
 in the sculptures of the caves of Elephanta near Bombay. 
 
442 Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Madura. 
 
 Of the others which I visited, the temples at Madura, 
 Ramesvara, Trichinopoly, KafijTvaram, Tinnevelly, and the 
 shrine of Kapalesvara at Nasik (one of the oldest), appeared 
 to me most worthy of note. 
 
 At the Madura temple Siva is worshipped as Sundaresvara, 
 a name given to him as the husband of Mlnakshl (corrupted 
 into Minaci), the deified daughter of a Pandya king^ 
 
 A very extensive and imposing series of shrines, passages, 
 and galleries, including a thousand-pillared open hall of great 
 beauty, constitutes the temple. These are enclosed by a high 
 wall, inside of which and encircling the interior building is an 
 open road or way for the benefit of pious persons who use it for 
 reverential circumambulation (pradakshina) round the sacred 
 shrine. Two lofty Gopuras form the enti'ance to the temple, 
 each leading by long corridors to the two principal shrines.' 
 That on the left leads to the shrine of Mlnakshl (commonly 
 called Minaci) ; that on the right terminates with the Linga 
 shrine. It is noteworthy that near the latter are images of 
 the five Pandava princes who are generally connected with 
 the worship of Krishna ^. Various interesting carvings and 
 sculptured figures are in the neighbouring corridors. It is 
 evident that Minakshi is the real popular deity of the dis- 
 trict, and that in the estimation of the inhabitants of Madura 
 her consort Siva is quite secondary. 
 
 I happened accidentally to witness a festival held in her 
 honour called Tailotsava, 'the oil festival.' A coarse image of 
 the goddess, profusely decorated with jewels and having a high 
 head-dress of hair, was carried in the centre of a long proces- 
 
 ■■ The temple is commonly called the Minakshl-sundaresvara pagoda, 
 the wife's name being placed first, as it generally is in other cases also 
 (see p. 184). The legend is that Mlnakshl was bom with three breasts, 
 but one disappeared on meeting with her future husband Siva. She was 
 then converted into a local goddess of great celebrity. 
 
 ^ This is an evidence of the tolerant spirit which marks Hinduism. 
 Where Saivism got the better of Vaishnavism in the South, the Vaishnava 
 ornaments were respected and allowed to remain in Saiva temples. 
 
Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Ramesvara. 443 
 
 sion on a canopied throne borne by eight Brahmans to a 
 platform in the magnificent hall or Mandapa of the Tirumell 
 Nayak opposite the temple. There the ceremony of undress- 
 ing the idol, removing its ornaments, anointing its head with 
 oil, bathing, redecorating and redressing it was gone through 
 amid shouting, singing, beating of tom-toms, waving of lights 
 and cowries, ringing of bells, and deafening discord from 
 forty or fifty so-called musical instruments, each played by 
 a man who did his best to overpower the sound of all the 
 others combined. At' the head of the procession was borne 
 an image of Ganesa. Then followed three elephants, a long 
 line of priests, musicians, attendants bearing cowries and um- 
 brellas, with a troop of dancing girls bringing up the rear. 
 
 No sight I witnessed in India made me more sick at heart 
 than this. It furnished a sad example of the utterly debasing 
 character of the idolatry which, notwithstanding the counter- 
 acting influences of education and Christianity, still enslaves 
 the masses of the population, deadening their intellects, cor- 
 rupting their imaginations, warping their affections, perverting 
 their consciences, disfiguring the fair soil of a beautiful country 
 with hideous images, and encouraging practices unsanctioned 
 even by their own most ancient sacred works. 
 
 Probably the Ramesvara temple ranks next to those of 
 Tanjore and Madura in magnificence, and to those of Benares 
 in sanctity. It is situated in a small town at the further side 
 of the island of Ramesvara — an island about eight miles 
 long by four broad — which, with the coral reef stretching for 
 twenty-one miles from its furthest extremity and appearing 
 like a broken bridge above the sea^, nearly connects India 
 with Manaar and Ceylon. The narrow channel separating 
 the island from the mainland is called Pambam (or Pamben). 
 The journey to it caused me great discomfort and fatigue. 
 
 ' The natives still believe this to be the remains of the bridge formed by 
 Hanuman and Rama's army of monkeys, when he invaded Ceylon for 
 the recovery of his wife Sita (see Indian Wisdom, p. 358). 
 
444 Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Ramesvara. 
 
 Starting from Ramnad a vast sandy waste has to be 
 traversed before this sacred island can be reached. Yet 
 thousands of pilgrims walk first to Benares and thence to 
 Ramesvara. And perhaps such a double pilgrimage (yatra) 
 is the most meritorious act a Hindu can perform. It is true 
 that enormous merit (punya) may be accumulated by simply 
 visiting Ramesvara, but this is as nothing compared to what 
 may be obtained by going first to Benares. 
 
 In my own case I had visited both Benares and Ramesvara, 
 though not on foot, and I was rewarded at the latter place 
 by being met on my arrival by a number of Pandits, who 
 brought a band of musicians and conducted me in state, 
 amid a deafening din, through the streets of the town. The 
 musicians, though they preceded me, all walked backwards. 
 
 In fact, if a man wish for the perfection of bliss hereafter, 
 he has only one course open to him. He must first journey 
 to Benares, there go through at least a hundred ceremonies 
 at a hundred shrines in the sacred circle surrounding the 
 centre of the city, pay large fees to the Brahmans at innu- 
 merable temples, and especially pour plenty of Ganges water 
 over the symbol of Siva at the Visvesvara shrine. Then he 
 must fill a jar with more holy water from the Ganges, and toil 
 with it on foot through dust and sand for about twelve hun- 
 dred miles to Ramesvara. There the sacred water is to be 
 poured over the symbol of Siva with the certainty of securing 
 complete beatitude hereafter, provided sufficient fees are paid 
 to the Brahmans, and the process is wound up by a bath in 
 the sea at Dhanush-koti, a little further on. 
 
 Shortly before my arrival at the temple a father and son 
 had just completed their self-imposed task, and after months 
 of hard walking succeeded in transporting their precious 
 burden of Ganges water to the other side of the channel. 
 The longed-for goal was nearly reached and the temple of 
 Ramesvara already in sight, when the father died suddenly 
 on the road, leaving his son, a mere child, utterly destitute. 
 
Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Jambukesvara. 445 
 
 The boy, however, had one treasure left— his jar of Ganges 
 water. This, if only it could be poured upon the sacred 
 symbol, would prove a complete panacea for all his earthly 
 troubles. Eagerly therefore he grasped his burden once 
 more and hurried on to the shrine. Imagine the child's 
 outburst of grief when the door was closed against him. He 
 had no fee for the presiding priest. 
 
 The temple of Ramesvara itself I found to be a vast ob- 
 long structure containing an immense collection of Linga 
 shrines, open halls and tanks surrounded by long beautiful 
 galleries and corridors, one entrance to which is from the 
 small town of Ramesvara and the other from the sea-shore. 
 The principal sanctuary or Garbha is well secluded and care- 
 fully protected from all unhallowed eyes in the centre of the 
 structure. It contains the celebrated Linga set up by Rama 
 after his return from Ceylon (Lanka). 
 
 The legend is that, anxious to expiate the impurity con- 
 tracted by the slaughter of Ravana in the battle which ended 
 in the demon's death (p. iii), Rama despatched Hanuman 
 to bring a Linga from Benares that he might erect a shrine 
 over it and so propitiate Siva. But the monkey-god was so 
 long in executing the commission that Sita prepared a Linga 
 of sand with her own hands, and Rama having then and there 
 performed the ceremony of setting it up (pratishtha) and 
 consecrating it, proceeded to worship it. He then bathed in 
 the sea from the neighbouring promontory at a spot which 
 was afterwards called Thanush-kodi (Dhanush-koti), because 
 marked by the corner of his bow. Hence a visit to this spot 
 is essential to a completely meritorious performance of the 
 Ramesvara pilgrimage. 
 
 The Saiva temple at Trichinopoly is dedicated to Siva in 
 his character of Jambukesvara, lord of the Jambu tree^- It 
 is one of the most important and interesting shrines in 
 
 ^ The connexion of Siva worship with tree and serpent worship seemed 
 to me traceable everywhere in Southern India (compare p. 331). 
 
446 Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Kanjzvaram. 
 
 India. No one could fail to be impressed with its beautiful 
 colonnades, cloisters, and thousand-pillared Mandapa, though 
 when I visited it in 1877 it was in a somewhat decaying con- 
 dition. In the central court of the temple is a metal column 
 (stambha) supporting a flag (dhvaja)^ and near it is the 
 Jambu tree over which Siva is supposed to preside. 
 
 The chief object of worship is a stone Lihga, always kept 
 under water and thence called the Ap-linga. The Pandits 
 informed me that four other celebrated Lihga-shrines in India 
 represent the remaining four elements — fire, air, earth, and 
 ether ^, all of which are believed to be manifestations of Siva 
 (compare p. 85). 
 
 At Kanjivaram (the ancient Kanci), one of the most sacred 
 places in India ^ not far distant from Madras, there are two 
 principal temples at opposite ends of the town, one dedicated 
 to Vishnu (as Varada-raja), the other to Siva. Both were 
 visited by me, and both I found to be striking examples of 
 South Indian architecture, containing a very considerable 
 collection of imposing buildings within their exterior walls. 
 According to a local legend the goddess Parvati once per- 
 formed penance under a mango-tree (amra) on the spot 
 where the Saiva temple now stands. There her husband 
 Siva appeared to her, and there he is worshipped as Ekamra- 
 natha, ' the peerless lord of the mango *.' 
 
 The Tinnevelly Saiva temple is also highly interesting and 
 instructive. Siva is here again worshipped in connexion with 
 a sacred tree, the Vata or Banian tree, whence his name 
 Vatesvara, 'lord of the Vata-tree^ ;' but here, as at Madura, his 
 
 ' A similar column is in other South Indian shrines. 
 
 ^ They are called the Tejo-linga, Vayu-lihga, Prithivi-lihga, and Akasa- 
 lihga respectively. 
 
 " It is enumerated among the seven most sacred places. 
 
 * So he was described to me by a Pandit in the temple. Otherwise his 
 name might literally be ' lord of the one mango.' 
 
 = Here is another instance of Siva's association with trees (compare 
 p. 331). The Pandits who took me round the temple described the god as 
 
Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Srl-rahgam. 447 
 
 wife Parvatl, who has a shrine on the left side of the temple, 
 under the name of KantimatI, ' the lovely one,' is the most 
 popular object of adoration 1. The Lihga of Siva, in a 
 kind of holy of holies in this temple, is very sacred. The 
 approach to it is by a long corridor; but the sanctuary itself 
 is not visible at the end of the vista. It is protected by three 
 other approaches or vestibules, each increasing in sanctity 
 (called the Ghanta-mandapa, the Maha-mandapa, and the 
 Arddha-mandapa), into none of which was I permitted to enter. 
 The Linga is, of course, never moved from its place in the 
 penetralia of the temple, but an image of Siva, called the 
 Utsava-murti, is carried about in procession on certain festival 
 days, especially when the annual ceremony of marrying the 
 god and the goddess is performed every October. The god 
 of love (Kama-deva) and his wife (Rati) have also images in 
 this temple, and a festival is held in their honour every 
 spring. Two magnificent open halls— one with a thousand 
 columns, the other with a hundred and eight— a tank, garden, 
 and grove of palms are all within the enclosure of the temple. 
 I will not advert to the ruins of the marvellous Kailasa 
 temple cut out of the solid rock at Ellora, which I visited 
 in 1877 (pp. 70, it8, 291), further than to say that it is one 
 of the wonders of India and indeed of the world. As to the 
 celebrated Vishnu-temple of Jagan-nath at Purl in Orissa, its 
 sanctity is such that 100,000 pilgrims annually eat the sacred 
 food {prasdda) distributed in its courts to priest, prince and 
 peasant aHke; for no distinctions of caste are recognized in the 
 presence of Krishna (Vishnu) ' the lord of the world.' (The 
 car-festival is described in my ' Modern India,' p. 68.) 
 
 The temple of Vishnu at Gaya has been described at p. 309, 
 and temples of Krishna at p. 144, and again at p. 152. 
 
 Salivatlsvara (or in Tamil, Nel velli-natha). I was informed that, at a 
 sacred shrine south of the Vindhya, Siva is worshipped as Draksharame- 
 svara, 'lord of the vineyard.' 
 
 Live parrots and cockatoos are hung before her shrine as offerings. 
 
448 Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Srt-rangam. 
 
 We pass on to the Srl-rangam temple at Trichinopoly which 
 contains in one of its courts a shrine of Ramanuja, the great 
 Vaishnava teacher (p. 119), who is supposed to have lived 
 here for a considerable time before his death. Sri-rangam is, 
 indeed, rather a sacred city than a temple. Hundreds of 
 Brahmans dwell within its precincts, thousands of pilgrims 
 throng its streets, and on great anniversaries myriads of wor- 
 shippers crowd its corridors, and press towards its sanctuary. 
 No sight is to be seen in any part of India that can at all 
 compare with the unique effect produced by its series of seven 
 quadrangular enclosures formed by seven squares of massive 
 walls, one within the other — every square pierced by four 
 lofty gateways, and each gateway surmounted by pyramidal 
 towers rivalling in altitude the adjacent rock of Trichinopoly. 
 
 The construction of this marvellous congeries of sacred 
 buildings must have cost millions of rupees, and since its first 
 construction fabulous sums have been spent on its main- 
 tenance and enlargement. It is said that kings and princes 
 have emptied their coffers and given up their revenues for 
 the completion and extension of its many-storied towers; 
 rich men of every rank have parted with their treasures 
 for the adding of column after column to its thousand- 
 pillared courts ; misers have yielded up their hoards for 
 the decoration of its jewelled images ; capitalists have be- 
 queathed vast benefactions for the support of its priests; 
 architects and artists have exhausted all their resources for 
 the production of a perfect shrine, the worthy receptacle of 
 an idol of transcendent glory. 
 
 The idea is that each investing square of walls shall form 
 courts of increasing sanctity which shall conduct the wor- 
 shipper by regular gradations to a central holy of holies 
 of unique shape and proportions. In fact, the entire fabric of 
 shrines, edifices, towers, and enclosures is supposed to be a 
 terrestrial counterpart of Vishnu's heaven (Vaikuntha), to 
 which his votaries are destined to be transported. 
 
Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. &ri-rahgam. 449 
 
 The idol itself is recumbent, and its legendary history is 
 curious. When Rama dismissed his ally Vibhishapa — the 
 brother of the conquered demon Ravana who had carried off 
 Sita to Ceylon — he gave him, out of gratitude for his services, 
 a golden idol of Vishnu, with instructions not to lay it down 
 till he had reached home. Vibhishana accordingly set out on 
 his return to Ceylon, taking the precious image with him. 
 Passing near SrI-rangam, and wishing to bathe in the sacred 
 tank, he gave the image to one of his followers, charging him 
 to hold it upright, and on no account to let it pass out of his 
 hands. But Vibhishana was so long over his ablutions, that 
 the' holder of the image, finding its weight insupportable, 
 deposited it on the ground, intending to take it up again 
 before Vibhishana's return. The dismay of all parties con- 
 cerned was great when they discovered that the idol obsti- 
 nately declined to be removed from its comfortable position. 
 It had, therefore, to be left in a recumbent attitude, and a 
 shrine was built over it, shaped like the sacred monosyllable 
 Om, supposed to be a combination of the three letters 
 A, U, M, mystically significant of the Supreme Being's three 
 principal manifestations, Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva (pp. 44 ; 
 402; 403). On the summit of the shrine were placed four 
 - pinnacles to denote the four Vedas, and around it were 
 constructed seven walls built in squares, one within the other, 
 and forming seven quadrangular courts, figuring the seven 
 divisions or degrees of bliss in Vishnu's heaven. 
 
 Of course the original idol of Vishnu is supposed to be still 
 immovable ; but another image has been consecrated (called 
 the utsava-vigraha), which is carried about in processions on 
 certain anniversaries — such, for example^ as the car-festival, 
 when the enormous car, attached to every Vaishnava temple 
 in Southern India, is dragged through the streets of the town 
 by thousands of men. 
 
 The dress, decorations, and jewelry belonging to this port- 
 able idbl were all exhibited to me. I saw the idol-crown 
 
 Gg 
 
450 Temples. Places of Pilgrimage. Sri-rangam. 
 
 covered with diamonds, pearls, and rubies— worth at least 
 eighty thousand rupees — with a breastplate, ornaments for 
 the feet, and necklace, worth a similar sum. 
 
 In the centre of the inner wall of the temple, near the 
 interior shrine on the north side, is a narrow door called 
 heaven's gate. I happened to visit SrI-rangam at the time 
 of the annual festival celebrated on the 27th of December. 
 This is the one day in the year on which the gate is opened, 
 and on the occasion of my visit the opening took place at 
 four o'clock in the morning. First the idol — bedecked and 
 bejewelled to the full — was borne through the narrow portal, 
 followed by eighteen images of Vaishnava saints and devotees; 
 then came innumerable priests chanting Vedic hymns and 
 repeating the thousand names of Vishnu ; then dancing girls 
 and bands of musicians — the invariable attendants upon idol- 
 shrines in the South of India. Finally, a vast throng — pro- 
 bably fifty thousand persons — crowded for hours through the 
 contracted passage, amid deafening shouts and vociferations, 
 beating of drums, and discordant sounds of all kinds of 
 music. 
 
 Not a single human being passed through that strait and 
 narrow portal without presenting offerings to the idol, and 
 gifts to the priests. Many, doubtless, joined the surging 
 throng from a vague sense of duty, or because their fathers 
 and grandfathers had joined it from time immemorial; but 
 the motive which actuated the majority was a firm conviction 
 that the passage of the earthly heaven's gate, kept by the 
 priests, and unlocked at their bidding, would be a sure pass- 
 port to Vishnu's heaven after death. 
 
 I may mention in conclusion that most of the South Indian 
 temples are sufficiently well endowed to maintain a band of 
 musicians. That of Tanjore has fifty. The number and 
 variety of their musical instruments struck me as extra- 
 ordinary, though the resulting sounds at the time of morning 
 and evening service, when a noisy orchestra is thought to 
 
Temples. Sri-rangam. Sacred Symbols. 451 
 
 contribute largely to the merit of religious worship, are pro- 
 ductive, at least to European ears, of excruciating discord. 
 
 All the temples also maintain troops of dancing girls. 
 The Tanjore temple possesses fifteen, ten of whom danced 
 before me in the court of the temple with far livelier move- 
 ments than are customary among the Nach girls of Western 
 and Northern India. There can be no doubt that dancing 
 in the East was once exclusively connected with religious 
 devotion, especially with homage paid to Siva in his character 
 of lord of dancing (see p. 85). Further, it is well-known that 
 in ancient times women were dedicated to the service of the 
 temples, like the Vestal virgins of Europe. They were held 
 to be married to the god, and had no other duty but to dance 
 before his shrine. Hence they were called the god's slaves 
 (deva-dasi), and were generally patterns of piety and pro- 
 priety. In the present day they are still called by the same 
 name, but are rather slaves to the licentious passions of the 
 profligate Brahmans of the temples to which they belong. 
 
 What surprised me most was the number and weight of 
 their ornaments, especially in the case of those attached to 
 the temples in Southern India. Some wore nose-rings and 
 finger-rings glittering with rubies and pearls. Their ears 
 were pierced all round and filled with costly ear-rings. Their 
 limbs were encumbered with bangles, anklets, armlets, toe- 
 rings, necklaces, chain-ornaments, head-ornaments, and the 
 like. One of the Tanjore girls informed me that she had 
 been recently robbed of jewels to the value of Rs. 25,000. 
 No doubt they drive a profitable trade under the sanction of 
 religion, and some courtezans have been known to amass 
 enormous fortunes. Nor do they think it inconsistent with 
 their method of making money to spend it in works of piety. 
 Here and there Indian bridges and other useful public works 
 owe their existence to the liberality of the frail sisterhood. 
 
 Gg 2 
 
CHAPTER XVIII. 
 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 The Portuguese, who were the first to trade with India, 
 used the word * casta,' ' i-ace,' to denote the infinite number of 
 classes into which Indian society is divided. This word was 
 changed by us into 'caste' — a word unrecognized by the 
 natives, but now universally adopted by all writers on Hin- 
 duism. Caste in India is closely bound up with religion. 
 
 Indeed it might fairly be asserted that Hinduism, allowing 
 as it does the most perfect freedom in regard to religious 
 opinions, is rather a religion of caste-rules and caste-usages, 
 of forms and ceremonies, than of doctrines and dogmas. 
 
 The four oi-iginal castes of Manu's time have been already 
 described (p. ^'^. His word for caste was varna, ' colour,' 
 which implied some ethnological distinction of complexion 
 as separating the dominant from the inferior classes. The 
 modern word is jati (jat), 'birth,' indicating that in whatever 
 station or profession a man is born to that he is indissolubly 
 bound. Of these four castes not one remains in its purity, 
 not even that of the Brahmans, who are divided and sub- 
 divided into countless sub-castes. Nevertheless the Brahmans 
 are still the purest caste of the four, though the Rajputs 
 claim to be pure Kshatriyas, and the Baniyahs or traders call 
 themselves pure Vaisyas, and in some parts of India there are 
 so-called pure Sudras. All these four castes consider them- 
 selves superior to the countless mixed castes, each one of 
 which is generally confined to its own employment, and these 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 453 
 
 again looC down upon the outcastes or sweepers who in the 
 South are called Pariahs. It has recently been asserted that 
 certain sections of the Pariah class are so down-trodden as to 
 be kept in practical slavery. As a rule, however, the lower 
 castes are not oppressed by the higher or even held in con- 
 tempt by them. It is remarkable, too, that the lower the 
 caste the more tenacious are its members of their- own caste- 
 rules and the more pride do they take in observing them, and 
 the more strict are they in enforcing them. 
 
 Doubtless railroads by necessitating personal contact and 
 facilitating communication have relaxed the rigour of caste in 
 some few particulars. Yet its power is still exerted with 
 almost irresistible force in imposing certain social restrictions 
 which may be classed under four heads as follow : — 
 
 I. Restrictions as to the kind of food allowed to be eaten 
 and as to its preparation by cooks who must not be of a caste 
 inferior to that of the eaters. 
 
 a. Restrictions as to commensality, — that is, as to persons 
 of different castes eating together 1, outcastes being excluded 
 from all commensality, except among themselves. 
 
 3. Restrictions as to marriage, including the enforcement of 
 child-marriages, the prohibition of widow-remarriage, and the 
 prevention of intermarriage between persons of different 
 castes. 
 
 4. Restriction of particular occupations to particular castes. 
 
 It is to the last of these four heads that the present chapter 
 . will mainly be confined. 
 
 It is remarkable that notwithstanding India's vast poten-* 
 tiality of wealth, all her ancient superiority in arts, sciences, and 
 
 ' Fruits and dry food may be eaten by all castes together. The 
 moment food is cooked caste comes in with strict prohibitions. Nothing 
 cooked in water can be eaten by people of different castes togfether, nor 
 can water be accepted by high caste from low caste persons. 
 
454 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 industries, carried back through countless generations for at 
 least 3500 years, it is impossible to deny that she has never 
 advanced beyond a certain point, and that she is at present both 
 scientifically and commercially left far behind by European 
 nations. Let us go back to the beginning. Let us try to 
 trace the causes which first promoted and then impeded the 
 'development of her trades and industries. 
 
 It is generally supposed that the first Aryan settlers on 
 Indian soil were all tillers of the land. Parties of immigfants 
 from Central Asia gained possession of fertile tracts in 
 Northern India and formed themselves into separate agri- 
 cultural communities. Soon the richness of the soil on the 
 plains of the Indus and the Ganges enabled them to support 
 a considerable surplus population. New wants arose with 
 the gradual growth of the community. Soldiers were needed 
 to fight their battles, watchmen to protect their cropsj priests 
 to perform their religious duties, weavers to weave their 
 garments, artisans to supply them with common articles of 
 every-day use, servants to do menial work. Hence arose a 
 complete system of division of labour. To every man his 
 place, work, rank, and remuneration were assigned. Hence, 
 too, every member of the body so constituted acquired 
 great skill in his own particular craft, and took a pride 
 in continually improving it. This skill and these feelings 
 of pride he transmitted to his children, hy whom again 
 they were developed and intensified. In this manner a 
 strong esprit de corps was generated, and associations of 
 persons engaged in the same occupations were ultimately 
 formed, each of which fenced itself round with rules and 
 regulations necessary for the protection of its own rights 
 and privileges. 
 
 It is easy to see, therefore, that caste and occupation were 
 formerly convertible terms. The number of these trade- 
 castes is at present quite incalculable. There seems to 
 be no limit to their formation. New ones are continually 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 455 
 
 forming. Old ones are coritinually passing away. Even 
 to enumerate their names would be impossible. In all 
 probability they have all grown out of the primitive con- 
 stitution of village communities. 
 
 And here I may observe that no circumstance in the 
 history of India is more worthy of investigation than the 
 antiquity and permanence of her village and municipal institu- 
 tions. The importance of the study lies in the light thereby 
 thrown on the parcelling out of rural society into autonomous 
 divisions, like those of our own English parishes, wherever 
 Aryan races have occupied the soil in Asia or in Europe. 
 The Indian village or township, meaning thereby not merely 
 a collection of houses forming a village or town, but a division 
 of territory, perhaps three or four square miles or more in 
 extent, with its careful distribution of fixed occupations for 
 the common good, with its intertwining and inter-dependence 
 of individual, family, and communal interests, with its perfect 
 provision for political independence and autonomy, is the 
 original type — the first germ of all the divisions of rural 
 and civic society in medieval and modern Europe. It has 
 existed almost unaltered since the description of its or- 
 ganization in Manu's code, two or three centuries before the 
 Christian era. It has survived all the religious, political, and 
 physical convulsions from which India has suffered from time 
 immemorial. Invader after invader has ravaged the country 
 with fire and sword ; internal wars have carried devastation 
 into every corner of the land; tyrannical oppressors have 
 desolated its homesteads ; famine has decimated its peasantry ; 
 pestilence has depopulated entire districts ; floods and earth- 
 quakes have changed the face of nature ; folly, superstition, 
 and delusion have made havoc of all religion and morality — 
 but the simple, self-contained Indian township has preserved 
 its constitution intact, its customs, precedents, and peculiar 
 institutions unchanged and unchangeable amid all other 
 changes. 
 
456 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 Let us endeavour to draw a picture of one of these Indian 
 communities. And in the first place let us bear in mind that 
 it consists mainly of tillers of the soil. At least three-fourths 
 of the whole body are common field-labourers. Each man 
 tills a small plot of ground of his own, which may vary in 
 extent according to his position and capabilities. In some 
 parts of India the cultivators form a separate caste, but as 
 a rule almost any low-caste man may become a tiller of the 
 ground. The implements are of the rudest kind. An Indian 
 plough is exactly what it was two or three thousand years 
 ago, not unlike a thin anchor, one claw of which pierces the 
 ground while the other is held by the ploughman. It may 
 be carried on a man's back, and scarcely does more than 
 scratch the soil. 
 
 How, then, does this body of agriculturists provide for the 
 management of its own affairs and the maintenance of order 
 and organization ? Each community forms itself into a little 
 republic ; bound, however, to the central Government by the 
 regular payment of an assessment or tax on the produce. 
 The first step is to elect their Headman or President, who 
 is paid by a fixed proportion of the land, and is a kind of 
 mayor or civic magistrate. He is the chairman of the village 
 or town council — called a panchayat — a kind of local board, 
 which often holds its sittings under a large tree. He decides 
 disputes, apportions the labour and the amount of produce 
 each labourer is to receive as remuneration, and is responsible 
 for the annual proportion due to the Government. It will 
 astonish an English workman to learn that the amount of 
 grain required for the support of an adult man in Bengal 
 is only valued at three shillings a month, and for a woman 
 at eighteen pence. A large family may be supported for 
 fourteen shillings a month. 
 
 The next important personage in the community is the 
 accountant or notary, a kind of local attorney, who transacts 
 the village business and keeps an account of the land, the 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 457 
 
 produce, the rents, and assessment. In some respects a far 
 more important functionary than either headman or notary- 
 is the priest (purohita), the spiritual head of the society, who 
 performs all religious ceremonies for its members, whether 
 at births, marriages, or deaths, and is supported by fixed 
 allotments of grain, or special offerings on solemn occasions. 
 As a Brahman he may be of higher caste than either the 
 headman or notary (who are not generally Brahmans), and 
 his spiritual power is unbounded. His anger is as terrible as 
 that of the gods. His blessing makes rich, his curse withers. 
 Nay, more, he is himself actually worshipped as a god. 
 No marvel, no prodigy in nature is believed to be beyond 
 the limits of his power to accomplish. If the priest were 
 to threaten to bring down the sun from the sky or arrest 
 it in its daily course in the heavens, no villager would for a 
 moment doubt his ability to do so. And indeed the priests 
 of India, in their character of Brahmans, claim to have worked 
 a few notable miracles at different times and on various 
 occasions. One of their number once swallowed the ocean 
 in three sips, another manufactured fire, another created 
 animals, and another turned the moon into a cinder. The 
 priest confers incalculable benefits on the community of which 
 he is a member by merely receiving their presents. A cow 
 given to him secures heaven of a certainty to the lucky donor. 
 The consequences of injuring him are terrific. The man who 
 does him the smallest harm must make up his mind to be 
 whirled about after death, for at least a century, in a hell 
 of total darkness. This will suffice to account for the respect 
 paid to the Brahman-priest by the peasants, who sometimes 
 drink the water in which his feet have been washed, by way 
 of getting rid of their sins with the least possible difficulty. It 
 by no means follows, however, that every Brahman is a priest. 
 Sometimes the priest combines the functions of village 
 astrologer — a very necessary official, since a chief part of the re- 
 ligion of all Indian peasants consists in a fear of the evil influence 
 
458 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 of stars and planets (p. 37 a). The astrologer determines the 
 lucky days for sowing and reaping, tells fortunes, prepares horo- 
 scopes, and knows how to counteract bad omens — to avert 
 the evil consequences of an envious look, of a sudden 
 sneeze, of the yell of a jackal or chirping of a lizard. If the 
 astrologer also practises magic it becomes necessary to con- 
 ciliate him ; for he has power over demons and evil spirits. 
 He can cause diseases as well as cure them, and can destroy life 
 by the repetition of magical texts. He is, I fear, the only phy- 
 sician. The true art of healing and of sanitation is unknown. 
 Then nearly every Indian village possesses a schoolmaster, 
 and his functions also are sometimes united in those of the 
 priest. In passing thrpugh a large village in Bengal, I came 
 upon a group of at least fifty naked children squatting under 
 a tree near a homestead, some engaged in scratching the 
 letters of the alphabet on leaves, and some learning to write 
 on the dust of the ground. This was the national school, 
 presided over by a nearly naked pedagogue who, on my 
 approach, made his pupils show off their knowledge of 
 arithmetic before me, by shouting out their multiplication 
 table with deafening screams. It may be noted as remark- 
 able, that no religious teacher in the native schools of India 
 receives money for teaching. Divine knowledge is too sacred 
 a thing to be sold. It is, therefore, nominally imparted gratis, 
 though the teacher has no objection to receive presents from 
 the parents on festive occasions. Some of the national punish- 
 ments are certainly curious from our point of view. For 
 instance, a boy is condemned to stand for half-an-hour on 
 one foot. Another is made to sit on the floor with one 
 leg turned up behind his neck. Another is made to hang 
 for a few minutes with his head downwards from the branch , 
 of a neighbouring tree. Another is made to bend down 
 and grasp his own toes and remain in that position for a 
 fixed period of time. Another is made to measure so many 
 cubits on the ground by marking it with the tip of his nose. 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 459 
 
 Another is made to pull his own ears, and dilate them to 
 a given point on pain of worse chastisement. Two boys, 
 when both have done wrong, are made to knock their heads 
 several times against each other. 
 
 Amongst the most important functionaries of the com- 
 munity I ought to mentioi;! the barber, who with the roughest 
 implements does his appointed work admirably. An Indian 
 barber can, if he likes, shave without soap. Shaving is, as 
 we have seen, a religious duty with all Hindus, but no one 
 ever thinks of shaving himself. He sends for the barber, 
 as he would for the priest or the doctor. Nor are this func- 
 tionary's duties restricted to shaving. He cuts the nails, 
 cleans the ears, kneads the body, cracks the joints, and often 
 does the work of a homely surgeon. The natives of India 
 are particularly fond of having their joints cracked. A rich 
 man's barber performs all these operations for him every 
 day, and is content with two shillings a month wages. 
 
 Next we have the village carpenter. If you enter a village 
 at early dawn you will probably find him engaged in making 
 handles for ploughs. You will see him saw as much by the 
 help of his feet as his hands ; for a Hindu's toes are never 
 cramped or made useless by tight shoes, but early begin 
 to assist his fingers. The ground is our carpenter's only 
 bench, while the tools he uses are of the rudest kind, per- 
 haps nothing beyond a coarse saw, hammer, plane, chisel, 
 and wedge. 
 
 Next look at the village blacksmith, he has only a hammer, 
 file, pair of tongs, and bellows. His forge is hollowed out of 
 the ground or constructed of a few broken bricks, and his 
 only anvil is a stone. Sitting on his hams he fashions old 
 hoop-iron into bill-hooks, nails, and ferrules for ploughs. 
 
 Then there is the cowman, who furnishes the milk, curds, 
 and a kind of butter, but not cheese ; for cheese is an article 
 of manufacture quite unknown to the Hindus. No such trade 
 as that of a cheesemonger is to be found throughout India. ' 
 
46o Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 Again, in some parts of India, behind the low huts of the 
 irregular village street is sure to be seen the weaver's loom. 
 For India, as Sir George Birdwood has well shown, is probably 
 the first of all countries that perfected weaving. The weaver's 
 art is alluded to in the Rig-veda, 1500 years before Christ, 
 and as the original source of any textile fabric is often 
 indicated by its name, so we find that calico takes its name 
 from Calicut, on the western coast of India ; chintz from the 
 Sanskrit ciira, 'variegated;' shawl from sdla, 'a hall;' just 
 as damask is from Damascus, dimity from Damietta, muslin 
 from Mosul, nankeen from Nankin, drugget from Drogheda. 
 The cotton thread used in India is spun by women of all 
 castes. They spin it on a thin rod of iron with a ball of 
 clay at the end, but the coarser thread is spun by means of 
 a wheel similar to that of an English spinster. 
 
 Another useful functionary is the village shoemaker. If 
 you wish him to make you a pair of shoes you must pay him 
 in advance, that he may first purchase a prepared hide from 
 the tanner, or prepare one himself, for he has no stock of 
 leather. Then with a rough last, a knife and an awl, he will 
 turn you out a very respectable pair of shoes, if you only give 
 him plenty of time. 
 
 Then on the outskirts of the village is sure to be established 
 another indispensable and much respected functionary, the 
 hereditary potter. There he sits on a slightly elevated piece 
 of ground outside the door of his hut with his apparatus ready 
 for use — the ideal of a man who has achieved perfect mastery 
 over the mechanism of his fingers, and is conscious of the 
 power of the human hand, as the instrument of bringing 
 beautiful shapes within the reach of the humblest cottager. 
 The apparatus with which he effects this object is a simple ^^^^ 
 circular horizontal well-balanced fly-wheel, generally two or 
 three feet in diameter, which can be made to rotate for two 
 or three minutes by a slight impulse. This he loads with 
 clay, and then with a few easy sweeps and turns of his hands 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 461 
 
 he moulds his material into beautiful curves and symmetrical 
 shapes, and leaves the products of his skill to bake by them- 
 selves in the sun. In fact, the sun is the Indian workman's 
 head assistant — nay, rather, his ever-present benefactor, from 
 whom he gets coals, candles, clothing, and almost every 
 necessary of life, free of all cost ^, This relieves him from a 
 deadweight of care, and enables him to give to his work — 
 which in India is always regarded as a religious function — that 
 placidity of mind, that pride and pleasure in it for its own 
 sake, which are essential to all artistic excellence and per- 
 fection. And no man takes a greater pride and pleasure 
 in his work, no man displays a greater air of dignity, self- 
 respect, and contentment than the village potter (kumbha- 
 kara, corrupted into kumbhar). No man furnishes a better 
 illustration of that excellent doggerel of ours. 
 
 If I were a cobbler, it would be my pride 
 
 The best of all cobblers to be ; 
 If I were a tinker, no tinker beside 
 
 Should mend a tin-kettle like me. 
 
 It never enters into his head to work for merely mercenary 
 motives or with any idea of making money. He simply | 
 works because it is his appointed duty — the sacred duty for 
 which God created him — to supply the villagers with as many 
 pots, pans, bowls, and jars as they need, and to make them in 
 the best and most workmanlike manner possible. Nor does 
 his ambition ever soar above simple earthenware. Such a 
 man never dreams of aspiring to the manufacture of valuable 
 china dishes or vessels and plates of porcelain. He has no 
 idea of rising above the art received from his fathers. One 
 reason for this may be that in India there is no demand for 
 chinaware. No orthodox Hindu likes to eat off anything but 
 plates of leaves freshly prepared for every meal and never 
 used again. Even earthenware dishes ought to be thrown 
 
 ' AU this, too, has been shown by Sir George Birdwood, K.C.I. E., to 
 whose able works on Indian art my descriptions are greatly indebted. 
 
462 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 away immediately after use. The great demand for earthen- 
 ware vessels in India arises from the impurity supposed to be 
 contracted by using any such articles a second time. It is 
 noteworthy that during an eclipse the very poorest people 
 fling them away. 
 
 I could go on to speak of the dyer, the washerman, the 
 druggist, the oilman, the water-carrier, the watchman, and 
 last but not the least useful functionary — the sweeper. 
 
 As to the towns, they are often of immense size and have 
 teeming populations. Calcutta and Bombay are larger cities 
 than any in the British Empire except, of course, London. 
 They have a larger population than Liverpool and Man- 
 chester, and every conceivable kind of trade is represented in 
 their streets. Even in the days of Rama, several centuries 
 B.C., the procession that went out to meet him from the 
 capital of Oudh included metal-workers, copper-smiths, ivory- 
 workers, crystal-cutters, glass-makers, inlayers, umbrella- 
 makers, perfumers, hair-dressers, fishmongers, musical instru- 
 ment-makers, painters, distillers, seedsmen, gardeners,partridge 
 dealers, basket-makers, brick-makers, plasterers, architects, 
 clothiers, exorcists, with the headmen of guilds bringing up 
 the rear. In an ancient work (a,lready alluded to) by a sage 
 named Vatsyayana sixty-four arts are enumerated. Among 
 them are the following : — singing ; dancing ; playing on musical 
 instruments ; playing on musical glasses filled with water ; 
 tattooing; colouring the teeth, hair, and nails; dyeing and 
 painting ; writing and drawing ; scenic representations, stage- 
 playing ; fixing stained glass into floors ; magic or sorcery ; 
 culinary art; making lemonades, sherbets, and acidulated 
 drinks ; practice with sword, single-stick, quarter-staff, and 
 bow and arrow; carpentry; architecture; knowledge about gold 
 and silver coins, jewels. and gems; chemistry and mineralogy; 
 gardening ; knowledge of treating the diseases of trees and 
 plants, of nourishing them and determining their ages ; cock- 
 fighting, quail-fighting, and ram-fighting; teaching parrots 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 463 
 
 and Maina birds to speak ; knowledge of languages and ver- 
 nacular dialects ; obtaining possession of the property of others 
 by means of incantations ; skill in youthful sports and gym- 
 nastics ; knowledge of the art of war, arms, armies, etc. ; 
 knowledge of the rules of society and how to pay respects and 
 compliments to others ; art of knowing the character of a man 
 from his features. 
 
 It is curious to compare this ancient list with a modern one 
 published by the Indian Census Office, in which, among other 
 remarkable varieties of modern trades, the following are 
 enumerated : — professional makers of speeches, professional 
 ear-cleaners, vendors of drugs to promote digestion, profes- 
 sional givers of evidence, and professional devil-extractors. 
 
 Now, in India, all who practise the same trade are con- 
 gregated in one quarter of the town. Some artisans are 
 scarcely numerous enough to form a street of their own ; but 
 you might find whole streets of ironmongers, copper-smiths, 
 braziers, weavers and confectioners, and these streets of shops 
 are called bazaars. Let us wander for a few minutes through 
 one of these native bazaars. We see nowhere any closed 
 shops resembling those of Europe. On both sides of us are 
 open recesses with dark interiors, wholly destitute of glass 
 windows, but protected towards the street by projecting 
 wooden eaves, often covered with cocoa-nut leaves or bamboos, 
 and sometimes supported by well-carved wooden pillars. In 
 these recesses, or under the open projections, are exposed for 
 sale all kinds of commodities, their scantily clothed owners 
 squatting in an apathetic manner on the ground, and ap- 
 parently by no means eager to serve their customers. Here, 
 in one quarter, we find vendors of coarse confectionery — 
 strange concoctions of ghee, sugar, almonds, pistachio nuts, 
 and saffron, or sellers of vegetables prepared with turmeric 
 and flavoured with assafetida. There, in another street, are 
 the workers in metal or wood. Everywhere we see open 
 workshops filled with artisans patiently and persistently plying 
 
464 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 their occupation after the fashion of their fathers. Even 
 artificers of a higher grade carry on their work almost in the 
 open street before your eyes, not at all disturbed by the 
 jostling throng of passengers around them, and not at all 
 objecting to their operations being watched or the secrets of 
 their craft studied. The patience, perseverance, and power of 
 physical endurance displayed by an Indian workman are well 
 worthy of imitation by us in Europe. He seems to be pro- 
 foundly conscious of the truth that nothing of any kind can 
 be well done, and no success of any kind achieved in this 
 workday world of ours, without the application of the most 
 common-place patient drudgery. 
 
 It is curious that in some trades even strict holidays are 
 made a source of revenue to the general body. One shop 
 in each mai-ket is then allowed to be kept open. The right 
 to open this shop is put up to auction and given to the 
 highest bidder, the amount being devoted to the general 
 purposes of the caste. 
 
 In a few trades children help the men. The aid of their 
 lithe and supple fingers is of great importance in all delicate 
 manipulations. It must, however, be admitted that the Hindu 
 is a slow worker ; he will take a whole day about a thing 
 which an active European would finish off in a couple of 
 hours. Yet for all that, if we watch a party of Hindu work- 
 men for a sufficient length of time we shall see the crudest 
 raw material transformed before our eyes into excellent 
 articles of every-day use ; not very rapidly — not by any 
 striking processes of inventive art — but by simple dexterity 
 of manipulation, by skilful movements of hands and feet, 
 aided by a few rough implements according to the most 
 primitive methods. 
 
 Often these humble artisans have no workshops of their 
 own. They bring their implements and their whole stock-in- 
 trade to the houses of those who need their services, and 
 when the work required of them is finished, pack up their 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations . 465 
 
 tools and seek another employer. Nor does it ever enter into 
 the heads of even the better class of workmen to think of 
 availing themselves of any modern scientific improvements. 
 If the most wonderful labour-saving machine were offered for 
 their use, they would still prefer the machinery of their fingers, 
 and the old traditionary practices received from their fathers. 
 
 And, perhaps, the great secret of the beauty of Indian art 
 lies in the suppleness and flexibility of Indian fingers, and the 
 consequent delicacy of Indian manipulation. The hand of 
 the commonest menial servant in an Indian household is often 
 as delicately formed as that of the most refined aristocratic 
 beauty at a European court. Yes, we must go to India for 
 the best illustration of the truth that the human hand is the 
 most wonderful of all machines. In Europe, manufacture is 
 no longer, as it ought to be according to its etymology, hand- 
 work. But in India the hand is still the chief implement 
 employed ; and a fervent hope may be expressed that no 
 European machinery may soon take its place. No greater 
 calamity could befall Indian art than that it should abandon 
 its own traditions and principles for meretricious ideas derived 
 from European sources. If any one doubts this, let him visit 
 the Indian Museum at South Kensington and examine the 
 specimens there collected. No one could fail to admire the 
 exquisite carvings, the delicate silver filigree work, the artistic 
 feeling displayed in the fashioning of ornaments; the gor- 
 geous richness of the Kincob work, with its gold, silver, and 
 silken threads, woven into the texture of the fabric ; the 
 tasteful designs and matchless colouring of Cashmere and 
 Delhi scarfs and shawls; the marvellous skill and taste 
 displayed in the sandal wood-carving and inlaid wood-work ; 
 the sumptuous gold and silver plate-work and highly-tem- 
 pered steel weapons of Kutch ; the admirable embroidery and 
 needlework of Amritsar and Delhi; the exquisitely fine 
 muslin produced at Dacca. 
 
 In this last kind of manufacture the Hindu artisan is 
 
 Hh 
 
466 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 absolutely unrivalled. With a loom of the simplest con- 
 struction, formed of a few rough sticks and reeds, he pro- 
 duces something which no European machinery can equal ; 
 for the mysteries of his craft have been transmitted from 
 father to son for thousands of years. The, names given to 
 different kinds of these muslins, such as 'woven air,' 'web 
 of the wind,' 'evening dew,' 'running water,' indicate the 
 extreme fineness and subtlety of their texture. A whole 
 dress of the finest quality may easily be passed through a 
 small finger ring, and a piece thirty feet in length may 
 be packed in a case not much bigger than an egg shell — 
 yet such a piece may take a workman at least four months 
 to fabricate, and be worth forty pounds. 
 
 It is recorded that a cow-keeper was once prosecuted by 
 a weaver because one of his cows had eaten up three dresses 
 of this muslin accidentally left on the grass. The cow-keeper 
 pleaded before the Judge that the muslin was too fine to be 
 distinguished by a hungry cow, and his plea was accepted. 
 
 Again, a story is told of a young lady who appeared at the 
 court of a Muhammadan Emperor in much too transparent 
 garments to be thought respectable. When accused of ex- 
 hibiting rather too much of the surface of her body in a 
 questionable manner, she indignantly repudiated the charge, 
 on the ground that she had carefully enveloped her entire 
 person in seven folds of Dacca muslin. 
 
 It would be easy to dilate on other examples of the higher 
 artistic genius of India. We are astonished at the Indian 
 workman's mastery over his materials. Even in the more 
 common work great regard is paid to beauty of form and 
 right proportion, and great taste in the arrangement and 
 
 distribution of the ornament. 
 
 «■ 
 
 As to jewelry, Sir Sourindro Mohun Tagore has written 
 two thick volumes on the virtues and supernatural properties 
 of Indian gems. The Puranas regard diamonds as differing 
 in gender and as divided into castes. Krishna or Vishnu has 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 467 
 
 two marvellous jewels (see p. 104) about which long histories 
 have been written. And doubtless jewelry is of all Indian arts 
 the most ancient ; for what would Indian women, from the 
 lowest to the highest, be without their jewels ? In most large 
 Indian houses belonging to rich natives a jeweller will be 
 found in some ante-room manufacturing jewelry for the family, 
 or repairing that in daily use (p. 396). Here is a description 
 of a typical Indian bride of high rank in ancient times : — 
 
 ' She has no other clothing but one light garment, ten yards 
 in length, of a rosy red colour, embroidered with gold, wound 
 round her body in graceful folds ; she has jewelled butterflies 
 in her raven hair ; her ears are bored in six places, and 
 loaded with resplendent gems ; a magnificent nose-ring of 
 emeralds and pearls sparkles in one nostril ; bright golden 
 bracelets encircle her wrists, and shining armlets her arms ; 
 a golden zone binds her slender waist ; she has jewelled rings 
 on her fingers, and golden rings on her toes, and golden 
 anklets, with musical bells attached, are fastened round her 
 ankles, which make a tinkUng sound as she walks.' 
 
 Those who were in India during the Prince of Wales' 
 visit, and saw the jewelled dresses of the Indian chiefs, will 
 not easily forget the sight. I was myself present in Sir 
 Richard Temple's house, when the Maharaja of Patiala hap- 
 pened to make a morning call. His coat was of blue satin, 
 beautifully embroidered with rows of pearls ; he had costly 
 ear-rings, and a necklace of diamonds worth ;^6o,ooo was 
 suspended carelessly about his neck. Strings of immense 
 uncut jewels ornamented his white turban. Even the humblest 
 woman would lose her self-respect if she appeared before 
 her family without a nose-ring and bangles. Children are 
 often left without a shred of clothing, till they are six years 
 of age, but are rarely without wrist-bands, or jewelled 
 ornaments of some kind. 
 
 When the sister of the late Bishop of Calcutta once visited 
 some native ladies in a Zenana, she made some remark about 
 
 H h a 
 
468 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 the simplicity of their attire. ' Look,' she said, ' at the number 
 and weight of my garments/ 'Yes,' they replied, 'but look 
 at the number and weight of our jewelry.' The use of jewels, 
 especially diamonds, as amulets, is very common. Certain 
 gems are believed to possess magical properties. A celebrated 
 amulet once existed in ancient India, supposed to be all- 
 potent in protecting from evil. It consisted of nine gems- 
 pearl, ruby, sapphire, topaz, diamond, emerald, lapis lazuli, coral, 
 and Gomeda. (We may compare the Hebrew High Priest's 
 breastplate containing twelve gems.) Even the commonest 
 Indian jewelry presents examples of every variety of beautiful 
 design. The forms have come down by unbroken tradition 
 from the earliest times. 
 
