CHAPTER XVI.

THE PUR[=A]NAS.--EARLY SECTS, FESTIVALS, THE TRINITY.

Archaeologia, 'ancient lore,' is the meaning of Pur[=a]na

_(pur[=a]na_, 'old'). The religious period represented by the extant

writings of this class is that which immediately follows the

completion of the epic.[1] These works, although they contain no real

history, yet reflect history very plainly, and since the advent and

initial progress of Puranic Hinduism, with its various cults, is

contemporary with important political changes, it will be necessary

briefly to consider the circumstances in which arose these new creeds,

for they were destined to become in the future the controlling force

in the development of Hindu religion.

In speaking of the extension of Buddhism we showed that its growth was

influenced in no small degree by the fact that this caste-less and,

therefore, democratic religion was adopted by post-Alexandrine rulers

in the Graeco-Bactrian period. At this time the Aryans were surrounded

with foreigners and pagans. To North and South spread savage or half

Hinduized native tribes, while soldiers of Greece and Bactria encamped

in the valley of the Ganges. Barbarians had long been active in the

North, and some scholars have even claimed that Buddha's own family

was of Turanian origin. The Brahmans then as now retained their

prestige only as being repositories of ancient wisdom; and outside of

their own 'holy land' their influence was reduced to a minimum by the

social and political tendencies that accompanied the growth of

Buddhism. After the fourth century B.C. the heart of India, the

'middle district,' between the Him[=a]laya and Vindhya mountains from

Delhi to Benares,[2] was trampled upon by one Graeco-Bactrian horde

after another. The principal effect of this rude dominion was

eventually to give political equality to the two great rival

religions. The Buddhist and the Brahman lived at last if not

harmoniously, at least pacifically, side by side. Members of the same

reigning family would profess Buddhism or Brahmanism indifferently.

One king would sometimes patronize both religions. And this continued

to be the case till Buddhism faded out, replaced by that Hinduism

which owed its origin partly to native un-Aryan influence (paganism),

partly to this century-long fusion of the two state religions.

To review these events: In the first decades of the fourth century

(320 or 315-291 B.C.) Candragupta, Sandrocottos, had built up a

monarchy in Beh[=a]r[3] on the ruins left by the Greek invasion,

sharing his power with Seleucus in the Northwest, and had thus

prepared the way for his grandson, Açoka, the great patron of Buddhism

(264 or 259). This native power fell before the hosts of Northern

barbarians, which, after irruptions into India in the second century,

got a permanent foothold there in the first century B.C. These

Northern barbarians (their nationality is uncertain), whose greatest

king was Kanishka, 78 A.D., ruled for centuries the land they had

seized; but they were vanquished at last in the sixth century,

probably by Vikram[=a]ditya,[4] and were driven out. The

breathing-space between Northern barbarian and Mohammedan was

nominally not a long one, but since the first Moslem conquests had no

definitive result the new invaders did not quite overthrow Hindu rule

till the end of the tenth century. During this period the native

un-Aryan tribes, with their Hinduizing effect, were more destructive

as regards the maintenance of the old Brahmanic cult than were

outsiders.[5]

When Tamerlane invaded India his was the fourth invasion after the

conquest of the Punj[=a]b by the Moslem in 664.[6] In 1525 the fifth

conqueror, Baber, fifth too in descent from Tamerlane, founded the

Mogul empire that lasted till the fall of this dynasty (nominally till

1857). But it must be remembered that each new conqueror from 997 till

1525 merely conquered old Mohammedan dynasties with new invasions. It

was all one to the Hindu. He had the Mohammedan with him all this time

only each new rival's success made his lot the harder, But Baber's

grandson, the Great Mogul, Akbar (who reigned from 1556 to 1605), gave

the land not only peace but kindness; and under him Jew, Christian,

Hindu, and Mohammedan at last forgot to fear or fight. After this

there is only the overthrow of the Mohammedan power to record; and the

rise of the Mahratta native kingdoms. A new faith resulted from the

amalgamation of Hinduism with Mohammedism (after 1500), as will be

shown hereafter. [8] In the pauses before the first Mohammedan

invasion, and between the first defeat of the Mohammedans and their

successful second conquest, the barbarians being now expelled and

Buddhism being decadent, Brahmanism rallied. In the sixth century

there was toleration for all faiths. In the seventh century

Kum[=a]rila renewed the strength of Brahmanism on the ritualistic side

with attacks on Buddhism, and in the ninth century Çankara placed the

philosophy of unsectarian pantheism on a firm basis by his commentary

on the Ved[=a]nta S[=u]tra.[7] These two men are the re-makers of

ancient Brahmanism, which from this time on continued in its

stereotyped form, adopting Hindu gods very coyly, and only as spirits

of small importance, while relying on the laws as well as the gods of

old, on holy _[=a]c[=a]ra_ or 'custom,' and the now systematized

exposition of its old (Upanishad) philosophy.[8] Its creative force

was already spent. Buddhism, on the other hand, was dying a natural

death. The time was ripe for Hinduism, which had been gathering

strength for centuries. After the sixth century, and perhaps even as

late as 1500, or later, were written the modern Pur[=a]nas, which

embody the new belief.[9] They cannot, on account of the distinct

advance in their cult, have appeared before the end of the epic age.

The breathing spell (between barbarian and complete Mohammedan

conquest) which gave opportunity to Kum[=a]rila to take a high hand

with Buddhism, was an opportunity also for the codification of the new

creeds. It is, therefore, to this era that one has probably to refer

the first of the modern sectarian Pur[=a]nas, though the ritualistic

Tantras and [=A]gamas of the lower Çivaite sects doubtless belong

rather to the end than to the beginning of the period. We are

strengthened in this belief by the fact that the oldest of these works

do not pretend to antedate Kum[=a]rila's century, though the sects

mentioned in the epic are known in the first centuries of the

Christian era. The time from the first to the seventh centuries one

may accordingly suppose to have been the era during which was

developing the Brahmanized form of the early Hindu sects, the

literature of these and subsequent sects being composed in the

centuries succeeding the latter term. These sects again divide into

many subdivisions, of which we shall speak below. At present we take

up the character of the Pur[=a]nas and their most important points of

difference as compared with the sectarian parts of the earlier

pseudo-epic, examining especially the trinitarian doctrine, which they

inculcate, and its history.

Save in details, even the special 'faith-scriptures' called Tantras go

no further than go the Pur[=a]nas in advocating the cult of their

particular divinities. And to this advocacy of special gods all else

in this class of writings is subordinated. The ideal Pur[=a]na is

divided into five parts, cosmogony, new creations, genealogies of gods

and heroes, _manvantaras_ (descriptions of periodic 'ages,' past and

future), and dynasties of kings. But no extant Pur[=a]na is divided

thus. In the epic the doctrine of trinitarianism is barely formulated.

Even in the Harivança, or Genealogy, _va[.n]ça_, of Vishnu, there is

no more than an inverted triunity, 'one form, three gods,' where, in

reality, all that is insisted upon is the identity of Vishnu and Çiva,

Brahm[=a] being, as it were, perfunctorily added.[10] In the

Pur[=a]nas, on the other hand, while the trinity is acknowledged,

religion is resolved again into a sort of sectarian monotheism, where

the devotee seems to be in the midst of a squabbling horde of

temple-priests, each fighting for his own idol. In the calmer aspects

of religion, apart from sectarian schism, these writings offer,

indeed, much that is of second-rate interest, but little that is of

real value. The idle speculations in regard to former divinities are

here made cobweb thin. The philosophy is not new, nor is the spirit of

religion raised, even in the most inspired passages, to the level

which it has reached in the Divine Song. Some of these Pur[=a]nas, of

which eighteen chief are cited, but with an unknown number of

subordinate works,[11] may claim a respectable age; many of them are

the most wretched stuff imaginable, bearing about the same literary

and historical relation to earlier models as do the later legal

Smritis. In fact, save for their religious (sectarian) purport, the

Pur[=a]nas for sections together do not differ much in content from

legal Smritis, out of which some may have been evolved, though,

probably, they were from their inception legendary rather than

didactic. It is more probable, therefore, that they appropriated

Smriti material just as they did epic material; and though it is now

received opinion that legal Smritis are evolved out of S[=u]tras, this

yet can be the case only with the oldest, even if the statement then

can be accepted in an unqualified form. In our own opinion it is

highly probable that Pur[=a]nas and later legal Smritis are divergent

developments from the same source.[12] One gives an account of

creation, and proceeds to tell about the social side; the other sticks

to the accounts of creation, goes on to theology, takes up tales of

heroes, introduces speculation, is finally wrenched over to and

amplified by sectarian writers, and so presents a composite that

resembles epic and law, and yet is generally religious and

speculative.

A striking instance of this may be seen in the law-book of 'Vishnu.'

