CHAPTER VIII.

HINDUISM: ITS DIVERSIFIED PHASES

OF

- ITS PHILOSOPHIC AND OTHER SECTS. OPINIONS RESPECTING THE EXISTENCE OF GOD AND THE UNIVERSE. -POPULAR THEORY OF VEDANTISM.-DEVELOPMENT THIS THEORY.-THE TRIAD.-PHYSICAL UNIVERSE.-PRETERNATURAL BEINGS. PERIODIC REVOLUTIONS.

HAVING, in the preceding parts of this work, presented brief and general information on the physical character of India, its population, its social condition, its languages, its literature, and its arts, it is now proposed to offer, in as condensed a form as possible, some account of its Religion. It is intended, in the first place, to speak of Hinduism, a term which comprehends the belief and practice of the Brahmanized portion of the inhabitants of India, because this portion includes the greater part of the inhabitants. The religious condition of the aboriginal tribes may be conveniently described in a separate chapter.

The Brahmanical faith is the national faith of India; and as, in the nations of Western Europe, Christianity has exerted its power in impregnating the mind, moulding political institutions, regulating jurisprudence, and thus affecting all things, civil, and sacred communicating vitality and direction. to much of its literature and science; so Brahmanism has injuriously exerted an influence in every part of India-only to a vastly larger extent, and in a more intense degree.

In a former chapter it was stated, that the religious system of the Hindus was contained in the four Vedas, the great Shastras, or books of sacred ordinance, which are said to have proceeded from the lips of Brahma, at the time when the

visible universe was called into existence. These ancient and venerated records are, by the bulk of the Hindus, believed to be eternal, as regards the matter of which they are composed. Nothing can exceed the sacredness attached to, them. As divinely originated records, they are guarded with profound reverence, and believed to be the fountains of all true religion, and the primeval source of every other species of useful knowledge.

With the Vedas, as we have seen, are connected other sacred records, such as the Vedangas, subordinate Vedas, and the Upangas, or inferior treatises, containing, among matters of speculation, theological teaching. These latter books exercise a much greater influence over the Hindus than the simple records of the Vedas. Those ancient depositories of a simple theism, prescribing no worship but that of ascriptions of praise and invocations in the presence of personified elements, were early abandoned for a more complex and elaborate system of mythology, which, however, the Brahmanical leaders profess to identify with the sacred Vedas, of which they affect to speak with the greatest reverence and veneration. They regard the Upangas, or inferior treatises, as the expansion or development of the germinant theological science concealed in the venerated records of the Veda.

It is confessedly difficult to obtain any fixed idea of the Hindu religion as it now prevails throughout India; and great pains and perseverance are necessary to comprehend the diversified and endlessly varied phases of a system that nevertheless possesses something in common. Professor Wilson, than whom no one is better qualified to express an opinion on this subject, says: "An early division of the Hindu system, and one conformable to the genius of all polytheism, separated the practical and popular beliefs from the speculative and philosophical doctrines. Whilst the common people addressed their hopes and fears to stocks and stones, and multiplied by their credulity and superstition the grotesque objects of their veneration, some few, of deeper thought and wider contem

plation, plunged into the mysteries of man and nature, and endeavoured assiduously, if not successfully, to obtain just notions of the cause, the character, and consequence of existence." It is admitted, that even the Vedas make a distinction between the practices of a ritual and the speculations of theology.

As will be seen in a subsequent part of this chapter, the Hindu Triad-BRAHMA, VISHNU, and SIVA-Occupy an important relation to the moral and material universe, and therefore claim the worship of those who follow the creed of the Brahmans. Their respective worshippers separated into different associations, at a remote period; and in this way, and from other causes never absent from the vagrant tendencies of our nature, distinct and isolated bodies sprang into existence. Whilst preferences for the ritual of the popular divinities separated the Hindus in relation to the popular objects of adoration, conflicting opinions on subjects respecting which human reason has never yet agreed, led to a division among the speculative; this produced the several schools of philosophy, called by the Hindus the six Dersanas.