 The fact is, that in India, artisans are not obliged to be 
 ever pandering to the mania for novelty, ever racking their 
 brains to invent some new fashion. They plod on in the 
 old beaten paths ; they are able to devote their energies 
 to the beautifying, improving, and perfecting of what already 
 exists. Perhaps the most beautiful ornaments are the work 
 of artificers, who have continued in the service of a particular 
 line of Rajas for centuries. These men dare not work for 
 other employers. The secret of their skill is preserved reli- 
 giously in their own families, and held to be the property of 
 their masters. 
 
 Sometimes the work of such men is made subservient to 
 the spiritual interests of their masters in rather a remarkable 
 manner. For example, it is recorded of a certain king of 
 Travancore, that feeling the blood he had spilt in his many 
 wars lie heavily on his conscience, he sought counsel of his 
 priests, who told him that if he wished to be cleansed from 
 his guilt his only course was to pass through the body of^ 
 a cow — that being the most sacred of all animals. This 
 seemed rather a difficult task to perform, but it was eventually 
 accomplished by help of the court jeweller and goldsmith, who 
 manufactured a jewelled cow of the purest gold of immense 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 469 
 
 Value. Into the interior of this golden image the king 
 solemnly crept, and there lay for many days in a state of 
 abject contrition, till at length the process of purification 
 being completed, he was permitted to emerge with all his 
 blood-guiltiness removed, all his sins atoned for, and all his 
 cheerfulness of mind restored. 
 
 Then as to sculpture and painting, would it be possible 
 to see anywhere more admirable specimens of modelling 
 than the clay figures made at Krishnagar? Such exquisite 
 modelling, and the beauty of Indian miniature paintings on 
 wood, talc, and ivory, prove that had the arts of sculpture 
 and painting been cultivated by the Hindus, they might have 
 attained great perfection. As it is, not a single fine large 
 painting, nor beautiful statue is to be seen throughout India. 
 Even the images of gods are only remarkable for their utter 
 hideousness ; nor do we see anywhere good specimens of 
 household furniture, ■ for in India the houses of the richest 
 natives are, to European eyes, almost furnitureless. Even 
 in princely palaces we may pass through beautifully decorated 
 rooms, we may see elaborate carved wood in niches and 
 verandahs ; yet the rooms appear to us bare and empty. 
 Not a chair or table is to be seen except in apartments set 
 apart for Europeans ; and the owner of the mansion will pro- 
 bably be found seated on a rug with a pillow behind his back. 
 
 And here let me say, that if the excellence of the articles 
 which the Indian artificer produces, with no other appliances 
 than his hands, and the rudest tools, and the admirable tra- 
 ditions of form, design, and colour preserved in his produc- 
 tions, excite our surprise, we are no less astonished at the 
 low cost of his workmanship. I visited a turner's shop in 
 Benares, where a man was making a set of twenty toy boxes, 
 some lacquered, some coloured, all neatly constructed and 
 furnished with lids, and fitting one inside the other so that 
 the smallest box in the interior of all was not bigger than 
 the head of a knitting-needle. The price of the whole nest 
 
470 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 of twenty boxes was not more than fourpence or sixpence, 
 although twenty-three different manipulations were needed 
 to complete each box. 
 
 Again, I went into a brass-worker's shop in the braziers' 
 quarter at Benares, where men were engaged in manu- 
 facturing drinking cups, salvers, vases, and other vessels. 
 These workmen were seen chiselling out the most intricate 
 and beautiful patterns with no other implements than a 
 hammer and a nail. A purchaser of any such articles re- 
 quests to have them weighed before buying them, and only 
 pays a shilling or two beyond the actual value of the brass. 
 
 Frequently, indeed, it strikes a European as strange, that if 
 he desires to purchase any of the beautiful articles he sees 
 before him in native workshops, scarcely a single thing is 
 to be had ; they have all been made to order. There is little 
 stock kept, and whatever a customer wants must be made 
 specially to order, and not without an advance in money. 
 There is little capital to be found in India; and this perhaps 
 will account for the undoubted fact, that Indian industries are 
 left behind in the race of competition by those of Europe. 
 
 During the American war, vast quantities of Indian cotton — 
 to the annual value of twenty-two million pounds sterling 
 — found its way to England, to be returned in the form of 
 printed calico to India. The Manchester cotton cloth was 
 far inferior to that spun and woven, and decorated with orna- 
 mental patterns, by men's hands in India, but it was much 
 cheaper, because even the most active hand workers, working 
 with imperfect implements and tools, according to antiquated 
 methods for the lowest possible wages, cannot compete with 
 machine-made goods, or make head against the combination 
 of European science, capital, and enterprise. It is on this 
 account that cotton mills have recently been established at 
 Bombay, and in some other parts of India. No less than 
 fifty-three spinning and weaving mills had been erected 
 ten years ago, while others were in process of erection. Is it 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 471 
 
 likely, then, that Indian trades and industries will be inju- 
 riously affected by the introduction of English ideas, English 
 machinery, and English education? Time will show. But 
 Caste is a strong conservative force, and as long as its strength 
 continues, and the present intimate connexion between religion 
 and caste is maintained, so long may Indian artisans be ex- 
 pected to work on in their old grooves, Indian agriculturalists 
 to plod on in their old ruts, and primitive customs to hold 
 their own against all modern inventions. 
 
 And be it borne in mind that an Indian caste is more than 
 a mere union for trading and industrial objects. It is cer- 
 tainly much more than a mere social division into classes of 
 men. It is part of a man's religious creed. 
 
 Its prohibitions extend, as we have seen (p. 453), to food, 
 commensality and intermarriage as well as to occupations. 
 
 And, in truth, the idea of a man's birth in a particular circle, 
 and of his being unalterably prohibited by the laws of his 
 religion from eating, marrying, or engaging in any occupation 
 except within the boundaries of that circle is essential to the 
 idea of caste. This applies even to certain criminal castes 
 in India, whose fixed business, inherited from their fathers 
 and grandfathers, is that of plundering or even murdering others. 
 
 Even in England caste feeling operates strongly, although 
 Christianity proclaims all men equal before God. In India 
 any individual who might try to break down the barriers of 
 caste, would find it impossible to withstand the opposition 
 of the Brahmans and his own caste-fellows. 
 
 Of course there are some exceptions to caste-rules. In 
 some instances castes have changed their occupations without 
 changing their names, just as the members of our great city 
 Companies are no longer goldsmiths, drapers, merchant tailors, 
 or fishmongers. The higher castes, too, are allowed consider- 
 able liberty of employment. A Brahman may devote himself 
 to almost any pursuit not absolutely degrading. He may be 
 a CDok, or even a soldier. Occasionally, too, men of the lower 
 
472 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 castes may rise to higher professions, though not to higher 
 castes ; but these exceptions only prove the rule. A Hindu 
 is taught by his religious books to believe that God created 
 orders of men, with fixed employments, as He created varieties 
 of animals and plants (see p. ^'^). 
 
 In Europe, the laws of society are supposed to be of inferior 
 obligation to the laws of the nation and the laws of religion. 
 An educated Englishman, for instance, is ready to submit to 
 the unwritten laws of his own social circle, but never allows 
 any rule of caste to supersede the higher laws of the nation 
 and of Christianity. In India, on the contrary, the laws of 
 caste, and the laws of religion, are part and parcel of one 
 Divine law, of which the Brahman is the interpreter, and 
 the laws of caste are stronger and more effectual than any 
 of the laws imposed by Government. 
 
 Perhaps the nearest parallel to the action of Indian caste 
 to be found in Europe is in such a social confederation as the 
 late Land-League of Ireland, the members of which were 
 bound together by an iron bond, were allowed no individual 
 liberty of action, were forced to submit their lives to the will 
 of the League, and made to subordinate the laws of the state 
 to the laws and mandates of their own leaders. 
 
 India" has furnished examples of Boycotters, and Boycbttees, 
 for many centuries. If a man offend against the rules of 
 caste, a meeting of his caste-fellows is instantly called, and 
 the offence being proved, he is thereupon condemned to a 
 form of persecution of which Boycotting is a bad imitation. 
 
 When I was in Gujarat, in 1875, a man named Lallu-bhai, 
 a cloth merchant of Ahmedabad, was proved to have com- 
 mitted -a heinous caste crime. He had married a widow of 
 his own caste, and to marry a widow is, in the eyes of a 
 Hindu, a most awful offence. A woman once married, belongs 
 to one husband, for time and eternity. Forthwith,, he was 
 sentenced to complete excommunication. No one, either of 
 his own or any other caste, was to be allowed to associate 
 
Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 473 
 
 with him ; no one was to eat with him ; no one was to 
 have any trade-dealings with him ; no one was to marry- 
 any of his children ; no temple was to receive him as a wor- 
 shipper ; and, if he died, no one was to carry his body to the 
 burning ground. On the morning after the sentence was 
 passed, he went into the bazaar as usual, but not a person 
 would buy from him or sell to him ; he could get no 
 home to live in ; and none of his debtors would pay him. 
 It was impossible to sue them, as no one would give 
 evidence. He was a ruined man, and had to leave the 
 country, and obtain Government employment in a distant 
 city. 
 
 This may seem an extreme case, but it would be easy to 
 multiply similar instances of the tyranny and terrorism of 
 caste-leagues in our Indian Empire. Yet, it cannot , be 
 doubted, that as a matter of fact, the caste system of India 
 really resulted from a natural and beneficial process of division 
 of labour. , Nor can there be a greater mistake than to 
 conclude that the lower castes are in a condition of un- 
 happiness. 
 
 In the present day, moreover, caste is certainly becoming 
 relaxed, and re-admission, after violating any of its rules 
 (especially that against a sea-voyage to Europe), can generally 
 be accomphshed by a money-indemnity, and by the religious 
 ceremony of swallowing the Paiicagavya (or five products of 
 a cow, viz. milk, curds, butter, and the two excreta). 
 
 The truth is, that of all masters, caste is the worst when 
 allowed to become a despot. It is then a league of the worst 
 kind ; and we have not far to look, even in our own favoured 
 country, if we wish to see the tyranny and terrorism such 
 a league may establish. Its action tends to arrest progress, 
 to paralyse energy, to crush manly independence, to stifle 
 healthy public opinion, to make nationality, patriotism, and 
 true liberty almost impossible. At the same time caste- 
 leagues have their good as well as their bad side, and at 
 
474 Caste, especially in relation to Occupations. 
 
 a particular stage of a nation's life may do good service. In 
 India, caste has been useful in promoting self-sacrifice, in 
 securing subordination of the individual to an organized body, 
 in restraining from vice, in preventing pauperism. And 
 certainly the antagonism of these caste associations and trade 
 leagues has helped us to govern the country by making 
 political combinations impracticable^. Our wisest pohcy will 
 be to convert caste from a master into a servant ; to defeat 
 its evil action, not indeed by forcible suppression but by the 
 gradual application of corrective influences; to counteract its 
 false teaching by imparting true ideas of liberty — true principles 
 of political economy, social science, and morality ; to supplant 
 its tyrannical enactments by considerate legislation, based on 
 the ancient laws and customs of the country ; to make its 
 hard support and iron grasp needless by helping the masses to 
 ameliorate their own social condition, and stimulating them to 
 improve their own national arts, trades, and industries in their 
 own way. By doing this will England best fulfil her mission j 
 best discharge her sacred trust ; best advance the cause of 
 true religion and justice; best promote the well-being and con- 
 ciliate the affections of the countless millions of her Eastern 
 Empire. 
 
 ^ The great diversity of languages and dialects, numbering at least 
 200— not to mention religious and sectarian differences which accompany 
 caste — is doubtless another great element of safety. It may l?e well, 
 however, to point out that education, scepticism in regard to religious 
 dogma, and the increasing employment of English as a common medium 
 of communication among an increasing number of intelligent natives in' 
 every separate district and province of India, are contributing in no small 
 degree towards making national union possible, and towards weakening 
 the walls of partition. 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 Modern Hindu Theism'^. Rammohun Roy. 
 
 It is a mistake to suppose that the first introduction of 
 Theism into India was due to the founders of the Brahma- 
 Samaj (in Bengal written Brahmo-Somaj), or modern Theistic 
 Churches of Bengal. Some of the oldest hymns of the Rig- 
 veda are monotheistic, and all the most pronounced forms of 
 Indian pantheism rest on the fundamental doctrine of God's 
 unity. ' There is one Being without a second,' ' Nothing really 
 exists but the one eternal omnipresent Spirit,' was the dogma 
 enunciated by ancient Hindu thinkers. It was a dogma 
 accepted by the philosophical Brahman with all its con- 
 sequences and corollaries. He firmly believed himself and 
 the Universe to be parts of the one eternal Essence, and 
 wrapped himself up accordingly in a kind of serene indiffer- 
 ence to all the illusions of external phenomena. Again 
 even the ordinary Hindu who practises the most corrupt 
 forms of polytheism is never found to deny the doctrine of 
 God's unity. On the contrary, he will always maintain that 
 God is essentially one, though he holds that the one God 
 exhibits Himself variously, and that He is to be worshipped 
 
 ' The two following chapters, which are principally the result of my own 
 researches in India, have had the advantage of being revised and 
 corrected by the venerable Debendra Nath Tagore himself, so that their 
 accuracy can be depended upon. Miss Collet's Brahma Year-book, once 
 published at the end of every year, gave a lucid and impartial account of 
 the progress of the Indian theistical movement, and to her labours we 
 are all indebted. 
 
476 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 
 
 through an endless diversity of manifestations, incarnations, 
 and material forms. 
 
 It is to be observed, too, that as often as pantheistic and 
 polytheistic ideas have been pushed to preposterous extremes 
 in India, a reaction has always taken place towards simple 
 monotheism. The Vaishnava Reformers of the I3th, 13th, 
 15th, and 1 6th centuries inculcated a doctrine which was an 
 approximation towards the Christian idea of God's Unity and 
 Personality, as set forth in the first article of the Church of 
 England. Ramanuja, Madhva, Vallabha^ and Caitanya, all, 
 as we have seen, taught the existence of one supreme personal 
 God of infinite power, wisdom, and goodness, the Maker and 
 Preserver of all things — a God whom they called Vishnu, and 
 whom they believed to be distinct from the human soul 
 and the material world. 
 
 But none of these great Reformers succeeded in counter- 
 acting the corrupt tendencies inherent in the Vaishnava 
 system. That system contains within itself the seeds of 
 constant morbid growth and unhealthy development. It 
 cannot get rid of its dogma of repeated incarnations, or, to 
 speak more correctly, repeated descents (avatara). Vishnu, it 
 is believed, has ever been accustomed to descend in the shape 
 of great warriors, great teachers, and even animals, to deliver 
 the world in seasons of special exigence and peril. Of 
 course such a theory opens the door to every kind of extra- 
 vagant superstition. Notwithstanding, therefore, the partial 
 reformation accomplished by Ramanuja, Madhva, Vallabha, 
 and Caitanya, the tide of degrading idolatrous practices set in 
 more strongly than ever. 
 
 Then followed the monotheistic reaction led by Kabir in 
 the i6th century and improved upon afterwards by Nanak,, 
 the founder of the Sikh religion (p. 161). These movements 
 were in a great measure due to Muhammadan influences, 
 Both Kablr and Nanak did their best to purify the Augean 
 stable of corrupt Hindii doctrine, but met with only partial 
 
Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 477 
 
 success. They taught devotion to one personal God, whether 
 called Vishnu or Krishna, or designated by any of his 
 established epithets or synonyms. They even endeavoured 
 to unite Hindus and Muhammadans on the common ground 
 of belief in the Unity of the Godhead. But in this they were 
 wholly unsuccessful, and the tenth Sikh Guru, Govind, made 
 religious fusion impossible by converting Sikhs and Muslims 
 into bitter mutual opponents. 
 
 It became, indeed, a question whether the followers of 
 Kablr and Nanak were not destined to become exterminated 
 under the persecutions to which they were exposed in the 
 reign of Aurangzib. Under that Emperor India suffered 
 everywhere from an outburst of Muhammadan fanaticism. 
 Nor was the stability of Islam shaken or its hold over the 
 people of India weakened, when the political power of the 
 Muhammadans declined. On the contrary, the number of 
 Muslims increased^ and their bigotry and intolerance gathered 
 strength in opposition to the advance of British domination, 
 and the diffusion of European knowledge. 
 
 The Hindis, on the other hand, were not too proud to 
 profit by contact with European ideas. Everywhere at the 
 great centres of British authority a mighty stir of thought 
 began to be set in motion, and able men, educated by us, made 
 no secret of their dissatisfaction with the national religion, and 
 their desire for a purer faith than that received from their 
 fathers. At the moment when thoughtful Hindus were thus 
 asking for light and leading, the right leader appeared. The 
 Hindu reformation inaugurated by Rammohun Roy was the 
 first reformation due to Christian influences, and to the 
 diffusion of European ideas through English education. He 
 was the first great modern theistical reformer of what may 
 be called British India. 
 
 Unhappily no biographies of India's eminent men have 
 ever been written. Neither Hindus nor Muhammadans have 
 ever shown any appreciation of the value of such writings. 
 
478 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. - 
 
 A good life of Rammohun Roy, composed in. Sanskrit or 
 Bengallj and translated into Hindustani and other principal 
 vernaculars, together with a collection of his writings, were 
 for a long time greatly needed ^ ; but these wants have been 
 recently to a great extent supplied by Nagendra-nath 
 Chatterjea and Raj Narain Bose. The former has published 
 a life of the Raja and the latter a new edition of his Bengah 
 writings. What little is known of his early history is soon 
 told. According to Nagendra-nath he was born in May, 
 1774, at a village called Radhanagar, in the district of 
 Murshidabad. His father, Ram Kant Roy, was a Brahman 
 of high caste, and his grandfather had held offices under the 
 Mogul Emperor. At an early age Rammohun Roy was sent 
 to study Persian and Arabic literature, including the Kuran 
 itself, at the great seat of Muhammadan learning, Patna. It 
 was thought that his proficiency in Muhammadan lore might 
 lead to his advancement at the Mogul court. Not that he 
 neglected Sanskrit or his Brahmanical studies. His father 
 was a worshipper of Vishnu. Every morning the son was 
 accustomed to read a chapter of the Vaishnava bible — the 
 Bhagavata Purana. Naturally thoughtful and intelligent, he 
 soon began to think for himself, and to see through the absurd 
 tissue of fable by which its authority is supported. Wholly 
 unable to acquiesce in its extravagant mythology, he betook 
 himself to the simple Vedic system, and the Vedanta as 
 expressed in the Upanishads attracted his special attention. 
 
 At the age of sixteen he composed a spirited tract against 
 idolatry. This for a mere boy was a sufficiently remarkable 
 achievement, and not likely 'to pass unnoticed. As a matter 
 of course it roused the anger not only of his own immediate 
 
 ^ The Rev. K. S. Macdonald gave a short and interesting summary of 
 his life in a paper read at Darjeeling (June, 1879), and Miss Mary Car- 
 penter published an interesting account of his ' Last Days ' in 1866. Mr. 
 Macdonald's anecdotes were chiefly taken from a speech delivered by 
 Raj Narain Bose at one of the annual meetings for commemorating the 
 memory of the Raja. 
 
Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 479 
 
 family, but of all his relatives and superiors. In consequence 
 of the enmity thus excited against him, it was thought 
 advisable that he should leave his father's home for a time. 
 He resided first at Benares, the stronghold of Brahmanism, 
 and afterwards in Tibet, where he gave himself with much 
 zeal to the study of Buddhism, and had many controversies 
 with Buddhist priests. Probably Rammohun Roy was the 
 first earnest-minded investigator of the science of comparative 
 religion that the world has produced. From his earliest years 
 he displayed an eagerness to become an unbiased student of 
 all the religions of the globe. His sole aim in such studies 
 was to seek out religious truth for himself with perfect fairness 
 and impartiality. Hence he spared himself no trouble in 
 endeavouring to master the several languages of the world's 
 sacred books, each of which claimed to be the sole depositaries 
 of such truth. As he studied the Hindu Veda in Sanskrit, so 
 he is beUeved to have given his attention to the Buddhist 
 Tripitaka in the original Pali. He is known, too, to have 
 mastered Arabic that he might read the Kuran, and later in 
 life he learnt Hebrew that he might form a just estimate of 
 the authority of the Old Testament, and even began Greek 
 that he might gain a complete knowledge of the New 
 Testament. 
 
 On his return home about the year 1796, he appears 
 to have been reinstated in the favour of his family and 
 relations. This led him to apply himself with more zeal than 
 ever to the study of Sanskrit literature and an examination of 
 the doctrines of his ancestral religion. He had too logical 
 a mind to be deceived by Brahmanical sophistries. Yet he 
 was accustomed to assert that he had found nothing in the 
 works of any other country, Asiatic or European, equal to 
 the scholastic philosophy of the Hindus. It was at about 
 this period that he gave himself seriously to the study of 
 English. At the same time he began to shake off the 
 prejudices he had imbibed against social intercourse with his 
 
480 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 
 
 country's rulers, and to derive benefit from mixing in 
 European society. After his father's death in 1 803 1, Ram- 
 mohun Roy became bolder in his controversies with the 
 Brahmans. Soon he began to publish various pamphlets and 
 treatises against the errors of Hinduism. This he did at 
 considerable risk to his own worldly prospects. His father 
 had left his property to be divided among his three sons; 
 but it was not long before, by their death, Rammohun Roy 
 became possessed of considerable patrimony, which would have 
 been forfeited had he formally abjured his family religion, 
 and legally lost caste. With an increase of wealth came an 
 increased desire for extension of usefulness. Notwithstanding 
 an inheritance sufficiently ample for his own personal wants, 
 Rammohun Roy found himself cramped in the carrying out 
 of the vast objects he had in view. This led him to seek 
 Government employment, and we find him acting for ten 
 years as Dlwan or managing officer to the judges and 
 collectors of Rangpur, Bhagalpur and Ramgarh, especially 
 to a Mr. Digby. Hence he was often called Diwan-ji,— a 
 title by which he continued to be known until he received 
 that of Raja from the ex-Emperor of Delhi, on the occasion 
 of his embassy to England. One object he had in under- 
 taking revenue work was to gain a practical knowledge of 
 the working of the British administration. Some have 
 spitefully accused him of augmenting his own legitimate 
 earnings by doubtful and underhand transactions. It is far 
 more likely that his prosperous career was due to his 
 righteous dealings, which made him popular among the 
 landed proprietors, and to the skill he displayed in the 
 settlement of Zamlndarl accounts, which made his services 
 indispensable to his masters. 
 
 Notwithstanding his assiduous attention to business, he 
 
 ^ Some give 1804 as the date of his death. His mother, who was at first 
 very bitter against him, lived to acknowledge that he was right, though 
 she could not give up her old faith, ' which was a comfort to her.' 
 
Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 481 
 
 found ample time for study and for the prosecution of his 
 schemes of reform. Every year his attitude of antagonism 
 to the idolatry of his fellow-countrymen became more and 
 more marked and decided. The ground he took, according 
 to his own statement, was not that of opposition to the 
 national faith, but to a perversion of it. He endeavoured to 
 show that the idolatry of the Hindus was contrary to the ^' 
 practice of their ancestors, and to the doctrine of the ancient 
 books and authorities which they profess to revere and obey. 
 Very soon after his father's death he had written a book in 
 Persian : ' Against the idolatry of all religions.' This was 
 followed at intervals by various treatises, and especially trans- 
 lations of some of the Upanishads. In the preface to the 
 Mundaka Upanishad of the Atharva-veda, he says : 
 
 ' An attentive perusal of this, as well as of the remaining books of the 
 Vedanta, will, I trust, convince every unprejudiced mind that they, with 
 great consistency, inculcate the unity of God ; instructing men, at the 
 same time, in the pure mode of adoring him in spirit. It will also appear 
 evident, that the Vedas, although they tolerate idolatry as the last provi- 
 sion for those who are totally incapable of raising their minds to the con- 
 templation of the invisible God of Nature, yet repeatedly urge the 
 relinquishment of the rites of idol-worship, and the adoption of a purer 
 system of religion, on the express grounds that the observance of 
 idolatrous rites can never be productive of eternal beatitude. These are 
 left to be practised by such persons only as, notwithstanding the constant 
 teaching of spiritual guides, cannot be brought to see perspicuously the- 
 Majesty of God through the works of Nature. 
 
 'The public will, I hope, be assured that nothing but the natural in- 
 clination of the ignorant towards the worship of objects resembling their 
 own nature, and to the external form of rites palpable to their grosser 
 senses, joined to the self-interested motives of their pretended guides, has 
 rendered the generality of the Hindu community (in defiance of their 
 saaed books) devoted to idol-worship :— the source of prejudice and 
 superstition, and the total destruction of moral principle, as countenancing 
 criminal intercourse, suicide, female murder, and human sacrifice.' 
 
 Perhaps the most important point to which he awakened 
 attention was the absence of all Vedic sanction for the self- ^ 
 immolation of widows (Suttee = Sanskrit Satl). It was prin- 
 cipally his vehement denunciation of this practice, and the 
 
 I i 
 
482 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 
 
 agitation against it set on foot by him, which ultimately led to 
 the abolition of SatI by statute throughout British India in 1 829. 
 
 Long before that period, however, the effect of his pub- 
 lications and addresses was to make his position one of 
 increasing isolation, until, in 18 14, finding himself surrounded, 
 by religious opponents, and ostracised by his own social 
 circle, he retired to Calcutta. His property by that time 
 had so far increased that he could reckon on an income of 
 ^1000 per annum, and he was able to purchase a residence 
 there. 
 
 It was only to be expected that among the inhabitants of 
 the metropolis would be many thoughtful persons capable 
 of sympathizing with his lofty aspirations. Accordingly he 
 attracted a number of adherents from Hindus and Jains of 
 rank, wealth, and influence. They gathered round him in a 
 small but united band, and agreed to co-operate with him 
 for the purification of their religion. 
 
 It may well be imagined that opinions like those which 
 Rammohun Roy laboured to propagate could not have been 
 adopted by any body of Hindus without, so to speak, loosen- 
 ing the anchorage by which they held on to the foundations 
 of their ancient faith. Yet in seeking their co-operation, he 
 never swerved from his original position. He continued to 
 declare that his only object was to bring back his countrymen 
 to what he believed to be the true monotheistic doctrine 
 underlying the Vedic hymns and brought out more clearly 
 in the Upanishad portion of the Veda. 
 
 The first step taken was to establish a private society for 
 spiritual improvement. The association was called Atmlya- 
 Sabha, spiritual society, and was first formed about the year 
 1816. It consisted chiefly of Rammohun Roy's own personal 
 friends, among whom was Dvaraka-nath (Dwarkanath) Tagore. 
 It met in Rammohun Roy's house at Manictolah, for discussion 
 at periodical intervals ; but the hostility of the Brahmans and 
 Pandits who were sometimes present, and who were offende(J 
 
Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 483 
 
 and alarmed at the crushing demolition of their arguments 
 by the reforming party, proved too strong for its continued 
 existence. One by one its members dropped off, till by 
 degrees the society ceased to exist. The great leader of the 
 movement, however, was not to be so easily suppressed. On 
 the contrary, he braced himself up with greater energy than 
 ever, to continue the conflict single-handed. His zeal and 
 industry in writing books, pamphlets, and addresses, only 
 increased in vehemence. 
 
 It is clear that even at that time his study of the sayings 
 of Christ in the New Testament had brought him to a quali- 
 fied acceptance of Christianity; for in 1830 he published in 
 Bengali and English a book called ' The Precepts of Jesus, 
 the Guide to Peace and Happiness.' In the preface he 
 wrote : — 
 
 'This simple code of religion and morality is so admirably calculated 
 to elevate men's ideas to high and liberal notions of one God, . . . and is 
 so well fitted to regulate the conduct of the human race in the discharge 
 of their various duties to God, to themselves, and to society, that I cannot 
 but hope the best effects from its promulgation in its present form.' 
 
 In a letter prefixed to one of his later works (an edition of 
 the Kena Upanishad) he makes the following admission : — 
 
 ' The consequence of my long and uninterrupted researches into reli- 
 gious truth has been that I have found the doctrines of Christ more con- 
 ducive to moral principles, and better adapted for the use of rational 
 beings, than any other which have come to my knowledge.' 
 
 It is said that on being one day shown a picture of Christ, 
 he remarked that the painter had represented Him falsely, 
 for he had given Him a European countenance, forgetting 
 that Jesus Christ was an Oriental, and that, in keeping with 
 the Eastern origin of Christianity, the Christian scriptures 
 glow throughout with rich Oriental colouring. 
 
 Some indeed, have not hesitated to affirm that Rammohun 
 Roy, though he never abjured caste, was in reality a true 
 Christian. But that he ever had the slightest leaning towards 
 Trinitarian Christianity is altogether unlikely. 
 
 I i % 
 
484 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 
 
 In his ' Final Appeal ^ ' he says : — 
 
 ' After I have long relinquished every idea of a plurality of Gods, or 
 of the persons of the Godhead, taught under different systems of modern 
 Hindooism, I cannot conscientiously and consistently embrace one of 
 a similar nature, though greatly refined by the religious reformations of 
 modern times. Since whatever arguments can be adduced against a 
 plurality of Gods strike with equal force against the doctrine of a plurality 
 of persons of the Godhead; and on the other hand, whatever excuse may 
 be pleaded in favour of a plurality of persons of the Deity, can be offered 
 with equal propriety in defence of polytheism.' 
 
 In fact his sympathies with the Unitarian sect were always 
 strongly marked, and it is certain that, whenever his mind 
 could free itself from the influence of Vedantic proclivities, 
 it gravitated towards a form of Unitarian Christianity. 
 
 But in truth the dominant feeling in Rammohun Roy's 
 mind was a craving for a kind of eclectic catholicity. 
 Throughout life he shrank from connecting himself with 
 any particular school of thought. He seems to have felt 
 a satisfaction in being claimed as a Vedantist by Hindiis, 
 as a Theist by Unitarians, as a Christian by Christians, and 
 as a Muslim by Muhammadans. His idea of"> inspiration was 
 that it was not confined to any age or any nation, but a gift 
 co-extensive with the human race. He believed it to be a 
 kind of divine illumination, or intuitive perception of truth, 
 granted in a greater or less degree to every good man in 
 every country. Whatever was good in the Vedas, in the 
 Christian Scriptures, in the Kuran, in the Zand Avasta, or in 
 any book of any nation anywhere, was to be accepted and 
 assimilated as coming from the ' God of truth,' and to be 
 regarded as a revelation. The only test of the validity of 
 any doctrine was its conformity to the natural and healthy 
 working of man's reason, and the intuitions and cravings of 
 the human heart. ' My view of Christianity,' he says in a 
 lettei- to a friend, ' is, that in representing all mankind as the 
 
 ^ He published three 'Appeals to the Christian public' against the 
 unfair construction which Dr. Marsham and others had put on his 
 ' Precepts of Jesus".' 
 
Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 485 
 
 children of one eternal Father, it enjoins them to love one 
 another, without making any distinction of country, caste, 
 colour, or creed.' It was easy for a man of so catholic and 
 liberal a spirit to become all things to all men. Hence, it 
 is not surprising that he cultivated friendship with Christian 
 Missionaries of all denominations. He assisted them in their 
 translation of the Scriptures, and occasionally joined in their 
 worship. It is well known that he aided Dr. Duff in the 
 establishment of his educational institution in Calcutta, re- 
 commending that its daily work should be commenced with 
 the Lord's Prayer, and declaring that he had studied the 
 Brahman's Veda, the Muslim's Kuran, and the Buddhist's 
 Tripitaka, without finding anywhere any other prayer so 
 brief, comprehensive, and suitable to man's wants. 
 
 In 1828 occurred an event which may be regarded as an 
 important turning-point in the history of the Theistic move- 
 ment. Mr. W. Adam, a Protestant Missionary, had entered 
 into friendly communications with Rammohun Roy, and had 
 been led through his influence to adopt a decidedly Unitarian 
 form of Christianity. This led to his being called ' the second 
 fallen Adam' by his opponents. But not content with 
 changing his own creed, he sought to disseminate the 
 opinions he had adopted by holding meetings and giving 
 lectures in a room attached to the Bengal Hurkaru News- 
 paper Office. For some time Rammohun Roy, with a few 
 of his friends, was accustomed to be present, till at last the 
 thought struck them that, instead of being dependent upon 
 a foreigner for religious edification, they might estabhsh a 
 meeting-house of their own. Dvaraka-nath (Dwarkanath) 
 Tagore, Prosonno Kumar Tagore, and others, came forward 
 with pecuniary aid. Temporary rooms in the Chitpore Road 
 were hired by Rammohun Roy, and prayer-meetings held 
 there every Saturday evening. The service was divided into 
 four parts— recitation of Vedic texts ; reading from the 
 Upanishads ; delivery of a sermon ; and singing hymns. 
 
486 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 
 
 It was thus that the germ of the first Theistic church was 
 planted at Calcutta in 1828. The commencement of its 
 existence as a living growing organization did not take place 
 till two years later. The beginning of 1830, now more than 
 sixty years ago, inaugurated a new era in the history of 
 Indian religious thought. It ushered in the dawn of the 
 greatest change that has ever passed over the Hindu mind. 
 A new phase of the Hindu religion then took definite shape — 
 a phase which differed essentially from every other that had 
 preceded it. For no other reformation has resulted in the 
 same way from the influence of European education and 
 Christian ideas. 
 
 The increase of contributions had enabled Rammohun Roy 
 to purchase a large house in the Chitpore Road, and endow 
 it with a maintenance fund. Trustees were appointed, and 
 the first Hindu Theistic Church, or, as it was sometimes 
 called by English-speaking natives, the Hindu Unitarian 
 Church ^ was then opened in Calcutta on the nth Magha, 
 '" 1 751, equivalent to January 23, 1830. The name given to it 
 by Rammohun Roy indicated its Unitarian character, and 
 yet connected it with the national faith. It was called 
 Brahma-Sabha, or Brahmlya-Samaj, that is to say, Ithe 
 . society of believers in God^ the word Brahma being an 
 adjective formed from Brahman (nom. case Brahma), the 
 name of the one self-existent God of orthodox Hinduism. 
 
 The trust-deed of the building laid down that it was to be 
 used as a place of meeting for the worship of the One 
 Eternal, Unsearchable, and Immutable Being, the Author 
 and Preserver of the Universe, to the promotion of piety, 
 morality, and charity, and the strengthening of the bonds 
 of union between men of all religious classes and creeds I 
 
 ^ So the Press at which Rammohun Roy's publications were printed 
 was called the Unitarian Press. 
 
 ^ It is said that in accordance with this principle, Eurasian boys used 
 to sing the Psalms of David in English, and Hindu musicians religious 
 songs in Bengali. 
 
Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 487 
 
 Moreover, that no image, print, picture, portrait, or likeness, 
 should be admitted within the building, that no sacrifice 
 should be offered there, and that nothing recognized as an 
 object of worship by other men should be spoken of con- 
 temptuously there. Yet Rammohun Roy still held fast to 
 his original position. He was careful to make the members 
 of the new society understand that he had no idea of found-, 
 ing a new sect or new system, or even a new church in the 
 ordinary sense of the word. He simply claimed to have 
 established a pure monotheistic worship for the first time in 
 a building where men of all castes, all classes, and all creeds, 
 Hindus, Muhammadans, and Christians, were invited to 
 worship together, the only unity of faith demanded being 
 belief in the Unity of God. This first introduction of congre- \ 
 gational worship and united prayer— before unknown among 
 the HindQs (pp. 351, 352)_was not the least of the benefits 
 effected by Rammohun Roy. Yet he never quite abandoned^ 
 the idea of an order of men ordained by God to be special 
 teachers of divine truth. It is said that the meeting-house 
 of the Samaj had a private room open only to Brahmans, 
 where special readings of the Veda were conducted by them. 
 
 And, in truth, Rammohun Roy's attitude towards his 
 national religion continued that of a friendly reformer, even 
 to the end of his life — a reformer who aimed at retaining all 
 that was good and true in Brahmanism, while sweeping away 
 all that was corrupt and false. The weak point in his plan 
 is manifest. The form of theology he propounded was too 
 vague, undogmatic, and comprehensive. He was, in fact, by 
 natural character too intensely patriotic not to be swayed, 
 even to the last, by an ardent love of old national ideas. He 
 had denounced caste as a demoralizing institution ^ ; he had 
 
 ^ Thus, in the introduction to his translation of the Isopanishad, he 
 says : ' The chief part of the theory and practice of Hindooism, I am soriy 
 to say, is made to consist in the adoption of a peculiar mode of diet, the 
 least aberration from which is punished by exclusion from both family and 
 
488 Modem Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 
 
 adopted a nearly true theory of the unity and personality of 
 God ; he had abandoned the doctrines of transmigration and 
 final absorption of the soul ; he had professed his belief in 
 a day of judgment ; he had accepted the Christian miracles, 
 and had even declared Jesus Christ to be the 'Founder of 
 truth and true religion,' and had admitted that the Son of 
 God was empowered by God to forgive sins ; but he never 
 entirely delivered himself from his old prepossessions, and 
 the alleged purity of his monotheism was ever liable to be 
 adulterated with pantheistic ideas. In the eyes of the law 
 he always remained a Brahman. He never abandoned the 
 Brahmanical thread, and had too lively a sense of the value 
 of money to risk the forfeiture of his property, and the con- 
 sequent diminution of his usefulness and influence, by formally 
 giving up his caste. In fact, though far in advance of his age 
 as a thinker, he laid no claim to perfection, or to perfect dis- 
 interestedness of motive as a man. 
 
 Unfortunately for the interests of India, Rammohun Roy's 
 career was cut short prematurely. In 1830 the ex-Emperor 
 of Delhi, having long felt himself ill-treated by the Indian 
 Government, deputed Rammohun Roy to lay a representation 
 of his grievances before the Court of Great Britain, at the 
 same time conferring on him the title of Raja. The Rajas 
 great wish had always been to visit England and inter- 
 change ideas with the Western thinkers. He also wished to 
 oppose in person a threatened appeal against the law for the 
 abolition of Suttee (Sati), the passing of which had been 
 just effected through his exertions, and which only required 
 the royal assent. He was aware, too, that the granting of a 
 new charter to the East India Company was about to be 
 discussed in Parliament, and he felt the importance of 
 
 friends. Murder, theft, or perjury, though brought home to the party by 
 a judicial sentence, so far from inducing loss of caste, is visited with no 
 peculiar mark of infamy.' 
 
Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 489 
 
 watching the proceedings on behalf of the natives of India, 
 and for the furtherance of their interests. 
 
 No better time for carrying these objects into execution 
 seemed possible than the period which followed the opening 
 of his new Church. He therefore sailed for Liverpool in 
 November, 1830, and arrived there on the 8th of April, 1831, 
 being the first native of rank and influence who had ventured 
 to break through the inveterate prejudices of centuries by 
 crossing 'the black water.' In England his enlightened 
 views, courteous manners, and dignified bearing attracted 
 much attentipn. During his residence in London he took 
 great interest in the exciting political conflicts then raging, 
 and the passing of the Reform Bill caused him unmixed 
 satisfaction. He was presented to the King, and was pre- 
 sent at the coronation. The evidence he gave on Indian 
 affairs before a Committee of the House of Commons was of 
 course highly valuable, and ought to be reprinted. In 
 one of his replies to the questions, addressed to him we 
 find him asserting that the only course of policy likely to 
 insure the attachment of the intelligent part of the native 
 community to English rule was ' the making them eligible 
 to gradual promotion, according to their respective abilities 
 and merits, to situations of trust and respectability in the 
 State.' Unhappily Rammohun Roy had not sufficient phy- 
 sical strength to contend with the severity of a European 
 climate. After visiting Paris and other parts of France in 
 1833, he began to show symptoms of declining health. He 
 had been invited to visit Bristol, and to take up his residence 
 at the house of Miss Castle — a ward of Dr. Carpenter— in the 
 vicinity of that city. He arrived there early in September, 
 1833, and shortly afterwards was taken ill with fever. Every 
 attention was lavished on him, and the best medical skill 
 called in; but all in vain. His death took place at Bristol 
 on September 27th, 1833. He died a Hindu in respect of 
 external observances ; his Brahman servant performed the 
 
490 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy. 
 
 usual rites required by his master's caste, and his Brahmanical 
 thread was found coiled round his person when his spirit 
 passed away. In all his Anti-Brahmanism he continued a 
 Brahman to the end. 
 
 Even after his death it was thought advisable to keep up 
 the fiction of a due maintenance of caste. His body was not 
 interred in a Christian burial-ground, but in the shrubbery at 
 Stapleton Grove, and without a religious service of any kind. 
 It was not till about ten years afterwards that Dwarkanath 
 Tagore, on the occasion of his visiting England in 1843, had 
 the coffin removed to Arno's Vale Cemetery, and a suitable 
 mpnument erected over the remains of one of the greatest 
 men that India has ever produced. Yet his grave is rarely 
 now visited, even by Indians, and few care to make them- 
 selves acquainted with the particulars of his last days. For 
 India is not alive to the magnitude of the debt she owes to 
 her greatest modern Reformer. Nor have his merits yet 
 received adequate recognition at the hands of European 
 writers. Nor indeed has it been possible within the compass 
 of the present summary to give even a brief description of 
 all the services rendered by Rammohun Roy to his country 
 as a social as well as religious Reformer, of his labours for 
 the elevation of women and for the education of the people 
 generally, of his invaluable suggestions made from time to 
 time for the carrying out of Lord William Bentinck's 
 political reforms, and of his efforts for the improvement of 
 the Bengali language, and the formation of a native litera- 
 ture. Assuredly the memory of such a man is a precious 
 possession to be cherished not by India alone, but" by the 
 whole human race. 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roy s successors. 
 
 It was not to be expected that the void caused by the 
 death of so great a patriot as Rammohun Roy could be 
 filled up immediately. The church he had founded in Cal- 
 cutta languished for a time, notwithstanding that his friend 
 Dwarkanath Tagore and his learned coadjutor Ramachandra 
 Vidyabagish made efforts to maintain its vitality, the latter 
 acting very regularly as minister of the Samaj. At length, 
 after the interval of a few years, a not unworthy successor 
 to Rammohun Roy was found in Dwarkanath's son^ Deben- 
 dra-nath Tagore. 
 
 This remarkable man, who was born in 1818, and is now, 
 if alive, seventy-three years of age, received a good English 
 education at the old Hindu College '^, and was the first 
 to give real organization to Rammohun Roy's Theistic 
 Church. But he imitated his great predecessor in doing 
 as little violence as possible to the creed and practice of 
 his forefathers. He aimed at being a purifier rather than 
 a destroyer. He had the advantage and disadvantage of 
 a rich and liberal father. The luxury in which he passed 
 his youth was for some time a drawback rather than an 
 aid. It was not till he was twenty years of age that he 
 began to be conscious of spiritual aspirations. Utterly dis- 
 satisfied with the religious condition of his own people, and 
 with the ideas of God presented by Brahmanical teaching, he 
 
 ' Under the teaching of a man to whom Bengal is perhaps as much 
 indebted as to David Hare. 
 
492 Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors 
 
 set himself to discover a purer system. It was highly credit- 
 able to his earnestness and sincerity that he took time foi 
 consideration before joining Rammohun Roy's Brahma-Sabha, 
 or, as it came to be called, Brahma-Samaj (Brahmo-Somaj). 
 
 In 1839, he established a society of his own, called. the 
 'Truth-investigating' or 'Truth-teaching Society' (Tattva- 
 bodhini Sabha), the object of which, according to its founder, 
 was to sustain and carry on the labours of Raja Rammohun 
 Roy, and to assist in restoring the monotheistic system of 
 divine worship in the original Hindu scriptures. 
 
 This Society lasted for twenty years, and was not finally 
 merged in the Brahma-Samaj till 1859. It met every week 
 for discussion at Debendra-nath's house, and had also monthly 
 meetings for worship and prayer, and the exposition of the 
 Upanishad portion of the Veda. It had its organ in a monthly 
 periodical, called the Tattva-bodhinI patrika, This jourijal 
 was started in August, 1843, and was well edited by Akhay 
 Kumar Datta, an earnest member of the theistic party. Its 
 first aim seems to have been the dissemination of Vedantic 
 doctrine, though its editor had no belief in the infallibility of 
 the Veda, and was himself in favour of the widest catholicity^- 
 He afterwards converted Debendra-nath to his own views. 
 
 It was not till 1841 that Debendra-nath, without giving 
 up occasional meetings at his own house, formally joined the 
 church founded by Rammohun Roy. He soon saw that if 
 Indian Theists were to maintain their ground in India, they 
 needed organization, and that if the Samaj was to exist as 
 a permanent church, it wanted a properly appointed presi- 
 dent, a regularly ordained minister, a settled form of worship, 
 and a fixed standard of faith and practice. He himself under- 
 took the task of preparing what is sometimes called the, 
 Brahma covenant, consisting of seven solemn declarations, 
 
 ' The Tattva-bodhinI patjika is, I believe, still in existence and is now 
 known as the organ of the Adi Brahma-Samaj. 
 
Modern Theism. Rammohun Roy's successors. 493 
 
 or vows to be taken by all candidates for admission into the 
 Theistic Society. 
 
 By the most important of these declarations every member 
 of the Society bound himself to abstain from idolatry; to 
 worship no created object, but to worship through the love 
 of God, and through doing the works dear to God (Para- 
 brahmani pritya tat-priya-karya-sadhanena), the One God, 
 the Creator, Preserver, Dissolver (srishti-sthiti-pralaya-kartri), 
 the Causer of emancipation (mukti-karana), the Partless (nir- 
 avayava), the One only without a second (ekamatradvitiya) ; 
 to lead holy lives, and to seek forgiveness through abandon- 
 ment of sin. At the same time a few short formulae for 
 worshipping God (Brahmopasana), consisting of prayers, invo- 
 cations, hymns, and meditations, were promulgated for use in 
 the daily services. This took place at the end of 1843. 
 
 Pandit Ram Chandra Vidya-bag-Ish was appointed minister 
 of the newly-organized church, and not long afterwards 
 Debendra-nath, with twenty friends, solemnly took the oaths 
 of the new Theistic covenant in his presence. The year 
 1844 may be given as the date of the real commencement 
 of the first organized Theistic Church of India, hence after- 
 wards called the Adi Brahma-Samaj, though at that time 
 and until the first secession it was simply denominated the 
 Calcutta Brahma-Samaj. 
 
 Three years later, in 1847, the number of covenanted 
 Brahmans had increased to seven hundred and sixty-seven. 
 
 But, as usual, with the accession of new members, the 
 growing church began to be agitated by contending opinions. 
 It was affirmed that the Vedas had never been thoroughly 
 examined with a view of arriving at a just estimate of their 
 value as an authoritative guide to truth. Four young Brah- 
 mans were therefore sent to Benares. Each was commissioned 
 to copy out and study one of the four Vedas. The result of 
 a careful examination of the sacred books was, that some 
 members of the Samaj maintained their authority, and even 
 
494 Modern Theism. Rammokun Roy's successors. 
 
 their infallibility, while others rejected them as abounding in 
 error. A serious conflict of opinion continued for some time. 
 In the end it was decided by the majority, that neither Vedas 
 nor Upanishads were to be accepted as an infallible guide. 
 Only such precepts and ideas in them were to be admitted as 
 harmonized with pure Theistic truth, such truth resting on 
 the two chief foundations of external nature and internal 
 intuition. Moreover, the religion of Indian Theists was held 
 to be one of equilibrium — that is, a system balanced by 
 intuition, reason, authority, personal experience, observation, 
 and faith. 
 
 This took place about the year 1 850, by which time other 
 Samajes had begun to be established in the provinces, such 
 as those at Midnapur, Krishnagar, and Dacca. Raj Narain 
 Bose was minister of the Midnapur Samaj for many years. 
 
 A new Theistic Directory was then put forth by Debendra- 
 nath, called Brahma-Dharma, or ' the Theistic Religion.' It 
 contained a statement in Sanskrit of the four fundamental 
 principles of Indian Theism, together with the seven declara- 
 tions revised, and approved extracts from the Veda, Upani- 
 shads, and later Hindu scriptures, as, for example, from the 
 Isopanishad, Satapatha-Brahmana, and Manu. Selections 
 from these works were thought to commend themselves to 
 national predilections. Otherwise they were not regarded 
 as possessing any special inspiration, or inherent superiority 
 over other good books. It is to be noted that the neuter 
 word Brahma is used for God — a word which seems incon- 
 sistent with the idea of personality and Fatherhood. 
 
 And any one who examines the whole compendium with 
 impartiality must come to the conclusion that, although the 
 quotations it gives are pervaded throughout by a strong 
 aroma of Vedantic and Pantheistic ideas, it marks an advance 
 in the Theistic movement. It presents us for the first time 
 with a definite exposition of Indian Theistic doctrine, which 
 may be held by those who i^eject Vedantism. Its four funda- 
 
Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 495 
 
 mental principles (called Brahma-dharma-vija) translated from 
 the Sanskrit are : — 
 
 I. — In the beginning before this Universe was, the One Supreme 
 Being was (Brahma va ekam idam-'agra asit) ; nothing else whatever was 
 (nanyat kindanasit) ; He has created all this universe (tad idam sarvam 
 asrijat). 
 
 II. — He is eternal (tadeva nityam), intelligent (jiianam), infinite (anan- 
 tam), blissful (sivam), self-dependent (sva-tantram), formless (nir-avaya- 
 vam), one only without a second (ekam evadvitlyam), all-pervading 
 (sarva-vyapi), all-governing (sarva-niyantri), all-sheltering (sarvasraya), 
 all-knowing (sarva-vid), all-powerful (sarva-saktimat), unmovable (dhru- 
 vam), perfect (purnam), and without a parallel (apratimam). 
 