Here there is an old base of legal lore, S[=u]tra, interlarded with

Puranic material, and built up with sectarianism. The writer is a

Vishnuite, and while recognizing the trinity, does not hesitate to

make his law command offerings to Krishna V[=a]sudeva, and his family

(Pradyumna, Aniruddha), along with the regular Brahmanic oblations to

older spirits.[13] Brahmanism recognized Hindu deities as subordinate

powers at an early date, at least as early as the end of the S[=u]tra

period; while Manu not only recognizes Vishnu and Çiva (Hara), but

recommends an oblation to Çr[=i] and K[=a]l[=i] (Bhadrak[=a]li, here,

as elsewhere, is Durg[=a]).[14]

In their original form the Pur[=a]nas were probably Hesiodic in a

great extent, and doubtless contained much that was afterwards

specially developed in more prolix form in the epic itself. But the

works that are come down as Pur[=a]nas are in general of later

sectarian character, and the epic language, phraseology, and

descriptions of battles are more likely taken straight from the epic

than preserved from ante-epic times. Properly speaking one ought to

give first place to the Pur[=a]nas that are incorporated into the

epic. The epic M[=a]rkandeya Pur[=a]na, for instance, is probably a

good type of one of the earlier works that went by this name. That the

present Pur[=a]nas are imitations of the epic, in so far as they treat

of epic topics, may be presumed from the fact that although they often

have the formulae intact of the battlefield,[15] yet do they not

remain by epic descriptions but add weapons, etc., of more modern date

than are employed in the original.[16]

The sectarian monotheism of the Pur[=a]nas never resulted in

dispensing with the pantheon. The Hindu monotheist is a pantheist, and

whether sectarian or philosophical, he kept and added to his

pantheon.[17] Indra is still for warriors, Maruts for husbandmen,

although old views shift somewhat. So for example, in the K[=u]rma

Pur[=a]na the Gandharvas are added for the Ç[=u]dras.[18] The

fourfoldness, which we have shown in the epic to be characteristic of

Vishnu, is now represented by the military epithet _caturvy[=u]has_

(agmen quadratum), in that the god represents peace, wisdom, support,

and renunciation; though, as a matter of fact, he is _avy[=u]ha,

i.e_., without any of these.[19] Starting with the physical 'god of

the four quarters,' one gets even in the epic the 'controller of

four,' or perfect person, conceived like [Greek: anêr tetragônos].

Tennyson's 'four-square to all the winds that blow' is a good

connecting link in the thought. The Pur[=a]nas are a mine of legend,

although most of the stories seem to be but epic tales, more or less

distorted. Nala 'the great-great-grandson of R[=a]ma' is described

after the history of R[=a]ma himself; the installation of P[=u]ru,

when his father had passed over his eldest son, and such reminiscences

of the epic are the stock in trade of the legendary writers.[20]

The origin of the four castes;[21] the descriptions of hell,

somewhat embellished,[22] where the 'sinful are cooked in fire';[23] the

exaltation of Vishnu as Krishna or K[=a]ma in one, and that of Çiva in

another--these and similar aspects are reflections of epic matter,

spirit, tone, and language, only the faith is still fiercer in

religious matters, and the stories are fainter in historical

references. According to the Pur[=a]na last cited: "There is no

expiation for one that bows to a phallic emblem," _i.e_., Çivaite, and

"all the B[=a]uddhas are heretics";[24] and according to the K[=u]rma

Pur[=a]na: "Vishnu is the divinity of the gods; Çiva, of the devils,"

although the preceding verses teach, in the spirit of the Divine Song,

that each man's divinity is that which he conceives to be the

divinity. Such is the concluding remark made by Vasistha in

adjudicating the strife between the Vishnuite and Çivaite sectaries of

the epic heroes.[25] The relation that the Puranic literature bears to

religion in the minds of its authors is illustrated by the remark of

the N[=a]rad[=i]ya to the effect that the god is to be honored "by

song, by music, by dance, and by recounting the Pur[=a]nas" (xvii. 9).

Some of the epic religious ceremonies which there are barely alluded

to are here described with almost the detail of a technical handbook.

So the N[=a]nd[=i]ya (xix.) gives an elaborate account of the raising

of a _dhvaja_ or standard as a religious ceremony.[26] The legal rules

affecting morality and especially caste-intercourse[27] show a laxity

in regard to the rules as formerly preached. Even the old Puranic form

of the epic is reproduced, as when M[=a]rkandeya converses again with

Yudhistris, exactly as he does in the epic.[28] The duration of the

ages; the fruit of sacrifices, among which are still mentioned the

_r[=a]jas[=u]ya, açvamedha_, and other ancient rites;[29] the virtue

of holy-places;[30] the admixture of pure pantheism with the idea of a

personal creation[31]--these traits are again just those which have

been seen already in the epic, nor is the addition of sections on

temple-service, or other more minute details of the cult, of

particular importance in a history of religious ideas.

The Pur[=a]nas for our present purpose may all be grouped with the

remark that what is ancient in them is a more or less fugitive

resemblance to the epic style and matter;[32] what is new is the more

pronounced sectarianism with its adventitious growth of subordinate

spiritualities and exaggerated miracles. Thus for instance in the

Var[=a]ha Pur[=a]na there are eleven, in the Bh[=a]gavat Pur[=a]na

twenty (instead of the older ten) _avatars_ of Vishnu. So too the god

of love--although K[=a]ma and his dart are recognized in the late

Atharvan--as a petty spirit receives homage only in the latest

S[=u]tra (as Cupid, [=A]pastamba, ii, 2. 4. 1), and in late additions

to the epic he is a little god; whereas in the drama he is prominent,

and in the Pur[=a]nas his cult is described at length (though to-day

he has no temple). The 'mother'-fiend P[=u]tan[=a], who suckles babes

to slay them, is scarcely known to the early epic, but she is a very

real personality in the late epic and Pur[=a]nas.

The addition to the trinity of the peculiar inferior godhead that is

advocated in any one Pur[=a]na, virtually making four divinities, is

characteristic of the period.

In proportion as sectarian ardor is heightened religious tone is

lowered. The Puranic votary clinging to his one idea of god curses all

them that believe in other aspects of the divinity. Blind bigotry

fills the worshipper's soul. Religion becomes mere fanaticism. But

there is also tolerance. Sometimes in one and the same Pur[=a]na rival

forms are honored. The modern Hindu sects are in part the direct

development of Puranic doctrine. But most of the sects of to-day are

of very recent date, though their principles are often of respectable

antiquity, as are too their sectarian signs, as well as the animals of

their gods, some of which appear to be totems of the wild tribes,

while others are merely objects of reverence among certain tribes.

Thus the ram and the elephant are respectively the ancient beasts of

Agni and Indra. Çiva has the bull; his spouse, the tiger. Earth and

Skanda have appropriated the peacock, Skanda having the cock also.

Yama has the buffalo (compare the Khond, wild-tribe, substitution of a

buffalo for a man in sacrifice). Love has the parrot, etc; while the

boar and all Vishnu's animals in _avatars_ are holy, being his chosen

beasts.[33]

EARLY SECTS.

A classification of older sects (the unorthodox) than those of the

present remains to us from the works of Çankara's reputed disciple,

[=A]nanda Giri, and of M[=a]dhava [=A]c[=a]rya, the former a writer of

the ninth, the latter of the fourteenth century. According to the

statements made by these writers there were a great number of sects,

regarded as partly heterodox or wholly so, and it is interesting in

examining the list of these to see that some of the epic sects (their

names at least) are still in full force, while on the other hand the

most important factions of to-day are not known at all; and that many

sects then existed which must have been at that time of great

antiquity, although now they have wholly passed away.[34] These last

are indeed to the author of the critique of the sects not wholly

heterodox. They are only too emphatic, in worshipping their peculiar

divinity, to suit the more modern conceptions of the Hindu reviewer.

But such sects are of the highest importance, for they show that

despite all the bizarre bigotry of the Pur[=a]nas the old Vedic gods

(as in the epic) still continue to hold their own, and had their own

idols and temples apart from other newer gods. The Vedic divinities,

the later additions in the shape of the god of love, the god of

wealth, Kubera,[35] the heavenly bird, Garuda, the world-snake, Çesha,

together with countless genii, spirits, ghosts, the Manes, the

heavenly bodies, stars, etc., all these were revered, though of less

importance than the gods of Vishnuite and Çivaite sects. Among these

latter the Çivaite sects are decidedly of less interest than the

corresponding Vishnuite heresies, while the votaries of Brahm[=a]

(exclusively) are indeed mentioned, but they cannot be compared with

those of the other two great gods.[36] To-day there is scarcely any

homage paid to Brahm[=a], and it is not probable that there ever was

the same devotion or like popularity in his case as in the case of his

rivals. Other interesting sects of this period are the

Sun-worshippers, who still exist but in no such numbers as when

[=A]nand[=a] Giri counted six formal divisions of them. The votaries

of these sub-sects worshipped some, the rising sun, some, the setting

sun, while some again worshipped the noonday sun, and others, all

three as a _tri-m[=u]rti._ Another division worshipped the sun in

anthropomorphic shape, while the last awakens the wrath of the

orthodox narrator by branding themselves with hot irons.[37]

Ganeça,[38] the lord of Çiva's hosts, had also six classes of

worshippers; but he has not now as he then had a special and peculiar

cult, though he has many temples in Benares and elsewhere. Of the

declared Çivaite sects of that day, six are mentioned, but of these

only one survives, the 'wandering' Jangamas of South India, the

Çivaite R[=a]udras, Ugras, Bh[=a]ktas, and P[=a]çupatis having yielded

to more modern sectaries.

