New Ideas in India During the Nineteenth Century Part 13

[Sidenote: The quest of the beatific vision still implies the dissociation of religion and active life.]

[Sidenote: An unproductive religious ideal.]

What concerns us here is that in the conception of the beatific vision, we still find ourselves in a different religious world from ours--religion exoteric for the vulgar, and religion esoteric for the enlightened; religion not for living by, but for a period of retirement; a religion of spiritual self-culture, not of active sons.h.i.+p and brotherhood. Far be it from me to say that at this point the West may not learn as well as teach, for how much thought does the culture of the spirit receive among us? How little! However that may be, this conception of the religious life is deeply rooted in educated India. The impersonal pantheistic conception of the Deity may be pa.s.sing into the theistic, and even into Christian theism; the doctrine of transmigration may be little more than the current orthodox explanation of the coming of misfortune; the doctrine of Maya or the illusory character of the phenomena of our consciousness, it may be impossible to utter in this new practical age; and Jesus Christ may be the object of the highest reverence; but still the instinctive thought of the educated Hindu is that there is a period of life for the world's work, and a later period for devotion to religion. When dissatisfaction with himself or with the world does overtake him, instinctively there occur to him thoughts of retirement from the world and concentration of his mind, thereby to reach G.o.d's presence. Very few spiritually minded Hindus past middle life pa.s.s into the Christian Church, as some do at the earlier stages of life. Under the sway of the Hindu idea of salvation, by knowledge or by intense intuition, they withdraw from active life to meditate on G.o.d, with less or more of the practice of religious exercises. Painful to contemplate the spiritual loss to the community of a conception of religion that diverts the spiritual energy away from the community, and renders it practically unproductive, except as an example. Once more we recall as typical the jogi, not going about doing good, anointed with the Holy Ghost and with power, but fixed like a plant to its own spot, and with inward-looking eyes. Time was that there were jogis and joginis (female jogis) in Europe; but even of St. Theresa, at one period of her life a typical jogini, we read that not long after her visions and supernatural visitations, she became a most energetic reformer of the convents.

[Sidenote: The jogi, not the brahman, is the living part of present-day Hinduism.]

That quest for the beatific vision or for union with G.o.d, is the highest and the most living part of present-day Hinduism, whether monotheistic or pantheistic. Not the purohit brahman (the domestic celebrant), or the guru brahman (the professional spiritual director), conventionally spoken of as divine, but the jogi or religious seeker is the object of universal reverence. And rightly so. The reality of this aspect of Hinduism is manifest in the ease with which it overrides the idea of caste. In theory brahmans are the twice-born caste, the nearest to the Deity and to union with Him. A man of lower caste, in his upward transmigrations towards union with G.o.d or absorption into Deity, should pa.s.s through an existence as a brahman. In the chapter on Transmigration we found that the upward steps of the ladder up to the brahman caste had been clearly stated in an authoritative Hindu text-book. The word _br[=a]hman_, the name of the highest caste, is itself in fact a synonym for Deity. But as a matter of fact, men of any caste, moved by the spirit, are found devoting themselves to the jogi life. "He who attains to G.o.d is the true br[=a]hman," is the current maxim, attributed to the great Buddha.

[Sidenote: Saving Faith, or Bhakti.]

[Sidenote: Bhakti implies a personal G.o.d.]

[Sidenote: Bhakti a genuine feeling because it may override caste.]

[Sidenote: Bhakti not fit to cope with caste.]