 III. — By Worship of Him alone can happiness be secured in this world 
 and the next (Ekasya tasyaivopasanaya paratrikam aihikam ca subham 
 bhavati). 
 
 IV. — Love towards Him (Tasmin prltis), and performing the works 
 He loves (priya-karya-sadhanam da), constitute His worship (tad-upasa- 
 nam eva). Note that, although the word ' He' is used, Brahma is neuter. 
 
 Any one who subscribed to these four principles was ad- 
 mitted a member of the Calcutta Brahma-Samaj. The seven 
 more stringent declarations were only required of those who 
 desired a more formal initiation into the system. 
 
 The substance of this improved Theistic teaching may be 
 thus summarized : — 
 
 Intuition and the book of Nature form the original basis 
 of the Brahman's creed, but divine truth is to be thankfully 
 accepted from any portion of the ancient Hindu scriptures 
 as from any other good books in which it may be contained. 
 According to the truth thus received, man is led to regard 
 God as his Heavenly Father, endowed with a distinct person- 
 ality, and with moral attributes befitting His nature. God 
 has never become incarnate, but He takes providential care of 
 His creatures. Prayer to Him is efficacious. Repentance is 
 the only way to atonement, forgiveness, and salvation. The 
 religious condition of man is progressive. Good works, charity, 
 attainment of knowledge, contemplation, and devotion, are 
 the only religious rites. Penances and pilgrimages are useless. 
 The only sacrifice is the sacrifice of self, the only place of 
 
496 Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors.. 
 
 pilgrimage is the company of the good, the only true Temple 
 is the pure heart. There is no distinction of castes. 
 
 The Hindu doctrine of transmigration of souls was given 
 up. Yet great latitude in regard to the maintenance of old 
 national customs was still allowed, and a friendly demeanour 
 towards the national religion encouraged. 
 
 In fact, the Mission of the Calcutta Brahma-Samaj, accord- 
 ing to its president and most able literary representative Raj 
 Narain Bose\ was to fulfil or at least to purify the old religion, 
 not to destroy it. 
 
 Such a compromise appeared wholly unsatisfactory to the 
 more thoughtful members of the Samaj, especially to those 
 who were beginning to be influenced by the opinions of a 
 clever eloquent young man, Keshab Chandar Sen, who joined 
 it in 1858. They felt that a more complete Reform was 
 needed before the Samaj could deliver itself from all complicity 
 with degrading social customs. 
 
 The youthful Keshab addressed himself to the task of 
 radical reform with the ardour of a young man full of spirit 
 and energy, who had his knightly spurs to win. 
 
 It must be borne in mind that we in Europe are wholly 
 unable to realize the difficulties which beset the career of a 
 radical religious reformer in India. There, religious and social 
 life are so intimately interwoven — there, the ordinary creed of 
 the people, their debasing idolatry and demoralizing super- 
 stitions, are so intertwined with the texture of their daily life, 
 with their domestic manners and institutions, and even with 
 the common law of the land, that to strike at the root of the 
 national faith is to subvert the very foundations of the whole 
 social fabric. Let a man enter on the path of progress, let 
 him abandon the ideas inherited from his parents, let him set 
 
 ^ Raj Narain Bose has rendered good service to the Adi Brahma- 
 Samaj by his able writings, just as Mr. P. C. Mozoomdar (see p. 521) has 
 done to the later development of Theism about to be described — the 
 Brahma-Samaj of India. 
 
Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 497 
 
 his face against the time-honoured usages of his country, let 
 him stand up boldly as the champion of truth, the eradicator 
 of error, the regenerator of a degenerate age, the purifier of a 
 corrupt condition of society, and what are the consequences ? 
 He has to fight his way through a host of antagonisms and 
 obstructions, sufficient to appal, if not to overpower, a man of 
 ordinary courage and determination. The inveterate pre- 
 judices of centuries, deeply-seated antipathies, national pride, 
 popular passion, a thousand vested interests of tradition, 
 ignorance, bigotry, superstition, indolence, priestcraft, conspire 
 to crush his efforts and impede his advance. Every inch of 
 the ground is disputed by a host of bitter antagonists. 
 Humiliation, insult, threat, invective, vituperation are heaped 
 upon his head. Father, mother, wife, children, relatives and 
 friends hold him fast in their embraces or unite their efforts 
 to drag him backwards. No one stirs a finger to help him 
 onwards. At length, by the force of his own resolute 
 character, by patience and conciliation, by firmness and 
 gentleness, by persuasion and earnestness, by carrying people 
 with him against their will, by making his work theirs as 
 well as his own, he gains a few adherents ; for nowhere do 
 qualities such as these command so much admiration as in 
 India. Then his progress becomes easier. But if his attitude 
 towards ancient creeds and social abuses continues that of an 
 uncompromising enemy, he will still have to do battle at the 
 head of a little band of followers against countless adversaries, 
 and will only triumph over opposition in one quarter, to find 
 it renewed with increased acrimony and vehemence in other 
 directions. 
 
 This may be taken as a description of the early career of 
 the third great Theistic Reformer of British India, Keshab 
 Chandar Sen, who was born in 1838 and died in 1884. 
 
 A few particulars of Mr. Sen's life ought to be given here. 
 He was a grandson of a well-known member of the Vaidya 
 caste, Ram Comul Sen, who was a man of great worth, talent 
 
 Kk 
 
498 Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 
 
 and literary culture ^ but a bigoted Hindu of the Vaishnava 
 school. The young Keshab was brought up in an atmosphere 
 of Hindu superstition and idolatry. As might have been 
 expected, the Vishnu-worship in which he was trained pre- 
 disposed him to emotional religion and to a belief in one 
 supreme personal God. Subsequently he received a thorough 
 English education at the Presidency College, Calcutta. There, 
 of course, the foundations of his family faith crumbled to 
 pieces. It could not bear collision with scientific truth as 
 imparted by European teachers. Nor was any new faith 
 built up immediately on the ruins of the old. His attitude 
 towards all religion became one of absolute indifference. 
 Happily, in a character like that of Keshab, the void caused 
 by the over-development of one part of his nature was not 
 long left unfilled. With a greater advance in intellectual 
 culture came a greater consciousness of spiritual aspirations, 
 and a greater sense of dependence upon the Almighty Ruler 
 of the Universe. He began to crave for a knowledge of the 
 true God. One day, when he was twenty years of age, some 
 sermons by Raj Narain Bose fell into his hands, and he found 
 to his astonishment that a pure Theistic Church had been 
 already founded in Calcutta. Without a moment's hesitation 
 he decided to enroll himself a member of the Calcutta 
 Brahma-Samaj. This happened towards the end of 1858, 
 when he was in his twentieth year. 
 
 The English culture and freedom of thought, not unmixed 
 with Christian ideas, which Keshab imported into the Calcutta 
 (Adi) Samaj, could not fail to leaven its whole constitution. 
 Not that Debendra-nath had been uninfluenced by similar 
 culture in his reorganization of the Brahma-Samaj. The fear 
 however was that Keshab's enthusiasm might lead him to put^ 
 himself forward prematurely. Happily his extreme youth- 
 
 ■^ He was held in great esteem by Prof. H. H. Wilson, and was the 
 author of a useful English and Bengali dictionary, to which my own 
 lexicography is under some obligations. 
 
Modern Theism. Rammokun Roy's successors. 499 
 
 fulness and inexperience compelled him to veil his own 
 individuality. He longed from the first to bring all the 
 impetuosity of his fervid nature to bear on the accomplishment 
 of vast changes. He was ambitious of penetrating to the 
 very springs of social life and altering their whole course. 
 But he was sensible enough to perceive that he could not 
 enter upon such a Herculean task without feeling his way and 
 testing his powers. He, therefore, commenced his mission as 
 a fellow-worker with Debendra-nath, and in due subordination 
 to him as his recognized leader. Their fellowship and co- 
 operation lasted for about five years. Nothing, however, 
 could keep the enthusiastic Keshab long in the background. 
 It was not sufficient for him that idolatry had been eliminated 
 from Hindu usages. They remained Hindu usages still. He 
 soon began to urge a complete abolition of all caste-restrictions. 
 The first change he advocated was that all who conducted 
 the services in the Mandir should abandon the sacred thread " 
 (upavlta, p. 378) which distinguished the Brahmans and higher 
 castes from the lower. But Debendra-nath, though he consented 
 to give up this sacred badge in his own case, declined to 
 force a similar renunciation upon others. Unhappily this was 
 the commencement of a difference of opinion between the 
 progressive and conservative Reformers, which afterwards led 
 to a more complete rupture. 
 
 Next to the abandonment of the thread came the alteration 
 of the Sraddha, or worship of deceased ancestors — a rite 
 involving ideas incompatible with the Brahma doctrine of 
 a future state. This was followed by a remodelling of the 
 ritual at the ceremonies of birth (jata-karma, p. zS?,)j name- 
 giving (nama-karana, p. 55^), and cremation of the dead 
 (antyeshti, p. 354). Then a solemn and impressive form of 
 initiation into the Brahma faith was substituted for the Upa- 
 nayana, or initiatory rite of Brahmanism (p. 377). Of course, 
 efforts were made for the education and elevation of women. 
 They were encouraged to join the Brahma- Samaj, which 
 
 K k S 
 
500 Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 
 
 many eventually did under the name of Brahmikas, worship- 
 ping at first either behind screens, or in a separate room. 
 
 A still more important matter was the reform of marriage 
 customs. Vast difficulties beset any reform in this direction. 
 Marriage is the most ancient, sacred, and inviolable of all 
 Hindu institutions, and its due performance the most com- 
 plicated of all religious acts. It involves intricate questions 
 of caste, creed, property, family usage, consanguinity, and 
 age. To remodel the institution of marriage is to reorganize 
 the whole constitution of Indian society, and to create, so to 
 speak, an entirely new social atmosphere. The first change 
 ^advocated by the Reformers had reference to the abolition of 
 child-marriages. Nothing has tended to the physical and 
 moral deterioration of the people so much as child-marriage. 
 It has not only resulted in excessive population, rapidly 
 multiplying till reduced to so low a standard of moral and 
 physical stamina that every failure of crops adds demoral- 
 ization to starvation. It is an ever-present source of weak- 
 ness and impoverishment, destructive of all national vigour, 
 and fatal to the development of national thrift and economy^ 
 The progressive Reformers felt that until this evil was re- 
 moved there could be no hope of India's regeneration. 
 
 Of course, no man was to be allowed more than one wife. 
 The idea that child-widowhood was the result of crimes com- 
 mitted in former births was scouted, and widows were to be 
 released from enforced celibacy. Raj Narain Bose was the 
 first to introduce the remarriage of widows into his family— 
 a reform for which the inhabitants of the village in which 
 he was born threatened to stone him to death (compare 
 p. 473). As to the marriage ceremony itself, all semblance of 
 idolatrous worship, all foolish ritual, all noisy music, needless j, 
 display and unnecessary expense, caused by spreading the 
 festivities over many days, were to be eliminated. Debendra- 
 nath himself was induced to set the example of celebrating 
 a nuptial ceremony in his own family according to this simple 
 
Modern Theism. Rammohun Roy's successors. 501 
 
 Brahmic form. His second daughter was engaged to be 
 married to Babu H. N. Mukerjea. The rite was performed 
 on the a6th of July, 1861, quietly, solemnly, simply, and 
 without protracted festivities, in the presence of nearly two 
 hundred co-religionists. This was the first Brahmic marriage. 
 
 A still more momentous reform was attempted by Keshab 
 Chandar Sen when he performed a marriage ceremony 
 between two persons of different castes in August, 1864. 
 An innovation so revolutionary gave great dissatisfaction to 
 Debendra-nath. In fact, Mr. Sen, notwithstanding the real 
 good he had effected by his influence, example, and personal 
 efforts, found himself hampered by his connexion with the 
 too conservative Calcutta Adi-Samaj. He was like a man 
 working in chains. He felt himself powerless to penetrate 
 beneath the outer crust of the social fabric. The old caste- 
 customs, the old superstitious rites, were still practised by 
 a large number of Theists, while others who professed sym- 
 pathy with the advanced Reformer, and adopted his opinions 
 in public, secretly reverted to their old ways. It was not to 
 be expected that a man of Mr. Sen's temperament would 
 long acquiesce in merely superficial changes and patchy 
 incomplete reformations. He was willing to accept half 
 measures as an instalment. But nothing short of a thorough 
 reconstruction of the whole religious and social fabric could 
 afford him permanent satisfaction. He was bent on laying 
 the axe to the very root of the tree. He felt his own mission 
 to be very different from that of Debendra-nath. He was to 
 destroy rather than to renovate the old Vedic system with all 
 its train of ceremonial rites and observances. 
 
 Of course, he no sooner gave up all idea of compromise 
 than instantly he found himself plunged in a slough of 
 obstruction. Difficulties and opposition met him at every 
 turn. At length, in February, 1865, the inevitable crisis 
 arrived. Keshab Chandar Sen with a large number of the 
 younger members of the Samaj formed themselves into a 
 
\y 
 
 502 Modern Theism. Rammohun Roy's successors. 
 
 separate body of advanced or progressive reformers, and 
 seceded from the old Society, leaving behind them all its 
 accumulated property. It was not, however, till November, 
 1866, that they were able to organize themselves into a new 
 Theistic Church called the Brahma-Samaj of India (Bhara- 
 tavarshlya Brahma-Samaj ^), a church which gloried in having 
 broken entirely with Brahmanism, and severed every link 
 which connected it with the national religion. 
 
 At a meeting held on November nth, 1866, the day of 
 the incorporation of the new society, Mr. Sen announced that 
 the aim of the new Church would be to unite all Brahmas 
 into one body, to reduce their labours to a well-organized 
 system of co-operation, and to establish a central metropo- 
 litan Brahma-Samaj of all India, to which all other Samajes 
 throughout the country might be affiliated, or with which 
 they might establish friendly relations. This idea was not a 
 new one. An effort had been made in 1864 to establish 
 a General Representative Assembly or Council of all the 
 existing Brahma Samajes. A meeting was then convened, 
 and twenty-eight out of the existing fifty Samajes sent repre- 
 sentatives, but little further was done. Nor did Mr. Sen 
 ever succeed in making his own Samaj a centre of union and 
 authority, though for a long time his talents as an orator 
 secured him a position as chief leader of the Brahma com- 
 munity. 
 
 The first stone of the new Mandir or place of worship of 
 the Brahma-Samaj of India was laid on the a3rd of January, 
 
 1868, but the building was not opened until August (Bhadra), 
 
 1869. As might have been expected, the new Samaj ex- 
 hibited from its first foundation a decided reflection of its 
 founder's individuality. He had imbibed Vaishnava ideas 
 with his earliest impressions. Yet the peculiar vein of 
 
 ' This new Church has been sometimes called the progressive Brahma- 
 Samaj. 
 
Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors, 503 
 
 Hindu theology which permeated his mind only operated 
 beneficially. The introduction of faith (bhakti), emotional 
 religion, and devotional fervour into the Brahma system was 
 a real advantage. It infused warmth and light into a cold 
 inanimate Theology, and brought the latest development of 
 Indian Theism into closer harmony with Christian ideas. 
 
 It remains to describe more fully the nature of that de- 
 velopment. No sooner was Brahmanism finally discarded than 
 it became necessary to formulate more definite articles of 
 faith. Briefly the new creed might have been described as 
 ' the Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Man.' Its 
 most essential points are as follow : — 
 
 God is the first cause of the Universe. By His will He created all 
 objects out of nothing and continually upholds them. He is spirit, not 
 matter. He is perfect, infinite, all-powerful, all-merciful, all-holy. He is 
 our Father, Preserver, Master, King, and Saviour. 
 
 The soul is immortal. Death is only the dissolution of the body. 
 There is no new birth on earth after death ; the future life is a continua- 
 tion and development of the present life. The men that now live are the 
 embryos of the men that are to be. 
 
 The true scriptures are two,— the volume of nature, and the natural 
 intuitions implanted in the mind. The wisdom, power, and mercy of the 
 Creator are written on the Universe. All ideas about immortality and 
 morality are primary convictions rooted in the constitution of man. 
 
 God Himself never becomes man by putting on a human body. His 
 divinitj dwells in every man, and is displayed more vividly in some ; 
 as in Moses, Jesus Christ, Muhammad, Nanak, (faitanya, and other great 
 Teachers, who appeared at special times, and conferred vast benefits on 
 the world. They are entitled to universal gratitude and love. 
 
 The Brahma religion is distinct from all other systems of religion ; yet 
 it is the essence of all. It is not hostile to other creeds. What is true 
 in them it accepts. It is based on the constitution of man, and is, there- 
 fore, eternal and universal. It is not confined to age or country. 
 
 All mankind are of one brotherhood. The Brahma religion recognizes 
 no distinction between high and low caste. It is the aim of this religion 
 to bind all mankind into one family. . ,- r ■ 
 
 Duties are of four kinds : (l) Duties towards God-sue)^ as belief m 
 Him, love, worship, and service ; (2) Duties towards self-snch as pre- 
 servation of bodily health, acquisition of knowledge, sanctification ot 
 soul ; (3) Duties towards others-sMch as veracity, justice, gratitude, the 
 promotion of the welfare of all mankind; (4) Duties towards animals 
 and inferior creatures— such as kind treatment. 
 
504 Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 
 
 Every sinner must suffer the consequences of his own sins sooner 
 or later, in this world or the next. Man must labour after holiness 
 by the worship of God, by subjugation of the passions, by repentance, 
 by the study of nature and of good books, by good company and by 
 solitary contemplation. These will lead through the action of God's 
 grace to salvation. 
 
 Salvation is dehverance of the soul from the root of corruption and 
 moral disease, and its perpetual growth in purity. Such growth continues 
 through all eternity, and the soul becomes niore and more godly and happy 
 in Him who is the fountain of infinite holiness and joy. The companion- 
 ship of God is the Indian Theists' heaven. 
 
 With regard to the worship of God, it was declared to be 
 ' a wholly spiritual act.' 
 
 The form of divine service was as follows :— First a hymn ; 
 
 then an invocation of God by the minister, followed by 
 
 another hymn; then adoration of God, chanted by the 
 
 whole congregation together, and continued by the minister 
 
 alone ; then silent communion for some minutes. Then the 
 
 following united prayer i, chanted by the whole congregation 
 
 standing : — 
 
 ' Lead us, O God ! from untruth to truth, from darkness to hght, from 
 death to immortality. O ! thou Father of truth, reveal thyself before us. 
 Thou art merciful, do thou protect us always in thy unbounded goodness. 
 Peace ! Peace ! Peace ! 
 
 Then a prayer for the well-being of the whole world by the 
 minister alone standing, succeeded by another hymn, and 
 by. a recitation of texts from Hindu and other scriptures. 
 Finally, a sermon, followed by a prayer, a benediction, and 
 a hymn (see pp. 527, 528). 
 
 Services of this kind still take place — generally on Sundays, 
 and often on a week-day in addition. There are also grand 
 anniversary festivals to celebrate the foundation of the Brahma 
 Church. The chief festival, called Maghotsab (Maghotsava), 
 on the 33rd of January (i ith of Magha), is kept by all the 
 Samajes in commemoration of the founding of monotheistic 
 worship by Rammohun Roy. Another, called Bhadrotsab 
 
 ^ This was taken from the form used by the Adi Brahma-Samaj. 
 
, Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 505 
 
 (Bhadrotsava), is held by the Brahma-Samaj of India in 
 celebration of the opening of the Mandir in August, 1869. 
 Solemn initiation services for the admission of new members 
 are also performed. They correspond in an interesting 
 manner to our Confirmation services. 
 
 Clearly it would be easy to prove that the advanced 
 Indian Reformers, trained and educated by us, and imbued 
 unconsciously with Western theological ideas, have borrowed 
 largely from our Christian system in formulating their own 
 creed. The points of agreement are too obvious to need 
 indicating. One noteworthy point of contact with Chris- 
 tianity is the active missionary spirit displayed by progres- 
 sive Brahmas, which indeed was originated by the members 
 of the Adi-Samaj. Such a spirit is, of course, essential to 
 the growth and vitality of all new systems. Keshab Chandar 
 Sen has made several Missionary tours in India, and in 1870 
 he came to England, giving out that his mission was to 
 excite the interest of Englishmen in the religious, social, 
 and political progress of his fellow-countrymen. Here he 
 visited fourteen of the chief towns of England and Scotland, 
 and conducted religious services in the pulpits of Baptist, 
 Congregational, and Unitarian chapels. He preached to 
 large congregations in East London, and addressed seventy 
 meetings in different places in behalf of such objects as 
 Temperance, Peace, Reformatories, Ragged Schools, and 
 general education. He had interviews with Her Majesty 
 and several eminent Statesmen. 
 
 And what were the impressions he formed of Christian 
 
 religious life and doctrine in England ? It may do us no 
 
 harm to listen once more to the Hindu Theist's utterances 
 
 before he left our shores : — 
 
 'One institution,' he said, 'in England I have looked upon with pecu- 
 liar feelings of delight— the happy English home, in which the utmost 
 warmth and cordiality of affection, and sympathy, are mingled with the 
 highest moral and religious restraint and discipline. The spirit of prayer 
 and worship seems mixed up with daily household duties, and the 
 
5o6 Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 
 
 influence of the spirit of Christ is manifest in domestic concerns.' 'Yet,' 
 he added, ' it grieves me to find that the once crucified Jesus is crucified 
 hundreds of times every day in the midst of Christendom. The Christian 
 world has not imbibed Christ's spirit.' 
 
 At Birmingham he said : — 
 
 ' Since my arrival in England I have found myself incessantly sur- 
 rounded by various religious denominations, professing to be Christians. 
 Methinks I have come into a vast market. Every sect is like a small 
 shop where a peculiar kind of Christianity is offered for sale. As I go 
 from door to door, from shop to shop — each sect steps forward and offers 
 for my acceptance its own interpretations of the Bible, and its own 
 peculiar Christian beliefs. I cannot but feel perplexed and even amused 
 amidst countless and quarrelling sects. It appears to me, and has always 
 appeared to me, that no Christian nation on earth represents fully and 
 thoroughly Christ's idea of the kingdom of God. I do believe, and I 
 must candidly say, that no Christian sect puts forth the genuine and 
 full Christ as He was and as He is, but, in some cases, a mutilated, 
 disfigured Christ, and, what is more shameful, in many cases, a counter- 
 feit Christ. Now, I wish to say that I have not come to England as one 
 who has yet to find Christ. When the Roman Catholic, the Protestant, 
 the Unitarian, the Trinitarian, the Broad Church, the Low Church, the 
 High Church, all come round me, and offer me their respective Christs, I 
 desire to say to one and all : " Think you that I have no Christ within 
 me ? Though an Indian, I can still humbly say, thank God that 1 have 
 my Christ." ' 
 
 This remarkable statement has become invested with far 
 deeper significance and interest since the publication of Mr. 
 Sen's striking lecture, on the subject ' India asks, Who is 
 Christ ? ' It might have been expected that his English visit 
 would have brought his Theism into closer affinity with 
 Christian dogma. But such was not really the case. I may 
 state, however, as an interesting fact, that two of his Hindi! 
 travelling companions were afterwards baptized. 
 
 On his return to India Mr. Sen applied himself zealously to 
 the work of social reform, and at once started what was called 
 ' The Indian Reform Association ' for female improvement, 
 for the promotion of education among men and women, for 
 the suppression of intemperance, and generally for the social 
 and moral reformation of the people of India. This society, 
 open to all classes and creeds, was founded November 2nd, 
 
Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 507 
 
 1870, and a female Normal and Adult School was opened 
 in 1871. 
 
 The most important Reform of all— that relating to mar- 
 riage—to which Mr. Sen's efforts had already been directed, 
 had not made much progress. The example so well set by 
 the marriage of Debendra-nath Tagore's daughter in 1861 had 
 created hopes of a better state of things, but little real advance 
 had been achieved. It is true that similar marriages had fol- 
 lowed, but the legality of such marriages was disputed, though 
 a form of ritual had been adopted which was thought to be 
 sufficiently conformable to Hindu usage to insure their va- 
 lidity. It was not encouraging that between 1864 and 1867 
 only seven or eight Adi Samaj Brahma marriages and four or 
 five Progressive Brahma intermarriages between persons of 
 different castes had been solemnized. Nor had much success 
 attended the attempt to prevent early marriages. Mr. Sen 
 and his followers now threw themselves more vigorously than 
 ever into the marriage-reform movement. The best medical 
 opinions were sought, and the proper marriageable age fixed. 
 But the most important step was to memorialize the Govern- 
 ment for a new Marriage Act, to relieve Brahmas from their 
 disability to contract legal marriages according to their own 
 forms. Much agitation ensued. The native mind became 
 greatly excited, and Indian society was stirred to its depths 
 by a conflict of opinion on a matter which affected the very 
 framework of its whole structure and composition. 
 
 At length a Bill was drawn up by Sir Henry Maine— the 
 legal Member of Council — and improved upon by his successor 
 Sir Fitzjames Stephen. This pleased no one. It was 
 violently opposed not only by the orthodox Brahmans, but 
 by the more conservative Theists. The struggle was pro- 
 tracted with much bitterness on the part of the natives for four 
 years. Finally, after many ineffectual attempts at obtaining 
 a general agreement of opinion, a third Bill was elaborated, 
 and under the able nianagement of Sir Fitzjames Stephen 
 
5o8 Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 
 
 the Native Marriage Act became law on the aand of March, 
 1872. It commences thus : — 
 
 ' Whereas it is expedient to provide a form of marriage for persons who 
 do not profess the Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Muhammadan, Parsi, Bud- 
 dhist, Sikh or Jaina religion, and to legalize certain marriages the validity 
 of which is doubtful ; it is hereby enacted,' etc. 
 
 The Act, in fact, introduced for the first time the insti- 
 tution of civil marriage into HindQ society. It sanctioned 
 matrimonial union without any necessary religious ceremo- 
 nial. It legalized marriages between different castes. It 
 fixed the minimum age for a bridegroom at 18 and of a 
 bride at 14, but required the written consent of parents or 
 guardians when either party was under ai. It prevented 
 marriage, within certain degrees of consanguinity. It pro- 
 hibited bigamy, and permitted the remarriage of widows, which 
 had been before legalized generally by the Act of 1 856. 
 
 After the passing of the Act of 1873 fifty-eight marriages 
 took place in the eight and a half years ending August, 1879, 
 against fifty-one in the ten and a half years preceding its 
 ratification. The average of widow marriages has not as 
 yet been greatly increased by the passing of the Act. The 
 same may be said of intermarriages between persons of dif- 
 ferent castes, though these are said to have become more 
 numerous during the Prince of Wales's visit. All the mar- 
 riages which took place before the Act might have been 
 registered retrospectively, and in this manner legalized, but 
 only twenty-one were so registered. Singularly enough, too, 
 even to this day, some Hindu Theists continue to prefer being 
 married according to Brahmic rites, without availing them- 
 selves of the Act. There appears to be a dislike to the 
 Registrar, as if he were required to take the place of the 
 minister of religion, whereas he simply witnesses the contract 
 between the bride and bridegrcy^m, and listens to the words 
 by which they bind themselves "to matrimonial union. Some 
 Theists also object to the categorical repudiation of the Hindi! 
 
Modern Theism. Rammokun Roy's successors. 509 
 
 religion which must precede the performance of the civil 
 marriage, considering that because they are Brahmas they 
 are not, therefore, un-Hinduized. 
 
 Yet, it cannot be doubted that Mr. Sen and his followers 
 deserve the gratitude of their fellow-countrymen for their 
 labours in agitating for and obtaining the ratification of so 
 useful an Act. At any rate the events of the year 1872 
 must always constitute an epoch in the history of the reform- 
 ing movement. 
 
 For some time afterwards the Adi Brahma-Samaj led by 
 Debendra-nath, and the Brahma-Samaj of India under Keshab 
 Chandar Sen, achieved good work in their respective spheres, 
 and in not unfriendly co-operation with each other. The two 
 leaders, though very different in character, were both men of 
 unusual ability, and both penetrated by a sincere desire for 
 the regeneration of India. Each Samaj, too, had its able 
 Secretary and Writer; the Adi-Samaj in Raj Narain Bose, 
 and the more Progressive Samaj in Mr. Sen's cousin Pratap 
 Chandar Mozoomdar^ Moreover, the Conservative Samaj 
 had its literary organ in the Tattva-bodhini patrika, and the 
 Progressive in a daily newspaper called ' The Indian Mirror.' 
 
 No better proof of the activity of the two societies could be 
 given than the success of their missionary operations. By the 
 end of 1877 the number of Brahma Samajes scattered through- 
 out India, including Assam, had increased to a hundred 
 and seven, some following the Conservative pattern, and 
 some the Progressive. In 1875 fresh attempts were made to 
 establish a general representative Council of all the Samajes, 
 and one or two meetings were held, but no definite scheme 
 has yet been matured. 
 
 Meanwhile, lamentable dissensions, leading to a serious 
 
 ' This gentleman was in England for three or four months in the 
 year 1883. He kindly called to see me at Oxford and much impressed 
 me by his conversation. I have given an account of my conversation with 
 him at p. 522. He has lately published a very interesting summary 
 of the doctrines of his Samaj. 
 
5IO Modern Theism. Rdmmohun Roy s successors. 
 
 i^ schism, have taken place in the Progressive Brahma-Samaj. 
 Without doubt the career of this Samaj continued for several 
 years to be one of real progress. It did sterling work in' 
 propagating its own reforming principles. It sent forth 
 earnest missionaries to all parts of India. It put forth an 
 ably written Sunday edition of its daily newspaper the ' Indian 
 Mirror ^.' It encouraged fervour of faith and devotion (bhakti) 
 to such an extent that it was accused of making religion an 
 affair of mere emotion and excitement. One direction in 
 which the devotional side of the movement developed itself 
 was in the rapturous singing of hymns in chorus (samklrtana), 
 sometimes performed in procession through the streets. 
 Another form of development was the establishment of 
 Brahmotsavas, or periodical religious festivals as seasons of 
 special prayer, faith, and rejoicing. Besides all this, many 
 members of the Society were remarkable for austerity of life, 
 and the Samaj had a niche for those who gave themselves up 
 to severe self-discipline and asceticism (Vairagya). 
 
 The rock on which it split was its too unquestioning 
 
 ^ submission to the commanding ability of its leader. Keshab 
 Chandar Sen had fought his way through difficulties, hard- 
 ships and perils, with indomitable energy, but was not prepared 
 for an unsuspected danger — the danger of success — the danger 
 that too much praise would be lavished on the work he had 
 accomplished. For many years his daily path had certainly 
 not led him through clover ; nor had his nightly rest been 
 taken on a bed of roses. Nowhere is eminent ability wor- 
 shipped with more fervour than in India. So conspicuous 
 were Mr. Sen's talents that he soon became the object of a 
 kind of adoration. He was even accused of accepting divine 
 
 ' Besides the 'Indian Mirror' the Sulabh Samachar ('Cheap News') 
 and Dharma-tattva, ' Religious Truth,' have long been exponents of Mr. 
 Sen's teaching. Mr. Mozoomdar's ' Theistic Annual,' and his ' Theistic 
 Quarterly Review ' which has lately taken its place, are more recent 
 advocates on the same side. 
 
Modern Theism. Rammohun Roys successors. 5 1 1 
 
 honours. This, of course, he denied, and his followers have 
 always indignantly repelled the charge, but his old Vaishnava 
 training was not without its influence on his own estimate 
 of his own mission and office. He certainly supposed himself 
 to be in some special manner a partaker of divine gifts. It is 
 noticeable that in his address, delivered January, 1879, though 
 he answered the question, ' Am I an inspired prophet ? ' in the 
 negative, he laid claim to a kind of direct inspiration. He 
 declared that he had had visions ^ of John the Baptist, Jesus 
 Christ, and St. Paul, who all favoured him with personal 
 communications^ that the Lord said he was to have perennial 
 inspiration from heaven, that all his actions were regulated by 
 divine command (adesa), and that men should remember that 
 to protest against the cause which he upheld was to protest 
 against the dispensations of God Almighty. 
 
 Then, again, Keshab Chandar Sen was not merely an 
 autocrat among his own people in matters of faith and 
 doctrine. He was the sole administrator of the affairs of 
 the Society, and ruled it with the rod of an irresponsible 
 dictator. People began to complain that the Progressive 
 Brahma-Samaj was without a constitutional government. It 
 had no freedom of discussion in the management of its own 
 affairs. Keshab Chandar Sen was not only its Bishop, Priest, 
 and Deacon all in one ; he was a kind of Pope^, from whose 
 decision there was no appeal. 
 
 ' A great part of the matter in this chapter was written by me soon 
 after my second travels in India, about the year 1879. N ot long afterwards 
 a Brahma Missionary Conference held on Dec. 22, 1880, commissioned 
 the brother of Mr. Sen to write me a letter calling in question some of 
 my statements. In that letter the members of the Conference objected to 
 the expression ' visions,' and declared that on the occasion here alluded 
 to Mr. Sen only meant to use metaphorical expressions. Further, they 
 assert that Mr. Sen was not regarded by them as a Pope, but only as an 
 inspired apostle commissioned by God. 
 
 " Raj Narain Bose considered that Mr. Sen was justly amenable to this 
 charge, as he (Mr. Sen) brought the same charge against Debendra-nath 
 at the time of the schism. 
 
5 1 2 Modern Theism. Rammokun Roys successors. 
 
 While all these elements of discontent were at work, a 
 most unexpected revelation took place, the effect of which 
 was to precipitate the disruption of the Samaj. It turned 
 out, in fact, that Keshab Chandar Sen, with all his almost 
 superhuman eloquence, ability, and genius, was nothing after 
 all but a plain human being, with very human infirmities. 
 It appears that as early as August, 1877, it began to be 
 anxiously whispered that the great social Reformer was 
 likely to sacrifice his own cherished principles at the altar of 
 ambition. He, who had denounced early marriages as the 
 curse of India, was said to be inclined to accept an offer of 
 marriage for his own daughter not yet fourteen, from the 
 3'oung Maharaja of Kuch Behar not yet sixteen years of age. 
 The rumour proved to be too true, and the ' Indian Mirror ' of 
 February 6, 1878, formally announced that the marriage had 
 been arranged. Protests from every conceivable quarter 
 poured in upon the great social Reformer, but they were not 
 only unheeded, they were absolutely ignored. The marriage 
 ceremony^ took place on March 6, 1878, and not without 
 idolatrous rites on the bride's side, though these were not 
 performed in the presence of Mr. Sen himself^. In point 
 of fact, the performance of certain ceremonies — such as the 
 Homa, or fire-oblation — was necessary to secure the validity 
 of the marriage in a Native State protected by our Govern- 
 ment, but not subject to the operation of the Marriage Act. 
 Immediately after the wedding the young Maharaja set out 
 
 ^ The Missionary Conference of Dec. 22, 1880, commissioned Mr. Sen 
 to inform me that this ceremony was only a betrothal and that the parties 
 did not live together as man and wife till a final ceremony had been per- 
 formed in the Brahma Mandir on Oct. 20, 1880. But the ceremony of 
 March 6 was surely the legal ceremony. 
 
 ^ The 'Indian Mirror' of March 17, 1878, informed its readers that 
 ' though the Raja's Purohits, who were orthodox Brahmins, were allowed 
 to officiate at the ceremony, the Homa was not performed during the, 
 marriage ; but after the bride and her party left the place. The prin- 
 ciples of Brahma marriage were barely preserved.' 
 
Brahma-Samaj and Keshab Chandar Sen. 513 
 
 for England, and the bridegroom and bride did not live 
 together as man and wife till a final ceremony had been 
 performed on Oct. 20, 1880. 
 
 Subsequently the Dharma-tattva and the 'Indian Mirror' 
 published an elaborate justification of Mr. Sen's conduct. 
 The defence set up was that Mr. Sen had no choice in the 
 matter. He had acted, it was said— as was said of Muhammad 
 of old— under divine command (adesa), and in obedience to 
 God's will. Moreover, it was contended that the marriage of 
 his daughter with a Maharaja had dealt a blow at caste- 
 marriages, while the propagation of Theistic opinions in Kuch 
 Behar and other Native States was likely to be materially 
 promoted. Another line of defence taken was that Keshab 
 Chandar Sen's mission had always been that of a religious 
 and not secular Reformer. 
 
 As might have been expected, the Protestors, who objected 
 to Mr. Sen's proceedings in regard to the marriage, met 
 together, soon after he left for Kuch Behar, to decide on their 
 line of action. An unsuccessful attempt was then made to 
 depose Mr. Sen from his office as Minister, and an unseemly 
 struggle took place for the possession of the Mandir. In the 
 end it was determined to establish a new church on a con- 
 stitutional and catholic basis. All the provincial Samajes 
 were consulted, and with the approval of the majority, a 
 meeting was held in the Town Hall, Calcutta, May 15, 1878, 
 Mr. Ananda Mohan Bose being in the chair, when the follow- 
 ing resolution was passed : — 
 
 'That this meeting deeply deplores the want of a constitutional or- 
 ganization in the Brahma-Samaj, and does hereby establish a Samaj to 
 be called "The Sadharana [or general] Brahma-Samaj," with a view 
 to remove the serious and manifold evils resulting from this state of 
 things, and to secure the representation of the views and the harmonious 
 co-operation of the general Brahma conjmunity, in all that affects the 
 progress and well-being of the Theistic cause and Theistic work in 
 India.' 
 
 At first the Prayer Meetings of this new Brahma-Samaj, of 
 
 Ll 
 
514 Sddkarana-Brakma-Samdj. 
 
 which Mr. Ananda Bose was the first President S were held in 
 temporary rooms, but the foundation stone of a new Prayer 
 Hall (311, Cornwallis Street) was laid on January 23, 1879, 
 and the building finished and consecrated on January aa, 
 1881. Moreover, the Brahma Public Opinion ^ newspaper, 
 and the Tattva-kaumudI, ' Moonlight of Truth,' a fortnightly 
 paper, were started as religious and literary organs of the • 
 protesting party. 
 
 It is not possible for me to speak with certainty as to the 
 success of this fourth development of the Brahma Theistic 
 movement although I visited its Mandir. Its name, Sadhar- 
 ana, implied that it aimed at more catholicity, and a more 
 democratic government, but its organization, though promis- 
 ing well under Mr. A. M. Bose and Pandit Sivanath Sastrl 
 (a man of eloquence and ability), did not appear to be 
 complete in relation to the rest of India. There appeared, 
 at that time, to be no one man among its members who had 
 the religious genius of either Keshab Chandar Sen, or of 
 Debendra-nath Tagore, or the literary culture which charac- 
 terized the best productions of Mr. P. C. Mozoomdar and Raj 
 Narain Bose. Yet there seemed to be a large number of 
 practical men — men of good sound sense, religious earnest- 
 ness, and sufficient ability, who were likely to accomplish a 
 great deal of useful work together, and to make their society 
 one of the leading Samajes of India. 
 
 After the unhappy breach of harmony, caused by Mr. 
 Sen's conduct in regard to the marriage of his daughter, he 
 appears to have made extraordinary efforts to restore his 
 own prestige by the' elaboration of novel ideas. The year 
 1879 was signalized by the institution of an order of professed 
 
 ^ He was succeeded by Babu Shib Chandar Deb, the Secretary being 
 Babu Dvarka Nath Ganguli. Whether these still continue I know not. 
 
 ^ This has now become a purely secular paper and has changed its 
 name to ' Bengal Public Opinion,' while the ' Indian Messenger,' well 
 edited by Sivanath Sastri, M. A., was started on September 9, 1883, and 
 has taken its place as the religious organ. 
 
Keshab Ckandar Sens Annual Sermon. 515 
 
 teachers of religion, called Adhyapakas. Four teachers were 
 ordained by Mr. Sen on September 7, 1879, among whom was 
 Mr. Mozoomdar. A curious practice was also introduced of 
 holding supposed conversations and passing days and nights as 
 imaginary pilgrims with the great prophets, apostles, and saints 
 of the world— as, for example, with Moses, Socrates, Caitanya, 
 the Rishis, Muhammad, Buddha— who were supposed to be 
 present and to take part in the dialogues and to inspire the 
 pilgrims with the fire of their own nature. 
 
 Furthermore, a remarkable ' Proclamation ' was issued in 
 the 'Sunday Mirror' of December 14, 1879, purporting to 
 come from ' India's Mother.' It is here abridged :— 
 
 ' To all my soldiers in India my affectionate greeting. Believe that 
 this Proclamation goeth forth from Heaven in the name and with the love 
 of your Mother. Carry out its behests like loyal soldiers. The British 
 Government is my Government. The Brahma-Samaj is my Church. 
 My daughter Queen Victoria have I ordained. Come direct to me, with- 
 out a mediator, as your Mother. The influence of the earthly Mother at 
 home, of the Queen Mother at the head of the Government, will raise the 
 head of my Indian children to their Supreme Mother. I will give them 
 peace and salvation. Soldiers, fight bravely and establish my dominion.' 
 
 This idea of God's Motherhood as a correlative to God's 
 Fatherhood is, as I have already pointed out, an essential 
 characteristic of HindQism (see Chapter VII. pp. 180-208). 
 
 Mr. Sen's lecture delivered on the 24th of January, 1880, 
 called ' God-vision,' was full of rhapsody mixed up with 
 many fine thoughts ; but that delivered in the Town Hall, 
 Calcutta, on the 9th of April, 1879, before at least a thousand 
 persons, on the subject, ' India asks, Who is Christ ? ' was 
 pronounced by those who heard it to be a masterpiece of 
 oratory 1. He not only entranced his hearers by an extra- 
 ordinary effort of eloquence ; he surprised them by calling 
 upon India to accept Christ. According to Mr. Sen, 
 
 ' The Rev. Luke Rivington was my authority. He was present with 
 the Bishop of Calcutta and a few other Europeans. Indeed the subject 
 chosen was due to a previous conversation with Mr. Rivington at a dinner- 
 party given by Mr. Sen to him and a large number of thoughtful natives. 
 
 L la 
 
5i6 Keshab Chandar Sens Annual Sermon. 
 
 Christianity is the true national religion of his fellow-country- 
 men. India is destined to become Christian, and cannot 
 escape her destiny. ' You, my countrymen,' he says, ' cannot 
 help accepting Christ in the spirit of your national scriptures.' 
 In another part of the lecture we find him using these 
 remarkable words : — 
 
 ' Gentlemen, you cannot .deny that your hearts have been touched, 
 conquered, and subjugated by a superior power. That power, need I 
 tell you ? is Christ. It is Christ who rules British India, and not the 
 British Government. England has sent out a tremendous moral force 
 in the life and character of that mighty prophet to conquer and hold 
 this vast empire. None but Jesus, none but Jesus, none but Jesus, 
 ever deserved this bright, this precious diadem, India, and Jesus shall 
 have it.' 
 
 It is evident, however, that Mr. Sen intends Christ to be 
 accepted by his fellow-countrymen as the greatest of all 
 Asiatic saints and not in the character ascribed to Him by 
 the Church of England. ' Christ comes to us,' he says, ' as 
 an Asiatic in race, as a Hindu in faith, as a kinsman and as a 
 brother. . . . Christ is a true Yogi, and will surely help us to 
 realize our national ideal of a Yogi. ... In accepting Him, 
 therefore, you accept the fulfilment of your national scriptures 
 and prophets.' This is all very striking, but seems rather 
 like presenting Christianity to the Hindus in the light of an 
 advanced phase of Hinduism. 
 
 A still more recent annual sermon delivered by Mr. Sen at 
 
 Calcutta, in January, 1881, announced the advent of a New 
 
 Dispensation, which any one perusing the discourse will be 
 
 surprised to find, is a kind of amalgamation of Hinduism, 
 
 Muhammadanism, and Christianity. Thenceforth the Brahma- 
 
 Samaj of India was to be called the ' New Dispensation 
 
 Church.' The present Bishop of Exeter (the Right Rev. Dr. 
 
 Bickersteth) was present on the occasion and recorded his ■. 
 
 impression of the address in a letter written from Bishop's 
 
 Palace, Calcutta : — 
 
 'This afternoon Keshab Chandar Sen 'gave his annual address to the 
 Brahma-Samaj in the Town Hall. The huge hall was crammed — I should 
 
The Church of the New Dispensation. 517 
 
 say 3500 men and some six ladies ; almost all were Hindus, thoughtful, 
 earnest-looking men. He spoke for one hour and forty minutes — a tor- 
 rent of eloquence. He denies the Godhead of Christ, though, with this 
 grave and grievous lack, nothing in parts could be more impassioned 
 than his language of devotion to Christ. He thinks himself the prophet 
 of a " New Dispensation,'' as he calls it, which is to affirm the Unity 
 of the Godhead, and the unity of all earnest creeds — Hindu, Moslem, and 
 Christian — who worship God. Of course it is a great advance upon the 
 multiform idolatry of this land ; and again and again I said to myself, 
 " Quoniam talis es, utinam noster esses." ' 
 
 This New Dispensation was proclaimed on January a6, 1881. 
 Then, on January 1, 1883, Mr. Sen, as chief apostle of the Church 
 of this Dispensation, put forth another manifesto. I here give 
 the greater portion as it appeared in the Indian newspapers of 
 about that date (see 'Times of India' for Jan. 13, 1883): — 
 
 ' Keshab Chandar Sen, a servant of God, called to be an apostle of the 
 Church of the New Dispensation, which is in the holy city of Calcutta, 
 the metropolis of Aryavarta, 
 
 ' To all the great nations in the world, and to the chief religious sects in 
 the East and the West, 
 
 'To the followers of Moses, of Jesus, of Buddha, of Confucius, of 
 Zoroaster, of Mahomet, of Nanak, and the various branches of the Hindu 
 Church, 
 
 ' Grace be to you, and peace everlasting. 
 
 'Whereas sectarian discord and strife, schisms and enmities prevail in 
 our Father's family, causing much bitterness and unhappiness, impurity 
 and unrighteousness, and even war, carnage, and bloodshed, 
 
 'Whereas this setting of brother against brother and sister against 
 sister in the name of religion has proved a fruitful source of evils, and is 
 itself a sin against God and man : 
 
 ' It has pleased the Holy God to send unto the world a message of 
 peace and love, of harmony and reconciliation. 
 
 'This New Dispensation hath He in boundless mercy vouchsafed to us 
 in the East, and we have been commanded to bear witness unto it among 
 the nations of the earth. 
 
 ' Thus saith the Lord— Sectarianism ' is an abomination unto Me, and 
 unbrotherliness I will not tolerate. 
 
 ' I desire love and unity, and My children shall be of one heart, even as 
 I am one. 
 
 'At sundry times have I spoken through My prophets, and through 
 My many and various dispensations ; there is unity in them. 
 
 ' Hear ye men, there is one music but many instruments, one body but 
 many hmbs, one spirit but diverse gifts, one blood yet many nations, one 
 church yet many churches. 
 
5i8 Death and Cremation of Keshab Chandar Sen. 
 
 ' Blessed are the peace-makers, who reconcile differences and establish 
 peace, good- will, and brotherhood in the name of the Father. ^ 
 
 ' These words hath the Lord our God spoken unto us, and His new 
 Gospel He hath revealed unto us— a gospel of exceeding joy. 
 
 ' And these blessed tidings the Loving Father hath chafged me and my 
 brother apostles to declare unto all the nations of the world, that being 
 of one blood they may also be of one faith and rejoice in one Lord. 
 
 'Gather ye the wisdom of the East and the West, and accept and 
 assimilate the examples of the saints of all ages. 
 
 'Above all, love one another and merge all differences in universal 
 brotherhood. 
 
 ' Let Asia, Europe, Africa, and America, with diverse instruments, praise 
 the New Dispensation, and sing the Fatherhood of God and the Brother- 
 hood of Man.' 
 
 Soon after this proclamation the health of the apostle of the 
 ' New Dispensation,' which had been for a long time subject 
 to severe disturbances, began to decline very rapidly, and, 
 a year afterwards, on the 8th of January, 1884, he died. 
 On the evening of that day his body was burnt at the Nim 
 Tollah burning-Ghat on the Ganges, and, being at Calcutta, 
 I went to the cremation. 
 
 The Ghat had no flight of steps down to the river, but 
 was simply a long brick building, with three enclosing walls, 
 open upwards to the sky, and on one side towards the river. 
 All cremations took place on its stone floor. Nothing Was to 
 be seen inside this utterly bare and dreary structure, except 
 bodies in the process of burning, surrounded here and there 
 by attendants and relations. 
 
 The sun was setting as I entered the building, and a lurid 
 afterglow — like that observed all over Europe during the winter 
 of 1883, 1884 — lingered in the sky, suffusing the river, the 
 shipping, and the whole surroundings of the Ghat with a weird 
 unearthly light. Just inside the entrance were two pyres 
 nearly burnt out, but with embers still smouldering. At the 
 farther end a crowd of perhaps three hundred people were 
 collected ^. These constituted the principal members and 
 
 ^ The small number present surprised me. I looked in vain for the 
 Maharaja of Kuch Behar. 
 
Death and Cremation of Keshab Ckandar Sen. 519 
 
 friends of the Brahma community of which Keshab was 
 head. 
 