Of these Dersanas, three have been mentioned already in the brief account of the Hindu sacred literature; they were the two Mimánsás and the Nyáya. Besides those, there are the Vaishéshika, the Sankhya, and the Sankhya-Yoga. These philosophical systems, studied more or less by all Brahmans, present varied subjects of difficult speculation. As we have seen, the Anterior Mimánsá relates to ceremonies, the Posterior Mimánsá to wisdom, the Nyáya to logic; the Vaisheshika sets forth an anatomic theory, similar to that of Democritus; the Sankhya is a system of universal and atheistical philosophy; and the Yoga is very like the Sankhya in some respects, though theistical in principle. Both these systems allow matter and spirit to be the components of the universe. There is also another numeral philosophy of the Puranas, which treats of the visible universe as an entire illusion, resolving matter and spirit into one entity, of which we shall

say more hereafter. All the schools of philosophy, however much they may differ in the resolution of difficult questions, agree in their final object, the acme to which they conduct, which is, liberation from matter and final repose. Professor Wilson says:

"It may be supposed that some time elapsed before the practical worship of any deity was more than a simple preference, or involved the assertion of the supremacy of the object of its adoration, to the degradation or exclusion of the other gods in like manner, also, the conflicting opinions were matters rather of curiosity than faith, and were neither regarded as subversive of each other, nor as incompatible with public worship: and hence, notwithstanding the sources of difference that existed in the parts, the unity of the whole remained undisturbed: in this condition, indeed, the apparent mass of the Brahmanical order at least, still continues: professing alike to recognise implicitly the authority of the Vedas, the worshippers of SIVA or of VISHNU, and the maintainers of the Sánkhya or Nyáya doctrines, consider themselves, and even each other, as orthodox members of the Hindu community."

Internal incongruities in the system have, however, affected its integrity, and created feelings of animosity among the different sects, which are expressed in the Puranas and other works written to magnify particular deities, or to promote the interests of certain shrines. The worship of Brahma has disappeared amid the strife, while Vishnu, Siva, and Sakti, who now receive the adorations of the Hindus, are chiefly worshipped under their representatives, Krishna, Rama, or the Linga. Quotations from standard works might be adduced to show how the partisans have respectively sought to vilify the objects adored by opposite sects.

Changes in opinion too supervened, and six heretical schools of philosophy arose, and disputed the preeminence with the orthodox: those systems have, however, almost disappeared. Some of those teachers attacked the Vedas and

the Brahmans, denouncing the latter as cunning hypocrites, who had invented a religious system for purposes of private gain. Others, too, contemned the sacred books, and their interpreters, and the objects of Brahmanical adoration, and advanced a step further by inventing a set of gods for themselves. These innovations provoked resentment, and ultimately led to the expulsion of Buddhism from India.

There is not only evidence to show that the Hindu religion at the present time differs essentially from that authorized by the Vedas, so far at least as we have ascertained their teaching, but likewise from that which has existed at different periods since the mythological system was invented. undergone many variations from time to time, and is now, though one in most of its great features, variously entertained by numerous sects. These sects of the Hindus have been described by several writers, both in the north of India, and also in the south.

From these records it may be seen that the popular divinities, Vishnu and Siva, have long had their numerous votaries divided by various rites and opinions. Many of the sects now existing may be known by their characteristic or sectarial marks, and also by their costume and diversified ascetic practices. The naked mendicant, smeared with funeral ashes, armed with a trident or a sword, carrying a hollow skull in his hand, and half intoxicated with the spirits he has quaffed from that disgusting wine-cup, is one of the most hideous of these very exceptionable classes. The licentious practices of some of the sects are said to be in excess quite beyond belief. The prevalence of foreign rule, and the influence thereunto belonging, has, however, had the effect of diminishing such practices as were formerly common, and where they have not been discontinued, they seek obscurity. Still, we are assured that some of the orgies of the Sactas are of a most disgusting kind.

There are among the Hindus five sects who may be regarded as orthodox, in relation to the fundamental principles

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