This brings us to the second of the three paths of salvation, the middle portion of the upward path to the mountain top of clear, unclouded vision of the All, the One Soul. In Hindu theory, at this second stage man is still amid the clouds that cling to the mountain's breast. For easy reference I have named it _Salvation by Faith_, although the English term must not mislead. The extract from the Mahanirv[=a]na Tantra, already quoted, describes this inferior stage as the method of "chanting of glories and recitation of names" of G.o.ds. The Sanscrit name, _Bhakti_, is rendered devotion, or fervour, or faith, or fervent love; and in spite of alien ideas a.s.sociated with bhakti, bhakti is much more akin to Faith than are many of the features of Hinduism to the Christian a.n.a.logues with whose names they are ticketed. For example, bhakti practically implies a personal G.o.d, not the impersonal pantheistic Brahma. Intense devotion to some personal G.o.d, generally Vishnu the preserver, under the name Hari, or either of Vishnu's chief incarnations, Ram or Krishna, is the usual manifestation of bhakti. In actual practice it displays itself in ecstatic dancing or singing, or in exclaiming the name of the G.o.d or G.o.ddess, or in self-lacerations in his or her honour. Lacerations and what we would call penances, be it remembered, are done to the honour of a Deity; they are not a discipline like the self-whipping of the Flagellants and the jumping of the Jumpers of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. "Bhakti," says Sir Monier Williams, "is really a kind of 'meritorious work,' and not equivalent to 'faith' in the Christian sense."[129] Bhakti is the religion of many millions of India, combined more or less with the conventional externals of sacrifice and offerings and pilgrimages and employment of brahmans, which together const.i.tute the third path of salvation, by karma or works. That ecstatic adoration is religion for many millions of India, although the name _bhakti_ may never pa.s.s their lips. We judged the idea of salvation by knowledge, or by intense concentration of mind, to be _genuinely_ felt, because it could override the idea of caste. Applying the same test here, we must acknowledge the genuineness of feeling in bhakti. Theoretically, at least, as Sir Monier Williams says, "devotion to Vishnu supersedes all distinctions of caste"; and again, "Vishnavism [Vishnuism], notwithstanding the gross polytheistic superst.i.tions and hideous idolatry to which it gives rise, is the only Hindu system worthy of being called a religion."[130] In actual practice the repudiation of caste no doubt varies greatly. In some cases, caste is dropped only during the fit of fervour or bhakti. At Puri, _during_ the celebrated Juggernath (Jagan-nath, Lord of the world) pilgrimage, high caste and low together receive and eat the temple food, afterwards resuming their several ranks in caste. As a matter of fact it was found at the census of 1901, that with the exception of a few communities of devotees, all the professed Vishnuites returned themselves by their caste names. Hindu bhakti, like Christianity, is in conflict with caste, and bhakti has not proved fit to cope with it.

[Sidenote: Bhakti in other religions.]

[Sidenote: In Christian wors.h.i.+p.]

Bhakti, then, is simply the designation for fervour in wors.h.i.+p or in presence of the Deity, as it appears in Hinduism. For fervour is not peculiar to any religion, even ecstatic fervour. We see it among the Jews in King David's dancing before the ark of the Lord, and we see it in the whirling of the dervishes of Cairo, despite Mahomedans' overawing idea of G.o.d. May we not say that the singing in Christian wors.h.i.+p recognises the same religious instinct, and the necessity to permit the exercise of it. Many of the psalms, we feel we must chant or sing; reading is too cold for them--the 148th Psalm for example, "Praise ye the Lord from the heavens; praise Him in the heights: praise ye Him, sun and moon," and so on.

[Sidenote: Bhakti a natural channel for religious feeling, now being reconsecrated.]

We pa.s.s over the extravagances and gross depths to which bhakti, devotion or faith or love, may degenerate in the excitement of religious festivals--_corruptio optimi pessimum_. Even, strange to say, we find the grossness of bhakti also deliberately embodied in figures of wood and stone. Pa.s.sing that over, we repeat that in bhakti or devotion to a personal G.o.d, or even only ecstatic extravagant devotion to a saint or religious hero semi-deified, we have a natural channel for the religious feeling of Indians, a channel that in these days is wearing deep. I speak of the middle cla.s.ses, not of the ignorant ma.s.ses, and my point is that the middle cla.s.ses and the new religious organisations including the Indian Church are reconsecrating bhakti. Here is a portion of a bhakti hymn of one of the sections of the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j:

"The G.o.ds dance, chanting the name of Hari; Dances my Gouranga in the midst of the choral band; The eyes full of tears, Oh! how beautiful!

Jesus dances, Paul dances, dances Sakya Muni."

[Sidenote: Bhakti in the Indian Church.]

Between singing the song and acting it while singing, the distance in India is little. The explanation of a recent Hindu devotee, Ramkrishna Paramhansa, is: "A true devotee, who has drunk deep of divine Love, is like a veritable drunkard, and as such cannot always observe the rules of propriety."[131] Manifestations of bhakti we would soon have in the Indian Christian Church were the cold moderating influence of Westerns lessened; and as the Church increases and becomes indigenous, we must welcome bhakti in measure. Every religious procession will lead to manifestations of bhakti. In the Church of Scotland Magazine, _Life and Work_, for November 1904, we are told of a convert at Calcutta: "She kept speaking and singing of Jesus.... She appeared to the Hindu family to be a Christ-intoxicated woman." Again, in the _Indian Standard_ for October 1905, we read of a religious revival among the Christians of the hills in a.s.sam, where the Welsh missionaries work. We may contrast the concomitants of the revival with those attending the late revival even among the fervid Welsh. At one meeting, we are told, "the fervour rose at times to boiling heat, and scores of men were almost beside themselves with spiritual ecstasy. We never witnessed such scenes; scores of people literally danced, while large numbers who did not dance waved their arms in the air, keeping time, as they sang some of our magnificent Kha.s.sie hymns."