 In their midst was an enormous pyre of sandal-wood which 
 quite concealed the dead body of their leader. I was allowed 
 to stand on a raised parapet, and from that vantage-ground 
 witnessed the first application of the lighted torch by some 
 near relative. Then other relatives and friends brought con- 
 tributions of sandal-wood and combustible substances, while 
 others cast flowers, garlands, and fragrant powder on the 
 burning pyre, amid the solemn chanting of hymns in Grego- 
 rian tones. 
 
 ' The mercy of God alone availeth ' (Brahma-kripa hi keva- 
 1am), was the burden of the cry of grief uttered by the 
 mourners. 
 
 Meanwhile, the lurid twilight gave place to gathering gloom. 
 The mourners ranged in a circle round the pyre swayed to 
 and fro as the flames darted forth from the blazing wood. 
 Their faces, now lighted up' by a fitful glare, now enveloped 
 in clouds of smoke, had a ghastly unearthly look. ' It was, in 
 truth, an extraordinary scene, the like of which I had never 
 seen before, and shall probably never witness again. Every 
 detail will remain indelibly imprinted upon my memory. 
 
 A greater contrast to a Christian funeral could scarcely be 
 imagined ', and the contrast was the more remarkable, as this 
 
 ' It was equally, however, a contrast to the form of cremation now in 
 vogue among orthodox Hindus, as may be proved by referring to pp. 
 295-303 of this volume, as well as by perusing the following account 
 of the cremation of the Hon. Kristo-das Pal, which appeared in the 
 ' Times of India Overland Summary ' for July 29, 1884 :— ' The remains of 
 Kristo-das Pal were cremated at Nim ToUah burning-Ghat in accordance 
 with the orthodox Hindu custom. A few moments before he expired, his 
 son poured a few drops of Ganges water into his mouth and anointed his 
 forehead with mud from the river; placing a few leaves of tulsi on the 
 forehead. The mourners then chanted the names of Hindu gods and 
 goddesses whilst anointing the corpse. The family priest also chanted 
 prayers. After the deceased had breathed his last, his eyelids and lips 
 were closed by his son, who was chief mourner. The remains were then 
 
520 Death and Cremation of Keshab Chandar Sen. 
 
 was the Keshab who in the impassioned address ah-eady 
 noticed, had called on India to accept Christ. I believe that 
 a further religious ceremony (corresponding to the Sraddha) 
 was performed at the private residence of the deceased man a 
 few days later, but to this I was not invited. Such ceremonies 
 make it abundantly clear how wide a chasm separates the 
 followers of Keshab, the enthusiastic admirer of Christ, from 
 the community of Christians at Calcutta. 
 
 But it is equally clear that Keshab was one of India's 
 greatest social and religious reformers, and, notwithstanding 
 his errors of judgment, a worthy successor of Rammohun Roy. 
 Before I left Calcutta a meeting was held to organize some 
 suitable plan for perpetuating his memory, and a large sum 
 had been collected in subscriptions. But I doubt whether 
 the time has yet arrived for an adequate appreciation of his 
 character, and it is to be feared that jealousies and disputed 
 among some of his former followers may impair the good 
 effect of what he has done for the cause of progress. 
 
 put into a cot and brought down into the court-yard. The chief mourner 
 applied nine bits of gold to the mouth, nostrils, eyes, and head of the 
 deceased, and anointed the body with otto of spikenard and otto of 
 sandal-wood. The corpse was then dressed in clean clothes, after which 
 garlands of flowers were placed on it. A small plant — the sacred tulsi — 
 with its root and flowers was placed on the head during this period. 
 Large crowds flocked in to see the last of the well-known patriot. At 
 three o'clock the cortege proceeded to the Ghat. The corpse was borne 
 by the friends and relatives of the deceased. On the way it was deposited 
 opposite the temple near the Ghat, where prayers were offered. It was 
 then taken to the side of the river, where the son anointed it with Ganges 
 water. The funeral pyre was composed partly of sandal-wood. A clean 
 piece of cloth was then put on the pyre, and the body was uncovered up 
 to the waist. After this the son was summoned to the side of the remains, 
 when ghee was placed on his hand, with which he anointed the head of 
 the corpse. Ganges water was again sprinkled on the body, after which 
 the priest gave the son two rings composed apparently of tulsl leaves, 
 which he placed round the forefinger of the deceased. The priest then 
 chanted some invocations in a low tone, which the son repeated. The 
 body was then placed on the funeral pyre and cremated. During the 
 cremation rice, dal, and pice were distributed to the poor. The deceased 
 wished that the cremation should not be attended with any pomp.' 
 
Pratap Chandar Mosoomdar. 521 
 
 It might indeed have been thought that the return of Mr. 
 Pratap Chandar Mozoomdar very soon after the death of 
 Keshab Chandar Sen would have made his election as Mr. 
 Sen's successor, and as leader of the New Dispensation 
 Church, certain. He had been travelling round the world, 
 but hurried back on hearing of Mr. Sen's illness. No one 
 could deny that he was the one man intellectually qualified 
 to succeed the great Reformer, and he himself was bent on 
 becoming a religious guide, if not a ruler. Nothing short of 
 this was likely to satisfy his aspirations. But he seemed to lack 
 the tact needed for keeping the great Keshab's Samaj to- 
 gether, and he failed at first to bring about any settlement 
 of the unseemly disputes which had arisen in regard to the 
 ownership of the place of worship. 
 
 On inquiry in August, 1884, I was told that he con- 
 ducted religious services in his own house, and that he had 
 started a Bengali paper (called the Alok) as an organ for 
 disseminating his own views and the doctrines of the ' New 
 Dispensation,' of which he still believed himself to be the ex- 
 ponent. He maintained that the public utterances of the late 
 minister showed that it was never his desire to appropriate 
 for the use of his own family and most intimate friends any 
 of the property of the Samaj, such as the prayer hall (Mandir) 
 which was erected by public subscription. 
 
 In opposition to this view, the near relatives and adherents 
 of the late Keshab Chandar Sen called themselves the true 
 members of the Apostolic Darbar, and claimed the Mandir as 
 their own, declining to recognize Mr. Mozoomdar as their 
 leader. They were for some time like a flock without a shep- 
 herd, and appeared likely to lapse — as their leader also seemed 
 latterly inclined to do — into many superstitious practices, or 
 even into a form of Theism nearly approaching Vaishnavism. 
 
 I have at present (1891) no information as to Mr. Mozoom- 
 dar's exact position ; but his great energy and ability, com- 
 bined with his oratorical powers, must have secured for him a 
 
522 Pratap Chandar Mozoomdar. 
 
 large number of adherents, and perhaps have led to his 
 organizing a Samaj of a purer character than that of his pre- 
 decessor Mr. Sen. It may be interesting, therefore, if I here 
 put on record a conversation I had with him, nearly in the 
 following words : — 
 
 What is your name for God ? 
 
 Brahma is our chief name, though this (being neuter) is rather our 
 philosophical one. Our house of God is called Brahma-mandira. But our 
 common name for God is Hari (also one of the common names of Vishnu), 
 which means ' the Taker away of sin and evil.' We also use the names 
 Paramesvara, ' Supreme Lord,' and Paramatma, ' Supreme Spirit,' and 
 Parama-pita, ' Supreme Father,' and even Parama-mata, ' Supreme 
 Mother.' Perhaps one reason for these last names may be that we can- 
 not get rid of the idea of Purusha and Prakriti, which is ingrained in the 
 Hindu mind (see p. 223 of this volume). 
 
 Do you hold that God created the world out of nothing, or that He 
 developed it out of His own essence ? 
 
 We consider this inquiry too recondite and too much beyond the reach 
 of our intellects. We do not attempt to go into it. But we hold that 
 God did not create the world all at once, but by gradual evolution. 
 Everything in creation proceeds progressively by fixed law, and not 
 per saltum. 
 
 Your late leader, Keshab Chandar Sen, called on India to accept 
 Christ ; what did he mean by this ? 
 
 We do accept Christ in our own way. We regard Him as our supreme 
 Exemplar, our ideal Man. He was the Spirit of God incarnate — the ideal 
 of the life of God in man. We do not beheve this of any one else. Moses 
 was a good man, and David a devoted man full of faith and trust in God. 
 But these were only partially good. Paul conforms most nearly to the 
 Christ-like pattern — Christ is the concentration and combination of all. 
 
 Do you claim anything similar for your late leader, Keshab Chandar Sen? 
 
 No. True, he was a good and holy man and had the Spirit of God ; 
 he was inspired, but not perpetually ; the Spirit was not always present in 
 him, and certainly he was not inspired in the sense Christ is thought to 
 have been by Christians. He was only inspired when he placed himself 
 in a devotional frame of mind and gave himself to earnest prayer. Then 
 great spiritual impulses were imparted to him, in response to such 
 prayers. And similar responses are given to other men also. Inspiration 
 was not confined to Mr. Keshab Chandar Sen. He had his allotted place 
 and work as our chief leader, and we yielded him allegiance. He was not 
 a guide to any except to those brought into association with him— not to 
 all the world. There is a common inspiration given to each member of 
 our church in his own special sphere of work. 
 
 What are your views on the subject of Christ's death ? 
 
 We accept Christ's death as an atonement spiritually. But there is no 
 
Pratap Chandar Mozoomdar. 523 
 
 mere mechanical and material application of Christ's merits. If we are 
 to profit by Christ's death we must go through the same processes. Christ's 
 death was the victory of pain and suffering over pleasure and carnality. 
 It was also a self-sacrifice. It was God living and dying for the good of 
 the world. It effected a reconciliation between sinful man and God. In 
 this sense we recognise the atonement. Any one who adopts the same 
 principle of self-sacrifice helps to effect reconciliation between man and 
 God. Christ has taught us to die. 
 Do you believe in the resurrection of Christ ? 
 Not in His bodily, but in His spiritual resurrection. 
 What are your ideas about Heaven ? 
 
 Our heaven is called Svarga. It is an eternal condition, and not neces- 
 sarily connected with any particular locality. 
 We do not believe in the transmigration of souls (metempsychosis). 
 Do you believe in a Hell ? 
 
 Yes, our Hell is called Naraka, but it is a temporary condition, like the 
 Purgatory of the Roman Catholics. It is not necessarily connected with 
 a locality. 
 What do you hold in regard to a personal Spirit of evil ? 
 We do not beheve in a personal Devil, nor in the Bhutas and Pretas of 
 the Hindus (see p. 241 of this volume). Evil is negative, and sin is a 
 positive act proceeding from weakness or disease of the will. 
 
 Do you keep up any of the Hindu domestic ceremonies, or have you 
 ceremonies of your own ? 
 
 We have some domestic ceremonies, of course, which we call Anush- 
 thana. They are performed without idolatry, and according to forms of 
 our own and with our own prayers. Thus we have Birth, Marriage, and 
 Funeral ceremonies. We have also Baptism and a rite called Homa 
 (using fire as a symbol). Moreover, we have a ceremony corresponding 
 to the Christian Communion, performed with rice and milk, which are 
 supposed to have the same symbolical significance as bread and wine,— 
 that is, they typify union and assimilation as food is assimilated. But we 
 do not consider our ceremonies (anushthana) binding on all. Any member 
 of our church may retain the Hindu domestic ceremonies, going through 
 ■ them as a matter of routine. Still, we do not consider any one a strict 
 Brahma -unless he adopts the Brahma (sometimes called Brahmic) cere- 
 monies, and these strict Brahmas we call Anushthanikas. 
 
 With regard to the question of Brahma ceremonies, it should 
 be carefully noted that, after all, the Brahma-Samaj Theist 
 who has not given up Hindu domestic rites and caste-customs 
 can scarcely be said to have severed himself from Hinduism. 
 The mere holding of Theistic opinions has nothing in it 
 opposed to Hinduism, nor even to Brahmanism. I once asked 
 a Brahman if he had any short creed which he could write 
 
524 Anushthana or Brahma Ceremonies- 
 
 down for me. He immediately wrote in Sanskrit a few words 
 which may be thus translated : ' I bow down before the One 
 God, who is the only existing Being, who is eternal, who is all 
 joy, and the giver of all joy; who is all knowledge; who is 
 unchangeable and present as a witness in all consciences.' 
 
 Indeed the foregoing pages of this volume will have been 
 written in vain if they have not made it evident that Vaish- 
 navism and Saivism — especially the former — are in reality 
 forms of Theism (pp. 54, 73, 96, 475). The Vaishnavas are 
 Theists who worship one personal God under the name of 
 Vishnu. They maintain that the idolatry connected with that 
 worship is not a necessary part of its essence. Adoration of 
 images (murti-puja) is allowed as a help to weak-minded people, 
 but the mental and spiritual form of devotion (manasi puja) 
 is repeatedly declared to be the highest (see p. 1 23), and that 
 to which all lower forms lead up. If, therefore, a Vaishnava 
 abstains from idolatry in his daily worship, and confines him- 
 self to spiritual adoration, it may be contended that he is as 
 good a Theist as any member of a Brahma-Samaj, bearing 
 in mind that some of these latter also worship God under 
 one of the names of Vishnu (Hari). Every such Vaishnava 
 may be a sympathizer with the members of modern Theistic 
 societies so far as mere monotheistic doctrines are concerned. 
 There remains, however, the doctrine of metempsychosis. 
 
 The crucial test of pure Theism among the Hindus lies in 
 the rejection of that doctrine and of the old domestic cere- , 
 monies and caste-customs. If a man adheres to caste, and 
 to the old superstitious and idolatrous methods of performing 
 family rites, and to the Hindu doctrine of metempsychosis, 
 he cannot be said to have joined the ranks of true Theistic 
 Reformers. • 
 
 And in real fact no one ought to be allowed to register his 
 name as a member of any Brahma-Samaj unless he has the 
 courage of his opinions, and is prepared to become an 
 Anushthanika ; that is to say,' unless he engages to shake off 
 
spread of Brahma Churches in India. 525 
 
 all the fetters of caste, and perform all domestic rites and 
 ceremonies at births, initiation, marriages, deaths, etc., ac- 
 cording to Brahma (Brahmic) rules and forms ; and of these 
 Anushthanikas I believe there are little more than eight 
 hundred all told. So much, then, for the actual advance of 
 pure Theism in India. ' 
 
 Nevertheless it is matter of congratulation that many- 
 thousands are now to be found who, though they do not 
 adopt pure Theistic forms, or renounce caste-customs, never- 
 theless sympathize with the members of the Brahma-Samaj 
 to the extent of renouncing idolatry. 
 
 And it is much to be hoped that the bitterness of feeling 
 produced by constant disputes and schisms may in the end 
 pass away, and that the various bodies of Theists, which the 
 operation of our educational system is rapidly calling into 
 existence, may ere long forget their petty differences, and 
 agree upon some course of combined and systematic action 
 for the promotion of social reform. Surely the present little 
 band of Reformers, however courageous, is not strong enough 
 to bear weakening by internal divisions. A compact and 
 serried front is urgently needed in the presence of countless 
 foes, who neglect no opportunity of marshalling their forces, 
 and uniting in active co-operation for the destruction of the 
 scattered ranks of their opponents. 
 
 Ten years ago the Census showed that there were 178 
 Theistic Churches established in different localities through- 
 out India. The present Census will no doubt prove them to 
 be now more numerous ; but it must be borne in mind that 
 many of them have few registered Anushthanika members, 
 though they have numerous sympathizers. 
 
 The Madras Samaj, founded in 1871, and developed out of 
 a previous Veda-Samaj, was well led by Sridharalu Naidu 
 (under the Adi Brahma-Samaj), but at his death languished. 
 It revived in 1879, but soon split into two parties, some siding 
 with Keshab Chandar Sen and some with the Sadharana 
 
526 spread of Brahma Churches. Theosophy. 
 
 Church. When I was last in India the latter party was the 
 strongest, and had formed a new Samaj. At Bombay, the 
 Prarthana-Samaj, or 'Prayer Society,' was the first Theistic 
 Church of Western India. It was founded in 1867, and owed 
 much of its continued vitality to the support of an enlightened 
 native. Dr. Atmaram Pandurang. 
 
 Some of the Samajes follow on the lines first laid down by 
 Keshab Chandar Sen, and are liberal and progressive. Many 
 are more conservative, and conform to the pattern of the 
 Adi Brahma-Samaj at Calcutta ^ Some, again, take an in- 
 dependent line, and call their creed ' Theosophy.' 
 
 Such Theosophical societies define ' Theosophy ' to mean 
 ' divine wisdom or science,' ' spiritual philosophy.' They 
 hold that all religions have elements of truth which spring 
 from the one Fountain of Truth, and that Theosophy is the 
 synthesis of all religions. Hence pure Brahmanism, pure 
 Buddhism, pure Islam, pure Christianity may be equivalent 
 to Theosophy. It may be true that Theosophy is spreading, 
 but in India it seems to be little more than another name 
 for the Vedanta philosophy. 
 
 Let me now describe the meetings which I myself attended 
 (i) of Keshab's Progressive Samaj or New Dispensation 
 Church at Calcutta ; (2) of the Adi Brahma-Samaj at Cal- 
 cutta; (3) of the Prarthana-Samaj at Bombay. 
 
 The meeting of the Progressive Brahma-Samaj at which 
 I was present, took place on the Sunday previous to Keshab 
 Chandar Sen's death, when he was lying dangerously ill. The 
 religious service was conducted by some relative who acted as 
 his deputy. His Secretary, Mr. Pratap Chandar Mozoomdar, 
 who, as already mentioned, had been on a tour round the world, 
 
 ' According to Raj Narain Bose, the Adi Brahma-Samaj, though 
 generally conservative, contains individual members who have .taken 
 part in very progressive reforms, such as discarding the thread, the 
 remarriage of widows, emancipation of females, etc. The Adi-Samaj in 
 fact is conservative in rehgious reform, basing it on Vedas and Vedanta, 
 but leaves social reform to the judgment and taste of individual members. 
 
Form of Service at Brahma-Samaj Meetings. 527 
 
 had not at that time returned. The building used for these 
 services is situated in a handsome street in the native quarter 
 of Calcutta, and has a spire and an exterior elevation copied 
 from our Christian churches ; while its interior arrangements, 
 though Oriental in points of detail, give it an appearance not 
 unlike that of a plain unadorned dissenting chapel. This is the 
 building which since the death of Keshab Chandar Sen has 
 caused a dispute as to its ownership, terminating in a serious 
 disruption (see p. 520). On driving up to the entrance I 
 noticed two temporary screens stretching from the road to a 
 side-door. This was to enable the female Brahmas (usually 
 called Brahmikas) to enter without being seen. 
 
 No doubt it is a most unusual circumstance in India for 
 the women of a family to meet in the same place of worship 
 and to join in the same devotions with their male relatives ; 
 but, I confess, I did not expect to find the female members 
 of the congregation of the great social Reformer immured in 
 a gallery with a wooden screen in front of it. 
 
 On entering the Church I found the interior nearly full of 
 men, almost every one of whom wore the shawl which con- 
 stitutes the favourite winter costume of a Bengali Babu drawn 
 closely around him. 
 
 They began by repeating a litany in a standing attitude, 
 and I observed that the responses of the congregation were 
 uttered with much apparent devotion. The preacher, who 
 was also wrapped in a shawl, sat in the middle of a slightly 
 raised platform surrounded by a railing. When the litany 
 was concluded he repeated a prayer in Bengali. Then came 
 a hymn sung to an organ accompaniment, apparently played 
 with one finger in single notes and in a minor key, a kind of 
 drum-beating time. After the hymn the preacher sat down 
 and in that attitude gave us an exhortation or sermon in a 
 very unimpassioned manner, interweaving many quotations 
 from the sacred scriptures of India and other nations, the 
 congregation listening with great attention. 
 
528 Form, of Service at Brdhma-Samaj Meetings. 
 
 The simple character of the service and the absence of all 
 idolatry was very refreshing after a recent visit I had made 
 to the temple of the goddess Kali. 
 
 The services at the Adi Brahma-Samaj were conducted 
 by a son of Debendra-nath. The sermon was preached 
 from a raised platform or altar (Vedi) ; and three singers, 
 seated in front of a kind of organ, chanted the hymns in 
 loud tones, and with much warmth of manner and energetic 
 gesticulation. 
 
 At Bombay the Manual used by the Prarthana-Samaj con- 
 tained selections from the Veda, Upanishads, Christian Bible, 
 Kuran, and Zand-Avasta. Hymns were sung with much 
 fervour in a thoroughly Hindu fashion to an accompaniment 
 played on the Vina or Indian lute, and prayers were said, 
 consisting chiefly of invocations of the Supreme Being, with 
 praise and adoration of His attributes, but without confession 
 of guilt, while the congregation remained seated, though their 
 hands were joined in reverence. After the prayer an able 
 sermon was preached by Professor Bhandarkar (Professor 
 of Sanskrit at Deccan College^ Poona) who took for his text a 
 passage from the Kathopanishad (VI. 15), thus translatable : — 
 ' Man cannot obtain immortality till all the knots in his heart 
 caused by ignorance and unbelief are cut (yada sarve prabhi- 
 dyante hridayasya granthayah).' He then illustrated his text 
 by quotations from other books. For example — a passage 
 from Tukaram — the most popular Maratha poet : ' There is 
 no happiness other than peace. Therefore preserve peace, 
 and you will cross over to yonder shore.' 
 
 What chiefly struck me at the Bombay meeting was the 
 apparent absence of sympathy or rapport between the official 
 performers of the services and the general congregation. The 
 hymns were energetically sung by the appointed singers, the 
 prayers earnestly repeated, and the address solemnly de- 
 livered by the minister, but the congregation neither stood 
 nor knelt, and seemed to take no really cordial part in the 
 
Vedic Theism. Daydnanda Sarasvah. 529 
 
 proceedings. It is true that a sitting posture at prayer is 
 customary, and by no means intended to imply irreverence ; 
 yet. I came away persuaded that the Prarthana-Samaj of 
 Bombay, in spite of honest strivings after a pure soul-stirring 
 Theism, is still chilled and numbed by the lingering influence 
 of Vedantic Pantheism, which it is unable wholly to shake off. 
 And this, I believe, is true of many of the Churches of Western 
 India which number many learned and philosophical men 
 among their members — men who have little sympathy with 
 the Vaishnava tendencies of the Bengali Brahmas. 
 
 Before concluding this sketch of modern Hindu Theism, 
 I should note that occasional Reformers still arise who 
 make efforts to found a purely Indian Theism on the doc- 
 trines supposed to be contained in the hymns of the Veda. 
 A movement for the diffusion of this kind of Vedic Theism 
 was not long ago inaugurated by a remarkable Gujarat! 
 Brahman, named Dayananda Sarasvati, who called his new 
 church the Arya-Samaj. I made his acquaintance at Bombay 
 in 1876, and was much struck by his fine countenance and 
 figure. There I heard him preach an eloquent discourse on 
 the religious development of the Aryan race. He began by 
 repeating a hymn to Varuna (see p. 15) preceded by the sylla- 
 ble Om (p. 10), prolating the vowel in deep sonorous tones. 
 Just before I reached India in the autumn of 1883 he died 
 suddenly (some say by poison) at Ajmere during the Divall 
 festival. In the spring of 1884 I visited Ajmere, and saw 
 the place of his cremation. I found that, although after 
 his death vast numbers declared their sympathy with him, 
 their admiration of his character and their willingness to 
 subscribe large sums to perpetuate his memory and his 
 teaching, yet that, while alive, he had many bitter enemies 
 among the Brahmans ; for he was a strong opponent of 
 idolatry as well as of all forms of Polytheism. The peculiarity 
 of his teaching was that he contended that the four collections 
 of Vedic hymns (Mantras), as distinct from the Brahmanas 
 
 M m 
 
530 Vedic Theism. Dayananda Sarasvatz. 
 
 and Upanishads (pp. 8, 21, a6), are the only true non-human 
 (a-paurusheya) revelation, and that the hymns to Agni, Indra, 
 and Surya are to One God under different names. In 
 his printed creed he declared that he was not an inde^ 
 pendent thinker (naham svatantrah), but a follower of the 
 Veda ; that the four Samhita texts of the Vedas — including 
 the Isa Upanishad — are to be received as a primary autho- 
 rity in all matters relating to human conduct ; that the other 
 Upanishads, the Brahmanas, beginning with the Satapatha ; 
 the six Ahgas or limbs of the Veda, beginning with Siksha ; 
 the four Upa-vedas ; the six Darsanas or Schools of Philo- 
 sophy, and the 1 130 schools or branches ^ (sakhas) of Vedic 
 teaching are to be accepted as secondary authority in ex- 
 pounding the meaning of the Vedic texts, and that adoration, 
 prayer, and devotion are to be offered to One God only, 
 abstracted from all idea of shape and form, and without any 
 second, as set forth in the Vedas. 
 
 In one of my interviews with him, I asked him for his defini- 
 tion of religion, he replied in Sanskrit : — ' Religion (Dharmah) 
 is a true and just view (nyayah), and the abandonment of all 
 prejudice and partiality (pakshapata-rahityam) — that is to 
 say, it is an impartial inquiry into the truth by means of the 
 senses and the two other instruments of knowledge (pramana), 
 reason, and revelation.' 
 
 Dayananda's teaching, however, included the doctrine of 
 metempsychosis (punar-janma), which it would be difficult to 
 found on Vedic authority. Of course, both this and all his 
 more peculiar doctrines are repudiated by the various Brahma 
 Samajes, and even by the Adi Samaj of Calcutta. Nor 
 would Dayananda himself have admitted an identity of teach- 
 ing with the Brahma Theistic movement. Nevertheless he 
 has done undoubted good by his uncompromising opposition 
 
 ^ Of these there are one thousand for the Sama-veda, one hundred for 
 the Yajur-veda, twenty-one for the Rig-veda, and nine for the Atharva- 
 veda. See Patanjali's Mahabhashya I. i. i. 
 
Vedic Theism. Dayananda Sarasvatl. 531 
 
 to idolatry and to the later developments of Hinduism, in- 
 cluding the whole circle of Puranic mythology. He was also 
 a Social Reformer and often preached against child-mar- 
 riages. He left a will (svikara-patra), written in Hindi, and 
 by that constituted what he called a Paropakarim Sabha— 
 that is to say, a Society, or more properly a Committee, con- 
 sisting of twenty-three members who are bound to assist each 
 other (the Maharana of Udaypur being President). The duty of 
 this Committee is (i) to publish and disseminate the Veda and 
 Vedangas; (2) to send missionaries to different countries and by 
 their means persuade every one to accept truth and abandon 
 error ; (3) to educate poor people in India (Aryavarta) in the 
 principles of the Arya-Samaj, as founded by himself. He 
 also left money to be spent in promoting these objects. 
 
 And let us not be slow to acknowledge the good results 
 likely to flow from all this agitation in Indian religious 
 thought^all this upheaval of old ideas, all this activity and 
 movement in Indian religious life. Still less let us regard 
 with distrust the efforts of these modern Theistic Reformers, 
 as if they were unfavourable to the progress of Christian 
 truth. We may be quite sure that men like Debendra-nath 
 Tagore, and the other leaders of the chief Brahma-Samaj 
 or Theistic churches, are doing good work in a Christian self- 
 sacrificing spirit, though they may fall into many errors. 
 And we shall do well not to be too censorious and critical 
 in our animadversions on their opinions and practices. 
 
 Rather let us hold out the right hand of fellowship to 
 these noble-minded Patriots ; for, indeed^ they need every 
 encouragement in their almost hopeless struggle with their 
 country's worst enemies, Ignorance, Prejudice, and Super- 
 stition, in whose train may generally be found Pride, Un- 
 truthfulness, Selfishness, and Immorality. Intense darkness 
 still broods over the land ; let Christianity thankfully wel- 
 come and wisely make use of every gleam and glimmer of 
 true light, from whatever quarter it may shine. 
 
 M m 3 
 
CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 Examples of the Moral Precepts of Brahmanism 
 and Hinduism, 
 
 In treating of Indian morality it is usual to aiBrm that 
 there is no connexion between a Hindu's creed and his 
 moral conduct. This is scarcely correct, because an essential 
 part of his creed is the doctrine of metempsychosis, which 
 teaches that a man may, on dying, return to earth in higher 
 or lower forms of existence according to the merit or de- 
 merit of his acts — after passing through intermediate periods 
 of bliss or torment in temporary heavens or temporary hells 
 (see pp. 232, 291-293). A belief in such a doctrine is of 
 course likely to have a powerful effect in impelling a man 
 to good actions and deterring him from evil. Every man 
 is likely to control his appetites, if, through indulging them 
 to excess, he may be born as an unclean animal in his next 
 birth ; and every man is careful not to steal, if theft may 
 lead to his being born as a rat ; and to abstain from murder, 
 if the killing of his neighbour may lead to his own degra- 
 dation in his next life to the condition of some noxious brute 
 or reptile. Constantly in the sacred books of the Hindiis 
 morality is summed up in three precepts, ' good thoughts,' 
 ' good words,' ' good deeds,' and these are enjoined upon 
 every man ; but no motive is put before him, except the 
 dread of the evil consequences which bad thoughts, bad 
 words and bad deeds will certainly entail, not only in this 
 life but in many subsequent states of existence. See pp. 
 52, 53- 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 533 
 
 For no Hindu is a believer in the possibility of obtaining 
 any supernatural external aid which may help him to lead 
 a moral life. He is no believer in any divine spring or 
 source of power, outside himself, which may act like a purify- 
 ing, energizing force upon his character, and make his obedience 
 to the laws of morality not only a duty, but a delight. 
 
 With regard to the mere letter of the Hindu moral code 
 it is admitted that the noble precepts scattered throughout 
 the sacred literature of Brahmanism and Hinduism often 
 rise to the level of Christian teaching, and present a picture 
 which, although it is here and there disfigured by dark spots 
 and blemishes, cannot but produce a favourable impression 
 on every candid critic (p. 5a). 
 
 The present chapter will be devoted to the exhibiting of 
 a few samples of the best of these precepts which I have 
 selected from different works, beginning with the ' Laws of 
 Manu.' As the originals are in verse, the translations are also 
 metrical, and as nearly literal as possible ^. 
 
 Precepts from Manu. General Precepts. 
 
 With pain the mother to her child gives birth. 
 
 With pain the father rears him ; as he grows 
 
 He heaps up cares and troubles for his parents ; 
 
 Incurring thus a debt he ne'er can pay, 
 
 Though he should strive through centuries of time (ll. 227). 
 
 Think constantly, O son, how thou mayest please 
 
 Thy father, mother, teacher — these obey. 
 
 By deep devotion seek thy debt to pay. 
 
 This is thy highest duty and religion (ll. aaS). 
 
 Even though wronged, treat not with disrespect 
 Thy father, mother, teacher, elder brother (ll. 226). 
 
 ' These translations are my own, and will be found scattered in some 
 of my other works, especially ' Indian Wisdom,' now out of print. 
 
534 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 From poison thou mayest take tHe food of life, 
 The purest gold from lumps of impure earth, 
 Examples of good conduct from a foe, 
 Sweet speech and gentleness from e'en a child, 
 Something from all ; from men of low degree 
 Lessons of wisdom, if thou humble be (ll. 238, 239). 
 
 Wound not another, though by him provoked, 
 
 Do no one injury by thought or deed. 
 
 Utter no word to pain thy fellow-creatures (ll. 161). 
 
 Say what is true, speak not agreeable falsehood (iv. 138). 
 
 Treat no one with disdain^, with patience bear 
 
 Reviling language; with an angry man 
 
 Be never angry ; blessings give for curses (vi. 47, 48). 
 
 E'en as a driver checks his restive steeds. 
 
 Do thou, if thou art wise, restrain thy passions, 
 
 Which, running wild, will hurry thee away (ll. 88). 
 
 When asked, give something, though a very trifle. 
 
 Ungrudgingly and with a cheerful heart. 
 
 According to thy substance ; only see 
 
 That he to whom thou givest worthy be (iv. 227, aa8). 
 
 Pride not thyself on thy religious works. 
 
 Give to the poor, but talk not of thy gifts, 
 
 By pride religious merit melts away. 
 
 The merit of thy alms by ostentation (iv. 336, 237). 
 
 None sees us, say the sinful in their hearts; 
 Yes, the gods see them, and the omniscient Spirit 
 Within their breasts. Thou thinkest, O good friend, 
 
 ^ In IV. 135 the householder is especially warned against treating with 
 contempt a Brahman well versed in the Veda, a Kshatriya, and a serpent, 
 because (siays KuUuka) the first has the power of destroying him by his 
 unseen power of magical texts and spells, the other two by their seen 
 power (drishta-saktyd). Cf. the passages relative to the power of the 
 Brahmans at pp. 201, 202. 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 535 
 
 'I am alone,' but there resides within thee 
 
 A Being who inspects thy every act, 
 
 Knows all thy goodness and thy wickedness (vill. 85, 91). 
 
 The soul is its own witness ; yea, the soul 
 
 Itself is its own refuge ; grieve thou not, 
 
 man, thy soul, the great internal Witness (viii. 84). 
 
 The Firmament, the Earth, the Sea, the Moon, 
 
 The Sun, the Fire, the Wind, the Night, and both 
 
 The sacred Twilights ^ and the Judge of souls 2, 
 
 The god of Justice, and the Heart itself— 
 
 All constantly survey the acts of men (vill. 86). 
 
 When thou hast sinned, think not to hide thy guilt 
 Under a cloak of penance and austerity (iv. 198). 
 
 No study of the Veda nor oblation, 
 
 No gift of alms, nor round of strict observance 
 
 Can lead the inwardly depraved to heaven (li. 97). 
 
 If with the great Divinity, who dwells 
 
 Within thy breast, thou hast no controversy. 
 
 Go not to Ganges' water to be cleansed. 
 
 Nor make a pilgrimage to Kuru's fields (viii. 93). 
 
 Iniquity once practised, like a seed, 
 
 Fails not to yield its fruit to him who wrought it. 
 
 If not to him, yet to his sons and grandsons (iv. 173J. 
 
 Contentment is the root of happiness. 
 
 And discontent the root of misery. 
 
 Wouldst thou be happy, be thou moderate (iv. 12). 
 
 Honour thy food, receive it thankfully. 
 Eat it contentedly and joyfully, 
 Ne'er hold it in contempt ; avoid excess, 
 For gluttony is hateful, injures health, 
 
 ^ See the account of the Sandhyas, p. 401. ^ Yama, see p. 289. 
 
536 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 May lead to death, and surely bars the road 
 To holy merit and celestial bliss (ll. 54, 5l)- 
 
 Shrink thou from worldly honour as from poison, 
 Seek rather scorn; the scorn'd may sleep in peace, 
 In peace awake ; the scorner perishes (ll. 163, 163). 
 
 Daily perform thy own appointed work 
 
 Unweariedly ; and to obtain a friend — 
 
 A sure companion to the future world — 
 
 Collect a store of virtue like the ants 
 
 Who garner up their treasures into heaps ; 
 
 For neither father, mother, wife, nor son, 
 
 Nor kinsman, will remain beside thee then, 
 
 When thou art passing to that other home — 
 
 Thy virtue will thy only comrade be (iv. 238, 239). 
 
 Single is every living creature born, 
 
 Single he passes to another world, 
 
 Single he eats the fruit of evil deeds, 
 
 Single, the fruit of good ; and when he leaves 
 
 His body like a log or heap of clay 
 
 Upon the ground, his kinsmen walk away ; 
 
 Virtue alone stays by him at the tomb, 
 
 And bears him through the dreary trackless gloom. 
 
 (IV. 240-242)^ 
 
 Thou canst not gather what thou dost not sow ; 
 As thou dost plant the tree so will it grow (ix. 40). 
 
 Depend not on another, rather lean 
 
 Upon thyself; trust to thine own exertions. 
 
 Subjection to another's will gives pain ; 
 
 True happiness consists in self-reliance (iv. 160). 
 
 ^ Dr. Muir has pointed out that the expression tamos tarati dustaram, 
 'he crosses the gloom difificult to be passed,' may be taken from Atharva- 
 veda IX. 5. i, tirtva, tamansi bahudha mahanti. 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 5 3 7 
 
 Strive to complete the task thou hast commenced; 
 
 Wearied, renew thy efforts once again ; 
 
 Again fatigued, once more the work begin, 
 
 So Shalt thou earn success and fortune win (ix. 300). 
 
 Be courteous to thy guest who visits thee ; 
 
 Offer a seat, bed, water, food enough, 
 
 According to thy substance, hospitably ; 
 
 Naught taking for thyself till he be served ; 
 
 Homage to guests brings wealth, fame, life, 'and heaven. 
 
 (ill. 106, IV. 29). 
 Though thou mayst suffer for thy righteous acts. 
 Ne'er give thy mind to aught but honest gain (iv. 171). 
 So act in thy brief passage through this world 
 That thy apparel, speech, and inner store 
 Of knowledge be adapted to thy age, 
 Thy occupation, means, and parentage (iv. 18). 
 According to a man's sincerity 
 In penitent confession of his crime. 
 And detestation of the evil deed. 
 Shall he be pardoned and his soul released 
 From taint of guilt, like serpent from its skin (xi. aa;, aa8). 
 If he do wrong, 'tis not enough to say 
 I will not sin again ; release from guilt 
 Depends on true contrition, which consists 
 In actual abstinence from sinful deeds (xi. 230). 
 Revolving in his mind the certainty 
 Of retribution in a future state. 
 
 Let him be pure in thought, in word, in deed^ (xi. a3i). 
 By free confession^ penitence, and penance, 
 By daily repetition of the Veda ^, 
 
 Here is another example of Manu's triple division of 'thought,, word, 
 and deed.' The same triple division is frequent in Buddhistic vifritings. 
 Khyapanena, anutapena, tapasa, adhyayena ca. 
 
538 Moral Precepts of Brakmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 By the five holy acts^, by giving alms, 
 
 By patience, and by bearing injuries, 
 
 The greatest sinner may obtain release (xi, 227, 245). 
 
 The man who keeps his senses in control. 
 
 His speech, heart, actions pure and ever guarded. 
 
 Gains all the fruit of holy study ; he . 
 
 Needs neither penance nor austerity (ll. 160). 
 
 Contentment, patience under injury. 
 
 Self-subjugation, honesty, restraint 
 
 Of all the sensual organs, purity. 
 
 Devotion, knowledge of the Deity ^ 
 
 Veracity, and abstinence from anger. 
 
 These form the tenfold summary of duty (vi. 92). 
 
 Long not for death, nor hanker after life ; 
 
 Calmly expect thy own appointed time, 
 
 E'en as a servant reckons on his hire (iv. 45). 
 
 This mansion of the soul, composed of earth, 
 
 Subject to sorrow and decrepitude. 
 
 Inhabited by sicknesses and pains, 
 
 Bound by the bonds of ignorance and darkness. 
 
 Let a wise man with cheerfulness abandon (vi. 77). 
 
 Quitting this body, he resembles merely 
 
 A bird that leaves a tree. Thus is he freed 
 
 From the fell monster of an evil world ^ (vi. 78). 
 
 Whate'er the act a man commits, whate'er 
 His state of mind, of that the recompense 
 Must he receive in corresponding body (xil. 81). 
 
 Action of every kind, whether of mind 
 
 Or speech or body, must bear fruit, entailing 
 
 ■■ That is, the five Maha-yajnas ; see p. 411. 
 
 ^ Vidya, ' knowledge of the supreme Spirit.' — Kulluka. 
 
 ' Kriochrad grahat=samsara-kashtad grahad iva. 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hindfiism. 539 
 
 Fresh births through multifarious conditions, 
 
 In highest, mean, and lowest transmigrations (xil. 3). 
 
 This universal Soul is all the gods. 
 
 Is all the worlds, and is the only source 
 
 Of all the actions of embodied spirits (xil. 119). 
 
 He is their ruler, brighter than pure gold, 
 
 Subtler than atoms, imperceptible, 
 
 Except by minds abstracted, all-pervading, 
 
 Investing all with rudiments of matter. 
 
 Causing all beings to revolve like wheels 
 
 In regular and constant revolution 
 
 Through birth and growth, decay and dissolution. 
 
 (xil. 122, 124). 
 
 Duties of Women and Wives. 
 
 In childhood must a father guard his daughter ; 
 
 In youth the husband shields his wife ; in age 
 
 A mother is protected by her sons — 
 
 Ne'er should a woman lean upon herself (v. 148, IX. 3). 
 
 A faithful wife who wishes to attain 
 
 The heaven of her lord, must serve him here 
 
 As if he were a god, and ne'er do aught 
 
 To pain him, whatsoever be his state, 
 
 And even though devoid of every virtue (v. 154, 156). 
 
 Be it her duty to preserve with care 
 
 Her husband's substance ; let her too be trusted 
 
 With its expenditure, with management 
 
 Of household property and furniture, 
 
 Of cooking and purveying daily food. 
 
 Let her be ever cheerful, skilled in all 
 
 Domestic work, and not too free in spending (v. 150). 
 
 Then only is a man a perfect man 
 
 When he is three — himself, his wife, his son — 
 
540 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 For thus have learned men the law declared, 
 
 ' A husband is one person with his wife ' (IX. 45). 
 
 Fidelity till death, this is the sum 
 
 Of mutual duties for a married pair (ix. loi). 
 
 And if the wife survives, let her remain 
 
 Constant and true, nor sully her fair fame 
 
 E'en by the utterance of another's name (v. 157). 
 
 Duties of Kings. 
 
 The. Lord of all in pity to our needs 
 
 Created kings, to rule and guard us here ; 
 
 Without a king this world would rock with fear (vil. 3). 
 
 A king, e'en though a child, must not be treated 
 As if he were a mortal ; rather he 
 Is a divinity in human shape (vil. 8). 
 
 Dread of the rod alone restrains the bad. 
 
 Controls the good, and makes a nation happy (VII. 15). 
 
 The king must therefore punish fearlessly ; 
 
 Else would the strong oppress the weak, the bad 
 
 Would wrong the good, and pierce them as with iron ^ ; 
 
 The crow would eat the consecrated rice, 
 
 The dog the burnt oblation ; ownership 
 
 And rights of property would be subverted ; 
 
 All ranks and classes would become confused. 
 
 All barriers and bridges broken down, 
 
 And all the world turned wrong side uppermost. 
 
 (Vil. 20, 21, 24). 
 
 But let the monarch, ere he wield his rod. 
 
 Consider place and time, the written law 
 
 Of justice, and the measure of his strength (vil. 16). 
 
 ' The literal translation of the text here is ' the stronger would roast 
 the weaker like fish on a spit' {siile matsyan ivapakshyan durbalan 
 balavattarah). 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 54 1 
 
 When Goodness, wounded by Iniquity, 
 
 Comes to a court of justice, and the judge 
 
 Extracts not tenderly the pointed dart, 
 
 That very shaft shall pierce him to the heart (vni.,12). 
 
 Let him with full deliberation weigh 
 
 The evidence, the place, the mode, the time. 
 
 The facts, the truth, and his own frame of mind, 
 
 Firmly adhering to the rules of law (viii. 45). 
 
 The court must not be entered by a witness, 
 
 Unless he speaks the truth without reserve ; 
 
 For equally does he commit a crime. 
 
 Who tells not all the facts, or tells them falsely (viii. 13). 
 
 A witness who gives evidence with truth 
 
 Shall be absolved from every sin, and gain 
 
 Exalted glory here and bliss above (vill. 81, 83). 
 
 Headlong in utter darkness shall the wretch 
 
 Fall into hell, who in a court of justice 
 
 Answers a single question falsely; he 
 
 Shall be tormented through a hundred births (vill. 83, 94). 
 
 And all the merit of his virtuous acts 
 
 Shall be transferred to dogs. Therefore be true. 
 
 Speak the whole truth without equivocation (vill. 90, loi). 
 
 Let no considerate witness take an oath 
 
 Lightly, or in a trifling matter ; he 
 
 Who does so shall incur eternal ruin (vm. m). 
 
 He who by firmness gains the mastery 
 
 Over his words, his mind, and his whole body, 
 
 Is justly called a triple-governor^ (xil. 10). 
 
 ' His title in Sanskrit is Tri-dandin. It is noticeable that the Indian 
 ascetic, who is described by Arrian (VII. 2) as exciting the wonder of 
 Alexander the Great by his Kaprepla, is named Aavhafus, probably from 
 the same root as danda {dam, ' to subdue,' in Intens.). By others he is 
 called Mandanis (root mand?). 
 
542 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 Exerting thus a threefold self-command 
 Towards himself and every living creature, 
 Subduing lust and wrath, he may aspire 
 To that perfection which the good desire (xil. ii). 
 
 Examples of Precepts from the Epic Poems. 
 
 To carry out an enterprise in words 
 Is easy; to accomplish it by acts 
 Is the sole test of man's capacity. 
 
 Ramayana (ed. Gorresio) IV. Ixvii. lo. 
 
 Where'er we walk, Death marches at our side ; 
 Where'er we sit, Death seats himself beside us ; 
 However far we journey, Death continues 
 Our fellow-pilgrim and goes with us home. 
 Men take delight in each returning dawn. 
 And with admiring gaze, behold the glow 
 Of sunset. Every season, as it comes, 
 Fills them with gladness, yet they never reck 
 That each recurring season, every day 
 Fragment by fragment bears their life away. 
 As drifting logs of wood may haply meet 
 On Ocean's waters, surging to and fro, 
 And having met, drift once again apart ; 
 So fleeting is a man's association 
 With wife and children, relatives and wealth, 
 So surely must a time of parting come. 
 
 Ramayana (ed. Bombay) II. cv. 24-27. 
 
 Whate'er the work a man performs. 
 The most effective aid to its completion — 
 The most prolific source of true success — 
 Is energy without despondency. 
 
 Ramayana (ed. Bombay) v. xii. 11. 
 Time is awake while mortals are asleep, 
 
Moral Precepts of Brakmanism and Hinduism. 543 
 
 None can elude its grasp or curb its course, 
 It passes unrestrained o'er all alike. 
 
 Maha-bharata I. 343. 
 Thou thinkest: I am single and alone — 
 Perceiving not the great eternal Sage 
 Who dwells within thy breast. Whatever wrong 
 Is done by thee, he sees and notes it all. 
 
 Maha-bharata I. 3015. 
 Heaven, Earth, and Sea, Sun, Moon, and Wind, and 
 
 Fire, 
 Day, Night, the Twilights, and the Judge of Souls, 
 The god of Justice and the Heart itself. 
 All see and note the conduct of a man. 
 
 Maha-bharata I. 3017. 
 A wife is half the man, his ti'uest friend. 
 Source of his virtue, pleasure, wealth — the root 
 Whence springs the line of his posterity. 
 
 Maha-bharata I. 3038. 
 
 An evil-minded man is quick to see 
 His neighbour's faults, though small as mustard-seed ; 
 But when he turns his eyes towards his own, 
 Though large as Bilva-^ fruit, he none descries. 
 
 Maha-bharata I. 3069. 
 
 If Truth and thousands of Horse-sacriiices 
 Were weighed together. Truth would weigh the most^. 
 
 Maha-bharata I. 3095. 
 
 Death follows life by an unerring law ; 
 Why grieve for that which is inevitable? 
 
 Maha-bharata I. 6144. 
 
 I 
 
 This is the Aegle Marmelos {Bel) or Bengal Quince, bearing a large 
 fruit. It is esteemed sacred to Maha-deva. Compare St. Matthew vii. 
 
 3,4- 
 '^ Hitopadesa IV. 135. 
 
544 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 Conquer a man who never gives by gifts ; 
 Subdue untruthful men by truthfulness ; 
 Vanquish an angry man by gentleness ; 
 And overcome the evil man by goodness ^ 
 
 Maha-bharata III. 13253- 
 
 Triple restraint of thought and word and deed, 
 
 Strict vow of silence, coil of matted hair, 
 
 Close shaven head, garments of skin or bark, 
 
 Keeping of fasts, ablutions, maintenance 
 
 Of sacrificial fires, a hermit's life, 
 
 Emaciation — these are all in vain. 
 
 Unless the inward soul be free from stain. 
 
 Maha-bharata III. 13445- 
 
 To injure none by thought or word or deed. 
 To give to others, and be kind to all — 
 This is the constant duty of the good. 
 High-minded men delight in doing good, 
 Without a thought of their own interest ; 
 When they confer a benefit on others. 
 They reckon not on favours in return ^. 
 
 Maha-bharata III. 1678a, 16796. 
 
 Two persons will hereafter be exalted 
 
 Above the heavens— the man with boundless power 
 
 Who yet forbears to use it indiscreetly, 
 
 And he who is not rich and yet can give^- 
 
 Maha-bharata V. 1028. 
 
 Sufficient wealth, unbroken health, a friend, 
 A wife of gentle speech, a docile son, 
 
 ' See Rom. xii. 21. Compare the Pali Rajovada Jataka (FausboU's 
 Ten Jatakas, p. s), Akkodhena fine kodham, Asadhum sadhuna fine, 
 Jine kadariyam danena, ScUdena alika-vadinam. See also Dhamma- 
 pada 223. 
 
 ^ Compare St. Luke vi. 35. " Compare St. Mark xii. 41-44- 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 545 
 
 And learning that subserves some useful end — 
 These are a living man's six greatest blessings. 
 
 Maha-bharata v. 1057. 
 
 Good words, good deeds, and beautiful expressions 
 A wise man ever culls from every quarter, 
 E'en as a gleaner gathers ears of corn. 
 
 Maha-bharata V. iia6. 
 
 To curb the tongue and moderate the speech. 
 Is held to be the hardest of all tasks 1. 
 The words of him who talks too volubly 
 Have neither substance nor variety. 
 
 Maha-bharata V. 11 70. 
 