Some at least among the six sects of the Vishnuite sects, which are

described by the old writers, appear to have been more ancient. Here

too one finds Bh[=a]ktas, and with them the Bh[=a]gavatas, the old

P[=a]ñcar[=a]tras, the 'hermit' V[=a]ikh[=a]nasas, and Karmah[=i]nas,

the latter "having no rites." Concerning these sects one gets scanty

but direct information. They all worshipped Vishnu under one form or

another, the Bh[=a]ktas as V[=a]sudeva, the Bh[=a]gavatas[39] as

Bhagavat. The latter resembled the modern disciples of R[=a]m[=a]nuja

and revered the holy-stone, appealing for authority to the Upanishads

and to the Bhagavad Git[=a], the Divine Song. Some too worshipped

Vishnu exclusively

as N[=a]r[=a]yana, and believed in a heaven of sensual

delights. The other sects, now extinct, offer no special forms of

worship. What is historically most important is that in this list of

sects are found none that particularly worship the popular divinities

of to-day, no peculiar cult of Krishna as an infant and no

monkey-service.

Infidel sects are numerous in this period, of which sects the worst in

the old writers' opinion is the sensual C[=a]rv[=a]ka. Then follow the

(Buddhist) Ç[=u]nyav[=a]ds, who believe in 'void,' and S[=a]ugatas,

who believe that religion consists only in kindness, the Kshapanakas,

and the Jains. The infamous 'left-hand' sectaries are also well known.

To one side of the Puranic religions, from the earlier time of which

comes this account of heresies, reference has been made above: the

development of the fables in regard to the infant Krishna. That the

cult is well known in the later Pur[=a]nas and is not mentioned in

this list of wrong beliefs seems to show that the whole cult is of

modern growth, even if one does not follow Weber in all his signs of

modification of the older practice.

RELIGIOUS FESTIVALS.

For the history of the cult there is in these works much to interest

one in the description and determination of popular festivals in honor

of the great sectarian gods. Further details of more specific nature

are given in other works which need not here be regarded. By far the

most important of these festivals are those that seem to have been

absorbed by the sectarian cults, although they were originally more

popular. Weber in the paper on the _r[=a]jas[=u]ya_, to which we have

had occasion several times to refer, has shown that a popular element

abided long in the formal celebrations of the Brahmanic ritual.[40]

is soundly beaten; that gaming creeps into the ceremony as a popular

aspect; that there was a special ceremony to care _katsenjammer_

caused by over-drinking; and that the whole ceremony was a popular

spring festival, such as is found to-day (but without the royal part

in the play).

Undoubtedly the original celebration was a popular one. Today the most

interesting of these popular fêtes is in all respects the New Year's

Festival and the Spring Festival. The latter has been cut up into

several parts, and to show the whole intent of the original ceremonial

it is necessary to take up the _disjecta membra_ and place them side

by side, as has been done by Wilson, whose sketch of these two

festivals, together with that by Gover of the New Year's Feast called

Pongol, we give in abstract, premising that, however close be the

comparison with European festivals of like nature, we doubt

whether there is any historical connection between them and the Hindu

celebrations.

We begin with the more popular New Year's, the Pongol:[41] The

interesting feature of this South India festival is that the Hindus

have done their best to alter its divinities and failed. They have,

indeed, for Indra and Agni got Krishna formally accepted as the god in

whose honor it is supposed to be held, but the feast remains a native

festival, and no one really thinks of the Puranic gods in connection

with it. Europe also has seen such dynamic alterations of divinities

in cases where feasts would insist till patrons of an orthodox kind

were foisted upon them to give an air of propriety to that which

remained heathenish.[42] The Pongol is a New Year's festival lasting

for three days. The first day is for Indra; the second, for (Agni)

S[=u]rya;[43] the third (to which is added, as a wind-up, a fourth

day), for cattle. The whole feast is a harvest-home and celebration of

cattle. The chief ceremony is the cooking of rice, which is put to

boil with great solemnity, and luck for the next year is argued from

its boiling well. If it does so a universal shout arises,[44] all rush

about, congratulate, and give presents to each other, and merry-making

follows. On the cattle-days the beasts are led about with painted

horns and decorated with ribbons, and are then chased and robbed by

the boys. The image of Ganeça is the only one seen, and his worship is

rather perfunctory. On the evening of the last day the women have a

party, paying obeisance to a peacock, and indulging in a family

reunion of very simple character. On this occasion the girl-wife may

return for a few hours to her mother. It is the only general fête for

women during the year.

Not unlike this festival of the extreme south is the New Year's

celebration at the mouth of the Ganges. Here there is a grand fair and

jewels are cast into the river as propitiation to the river-goddess.

Not long ago it was quite customary to fling children also into the

river, but this usage has now been abolished.[45] Offerings are made

to the Manes, general and particular, and to the All-gods. As with the

Pongol, the feast is one of good-fellowship where presents are

distributed, and its limit is the end of the third day. After this the

festivities have no religious character. Thousands of pilgrims

assemble for this fête. Wilson, who gives an account of this

celebration, compares the ancient Roman New Year's, with the _mutui

amoris pignora_ which were sent at that season. The gifts in India are

sweetmeats and other delicacies, ominous of good for the next

year.[46]

On the 2d of February occurs a feast to Çr[=i], or Lakshm[=i],

Vishnu's bride, patroness of all prosperity to her worshippers. At

present it is a literary festival on which all books, inkstands, pens,

etc., are cleaned and worshipped, as adjuncts to Sarasvat[=i], the

goddess of learning. This is rather significant, for Sarasvat[=i] is

properly the wife of Brahm[=a], but the Vishnuites of Bengal have made

her the wife of Vishnu, and identified her with Çr[=i]. It is to be

noticed that in this sole celebration of abstract learning and

literature there is no recognition of Çiva, but rather of his rival.

Çiva and Ganeça are revered because they might impede, not because, as

does Sarasvat[=i], they further literary accomplishment. Sarasvat[=i]

is almost the only fair goddess. She is represented not as a horror,

but as a beautiful woman sitting on a lotus, graceful in shape, a

crescent on her brow.[47] The boys, too, celebrate the day with games,

bat and ball, prisoner's base, and others "of a very European

character." The admixture of sectarian cults is shown by the

transference to this Vishnuite feast of the Çivaite (Durg[=a])

practice of casting into the river the images of the goddess.[48] When

applied distinctly to Sarasvat[=i] the feast is observed in

August-September; when to Lakshm[=i], in October-November, or in

February. There is, however, another feast, celebrated in the North

and South, which comes on the exact date fixed by the Romans for the

beginning of spring, and as an ending to this there is a feast to

K[=a]ma, Cupid, and his bride Rati ('Enjoyment'). This is the Vasanta,

or spring festival of prosperity and love, which probably was the

first form of the Lakshm[=i]-Sarasvat[=i] feast.

Another traditional feast of this month is the 10th[49] (the eleventh

lunar day of the light half of M[=a]gha). The eleventh lunar day is

particularly holy with the Vishnuites, as is said in the Brahma

Pur[=a]na, and this is a Vishnuite festival. It is a day of fasting

and prayer, with presents to priests.[50] It appears to be a mixture

of Vedic prayers and domestic Vishnu-worship. On the 11th of February

the fast is continued, and in both the object is expiation of sin. The

latter is called the feast of 'six sesamum acts,' for sesamum is a

holy plant, and in each act of this rite it plays a part. Other rites

of this month are to the Manes on the 14th, 22d, and 24th of February.

Bathing and oblation are requisite, and all are of a lustral and

expiatory nature. Wilson remarks on the fact that it is the same time

of year in which the Romans gave oblations to the Manes, and

that Februus is the god of purification. "There can be no reasonable

doubt that the Feralia of the Romans and the Çr[=a]ddha (feast to the

Manes) of the Hindus, the worship of the Pitris and of the Manes, have

a common character, and had a common origin."[51]

The 27th of February is the greatest Çivaite day in the year. It

celebrates Çiva's first manifestation of himself in phallic form. To

keep this day holy expiates from all sin, and secures bliss hereafter.

The worshipper must fast and revere the Linga. Offerings are made to

the Linga. It is, of course, a celebration formed of unmeaning

repetitions of syllables and the invocation of female Çaktis, snapping

the fingers, gesticulating, and performing all the humbug called for

by Çivaite worship. The Linga is bathed in milk, decorated, wrapped in

_bilva_ leaves, and prayed to; which ceremony is repeated at intervals

with slight changes. All castes, even the lowest, join in the

exercises. Even women may use the _mantras_.[52] Vigil and fasting are

the essentials of this worship.[53]

The next festival closes these great spring celebrations. It bears two

names, and originally was a double feast, the first part being the

Dol[=a] Y[=a]tr[=a], or 'Swing-procession,' the second part being the

execrable Holi. They are still kept distinct in some places, and when

this occurs the Dolotsava, or Dol[=a] Y[=a]tr[=a], follows the Holi.