[Sidenote: Saving knowledge naturally superseded by Bhakti in the new monotheism.]

[Sidenote: An object of bhakti needed for educated India.]

[Sidenote: Buddha, Krishna, Chaitanya.]

[Sidenote: Jesus Christ, the supereminent object of bhakti.]

If what I have frequently repeated in these chapters be correct--that in the nineteenth century educated India has become largely monotheistic, it is in keeping therewith that the prevailing conception of religion should have changed, alongside, from the quest of Saving Knowledge to that of Bhakti or enthusiastic devotion to a person. Direct confirmation of that inference, a recent Hindu historian supplies. In a different context altogether, he declares: "The doctrine of bhakti (Faith) now rules the Hindu to the almost utter exclusion of the higher and more intellectual doctrine of gnan (Knowledge of the Supreme Soul)." The conception of the all-comprehending impersonal Brahma has, indeed, lost vitality; for the educated also the externals of the popular religion have lost their significance and become puerile. But for them also, the objects of popular bhakti, Ram and Krishna, are as much epical as religious heroes. Hinduism needs an object of bhakti for her educated people. The fact explains several of the novel religious features of the past half-century. The great jogi, Buddha, although not a brahman, was rediscovered as a religious hero for Hindus; at the commencement of the century he was a heretic to the brahmans. "The head of a sect inimical to Hinduism," the great Rammohan Roy calls him. So Sir Edwin Arnold's _Light of Asia_ had a great vogue some twenty years ago. Then Krishna has had his life re-written and his cult revived--purged of the old excesses of the Krishna-bhakti. More recently, Chaitanya, the religious teacher in Bengal in the fifteenth century, has been adopted by certain of the educated cla.s.s in Bengal as an object of bhakti. Here, it seems to me, is found the place of Christ in the mind of educated India. They are fairly familiar now with the story of the New Testament, and Jesus Christ stands before them as the supereminent object of bhakti; and I venture to say is generally regarded as such, although comparatively few as yet have adopted the bhakti att.i.tude towards Him. The _Imitatio Christi_, however, is a well-known book to the spiritually minded among the educated cla.s.ses. India has advanced beyond the cold, intellectual, Unitarian appreciation of Jesus Christ that marked the early Br[=a]hma and Pr[=a]rthan[=a] Sam[=a]j movements and manifested itself in their creeds in express denial of any incarnation. For Br[=a]hma wors.h.i.+p, I have seen the hymn, "Jesus, lover of my soul," transformed into "Father, lover of my soul." Hindus of the newer bhakti att.i.tude to Christ would find no difficulty in singing the hymn as Christians do, provided the doctrinal background be not obtruded upon them. Sober faith has dawned, and will formulate itself by and by.

CHAPTER XXI

CONCLUSION

"Draw the curtain close, And let us all to meditation."

SHAKESPEARE, _Hen. VI_. II.

Sailing, say to India, from Britain down through the Atlantic, close by the coast of Portugal and Spain, and then, within the Mediterranean, skirting the coast of Algeria, and so on, one is often oppressed with a sense of his isolation. We can see that the land we are pa.s.sing is inhabited by human beings like ourselves; and those houses visible are homes; and signs of life we can see even from our pa.s.sing vessel. What of all the tragedies and comedies that are daily being enacted in these houses--the exits and the entrances, the friends.h.i.+ps and the feuds, the selfishnesses and self-sacrifices, the commonplace toil, the children's play, that are going on the very moment we are looking? We are out of it, and our affections refuse to be wholly alienated from these fellow-beings, although the s.h.i.+p of which we form a part must pursue her own aim, and hurries along.

The Briton's tie to India and Indians is of no pa.s.sing accidental character. Our life-histories are not merely running parallel; our destinies are linked together. Christian feeling, duty, self-interest, and the interest of a linked destiny all call upon us to know each other and cherish mutual sympathy. Not that the West has ever been without an interest in India, as far back as we have Indian history, in the Greek accounts of the invasion of India by Alexander the Great in 327 B.C.

Writing in the first century B.C. and rehearsing what the earlier Greek writers had said about India, Strabo, the Greek geographer, testifies to the prevailing interest in India, and even sets forth the difficulty of knowing India, exactly as a modern student of India often feels inclined to do. "We must take with discrimination," he says, "what we are told about India, for it is the most distant of lands, and few of our nation have seen it. Those, moreover, who have seen it, have seen only a part, and most of what they say is no more than hearsay. Even what they saw, they became acquainted with only while pa.s.sing through the country with an army, in great haste. Yea, even their reports about the same things are not the same, although they write as if they had examined the things with the greatest care and attention. Some of the writers were fellow-soldiers and fellow-travellers, yet oft-times they contradict each other.... Nor do those who at present make voyages thither afford any precise information." We sympathise with Strabo, as our own readers also may. The interest of the West was of course interrupted when the Turks thrust themselves in between Europe and India and blocked the road Eastward overland. But the sea-road round the Cape of Good Hope was discovered, and West and East met more directly again, and Britain's special interest in India began. Judged by the recent output of English books on India, the interest of Britons in things Indian is rapidly increasing, and, _pace_ Strabo, it is hoped that this book, the record of the birth of New Ideas in India, will not only increase the knowledge but also deepen interest and sympathy. For even more noteworthy than the number of new books--since many of the new books deal only with what may be called Pictorial India--is the deepening of interest manifest in recent years.