 Darts, barbed arrows, iron-headed spears, 
 However deep they penetrate the flesh. 
 May be extracted ; but a cutting speech. 
 That pierces, like a javelin, to the heart. 
 None can remove ; it lies and rankles there. 
 
 Maha-bharata V. 1173. 
 
 Bear railing words with patience, never meet 
 An angry man with anger, nor return 
 Reviling for reviling, smite not him 
 Who smites thee ; let thy speech and acts be gentle. 
 
 Maha-bharata V. 1370, 997a. 
 
 If thou art wise, seek ease and happiness 
 
 In deeds of virtue and of usefulness ; 
 
 And ever act in such a way by day 
 
 That in the night thy sleep may tranquil be ; 
 
 And so comport thyself when thou art young. 
 
 That when thou art grown old, thine age may pass 
 
 In calm serenity. So ply thy task 
 
 ^ St. James iii. 8. 
 N n 
 
546 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 Throughout thy life, that when thy days are ended, 
 Thou may'st enjoy eternal bliss hereafter. 
 
 Maha-bharata V. 1348. 
 
 Reflect that health is transient, death impends, 
 Ne'er in thy day of youthful strength do aught 
 To grieve thy conscience, lest when weakness comes, 
 And thou art on a bed of sickness laid, 
 Fear and remorse augment thy sufferings. 
 
 Maha-bharata V. 1474- 
 
 Do naught to others which if done to thee 
 Would cause thee pain ; this is the sum of duty. 
 
 Maha-bharata V. 1517. 
 
 A king must first subdue himself, and then 
 Vanquish his enemies. How can a prince 
 Who cannot rule himself, enthral his foes ? 
 To curb the senses, is to conquer self. 
 
 Maha-bharata XII. 3599. 
 
 Who in this world is able to distinguish 
 The virtuous from the wicked, both alike 
 The fruitful earth supports, on both alike 
 The sun pours down his beams, on both alike 
 Refreshing breezes blow, and both alike 
 The waters purify? Not so hereafter — 
 Then shall the good be severed from the bad ; 
 Then in a region bright with golden lustre — 
 Centre of light and immortality — • 
 The righteous after death shall dwell in bliss ^. 
 Then a terrific hell awaits the wicked — 
 Profound abyss of utter misery — 
 Into the depths of which bad men shall fall 
 Headlong, and mourn their doom for countless years. 
 
 Maha-bharata XII. 2798. 
 
 ^ Compare St. Matthew xiii. 43, xxv. 46. 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 547 
 
 Enjoy thou the prosperity of others, 
 Although thyself unprosperous ; noble men 
 Take pleasure in their neighbour's happiness. 
 
 Maha-bharata XII. 3880. 
 
 Even to foes who visit us as guests 
 Due hospitality should be displayed; 
 The tree screens with its leaves, the man who fells it \ 
 
 Maha-bharata xil. 5538. 
 
 What need has he who subjugates himself 
 To live secluded in a hermit's cell? 
 Where'er resides the self-subduing sage, 
 That place to him is like a hermitage. 
 
 Maha-bharata Xll. 5961. 
 
 Let none reject the meanest suppliant 
 Or send him empty-handed from his door. 
 A gift bestowed on outcasts or on dogs 
 Is never thrown away or unrequited. 
 
 Maha-bharata XIII. 3212. 
 
 Time passes, and the man who older grows 
 Finds hair and teeth and eyes grow ever older. 
 One thing alone within him ne'er grows old — 
 The thirst for riches and the love of gold. 
 
 Maha-bharata XIII. 3676, 368^ 
 
 This is the sum of all true righteousness — 
 Treat others, as thou would'st thyself be treated. 
 Do nothing to thy neighbour, which hereafter 
 Thou would'st not have thy neighbour do to thee. 
 In causing pleasure, or in giving pain. 
 In doing good, or injury to others. 
 
 ' This verse occurs in Hitopadesa I. 60. Cf. Rom. xii. 20. Professor 
 H. H. Wilson was induced to commence the study of Sanskrit by reading 
 somewhere that this sentiment was to be met with in Sanskrit literature. 
 
 N n 2 
 
548 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 In granting, or refusing a request, 
 
 A man obtains a proper rule of action 
 
 By looking on his neighbour as himself i. 
 
 Maha-bharata XIII. 5571. 
 
 Before infirmities creep o'er thy flesh ; 
 Before decay impairs thy strength and mars 
 The beauty of thy limbs ; before the Ender, 
 Whose charioteer is sickness, hastes towards thee, 
 Breaks up thy fragile frame and ends thy life^, 
 Lay up the only treasure ; do good deeds ; 
 Practise sobriety and self-control ; 
 Amass that wealth which thieves cannot abstract. 
 Nor tyrants seize, which follows thee at death. 
 Which never wastes away, nor is corrupted ^. 
 
 Maha-bharata XIII. 13084. 
 
 Heaven's gate is very narrow and minute *, 
 It cannot be perceived by foolish men, 
 Blinded by vain illusions of the world. 
 E'en the clear-sighted who discern the way. 
 And seek to enter, find the portal barred 
 And hard to be unlocked. Its massive bolts 
 Are pride and passion, avarice and lust. 
 
 Maha-bharata XIV. 2784. 
 
 Just heaven is not so pleased with costly gifts, 
 
 Offered in hope of future recompense, 
 
 As with the merest trifle set apart 
 
 From honest gains, and sanctified by faith'. 
 
 Maha-bharata XIV. 2788. 
 
 ^ Compare St. Matthew xxii. 39, St. Luke vi. 31. 
 
 ^ Compare Eccles. xii. i. 
 
 ' Compare St. Matthew vi. 19, Prov. xxiii. 4, 5. 
 
 * Compare St. Matthew vii. 14. 
 
 ^ Compare St. Matthew vi. 1-4, St. Mark xii. 43, 44. 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 549 
 
 Examples of Precepts from Bhartri-hari. 
 
 Blinded by self-conceit and knowing nothing, 
 
 Like elephant infatuate with passion, 
 
 I thought within myself, I all things knew; 
 
 But when by slow degrees I somewhat learnt, 
 
 By aid of wise preceptors, my conceit. 
 
 Like some disease, passed off; and now I live 
 
 In the plain sense of what a fool I am (ll. 8). 
 
 The attribute most noble of the hand 
 Is readiness in giving ; of the head. 
 Bending before a teacher ; of the mouth, 
 Veracious speaking ; of a victor's arms. 
 Undaunted valour ; of the inner heart, 
 Pureness the most unsullied ; of the ears. 
 Delight in hearing and receiving truth — 
 These are adornments of high-minded men 
 Better than all the majesty of Empire (ll. $^. 
 
 Now for a little while a child, and now 
 
 An amorous youth; then for a season turned 
 
 Into the wealthy householder ; then stripped 
 
 Of all his riches, with decrepit limbs 
 
 And wrinkled frame, man creeps towards the end 
 
 Of life's erratic course ; and, like an actor, 
 
 Passes behind Death's curtain out of view^ (ill. 51). 
 
 Examples from the Kiratarjuntya of Bhdravi. 
 
 Those who wish well towards their friends disdain 
 To please them by fair words which are not true (i. a). 
 
 Better to have a great man for one's foe 
 Than court association with the low (l. 8). 
 
 The parallel in Shakespeare need scarcely be suggested. 
 
5 50 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 In matters difficult and dark, concealed 
 By doubt and disagreement of opinion, 
 The Veda, handed down by holy men. 
 Explained with clearness, and well put in practice. 
 Like a bright lamp throws light upon the way; 
 Guiding the prudent lest they go astray (ll. 33). 
 
 Would'st thou be eminent, all passion shun. 
 Drive wrath away by wisdom ; e'en the sun 
 Ascends not to display his fullest light 
 Till he has chased away the mists of night (ll. 36). 
 
 The noble-minded dedicate themselves 
 
 To the promotion of the happiness 
 
 Of others — e'en of those who injure them. 
 
 True happiness consists In making happy (vil. 13, a8). 
 
 Let not a little fault in him who does 
 
 An act of kindness, minish aught its value (vil. 15). 
 
 Youth's glories are as transient as the shadow 
 
 Of an autumnal cloud ; and sensual joys, 
 
 Though pleasant at the moment, end in pain (xi. 12). 
 
 Riches and pleasure are the root of evil; 
 Hold them not dear, encourage not their growth ; 
 They are aggressors hard to be subdued. 
 Destroyers of all knowledge and of truth (xi. 20). 
 
 The enemies which rise within the body. 
 Hard to be overcome — thy evil passions — 
 Should manfully be fought ; who conquers these 
 Is equal to the conqueror of worlds (xi. 32). 
 
 The friendship of the bad is like the shade 
 Of some precipitous bank with crumbling sides, 
 Which falling buries him who sits beneath (xi. ^^). 
 
 The natural hostility of beasts 
 
 Is laid aside when flying from pursuers ; 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 5 5 , 
 
 So also. when calamities impend 
 
 The enmity of rivals has an end (xil. 46). 
 
 Examples of Precepts from the Sisupdla-badha of Mdgha. 
 
 He who by virtue of his rank, his actions, 
 
 And qualities, effects no useful purpose, 
 
 Is like a chance-invented word ; his birth 
 
 Is useless, for he merely bears a name (47). 
 
 A man of feeble character resembles 
 
 A reed that bends with every gust of wind (50). 
 
 Two only sources of success are known — 
 
 Wisdom and effort; make them both thine own 
 
 If thou would 'st rise and haply gain a throne (76). 
 
 Science is like a couch to sapient men ; 
 
 Reclining there, they never feel fatigue (77). 
 
 . A monarch's weapon is his intellect; 
 His minister and servants are his limbs ; 
 Close secresy of counsel is his armour; 
 Spies are his eyes ; ambassadors, his mouth (82). 
 
 That energy which veils itself in mildness 
 
 Is most effective of its object ; so 
 
 The lamp that burns most brightly owes its force 
 
 To oil drawn upwards by a hidden wick (85). 
 
 Wise men rest not on destiny alone. 
 
 Nor yet on manly effort, but on both (86). 
 
 Weak persons gain their object when allied 
 With strong associates; the rivulet 
 Reaches the ocean by the river's aid (100). 
 
 A good man's intellect is piercing, yet 
 Inflicts no wound ; his actions are deliberate, 
 Yet bold ; his heart is warm, but never burns ; 
 His speech is eloquent, yet ever true (109). 
 
552 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 Examples of Precepts from the Panca-tantra. 
 
 Praise not the goodness of the grateful man 
 Who acts with kindness to his benefactors. 
 He who does good to those who do him wrong 
 Alone deserves the epithet of good (l. 277). 
 
 Hear thou a summary of righteousness, 
 
 And ponder well the maxim : Never do 
 
 To other persons what would pain thyself (ill. 104). 
 
 The little-minded ask: Belongs this man 
 
 To our own family ? The noble-hearted 
 
 ' Regard the human race as all akin (v. 38). 
 
 Examples of Precepts from the Hitopadesa or book of 
 ^friendly advice' 
 
 A man of truest wisdom will resign 
 
 His wealth, and e'en his life, for good of others ; 
 
 Better abandon life in a good cause, 
 
 When death in any case is sure to happen (l. 45). 
 
 He has all wealth who has a mind contented. 
 
 To one whose foot is covered with a shoe 
 
 The earth appears all carpeted with leather (l. 152)- 
 
 Strive not too anxiously for a subsistence. 
 
 Thy Maker will provide thee sustenance ; 
 
 No sooner is a human being born 
 
 Than milk for his support streams from the breast. 
 
 (I. 190). 
 
 He by whose hand the swans were painted white. 
 And parrots green, and peacocks many-hued, 
 Will make provision for thy maintenance ^ (l. 191). 
 
 ' Compare St. Matthew vi. 26. 
 
Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 553 
 
 How can true happiness proceed from wealth, 
 
 Which in its acquisition causes pain; 
 
 In loss, affliction; in abundance, folly (i. 192)? 
 
 Whoever, quitting certainties, pursues 
 
 .Uncertain things, may lose his certainties (l. 227). 
 
 By drops of water falling one by one, 
 
 Little by little, may a jar be filled ; 
 
 Such is the law, of all accumulations 
 
 Of money, knowledge, and religious merit (ll. 10). 
 
 That man is sapient who knows how to suit 
 
 His words to each occasion, his kind acts 
 
 To each man's worth, his anger to his power (11. 48). 
 
 If glass be used to decorate a crown, 
 
 While gems are taken to bedeck a foot, 
 
 'Tis not that any fault lies in the gem, 
 
 But in the want of knowledge of the setter ^ (11. 72). 
 
 A man may on affliction's touchstone learn 
 
 The worth of his own kindred, wife, and servants ; 
 
 Also of his own mind and character (11. 79). 
 
 A feverish display of over-zeal 
 
 At the first outset, is an obstacle 
 
 To all success ; water, however cold. 
 
 Will penetrate the ground by slow degrees (iii. 48). 
 
 E'en as a traveller, meeting with the shade 
 
 Of some o'erhanging tree, awhile reposes^ 
 
 Then leaves its shelter to pursue his way. 
 
 So men meet friends, then part with them for ever. 
 
 (IV. Ti). 
 
 ' ' Is such a thing as an emerald made worse than it was, if it is not 
 praised ? ' Marcus Aurelius. Farrar's ' Seekers after God,' p. 306. 
 
554 Moral Precepts of Brahmanism and Hinduism. 
 
 Thou art thyself a stream whose sacred ford 
 Is self-restraint, whose water is veracity, 
 Whose bank is virtue, and whose waves are love ; 
 Here practise thy ablutions ; by mere water 
 The inner man can ne'er be purified (IV. 90). 
 
 It must not, of course, be inferred from a perusal of the 
 above selection of examples that all the moral precepts of 
 the Hindus are all equally unexceptionable. It would be 
 easy to give specimens of a very different character, and I 
 here subjoin a prose translation of two verses of a less favour- 
 able type from the code of Manu. 
 
 ' In certain cases a man stating a case falsely from a pious 
 motive, even though he knows the truth, is not excluded from 
 heaven ; such a statement they call divine speech. 
 
 ' Whenever the death of a Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaisya or 
 Sudra may result from speaking the truth, then an untruth 
 may be told ; for falsehood in this case is preferable to truth 
 (viii. 103, 104. Compare p. j^^fi, note i, of this volume).' 
 
 I could easily multiply examples of a far more objectionable 
 character. Nay, I do not hesitate to declare my conviction 
 . that the gems of truth, which I have carefully and with much 
 trouble unearthed from the sacred literature of the Hindus 
 and exhibited in the foregoing pages, are generally so buried 
 under a superincumbent mass of erroneous teaching or so set 
 in a false framework of fable and fiction, as to be practically 
 of little or no value as rules of life, or as guides to the per- 
 formance of a man's duty towards God, his neighbour, and 
 himself 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 Supplementary \ 
 
 The Worship vf Brahma at Pushkara, with some 
 Account of the Sara-sayya or '■ Arrowy-bed' form of 
 self mortification (tapasya). 
 
 We have seen that Brahmanism has no Creator in our 
 sense. The personal god Brahma (mascuhne) who is called^ 
 'the Creator,' is himself evolved out of the one impersonal 
 self-existent Being, Brahma (neuter). The personal Brahma 
 then becomes the Evolver of the Universe, while Vishnu is 
 associated with him as its Maintainer, and Siva as its Dis- 
 solver. These three gods constitute the well-known Hindu / 
 Triad (Tri-murti, pp. 44, 45). How then has the worship of 
 the first fallen into comparative desuetude ? 
 
 According to the Abbe Dubois in his interesting work on ■^ 
 the religions of India (English translation, p. 430) a legend is 
 current that the god Brahma indulged an incestuous passion ^ 
 for Sarasvatl, who, being really his daughter, afterwards 
 became his wife. He states that the god's supposed violation 
 of the most sacred laws of nature is the true cause of his 
 being without any temples and ceremonies in India. Else- 
 where he relates another legend that the absence of temples 
 dedicated to Brahma arose from a curse pronounced upon 
 him by a holy man, whom he had treated with irreverence. 
 To say, however, that Brahma is wholly without temples is, 
 as I shall show, inaccurate. Rodriguez in his exhaustive 
 
 ' ' Supplementary notes collected during my Indian travels in 1884. 
 
556 Neglect of the Worship of Brahma. 
 
 ' Hindu Pantheon ' (published at Madras in 1841) affirms that 
 Brahma is never adopted by any Hindu as his guardian deity, 
 and, like Dubois, repeats the legend of Brahma's unnatural 
 passion for his daughter ; assigning the neglect of the god's 
 worship to this cause. Furthermore he adds a legend from 
 the Skanda-purana, in which it is declared that Brahma' once 
 had five heads, but that one was cut off by the god Siva 
 inflamed with anger because Brahma boasted that he was the 
 greater god of the two. - Others again explain the neglect of 
 Brahma's worship by asserting that his only office is to create, 
 
 [ I and that having once created men and endowed them with 
 life he has no further benefit to confer upon them, while men, 
 
 \ on the other hand, have nothing to gain by propitiating him. 
 Probably the origin of these fanciful notions is to be traced to 
 some of the Puranas, or possibly to the Upapuranas and 
 Tantras ; but it seems scarcely worth while to ransack these 
 immense repositories of myths in the hope of discovering the 
 source of a few grotesque legends ; and the less so as/I hold that 
 the true reason for the rarity of Brahma's temples is to be 
 sought for in the fact that, according to orthodox Brahmanisin, 
 the functions of Brahma, Vishnu and Siva are interchangeable, 
 and that both Vishnu and Siva may be identified with 
 
 \ Brahma, or be worshipped as Brahma. This has been already 
 pointed out (p. 45), and the remarkable verse in KaUdasa's 
 Kumara-sambhava which expresses the doctrine,, may be 
 repeated here : — 
 
 In those three Persons the one God was shown — 
 Each first in place, each last — not one alone ; 
 Of Siva, Vishnu, Brahma, each may be 
 First, second, third among the blessed Three ^. 
 
 Others declare that Brahma's inferiority is indicated by the 
 legend which makes him spring from Vishnu's navel (see p. 66). 
 
 * Translated by Griffith. The Sanskrit words are as follow :— 
 ' Ekaiva miirtir bibhide tridha sa samanyam esham prathamavaratvam 
 Vishnor Haras tasya Haribi kada6id Vedhas tayos tavapi Dhatur adyau.' 
 
Neglect of the Worship of Brahma. 557 
 
 It is certainly incorrect to compare (as some have done) 
 the Hindu doctrine of a Triad with the Christian dogma of a 
 Unity in Trinity and a Trinity in Unity. For it must be 
 borne in mind that Brahma, Vishnu and Siva are all three held 
 to be subordinate deities, and that all three have celestial bodies 
 '(antecedent to their earthly incarnations), and that all three 
 are believed to be corporeal manifestations of the one sole 
 self-existent, bodiless, impersonal Essence of the Universe, and 
 destined to be reabsorbed into that Essence. Their coequality 
 and interaction as personal manifestations of the one Self- 
 existent God is nobly symbolized in the caves of Elephanta 
 at Bombay, where may be seen sculptured out of the rock, 
 three majestic heads springing out of one body. Such repre- 
 sentations, however^ are rare in other parts of India, and the 
 intelligent traveller who judges of t|ie Hindu religion by what 
 meets the eye finds that he may generally regard the apparent 
 medley of Indian divinities as forms of the two chief gods 
 Vishnu and Siva with their wives. He would see little or no 
 evidence of any worship paid to the male god Brahma. 
 
 Indeed, so far as I was able to ascertain I could only hear 
 of two temples dedicated directly and primarily to Brahma, 
 amid the vast number which may be observed dedicated 
 to forms of Vishnu, Siva, or to their wives or offspring. And 
 this is the more remarkable as certain localities are held 
 to be consecrated through a sacrifice supposed to have been 
 performed by Brahma in the neighbourhood^- Moreover 
 among the various idols and symbols scattered throughout 
 India, those of Vishnu and Siva are by far the most abundant 
 and often imply that these gods are worshipped as Brahma, 
 or are identified with him in his character of Evolver of the 
 Universe ^, whereas the image of Brahma with his four faces 
 
 ' The remarkable myth of Brahma offering himself up as a victim in 
 the form of Purusha rests on a hymn of the Rig-veda (X. 90). 
 
 '^ Images of Vishnu with Brahma in the act of being evolved out of his 
 navel are common enough, and, as I have stated further on, the Lihga 
 with four faces carved round it is by no means uncommon. 
 
558 The Worship of Brahma at Pushkara. 
 
 looking in all directions i, though carved and sold by 
 image-vendors, and even found in houses or in the precincts 
 of Saiva and Vaishnava temples, do not imply that he combines 
 in his own person all the functions of the Triad. 
 
 Of course the substitution of a kind of ditheism for tritheistic 
 ideas is quite in harmony with the dualism which I have already 
 described as an essential element in Hindu philosophy. 
 
 It is exactly what every student of the Sahkhya and Vedanta 
 aphorisms would be led to expect (p. 38). But the general 
 falling off in the direct worship of Brahma is nevertheless a 
 point of great interest in the development of Indian religious 
 thought, and I therefore determined, when last travelling in 
 India, to make a detour with the object of accomplishing a 
 journey to Pushkara (Pokhar), where the most celebrated of 
 the two temples of Brahma now stands. 
 
 Pushkara, I should state at the outset, is one of the most 
 sacred Tirthas in all India. It is said that Brahma having 
 once performed a particular sacrifice (yajna) there, the waters 
 of the small lake near the present town were thereby so 
 sanctified that they ever afterwards became a potent specific 
 for the removal of every kind of guilt. The greatest sinner 
 has only to bathe in them to be at once purified and rendered 
 fit for admission to Brahma's heaven (Brahma-loka) ^. 
 
 In the Tirtha-yatra-parva of the Maha-bharata (Vana-parva, 
 sec. 82) the precedence over all other places of pilgrimage is 
 given to Pushkara : — ' Any one who sojourns there,' so it 
 affirms, ' becomes equal to the God of gods (deva-devasya). It 
 was there that the gods, Daityas and Brahmarshis, having per- 
 formed self-mortifying austerities (tapas taptva) accumulated 
 
 ' And, as some say, symbolizing the four Vedas. In Kumara-sambhava 
 (II. 3) Brahma is called Vag-Isa, 'The lord of speech or of word ; ' but 
 his epithet is Sarvato-mukha, 'looking in all directions.' 
 
 ^ I need not repeat here that Brahma, Vishnu and Siva each has his 
 own special heaven (see pp. 54, 291). The Krishna form of Vishnu also 
 has a heaven of his own. 
 
The Worship of Brahma at Pushkara. 559 
 
 vast merit and attained to the rank of deities. Men of self-con- 
 trol are cleansed from their sins by ever thinking of Pushkara. 
 The great Brahma (pitamahah), w^ho has the lotus for his seat 
 (Kamalasanah), dwelt writh great delight at this Tirtha.' No 
 wonder, then, that the little lake is lined with bathing Ghats, 
 and according to Sir W. W. Hunter's ' Imperial Gazetteer,' 
 surrounded with houses belonging to most of the Rajput 
 princes. It is stated that no living thing is allowed to be put 
 to death within the precincts of the town, though how this 
 rule can be enforced seems difficult to understand, considering 
 that, at the great fair held there in October and November, 
 at least 100,000 pilgrims throng the neighbourhood. 
 
 It was with the assistance of Mr. L. Saunders, whose guest 
 I was when he was collector at Ajmere in Rajputana, that I 
 made an expedition from Ajmere to Pushkara (popularly 
 called Pokhar), on February 23, 1884. The distance was only 
 about seven miles from Mr. Saunders' house, and he arranged 
 that I should be accompanied by an intelligent, well-educated 
 Brahman Pandit who knew the country thoroughly, and 
 would be able to point out every object which was likely to 
 inteS-est me. 
 
 The road, like most of the roads made by Anglo-Indian 
 engineers, seemed to me admirably constructed, and as 
 pleasant to travel on as the best macadamized road in 
 England. Soon after leaving the town of Ajmere it passes 
 through a deep cutting in the hills, and then emerges on 
 rather a wild country. I noticed here and there in the 
 adjoining fields traps for catching tigers, leopards, and other 
 less formidable beasts of prey, while occasional rude paint- 
 ings, images, and shrines by the road-side warned us to be on 
 our guard against prowling demons, especially those most 
 spiteful of all evil spirits—the spirits of recently deceased 
 human beings who, through some failure in the due per- 
 formance of their funeral rites, were believed to rove about 
 and haunt the neighbourhood. It was hinted to me that 
 
560 ' Arrowy-bed' form of self-torture. 
 
 some of these malignant and unrestful spirits were in the habit 
 of making themselves troublesome to any travellers or passers 
 by who might neglect to propitiate them by offerings. 
 
 ^yhen we had accomplished about half of our journey and 
 were approaching Pushkara we came upon a very interesting 
 anthropological curiosity. This was a Vairagl or Vaishnava 
 ascetic, whose appearance would certainly have shocked any 
 one fresh from London Society and inclined to be a stickler 
 for the proprieties of life. His demeanour seemed to be that of 
 a human being, who, though just alive himself, seemed to be 
 supremely indifferent to the existence of everything else in 
 creation, including demons and beasts of prey. He had, how- 
 ever, erected for his own protection close to the road a rough 
 covering consisting of a mat supported on four poles, open to 
 all the winds of heaven. Like other ascetics of his type still 
 to be seen in India, he was not altogether an inviting object 
 to be looked upon by any one at all fastidious in regard to the 
 realities of human anatomy, for he was absolutely nude with 
 the exception of the smallest conceivable patch of cloth, three 
 or four inches square. Nor was he a very promising object 
 of investigation to any one, who, like myself, was bent on 
 extracting information from every possible source ; for he was 
 under a vow of silence (mauna-vrata) which was supposed to 
 be inviolable for at least six years. Yet, for. all that, he made 
 a kind of mumbling sound through his closed lips, and tried 
 to make himself intelligible to us by signs, when, descending 
 from our vehicle, we approached his hermitage to examine his 
 condition and surroundings more closely. 
 
 An inscription written in rude characters indicated his 
 name — Khaki Jiiana-das. Round his neck was a rosary 
 (japa-mala) consisting of eighteen large rough TulasI beads 
 (see p. 67). He was seated in the usual way on the ground, 
 but close to him on his right hand was his only bed — an iron 
 framework resting on four short legs, and unprovided with 
 mattress or coverlet, but studded instead with rows of iron 
 
^ Arrowy-bed' form of self-torture. 56 J 
 
 spikes, somewhat blunted at the points, while at the pillow- 
 end there was a spiky head-rest. This remarkable couch was 
 called by my Brahman companion the devotee's Kantaka- 
 sayya, ' bed of thorns,' though I noticed that it had an in- 
 scription in Sanskrit letters designating it as ' a bed of arrows ' 
 (Bana-sayya). This convinced me that it was intended to 
 represent Bhishma's Sara-sayya or ' arrowy bed ' described in 
 the Maha-bharata (Bhlshma-parva and Anusasana-parva 773 a), 
 and, on my mentioning this to my companion, the Vairagi 
 gave a grunt of assent and approval, evidently pleased with 
 my acquaintance with the story of Bhishma. 
 
 I should observe that, resting on the spiky bed, was a 
 wooden stand on which were deposited (i) the black stone 
 (Sala-grarna) of Vishnu, (a) the white stone (Bana-linga) of 
 Siva, and (3) the red stone of Ganesa (see pp. 69, 70, 41a). 
 I noticed no symbol of the divine mother (generally identified 
 with Siva's consort) nor of the Sun, which, together with the 
 three just named, usually represent a Pentarchy of divinities 
 worshipped at the Paiidayatana ceremony (see pp. 410-416). 
 
 It was a great satisfaction to me that I had at length met 
 with a genuine example of the spiky-bed form of self- 
 mortification (tapas); for during my numerous travels in 
 different parts of India I had hitherto sought for one in vain, 
 and had begun to doubt the truth of the story told in a 
 paper read before the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 179a 
 (see the fifth volume of the Asiatic Researches), relative to 
 a Brahman ascetic at Benares, who is depicted as actually 
 Ijang naked day and night on one of these spiky couches 
 which he is described as having used for thirty-five years. 
 That man's name was Parama Svatantrl Prakasananda. He 
 had travelled much as a devotee through many countries, 
 and part of his process of self-mortification, during winter, 
 consisted in placing himself beneath a perforated pot full 
 of water which fell drop by drop on his head, and, during 
 summer, in reclining between four blazing fires with the rays 
 
 O o 
 
562 'A rrowy-bed ' form of self-torture. 
 
 of the burning sun beating down upon him from above. 
 Questioneci as to his reason for punishing himself by such 
 severe forms of self-torture (tapasya), he repudiated the idea 
 of resorting to vi^hat we call 'penance' as an atonement for 
 the commission of sin or of any special crime. The simple 
 reason he gave was that since a celebrated Rishi or holy 
 man named Agni-varna had undergone the spiky-bed form 
 of austerity in the Satya-yuga or first age of the world, and 
 since the demon Ravana had done the same for ten thousand 
 3'ears in the Treta or second age of the world, and since 
 Bhishma had done the same in the Dvapara or third age, 
 it had been assigned to him as a peculiar privilege to go 
 through similar austerities in the present age of the world. 
 Of course, as we have already shown (see pp. 7 a, 87), the 
 efficacy of bodily mortification is an essential element in the 
 Hindu creed, and the ostensible motive of all self-torture is 
 either to accumulate merit, or to acquire supernatural power, 
 or to achieve' complete absorption of individual personality 
 in the one eternal Essence of the Universe. 
 
 The story of Bhishma's arrowy couch is one of those ex- 
 travagant figments, occurring here and there in Indian sacred 
 literature, which has hitherto been passed over or little noticed 
 by Eui'opean writers on Hinduism. Nor indeed is it easy to 
 disentangle this remarkable episode of the Maha-bharata from 
 the tedious succession of legendary stories with which it is 
 interwoven ; although it constitutes an important link in the 
 continuity of the leading narrative. It will be sufficient to 
 note here that the Bhishma-parva of that immense Epic poem 
 relates how the two armies of the Pandavas and Kauravas 
 met on Kuru-kshetra — a vast plain north-west of Delhi ; the 
 Kauravas (or Kurus) being commanded by Bhishma. Long 
 tedious descriptions of the battles which ensued are closed 
 with an account of the terrific duel between Bhishma and 
 Arjuna — the bravest of the Pandavas. In the end Arjuna 
 transfixed Bhishma with innumerable arrows, so that there 
 
BhtshmcHs Arrowy Bed. 563 
 
 was not a space of two fingers' breadth left unpierced on the 
 surface of his body. Then Bhishma fell from his chariot, but 
 the countless arrows which had penetrated his frame pre- 
 vented it from touching the ground, so that instead of lying 
 prostrate it remained suspended, and, as it were, reclining on 
 an arrowy couch (sara-talpe sayana). In that condition the 
 old warrior continued alive and conscious. The story goes 
 on to relate that he had been endowed with the supernatural 
 power of fixing the time of his own death, and that, although 
 pierced through and through and grievously wounded, he 
 resolved not to die, but to remain alive till the sun had 
 entered its northern course in the heavens. All the warriors 
 on both sides thereupon ceased fighting that they might view 
 this wonderful sight. As he lay on his arrowy bed his head 
 hanging down, he begged for a pillow ; whereupon the chiefs 
 brought all kinds of soft supports, which Bhishma rejected. 
 Arjuna then made a pillow for his head with three sharp 
 arrows, which Bhishma approved. Soon after this he asked 
 for water, and Arjuna thereupon struck the ground with an 
 arrow, causing a pure spring to burst forth. This so refreshed 
 Bhishma that he remained ; alive on the field of battle for 
 fifty-eight days and nights, pouring forth words of wisdom 
 for the benefit of the listening watriors, and enunciating many 
 excellent moral precepts and sage counsels on social and 
 political subjects ^- When the time came for him to die, the 
 arrows suddenly and of their own accord left his body, his 
 skull divided, and his spirit, bright as a meteor, ascended 
 through the top of his head (see p. 291) to the skies. 
 
 Doubtless the voluntary bodily suffering undergone by 
 Bhishma for so long a period, pierced and agonized by sharp 
 arrows, was the supposed efficient cause of the divine know- 
 ledge of which he became possessed and which he was able 
 to impart to others in his long series of discourses. 
 
 ^ These precepts are all collected in the Santi and Anusasana Parvas of 
 the Maha-bharata, two of the longest books in that vast thesaurus of 
 Hindu legendary tradition. Compare p. 546 of this volume. 
 
 O o a 
 
564 Bhishmds Arrowy Bed. 
 
 A picture of the old warrior sage, lying in a moribund con- 
 dition on his arrowy bed, is given in the Bombay edition of 
 the' Maha-bharata ^, and always interested me, whenever I had 
 occasion to refer to its pages. Here then I had at last acci- 
 dentally come across a living specimen of a ' holy man ' intent 
 on practising a similar method of obtaining divine knowledge 
 and union with the Deity ; and that, too, under our own 
 matter-of-fact work-a-day rule, and notwithstanding the ex- 
 pected collapse of superstition under the pressure of steam, 
 electricity, and generally advancing civilization and education. 
 
 Of course my interest in the example before me led me to 
 scrutinize his condition and habits rather critically, and in the 
 absence of all power of cross-questioning this utterly apathetic 
 ascetic under a vow of silence, I confess that I soon began to 
 feel somewhat sceptical as to his sincerity, or at least as to 
 the fact of his torturing himself by too close a contact with 
 his spiky bed. To test therefore the reality of his self- 
 imposed bodily suffering, as well as his freedom from all 
 worldly desires and consequent right to the title of VairagI, 
 I offered him half a rupee if he would rise from the ground 
 and lie on the spikes for a few' minutes ; but he declined either 
 to gratify my curiosity or to satisfy my doubts, pointing to his 
 pebble-gods, and making signs to intimate that they were 
 asleep on the spiky bed and could not be disturbed without 
 impiety. 
 
 Perhaps it was unfair to place an uncharitable construction 
 on his excuses, without first paying him a nocturnal visit* 
 Possibly his vow debarred him from taking a recumbent 
 posture except at night, and he might not improbably have 
 been found at a later hour, reposing on his bed of thorns 
 under the protection of his then wakeful and vigilant godS. 
 Or possibly my silvery offering was not liberal enough to 
 
 ^ I saw one also in the Comte de Gubematis' Indian Museum at 
 Florence. 
 
The Worship of Brahma at Pushkara. 565 
 
 be tempting, yet I noticed that he evinced no particular 
 contempt for money doles tendered in the form of metal of 
 the baser kind. He had a Tulasi shrub in front of him, and 
 even during our short sojourn near his hermitage two or three 
 passers by approached him, bowed their heads reverently 
 before the divinity supposed to be embodied in the ' holy man,' 
 and offered him one or two pice which he accepted without 
 demur, while giving in return one or two leaves of the sacred 
 plant to be preserved by the recipients as preservatives against 
 evil. We, too, were honoured by the gift of a few leaves 
 presented to us quite gratuitously, but evidently only intended 
 as a parting memento, or as a token that the prolongation of 
 our visit would be unwelcome. 
 
 On our reaching the outskirts of the town of Pushkara, my 
 companion pointed out on the right of the road a celebrated 
 Varaha-mandira — that is — a temple of Vishnu in his Boar- 
 incarnation. It was a striking structure^ built on an elevation, 
 and approached by a long flight of steps. I ascended, and 
 was allowed to inspect the image of the god represented here 
 in his boar-form and in the act of destroying the demon 
 Hiranyaksha (see p. 109). Willingly would I have lingered 
 and taken note of all the surroundings had not my presence 
 attracted a number of temple-attendants who began to crowd 
 round us and clamour for fees in an excited manner. 
 
 It was with difficulty that we escaped to our carriage and 
 proceeded on our way to the town. Before entering the main 
 street, I noticed a temple dedicated to Siva (Maha-deva), 
 which, like the other temples, was raised above the level of 
 the road. On ascending the steps leading to the shrine, I 
 found the usual image of a bull (Nandi) looking into it and 
 the usual linga of Siva in the sanctuary, but with four human 
 faces carved round it. This was to show that Siva was wor- 
 shipped there as identified with Brahma. I saw a similar 
 four-faced linga in a shrine between Jaipur and Ambar. 
 With reference to this point, I may observe that in the 
 
566 The Worship of Brahma at Pushkara. 
 
 Sauptika Parva (770) of the Maha-bharata there is a curious 
 account of the subordinate part which Brahma instigated Siva 
 to take in the creation of the world, and of the delay caused 
 by the preparatory course of austerity which Siva thought it 
 necessary to perform immersed in water. In the Siva-purana, 
 on the other hand, the god Siva is described as the direct 
 author of creation, and the linga is asserted to be the source 
 of the whole visible universe. 
 
 But to return to Pushkara, no sooner did we enter the town 
 and reach the margin of the sacred waters than a crowd of 
 Brahman Harpies surrounded us, intent on exacting money- 
 fees. It was useless maintaining that the shore of the lake 
 was open to the public ; the mob was not to be reasoned with> 
 and the demeanour of a few individuals close to us became so 
 threatening that I unwisely tendered two or three rupees as a 
 peace-offering. My proffered coins were instantly snatched 
 by those nearest to us, and snatched at again by others who 
 considered that they had a right to a share in my gifts. Then 
 a free fight ensued — no mere good-natured scramble between 
 a few idlers, but the fierce struggle of a mass of half-frantic 
 human beings, each grappling the other in savage embrace, 
 and all vociferating together, while they surged hither and 
 thither in remarkable contrast to the peaceful surface of the 
 lake. Happily under cover of the confusion caused by this 
 battle-royal, we effected a retreat, congratulating ourselves that 
 our garments had not been torn off our backs in the mel^e. 
 
 Of course the chief object of my journey was the all but 
 unique temple of the god Brahma. The first impression 
 made on me by this structure was one of surprise at its 
 massiveness. It is erected on an elevated piece of ground at 
 the further end of the town in full view of the picturesque 
 temple of Savitri which crowns the sugar-loaf peak of a hill in 
 the Aravali range close at hand. No doubt Savitri, or Gayatrl 
 (pp. 19; 403; 406) is there personified and worshipped in 
 connexion with the god Brahma as his wife. The temple of 
 
The Worship of Brahma at Pushkara, 567 
 
 Brahma itself is approached by successive flights of solid 
 stone steps, and has rather the appearance of a small fortress 
 with loop-holed bastions. The present structure is said to be 
 of no great antiquity, and is believed to be not much older 
 than the present century. I ascended the steps along with 
 my Brahman companion, and passing through the portal 
 entered a spacious court-yard surrounded by cloisters. This 
 cloistered quadrangle constitutes the precincts of the temple. 
 Looking back I noticed above the- entrance gate a covered 
 place for the temple-musicians, and just below an image of a 
 goose-like bird (Sanskrit, hansa) carved in the stone-work — 
 this animal being the vehicle or symbol of the god Brahma 
 (see pp. 104, 3 ; 328). 
 
 In the centre of the quadrangle was the actual shrine of 
 Brahma — an isolated temple of some architectural pretensions, 
 with columns supporting a roof on which was a low central 
 'dome and the usual pyramidal tapering tower rising above the 
 sanctuary, where Brahma's image is enshrined. In front of 
 the entrance was the inevitable bell. I was allowed to look 
 through the well-carved wooden gates at the image which 
 was clearly visible in its sanctuary at the end of the vista of 
 open columns. I observed that it had four black faces, each 
 one of which was supposed to be directed towards one of the 
 four quarters of the compass. In point of fact, however, three 
 of the faces were made to look at the observer, each face 
 having two great staring glass eyes. Covering the four-faced 
 head was a broad red turban, and over that were hanging five 
 umbrella-shaped ornaments. I noticed that the image was 
 dressed in red clothes with flaps of coloured cloth hanging 
 round the waist. On one side of the god's image was that of 
 his wife worshipped here as Gayatrl or Savitrl (p. 19) \ and 
 behind both was the image of Kama-dhenu— the sacred cow 
 
 ^ The Gayatrl or most sacred verse of the Veda is personified and 
 sometimes identified with SarasvatI and called the Mother of .the four 
 Vedas. She is also regarded as the daughter of Prajapati (Brahma). 
 
568 The Worship of Brahma at Pushkara. 
 
 granting all desires. On the marble floor in front of the 
 shrine was the carved representation of a tortoise, — significant, 
 no doubt, of Brahma's connexion with Vishnu (p. 108), out of 
 whose navel he is fabled to have sprung, seated on a lotus. 
 
 In the court-yard surrounding the inner temple and in front , 
 of it on one side was a small shrine dedicated to the linga of 
 Siva, which here — as in the instances already mentioned — 
 really represents Brahma. It consists of a dwarf stone column 
 with four faces carved round it, while underneath is the usual 
 female symbol (yoni). Near it is a shrine of Vishnu — doubt- 
 less here identified with Brahma. Again, there is a shrine 
 close at hand dedicated to the Ardha-narl form of Siva, and 
 another to Dattatreya, regarded as an incarnation of Brahma, 
 Vishnu and Siva united in one person (see p. 267). Else- 
 where in the precincts, I noticed images of Indra and Kuvera, 
 both riding on elephants, and of course, here, supposed to be 
 subservient to the god of the temple. I ought to mention, 
 that reclining lazily on the ground in the cloisters of the 
 quadrangle were two devotees, of the Parama-hansa class. 
 One of these was a sleek stalwart youth, who looked as if 
 he lived well and was daily fed on the fat of the land. Both 
 devotees were supposed to be wholly devoted to the contem- 
 plation of Brahma (here manifested as Brahma), and to do 
 nothing else whatever. I could not help addressing them 
 and suggesting that the god Brahma would be more honoured 
 by their doing some useful work for the good of his creatures. 
 
 Several sacred trees were growing in the court-yard of the 
 temple— for instance, a Pipal tree (see p. '^'^$\ two Banian 
 trees (Vata), a Nlm, an Asoka, an Amalaki, and the sacred 
 Tulasi (Tulsi) shrub. In one spot I noticed a Sam! tree 
 married to a Banian (see p. 335). 
 
 With regard to the other temple of Brahma, which is said 
 to be the only other temple existing in India, and to which I 
 believe I was the first to draw attention in a note to the first 
 edition of my Manual of Hinduism (p. 90), it is to be found 
 
Account of a Maharani s Cremation. 569 
 
 near Idar (or Edar), but I was unable to make an expedition 
 
 to this place. 
 
 Mr. G. P. Taylor, a missionary, having observed my note, 
 
 made inquiries of a friend living in the Idar state, which is 
 
 situated about sixty miles N. E. of Ahmedabad, and not 
 
 very far S. of Mount Abu, and ascertained the following 
 
 particulars : — 
 This second temple dedicated to Brahma is not in the 
 
 town of Idar itself, but about fifteen miles distant, on a plain 
 called Brahma-khed (Brahma-kshetra). It is constructed of 
 white sandstone and bricks covered with cement. It is seven 
 feet long, thirty broad, and thirty-six high, and is traditionally 
 believed to have been built by Brahma's reputed son, Bhrigu 
 — probably the identical personage who gave his name to 
 Broach (Bhrigu-kaccha). Though not so celebrated as the 
 Pushkara temple, it is nevertheless held in high esteem and 
 much resorted to by pilgrims and others at certain seasons of 
 the year. 
 
 An Account of the late Maharani of Nuddeds Cre- 
 mation and the subsequent Funeral and Sraddha 
 Ceremonies as performed by her Son, Kshitisa 
 Chandra Ray a, Maharaja of Nuddea. 
 
 The young Maharaja of Nuddea paid me a visit whilst 
 I was Lord Ripon's guest at Government House, Calcutta, 
 in the early part of the year 1884, attended by his English 
 tutor; and knowing that I was interested in the religious 
 ceremonies of the Hindus, gave me an account of the cre- 
 mation of his mother, written by himself I here give it 
 nearly in his own words : — 
 
 •On the evening of Dec. a6, 1883, my mother died at 
 Krishna-nagar (Krishnagar), in the Nuddea district (Bengal). 
 Some Brahmans were at once called in to remove the dead 
 
570 Account of a Maharanvs Cremation. 
 
 body to Nuddea, that they might burn it near the Ganges. Hav- 
 ing wrapped the body up in the bedding on which she died, we 
 fastened it with strings, and put a small piece of iron in the 
 wrappings. The dead body was then laid on a charpoy, and 
 covered with a curtain. This was carried by Brahmans only. 
 Soon after midnight we started for Nuddea, arriving there 
 early on the morning of the a7th. Having collected woodj 
 ghee, earthen vessels, etc., we summoned our priests, and the 
 Pandit Braja-nath Vidya-ratna, the chief expounder of Smriti 
 — who all lived at Nuddea. Then the man who makes arrange- 
 ments for cremation, called ' Ganga-putra' (p. 347), enclosed 
 a space near the Ganges with a long sheet, there being an 
 opening only on the river side. As a boat was passing at the 
 time we ordered it to the other side. Removing the curtain 
 we took the body off the charpoy, and laid it on the bank, 
 covered only with a simple white cloth. The feet up to the 
 ankle were immersed in the water, the rest of the body was 
 on the dry land. The priest then repeated some texts (Man- 
 tras), corrected from time to time by the chief Pandit. The 
 deceased meanwhile was supposed to be assisted by this cere- 
 mony in crossing the river Baitarani (Vaitarani), the river 
 supposed by all good Hindus to lie between this world and 
 the next (see p. 297 of this volume). 
 
 ' I then plunged into the Ganges, and on coming out boiled 
 a mixture of rice, sesamum, plantain, and ghee, which I took 
 near the dead body of my mother. Then dividing the mix- 
 ture into two parts, and repeating some Mantras, I threw it 
 into the river. This ceremony is called the giving of Pinda 
 (Pinda-dana, see pp. 385, 293) — that is to say, presenting the 
 dead with an oblation of food. Then I bathed again, and 
 rubbed some ghee, etc. on my deceased mother's head, and 
 threw some water over the body. I then re-covered the face. 
 Next, we removed the body to a pile of wood about two feet 
 high, called a Chelu, within the enclosure. Then laying the 
 body on this pile, I uncovered the face, and with a torch in 
 
Account of a Mahar5.m s Cremation. 571 
 
 my right hand burned the hair, but my back was turned, and 
 I was not allowed to see the face. The whole pile was then 
 set On fire, and soon after I threw seven pieces of sandal-wood 
 into the flames, repeating a Mantra. Some two hours after- 
 wards I took a sharp-pointed bamboo, and piercing the back- 
 bone which is never totally consumed, placed it in the water. 
 This concluded the actual ceremony of cremation. 
 
 ' Then after a substitute had dipped ten times in the river for 
 me, and, instead of my dipping, had touched me ten times, I 
 prepared my breakfast with my own hands, and after taking 
 it returned to my home at Krishna-nagar on the evening of 
 December 27. For the twelve days during which the mourn- 
 ing lasts the use of all luxurious food — such as fish or flesh, — of 
 good clothes, of beds, of chairs, of shoes, and of an umbrella, is 
 forbidden to the nearest surviving relative ; but in my case, I 
 being an adopted son, the prohibition only took effect for five 
 days, during which period I slept — wrapped up in a blanket 
 on the floor, and ate no rich food, nor used luxurious oils when 
 bathing. 
 
 ' On the morning of the 38th, or second day, the priest and 
 the chief Pandit came from Nuddea, and we went to a neigh- 
 bouring tank, and boiled some simple food, such as ghee, sesa- 
 mum, rice, and plantain ; dividing it into eight portions, we 
 threw each portion into the river, repeating a Mantra. 
 
 ' Thus altogether ten portions had been given as food for 
 the deceased during ten days (see p. 393 of this volume). I 
 then shaved my hair off", the other relatives shaving their 
 moustache only. Next I cooked my simple food of rice 
 and ghee (Havishya). On the third day, or December the 
 29th, the first thing I did was to bathe in the tank, using no 
 i towel, soap, or luxurious oils. I then put on my simple 
 ' clothing, consisting of a white sheet known as Kacha, which 
 was the only clothing I was allowed to wear during the five 
 days prescribed for the period of mourning, called the Asauca. 
 I then went to a room and dedicated fruit, money, a bed, rice, 
 
572 Account of a Maharani's Cremation. 
 
 shoes, and umbrellas to Vishnu, in the presence of the Priest; 
 the Guru, and other Brahmans. These offerings were then 
 distributed amongst the Brahmans who were present. This 
 is called the Tri-ratra or ' Three-night ceremony,' after which 
 the spirit of the deceased, having been judged (see p. 29a of 
 this volume), is sent to its own place. A short time after the 
 performance of this rite I again went to the tank, and cooked 
 and dedicated a Pinda, or funeral cake, to Vishnu. I also 
 dedicated to him a bull-calf marked on one side with the Tri- 
 sula or Trident, and on the other with the Cakra or Circle, 
 and four young heifers, which were all let loose, and allowed 
 to roam where they pleased. These ceremonies over I 
 breakfasted. 
 
 ' On the fourth day I was not called upon to do anything. 
 On the fifth day I fixed a wooden pole, with the image of a 
 bull in a small shrine on its summit, in the ground a few yards 
 from the house. After walking round it seven times I went 
 to the tank and bathed, being now allowed to use soap, towels, 
 and fragrant oils. I then breakfasted for the first time after 
 my mother's death on fish and the flesh of kid ; and from 
 this day was again allowed to use fine clothes, chairs, shoes, 
 beds, and umbrellas, first presenting some Brahman with one 
 of each. 
 