They are both spring festivals, and answer roughly to May-day, though

in India they come at the full moon of March. We have followed

Wilson's enumeration of all the minor spring feasts, that they may be

seen in their entirety. But in ancient times there was probably one

long Vasantotsava (spring-festival), which lasted for weeks, beginning

with a joyous celebration (2d of February) and continuing with lustral

ceremonies, as indicated by the now detached feast days already

referred to. The original cult, in Wilson's opinion, has been changed,

and the Dol[=a] Y[=a]tr[=a] is now given over to the Krishna-cult,

while the Hol[=i] divinity is a hobgoblin. The Dol[=a] Yatr[=a] begins

with fasting and ends (as Hol[=i]) with fire-worship. An image of

Krishna is sprinkled with red powder (_ab[=i]r_), and after this

(religious) ceremony a bonfire[54] is made, and an effigy, Holik[=a],

is put upon it and burned. The figure is carried to the fire in a

religious procession headed by Vishnuite or Brahman priests, of course

accompanied with music and song. After seven circumambulations of the

fire the figure is burned. This is the united observance of the first

day. At dawn on the morning of the second day the image of Krishna is

placed in a swing, _dol[=a]_, and swung back and forth a few times,

which ceremony is repeated at noon and at sunset. During the day,

wherever a swing is put up, and in the vicinity, it is the common

privilege to sprinkle one's friend with the red powder or red

rose-water. Boys and common people run about the streets sprinkling

red water or red powder over all passengers, and using abusive

(obscene) language. The cow-herd caste is conspicuous at this

ceremony. The cow-boys, collecting in parties under a koryphaios,

hold, as it were, a komos, leaping, singing, and dancing[55] through

the streets, striking together the wands which they carry. These

cow-boys not only dress (as do others) in new clothes on this

occasion,[56] but they give their cattle new equipments, and regard

the whole frolic as part of a religious rite in honor of Krishna, the

cow-herd. But all sects take part in the performance (that is to say,

in the Hol[=i] portion), both Çivaites and Vishnuites. When the moon

is full the celebration is at its height. Hol[=i] songs are sung, the

crowd throws _ab[=i]r_ the chiefs feast, and an all-night orgy ends

the long carousal.[57] In the south the Dol[=a] takes place later, and

is distinct from the Hol[=i]. The burning here is of K[=a]ma,

commemorating the love-god's death by the fire of Çiva's eye, when the

former pierced the latter's heart, and inflamed him with love. For

this reason the bonfire is made before a temple of Çiva. K[=a]ma is

gone from the northern cult, and in upper India only a hobgoblin,

Hol[=i], a foul she-devil, is associated with the rite. The whole

performance is described and prescribed in one of the late

Pur[=a]nas.[58] In some parts of the country the bonfire of the

Hol[=i] is made about a tree, to which offerings are made, and

afterwards the whole is set on fire. For a luminous account of the

Hol[=i], which is perhaps the worst open rite of Hinduism,

participated in by all sects and classes, we may cite the words of the

author of _Ante-Brahmanical Religions_: "It has been termed the

Saturnalia or Carnival of the Hindus. Verses the most obscene

imaginable are ordered to be read on the occasion. Figures of men and

women, in the most indecent and disgusting attitudes, are in many

places openly paraded through the streets; the most filthy words are

uttered by persons who, on other occasions, would think themselves

disgraced by the use of them; bands of men parade the street with

their clothes all bespattered with a reddish dye; dirt and filth are

thrown upon all that are seen passing along the road; all business is

at a stand, all gives way to license and riot."[59]

Besides these the most brilliant festivals are the R[=a]s Y[=a]tr[=a]

in Bengal (September-October), commemorating the dance of Krishna

with the _gop[=i]s_ or milk-maids, and the 'Lamp-festival'

(D[=i]p[=a]l[=a]), also an autumnal celebration.

The festivals that we have reviewed cover but a part of the year, but

they will suffice to show the nature of such fêtes as are enjoined in

the Pur[=a]nas. There are others, such as the eightfold[60]

temple-worship of Krishna as a child, in July or August; the marriage

of Krishna's idol to the Tulasi plant; the Awakening of Vishnu, in

October, and so forth. But no others compare in importance with the

New Year's and Spring festivals, except the Bengal idol-display of

Jagann[=a]th, the Rath Y[=a]tr[=a] of 'Juggernaut'; and some others of

local celebrity, such as the D[=u]rg[=a]-p[=u]j[=a].[61] The temples,

to which reference has often been made, have this in common with the

great Çivaite festivals, that to describe them in detail would be but

to translate into words images and wall-paintings, the obscenity of

which is better left undescribed. This, of course, is particularly

true of the Çiva temples, where the actual Linga is perhaps, as Barth

has said, the least objectionable of the sights presented to the eye

of the devout worshipper. But the Vishnu temples are as bad.

Architecturally admirable, and even wonderful, the interior is but a

display of sensual immorality.[62]

HISTORY OF THE HINDU TRINITY.

In closing the Puranic period (which name we employ loosely to cover

such sects as are not clearly modern) we pause for a moment to cast a

glance backwards over the long development of the trinity, to the

units of which are devoted the individual Pur[=a]nas. We have shown

that the childhood-tales of Krishna are of late (Puranic) origin, and

that most of the cow-boy exploits are post-epic. Some are referred to

in the story of Çiçup[=a]la in the second book of the

Mah[=a]bh[=a]rata, but this scene has been touched up by a late hand.

The Vishnu Pur[=a]na, typical of the best of the Pur[=a]nas, as in

many respects it is the most important and interesting, represents

Krishnaite Vishnuism as its height. Here is described the birth of the

man-god as a black, _k[r.][s.][n.]a,_ baby, son of Nanda, and his real

title is here Govinda, the cow-boy.[63] 'Cow-boy' corresponds to the

more poetical, religious shepherd; and the milk-maids, _gopis_ with

whom Govinda dallies as he grows up, may, perhaps, better be rendered

shepherdesses for the same reason. The idyllic effect is what is aimed

at in these descriptions. Here Krishna plays his rude and rustic

tricks, upsetting wagons, overthrowing trees and washermen,

occasionally killing them he dislikes, and acting altogether much like

a cow-boy of another sort. Here he puts a stop to Indra-worship,

over-powers Çiva, rescues Aniruddha, marries sixteen thousand

princesses, burns Benares, and finally is killed himself, he the one

born of a hair of Vishnu, he that is Vishnu himself, who in 'goodness'

creates, in 'darkness' destroys,[64] under the forms of Brahm[=a] and

Çiva.[65]

In Vishnu, as a development of the Vedic Vishnu; in Çiva, as

affiliated to Rudra; in Brahm[=a], as the Brahmanic third to these

sectarian developments, the trinity has a real if remote connection

with the triune fire of the Rig Veda, a two-thirds connection, filled

out with the addition of the later Brahmanic head of the gods.

To ignore the fact that Vishnu and Rudra-Çiva developed inside the

Brahmanic circle and increased in glory before the rise of sectaries,

and to asseverate, as have some, that the two chief characters of the

later trinity are an unmeaning revival of decadent gods, whose names

are used craftily to veil the modernness of Krishnaism and

Çivaism,--this is to miscalculate the waxing dignity of these gods in

earlier Brahmanic literature. To say with Burnouf that the Vishnu of

the Veda is not at all the Vishnu of the mythologists, is a statement

far too sweeping. The Vishnu of the Veda is not only the same god with

the Vishnu of the next era, but in that next era he has become greatly

magnified. The Puranic All-god Vishnu stands in as close a relation to

his Vedic prototype as does Milton's Satan to the snaky slanderer of

an age more primitive.

Çiva-worship appears to have been adapted from a local cult in the

mountainous West, and at an early date to have been amalgamated with

that of his next resemblance, the Vedic Rudra; while Krishna-worship

flourished along the Ganges. These are those Dionysos and Herakles of

whom speak the old Greek authorities. One cult is possibly as

venerable as the other, but while Çivaism became Brahmanized early,

Krishnaism was adopted much later, and it is for this reason, amongst

others, that despite its modern iniquities Çiva has appealed more to

the Brahman than has Krishna.

Megasthenes tells us a good deal about these Hindu representatives of

Herakles and Dionysos. According to him there were Dionysiac festivals

in honor of the latter god (Çiva),[66] who belongs where flourishes

the wine, in the Açvaka district, north of the Kabul river. From this

place Çiva's worship extended into the East, M[=a]gadha (Beh[=a]r),

around Gokarna in the West, and even to the Kalinga country in the

extreme Southeast. But it was especially native to the mountainous

Northwest, about the 'Gate of Ganges' (north of Delhi, near

Saharampur), and still further north in Kashmeer. In the epic, Çiva

has his throne on K[=a]il[=a]sa,[67] the Northern mountain, in the

Him[=a]layas, and Ganges descend from the sky upon his head.

On the other hand, Herakles, of the Ganges land, where grows no wine,

is plainly Krishna, who carries club, discus, and conch. The Greek

cities Methora and Kleisobora are Mathur[=a] and Krishna-pur,

'Krishna-town'; the latter on the Jumna, the former near it on the

same river, capital of the clan which venerated Krishna as its chief

hero and god, the Y[=a]davas. Megasthenes says, also, that Herakles'

daughter is Pandaie, and this agrees with the P[=a]ndya, a southern

development of the epic Gangetic P[=a]ndavas, who especially worship

Krishna in conjunction with the Y[=a]davas. Their South-Indic town,

Mathur[=a], still attests their origin.

In speaking of the relative antiquity of Vishnuism and Çivaism one

must distinguish the pantheistic form of these gods from the single

forms. While Çivaism,_per se_, that is, the worship of Çiva as a great

and terrible god, preceded the same exaltation of Krishna, as is shown

by their respective literary appearance, and even by Megasthenes'

remark that the worship of Dionysos preceded that of Herakles by

fifteen generations, yet did Krishnaism, as a popular pantheism, come

before Çivaism as such. Although in the late Çvet[=a]çvatara Upanishad

Çiva is pantheistic, yet is he not so in the epic till some of the

latest passages make him the All, in imitation of Krishna as All-god.