That self-glorifying expression, "the brightest jewel in the British crown," has grown obsolete, and India has become not the glory of Britain, but the first of her imperial responsibilities. The thought of Britain as well as the thought of new India has changed. To the extent of recognising a great imperial responsibility, the mission efforts of the Churches and the speeches of statesmen and the output of the press have converted Britain. India, what her people actually are in thought and feeling, what the country is in respect of the necessities of life and industrial possibilities--these are questions that never fail to interest an intelligent British audience. In this volume, the aim has been to set forth the existing thoughts and feelings, especially of new-educated India, and to do so on the historical principle, that to know how a thing _has come to be_, is the right way to know what it is and how to treat it. The history of an opinion is its true exposition.

These chapters are not speculations, but a setting forth of the progress of opinion in India during the British period, and particularly during the nineteenth century. The successive chapters make clear how wonderful has been the progress of India during the century in social, political, and religious ideas. The darkness of the night has been forgotten, and will hardly be believed by the new Indians of to-day; and ordinary Britons can hardly be expected to know Indian history beyond outstanding political events. Not, however, to boast of progress, but to encourage educated Indians to further progress, and to enlighten Britons regarding the India which they are creating, is the hope of this volume. Further progress has yet to be made, and difficult problems yet await solution, and to know the history of the perplexing situation will surely be most helpful as a guide. What future is in store for India lies hidden. It would be interesting to speculate, and with a few _ifs_ interposed, it might be easy to dogmatise. What will she become? is indeed a question of fascinating interest, when we ask it of a child of the household, or when we ask it of a great people rejuvenated, to whom the British nation stands in place of parent. In the history of the soul of a people, the century just ended may be but a brief s.p.a.ce on which to stand to take stock of what is past and seek inspiration for the future, to talk of progress made and progress possible.

"Where lies the land to which the s.h.i.+p would go?

Far, far ahead, is all her seamen know.

And where the land she travels from away?

Far, far behind, is all that they can say."[132]

But the past century is all the experience of India we Britons have, and we are bound to reflect well upon it in our outlook ahead.

[Footnote 1: The Senate and People of Rome--Senatus Populus-que Roma.n.u.s.]

[Footnote 2: In the Hindu College at Benares, affiliated to Allahabad University, certain orthodox Hindus also objected to sacred texts being read in the presence of European professors and teachers. Think of it, in that college preparing students for ordinary modern degrees!--Bose, _Hindu Civilisation, I_. x.x.xiii.]

[Footnote 3: One of the Zoroastrian Persians who fled to Western India at the beginning of the eighth century A.D. At the census of 1901 they numbered 94,190. They are most numerous in the city of Bombay.]

[Footnote 4: _Asiatic Studies_, I.]

[Footnote 5: _Ibid_., I. iii.]

[Footnote 6: _Quinquen, Report on Education in India_, 1897-1902.]

[Footnote 7: For an apparently contrary view, see _Census of India, 1901, Report,_ p. 430: "Railways, which are sometimes represented as a solvent of caste prejudices, have in fact enormously extended the area within which those prejudices reign supreme." The sentence refers to the influence of the fas.h.i.+on of the higher castes in regard to child marriage and prohibition of the marriage of widows.]

[Footnote 8: Sir W.W. Hunter, _England's Work in India_.]

[Footnote 9: The manifold origins of castes are fully discussed in the newest lights in the _Census of India Report_, 1901.]

[Footnote 10: Miss n.o.ble [Sister Nivedita], finds herein an apology for caste. "The power of the individual to advance is by this means kept strictly in ratio to the thinking of the society in which he lives."

_(The Web of Indian Life_, p. 145.)]

[Footnote 11: Sir A. Lyall, _Asiatic Studies_, I. v.: "A man is not a Hindu because he inhabits India or belongs to any particular race or state, but because he is a Brahmanist." Similarly _Census of India_, 1901, _Report_, p. 360: "The most obvious characteristics of the ordinary Hindu are his acceptance of the Brahmanical supremacy and of the caste system."]