 ' On January 5, or the tenth day, I dedicated to Vishnu a 
 large number of shoes, umbrellas, beds, brass and silver cook- 
 ing, utensils, copper, silver, and gold coin, lampstands of silver 
 and brass, carpets, shawls, and clothes. After the dedication 
 the things were distributed amongst the Pandits, Brahmans, 
 and relatives present. In the evening we entertained them 
 all at a feast, to the number of about one thousand; and 
 during the night some thirteen thousand poor were fed with 
 rice and sweetmeats, and each man, woman, and child received 
 four annas ( = 6<f.). On January 7, or the twelfth day, the 
 Sraddha ceremonies were concluded by another feast given 
 to some five hundred relatives and Brahmans.' 
 
Account of a Maharajc^s Deva-puja. 573 
 
 An Account of the daily Deva-puja performed by 
 the Maharaja of Dhol-pur. 
 
 When (in 1884) I was the guest of General Dennehy at 
 the Residency, Dhol-pur, the youthful Maharaja (named Rana 
 Nihal Sinh)— whose education the General was then ably 
 superintending— very obligingly performed his usual diurnal 
 Deva-puja, or ' worship of the gods,' in my presence. 
 
 The ceremony took place in one of the courts of his palace, 
 under a Mandapa or open hall leading to a shrine of Vishnu, 
 worshipped as Narasinha. A square piece of ground was 
 marked out and consecrated on the floor, and in the 
 centre of the ground so prepared was a small rectangular 
 silver platform or low stand on legs, and in the centre of this 
 again a little round platter with a silver cup containing several 
 Bana-liiigas, Sala-gramas, etc. (see pp. 69, 392, 413). On the 
 right of this was a little white conch-shell resting on a small 
 silver stand, on the left a silver bell, and at the opposite corner 
 a cocoa-nut. All around on the ground were arranged sacri- 
 ficial implements, sacred vessels, cups, lotas, and flowers; On 
 one side of the prepared ground and close to the silver stand 
 sat the Maharaja, with his legs folded under him in the usual 
 manner, having the sacred vessels and implements in front 
 of him within easy reach of his hands. Behind him sat his 
 domestic priest (Purohit) ready to give him directions for the 
 due performance of the ceremonial, and on one side of the 
 prepared ground sat a row of four Brahmkns who took part 
 in the muttering of prayers, the repetition of texts and chant- 
 ing. Not far off", on an elevated step, was the altar (vedi) for 
 the Homa or sacrifice to fire. This altar was made of clay 
 well plastered with cow-dung, but only rising a few inches 
 from the ground. It was of an oblong form, with a Svastika 
 (p. 91, note i) or auspicious mark in the centre. It was also 
 ■ponsecrated by water scattered on its surface with Kusa grass. 
 
5 74 Account of a Maharaja's Deva-puja. 
 
 On it was kindled the sacred fire which was fed with Samidh 
 or fuel, composed of pieces of wood of six different kinds 
 (Palasa, Sami, Khadira, Asvattha, Udumbara, etc.), and was 
 made to blaze up by ghee poured on the wood with sacrificial 
 ladles (Sruva, darvi). 
 
 At the commencement of the Deva-puja a piece of silk was 
 bound round the Maharaja's arm, with repetition of bene- 
 dictory formulas, to protect him from the evil influence of 
 demons always on the watch to counteract the good effect of 
 religious ceremonies. This is called Raksha-bandhana. 
 
 Much of the detail of the ceremonial resembled that of the 
 Paiidayatana-puja, described at p. 410 of this volume. The 
 Maharaja, under the direction of his Purohit, performed the 
 usual acts of worship by the offering of flowers (pushpa), by 
 placing garlands of yellow flowers round the sacred vessels, by 
 the burning of incense (dhupa), by the waving of lights (dipa), 
 by oblations of rice-grains etc. (naivedya), by offering a cloth 
 (vastra) placed on the central stand, by the pouring of water 
 with a little spoon into his own hand, or into a boat-shaped 
 vessel, by repeatedly sprinkling the Bana-lingas etc. with water 
 taken out of the larger sacred water-vessel (Kalasa), by again 
 pouring water into the Kalasa, and by putting yellow flowers 
 into it, and by again pouring out water with these flowers. 
 
 It seemed to me that the most important part of the 
 ceremonial consisted in the constant sprinkling and pouring 
 out of water and scattering of rice-grains. Some of the latter 
 the Rana threw behind his head, while during the entire cere^ 
 mony the Purohit and Brahmans recited texts, muttered 
 prayers, and chanted verses. There was also a hymn to Siva 
 (Siva-stotra), with repetition of some of his 1008 names (see 
 pp. 81, 106), preceded by adoration of the nine planets (p. 344) 
 represented by nine areca nuts placed in rice and arranged in 
 order on the ground. The repetitions were concluded by the 
 exclamation, ' Om phat,' and by clapping of hands. 
 
 How far the young Rana himself believed in the eiificacy of 
 
Account of Kal-Hs Temple at Vindhyadal. 575 
 
 these ceremonies, I cannot undertake to say, but he went 
 through them with an evident desire to fulfil every minute 
 requirement of the ritual ill a careful and reverential manner. 
 
 An Account of the Temple of Kail at Vindhyatal. 
 
 When I was at Mirzapur in the spring of 1884, I visited the 
 neighbouring temple of Kali (about five miles distant), wor- 
 shipped under the name of Vindhyadala-vasini (popularly 
 
 ; Vindhyacal), 'dweller on the Vindhya mountains.' This was 
 the form of the goddess to which the Thags were supposed 
 to offer up their victims, and here was the particular shrine 
 to which they made pilgrimages from all parts of the country. 
 It is still one of the most popular temples in India, and on 
 the day of my visit at least a thousand worshippers were col- 
 lected in the precincts. There is a small central temple with 
 a low roof, on which several flags were kept flying. As it was 
 
 - the time of darsana — i. e. homage paid to the idol by viewing 
 it when dressed and decorated — the surging, struggling crowd 
 passed in through a narrow door on one side, and out at 
 an equally narrow exit on the other, amidst a deafening din 
 of yelling, shouting, and tolling of bells. I was informed that 
 
 ': between the hours of la and 3 in the day, and of i3 and 5 at 
 night, the goddess is put to sleep on a silver bed, and the 
 shrine is then closed. 
 
 The temple has a space round it for pradakshina (p. 68, %) 
 or reverential circumambulation, and round this again is an 
 open area, on three sides of which are rows of shrines to 
 various deities behind finely carved screens. I noticed an 
 image of SarasvatI in a particularly beautiful shrine, behind 
 an exquisitely carved lace-like stone screen. Near this was 
 the place for sacrificing goats. The priests seemed to take 
 especial pleasure in chopping off the heads of as many goats 
 as possible while I was examining the shrines, perhaps to make 
 
 atonement for the pollution caused by my presence. The 
 
576 Account of the Santals. 
 
 animals were then flayed, and dogs came and licked up the 
 blood. 
 
 Close to the exit of the temple the Homa sacrifice to fire 
 was being performed by a number of Brahmans seated in a 
 semi-circle round it. I observed two or three women at one 
 end of the semi-circle. All were engaged in putting ghee 
 into the fire with wooden ladles and then scattering grain, 
 camphor, and sawdust of sandal-wood on the flames, the 
 Brahmans chanting texts (see p. '>fi']). 
 
 What struck tne as most curious in the conduct of the crowd 
 was that some of the worshippers before leaving the temple 
 left an impress of their hands — dipped in some dark colouring 
 matter — on the exterior wall, close to the entrance. I was 
 told that this was intended as the record of a vow, binding 
 the worshipper, if he obtained some particular boon which he 
 had prayed for, to sacrifice a goat to' the goddess. When the 
 boon was obtained, and the vow fulfilled, the mark on the 
 wall was to be effaced. 
 
 Account of the Customs and Religious Tenets 
 of the Santals. 
 
 One of my objects in travelling through India in 1 883-1 884, 
 was to gain a better knowledge of the Jains and of the points 
 of difference which distinguish Jainism from Buddhism. I 
 therefore determined to visit Parasnath, which is perhaps the 
 most sacred of all thfe hills dedicated to Jaina saints. At any 
 rale numerous Jaina temples crown the table-land on the sum- 
 friit, and are daily visited by hundreds of Jaina pilgrims from 
 all parts of India. 
 
 Yet this pilgrim-frequented mountain, rising, as it does, 
 about 4,500 feet above the sea, is surrounded by tiger-haunted 
 jungles, and is by no means easy of access. My ascent of it 
 is briefly described in my work on Buddhism (p. 509) and I 
 propose referring to it more particularly in another work. 
 
 As my way led me through a tract of country inhabited by 
 
Account of the Santals. 577 
 
 the Santals, I availed myself of the opportunity to make my- 
 self acquainted with some of the customs of that aboriginal 
 race— a race generally classified under what is usually called 
 the Kolarian group of aborigines. 
 
 I had received an invitation to stay with Mr. Stevenson, an 
 energetic missionary of the Free Church of Scotland, who had 
 laboured for many years among the Santals and at that time 
 had fixed his residence at Pachamba 1 about three miles from 
 Girldi— a station of the narrow guage railway leading from 
 Madhupur— and about 200 miles north-west of Calcutta. 
 
 The whole of the plain extending for thirty miles between 
 Girldi and the Parasnath range, forms part of the District 
 officially known as the Santal Parganas. According to the 
 Imperial Gazetteer this district, which is under the Lieutenant 
 Governorship of Bengal, has an area of 5,488 square miles and 
 a population (at the last census) of 1,259,387 souls inhabiting 
 9,872 villages. 
 
 Colonel Dalton considers, that there were in 1872 about 
 200,000 Santals, and the same authority states, that they 
 form about one-third of the total number of the aboriginal 
 races of Bengal ^- 
 
 On the 28th of January, 1884, 1 started with Mr. Stevenson 
 from Pachamba with the view of gaining some knowledge of 
 these people and with the special object of observing the 
 relation between their usages and those of Hinduism. 
 
 We drove through a pleasant undulating country, passing 
 
 ^ Mr. Stevenson died of cholera at Pachamba three years ago, to the 
 great grief of those among whom he laboured and of all who knew him ; 
 but his influence still lives in Santalia. In 1887 he published a little 
 pamphlet containing a brief history of the Scotch Mission to the Santals, 
 and of Santal customs, and this I have consulted. Most of the infor- 
 mation, however, embodied in this part of my book was gathered from 
 his own lips. Much has been written on the same subject by Colonel 
 Dalton, Sir W. W. Hunter, and others. According to Mr. Stevenson 
 the name Santal should properly be spelt Saontal. 
 
 ^ The whole number of Santals amounted in Mr. Stevenson's time to 
 about a million, and of these about 8,000 were Christians. 
 
 Pp 
 
578 Account of the Santals. 
 
 many villages and rice-fields, till we came to what appeared to 
 be a good typical example of a Santal village-community. The 
 village — called, I believe, Chamarkho — lay about a quarter of 
 a mile from the road, and to reach it, we had to leave our 
 carriage and follow a well-beaten path across a paddy-field 
 bordered here and there by palm-trees. We found the primi- 
 tive inhabitants quite as unprepared for our visit, as we had 
 hoped to find them. No head-man made his appearance for 
 some time after our arrival, and few human beings, except 
 children, were at first visible. I noticed that the huts and 
 homesteads which constituted the village were not grouped 
 together in an irregular cluster, as is usual in the rural dis- 
 tricts of India, but were arranged in one long straight line, 
 protected on both sides by a high thick fence, made of boughs 
 of trees wattled together and strengthened by thick sticks, 
 while here and there the monotony of the line of fencing was 
 , broken by the stems of living palms and tamarind trees, and 
 castor-oil plants. The fence ran parallel on one side with the 
 homesteads, but so as to leave an intervening space, which 
 formed a kind of long straight street. Each homestead, too, was 
 surrounded by a similar protection, enclosing a kind of separate 
 compound. Of course the usual troop of village dogs and 
 yelping curs surrounded us, and had to be kept off by the free 
 use of our sticks. Their barking, however, had the effect of 
 rousing some of the villagers, who approached us and greeted 
 Mr. Stevenson with exclamations of pleasure, appearing to 
 recognize him as an old friend and benefactor, and talking 
 familiarly with him in their own peculiar speech. Parentheti- 
 cally I may remark that the Santal language offers to scholars 
 an interesting example of the Kolarian family, and those philo- 
 logists who have investigated it have shewn that it contains 
 some remarkable curiosities of complex grammatical structure 
 and idiom. All the difficulties and intricacies of the dialect 
 had been mastered by my companion, Mr. Stevenson, and 
 another excellent missionary (Mr. Campbell), who had heard 
 
Account of the Santals. 579 
 
 of our expedition and joined us. Both missionaries spoke 
 to the natives with as much ease and fluency as if Santall was 
 as familiar to them as their own mother-tongue. I noticed 
 that the Santal men were branded or tattooed on three places 
 on the left arm under the elbow. Such marks are supposed 
 to act as charms against evil influences. The women have 
 the arms and chest tattooed in the same way and for the same 
 purpose. They chattered as unconstrainedly as the men, and 
 seemed to enjoy quite as much freedom and liberty of action. 
 It was not long before the head-man, called Manjhl, appeared 
 — a venerable old gentleman who welcomed us to the village 
 in the name of all the inhabitants. 
 
 We found the main-street not particularly clean, but enter- 
 ing one of the compounds at the invitation of its smiling 
 owners, we observed a marked contrast to the state of the 
 street in the well-swept floors and great tidiness and good 
 order of all the interior arrangements of the homestead. On 
 the left of us was a buffalo-shed, and near it a shed for cooking 
 and another for other domestic purposes. On our right was 
 the dwelling-place of the family, consisting of a large shed 
 with a thatched roof and walls made of mud-cement and 
 floors smeared with mud. The one door-way was so low, that 
 we had to stoop on entering. Creeping inside we noticed that 
 the dimly-lighted apartment had a vacant space in the middle 
 with a solitary piece of furniture in the shape of a small char- 
 poy, barely big enough for the father and mother to lie upon, 
 while the children slept on the floor. All around the wall 
 were about fourteen huge bee-hive shaped receptacles for 
 stored grain bound round and round with straw bands. We 
 noticed also a weaving-loom, some gourds for holding water, 
 some native-made umbrellas and a collection of bows and 
 
 arrows. 
 • As to wardrobe, nothing of the kind was visible. Nor was 
 
 it needed, since the only dress of the men is a strip of cloth, 
 Vwhile a single Sari satisfies the women, though this one 
 
 P p a 
 
580 Account of the Santa'ls. 
 
 article of dress may consist of a strip of calico, five or six 
 yards long. The women, however, have very heavy brass 
 ornaments on their neck, arms, ancles and toes, besides curious 
 brass finger-rings ; the whole collection of ornaments often 
 weighing sixteen pounds. We observed that the girls and 
 women were generally tolerably clean and always bright and 
 cheerful ; but the men were dirty, rough and unkempt, with 
 long locks of dark hair hanging down over their shoulders. 
 As to the children, they ran about, innocent of all clothing, and 
 to all appearances utterly untended and uncared for, in the 
 full enjoyment of unmitigated dirt. Each child, too, held in 
 its hand a stick of sugar-cane, the continued sucking of which 
 was not conducive to its facial cleanliness. 
 
 And I may mention here that throughout India there exists 
 a superstition according to which it is unlucky to wash 
 children until they reach a certain age, or until they have 
 been taken to some far distant temple, to the deity of which 
 they have been dedicated at their birth. 
 
 I was informed that Santal parents exercise little or no 
 control over their offspring, and for no other reason than a 
 rooted dislike to trouble of any kind. Girls are not generally 
 married till fourteen or even fifteen or sixteen years of age, 
 betrothal taking place three or four days previously. It is 
 important to choose a lucky day for both betrothal and wed- 
 ding. This is done by observing omens, and strange to say, 
 the sight of a dead body is considered auspicious. Santal 
 wives, however, must always be purchased, and the price of 
 a bride ranges from five to sixteen rupees. With regard to 
 intermarriage there are no distinctions of caste among the 
 Santals, but there are diiTerences of tribe ; each tribe forming 
 a kind of separate caste. A curious custom prevails of not 
 permitting a youth to take a wife of the same tribe as himself. 
 
 Emerging from the homestead, which served as a fair sample 
 of Santal family-life, we proceeded to the centre of the village, 
 where in an open space was a small shed roofed over with 
 
Account of the Santals. cgi 
 
 circular tiles and supported by four posts and a central pole. 
 Its clay floor, smeared with cow-dung, was raised about two 
 feet from the ground, and on one side of the central pole were 
 ranged what resembled three thick nine-pins, roughly moulded 
 out of clay and made somewhat thicker in the centre. The 
 whole Santal community firmly believe that these are tenanted 
 by the spirits of the last three head-men (Manjhl) of the village, 
 and the simple shed-like shrine which contains them is there- 
 fore called the Manjhi-than or abode of the Manjhis. To these 
 clay representatives of their dead chiefs daily offerings are 
 made, and it struck me that Africa itself could not afford a 
 better illustration of genuine fetish-worship. ' They cleared the 
 jungle for us, they watched over the cultivation of our fields, 
 and it is now our turn to support them by our offerings.' 
 Such was the explanation given by the villagers themselves. 
 
 Further on we came upon the village- weaver. His loom 
 was of the simplest construction. A hole dug in the ground 
 served as a receptacle for his legs and a quantity of branches 
 formed a roof over his head. Half hidden in that well-like 
 cavity he sat patiently at work to supply the wants of his 
 fellow-villagers. We were told, that a hard-working man could 
 weave five yards a day of a kind of rough unbleached cloth. 
 
 Before leaving the street we were invited to witness a 
 Santal dance. Three young men stood in a row holding 
 drums (tom-toms), two of which were beaten with the hand 
 and one with sticks. Then a row of eight girls filed out of 
 their dwellings looking bright and modest. These clasped 
 hands together, each girl bending her fingers upwards through 
 the fingers of the next girl and turning the other palm towards 
 us. In this way they made a quiet movement backwards and 
 forwards, advancing and retix'ing with joined hands to the sound 
 of the drums or occasionally moving sideways and singing a 
 low quaint melody. The effect was simple and the com- 
 bination of dance and song was on the whole pleasing and 
 attractive. It seems that dancing, singing and feasting to- 
 
582 Account of the Santals. 
 
 gether make up a considerable portion of the every-day life 
 of every Santal community. 
 
 Passing out of the street we noticed that the village was 
 surrounded with well-cultivated paddy fields. Here and there 
 flocks and herds were grazing and nowhere could we detect 
 any signs of poverty. Yet Santal men are decidedly lazy, and 
 in the winter do very little work beyond using their bows and 
 arrows in hunting for game. When the rain comes they may 
 be seen exerting themselves a little to turn up the soil. But 
 even then the women have to make up for the laziness of the 
 men. They not only cook for the family, but are expected 
 to work in the fields, reap the harvest and carry the grain on 
 their heads for storing at home. 
 
 Just outside the village was the sacred grove, which always 
 consists of Sal-trees — tall stately trees, not unlike poplars. 
 Under a cluster of three of these trees planted close together 
 (compare p. 33a) we noticed rude erections consisting of four 
 poles with three crossing at the top to keep the structures 
 together. It is in these that the six great Bongas or Demon^ 
 Spirits named Jaherera, Monreko, Turuiko, Marang Burn, 
 Gosaeera and Fergana Bonga are believed to reside. Of these 
 six Marang Buru is thought to have most power over human 
 beings. Indeed^ although the Santals believe in the existence 
 of one Supreme God, they consider that He need not be 
 worshipped since He has no dealings with His creatures except 
 through the great demon-spirit Marang Buru, who alone re- 
 quires any real adoration and propitiation. He is a supreme 
 Being it is true, but He resides too far away in the inac- 
 cessible orb of the Sun ; He is even identified with the Sun, 
 and the Sun is therefore saluted every morning (compare 
 pp. 62, 406), and a festival held in his honour at intervals of 
 three, five, seven or ten years. 
 
 Yet it is certain that Heliolatry is not a real element in 
 the religion of the Santals. Such religion as they possess 
 consists rather in Demonolatry — that is, in the worship of 
 
Account of the Santdls. 583 
 
 demon-spirits (Bongas) combined with ancestor-worship. In 
 this respect the aboriginal tribes closely resemble the great 
 majority of the unlettered and ignorant Hindus of the mixed 
 Aryan race who live around them. 
 
 Yet it should be noted that the worship of a man's own 
 deceased ancestors is thought to be a duty which is not so 
 obligatory on a Santal as the homage due to the departed 
 spirits of the head-men of his own village ; for his belief is that 
 the interests of the community ought to take precedence of 
 those of the family. 
 
 As to the worship of demons and spirits, it is not, of course, 
 limited to Marang Buru or to any of the six enumerated 
 above ; for demon-spirits are innumerable. They haunt the 
 air, pervade the waters, ride on the winds, and are to be found 
 everywhere, being particularly fond of residing in trees and 
 sometimes dwelling in animals and even in men. They in- 
 fluence for good or evil all the affairs and events of life ; and 
 if they are not well supplied with food and offerings, they 
 become very spiteful and vindictive, causing diseases, pro- 
 ducing storms and blighting crops ^ 
 
 These demon-spirits, however, are not represented by images 
 (compare pp. 243 ; 349). We have already seen that rude 
 nine-pins like lumps of clay are set up in roughly constructed 
 shrines, as representatives of the spirits of the head-men. 
 In contradistinction to these clay fetishes, lumps of quartz, 
 smeared with red paint, are deposited under trees to represent 
 the demon-spirits (Bongas) dwelling in the sacred groves. 
 Several feasts are held in honour of the demon-spirits, but the 
 chief festival of the year is that called Soharai at the begin- 
 
 1 They will apparently take possession of hysterical persons, who, when 
 so possessed, jump and run about, writhe and contort their limbs, or speak 
 in the name of some demon, perhaps, to some terrified villager, or calling 
 out and saying :-' I am come to eat your wife, if you do not wish her 
 to be killed (by some disease) you must give a goat to propitiate the 
 demon.' 
 
584 Account of the Santals. 
 
 ning of January. Mr. Stevenson describes it as a kind of 
 harvest festival, which lasts for four or five days ia each 
 village ; but as the period of its celebration varies in different 
 places, every community invites the other to its own feast, 
 and in this way the feasting may be prolonged for a month. 
 There is much drinking of strong liquor, distilled from Mahwa 
 flowers, the method of distilling which is supposed to have 
 been revealed by the chief demon, Marang Buru. 
 
 In fact, a Santal has no idea of any form of worship except 
 that of propitiating an irascible being by offerings of food and 
 sacrifices of fowls and other animals, of which the worshippers 
 partake themselves. His religion is one of much eating and 
 drinking and carousing. He has no conception of sin in the 
 Christian sense; nor would he dream of asking pardon for 
 any error, except that of omitting to make a sufficient number 
 of oblations. No act of immorality, according to his ideas, 
 can possibly offend a Bonga. If a villager sins against a 
 fellow-villager, a money compensation to the person sinned 
 against expiates all the guilt. 
 
 Then each family has its own special Bonga belonging to 
 the household which must be propitiated every day, and is 
 on special occasions very exacting. If, after receiving his due 
 mead of offerings and invocations, he does nothing for the 
 fulfilment of the wishes of the family, he is abused in decidedly 
 strong and vituperative language ^. 
 
 Then Bongas often dwell in ferocious animals, such as 
 tigers and leopards, and when a Bonga occupies human 
 beings or otherwise harmless animals, it may make them 
 fierce and dangerous. 
 
 When we were passing through the Santal district, we were 
 gravely warned to beware of an elephant which had been 
 
 ' For instance :— ' I gave you a goat and you ought to be ashamed of 
 yourself, you are a brute (or some equivalent expression) for not having 
 cured my son.' 
 
Account of the Santals. 585 
 
 selected by a Bonga for its habitation, and had killed several 
 people who had before found it tractable and good-tempered. 
 
 In regard to death-ceremonies, I was informed that the 
 occasion of a death among the Santals is always made an 
 excuse for a feast. Then after the corpse is cremated, five 
 small bones or pieces of bone are searched for among the 
 ashes. If portions of the skull or collar-bone can be found 
 they are preferred to any other fragments ^ These are care- 
 fully placed in an earthen lota, and are either preserved in 
 the house of the nearest relative or are buried under a tree 
 until an opportunity occurs of making a pilgrimage to the 
 river Damodar 2, which is the sacred river of the Santals. In 
 due course of time the nearest relative carries these pieces of 
 bone to the sacred stream, taking with him some bread for 
 offerings. Next he erects three rude altars on the bank, and 
 entering the water, first immerses his own body and then 
 scatters the bony fragments on the stream, allowing the 
 current to bear them away. 
 
 Finally he makes three offerings of bread on the altars — one 
 to Marang Burn, calling on that spirit to introduce his relative 
 to the world of spirits ; another to the spirits of his ancestors, 
 inviting them to receive the recently deceased man; and a 
 third to the spirit of the dead man himself, at the same time 
 expressing a hope that every possible steps have been taken 
 for the furtherance of his welfare in the other world. 
 
 These strange superstitions, as well as those previously 
 described, point to a close connexion with Hinduism, and 
 testify to the fact of a constant interaction and interfusion 
 of religious ideas between Aryan and Non-Aryan races 
 (see pp. 374-312). 
 
 It is this interaction between Brahmanical pantheism and 
 the pre-existing cults and superstitions, not only of aboriginal 
 
 m 
 
 ^ Compare the funeral ceremony witnessed by me at Bombay, described 
 my work ' Modern India and the Indians' (Trubner and Co.), p. 97. 
 ^ Damodara is a name of Krishna and also of a river in Bengal. 
 
586 Conclusion. 
 
 races, but of Dravidians and Buddhists, that has led to the 
 production of the composite and complex religious system 
 which, from the absence of any one founder or supreme Head, 
 and from the want of a general name applied to it by the 
 Hindus themselves, we have been obliged to designate by the 
 double title — ' Brahmanism and Hinduism ' — a system which, 
 as I have explained in the Preface to this volume, is really 
 no system, but rather a vast mosaic, inlaid with every variety 
 of idea which the human mind, unaided by any true super- 
 natural inspiration, is able to conceive and elaborate for itself. 
 
 And the reader who looks back on the foregoing pages 
 will, I think, bear me out when I assert that I have had no 
 light task in endeavouring to bring some kind of order out 
 of a chaotic confusion of creeds, traditions and usages, over- 
 laid with some of the worst superstitions which have ever 
 degraded the human race at any time or in any country. 
 
 We may speak of this complicated system as pecuhar to 
 India and the Indians, but in real fact the pantheistic ideas on 
 which it rests and its cardinal doctrines of Self-evolution, 
 self-evolved righteousness, and self-created new-births, belong 
 quite as much to other nations, and are the spontaneous pro- 
 duct of every human thinker's inborn faculties and instincts, 
 when they work naturally. 
 
 Our conviction is that Hinduism will ultimately crumble to 
 pieces when brought more fully into contact with the truths 
 of Christianity. But it may be predicted that, as long as 
 human nature and the human mind remain what they are, so 
 long will this subjectively evolved creed, though its doctrines 
 and its gods may be called by other names, continue to prevail 
 in various parts of the world, and its more philosophic phases 
 continue to commend themselves to those who deny that there 
 is any other source of authority in religion than a man's own 
 innate personal intuitions, and any other external revelation 
 than the book of Nature. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Observe— In the following Index the numbers indicate the pages. When more than one 
 page is given the numbers are separated by semicolons. A unit separated from a pre- 
 ceding number by a comma indicates the number of a foot-note. 
 
 Abbe Dubois, 555. 
 Abhisheka, 68. 
 
 Abhisheka-patra (vessel),4i2. 
 Abstinence (total), 195. 
 Abu (Mount), 349. 
 Aiamana, 144 ; 401 ; 407. 
 Afamaniya, 415. 
 Acarya (worship of), loi ; 
 
 116; 117. 
 A&rya-tarpana, 410. 
 A-iit, 130. 
 ! Activity, 36. 
 
 Acts (live Sakta), 192-196. 
 Adam (Mr. W.), 485. 
 Adbhnta-brabmana, 398. 
 Adhika-masa, 433. 
 Adhishthana-deha, 28; 293,1. 
 Adhyapaka, 515. 
 Adibrahma-Samaj, 493 ; 526. 
 Adi-Granth, 161 ; 169. 
 Aditi, 15 ; 182 ; 223. 
 Aditya, 75. 
 Adityas, 10. 
 
 A-dvaita, 122 ; 139 ; 142. 
 Advaita-drohinah, 86. 
 Afghanistan, 4. 
 Agama, 185 ; (Sacred Books 
 
 oftheSaivas), 89. 
 Agama-prakasa, 94 ; 189, x. 
 Agastya, 421. 
 
 Age (Dvapara), III ; (Kali), 
 , "4; 163; (Satya), 109; 
 
 (Treta), 110. 
 Ages (four), 433. 
 Agha-marshana, 404. 
 Aghora-panthi, 87 ; 94. 
 Aghorl, 87 ; 94. 
 Agnayi, 14 ; 182. 
 Agni, 559; 10 ; 15. 
 Agnihotri-Brahmans, 50. 
 Agni-Narayana, 50. 
 Agnishtoma, 36S. 
 Agra, 175 5 (tort), 272. 
 
 Aham-kara, 31; 32. 
 
 Ahi, 320. 
 
 Ahmedabad, 149. 
 
 Ahobala, 129. 
 
 Ahuti (offerings), 425. 
 
 Air, 20 ; 30. 
 
 Airavata, 109. 
 
 Aitareya-brahmana, 21; 24 ; 
 
 102. 
 Ajagava, 8l. 
 Ajmere, 529; 559. 
 Ajnana, 35. 
 Ajya, 367. 
 Akali, 175. 
 Akasa (ether), 30. 
 Akbar (Emperor), 318. 
 Akhay Kumar Datta, 492. 
 Akshatah, 420. 
 Akshaya-vata (tree), 337. 
 Alchemy (Sakta idea of), 206. 
 Alibag, 392. 
 Allahabad (camp-meeting at), 
 
 136. 
 All Souls' day, 275, 3. 
 Alopi (shrine of), 226. 
 AmalakI, 339 ; 568. 
 Amar-das, 164. 
 Amaru-Sataka, 56, 2. 
 Amba (mother), 222. 
 Ammans (mothers), 228. 
 Amrita, 108. 
 
 Amrita-sar (tank), 165; (tem- 
 ple at), 175 ; (town), 166. 
 Amrita-vapuh, 106, i. 
 Amritsar. See Amrita-sar. 
 Amulet, 204 ; 468. 
 An-adhyaya, 433. 
 Anala, 82. 
 Ananda, 34. 
 Ananda-giri, 59. 
 Ananda-tirtha, 130. 
 An-anta, 323. 
 Anantesvar, 130. 
 
 Anaryan, 388, I. 
 
 Auavalopana, 356. 
 
 Ancestor-worship, 72 ; 274. 
 
 Andhaka, 81. 
 
 Anga, 164. 
 
 Ahgada, 164. 
 
 Angarakha, 395. 
 
 Anger (personified), 404, I. 
 
 Angirasa, 407. 
 
 Angushtha-niatra, 291. 
 
 Animal-life (sacredness of), 
 
 118; 316. 
 Animal-marriages, 327. 
 Animal- sacrifice, 13; 369; 
 
 393. 
 Animal-worship, 73 ; 313. 
 Animals (sacred), 327; 328. 
 Animishah, 106, i. 
 Animism, 339 ; 340. 
 Ankana (branding), 132. 
 Anna-prasana, 353 ; 358. 
 Anna-piirna, 87, 2 ; 439. 
 Ansa, 142. 
 Ansa-riipini, 187. 
 Antar-vedi, 282. 
 Antaryamin, 123. 
 Anthropomorphism, 7. 
 Antyeshti, 22; 394; 532. 
 Anumana, 39. 
 An-upalabdhi, 39, I. 
 Anuradha-pura, 338. 
 Anusasana-parvan, 78 ; 105. 
 Anushthanika, 524. 
 Anustarani, 282, I. 
 Apah (water), 30. 
 Apam-napat, 346. 
 Apa-smara, 441. 
 Ap-linga, 446. 
 Apsaras, 337 ; 238. 
 Arani, 9; 364; 368. 
 Arddha-mandapa, 447. 
 Ardha-nari, 85. 
 Ardha-narlsa, 225. 
 
588 
 
 Arghya,404; 4I5- 
 
 Arghya-dana, 404. 
 
 Arishta, 193. 
 
 Aristotle, 105, i. 
 
 Arjun, 164 ; 165 ; (tomb of), 
 
 174; 175- 
 
 Arjiina, 63 ; 271 ; 272. 
 
 Arka (tree), 338. 
 
 Arrack, 193. 
 
 Arrows (five, of Love\ 200, 
 
 Arrowy bed, 560 ; 561. 
 
 Artha, 388. 
 
 Arthapatti, 39, I. 
 
 Arti, 94. 
 
 Arts (Indian), 462 ; 468. 
 
 Aruna, I04, 3. 
 
 Arya, 4. 
 
 Arya-dharma, 20; 53; 55. 
 
 Aryaman, 5. 
 
 Aryans, 223 ; 244 ; (early re- 
 ligion of), II. 
 
 Arya-Samaj, 529. 
 
 Aryavarta, 517; 531. 
 
 Asana, 415. 
 
 Asapiira, 227. 
 
 Asauia, 288 ; 57 r. 
 
 Ascetics (Aghora-panthi), 87 ; 
 (AkSsa - mukiiin), 87 ; 
 (Kapalika), 88; Liiiga- 
 vaf), 88 ; (Saiva), 86-88 ; 
 (tjrdliva-bahu), 87 ; (at 
 Benares), 87, 2 ; (at Bom- 
 bay), 91 ; (at Gaya), 87, 
 2 ; (Dandin), 87. 
 
 Asclepias Acida, 12. 
 
 Ashes (application of), 400; 
 (act of taking up), 420. 
 
 Asiatic (Journal), 432 ; 51 1, 1. 
 
 Asoka (tree"), 338. 
 
 Asrama, 154. 
 
 Asramas (fourl, 362. 
 
 Association (Reform), 506. 
 
 Asthi-sandaya, 284; 300; 302, 
 
 Asthi-vilaya-lirtham (at Na- 
 sik), 301. 
 
 Astrologer (family), 372 ; 
 
 _ (village), 457. 
 
 Asura, 235 ; 236 ; 237. 
 
 Asvalayana, 281 ; 356 ; 358. 
 
 Asva-medha, 8 ; 24 ; 329. 
 
 Asvattha (tree), 83 : 335. 
 
 AsvSvatara, 114. 
 
 Asvins, 9 ; 271 ; 341. 
 
 Atala, 102, I. 
 
 Atharva-veda, 8 ; 9; 15; 21; 
 182, 2 ; 238. 
 
 Ati-kriddhra (fast), 427. 
 
 Atithi-pujana, 423, i. 
 
 Ativahika, 28. 
 
 Atman (or Atma), 20 ; 26 ; 
 
 Index. 
 
 27; 31. 2; 3i?; 34; 37; 
 
 _ 85 ; 95, 2 ; xxi. 
 Atmaram Pandurang (Dr.), 
 _ 526. 
 
 Atmiya-Sabha (society), 482. 
 Atmosphere, 5, 
 AuM, 44. 
 
 Aurangzib (Emperor), 166 ; 
 168; 477; (mosque of), 
 
 437- 
 Aurdhva-dehikam, 293, i. 
 Aushadham, 106. 
 Avadana, 368. 
 Avahana (invocation), 19 ; 
 
 415; 418. 
 Avatara, 47 ; 62 ; 63 ; 97. 
 Avayava, 39. 
 A-vyakta, 30. 
 Axe (Rama with), no. 
 Ayatana, 413. 
 
 AyenSr, 209; 218-220; 245. 
 Ayenar-appan, 218. 
 Ayodhya (Oudh), no. 
 
 Babar (Emperor), 161. 
 Babylonia, 313. 
 Bacchus (Indian), 12. 
 Badava-mukhah, 106, 
 Badrinath, 55, I. 
 Bagala (or Vagala), 1 1 8. 
 Bahadur Shah, 168. 
 Baitaranl. See Vaitaranl. 
 Bala-ji, 267. 
 Balak-das, 179. 
 Bala- Krishna, 1 36. 
 Bala-rama, 112; 113 ; 195; 
 
 270; 323- 
 
 Bah (sacrifice), 25 ; 31)3. 
 
 Bali (tyrant-demon), 104, 2 ; 
 no; 233. 
 
 Baii-gayatri, 201. 
 
 Bali-harana (ceremony), 329 ; 
 394; 418; 421. 
 
 Balini, 188. 
 
 Baikh, 4. 
 
 Bam-i-dunya, 3. 
 
 Bana, 104, i. 
 
 Bana-Unga, 69; 392; 412; 
 561. 
 
 Banaras, 434, I. 
 
 Banerjea (Dr. K. M.), 121 ; 
 123; 322, I. 
 
 Banyan, 337. 
 
 Baptism (selt"), 403. 
 
 Barber (village), 459 ; (pro- 
 fessional), 374. 
 
 Barth (A.), 19; 211, i. 
 
 Basaba, 88 ; (purana), 88. 
 
 Basil (holy), 333. ' 
 
 Bathing (religious), 393 ; 399. 
 
 Baval or Babul (tree), 399, i. 
 
 Bazaars (Indian), 463. 
 Beaconsfield,Lord ^late), 88,2. 
 Beatification, 41 ; 118 ; 234, 
 Bedaraji, 227. 
 Bell (adoration of), 414. 
 Benares, 50; 272; 434; 
 
 (Sraddha at), 308, 
 Bentinck (Lord W.), 490. 
 Berai, 227. 
 
 Berkeley, 33, I ; 132, 
 Betrothal (ceremony of), 377. 
 Bhadrotsab, 504. 
 Bhagat, 87, 1 ; (Sikh saints), 
 
 162 ; 169. 
 Bhagavad-gita, 63, 2; 116; 
 
 235- 
 Bhagavata-purana, 45 ; 116; 
 
 141. 
 Bhairava, 82 ; 85, 
 Bhairavi, 188. 
 Bhakta, 87, I. 
 Bhakta-mala, 147. 
 Bhakti, 97. 
 Bhakti-marga, 63. 
 Bhakti-sutras, 63, 2 ; 97. 
 Bhandara (of a Bhiita), 248. 
 Bhandarkar (Prof.), 121, i ; 
 
 528. 
 Bharata, 47. 
 Bharatavarshlya Brahma- 
 
 Samaj, 502. 
 Bhaskaraiarya (astronomer), 
 
 146 ; 202. 
 Bhasma-dharana, 399. 
 Bhat, 169. 
 Bhava, 85. 
 Bhavani, 79, 
 Bhikshu, 53 ; 55 ; 362. 
 Btiikshukas, 386. 
 Bhima, 271 ; 272 ; 322. 
 Bhishma, 561-564. 
 Bhog, 170. 
 Bhogavati, 322. 
 Bhojaiia-vidhi, 423. 
 Bhrigu,45; 46; 52,1; 264. 
 Bhrigu-pata (suicide), 349. 
 Bhringi, 441. 
 Bhroach, 337 ; 569. 
 Bhumya, 243. 
 Bhur, 9 ; 102, 1 ; 403. 
 Bhuta, 82 ; 241. 
 Bhuta-bhavana, 83. 
 Bhiita- puja, 71. 
 B:iuta-sthan, 249. 
 Bhiita-suddhi, 197, 
 Bhata-yajna, 421. 
 Bhuvah, 9. 
 Bhuvanesvara (temple of), 68, 
 
 3; 93. 
 
 Bhuvanesvari, 188, 
 Bhuvar, 102, i ; 234 ; 403. 
 
Bible (Hindu), 8 ; (of nomis- 
 
 tic Brahmanism), 52 ; 
 
 (Saiva), 73; (Sakta), 184; 
 
 (Sikh), 158; 161; 165; 
 
 (Vaishnava), n6 ; (of 
 
 tenth Guru), 167. 
 Bickersteth (Bishop), 516, 
 Bija, 197-202. 
 Bil (leaves), 90. 
 Bilva (Vilva-tree), 336. 
 Birbhiim, 332. 
 Bird (Gamda), 104; 327. 
 Birds (of ill-omen), 329 ; 398. 
 '. Birdwood (Sir George), 460. 
 IBirth-record, 372. 
 
 Blacksmith (village), 459. 
 :: Blessedness (stages of), 10. 
 Bliss (pure), 34 ; (method of 
 
 obtaining), 444 ; (three 
 
 conditions of), 118. 
 Boar, 109. 
 
 Bodh-gaya. SeeBuddha-Gaya. 
 Body (causal), 35 ; (gross), 
 
 28; 35! (subtle), 28; 35. 
 Bombay (burning- ground), 
 
 284; 302. 
 Bone - gathering ceremony, 
 
 384^ 300 ; 302. 
 Bose (Ananda Mohan), 513 ; 
 
 (Raj Narain),' 478 ; 494; 
 
 496; 500; ^11, 2; 514; 
 
 526, I ; (S. C), 295 ; 
 
 306; 307; 429. 
 Bo-tree (Bodhi-druma), 338. 
 Bow (miraculous), 109 ; 
 
 (Vishnu's), 104. 
 Brahma, 2 ; 3; 21 ; 25 ; 34; 
 
 35 ; 43 ; 409- 
 
 Brahma, 2 ; 3; 102, i. 
 
 Brahma, 31, 2 ; 36 ; 44 ; 
 48 ; 65 ; 66, i ; 95 ; (wor- 
 ship of), 555-569. 
 
 BrahmaiarT, 55; 84; 151; 
 363. 
 J Brahmadi-stamba, 44, i. 
 " Brahnia-dvish, 237. 
 
 Brahma-karma-pustaka, 401. 
 
 Brahma-loka, 54; 291. 
 
 Brahman (the God), 21 ; 26. 
 
 Brahman. See Brahmans. 
 I Brahma-dharma, 494. 
 
 Brahmanas, 21; 52; (story 
 '°)' 356 > (doctrine of), 
 140. 
 
 Brahmanhood (two badges 
 
 . of). 374- 
 
 i Brahmanism, 253; 19-5.';; 
 97; (four phases of), 21 ; 
 (fundamental doctrine of), 
 20; 21; (mythological), 
 41-51 ; (nomistic), 51-53 !■ 
 
 Index. 
 
 (pantheism of), 224; (phi- 
 losophical), 25-41; (ritual- 
 istic), 21-24; (theory of), 
 180. 
 Brahmans, 2 ; 53 ; (acts and 
 duties of), 393 ; 394; (A- 
 yengSr), 129; (god of), 
 84; (Mantra-sastris), 199 ; 
 (race), 353; (two classes 
 oO. 386; (Vaidik), 386; 
 
 (Vedic),so;(wifeof),394- 
 Brahmanyah, 106, I. 
 Brahma-randhram, 291. 
 Brahma-Sabha, 486. 
 Brahma-Samaj, 491-539 ; (of 
 
 India), 502-536; (schism 
 
 in), 510 ; (festivals), 504. 
 Brahma-sambandha, 136. 
 Brahma-vid, 84. 
 Brahma-yajna, 393 ; 408. 
 Brahmiya-Samaj, 486. 
 Brahmopasana, 493. 
 Brahmotsava (festival), 510. 
 Branding (ceremony of), 139 ; 
 
 (Madhva), 132 ; 133. 
 Brands (Saiva), 67 ; (Ten- 
 
 galai), 127; (Vaishnava), 
 
 67; 118. 
 Breath (exercise), 40?. 
 Brihad-aranyaka Upanishad, 
 
 26; 39; 182. 
 Brihas-pati, 215. 
 Brishotsarga.SeeVrishotsarga. 
 Broach. See Bhroach. 
 Buddha, 42; 58; 64; I14; 
 
 338. 
 Buddha-Gaya, 272 ; 338. 
 Buddhi, 27 ; 31 ; 32 ; 315, 2. 
 Buddhism, 3; 41; 68;97; 114. 
 Buddhists, 3. 
 
 Buffalo (Yama's), 104, 3. 
 Bull (Siva's), 104, 3. 
 Burial-ground, 94. 
 Burnell, Dr. (late), 13, I ; 
 
 52, i; 56, I ; 62, 1 ; 247. 
 Burning-ground, 279; 284; 
 
 302. 
 Butter (clarified), 6. 
 
 C'aitanya (life of), 138; 139; 
 
 140; 142; 476; 515. 
 C'aitanya-daritamrita, 144. 
 C'akra, 103. 
 
 C'akravarti (Nilambar), 138. 
 Caldwell (Bishop), 251. 
 Camp-meeting, 261. 
 C'amparanya (forest), 134. 
 C'amunda, 188, I ; 228. 
 L'andalas, 422. 
 C'aiidana (sandal), 144 ; 308 ; 
 
 415- 
 
 589 
 
 C'andra, 108. 
 
 C'andrayana-vrala (fast), 427. 
 
 C'aranamrita, 137. 
 
 Car-festival (Jagan-nath),447. 
 
 Carpenter (Miss Mary),478,i. 
 
 Carpenter (village), 459. 
 
 Cashmere, i ; 4. 
 
 Caste (institution oQ, 17; 
 18; 63; 128, I ; (in rela- 
 tion to trades and indus- 
 tries), 452-474; 487, I ; 
 (abolition of, among Sikhs), 
 167 ; (definition of), 471 ; 
 (kingly and military), 98 ; 
 no; (subordination of), 
 139 ; (temporary suppres- 
 sion of), 192, I ; (tyranny 
 of), 298 ; 472 ; (equality 
 °0> 377; (abolition of), 
 499- 
 
 Cat (sacred), 328. 
 
 Cat-hold theory, 125. 
 
 C'aturmasya (sacrifice), 368. 
 
 C'aturthi-karma, 354. 
 
 C'aula, 353 ; 359. 
 
 Cause (material), 119. 
 
 Caves (Buddhistic), 271. 
 
 Census, 453 ; 535. 
 
 Ceremonies (at Liiiga Shrine), 
 89-91 ; (domestic), 52 
 (funeral and Sraddha), 28f 
 (over a corpse), 297 , 
 I, Saiva), 89-94 ; (name- 
 gi^ing), 3.7°; (Sakta), 192- 
 196 ; (Sraddha), 284 ; 
 (Tambila), 248. 
 
 Ceylon, 245; 313. 
 
 Chamar, 179. 
 
 Chanda-pur, 323. 
 
 C'handas, 7. 
 
 C'handogya Upanishad, 26 ; 
 
 34- 
 Chapai, 148. 
 Charms, 197-202 ; 354. 
 C'hathi (goddess), 229. 
 Chatisgarh, 179. 
 Chatterjea (Nagendra-nath), 
 
 478. 
 Child-marriages, 385 ; 387 ; 
 
 500. . 
 Child-widows, 388. 
 Children's attire, 397. 
 China, 313. 
 C'hinna-mastaka, 188. 
 Christianity, 3, and Vaishna- 
 
 VTsm (compared), 119. 
 Churel (demon), 339. 
 Circles (holy), 196. 
 Circumambulation, 68, 2 ; 
 
 145; 334; 348; 415- 
 C'it, 34 ; 120. 
 
590 
 
 Index. 
 
 C'it-pavan (tribe of Brah- 
 mans), 271, I ; 311. 
 
 C'itra-gupta, 292 ; 425. 
 
 C'itrahuti, 425. 
 
 C'itra-kiita, 147 ; 349. 
 
 C'itrinl (woman), 389. 
 
 C'itta-vritti-nirodha, 4«. 
 
 Class (Smarta), 95 ; (Saivas), 
 95 ; (Vaishnava), 95. 
 
 Classes (four distinct), 53 ; 
 (three principal Hindu), 95. 
 
 Cleanliness, 88. 
 
 Club (Musala), 112; (Vish- 
 nu's), 103; 104. 
 
 Coiling-folk, 324. 
 
 Colebrooke, 417, 2. 
 
 Collet (Miss S. G.), 475, 1. 
 
 Colombo, 247. 
 
 Commerce (Indian and Euro- 
 pean compared), 454. 
 
 Conch-shell, 92 ; 103 ; 104 ; 
 109; 412; 413. 
 
 Conjivaram = Kanjivaram. 
 
 Continuity (law of), 330. 
 
 Converts (Christian), I. 
 
 Cooking (of food), 128 ; 423. 
 
 Council (village), 456. 
 
 Courtezans (Indian), 451. 
 
 Cow (of plenty), 108; (sa- 
 credness of), 172; (worship 
 of), 317; 318. 
 
 Cowell (Prof.), 119; 122; 
 
 123; 133- 
 
 Cowherdesses, 136. 
 
 Cowman (village), 459. 
 
 Cows (sacrificed), 195. 
 
 Creation (description of), 13, 
 
 Creator, 45. 
 
 Creed (Aryan), 53 ; (Brah- 
 man), 523; (Hindu), 37; 
 (of modern Theism), 503. 
 
 Cremation, 281; 299; 518; 
 519, I ; 569-572. 
 
 Crocodiles (sacred), 328. 
 
 Crosses (sacred), 90. 
 
 Crows (sacred), 329. 
 
 C'udel (demon), 229. 
 
 Dadii, 178; 268. 
 Dadii-panthi, 178., 
 Daityas, 233 ; 238. 
 Daiva, 235. 
 