Probably Çivaism remained by the first philosophy, Sankhyan dualism,

and was forced into Krishna's Vedantic pantheism, as this became

popular. At first neither was more than a single great god without any

philosophy.[68]

In one of the early exegetical works, which is occupied somewhat with

philosophical matter, there is evidence that a triad existed between

the Vedic triad of fires and the Puranic triad. Fire, Wind (or Indra),

and the Sun (S[=u]rya), are stated in a famous passage to be the only

real gods, all the others being but names of these. But, although in

form this triad (Nirukta, vii. 4, 5) is like the Vedic triad,[69] it

is essentially a triad in a pantheistic system like that of the epic

and Pur[=a]nas, for it is added that "all the gods are parts of one

soul." In explanation it is said: "Fire is the earth-god, Wind, or

Indra, is the god of the atmosphere, and the sun is the god of the

sky." Now in the Rig Veda Indra is closely united not only with Agni

but with Vishnu, albeit in this period Vishnu is his subordinate. The

nearest approach of this Vishnu to his classical descendant is in one

of the latest hymns of the Rig Veda, where it is said that the seven

seeds of creation are Vishnu's, as in later times he comprises seven

males. In the philosophy of the T[=a]ittir[=i]ya Samhit[=a] the three

places of Vishnu are not, as in the Rig Veda, the two points of the

horizon (where the sun sets) and the zenith, but 'earth, air, and

sky.'[70] That is to say, in the Brahmanic period Vishnu is already a

greater god than he had been. Nay, more, he is explicitly declared to

be

"the best of the gods."[71] That best means greatest may be shown from

the same work, where in savage fable it is recited that all the gods,

including Indra, ran up to him to get his strength.[72] But especially

in the Upanishads is Vishnu the one great god left from the Rig Veda.

And it is with the philosophical (not with the ritualistic) Vishnu

that Krishna is equated.

Of Çiva, on the other hand, the prototype is Rudra ('red'), his

constant sobriquet. In the Rig Veda he is the god of red lightning,

who is the father of the Maruts, the storm-gods. His attributes of a

fulgurant god are never lost. Even as Çiva the All-god he is still the

god of the blue neck, whose three-forked trident and home among the

mountains remind us of his physical origin. He is always the fairest

of the gods, and both early and late he is terrible, to be averted by

prayer, even where his magic 'medicines' are asked for. To him are

addressed the most suppliant cries: "O Rudra, spare us, strike not the

men, slay not the kine." In the Atharva Veda at every step one finds

characteristics which on the one hand are but exaggerations of the

type formulated in the Rig Veda, and on the other precursors of the

signs of the later god. In Çivaism, in contradistinction to Vishnuism,

there is not a trace of the euhemerism which has been suspected in the

Krishna-Vishnu cult. The Rudra of the Rig Veda already begins to be

identified with the triune fire, for he bears the standing epithet of

fire, "he of three mothers."[73] And this name he keeps, whether as

Rudra, who is "brilliant as the sun" (RV. i. 43. 5), whose weapon is

"the shining one that is emitted from the sky and passes along the

earth" (_ib_. vii. 46. 3); or again, as the "red boar of the sky,"

the "holder of the bolt" (_ib._ ii. 33. 3), and, above all gods, "the

terrible" (x. 126. 5).

Coming to the Brahmanic period one finds him a dweller in the mountain

tops, of a red color, with a blue neck, the especial lord of the

mountains, and so of robbers; while he is also the 'incantation-god,'

the 'god of low people.' Some of these are Rudra's attributes; but

here his name is already Çiva, so that one may trace the changes down

the centuries till he finds again in the epic that Çiva is the lord of

mountains, the patron of thieves (Hara, robber?), and endowed with the

trident, the blue neck,[74] and the three mothers of old. In the

middle period he has so many titles that one probably has to accept in

the subsequent Çiva not only the lineal descendant of the Vedic Rudra,

but also a combination of other local cults, where clan gods,

originally diverse, were worshipped as one in consequence of their

mutual likeness. One of the god's especial names is here Bhava, while

in the earlier period Bhava and Rudra are distinct, but they are

invoked as a pair (AV).[75] What gives Çiva his later tremendous

popularity, however, is the feature to which we have alluded in the

chapter on the epic. In the epic, all the strength of Çiva lies in the

Linga.[76] Both Bhava and Rudra, as Çarva, the archer--his local

eastern name--are represented as hurling the lightning, and it is

simply from identity of attributes that they have become identified in

person (AV. x. i. 23). Rudra's title of Paçupati, or 'lord of

cattle'[77] goes back to the Vedic age: "Be kind to the kine of him

who believes in the gods" is a prayer of the Atharva Veda (xi. 2. 28).

Agni and Rudra, in the Rig-Veda, are both called 'cattle-guarding,'

but not for the same reason. Agni represents a fire-stockade, while

Rudra in kindness does not strike with his lightning-bolt. The two

ideas, with the identification of Rudra and Agni, may have merged

together. Then too, Rudra has healing medicines (his magical side),

and Agni is kindest to men. All Agni's names are handed over in the

Br[=a]hmanas to Rudra-Çiva, just as Rudra previously had taken the

epithets of P[=u]shan (above), true to his robber-name. To ignore the

height to which at this period is raised the form of Rudra-Çiva is

surely unhistorical; so much so that we deem it doubtful whether

Çiva-invocations elsewhere, as in the S[=u]tra referred to above,

should be looked upon as interpolations. In the M[=a]itr[=a]yan[=i]

Collection, the Rudrajapas, the invocations to Rudra as the greatest

god, the highest spirit, the lord of beings (Bhava), are expressly to

Çiva Giriça, the mountain-lord (2. 9; Schroeder, p. 346). In the

[=A]itareya Br[=a]hmana it evidently is Rudra-Çiva, the god of ghastly

forms (made by the gods, it is said, as a composite of all the 'most

horrible parts' of all the gods), who is deputed to slay the

Father-god (when the latter, as a beast, commits incest with his

daughter), and chooses as his reward for the act the office of 'lord

of cattle.'[78] This is shown clearly by the fact that the fearsome

Rudra is changed to the innocuous Rudriya in the next paragraph. As an

example of how in the Br[=a]hmanas Rudra-Çiva has taken to himself

already the powers of Agni, the great god of the purely sacrificial

period, may be cited Çat. Br. vi. 1. 3. 10 and 2. 1. 12. Here Agni is

Kum[=a]ra, Rudra, Çarva (Sarva)[79], Paçupati (lord of beasts),

Bh[=a]irava (terrible), Açani (lightning), Bhava (lord of beings),

Mah[=a]deva (great god), the Lord--his 'thrice three names.' But where

the Br[=a]hmana assumes that these are names of Agni it is plain that

one has Rudra-Çiva in process of absorbing Agni's honors.

The third element in the Pur[=a]nic trinity,[80] identified with the

Father-god, genealogically deserves his lower position. His rivals are

of older lineage. The reason for his inferior position is,

practically, that he has little to do with man. Being already created,

man takes more interest in the gods that preserve and destroy.[81]

Even Brahm[=a]'s old exploits are, as we have shown, stolen from him

and given over to Vishnu. The famous (totemistic) tortoise legend was

originally Brahm[=a]'s, and so with others of the ten 'forms' of

Vishnu, for instance the boar-shape, in which Vishnu manifests

himself, and the fish-shape of Brahm[=a] (epic) in the flood-story.

The formal _trim[=u]rti_ or _tr[=a]ipurusha_ ('three persons') is a

late figure. It would seem that a Harihara (Vishnu and Çiva as one)

preceded the trinity, though the dual name is not found till quite

late.[82] But, as we showed above, the epic practically identifies

Vishnu and Çiva as equals, before it unites with these Brahm[=a] as an

equal third.

There arises now the further question whether sectarian Vishnuism be

the foisting of Krishnaism upon a dummy Vishnu. We think that, stated

in this way, such scarcely can have been the case. Neither of the

great sects is professedly of priestly origin, but each, like other

sects, claims Vedic authority, and finds Brahmanical support. We have

said that Vishnu is raised to his position without ictic suddenness.

He is always a god of mystic character, in short, a god for philosophy

to work upon. He is recognized as the highest god in one of the oldest

Upanishads. And it is with the philosopher's Vishnu that Krishna is

identified. Krishna, the real V[=a]sudeva (for a false V[=a]sudeva is

known also in the epic), is the god of a local cult. How did he

originate? The king of serpents is called Krishna, 'the black,' and

Vishnu reposes upon Çesha Ananta, the world-snake; but a more

historical character than this can be claimed for Krishna. This

god-man must be the same with the character mentioned in the

Ch[=a]ndogya Upanishad, 3. 17. 6. One may notice the similarities

between this Krishna and him of the epic cult. Krishna, son of

Devak[=i], was taught by his teacher, Ghora [=A]ngirasa, that

sacrifice may be performed without objective means; that generosity,

kindness, and other moral traits are the real signs of sacrifice; and

it is then said: "The priest Ghora [=A]ngirasa having said this to

Krishna, the son of Devak[=i]--and the latter was thereby freed from

(thirst) desire--said: "When a man is about to die let him resort to

this triad: 'the imperishable art thou,' 'the unmoved art thou,'

'breath's firmness art thou'; in regard to which are these two verses

in the Rig-Veda:[83] 'till they see the light of the old seed which is

kindled in the sky,' and 'perceiving above the darkness the higher

light, the sun, god among gods, we come to the highest light.'"

Krishna thus learned the abolition of sacrifice, and the worship of

the sun, the highest light (Vishnu), as true being--for this is the

meaning of the philosophical passage taken with its context. Kings and

priests discuss philosophy together in this period,[84] and it would

conform to later tradition to see in the pupil the son of a king. It

is, moreover, significant that the priest, Ghora [=A]ngirasà, is named

specially as priest of the sun-god elsewhere (K[=a]ush. Br. 30. 6), as

well as that Krishna [=A]ngirasa is also the name of a teacher. It is

said in this same Upanishad (3. 1. 1) that the sun is the honey,

delight, of the gods; and this chapter is a meditation on the sun,[85]

of which the dark (_k[r.][s.][n.]a_) form is that which comes from the

Itih[=a]sas and Pur[=a]nas, the fore-runners of the epic (3. 4. 3).

This is taught as a _brahma-upanishad_, a teaching of the absolute,

and it is interesting to see that it is handed down through Brahm[=a],

Praj[=a]pati, and Manu, exactly as Krishna says in the Divine Song

that his own doctrine has been promulgated; while (it is said further)

for him that knows the doctrine 'there is day,' his sun never sets (3.

11. 3-4). It is a doctrine to be communicated only to the eldest son

or a good student, and to no one else (_ib. 5), i.e_., it was new,

esoteric, and of vital importance. Here, too, one finds

Sanatkum[=a]ra, the 'ever young,' as Skanda,[86] yet as an earthly

student also (7. 1; 26. 2), just like Krishna.

It cannot be imagined, however, that the cult of the Gangetic Krishna

originated with that vague personage whose pupilage is described in

the Upanishad. But this account may still be connected with the epic

Krishna. The epic describes the overthrow of an old Brahmanic Aryan

race at the hands of the P[=a]ndavas, an unknown folk, whose king's

polyandrous marriage (his wife is the spouse of his four brothers as

well as of himself) is an historical trait, connecting the tribe

closely with the polyandrous wild tribes located north of the Ganges.

This tribe attacked the stronghold of Brahmanism in the holy land

about the present Delhi; and their patron god is the Gangetic Krishna.

In the course of the narrative a very few tales are told of Krishna's

early life, but the simple original view of Krishna is that he is a

god, the son of Devak[=i]. The few other tales are late and

adventitious additions, but this is a consistent trait. Modern writers

are fain to see in the antithesis presented by the god Krishna and by

the human hero Krishna, late and early phases. They forget that the

lower side of Krishna is one especially Puranic. In short, they read

history backwards, for theirs is not the Indic way of dealing with

gods. In Krishna's case the tricky, vulgar, human side is a later

aspect, which comes to light most prominently in the Genealogy of

Vishnu and in the Vishnu Pur[=a]na, modern works which in this regard

contrast strongly with the older epic, where Krishna, however he

tricks, is always first the god. It is not till he becomes a very

great, if not the greatest, god that tales about his youthful

performances, when he condescended to be born in low life, begin to

rise. An exact parallel may be seen in the case of Çiva, who at first

is a divine character, assuming a more or less grotesque likeness to a

man; but subsequently he becomes anthropomorphized, and is fitted out

with a sheaf of legends which describe his earthly acts.[87] And so

with Krishna. As the chief god, identified with the All-god, he is

later made the object of encomiums which degrade while they are meant

to exalt him. He becomes a cow-boy and acts like one, a god in a mask.

But in the epic he is the invading tribe's chief god, in process of

becoming identified with that god in the Brahmanic pantheon who most

resembles him. For this tribe, the (Yadavas) P[=a]ndavas, succeeded in

overthrowing the Brahmanic stronghold and became absorbed into the

Brahmanic circle. Their god, who, like most of the supreme gods of

this region among the wild tribes, was the tribal hero as sun-god,

became recognized by the priests as one with Vishnu. In the Upanishad

the priest-philosopher identifies Krishna with the sun as the 'dark

side' (_k[r.][s.][n.]a_, 'dark') of Vishnu, the native name probably

being near enough to the Sanskrit word to be represented by it. The

statement that this clan-god Krishna once learned the great truth that

the sun is the All-god, at the mouth of a Brahman, is what might be

expected. 'Krishna, the son of Devaki,' is not only the god, but he is

also the progenitor of the clan, the mystic forefather, who as usual

is deified as the sun. To the priest he is merely an _avatar_ of

Vishnu. The identity of Krishna with the Gangetic god described by

Megasthenes can scarcely be disputed. The latter as represented by the

Greek is too great a god to have passed away without a sign except for

a foreigner's account. And there is no figure like his except that of

Krishna.

The numerous _avatars_[88] of Vishnu are first given as ten, then as

twenty, then as twenty-two,[89] and at last become innumerable. The

ten, which are those usually referred to, are as follows: First come

the oldest, the beast-_avatars_, viz., as a fish; as a tortoise;[90]

as a boar (rescuing earth from a flood); and as a man-lion (slaying a

demon). Next comes the dwarf-_avatar_, where Vishnu cheats Bali of

earth by asking, as a dwarf, for three steps of it, and then stepping

out over all of it (the 'three strides' of the Rig Veda). Then come

the human _avatars_, that of Paraçu-R[=a]ma (R[=a]ma with the axe),

Krishna, R[=a]ma[91] (hero of the R[=a]m[=a]yana epic), Buddha, and

Kalki (who is still to come).

The parallels between the latest Krishna cult and the Biblical

narrative are found only in the Pur[=a]nas and other late works, and

undoubtedly, as we have said in the last chapter, are borrowed from

Christian sources. Krishna is here born in a stable, his father, like

Joseph, going with his virgin spouse to pay taxes. His restoring of a

believing woman's son is narrated only in the modern J[=a]imini

Bh[=a]rata, These tales might have been received through the first

distant Christian mission in the South in the sixth century, but it is

more likely that they were brought directly to the North in the

seventh century; for at that time a Northern king of the V[=a]içya

caste, Çil[=a]ditya (in whose reign the Chinese pilgrim, Hiouen

Thsang, visited India), made Syrian Christians welcome to his court

(639 A.D.).[92] The date of the annual Krishna festival, which is a

reflex of Christmastide, is variously fixed by the Pur[=a]nas as

coming in July or August.[93]

As Krishna is an _avatar_ of Vishnu[94] in the Bh[=a]rata, and as the

axe-R[=a]ma is another _avatar_ in legend (here Vishnu in the form of

Paraçu-R[=a]ma raises up the priestly caste, and destroys the

warrior-caste), so in the R[=a]m[=a]yana the hero R[=a]ma (not

Paraçu-R[=a]ma) is made an _avatar_ of Vishnu. He is a mythical prince

of Oude (hence a close connection between the R[=a]m[=a]yana

and Buddhism), who is identified with Vishnu. Vishnu wished to

rid earth of the giant R[=a]vana,[95] and to do so took the form of

R[=a]ma. As Krishnaism has given rise to a number of sects that

worship Krishna as Vishnu, so Ramaism is the modern cult of R[=a]ma as

Vishnu. Both of these sects oppose the Vishnuite that is not inclined

to be sectarian; all three oppose the Çivaite; and all four of these

oppose the orthodox Brahman, who assigns supreme godship to Çiva or

Vishnu as little as does the devotee of these gods in unsectarian form

to Krishna or R[=a]ma.

Çiva is on all sides opposed to Vishnu. The Greek account of the third

century B.C. says that he taught the Hindus to dance the kordax, but

at this time there appears to have been no such phallic worship in his

honor as is recorded in the pseudo-epic. Çiva is known in early

Brahmanic and in Buddhistic writings, and even as the

bearer-of-the-moon, Candraçekhara, he contrasts with Vishnu, as his

lightning-form and mountain-habitat differ from the sun-form and

valley-home of his rival. This dire god is conceived of as ascetic

partly because he is gruesome, partly because he is magical in power.

Hence he is the true type of the awful magical Yogi, and as such

appealed to the Brahman. Originally he is only a fearful magical god,

great, and even all-pervading, but, as seen in the Brahmanic

Çatarudriya hymn, he is at first in no sense a pantheistic deity. In

this hymn there is a significant addition made to the earlier version.

In the first form of the hymn it is said that Rudra, who is here Çiva,

is the god of bucolic people; but the new version adds 'and of all

people.' Here Çiva appears as a wild, diabolical figure, 'the god of

incantations,' whose dart is death; and half of the hymn is taken up

with entreaties to the god to spare the speaker. He is praised, in

conjunction with trees, of which he is the lord, as the one 'clad in

skins,' the 'lord of cattle,' the 'lord of paths,' the 'cheater,' the

'deceiver.' When he is next clearly seen, in the epic, he is the god

to whom are offered human sacrifices, and his special claim to worship

is the phallus; while the intermediate literature shows glimpses of

him only in his simple Brahmanic form of terror. It has long been

known that Çivaite phallic worship was not borrowed from the

Southerners, as was once imagined, and we venture with some scholars

to believe that it was due rather to late Greek influence than to that

of any native wild tribe.[96]

* * * * *

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Parts of the epic are called Pur[=a]nas, as

other parts are called Upanishads. These are the forerunners

of the extant Pur[=a]nas. The name, indeed, is even older

than the epic, belonging to the late Vedic period, where are

grouped together Pur[=a]nas and Itih[=a]sas, 'Ancient

History' and 'Stories'; to which are added 'Eulogies.' Weber

has long since pointed out that even when the 'deeds of

kings' were sung at a ceremony they were wont to be so

embroidered as to be dubbed 'fiction' by the Hindus

themselves. India has neither literary history (save what

can be gleaned from genealogies of doubtful worth), nor very

early inscriptions. The 'archaeology' of the Pur[=a]nas was

probably always what it is in the extant specimens,

legendary material of no direct historical value.]