 Daivika (Sraddha), 305. 
 Dakini, 189. 
 Uaksha (sage), 82. 
 Dakshina (gilt), 308. 
 Dakshina-margi, 185. 
 Damaru, 81. 
 Damdama, 168. 
 Danavas, 233 ; 238. 
 JJancing (religious), 141; 451; 
 
 (demoniacal), 246 ; 247 ; 
 248. 
 Danda, xxi note. 
 Danda-dhara, 290. 
 Dandin (Saiva ascetic), 87- 
 Dara-ganj, 323. 
 Darbar Sahib, 1 75. 
 Darbha Sraddha, 306. 
 Darkness (indifference), 31. 
 Darsana, 61, i ; 152. 
 Daruul ratrih, 204. 
 Darvi (spoon), 420. 
 Dasa (slave), 358. 
 Dasa-hara (festival), 329. 
 Dasa-nami Dandins, 87. 
 Dasangula, 414, 1. 
 Dasa-ratha, 1 10. 
 Dasya, 141. 
 Dasyus, 237. 
 
 Datta (Akhay Kumar), 492. 
 Dattatreya, 205; 267. 
 Dawn, 9 ; (goddess), 182. 
 Dawns (personified), 407. 
 Dayabhaga, 286, I. 
 Dayananda Sarasvati, 529- 
 
 531- 
 Dead (the condition of), 274. 
 Death, 274 ; (present HindS 
 
 creed regarding), 291. 
 Debendra-nath Tagore, 491 ; 
 
 498; 514; 531- 
 
 Dehii, 265. 
 
 Deification, 258; (Chinese), 
 262 ; (local), 263. 
 
 Deities (favourite presiding), 
 50 ; (tutelary), 209-229. 
 
 Demon-dancing, 246 ; 247. 
 
 Demon and devil (not con- 
 vertible terms), 231. 
 
 Demon-festivals, 247. 
 
 Demon-host (lord of), 215 ; 
 218 ; (three classes), 241. 
 
 Demon-kings (seven), 236. 
 
 Demonophobia, 210. 
 
 Demons (character of), 234 ; 
 (corporeal organization ot), 
 235 ; (destroyed by Vish- 
 nu), 104, 2 ; (numbers of), 
 234; (orders of), 213; (two 
 great divisions of), 236. 
 
 Demon-shrines, 243. 
 
 Demon-worship, 71 ; 230- 
 256. 
 
 Dennehy (General), 534. 
 
 Dervishes, 141, 1. 
 
 Deshmukh (Gopal Hari), 94, 
 2 ; 189, I ; 200, 2 ; 208 ; 
 311; 401, 2. 
 
 Destroying-god, 9. 
 
 Dev (deva, god), 272, i. 
 
 Deva-cakra, 196. 
 
 Deva-dasi, 451. 
 Devaki, III ; 112 ; 113. 
 Deva-piija, 394 ; 411; 573. 
 Devas, 4. 
 
 Devata-pujana, 394, i. 
 Deva-tarpana, 409. 
 DevayanI, 194, i ; 214. 
 Devi, 185. 
 
 Devil and demon (not con- 
 vertible terms), 231. 
 Devil-dancing, 246; 247; 248. 
 Devil-region, 245. 
 Devil-worship, 244 ,- 251. 
 Devotee (at Bombay), 92. 
 Dhan, 117. 
 Dhanna, 169. 
 Dhanus, 1 09. 
 Dhanush-koti, 444; 445. 
 Dhanvantari, 108; 422. 
 Dharma, 290; 388. 
 Dharma-raja, 290. 
 Dharma-sala (clergy asylum), 
 
 163- 
 Dharma-sastra, 51.. 
 Dharma-tattva, 510, 1 ; 513. 
 Dher, 249 ; 250. 
 Dhol-pur (ceremony at), 573. 
 Dhoti, 395. 
 Dhrita-rashtra, 322. 
 DhumSvati, 188. 
 Dhundhi-raja, 218, i. 
 Phuitdhiraj Vinayak Sudas, 
 
 392- 
 Dhupa, 415. 
 Dhurjati, 83. 
 Diagrams (mystical), 203. 
 Dig-ambara, 83. 
 Digby (Mr.), 480. 
 Diksha, 61; 117 ; 191. 
 Dinanath, 155. 
 Dining (ceremony of), 423. 
 Dipa, 415. 
 
 Directory (Theistic), 494. 
 Disintegration (act of), 74; 75. 
 DIssolver, 44. 
 Diti, 182. 
 
 Divali (festival), 432; 529. 
 Dnyanesvara, 266. 
 Dnyano-ba, 266. 
 Doctrine (Vedanta), 53 ; 
 
 (Hindu, various phases of), 
 
 71 ; 72 ; (four principles 
 
 of theistic), 495. 
 Dog (sacred), 328. 
 Dog-demon, 243. 
 Dogs (watch), 289. 
 Dola-yatra (festival), 430. 
 Domestic rules (Ancient 
 
 Hindu), 363. 
 Domestic worship (Hindu), 
 
 352- 
 
Draksha, 192. 
 Draksharamesvara, 446, 5. 
 Draupadi, 271. 
 Draupadi-Amman, 271. 
 Dravana-bana, 200. 
 Dravidians, 244. 
 Dravya, 40. 
 Dress (of Indian household), 
 
 395- 
 DrishadvatI (river), 51. 
 Diishti-dosha, 12S. 
 Diisyam, 119. 
 Dualism, 37. 
 Duality (in the divine unity), 
 
 39 ; (doctrine of), 130 ; 
 
 131 ; (first dawn of), 181 ; 
 
 (enunciated), 182; 183. 
 Dubois, 202, I. 
 
 Duff (Dr.), 316; 485- 
 DurgS, 72; 188, i; 185; 
 
 197; 198. 
 Durga-puja, 197 ; 198 ; 431. 
 Durva (grass), 338. 
 Duryodhana, 322. 
 Duties (six daily), 158, 1. 
 Dvaita, 130. 
 
 DvSpara (age), III ; 433. 
 Dvaraks-nath Tagore, 482 ; 
 
 486- 
 Dvarika, 55, I; 1135400, i. 
 Dvi-ja, 361. 
 Dwarf, no. 
 Dyaus (heaven), 182. 
 Dyaus, Zeus (worship of), 
 
 , 223- 
 
 iPyaus.-pitar, Jupiter (worship 
 
 ' of), 223. 
 
 Dynasties (warrior), 43. 
 
 Dyu (or Dyaus), 8. 
 
 Dyupitar, 4. 
 
 Ear (sacredness of), 405, 2. 
 
 Ear-boring, 360 ; 376. 
 
 Early Ideas (by Anaryan), 
 
 388, I. 
 Earth (Prithivl or Bhumi), 
 
 30; 182. 
 Earth-spirit, 243. 
 
 %Pt, 313- 
 
 Ekam-eva-advitlyain, 34. 
 Ekamranatha, 446, 
 Ekoddishtam (Sraddha), 305. 
 Elements (five subtle), 30. 
 Elephant (Indra's), 104, 3 ; 
 
 (mythical), 108. 
 JElephanta (caves of), 74, i ; 
 
 82; 85, i; 236, I. 
 Elephant-worship, 328. 
 Ella-amman, 228. 
 Ellora (caves of), 84, 2 ; 
 ;: (temple at), 71, I. 
 
 Index. 
 
 Entity, 2 ; 29. 
 
 Entities (tri-unity of), 34. 
 
 Envelopes (three corporeal), 
 
 35- 
 Epicureans of India, 135. 
 Epithets (of Siva and Vishnu), 
 
 105 ; lo5; 107; 239. 
 Eras (four Hindu), 433. 
 Ether (Akasa), 30. 
 Evil eye, 253 ; 254. 
 Evil (impersonations of), 238. 
 Evolution (doctrine of), 43. 
 Existence, 34. 
 Exercisers (professional), 241 ; 
 
 246. 
 
 Fair (religious), 429. 
 
 Faith (doctrine of), 63, i ; 97. 
 
 Fakirs, 87, I. 
 
 Family-religion (Hindu), 352; 
 370. 
 
 Fasting (Hindu powers of), 
 426. 
 
 Fasts (special Hindu), 427. 
 
 Fatihah, 403. 
 
 Fergusson (Mr.), 313; 330. 
 
 Festival (Piirnima), 151 ; 152. 
 
 Festivals (of the left-hand 
 worshippers), 204 ; (time 
 of), 431 ; (special), 428 ; 
 (Brahma-Samaj), 504. 
 
 Fetishism, 340 ; 341. 
 
 Fever-gayatri, 201. 
 
 Fig-tree (sacred), 9 ; 399. 
 
 Figures (twenty-four mysti- 
 cal), 406. 
 
 Fingers (consecration of), 405. 
 
 Fire, 10; 20; (god of), 420; 
 (Tejas or Jyotis), 30. 
 
 Fire-god, 9; 15. 
 
 Fires (sacred), 281 ; 282. 
 
 Fire-worship, 2 ; 346 ; 364. 
 
 Fish, 107 ; (sacred), 328 ; 
 (Varuna's), 104, 3. 
 
 Fish-gayatrl, 201. 
 
 Flood, 107. 
 
 Food (secrecy in preparation 
 of), 128. 
 
 Fortune-tellers, 202. 
 
 Foulkes (Mr.), 440, 3. 
 
 Free-will (doctrine of), 125. 
 
 Fruits (sacred), 339. 
 
 Funeral (and Sraddha cere- 
 monies compared), 285 ; 
 (ceremonies), 278; (cere- 
 monies in Vedic times), 
 279; (Hindu), 276; (of a 
 child), 287. 
 
 Funeral-pile, 299. 
 
 Funerals (expense of), 278. 
 
 Furniss (Rev. J.), 232, 3. 
 
 Gada, 103. 
 
 Gadada, 150. 
 
 Gadi (chair), 135. 
 
 Gana, 85. 
 
 Gana-pati, 77 ; 211. 
 
 Ganapatim gananam, 413. 
 
 Ganapatyas, 59. 
 
 Ganas, 79- 
 
 Gandaki (river), 69 ; 347. 
 
 Gandha, 66 ; 415. 
 
 Gandharvas, 237 ; 238. 
 
 Gandiva, 272. 
 
 Ganesa, 48 ; 63 ; 79 ; 392 ; 
 
 (temple), 440 ; (worship 
 
 of), 211-317. 
 Ganesa and Subrahmanya 
 
 (contrasted), 215. 
 Ganesa - daturthi (festival), 
 
 431- 
 Ganga-putra, 347 ; 570. 
 Gangashtaka, 399. 
 Ganges, 80 ; 295 ; 347. 
 Garbha (sanctuary), 445. 
 Garbhadhana, 353 ; 354. 
 Garbha-griham, 440. 
 Gargya, 407. 
 Garpagari, 24T. 
 Garuda (vehicle), 65 ; (bird), 
 
 104; 288; 321 ; 327. 
 Garuda-purana, 288 ; 293 ; 
 
 298; 301. 
 Gati (refuge), 260. 
 Gaudi, 193. 
 Gauri, 80, 2. 
 Gautama, 42. 
 Gautamiya (Tantra), 207. 
 Gaya, 81 ; 309. 
 Gayatri, 19 ; 342 ; 403 ; 
 
 (translation of), 19; 361; 
 
 (upadesa), 362. 
 Gayatri-japa, 406. 
 Gayatri Mantras, 200; 201. 
 Gayawals, 310. 
 Gems (magical), 46S. 
 Genesis (viii. 21), 12, i. 
 Ghana (recitation), 409. 
 Ghanta (bell), 144. 
 Ghanta-mandapa, 447. 
 Ghanta-mudra, 414. 
 Ghasi-das, 179. 
 Ghat (at Benares), 435 ; 
 
 (NimTollah),6]8;si9, 1. 
 Ghataka, 377. 
 
 Ghose (Pratapa-(5andra), 197. 
 Girgaum House, 381. 
 Girls (dancing), 450; (Indian), 
 
 .^87. 
 Girnar (hill), 349. 
 Gita-govinda, 114; 146. 
 Gobhila, 354, i. 
 Godavari, 295. 
 
592 
 
 Index. 
 
 Goddess-worship, ■18&-196. 
 
 Gods (ancient Vedic), 182; 
 (animal attendants of), 104, 
 3; (Brahman), 44; (five 
 Hindu), 392 ;■ (number of), 
 41 7, I ; (offerings to all 
 the), 420 ; (structure of 
 the bodies of), 28 ; (wor- 
 ship of the), 411. 
 
 Gokula, 113. 
 
 Golden temple, 436. 
 
 Goloka, 118; 291. 
 
 Gomeda (gem), 468. 
 
 Go-mukha, 348. 
 
 Gomukhl (bag), 92 ; 406. 
 
 Goodness, 36. 
 
 Gopal Hari Deshmukh, 94, 
 2 ; 189, I ; 200, 2 ; 208. 
 
 Gopatha-brahmana, 21. 
 
 GopT-candana, 67 ; 400, 2. 
 
 Gopis (cowherdesses), 113; 
 136. 
 
 Gorakhpur, 158. 
 
 Goreh (Rev. Nehemiah), 373, 
 ,1; 422, 2; 536. 
 
 Gosains, 87; 135 ; 142. 
 
 Gosainji, 135. 
 
 Goshthl-Sraddha, 305. 
 
 Gospel (St. John's), 419, 2. 
 
 Gotrodcara (ceremony), 407. 
 
 Gough (Prof.), 37, I ; 119; 
 122; 130; 131; 133. 
 
 Govardhana (mountain), II3. 
 
 Govind (bible of), 167; (cha- 
 racter of), 168; (shriue of), 
 175 ; 176. 
 
 Govinda, 405. 
 
 Govind-Sinh, 164 ; 166 ; 167. 
 
 Grace (before dinner), 424. 
 
 Grain (parched), 192 ; 193. 
 
 Grama-devatS, 209. 
 
 Grant (Sir A.), 265. - 
 
 Granth or Grantha (bible of 
 Sikhs), 158 ; 165 ; (ar- 
 rangement of), 170 ; (pas- 
 sages from), 171 ; (teach- 
 ing of), 172; (worship of), 
 172 ; 177. 
 
 Graphic, 255, i. 
 
 Grasses (sacred), 33S. 
 
 Greece, 313. 
 
 Grihastha (householder), 138 ; 
 150; 362; 386. 
 
 GrihinI, 397. 
 
 Grihyagni, 365. 
 
 Grihya-Sutras, 281. 
 
 Groves (sacred), 332. 
 
 Guhyah, 106, I. 
 
 Gujarat, 113 ; 225. 
 
 Gunas, 30 ; 31 ; 36 ; 163. 
 
 Gupta (protected), 358. 
 
 Guru, 352 ; (derivation of), 
 161 ; (Vaishnava), 142. 
 
 Guru-mukhl (alphabet), 164; 
 170. 
 
 Gurus, 61 ; (tea chief Sikh), 
 164. 
 
 Haas (Dr.), 363, i. 
 
 Hadakai, 227. 
 
 Hair (cutting off the), 359 ; 
 (the pride of women), 375. 
 
 Hansa, 104, 3. 
 
 Han Tan Hien, 262. 
 
 Hanuman, 48; III; 326; 
 445 ; (temple of), 65, 2 ; 
 (worship of), 220-222. 
 
 Hapta Hendu, 7. 
 
 Hara, 82. 
 
 Hare (David), 491, I. 
 
 Har-Govind, 164. 
 
 Hari (name), 522 ; (temple), 
 175; 176; (bol), 297. 
 
 Hari-das, 142. 
 
 Haridra-Ganapati, 217. 
 
 Hari-Hara, 65. 
 
 Hari-jana, 269. 
 
 Hari-Krishna, 269. 
 
 Haris- Sandra, 24. 
 
 Hari-vansa (chap, clxxxi), 65. 
 
 Har-Kisan, 164. 
 
 Har-Rai, 164. 
 
 Hastini, 389. 
 
 Haug's Rig-veda, 102. 
 
 Haya-gardabhih, 107. 
 
 Head-coverings, 395. 
 
 Headman (duties o^, 456. 
 
 Heaven, 22 ; 23 ; 232 ; 
 (Dyaus), 1S2 ; (indra's), 
 13; 49; (Krishna's), 118; 
 (Vaishnava), 70 ; (Vish- 
 nu's), 118; (Saiva), 70; 
 (five heavens), 102 ; 403. 
 
 Heaven's gate, 449. 
 
 Heber (Bishop), I49. 
 
 Hell (twenty-one), 127, I ; 
 232. 
 
 Herambai 218. 
 
 Hercules (Indian), 112. 
 
 Hermaphrodite, 183. 
 
 Hero-worship, 71 ; 257-273. 
 
 Hetu, 39. 
 
 Hills (sacred), 349. 
 
 Himalaya, 4. 
 
 Hindu Religious Sects, 160,1. 
 
 Hindu-i, 170. 
 
 Hinduism, 2 ; 3 ; 64-72 ; 
 (compared to banian-tree), 
 98 ; (Sakta form of), 180 ; 
 186 ; (Theism of), 224. 
 
 Hindiis (naturally religions), 
 100 ; (as they are), 296, 1. 
 
 Hingraj, 227. 
 
 Hioueii Thsang, 337. ' 
 
 Hiranya-garbha, 14 ; 35 ; 44. 
 
 Hiranya-kasipu (tyrant), 109, 
 
 Hiranyaksha (demon), 109. 
 
 Hiranya-Sraddha, 306. 
 
 History (absence of), 38. 
 
 Holi (festival), 430. 
 
 Homa (ceremony), 299; 394; 
 (sacrifice), 367; 576. 
 
 Homage (acts of), 415. 
 
 Homa-sala, 365; 411. 
 
 Hongi, 273, I. 
 
 Horoscope, 372 ; 373.^ 
 
 Horse (high-eared), 108. 
 
 Horse-sacrifice, 8 ; 24; 329. 
 
 Horses (clay), 219; 220. 
 
 House (arrangement of), 391. 
 
 Householder's wife, 397. 
 
 Hrisliikesa, 405. 
 
 Human life (three great ob- 
 jects of), 388. 
 
 Hunter's Annals of Rural 
 Bengal, 332, 1. 
 
 Hutasani (festival), 430. 
 
 Hymn (creation), 404. 
 
 Hymns, 7 ; 8 ; (to the Vedic 
 triad), 15; 16; (character 
 of Vedic), 18. 
 
 Hymn-veda, 8. 
 
 Ma, 5. ' ': 
 
 Idar (temple), 569. 
 
 Idol-crown, 449. 
 
 Idols, 123; (artificial), 70. 
 
 Ikshu, 193. 
 
 Ille<!(ihida Nema (festival), 
 
 247. 
 Illusion, 27; 36; 37; 41. 
 Images (sanctity oQ, 69. 
 Implements (agricultural), 
 
 456 ; (five destructive), 
 
 418 ; (for shaving), 459. 
 Inca, 273, I. 
 
 Incarnation (Hindi! doctrine 
 ' of), 62 ; 63. 
 Incarnations (Vishnu's), 107- 
 
 116; 115; 315. 
 Incense, 415. 
 India's Mother, 513. 
 Indian Antiquary, 265. 
 Indian Mirror, 509; 512; 513. 
 Indian Wisdom, 13; 112. 
 Indifl'erence, 36. ' 
 
 Indische Studien, 363, I. 
 Indra, 9 ; 10; 12 ; 16 ; 63; 
 
 271. 
 Indrani, 14; 182 ; 188. 
 Indriya-sparsa (ceremony), 
 
 406. 
 Influenza, 227. 
 
Initiation, 1 1 7 ; 360; 377. 
 Instruments (musical), 145 ; 
 
 381 ; 450. 
 Interchangeableness (of Indian 
 
 religious beliefs), 159. 
 Isa (or IsSna), 85. 
 Isa Upanishad, 26. 
 Ishtah, 106, 1. 
 
 Ishta-devata, xiv ; 370; 435. 
 Islam, 3. 
 
 lslands(seven circular), 232, i. 
 Isopanishad, 487, I. 
 Isvara, 35 ! 85 ; 89 ; 119. 
 Itihasa, 41 ; (verses), 287. 
 
 Jada, 132. 
 Jagad-amba, 185. 
 Jagan-mata, 185. 
 Jagannath (temple of), 59, 1 ; 
 
 139: 447 ; (car of), 118. 
 Jagannath-puri, 55, i; 447. 
 Jag-jivan-das, 179. 
 JahSnglr (Emperot), 166. 
 Jaimini, 19S. 
 Jalesvara, 201. 
 Jamadagni, no; 421. 
 Jambukesvara (Siva), 445 ; 
 
 (temple), 446. 
 Jambu-tree, 445. 
 Janah (heaven), 102, I ; 403. 
 Janamejaya, 321. 
 Janam-sSkhi, 162. 
 Janar (heaven), 403. 
 Jangamas, 88. 
 Janiiri, 182. 
 Janma-patra, 372. 
 Janmashtami, 113, 2. 
 Jap-ji, 170. 
 Japu, 170. 
 
 Jata (recitation), 409. 
 Jata-karman, 353 ; 357. 
 JStavedas, 420. 
 jiti (Jat), caste, 471. 
 Jati-mala, 207, i. 
 Jaya-deva (poet), 146. 
 Jetalpur, 149. 
 Jewel (miraculous), 108 ; 
 
 (Vishnu's), 104. 
 Jewelry (Indian), 396 ; 466. 
 Jiva (or Jivatman), 26 ; 27 ; 
 
 28. 
 Jivan-mukti, 206. 
 Jivatman, 37 ; 40. 
 Jiian-marga, 63. 
 JBana (knowledge), 27 ; 140. 
 Jnana-prakasa, 179. 
 Jiiana-vap!, 437. 
 Jiianesvara, 266. 
 Jiieyam, 49. 
 
 John (St., Gospel, i. 1), 419,2. 
 Journal (Asiatic),432; 511, i- 
 
 Index. 
 
 Jupiter, 4. 
 
 Jvara, 201. 
 
 Jyotisha (Jyoshi, or JoshI), 
 
 372- 
 Jyotishtoma, 22; 368. 
 
 Kabir, 99, i; 148; 169; 
 476 ; (life of), 158 ; (say- 
 ings and precepts of), 160 ; 
 (twelve disciples of), 178. 
 
 Kabir-panthis, 160. 
 
 Kabir- Var (tree), 337. 
 
 Ka6a, 194, i. 
 
 Kadambarl, 193. 
 
 Kadru, 233; 322. 
 
 Kah, lo6, I. 
 
 Kailasa, 70 ; 78 ; 84 ; 103 ; 
 291 ; 447. 
 
 Kaira, 269. 
 
 Kaka-bali (ceremony), 329 ; 
 421. 
 
 Kalahasta, 441. 
 
 Kalansa-rupini, 187. 
 
 Kala-ratri, 204. 
 
 Kala-nipini, 187. 
 
 Kalas (of Moon), 343. 
 
 Kalasa (vessel), 412; 413; 
 
 513- ^ 
 
 Kali (age), 52 ; 114. 
 
 Kai (goddess), 25 ; 79 ; 187 ; 
 
 393 ; (description of), 189 ; 
 
 (worship of), 185. 
 Kal!-6aturdasi, 204. 
 Kalidasa, 45; 333, 1. 
 Kali Ghat (temple), 431. 
 Kali-puja (festival), 431. 
 Kaliya (serpent), 113. 
 Kali-ynga (age), 60 ; 163 ; 
 
 398 ; 433- 
 Kalka, 227. 
 Kalkatti, 250. 
 Kalki, 114. 
 Kalkin, 114. 
 Kalkuda, 250. 
 Kallurti, 250. 
 Kallyata (festival), 247. 
 Kalmucks, 313. 
 Kalpa (age), 82. 
 Kalpa-druma, 332. 
 Kama, 388. 
 Kamat^i, 22S. 
 Kama-deva, .83 J 114; 115; 
 
 200; 447. 
 Kama-dhenu, 108; 318. 
 Kamakhya (Tantra), 207. 
 Kamalatmika, 188. 
 Kamandalu, xxi, note. 
 Kamya (Sraddha), 305. 
 Kanara, 250. 
 Kan(;i-puram( = KaSjivaram), 
 
 119. 
 
 Q q 
 
 593 
 
 Kanjivaram, 124; 446. 
 Kansa, 104, 2 ; in ; 113. 
 Kantaka (a thorn), 191, I. 
 Kanthi (rosary), 117; 135. 
 Kantimati (Parvati), 447. 
 Kapala, 367. 
 Kapalika, 59. 
 Kapardin, 77. 
 Karakal, 250. 
 Karana-sarina, 35 ; 36. 
 Kara-nyasa, 405. 
 Karma (works), T40. 
 Karma-marga, 63. 
 Karma-nasa (river), 348. 
 Karnian, 22. 
 
 Karmariga (Sraddha), 305. 
 Karna, 273. 
 Karta, 89. 
 Karttika-purniraa (festival) , 
 
 432- 
 Karttikeya, 48 ; 211; 213. 
 Karya, 89. 
 Kashmir, 312 ; 313. 
 KasI, 434. 
 
 Kasyapa, 104,3; 233; 322; 
 421. 
 
 Kasyapa (sage), 123, I. 
 
 Katak, 139. 
 
 Katerl, 228. 
 
 Katha Upanishad, 26. 
 
 Kathopanishad, 121, 1 ; 528. 
 
 Katwa, 179. 
 
 Kaula (Upanishad), 185. 
 
 KaulesI, 188. 
 
 KaumodakI, 103. 
 
 Kaupinesvara, 50. 
 
 Kaustubha, 104 ; I08. 
 
 Kavadas (or Amulets), 204. 
 
 Kaveri (river), 119 ; 347. 
 
 Kayastha (caste), 292, I. 
 
 Kedarnath, 56. 
 
 Kerala (Malabar), 55. 
 
 Kesanta, 353 ; 359. 
 
 Keshab Chandar Sen, 496 ; 
 
 497; 499; 505; ."iio; 
 
 512-523; 525; 52&- 
 Ketu, 344. 
 Khadira, 367; 535. 
 Khalsa, 167. 
 Khande-Rao, 266. 
 Khando-ba, 266. 
 KhaRjana, 328. 
 Kharjuri, 192. 
 Khatvanga, 81. 
 Kheia, 163. 
 Khodiyar (shrine of), 225 ; 
 
 226. 
 Kim, 106, I. 
 Kimldins, 237. 
 Kimpurushas, 238. 
 King (deification of), 259. 
 
594 
 
 Index. 
 
 Kinnaras, 238. 
 Kiiata^ 84. 
 Kirtana, 264. 
 Kistna (river), 348. 
 Kitchen (Indian), 128. 
 Knowledge (salvation by), 
 
 63- 
 
 Koli, 193. 
 
 KoUa (festival), 249. 
 
 Konarak, 343. 
 
 Kookas. See Kukas. 
 
 Krama (recitation), 84 ; 409. 
 
 Kravyad, 237. 
 
 Krishna, 47 ; 98; 111-114; 
 116; 259; (worship of), 
 144; 145; 447; (life of), 
 112; (miracles of), 113; 
 (repetition of name of), 
 143 i (sons of), 114. 
 
 Krishna (Kistna), 295 ; 348. 
 
 Kjrishna-das, 144. 
 
 Krishna-deva, 134. 
 
 Krishna-janmashtami, 430. 
 
 Krishna-nagar, 569. 
 
 Kiisto-das Pal, 519, I. 
 
 Krita (age), 433. 
 
 Krita-jna, 329. 
 
 Krittikas (six), 213. 
 
 Kshatriyas, 53 ; (god of the), 
 84. • 
 
 Kshaura (shaving), 312; 353; 
 
 359- 
 
 Kubera, 238; 268. 
 
 Kuber-bhaktas, 269. 
 
 Kuch Behar (Maharaja, mar- 
 riage of), 512 ; 518, I. 
 
 Kukas (sect of Sikhs), 268. 
 
 Kulamava (Tantra), 207- 
 
 Kulluka, 184. 
 
 Kulumandi-amman, 228. 
 
 Kumara, 214. 
 
 Kumara-sambhava, 45. 
 
 Kumbhaka, 402. 
 
 Kumbha-Konam, 3481 
 
 Kunda, 417. 
 
 Kuiikuma, 91. 
 
 Kunte (Mr. M. M.), 366, 2. 
 
 Kunti, 271. 
 
 Kupa-kad6hapa, 329. 
 
 Kapa-manduka, 329, 
 
 Kiirma, 108. 
 
 Kurma-purana, 74. 
 
 Kurukulya, 188, i. 
 
 Kusa, 48, 1 ; (grass),296; 338. 
 
 Kush (Hindu), 3. 
 
 Kuvera, 59 ; 79 ; 238. 
 
 Laghima, 427. 
 Lahana, 164. 
 Lake-temple, 165. 
 Lakshmanaj 47. 
 
 Lakshmi, 14 ; 103 ; 108 ; 
 
 182. 
 Lakshmi-Narayana (temple 
 
 of), 151 ; 184.' 
 Lamps (feast of), 432 ; 529. 
 Lares (Indian), 392. 
 Lares, 425, 1. 
 Larv£B, 274, I. 
 Laukikagni, 287. 
 Lava, 48, I. 
 Law-books and Law Schools, 
 
 51; 52; 286,1. 
 Leader (religious), 1 01. 
 Leaves (Bilva), 68; 90; (as 
 
 plates), 461. 
 Lecture (by Keshab), 515. 
 Left-hand worshippers, 185. 
 Lemures, 274, I. 
 Lila (sport), 43 ; 138. 
 Linga (body), 28 ; (phallus), 
 
 33; 68; 70; 83; 90; 
 
 447! (tyP'<^3')> ^24 > (""'"■ 
 her of), 78, I ; (worship 
 
 .of).. 439; 440; 567; 568. 
 LingaitSj 88. 
 Linga-purana, 65 ; 74- 
 Linga-sarira, 35 ; 297. 
 Liquor (spirituous), 108 ; 
 
 112; 193; 194. 
 Liquors (twelve Sakta), 192. 
 Lithuania, 313. 
 Loango (king of), 273, 1. 
 Lokas (seven), 102, I. 
 Lotus-flower, 103 ; 338. 
 Love (god of), 83. 
 Lubbock (Sir John), 273, I ; 
 
 313; 330; 340; 372, '■■ 
 Luther (Martin), 138; 139 ; 
 
 162. 
 Lyall (Sir A.), 262. 
 
 Macdonald (Rev. K.), 478, 1. 
 Machinery, 470. 
 Madagascar (bishop of), 274, 
 
 3- 
 
 Madhava, 405. 
 Madhu, 104, 2. 
 Madhiika, 193. 
 Madhurya, 141. 
 Madhva, 96 ; 130 ; 476. 
 Madhvika (plant), 193. 
 Madhyahna-sandhya, 407. 
 Madras (Missionarv Record), 
 
 i79._ 
 Madura (temple of), 58, I ; 
 
 65 ; 79. 1 ; 442 ; (town), 
 
 182, 2; 219; 228; 272. 
 Madya, 192. 
 Magar, 158. 
 Maghotsab, 504. 
 Mahalj (heaven), 102, l ; 403. 
 
 Mahabalesvar, 216; 217; 
 348. 
 
 Maha-bharata, 41 ; 47 ; 63 ; 
 116; 232, 1 ; 241 ; 271- 
 273; 292; 321; 389. 
 
 Mahabhashya, 198 ; 419, 2 ; 
 
 519.1- 
 Maha-bhuta, 31, i. 
 Maha-iiakra, 196. 
 Maha-deva, 78 ; 85. 
 Maha-devi (manifestations ol), 
 
 186. 
 Maha-Ganapati, 217. 
 Maha-kala, 82. 
 Maha-krodhah, 107. 
 Maha-lakshmi, 385. 
 Maha-mandapa, 447. 
 Maha-raatris, 188. 
 Maha-mayah, 106. 
 Maha-nirvana (Tantra), 207. 
 Mahant, 87, I. 
 Maha-pralaya, 179. 
 Mahar (heaven), 403. 
 Maharaja (title of), 135; 
 
 (homage to), 136 ; 137. 
 Maha-ratri, 204, 
 Maha - Siva - ratri (festival), 
 
 430. 
 Mahatala, 102, i. 
 Maha-tapah, 83. 
 Mahatma, xii, I, 
 Mahatmya, 433. 
 Maha-vidya (ten), 187. 
 Mahayajna (five), 411. 
 Maha-yogi, 83. 
 Mahidhara,,406.- 
 Mahisha, 104, 3. 
 Mahishasur (demon), 431. 
 Maine (Sir Henry), 507. 
 Maintenance, 74 \ 75- 
 Maireya, 193. 
 Maithuna, 192. 
 Ma-karas (five), 192, 2. 
 Makara-sankranti, 428. 
 Mallari, 266. 
 Mallasura, 266. 
 Malwa, 168. 
 
 Man (divine and human), 235. 
 Manas, 27; 31; 32; 40. 
 Manasi-piija, 524. 
 Manavas, 51. 
 Mandapa, 440. 
 Mandara (mountain), 108. 
 Mandir (or Mandira), 15IP ' 
 
 392; 411; 513. 
 Manes, 274, i. 
 Mangalor (district), 247. 
 Mangal Sinh Ramgharia, 17$' 
 Mango (tree), 446. 
 Mani-karnika, 308 ; 438. 
 Marii-pur, 322, 2; 329, I. 
 
Index. 
 
 595 
 
 Man-lion, log. 
 
 Mansa, 192. 
 
 Mantra, 7 ; 8 ;^ (importance 
 of), 61 ; (Sakta), 197 ; 
 (eight - syllabled), 297 ; 
 (number of Mantras), 199 ; 
 (efficacy of), 199 ; transla- 
 tions of), 200 ; 197-202. 
 
 Mantra-pushpa, 415. 
 
 Mantra-sastri (power of), 
 201 ; 202 ; (decline of 
 power of), 208. 
 
 Mantra-vid, 84. 
 
 Manu, 30; 52, i; 107; 
 (Book I. 5), 30 ; (1. 49), 
 331; (II. 60), 406; (III. 
 68), 418, 3 ; (III. 70. 81), 
 431; (III. 84-93), 417; 
 (III. 237), 285; (IV. 21), 
 421 ; (IV. 26), 368 ; (IV. 
 173), 287,1; (IV. 88-90), 
 232; (V. 68), 287; (VI. 
 10), 368 ; (VI. 20), 428 ; 
 (Seventh), 237 ; (VII. 41), 
 241; (IX. 96), 334; 387; 
 (IX. 317. 319), 260; (X. 
 75), 394, i; (XI. 84), 
 260; (XI. 216), 428; (XI. 
 243. 244), 235 ; (code of), 
 ,51; 52 ; (doctrine of), 53 ; 
 (teaching of), 129. 
 
 Manushya-yajiia, 423, I. 
 
 Man-worship, 71 ; 273, I. 
 
 Manyu, 404, I. 
 
 Maraki, 227. 
 
 Margah, 106. 
 
 Mari-amman, 226 ; 228. 
 
 Marjana (sprinkling), 403 ; 
 404. 
 
 Marjara-nyaya, 125. 
 
 Mark (sectarial), 66 ; (nama), 
 66; (pundra),66 ; (tilaka), 
 66 ; (tri-pundra) , 66 ; (iir- 
 dhva-pundra), 67 ; (Sri- 
 vatsa), 103 ; 1 13 ; Svas- 
 tika), 104, I ; (sacred), 
 400. 
 
 Markandeya, 441. 
 
 Markata-nyaya, 125. 
 
 Marld, 227. 
 
 Markings (religious), 400. 
 
 Marks (Saiva), 66 ; (Vaish- 
 nava), 66; 118; (Ten- 
 galai), 126; (Vada-galai), 
 126; (Madhva), 133. 
 
 Marriage-act, 508. 
 
 Marriage-ceremonies (ancient 
 form of), 354; 363; (re- 
 form in), 500 ; 507 ; (ex- 
 pense of), 379 ; (modern), 
 379 ; (in Brahma-Saniaj), 
 
 501 ; (marriage of trees) , 
 
 335- 
 
 Marriage-hymn, 363, I, 
 
 Marriages (early), 362 ; 385. 
 
 Mars (Hindii), 212. 
 
 Marshman (Dr.), 484, I. 
 
 Marudayi, 228. 
 
 Maruta, 221. 
 
 Maruts, 9. 
 
 Mata (religious sect), 61, I. 
 
 Mata (mother), 106 ; (wor- 
 ship), 222. 
 
 Matangi, 188. 
 
 Matara, 182. 
 
 Match-maker (professional), 
 
 377- 
 Matha (monastery), 55 ; 129. 
 Mathura, 113 ; 375. 
 Matri (or Mother forms of 
 
 Siva's wife), 188 ; 188, i. 
 Matrika, 188. 
 Matrika-bheda Tantra, 193. 
 Matris, or Mothers, 223. 
 Matsya, 107 ; 192. 
 Maya, 35; 37; 441 85; "O. 
 Maya-iiid-yoga, 37, 1. 
 Men-eaters, 237. 
 Metempsychosis, 18; 26; 
 
 27; 41; 53; 57; 60; 
 
 "5 ; 173; 316; 331 ; 
 
 339- 
 Midnapur Samaj, 494. 
 Milton, 386. 
 Mimansa (Sutra), 26. 
 Minafi (goddess), 58,1; 228 ; 
 
 442. 
 Miuakshi, 58, I ; 228 ; 442. 
 Minakshi-sundaresvara (pa- 
 goda), 442, I. 
 Minos (Hindii), 290. 
 Mira-bai, 268. 
 Miracles, 266. 
 Misra (Jagannath), 138. 
 Missionary Conference, 512,1. 
 Mitakshara (law-book), 52 ; 
 
 286, I. 
 Mitchell (Dr. Murray), 265. 
 Mithra, 406. 
 Mitra, 5 ; 9 ; 10 ; 406. 
 Mitra (Dr. Rajendra - lala"), 
 
 282, I. 
 Mitropasthana, 406. 
 Modelling (art of), 469. 
 Model-wife, 389. 
 Moha-ratri, 204. 
 Mohini, 65, I. 
 Monasteries (founded by San- 
 
 kara), 55. _ 
 
 Monkeys (veneration of) ; 
 
 222 ; 326. 
 Monkey-temple, 327. 
 
 Q q 2 
 
 Monkey-theory, 125. 
 Monotheism, ii ; 17. 
 Months (lunar), 432. 
 Moon, 108. 
 Moon-worship, 343. 
 Morning Sandhya Service, 
 
 401. 
 Moses, 515; 517. 
 Mothers (number of), 225 ; 
 
 (shrines of), 226 ; (special), 
 
 227; 228; (Tantrikas), 
 
 229 ; 245. 
 Mother-worship, 188 ; 222- 
 
 229. 
 Mountain-worship, 349. 
 Mourning (time of), 306, 3. 
 Mozoomdar (Mr. P. C), 496, 
 
 I ; 509; 510, i; 514; 
 
 515; 521-523; 526. 
 Mricdhakatika (drama), 77,1. 
 Mudra, 204 ; 406 ; (double 
 
 meaning of), 192, 2. 
 Muir (Dr. John), 182, 2 ; 237, 
 
 I ; 414, I. 
 Muir's Texts, 366. 
 Mukunda, 318. 
 Mula (root), 107. 
 Mundaka Upanishad, 26 ; 
 
 120. 
 Munich (church at), 2 29, 1 . 
 Mura, 104, 2. 
 Muralis, 266, 
 Murti-piija, 524. 
 Musala (club), 112. 
 Muslin (Indian), 465. 
 Mystical formulae, 197. 
 
 Nabhaji, 147. 
 
 Nach (girls), 381 ; 382; 451. 
 
 Naches, 430. 
 
 Nadiya, 138. 
 
 Naga (serpents), 233 ; 237 ; 
 
 321-326^ 
 Naga-kanya, 233. 
 Naga-paiicamI, 323 ; 40. 
 Naga-pratishtha, 324. 
 Naga-shrines, 323. 
 Nagendra-nath, 478. 
 Nag-loka, 322. 
 Nagpur, 323. 
 Nahusha, 241. 
 Naimittika (Sraddha), 305. 
 Naivedya (food), 144; 415. 
 Nakshatra, 345; (name), 372; 
 
 (constellation), 373, I. 
 Nakula, 271 ; 272. 
 Nala, 235. 
 Nalayira, 125. 
 Namak and Camak, 416. 
 Nama-karana, 132; 353; 
 
 358 ; 37°- 
 
596 
 
 Index. 
 
 Nama-kiTtana, 14I. 
 Nama-sankirtana, 105. 
 Namaskara, 415. 
 Namdev, 169. 
 
 Name (importance of), 358 ; 
 , (for sorcery), 372 ; (name- 
 
 g'ving), 358 ; 370 ;, 371. 
 Names (special)-, 358 ; (of 
 ; Vishnu andSiva), 105-107. 
 Nanak (life and teaching of), 
 
 161 ; 162 ;:i63; 476. 
 Nanda (herdsman), 113. 
 Nandaka, I04. 
 Nandi (bull), 81 ; 440. 
 Napita (barber), 374 ; 459. 
 Nara-bali (human sacrifice), 
 
 190. 
 ?Jarain Bose, 478. See Bose. 
 Nara-sinha, 109. 
 Narayana, 62, I ; 102. 
 Narbada (rivet), 69; 347; 
 
 348. 
 iJJariad (temples of), 269. 
 Narikela, 192. 
 Narmada, 295. 
 Narmada-sankar, 37I1 I. 
 Nasik, 272 ; 301. 
 Nafesvara, 84. 
 Nathubhai (Sir Mangaldas), 
 
 .381. 
 Nature-worship, 2 ; 4 ; 5 ; 7 2. 
 Navanita-Ganapati, 2 1 8. 
 Nava-ratra (festival), 431. 
 Nayars (aborigines'), 271, 2. 
 Nayika (forms of Siva's wife), 
 
 188, 
 Necklace (thread), 35. 
 Nectar-g5yatri, 201. 
 Nets (guide), 106, I. 
 New Dispensation, 516; 517; 
 
 526. 
 Nicholson (General), 260. 
 Nigamana, 39 ; 185. 
 Nikkal Sen (worshippers) , 2 60. 
 Nimbarka (miracle of), 146. 
 Nimitta-jiiana, 397. 
 Nim ToUah (Ghat), 518; 
 
 519. !•- 
 Nirguna, 31, I; 30, i ; 121. 
 Nirnaya-sindhu, 303 ; 305. 
 Nirvana, 106. 
 Nirvapa, 367. 
 Nisadarah, 106. 
 Nishkramana, 353 ; 358. 
 Nitya (Sraddha), 305. 
 NitySnanda, T39 ; 142. 
 Niviti, 379 ; 410. 
 Noah, 107. 
 
 Non-duality (doctrine of), 86. 
 Non-entity, 29. 
 Notary (village), 456. 
 
 Nritya-priyah, 84. 
 Nuddea (cremation at), 569. 
 Numismatic Chronicle, 1 04, 1. 
 Nyasa (ceremony), 204; 405; 
 
 413- 
 Nyaya (SQtra), 26. 
 
 Objects (worship of), 339 ; 
 
 349- 
 Oblations (to fire), 365 ; 366 ; 
 
 '367- 
 
 Obstacles (lord of), 216. 
 
 Odyssey (Homer's), 274, i. 
 
 Oiferings, 6; (at dinner), 425. 
 
 Oil (festival), 442. 
 
 Om, 10; 44; 357; 402; 
 449. 
 
 Omens, 320 ; 397. 
 
 Ophiolatry, 319. 
 
 Origin of Civilization (Lub- 
 bock's), 273, 1 ; 313. 
 
 Orissa, 447. 
 
 Ornaments (eight kinds), 396. 
 
 Oudh (Ayodhya), no; (prin- 
 ces of), 113, I. 
 
 Oxus (river), 3. 
 
 Pachamba (village), 577- 
 Pada (recitation), 409. 
 Padartha-tritayam, 119. 
 Padma, 103. 
 Padmini, 389. 
 Padya, 415. 
 
 Pagri. 396, 2. 
 
 Pahul, 167. 
 
 Paishti, 193. 
 
 Pala, 151. 
 
 Panasa, 192. 
 
 Pandajana (demon), I03, 2. 
 
 Paniakos! (Benares), 218, i ; 
 
 43.";. 
 Pandanana, 79. 
 PancJa-patra, xxi, note. 
 Pan(5a-prayaga, 367. 
 Pandasuna, 418, 
 Pan<5ayatana(ceremony),4IO- 
 
 416. 
 Panchayat, 456. 
 Pandavas, 112 ; 271. 
 Pandharpur, 50 ; 263 ; 264. 
 Panditah, 84. 
 Pandit (lady), 389. 
 Pandu, 271 ; (princes), 322. 
 Pandu-lene, 272. 
 Pandya (kingdom), 58, I. 
 Panini, 84 ; 184, i ; 329 ; 
 
 519. I- 
 Panjab, 7. 
 Panjflrli, 250. 
 Pannagas, 238. 
 
 Pan-supari, 137. 
 Pantheism, 2; 7; 11; 17. 
 Papa (demerit), 292. 
 Paradise (temporary), 118. 
 Parali, 268. 
 Parama-hansa, 87. 
 Paramarthika, 38. 
 Paramatman, 37 ; xii, I. 
 Paramesvara, 35 ; 36 ; 44 ; 
 
 45 ; 60- 
 Parafara (code of), 51 ; 52 ; 
 
 394. 1- 
 Parasu-rama, no ; 270. 
 Parijata, 108 ; 332. 
 Parikrama (of a river), 349. 
 Parinama, 269. 
 Parrot (Kama's), 104, 3. 
 Partha-sarathi, 107. 
 Parvana (Sraddha), 305. 
 Parvati (goddess), 46 ; 47 ; 
 
 446 ; (will of), 65 ; (diflisr- 
 
 ent names of), 79- 
 Pasa (fetter), 81 ; 89. 
 Pasin, 290. 
 
 Passion (or activity), 31. 
 Pasu (an animal), 89 ; 191. 
 Pasupata, 59. 
 Pasupati (Siva), 85 ; 89. 
 Patala, 102, 1 ; 233; 312 ; 
 
 323- 
 Pataiijali, 198 ; 419, 2. 
 Pathas (five Veda), 409. 
 Pati, 89. 
 
 Patiala (MahSrSja), 467. 
 Patna, 166 ; (temple at), 174. 
 Patrimony, 286. 
 Pauranika, 25. 
 Pavamana (hymns), 368. 
 Pavana, 221. 
 Pavitram, 106. 
 Peacock (Skanda's), 104, 3, 
 Pebbles (sacred), 69 ; 349. 
 Penance (six courses of), 87. 
 Penates (Indian), 392. 
 People (social condition), 18. 
 Permagudy, 219. 
 Persia, 313. 
 
 Peterborough (Bishop),27S,2. 
 Phalgu-Sraddha, 312. 
 Phallus, 68, I. iSceLinga. 
 Phenta, 396. 
 Philosophy (Vedanta), 33 ; 
 
 85; (Saiikhya), 30; 85. ^ 
 Phcenicia, 313. 
 Pictures (on temple walls),44l. 
 Pidari, 228. 
 Pilgrimages, 311; 348; 349; 
 
 434; 444; 570- 
 Pinaka, 8l. 
 
 Pindas, 293; 298-310. 
 Pips, 148 ; 169. 
 
Index. 
 
 597 
 
 Pipal or Pippala-tree, 83 ; 
 
 334; 335; 336. 
 Fisa(^as, 82 ; 237 ; 241 ; 
 
 242. 
 Pita, 106 ; 182 ; 244. 
 Pitara, 182. 
 
 Pitei (departed ancestors), lo. 
 Pitri-loka, 28. 
 Pitri-paksha, 329; 431. 
 Pitri-tarpana, 394, i ; 410. 
 Pitrya, 410, 1. 
 Planet-worship, 344. 
 Plant-marriages, 334. 
 Plants (sacred), 338. 
 Plant-worship, ^2 ; 330 ; 332. 
 Plateau (Pamir), 3. 
 Plates (of leaves), 424; 46 1. 
 
 Pliny, 330, I- 
 Plough (Indian), 456. 
 Pluto (Hindu), 290. 
 Poems (heroic), 42. 
 Poison (deadly), 109. 
 Polyandry, 271. 
 Polygamy (forbidden), 500. 
 Polytheism, 7 ; 11; 17. 
 Pomla (caste), 229. 
 Pongal (festival), 429. 
 Poona (temple at), 144. 
 Population (Hindu), 2. 
 Potter (village), 460 ; xxii. 
 Prabhus, 142. 
 PradlnavitI, 378 ; 410. 
 Pradakshina (worship by), 
 
 68,2; 145; 348; 415. 
 Pradhana, 30. 
 Pradyumna, 114; 116. 
 Prahlada, log. 
 Praja-pati, 35; 237; 34I ; 
 
 355- 
 Prakriti, 30J 31; 32; 36; 
 
 85; 223. 
 Prama, 27. 
 Pramana (four), 39. 
 Pramanam, 106, I. 
 Pramathas, 238. 
 Prana, 35. 
 Pranah, 106. 
 Pranava, 402. 
 Pranayama, 402. 
 Prarthana (prayer), 19. 
 Prarthana-Samaj (manual of), 
 
 526; 528; 529. 
 Prasada (sacred food), 69 ; 
 
 94 ; 145 ; 168 ; 447. 
 Pratah-sandhya, 401. 
 Pratapa-(5andra Ghosha, 197. 
 Prathama-grantha, 179. 
 Pratibhasika, 38. 
 Pratijna, 39. 
 Pratishtha, 70. 
 Pratyaksha, 39. 
 