[Footnote 2: Strictly speaking to the present

Allah[=a]b[=a]d, where is the Pray[=a]ga, or confluence of

Yamun[=a] and Gang[=a] (Jumna and Ganges).]

[Footnote 3: M[=a]gadha; called Beh[=a]r from its many

monasteries, _vih[=a]ras_, in Açoka's time.]

[Footnote 4: So, plausibly, Müller, _loc. cit_. below.]

[Footnote 5: The tribes became Hinduized, their chiefs became

R[=a]jputs; their religions doubtless affected the ritual

and creed of the civilized as much as the religion of the

latter colored their own. Some of these un-Aryan peoples

were probably part native, part barbaric. There is much

doubt in regard to the dates that depend on accepted eras.

It is not certain, for instance, that, as Müller claims,

Kanishka's inauguration coincides with the Çaka era, 78 A.D.

A great Buddhist council was held under him. Some

distinguished scholars still think with Bühler that

Vikram[=a]ditya's inauguration was 57 B.C. (this date that

used to be assigned to him). From our present point of view

it is of little consequence when this king himself lived. He

is renowned as patron of arts and as a conqueror of the

barbarians. If he lived in the first century B.C. his

conquest amounted to nothing permanent. What is important,

however, is that all Vikram[=a]ditya stands for in legend

must have been in the sixth century A.D. For the drama, of

which he is said to have been patron, represents a religion

distinctly later than that of the body of the epic

(completed in the sixth or seventh century, Bühler, _Indian

Studies_, No. ii.). The dramatic and astronomical era was

but introductory to Kum[=a]rila's reassertion of Brahmanism

in the seventh century, when the Northern barbarian was

gone, and the Mohammedan was not yet rampant. In the rest of

Northern India there were several native dynasties in

different quarters, with different eras; one in Sur[=a]shtra

(Gujar[=a]t), one again in the 'middle district' or 'North

Western Provinces,' one in Kutch; overthrown by Northern

barbarians (in the fifth century) and by the Mohammedans (in

the seventh and eighth centuries), respectively. Of these

the Guptas of the 'middle district,' and the Valabh[=i]s of

Kutch, had neither of the eras just mentioned. The former

dated from 320-321 (perhaps 319), the latter from 190

(A.D.). The word _samvat_, 'year,' indicates that the time

is dated from either the Çaka or Vikram[=a]ditya era. See

IA. xvii. 362; Fergusson, JRAS. xii. 259; Müller, _India,

What Can It Teach Us_? p. 282; Kielhorn, IA. xix. _24;_

xxii. 111. The Northern barbarians are called Scythians, or

Huns, or Turanians, according to fancy. No one really knows

what they were.]

[Footnote 6: The first host was expelled by the Hindus in

750. After a period of rest Mahmud was crowned in 997, who

overran India more than a dozen times. In the following

centuries the land was conquered and the people crushed by

the second great Mohammedan, Ghori, who died in 1206,

leaving his kingdom to a vassal, Kutab, the 'slave sultan'

of Delhi. In 1294, thus slave dynasty having been recently

supplanted, the new successor to the throne was slain by his

own nephew, Allah-ud-din, who is reckoned as the third

Mohammedan conqueror of India. His successor swept even the

Dekhan of all its Hindu (temple) wealth; but his empire

finally broke down under its own size; preparing the way for

Timur (Tamerlane), who entered India in 1398.]

[Footnote 7: Çankara himself was not a pure Brahman. Both

Vishnuites and Çivaites lay claim to him.]

[Footnote 8: Coy as was the Brahman in the adoption of the

new gods he was wise enough to give them some place in his

pantheon, or he would have offended his laity. Thus he

recognizes K[=a]l[=i] as well as Çr[=i]; in fact he prefers

to recognize the female divinities of the sects, for they

offer less rivalry.]

[Footnote 9: There was a general revival of letters

antedating the Brahmanic theological revival. The drama,

which reflects equally Hinduism and Brahmanism, is now the

favorite light literature of the cultured. In the sixth

century the first astronomical works are written

(Var[=a]hamihira, who wrote the _B[r.]hat Sa[.m]hit[=a]_),

and the group of writers called the Nine Gems (reckoned of

Vikram[=a]ditya's court) are to be referred to this time.

The best known among them is K[=a]lid[=a]sa, author of the

_Çakuntal[=a]_. An account of this Renaissance, as he calls

it, will be found in Müller's _India, What Can It Teach Us_?

The learned author is perhaps a little too sweeping in his

conclusions. It is, for instance, tolerably certain that the

Bh[=a]rata was completed by the time the 'Renaissance'

began; so that there is no such complete blank as he assumes

prior to Vikram[=a]ditya. But the general state of affairs

is such as is depicted in the ingenious article referred to.

The sixth and seventh centuries were eras that introduced

modern literature under liberal native princes, who were

sometimes not R[=a]jputs at all. Roughly speaking, one may

reckon from 500 B.C. to the Christian era as a period of

Buddhistic control, Graeco-Bactrian invasion, and Brahmanic

decline. The first five centuries after the Christian see

the two religions in a state of equilibrium, under Scythian

control, and the Mah[=a]-Bh[=a]rata, the expanded

Bh[=a]rata, is written. From 500 to 1000 is an era of native

rulers, Brahmanic revival in its pure form, and Hindu

growth, with little trouble from the Mohammedans. Then for

five centuries the horrors of Moslem conquest.]

[Footnote 10: Har. 10,662. Compare the laudation of 'the two

gods' in the same section.]

[Footnote 11: As the Jains have Angas and Up[=a]ngas, and as

the pseudo-epic distinguishes Nishads and Upanishads, so the

Brahman has Pur[=a]nas and Upapur[=a]nas (K[=u]rma

Pur[=a]na, i. p. 3). Some of the sects acknowledge only six

Pur[=a]nas as orthodox.]

[Footnote 12: As an example of a Puranic Smriti (legal) we

may cite the trash published as the

V[r.]ddha-H[=a]rita-Sa[.m]hit[=a]. Here there is polemic

against Çiva; one must worship Jagann[=a]th with flowers,

and every one must be branded with the Vishnu disc

(_cakra_). Even women and slaves are to use _mantras_, etc.]

[Footnote 13: The lateness of this law-book is evident from

its advocacy of _suttee_ (XXV. 14), its preference for

female ancestors (see below), etc.]

[Footnote 14: Manu, III. 89; XII. 121.]

[Footnote 15: As, for example, in K[=u]rma Pur[=a]na, XVI.

p. 186, where is found a common epic verse description of

battle.]

[Footnote 16: A good instance of this is found in Brihan

N[=a]rad[=i]ya Pur[=a]na, X., where the _churik[=a]_ and

_drugha[n.]a_ (24) appear in an imitative scene of this

sort; one of these being later, the other earlier, than the

epic vocabulary.]

[Footnote 17: Perhaps the most striking distinction between

Vedic and Puranic, or one may say, Indic Aryan and Hindu

religions, is the emphasis laid in the former upon Right; in

the latter, upon idols. The Vedic religion insists upon the

law of right (order), that is, the sacrifice; but it insists

also upon right as rectitude, truth, holiness. Puranic

Hinduism insists upon its idols; only incidentally does it

recommend rectitude, truth, abstract holiness.]

[Footnote 18: KP. i. p. 29.]

[Footnote 19: K[=u]rma, xii. p. 102. Contrast _ib_. xxii. p.

245, _caturvy[=u]hadhara Vishnur avy[=u]has procyate_

(elsewhere _navavy[=u]ha_). Philosophically, in the doctrine

of the epic P[=a]ñcar[=a]tras (still held by some

sectaries), Vishnu is to be revered as Krishna, Balar[=a]ma,

Pradymana, Aniruddha (Krishna's brother, son, and grandson),

representing, respectively, _[=a]tm[=a], j[=i]va,_ supreme

and individual spirit, perception, and consciousness.

Compare Mbh[=a]. xii. 340. 8, 72.]

[Footnote 20: KP. xxi. p. 236; xxii. p. 238, etc.]

[Footnote 21: _ib._ I, p. 23.]

[Footnote 22: Compare Brihan N[=a]radiya Pur[=a]na, xiv. 10,

_bah[=u]ni k[=a][s.][t.]hay[=a]ntr[=a][n.]i_ (torture

machines) in hell. The old tale of N[=a]çiketas is retold at

great length in the Var[=a]ha Pur[a=]na. The oldest

Pur[=a]na, the M[=a]rkandeya, has but seven hells, a

conception older than Manu's twenty-one (compare on MP. x.

80 ff., Scherman, _loc. cit_. p. 33), or the later lists of

thousands. The Padma Pur[=a]na, with celebrates R[=a]ma, has

also seven hells, and is in part old, for it especially

extols Pushkara (Brahm[=a]'s lone shrine); but it recommends

the _taptamudra_, or branding with hot iron.]

[Footnote 23: Nar. xiv. 2.]

[Footnote 24: xiv. 54 and 70.]

[Footnote 25: KP. xxii. pp, 239-241.]

[Footnote 26: As will be shown below, it is possible that

this may be a ceremony first taken from the wild tribes. See

the 'pole' rite described above in the epic.]