 Prayaga,_375. 
 Prayagwal (priests), 375. 
 Prayas(!itta, 41 ; 367. 
 Prayer (eight-syllabled), 136. 
 Prayers (for the dead), 275. 
 Preta, 241 ; 242. 
 Preta-sarira, 28. 
 Priests, 386 ; 457. 
 Primitive Culture (Tylor's), 
 
 274. 2 ; 313 ; 314- 
 
 Princes (Rajputana), 113, i ; 
 
 (Oudh), 113, I ; (Pan- 
 
 dava), 271 ; 272. 
 Principles (triad of), Iig. 
 Pritha, 271. 
 Prithivi, 8; 30; 182. 
 Priya-krit, 106, I. 
 Proclamation (Keshab's),5I5. 
 Profession (choice of), 386. 
 Progressive Samaj, 526. 
 Prosonno Kumar Tagore, 485. 
 Prosperity (temple of), 385. 
 Pudkala, 219. 
 POjari (priest), 249. 
 Pulastya, 192. 
 Puliyar, 211 ; 217. 
 Pulney Hills, 214, 2 ; 349. 
 Pumsavana, 353 ; 355. 
 Puridalika(orPundanka),263. 
 Pundra, 66 ; 67; £i8 ; 400. 
 Punishment (future), 295 ; 
 
 (of school-boys), 458. 
 Punya (merit), 292. 
 Pura, 81. 
 Puraka, 402. 
 Puranas, 63 ; 99. 
 Purani, 219. 
 
 Purgatories (temporary), 232. 
 Puri, 142 ; 447. 
 Purity (or goodness), 31 ; 
 
 (age of), 1 14. 
 PurBa-prajiia, 130. 
 Piirna sakti, 187. 
 POrnima (festival), 151 ; 152. 
 Puro-dasa, 367. 
 Purohita (priests), 352 ; 386; 
 
 457- 
 Purusha, 31 ; 33 ; 34 ; 35 ! 
 
 (division of), 415. 
 Purusha-hymn (or sfikta), 1 7 ; 
 
 23 ; 33i 414- 
 
 Purusha-kara, 125. 
 Purva-mimansa, 198. 
 Pushan, 9. 
 
 Pushkara (Pokhar), 558. 
 Pushpa (flowers), 144; 415. 
 Pushti-marga, 134. 
 Pushty-artha (Sraddha), 305. 
 Put (hell), 287. 
 Piitatma, 106. 
 Put-tra, 287; 355. 
 
 Qq3 
 
 Race (great Aryan), 3; (Ana- 
 
 rya)_, 19 ; (Dasyu), 19 ; 
 
 (Dravidian), 3 ; 19 ; (Ko- 
 
 larian), 3; (lunar)_, 112; 
 
 (Naga), 233; (Non- Aryan), 
 
 3 ; (Nishada), 19 ; (pasto- 
 ral), 3 J (Serpent), 321. 
 Radha, 113. 
 Radha-Krishmu, 184. 
 Rag (or Ragas), 170 ; (Asa), 
 
 1 70 ; (Gauri), 1 70 ; (Majh), 
 
 170. 
 Rahu, 344. 
 Rain-god, 9; 12 ; :6. 
 Rain-worship, 2. 
 Raja-(iakra, 196. 
 Rajanya, 415. 
 Rajas, 31 ; 36. 
 Rajendralala Mitra (Dr.), 93; 
 
 108, 2 ; 193 ; 194, I ; 
 
 195,3; 282, I. 
 Rajo-guna, 45. 
 Rajput (tribe), 233, I. 
 Rajputana, 1 13; 559; (princes 
 
 of), 113, I- 
 Rakshasas, 237 ; 244. 
 Ram (Agni's vehicle), 104, 3. 
 Rama, 47; 62,1; 98; ill; 
 
 220; 259; 445; 462. 
 Rama-ciandra, 110; 220; 
 
 270. ' 
 
 Rama-lila, 431. 
 Ramanand, 169 ; (disciples 
 
 of), 148. 
 Ramananda-Svami, 149. 
 Rama-navamT (festival), 430. 
 Ramanuja (doctrine of), 119; 
 
 120; 121 ; 476. 
 Ramayana, 41 ; 42 ; 47 ; 1 1 1 ; 
 
 116 ; 148 ; 220 ; 328 ; 
 
 329; (of Tulsi-das), 116. 
 Rambha, 108. 
 Ram-das, 164; 165; 268. 
 Ramesvara (island), 443. 
 Ram Kant Roy, 478. 
 Rammohun Roy, 475-490. 
 Ramnad, 444. 
 Ram-singh, 26S. 
 Ran-chor, 152. 
 Ranjit Sinh (tomb of), 174; 
 
 177. 
 Rasatala, 102, a. 
 Rasesvara-darsana, 206, i. 
 Rat (Ganesa's), 104, 3. 
 Rati, 447. 
 
 Raurava (hell), 127, I. 
 Ravana (tyrant-demon), IIO ; 
 
 220; 238; 445. 
 Ravi, 162. 
 Ravi-das, 148 ; 169. 
 Reasoning (logical), 39. 
 
598 
 
 Recaka, 402. 
 
 Redeemer (universal, belief 
 in), 114. 
 
 Reformation (Hindu), 477. 
 
 Reformers (Vaishnava), 476 ; 
 (advanced Indian), 505. 
 
 Reforms (religious), 496. 
 
 Regions (seven lower), 102, 
 1 ; 232 ; 233 ; (seven up- 
 per), 232 ; 233. 
 
 Reintegration, 74 ; 75. 
 
 Religio-Philosophical Journal, 
 
 256- . 
 
 Religion (social equality in), 
 
 64; (Hindia daily), 351 ; 
 
 (in moderti family-life), 370. 
 Religious Truth, 510, I. 
 Remarriage of widows, 472 ; 
 
 500; 508. 
 Reproach (terms of), 329. 
 Reproducer, 44. 
 Revati, 112. 
 Reva (river), 347. 
 Rid (hymn), 415. 
 Rice, 6 ; (consecration of), 
 
 419. 
 Riddhi, 215. 
 
 Right-hand worshippers, 185. 
 Rig-veda, 8 ; 12; 13 j 14; 
 
 21 ; 281 ; (I. 25), 407; 
 
 (I. 34. II), 10; (I. 45. 2), 
 
 10; (I. 72. 6), 418; (I. 
 
 114. 8), 421 ; (I. 164. 20), 
 
 120; (I. 164. 46), 51 ; (II. 
 
 23. I), 216; (III. 59), 
 
 406; (III. 62. 10), 403 J 
 
 (IV. 5. 6), 281, I ; (IV. 
 
 51. ii),407;(IV. 58. 3), 
 
 419; (V. 4. 6). 418; (V. 
 
 4. 9), 420 ; (VI. 20. 2), 
 
 320; (VII. 89. l), 280; 
 
 (VII. 99. 7, 100. 7), 416 ; 
 
 (VII. 104. 3), 281. 1 ; 
 
 (VIII. 58. 2), 51; (IX. 73. 
 
 8), 281, I ; (X. 9), 403; 
 
 (X. 10), 289; (X. 14.9), 
 
 282 ; (X. 14. 7. 11), 2831 
 
 (X. 17. 3), 299; (X. 18. 
 
 3), 283; (X. 18. 8), 280; 
 
 (X. 71. 2), 182, 2; (X. 
 
 8.';).363;(X. 85. 6),343; 
 
 (X. 86). 222, I ; (X. 88. 
 
 11), 341; (X. 90), 23; 
 
 414; (X. 121. 10), 424; 
 
 (X. 129), 29. 
 Ripon (Lord), 569. 
 Rishis, 2 ; 7 ; (seven), 107. 
 Rishi-tarpana, 410. 
 Rita, 404. 
 Rite (Agnishtoma), 22 ; (Ap- 
 
 toryama), 22 ; (Asva- 
 
 Index. 
 
 medha), 22 ;, (Branding), 
 132; 133! (Funeral), 274; 
 (Jyotishtoma), 22 ; (Va- 
 japeya), 22, 194; (Dedi- 
 cation), 117; (purificatory), 
 157; 3S3.i (sacrificial), 22; 
 367; (Sikh,baptismal),i67; 
 (Vaitarani), 297 ; (Sautra- 
 mani), 194. 
 
 River-god, 182.' 
 
 River-goddess, 182. 
 
 Rivers (sacred), 295 ; 347 ; 
 (trinity of), 347. 
 
 Rivington (Rev. Luke), 5 1 5, i . 
 
 Rocks (sacred), 349. 
 
 Roer, 183. 
 
 Rohini, 11 j. 
 
 Rosary, 67 ; 135 ; 406 ; 
 (Vaishnava), 67 ; 117 ; 
 (Saiva), 67 ; 82; (of asce- 
 tic), 92. 
 
 Rudra, 9 ; 3^ ; 75 ! 7^ i 77 .' 
 82 ; 85 ; (hymns), 416. 
 
 Rudraksha (tree), 67 ; (ber- 
 ries), 82. 
 
 Rudras_(eleven), 10. 
 
 Rudra-Siva, 44 ; 75. 
 
 Rudra-yamala (Tantra), 207. 
 
 Rukmaka (fire), 419. 
 
 Rukmint. 114. 
 
 Rules (of hfe), 51 ; 281. 
 
 Sabala, 289 ; 422. 
 
 SabarmatI, 347. 
 
 Sabda (or aptopadesa), 39. 
 
 Sabha-mandapa (assembly 
 hall), 153. 
 
 Sacerdotalism (HindO), 352. 
 
 Sacrifice (meaning of), 1 2 ; 
 13, I ; (foreshadowing of), 
 17; (efficacy of), 22 J 23; 
 (Brahmanical), 22 ; 23 ; 
 (human), 24; 166.; (ani- 
 mal), ^4. 
 
 Sacrificial-rites, 367. 
 
 Sada-Siva, 83. 
 
 Sadharana (Brahma-Samaj) , 
 513! '6I+ 
 
 Sadhus(holymen),87,i; 150. 
 
 Sadyo-jata, 400. 
 
 Saffron, 91. 
 
 Saguna, 31, i ; 36, I ; 121. 
 
 Sahadeva, 271 ; 272. 
 
 Sahajananda, 148; 149; 268. 
 
 Sahishnuh, 106, i. 
 
 Saint-worship, 257-273. 
 
 Sainya, 407. 
 
 Saira, 193. 
 
 Saiva (worshippers of Siva), 
 
 . 59; 60; 73; 96- 
 Saiva-darsana, 89. 
 
 Saivistn, 71 r 73^94 > (preva- 
 lency of), 244 ; (compared 
 
 . with Vaishnavlsm), 64. 
 
 Saka (era), 433. 
 
 Sakha (of the Veda), 530, 
 and note. 
 
 Sakhya, 141. 
 
 Sakinls, 189. 
 
 Sakshi, 106, I. 
 
 Sakshin (witness), 218, 1. 
 
 Sakshi- Vinayaka, 218, 1. 
 
 Saktas, 59 ; 140. 
 
 Sakti, 33; 62; 187; 392. 
 
 Sakti-saiigama (Tantra), 207. 
 
 Saktism, 71 ; 180-196 ; (de- 
 finition of), 180; (theory 
 of),l8i; (licentiousness of), 
 190; (initiation into), 191. 
 
 Sal (tree), 582. ' 
 
 Salagrama, 46; .69; 296; 
 
 ._33_6; 392; 412; 561. 
 
 Salivahana, 433. 
 
 Salivatlsvara, 446, 5. 
 
 Salokya, 41 ; 71 ; 118. 
 
 Salutation (at Sandhya), 536. 
 
 Samadh (tomb), 179. 
 
 Samadhi, 48 ; 261. 
 
 Samajes (various), 494; (com- 
 pared), 509. 
 
 Samaa (hymn), 415. 
 
 Samanodakas, 286. 
 
 Samarpana, 117; 137. 
 
 Samavartana, 353 ; 362 ; 379. 
 
 Sama-veda, 8 ; 21. 
 
 Sambhu, 83. 
 
 Samhita (recitation), 409. 
 
 Samhitas (of the Veda), 8. 
 
 SamI (tree), 338 ; 535. 
 
 Samidh (fuel), 367. 
 
 Samipya, 41 ; 71 ; 118. 
 
 Samjna, 341. 
 
 Sammohana, 200. 
 
 Sampradaya, 61 ; 62. 
 
 Samvat (era), 433. 
 
 Samvatsara-karah, 106. 
 
 Samya, 30. 
 
 San (era), 433. 
 
 Sanaka, 422. 
 
 Sanat-kumara (Tantra), 207. 
 
 Saijdal, 144; 415, I. 
 
 Sandansa, 232. 
 
 Sandhya (morning), 401 ; 
 (mid-day), 407 ; (even- 
 ing) ,_407- 
 
 Sandhja-japa, 394, I. 
 
 Sandilya, 63, 2 ; 97. 
 
 Sandipana, 200. 
 
 Sankalpa, 23 ; 27, 
 
 Sankara, 55 ; 56 ; 83 ; (doc- 
 trine of), ISO. 
 
 Sankaradarya, 53 ; 59. 
 
Index, 
 
 599 
 
 Sankara-NarayaBa, 65. 
 Sankara-vijaya, 59 ; 67, 2 ; 
 
 86; 217; 236; 342. 
 Sankha (shell), 65 ; 92 ; 103 r 
 
 109 ; 299. 
 Saiikhini, 389. 
 Sankhya (Sutra), 26. 
 Sanklrtana, 141. 
 Sankrant (festival), 428. 
 Sannyasi, 53; 55; 87; 129; 
 
 261J 362 ; 375 ; xxi. 
 Sanskaras (twelve), 353. 
 Sanskrit Texts (Muir's), 182, 
 
 2; '237, I. 
 Sanskrita (language), 4. 
 Santals and Santalia, 576- 
 
 585- 
 Santana-Ganapati, 218. 
 Santa-Ram, 269. 
 Santi, 141 ; 346. 
 Santi-da, 106, I. 
 Santi-parvan (13140), 66. 
 Sapindana (Sraddha), 305. 
 Sapindas, 286. 
 Sapta-padi, 364; 380, 3. 
 Sapta Sindhu, 7. 
 Sarada-tilaka (Tantra), 207. 
 Saranam, 106, I. 
 Saraiigi, 381. 
 Sara-sayya, 56 1. 
 Sarasvat, 182. 
 Sarasvatl (goddess), 14 ; 47 ; 
 
 182 ; 211 ; ^36 ; (worship 
 
 of), 429 ; (river), 5.1. 
 Sarayu, 347. 
 
 Sarcostema Viminalis, 12. 
 Sari, 396. 
 
 Sariraka-bhashya, 121. 
 Sarman (prosperityj, 358. 
 Sarnga, 104. 
 Sarsa, 268. 
 Sarshti, 205. 
 Sarupya, 41 ; 71 ; 118. 
 Sarva, 85. 
 
 Sarva-bhiita-hara, 82. 
 Sarva-darsana-sangraha, 119; 
 
 121, I ; 122 ; 124, I ; 
 
 131 ; 133- 
 Sarvah, 106, i. 
 
 Sastris (Pandits), 386. 
 Sat, 34. 
 
 Satani (school), 125, 1. 
 Satapana, 200. 
 Satapatha-brahniana, 2 1 ; 24; 
 
 29; 182. 
 Satarudriya, 76 ; 79 ; 328. 
 Sati, 79; 261 ; 279, 1 ; 299; 
 
 4S1. 
 Satnami, 178 ; 179. 
 Satru-ghiia, 47. 
 
 Sattara, 267 ; 268. 
 Sattra, 368. 
 Sattva, 31 ; 36. 
 Sattva-guna, 45 ; 412, 2. 
 Saturnalia (Hindii), 430. 
 Satya, 102, i ; (age), 109 ; 
 
 "4; 433- 
 Satyah, 106 ; 403, 
 Sauras, 59 ; 342. 
 Saura-siikta, 342. 
 Savam asaudam, 288. 
 Savana, 369. 
 Savitri, 9; 75 ; 341; 361 ; 
 
 _403- 
 
 Sayam-sandhya, 407. 
 
 Sayana, 78, 2 ; 419, 2. 
 
 Sayana-Madhava, 56. 
 
 Sayujya, 41 ; 71 ; 118. 
 
 Sayujya-mukti, 196. 
 
 Scape-goat, 227. 
 
 Schadel-haus, 275, I. 
 
 Schoolmaster (village), 458. 
 
 Schools (village), 458. 
 
 Scriptures (Hindu), 408. 
 
 Sea (of milk, &c.), I08. 
 
 Sect (Hindii), 60; (Bhatta), 
 86 ; (C'aitanya), 138-145 ; 
 (Ganapatya), 217; (Jah- 
 gama), 86 ; (Madhva), 
 129-134; (Nimbaditya), 
 146 ; (Nimbarka), 146 ; 
 (Pasupata), 86 ; 89; (Ram- 
 anuja), 119-129 ; (Rama- 
 nanda),147; (Raudra),86; 
 (Saiva), 86-89 ; (Sikh), 
 161-178; (Smarta), 95 ; 
 (Svami-Narayana), 148- 
 158; (ofKabir), 158-161; 
 (Vaishnava), 116-161. 
 
 Sectarianism (Hindu), 60 ; 
 (Saiva), 86-89 ; (Vaish- 
 nava), 116-160. 
 
 Sen (Keshab Chandar), 496 ; 
 
 497; 510; 512-523; 525; 
 
 526._ 
 Sen (Ram Comul), 497. 
 Serpent, 80 ; 105 ; (Kaliya), 
 
 113 ; (demons), 233 ; 
 
 (temple), 323 ; (worship), 
 
 313; 319-326. 
 Services (religious), 392. 
 Sesamum (seed), 296. 
 Sesha (serpent-god), 59 ; .63 ; 
 
 105; 112 ; 232, 1; 321; 
 
 323; 332, 1. 
 Setuh, 106, I. 
 Seven (steps), 364; (seas), 
 
 108 ; (worlds), 403. 
 Shadvinsa-brahmana, 398. 
 Shakespeare, 386. 
 Shamanism, 246. 
 
 Shanars (religion of), 251. 
 Shan-mata-sthapaka, 59. 
 Shashthi (goddess), 229 ; 328. 
 Shat karniani, 394, 1. 
 Shaving (religious), 127; 359; 
 
 374; (of corpse), 297. 
 Sherring (Mr.), 437, i. 
 Shodasi, 188. 
 Shoemaker (village), 460. 
 Shoes, 396. 
 Shrines (celebrated), I39; 
 
 434-451 ; (demon), 249. , 
 Siddha (perfect ones), 191. 
 Siddhi, 215. 
 Sights (inauspicious), 397 ; 
 
 (auspicious), 398. 
 Sikandar Shah Lodi, 158. 
 Sikh (sect), 161-178. 
 Sikha, 374. 
 Sikha-bandhana, 400. 
 Siksha-patri (translated), 155. 
 Simantonnayana, 353 ; 357. 
 SindiJra (vermilion), 221. 
 Singing (religious), 14I ; 264; 
 
 . 527; 528- 
 
 Sipivishta, 416. 
 
 Sipping water, 144; 401. 
 
 Siras-ifheda, 201. 
 
 Sirs Rag, 1 70. 
 
 Sisu-pala, 143 ; 259, i. 
 
 Sita, 48, 1 ; 220; 445. 
 
 Sitala Devi, 228. 
 
 Sitala-saptami (festival), 430. 
 
 Sita-Ramau, 184. 
 
 Siva, 3 ; 45 ; 46 ; 47 ; 54 ; 
 56 ; 62 ; 65 ; 66 ; 67 ; 
 68 ; 69 ; (supremacy of), 
 74 ; (symbol of), 78 ; 
 (names of), 78; 82; 106 ; 
 (description of), 78 ; 79 ; 
 (names of attendants of), 
 79, 1 ; (five faces of), 79, 
 3 ; (eyes of), 80 ; (weapons 
 of), 81 ; (five chief char- 
 acters of), 81-86; (repre- 
 sentation of), 82; (feminine 
 counterpart), 83 ; (eight 
 material forms of), 85 ; 
 (miracles), 85 ; (eight prin- 
 cipal manifestations), 85 ; 
 (female energy), 187; (con- 
 tradictory qualities), 186; 
 (incarnation), 266. 
 
 Siva-ji, 265. 
 
 Sivanath Sastri (Pandit), 514. 
 
 Siva-purana, 74 ; 78- 
 
 Siva-rat, 90. 
 
 Siva-ratri, 204 ; 428. 
 
 Siva-stotra, 535. 
 
 Siva-sutras, 84, i. 
 I Skanda, 48; 62; 79; 214. 
 
6oo 
 
 Index, 
 
 Skanda-purana, 74. 
 Skull (cracking), 299. 
 Sky, 5:9; 20. 
 Sky-god, 15. 
 
 Sleeman (Col.), 331, 3 ; 335' 
 Small-pox (goddess of), 22^. 
 SmSrta Brahmans, 55 ; 95. 
 Smarta-karman, 365. 
 Smasana, 203 ; 28 1. 
 Smasana-vasin, 82. 
 Smriti, S3. 
 Smriti-karman, 52. 
 Smriti-sastra, 51. 
 Snake-chiefs, 233. 
 Snake-stones, 3:25. 
 Snake-superstitions, 324. 
 Snake-worship, 319. 
 Snana (bathing), 394, i ; 
 
 399; 415- 
 
 Societies (Theistic), 48,15-520. 
 
 Socrates, 515. 
 
 So-daru, 170. 
 
 Sohila, 170. 
 
 Soma (moon), 343. 
 
 Soma-god, 12. 
 
 Soma-juice, 25 ; 369. 
 
 Soma (plant), 6 ; 8 ; 12; 332, 
 
 Soma-sacrifice, 25 ; 368; 392. 
 
 Son (importance of), 355. 
 
 Sons (of the Ganges), 34!^, 
 
 So-purkhu, 170. 
 
 Sorcerer (story of a), 299. 
 
 Soul (restless state of), 277, 1. 
 
 Sound (eternity of), 198. 
 
 Spell-Veda, 8. 
 
 Spiky bed, 561. 
 
 Spirit (Supreme), 14 ; (bodily 
 coverings of), 26 ; 27 ; 
 (mode of worshipping), 49 ; 
 50 ; (disembodied), 291 ; 
 292 ; (embodied), 293. 
 
 Spirit-worship, 71 ; 230-256. 
 
 Sraddha (ceremonies), 276 ; 
 303; (object of), 304; 
 (twelve Sraddhas), 305 ; 
 (payment for), 307 ; (time 
 and place of), 308 ; (spe- 
 cial), 308 ; 310 ; 3" ; 
 
 (expense of), 278 ; 312. 
 Sramana, 58. 
 
 Srauta-karman, 365 ; 368. 
 Sri, 103. 
 
 SrWakra, 196 ; 203. 
 Srldharalu Naidu, 525. 
 Sringa-giri, 55. 
 Sri-phala, 299, 
 Sri-raiigara, 119; (temple of), 
 
 ?o, I ; 447-451. 
 Srishti-sthiti-laya, 44. 
 Sruti, 7. 
 Sruti-karman, 52. 
 
 Stages (four, of BrShman's 
 life), 362. 
 
 Stambhana, 200. 
 
 Statue (Jain), 250. 
 
 Stephen (Sir Fitzjames), 507. 
 
 Sthann, 83. 
 
 Sthiila-sarira, 28 ; 35. 
 
 Sthu^a (column), 2S0. 
 
 Stones, 272 ; (five), 349 ; 
 411 ; (five methods of ar- 
 rangement of), 4IZ. 
 
 Storm-god, 9. 
 
 Strl ParambattOr, 119. 
 
 Stuti (praise), 19. 
 
 Styx (Hindu), 297. 
 
 Subrahmanya, 48 ; 211-218 ; 
 323 ; (contrasted with 
 Ganesa), 215. 
 
 Sudarsana, 103 ; 133; xxi. 
 
 Suddhy-artha (Sraddha), 305. 
 
 Sudra, 53; 415 j (god of 
 the), 84; 212. 
 
 Sugriva (king), 221. 
 
 Suhrid, 106, i. 
 
 Sukh-nidhan, 160. 
 
 Suklah (name of Siva), I07. 
 
 Sukra, 194, 1. 
 
 SGkshma, 123. 
 
 Sukshma-sarira, 28. 
 
 Sulabh Samachar, 510, I. 
 
 Sun, 10; 20; 104; 365; 
 
 _ (titles of), 341. 
 
 Sunahsepa, 24. 
 
 Sundaresvara, 442. 
 
 Sun-god, 9 ; 10 ; 16. 
 
 Sun-temples, 342. 
 
 Sun-worship, 2 ; 5 ; 341. 
 
 Sun-worshippers, 62 ; 342. 
 
 Superstition, 210; 230; 344; 
 
 370- 
 Sura (wine-goddess), 108 ; 
 
 193; 195- 
 Surabhi, 108 ; 318. 
 Sur-das (poet), 147; 169. 
 Surya, 9; 16 ; 75 ; 341 ; 392. 
 Surya-Narayana, 342, I. 
 Surya-sukta, 342. 
 Surya-sukta, 343 ; 363, nofe. 
 Sutala, 102, I. 
 Sutra (aphorism), 26.' 
 Sutratman, 35, 
 Suttee (for Sati). See Sati. 
 Svadha, 304. 
 SvadhySya, 394, i. 
 Svaml. See Dayananda. 
 Svami-Narayana (sect), 148 ; 
 
 268 ; (manual), 155. 
 Sva-pada, 329. 
 Svar, 9 ; 102, I ; 403. 
 Svarga, 13 ; 49 ; 71; 118. 
 Svarna-Ganapati, 218. 
 
 Svastika (mark), 90, 2; 104, 
 
 1 ; 573- 
 Svayam-bhii, 30 ; 6g. 
 Sveta, 80, 2. 
 
 Svetasvatara Upanishad, 419. 
 Swan (Brahma's), 104, 3. 
 Sword (Vishnu's), 104. 
 Swords (sacred), 175. 
 Syama, 187; 289; 422. 
 Syama-rabasya CTantra), 207. 
 Symbols (of Siva), 67 ; 239 ; 
 
 (of Vishnu), 127; 239; 
 
 (sanctity of), 69. 
 
 Tabla (tom-toms), 381. 
 
 Tacitus, 330. 
 
 Tagore (Debendra-nath), 491 ; 
 498:514; 63i;(DTaraka- 
 nath), 482 ; 485 ; 491 ; 
 (Prosonno Kumar), 485. 
 
 Tailotsava (festival), 442. 
 
 Taittiriya Aranyaka, 400 ; 
 
 403- 
 Taittiriya-brahmana,23; 195, 
 
 3- 
 Taittiriya-samhita (VI. 4. 10. 
 
 I)>237- 
 Taj at Agra, 175 ; 176. 
 Takshaka, 233 ; 323. 
 Talatala, 102, i. 
 Tali (toddy), 192. 
 Talismans, 197-202 ; 204 ; 
 
 254- 
 
 Talvandi, 162. 
 
 Tamas, 31 ; 36. 
 
 Tamatoa (king), 273, i. 
 
 Tambila (ceremony), 248. 
 
 Tamo-guna, 45 ; 412, 2. 
 
 Tamraparm (river), 324. 
 
 Tandava (dance), 85. 
 
 Tandya-brahmana, 21; 23. 
 
 Tanjore, 66, 2 ; 439. 
 
 Tafika, 193. 
 
 Tanmatra, 30; 31, 2. 
 
 Tantra (Matrikarbheda), 193. 
 
 Tantras, 63 ; 85 ; 184; (ex- 
 tracts from), 189 ; (Vaish- 
 ^ava), 207; (authorship and 
 character of), 205 ; 206. 
 
 Tantra-sara, 200, i. 
 
 Tantrikas, 25. 
 
 Tanus (eight), 85. 
 
 Tapah or 'Tapar (heaven), 
 102, I ; 403. 
 
 Tapana, 86. 
 
 Tapas, 72 ; 87. 
 
 Tapasvl, 83. 
 
 Tapta-kumbha, 232. 
 
 Tapta-loha, 232. 
 
 Tapti (river), 347. 
 
Index. 
 
 60 1 
 
 Tara, 187. 
 Taraka-mantra, 297. 
 Taipana (ceremony) , 394 ; 
 
 409- 
 Tattva, 106. 
 
 Tattva-bodhini-patrika, 509. 
 Tattva-bodhini-sabha, 492. 
 Tattva-muktavali, 122. 
 Teachers (Vaishnava), 86. 
 Teeth-cleaning (religious act), 
 
 . 376; 399- 
 
 Teg-Bahadur, 164 ; 166. 
 
 Tejas (fire), 30. 
 
 Temple (golden), 175 ; 176; 
 436 ; (of Vishuu-pada), 
 309; (of Ganesa), 217. 
 
 Temples (description of), 
 
 434-451- 
 Temple (Sir Richard), 467. 
 Ten-galai, 125-127. 
 Tennyson, 386. 
 Thag. See Thug. 
 Thana (temples of), 50. 
 Thanush-kodi, 445. 
 Theism, 7 ; (introduced into 
 
 India), 475 ; (forms of), 
 . 524; (modern Hindu), 492. 
 Theistic Annual, 510, I. 
 Theistic Church (first Hindu), 
 
 486. 
 Theistic Churches (number 
 
 of), 517- 
 
 Theistic Society, 493. 
 
 Theistic Quarterly Review, 
 510, I. 
 
 Theists (Vaishnava), 179- 
 
 Theosophy, 526; xii, I. 
 
 Thomas (Mr. Edw.), 104, i. 
 
 Thread (Brahmanical), 84; 
 360; 361; 378; 409. 
 
 Threefold pains of life, 97. 
 
 Thug (thag), 260 ; 575. 
 
 Tibet, 3 ; 313. 
 
 Tiger (Durga's), 104, 3. 
 
 Tilaka, 66; 67; 118; 400. 
 
 Tinnevelly, 272; (Saiva tem- 
 ple), 446. 
 
 Tirtha (water), 145. 
 
 Tirtha-kaka, 329. 
 
 Tirumell Nayak, 443. 
 
 Todas (aborigines), 271, i. 
 
 Tonsure, 359 ; (modern), 
 
 375- 
 Torment (regions of), 293. 
 Tortoise, 108 ; 328. 
 Totemism, 314. 
 Towns (Indian), 462. 
 Trade (Indian), 453. 
 Trade-castes, 454. 
 Tradition (Brahmanical), 53. 
 Transfiguration, 206. 
 
 Transmigration, 24; 52; 
 235. iSec Metempsychosis. 
 Travancore (king of), 468. 
 Tree, (celestial), 108. 
 Tree and Serpent Worship, 
 
 313- 
 Trees (sacred), 338 ; (Siva's 
 
 association with), 446. 
 Tree-worship, 72 ; 330; 332. 
 Treta(age), no; 433. 
 Triad (sacred), 5 ; 9 ; 44 ; 45 ; 
 
 49; 74; (of Principles), 
 
 119; (Vaishnava), 142. 
 Tribe (Yadava), 112; (Raj- 
 
 put). 233. I. 
 Trichinopoly, 70, i; 119; 
 (temples)', 217; 445; 447; 
 (Vaishnava temple at), 
 
 447- 
 
 Tri-dandin, 541, I. 
 
 Trikona, 45. 
 
 Tri-miirti, 45 ; 74- 
 
 Trinity (Hindu, wrongly call- 
 ed), 44; (contrasted with 
 Christian Trinity), 49. 
 
 Tri-pati, 267. 
 
 Tripura, 81. 
 
 Tripura, 188. 
 
 Tripurasura (demon), 432. 
 
 Tritheism, II. 
 
 Tri-vikrama, 365 ; 4^5* 
 
 Trumpp (Prof.), 161; 164; 
 169; 170, I. 
 
 Tryayusham, 421. 
 
 Tukaram or Tuka-rama, 
 264; 265 ; 528. 
 
 Tulasi or Tulsi (shrub), 46 ; 
 67 ; 296 ; (healing qualities 
 oO> 333; (worship of), 333. 
 
 Tulsi-das (poet), 147 ; 148. 
 
 Tnnga-bhadra, 347. 
 
 Turbans, 396. 
 
 Turlya, 35. 
 
 Tutelary deities, 71. 
 
 Tylor (£. B.), 274, 2 ; 313 ; 
 314; 33°- 
 
 Ucidaih-sravas, 108 ; 329. 
 Ucdhishta-Ganapati, 218. 
 Udaharana, 39. 
 Udasa, 154. 
 Uddisa (Tantra), 207. 
 Udumbara, 535. 
 Udupi, 130. 
 Ugra, 76; 85. 
 Ujjhi Puliyar, 2 1 7. 
 Uliipi, 233, I ; 322. 
 Uma, 79; 229. 
 Untai, 227. 
 Upadara, 413. 
 Upadana, 119. 
 
 Upadana-karana, 120. 
 
 Upadesa (knowledge), 191. 
 
 Upamana, 39. 
 
 Upanaya, 39. 
 
 Upanayana (ceremony), 353 ; 
 
 360; 377. 
 Upanishad (Kaula), 185. 
 Upanishads, 26 ; (philosophy 
 
 oO, 37. I- . 
 Upasana (meditation), 19. 
 UpasthSna (service), 406 ; 
 
 (prayer), 407 ; (act), 420. 
 Upavastra, 415. 
 Upavlta, 378. 
 Upaviti, 409. 
 Upaya (means), 125. 
 Urdhva-bahu, 88 ; 439. 
 Urdhva-deha, 293, I. 
 tjrdhva-pundra, 67 ; 118. 
 Urvasi (nymph), 333, I. 
 Ushas, 5 ; 9 ; 182. 
 Utsava-murti, 447. \ 
 
 Utsava-vigraha, 449. 
 Uttariya, 395. 
 
 Vada-galai, 125-127. 
 
 Vagala or Bagala, 188. 
 
 Vag-dana, 377. 
 
 Vaghoba, 328. 
 
 Vahana, 104, 3. 
 
 Vaidika Upadesa, 362. 
 
 Vaidyah, 106. 
 
 Vaikuntha, 70; 102; 118; 
 124; 142 ; 291 ; (terres- 
 trial counterpart of), 448. 
 
 Vairagi, 87; 561. 
 
 Vairagya, 48 ; 510. 
 
 Vaiseshika (SOtra), 26. 
 
 Vaishnavas, 59; 60; 95-160. 
 
 Vaishiiavism, 71 ; (general 
 characteristics), C15-106 ; 
 (compared with Saivism), 
 64 ; (with Christianity), 
 119. 
 
 Vaisvadeva (ceremony), 394; 
 416. 
 
 Vaisvadeva-balikarmani, 417, 
 2. 
 
 Vaisvanara, 35. 
 
 Vaisya, 53; 415; (god of 
 the), 84. 
 
 VaitaranI, 290; 297; 570. 
 
 Vajasaneyi-samhita, 76. 
 
 Vajra, 81. 
 
 Vallabha or Vallabhaiarya 
 (life of), 134; 135; (teach- 
 ing of), 476; (Maharajas), 
 
 335- 
 Valli-amman, 214. 
 
 Valmiki, 196. 
 Vama-margTs, 185. 
 
602 
 
 Index. 
 
 Vamana, no. 
 Vana-liiiga, 69. 
 Vanamamala, 129. 
 Vana-parva, 292. 
 Vanaprastba, 362. 
 Vansa-brShmana, 56, i. 
 Varada-raja, 446. 
 Varaha, 109. 
 VarSnasi, 434. 
 Varman (armour), 358. 
 Varuna, 5; 9; 10; 15; 59. 
 Varum, 193. 
 Vasanta-pan(iami (festival), 
 
 429. 
 Vasikarana, 200. 
 Vasishtha, 196. 
 Vastia, 415. 
 
 Vasudeva, lii; 112; 113. 
 Vasuki (serpent), 108 ; 233; 
 
 323- 
 Vasus (eight), 10. 
 Vata-Sraddha, 312. 
 Vata-tree, 337; 399. 
 Vatesvara (Siva), 446. 
 Vatsalah, 106, I. 
 Vatsalya, 141. 
 
 Vatsyayana (sage), 388; 462. 
 Vayavya, 414. 
 Vayu, 9j 10; 30563; 271. 
 Vayu-vahana, 105. 
 Veda, 2; 7; 8; 18; 21. 
 Veda-narayana, 50. 
 Veda-Samaj, 525. 
 Vedanta philosophy, 33 ; 
 
 (SutraX 26; 55. 
 Vedantacarya, 134. 
 Vedantism (pure), 36. 
 Vedarambha-sanskara, 362. 
 Vedi (altar), 308. 
 Vedism, 1-19 ; 96. 
 Vehicles (of the gods), 104, 
 
 3| 327 ; 338. 
 
 Vena (river), 347. 
 Veni-danam, 375. 
 Venkatesa, 107 ; 267. 
 Vibhishana, 238 ; 448. 
 Vibhuti, 66. 
 Vibhati-grahana, 420. 
 Vidyabagish (Ram Chandra), 
 
 493- 
 Vidya-dharas, 238. 
 Vighna-Taja, 216. 
 Vighnesa, 216. 
 Vijaya-nagar, 134. 
 Vikalpa, 27. 
 Vikramaditya, 433. 
 Vikramorvasi,' 333, I. 
 Vilepana, 420. 
 Village communities, 455 ; 
 
 (Deities), 209-229. 
 Vinata, 104, 3 ; 322. 
 
 Vindhyacal or Vindhyadala- 
 vasint (form of Kali), 675- 
 Vipra, 361. 
 
 Vir (vira, hero), 272, i. 
 Vira (Tantra), 207. 
 Virabhadra, 47 ; 79 ; 82. 
 Vira-dakra, 196. 
 Viradha, 237. 
 Viraj, 30; 35; 44; 414. 
 Virgin (black), 229, 1. 
 Virodha-bhakti, 143. 
 Virupa, 77; 107. 
 Visala^i, 228. 
 Visha, 109. 
 Vishnu, 3; 9; 14; 36;, 44; 
 
 45; 46; 54; 56; (*"- 
 acter of), 97; 104; 107; 
 (descents of), 47; 103; 
 107-116; (in jRig-veda), 
 102 ; (origin of), 66 ; 
 (worship of), 68 ; 69 ; 
 (supremacy of), 74; (deri- 
 vation of), lol ; (as de- 
 scribed in Puranas), 103 ; 
 (epithets of), 105 ; 106 ; 
 (original idol of), 449. 
 
 Vishnu-pada (temple),. 309. 
 
 Vishnu-pada-Sraddha, 312. 
 
 Vishuu-purana, 103, 2 ; 232; 
 233; 241; 290; 291)304. 
 
 Vishnu-Siva, 65. 
 
 Vishnu-svamI, 134, 
 
 Vishnu-yamala (Tantra), 307. 
 
 Visishtadvaita, 122; 124. 
 
 Visvamitra, ig. 
 
 Visva-sara (Tantra), 207. 
 
 Visvesvara, 50 ; (temple of), 
 437; 438; (worship at), 
 
 439- 
 Vitala, 102, I. 
 Vitho-ba, 50 ; 263 ; 264. 
 Viththal, 263. 
 Vitthalnath, 135. 
 Vivaha, 353 ; 362. 
 Vivasvat, 289. 
 Vraja, 113. 
 Vriddha-^anga, 347. 
 Vriddhi Sraddha, 305. 
 Vrihaspati, 194, i. 
 Vrindavana, 113. 
 Vrishakapi, 222, i. 
 Vrishotsarga, 319. 
 Vritra, 15, i ; 320. 
 Vyahritis (seven), 403. 
 Vyakara^ottarah, 84, I. 
 Vyankatesa, 267. 
 Vyapaka, 39. 
 Vyapti, 39. 
 Vyapya, 40. 
 Vyasa, 55. 
 Vyavaharika, 38. 
 
 Wa-i, 267 ; (temple, of); 
 
 217. 
 Walhouse (Mr.), 248 ; 249 ; 
 
 251 ; 323- 
 
 Walkesvar (temple at), 90. 
 War (god of), 212 ; 213. 
 Warali (tribe), 328. 
 Ward's Hindoos, 327. 
 Ware (Rev. C), 256. 
 Warrior-deification, 259. 
 Wartal, 150; (temples at), 
 151 ; 152; (Darbar at), 
 
 153- 
 Washing (of children), 580. 
 Watch-dogs, 329. 
 Water (Apah, pi.), 30. 
 Water-worship, 346. 
 Wealth (god of), 79. 
 Weapon (circular), 103 ; 104 ; 
 
 (of Siva), 67 ; 201 ; 239. 
 Weaving, 460. 
 Weber (Prof. A.), 363, i ; 
 
 398.1. 
 
 Wedding (descriptidn of),38i; 
 
 Week (sacred character of 
 days of), 433. 
 
 Well (at Benares), 437 ; 438. 
 
 Widows, 388; 423; 473; 
 (Ten-galai), 127; (re- 
 marriage of), 500 ; 508 ; 
 (burning of), 280 note. 
 
 Wife (model), 389. 
 
 Wilson (Prof. H. H.), 160, 1 i 
 179; 419, 2; 498, I. 
 
 Wind, 9 ; 10. 
 
 Wind-worship, 2. 
 
 Wine (goddess of), 108. 
 
 Wiue-drinking, 108, 2 ; (ces- 
 sation of), 194, I. 
 
 Women (prototype of), 108; 
 (status and condition of), 
 
 333; 387; 388; 398; 
 (four kinds of), 389 ; (de- 
 dicated to service of tem- 
 ples), 451. 
 
 Woodrow (Mr., late), 373, 2. 
 
 Workmanship (low cost of), 
 
 469- 
 Workmen (perseverance of), 
 
 464. 
 Works (salvation by), 63 ; 
 
 119. 
 World (visible), 119. 
 Worlds (seven), 102, 1 ; 403 ; 
 
 (fourteen), 232. 
 Worship (domestic), 392 ; 
 
 (form of), 5 ; 6 ; 71 ; 72 ; 
 
 (threefold act of), 132 ; 
 
 (with the heart), 132; 
 
 (with the body), 132; 
 
 (with the voice), 132. 
 
Yadava (tribe), 112. 
 Yajna, 13; 19; 23; 140. 
 Yajnavalkya (code of), 5 1 ; 
 
 52 ; 287 ; 35S. 
 Yajnika (priests), 386. 
 Yajnopavlta (sacred thread), 
 
 377; 378; 405. 1. 
 
 Yajur-veda, 8; 21 ; 76; 328. 
 Yajus or Yajush, 8 ; 415. 
 Yakshas, 79 ; 237 ; 238. 
 Yama, 10; 16; 17 ; 59; 
 233; 271; (functions of), 
 
 Index. 
 
 289; (names of), 290; 
 
 (two messengers of), 291 ; 
 
 296, 2 ; (judgment-seat 
 
 of), 292 ; (Registrar of), 
 
 292. 
 Yama-pura or Yama-sadana, 
 
 290. 
 YamI, II; 289. 
 Yantras, 203. 
 Yatana, 291. 
 
 Yatra, 444. See Pilgrimage. 
 Yatrartha (Sraddha), 305. 
 
 603 
 
 Yatudhanas, 237. 
 Yenur, 250. 
 Yoga (Sutra), 26. 
 Yogi, 83 ; 87 ; 516. 
 Yoginis, 188; 189. 
 Yoni, 33 ; (typical), 224. 
 Yudhi-shthira, 271 ; 272 
 Yule (Sir H.), 333> 3- 
 Yupa, 24. 
 
 Zenana, 388 ; 467. 
 Zoolatry, 313; 314. 
 
 WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR. 
 
 Buddhism. Second Edition, with full index. John Murray, 
 
 Albemarle Street. 1890. ;^i is. 
 
 Sakuntald. A Sanskrit Drama, in Seven Acts ; the Sanskrit 
 
 and Prakrit Text, with critical and explanatory notes and literal English 
 translations. Second Edition. At the University Press, Oxford. Henry 
 Frowde, Amen Corner, E.C. 1876. 8vo, cloth, 21s. 
 
 Sakoontald, or ' The Lost Ring.' Free Metrical Translation of 
 
 this most beautiful of all Sanskrit Dramas, with a portrait of the heroine and 
 her two friends, and copious explanatory notes. Sixth Edition. W. H. 
 Allen & Co., 13 Waterloo Place. iSgo. 7s. dd. 
 
 ' A new and very elegant English version.' — Professor Max Muller's History of Ancient 
 Sanskrit Literature. First edition, page i. 
 
 'This translation deserves the highest acknowledgment on account of the consummate taste 
 with which it has rendered the metrical part of the original.' — Professor Goidstiicker, in Chambers^ 
 Encydopcedia, 
 
 Another Edition of the above, illuminated and illustrated. 
 
 Stephen Austin, Hertford. 1855. 
 
 This edition is exhibited in a case of choice works in the King's Library, British Museum, 
 and in the Imperial Library, St. Petersburg. 
 
 Indian Wisdom, or Examples of the Religious, Philosophical, 
 
 and Ethical Doctrines of the Hindiis : with a history of the chief departments 
 
 of Sanskrit Literature. Fourth Edition. To be published by Luzac & Co., 
 
 46 Great Russell Street, London. 
 
 ' This work, from beginning to end, bears the marks of earnest and thoughtful labour. It 
 has fully accomplished the designs of the writer. It clearly describes and illustrates all the great 
 divisions of Sanskrit literature, and the means of pleasantly acquiring a general knowledge of 
 that literature is now open to all who choose to seek \i:— Saturday Review, June 26, 1875. 
 
 Indian Epic Poetry. Lectures delivered at Oxford. 1863. 
 
WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR, 
 Modern India and the Indians : A Series of Impressions, Notes, 
 
 and Essays. Fifth Edition, with index. TrUbner & Co. 1890. 
 ' Professor Monier Williams not only deserves the thanks of every Englishman for this able 
 contribution to the study of Modern India— a subject with which we should be specially familiar 
 —but he deser\'es the thanks of every Indian, Parsee, or Hindoo Buddhist and Moslem, for his 
 clear exposition of their manners, their creeds, and their necessities. _ We await with interest the 
 promised Essays on Modem Indian religious life.' — The Titnes^ April 19, 1878. 
 
 Hinduism. A Manual published by the Society for Promoting 
 
 Christian Knowledge. Eleventh thousand. 2s. 6d. 
 
 The Study of Sanskrit in relation to Missionary Work in India. 
 Wilhams & Norgate. 1861, 
 
 Sanskrit-English Dictionary. Published at the University Press, 
 
 Oxford. Henry Frowde, Amen Corner, E.G. 1888. £^ 14s. 6rf. 
 
 'This is a most laboriously and carefully constructed and excellent work, which no student 
 of Sanskrit can do without.' — W. D. Whitney^ Professor of Sanskrit and Comparative Philology 
 in Yale College (from the Harvard College Courant). 
 
 'The Eoden Professor's labour of years, and the assistance of his coadjutors, have brought 
 forth abundantly, and a grand work has been accomplished. It presents a great help and a great 
 incentive to Sanskrit study, and it will lend a vigorous impulse to that movement which is now 
 working to give Sanskrit its due position in the curriculum of our Universities,' — Saturday 
 Review^ September 38, 1872. 
 
 ' There can be no doubt that the meanings of the words have been admirably arranged, and 
 that a great amount of labour, and that of the most useful kind, has been bestowed on the work.* 
 — Academy^ July 15, 1873. 
 
 English- Sanskrit Dictionary. At the India Office. £'^ y. 
 
 'I received a copy of Professor Monier Williams' Dictionary at a time when I was about to 
 commence a translation into Sanskrit of portions of the Old Testament. I have used it daily for 
 the last seven years, and the more I have consulted it the more excellent I have found it. I feel 
 bound to say that he appears to have succeeded, not only beyond my previous ideas of what 
 was likely, but also of wnat was feasible, to be accomplished at the present time. The Pundits 
 whom I employ have likewise expressed their unqualified admiration of the labour and erudition 
 which his volume displays. The Rev. J. Parsons of Benares, who has been engaged for some 
 years past in preparing a new Hindee version of the New Testament, has likewise derived 
 material assistance from Professor M. W. 's work. Indian missionaries generally owe him a large 
 debt of gratitude.'-rj. Wenger, Missionary of Calcutta, translator of the Sanskrit Bible, of the 
 Bengali oible, editor of Dr. Yates' Sanskrit Dictionary, etc. 
 
 Practical Sanskrit Grammar. Fourth Edition. At the Uni- 
 versity Press, Oxford. Henry Frowde, Amen Corner, E.C. 1877. 
 
 'I am accustomed to recommend this Grammar to any one who takes up the study of 
 Sanskrit hy himself, without a teacher, because it is more intelligible and easily managed/ — 
 W. D. Whitney (from the Harvard College Courant). 
 
 Sanskrit Manual with Exercises : to which is added a vocabulary 
 
 by Professor Gough. W. H. Allen & Co., 13 Waterloo Place. i8mo. 7s. 6d. 
 
 Vikramorvasl. A Sanskrit Drama. Stephen Austin, Hertford. 
 Story of Nala: A Sanskrit Poem. The Sanskrit Text, with full 
 
 Vocabulary and an improved version of Dean Milman's Translation. Uni- 
 versity Press, Oxford, and Amen Corner, E.C, Second Edition. 
 
 Application of the Roman Alphabet to the Languages of India. 
 
 Longmans. 
 
 Practical Hindustani Grammar. Longmans. 
 
 Easy Introduction to the Study of Hindustani, Longmans. 
 
 Hindustani Primer. Longmans. 
 
 Bdgh Bahdr. Text in Roman characters. Longmans.