[Footnote 27: Compare for instance _ib_. xxviii. 68, on the

strange connection of a Ç[=u]dr[=a] wife of a Guru.]

[Footnote 28: KP. xxxvi. It is of course impossible to say

how much epic materials come from the literary epic and how

much is drawn from popular poetry, for the vulgar had their

own epoidic songs which may have treated of the same topics.

Thus even a wild tribe (Gonds) is credited with an 'epic.'

But such stuff was probably as worthless as are the popular

songs of today.]

[Footnote 29: KP. xxx. p. 305; xxxvii. p. 352.]

[Footnote 30: _ib._ p. 355.]

[Footnote 31: Compare N[=a]rad[=i]ya, xi. 23,27,31 'the one

whom no one knows,' 'he that rests in the heart,' 'he that

seems to be far off because we do not know,' 'he whose form

is Çiva, lauded by Vishnu,' xiii. 201.]

[Footnote 32: Even Vishnu as a part of a part of the Supreme

Spirit in VP. is indicated by Vishnu's adoration of

_[=a]tm[=a]_ in the epic (see above).]

[Footnote 33: Compare Williams' _Brahmanism and Hinduism_.]

[Footnote 34: Çankara's adherents are chiefly Çivaite, but

he himself was not a sectary. Williams says that at the

present day few worship Çiva exclusively, but he has more

partial adherents than has Vishnu. _Religious Thought and

Life,_ pp. 59, 62.]

[Footnote 35: The two last are just recognized in Brahmanic

legal works.]

[Footnote 36: See Wilson's sketch of Hindu sects. The author

says that there were in his day two shrines to Brahm[=a],

one in [=A]jm[=i]r (compare Pushkara in the epic), and one

on the Ganges at Bithur. The Brahma Pur[=a]na is known also

as S[=a]ura (sun). This is the first in the list; in its

present state it is Vishnuite.]

[Footnote 37: Sun-worship (Iranian?) is especially

pronounced in the Bhav[=i]shya(t) Pur[=a]na. Of the other

Pur[=a]nas the L[=i]nga is especially Çivaite (_linga_ is

phallus), as are the Matsya and older V[=a]yu. Sometimes

Çiva is androgynous, _ardhan[=a]r[=i]çvara_, 'half-female.'

But most of the Pur[=a]nas are Vishnuite.]

[Footnote 38: On the Ganeça Pur[=a]na see JRAS. 1846, p.

319.]

[Footnote 39: The worshippers of Bhagavat were originally

distinct from the P[=a]ñcar[=a]tras, but what was the

difference between them is unknown. The sect of this name in

the pseudo-epic is not Ç[=a]kta in expression but only

monotheistic. Probably the names of many sects are retained

with altered beliefs and practices. The Vishnu Pur[=a]na, i.

11. 54, gives a model prayer which may be taken once for all

as the attitude of the Vishnuite: "Glory to V[=a]sudeva, him

of perfected wisdom, whose unrevealed form is (known as)

Brahm[=a], Vishnu, and Çiva" (Hira[n.]yagarbha, Purusha,

Pradh[=a]na).]

[Footnote 40: Weber shows for instance, _loc. cit_., that

Indra takes the place of older Varuna; that the house-priest

yields to the Brahm[=a]; that in this feast in honor of the

king he]

[Footnote 41: Gover, JRAS. v. 91; IA. xx. 430.]

[Footnote 42: In Hinduism itself there is a striking example

of this. The Jagann[=a]th ('Juggernaut') temple was once

dedicated to Buddha as _loka-n[=a]th_ or _jagan-n[=a]th_,

'saviour of the world' Name, temple, and idol-car are now

all Vishnu's!]

[Footnote 43: That is, Rain and Sun, for all Indra's warlike

qualities are forgotten, absorbed into those of Çiva and his

son, the battle-god. The sun crosses the equator at noon of

the second day, the 'Mah[=a] Pongol.']

[Footnote 44: "Now every neck is bent, for the surface of

the waters disturbed. Then with a heave, a hiss, and a surge

of bubbles, the seething milk mounts to the top of the

vessel. Before it has had time to run down the blackened

sides, the air resounds with the sudden joyous cry of

'Pongol, oh Pongol, S[=u]rya, S[=u]rya, oh Pongol,' The word

Pongol means "boiling," from the Tamil word _pongu_, to

boil; so that the joyous shout is, 'It boils, oh S[=u]rya,

it boils.' In a moment a convulsion of greetings animates

the assembly. Every one seizes his neighbor and asks, 'Has

it boiled?' Both faces gleam with delight as the answer

comes--'It has boiled.' Then both shout at the top of their

voices--'Oh Pongol, Pongol, oh S[=u]rya, oh Indra, Pongol,

Pongol.'" Gorer, _loc. cit_.]

[Footnote 45: The Crocodile, _makara_, like the parrot, is

sacred to K[=a]madeva, Love. But as Ganges also is holy it

is difficult to say for which divinity the offering was

intended. Some, indeed, interpret _makara_ as dolphin.]

[Footnote 46: A feast now neglected, though kept up by

strict Brahmans, occurs on or about the 20th January. The

orthodox adherents of the Çivaite sects and Ç[=a]ktas also

observe it. It is a Çr[=a]ddha, or funeral feast to the

Manes. Also on the 26th and 30th January there are rites

nearly obsolete, the first being signalized by offerings to

Yama; the second, a Çivaite feast (to his spouse, as 'giver

of bridegrooms'). The list is more celebrated in the South

than in the North. It is interesting chiefly as a parallel

to St. Valentine's day, or, as Wilson says, the nearer feast

of St. Agnes (21st January) on the eve of which divination

is practiced to discover future husbands. It is this time

also that the Greeks call 'marriage-month' (Gamelion); and

the fourth day from the new moon (which gives the name to

this Hindu festival, _caturth[=i]_, "fourth day") is the day

when Hesiod recommends the bringing home of the bride.]

[Footnote 47: In case any writing has to be done on this day

it is done with chalk, not with the pens, "which have a

complete holiday" (Wilson).]

[Footnote 48: The invocations show very well how the worship

of Brahm[=a] has been driven out in honor of his more

powerful rivals. For Sarasvat[=i] is invoked first as "Thou

without whom Brahm[=a] never lives"; but again as "Thou of

eight forms, Lakshm[=i], Medh[=a], Dhav[=a], Pusht[=i],

G[=a]ur[=i], Tusht[=i], Prabh[=a], Dhriti, O Sarasvat[=i]."

The great festivals, like the great temples, are not very

stricly sectarian. Williams says that in Çiva's temple in

Benares are kept monkeys (sacred to Vishnu).]

[Footnote 49: Between this and the last occur minor

holidays, one to avert small-pox; one (February the 4th)

sacred to the sun (Sunday, the seventh day of each lunar

fortnight, is strictly observed); and one to the Manes.]

[Footnote 50: Fasting is not necessarily a part of civilized

religion alone. It is found in the Brahmanic and Hindu

cults, but it obtains also among the American Indians. Thus

the Dacotahs fast for two or three days at the worship of

sun and moon. Schoolcraft, _Histor. and Statist_., iii.

227.]

[Footnote 51: The last clause (meaning 'common historical

origin') were better omitted.]

[Footnote 52: Except the mystic syllable _[=O]m_, supposed

to represent the trinity (_[=O]m_ is _a, u, m_), though

probably it was originally only an exclamation.]

[Footnote 53: A small Vishnu festival in honor of Vishnu as

'man-lion' (one of his ten _avatars_) is celebrated on the

13th of March; but in Bengal in honor of the same god as a

cow-boy. On the 15th of March there is another minor

festival in Bengal, but it is to Çiva, or rather to one of

his hosts, under the form of a water pot (that is to

preserve from disease).]

[Footnote 54: The bonfire is made of fences, door posts,

furniture, etc. Nothing once seized and devoted to the fire

may be reclaimed, but the owner may defend his property if

he can. Part of the horse-play at this time consists in

leaping over the fire, which is also ritualistic with same

of the hill-tribes.]

[Footnote 55: Compare the Nautch dances on R[=a]macandra's

birthday. Religious dances, generally indecent, are also a

prominent feature of the religions of the wild tribes (as

among American and African savages, Greeks, etc., etc.).]

[Footnote 56: The 'Easter bonnet' in Indic form.]

[Footnote 57: In sober contrast stands the yearly orthodox

Çráddha celebration (August-September), though Brahmans join

in sectarian fêtes.]

[Footnote 58: Wilson draws an elaborate parallel between the

Hol[=i] and the Lupercalia, etc. (Carnival). But the points

of contact are obvious. One of the customs of the Hol[=i]

celebration is an exact reproduction of April-Fool's day.

Making "Hol[=i] fools" is to send people on useless errands,

etc. (Festum Stultorum, at the Vernal Equinos, transferred

by the Church to the first of November, "Innocents' Day").]

[Footnote 59: Stevenson, JRAS. 1841, p. 239; Williams,

_loc. cit._; Wilkins, _Modern Hinduism_, ch. III.]

[Footnote 60: The daily service consists in dressing,

bathing, feeding, etc It is divided into eight ridiculous

ceremonies, which prolong the worship through the day.]

[Footnote 61: The brilliant displays attracted the notice of

the Greeks, who speak of the tame tigers and panthers, the

artificial trees carried in wagons, the singing,

instrumental music, and noise, which signalized a fête

procession. See Williams, _loc. cit_.]

[Footnote 62: Such, for instance, is the most holy temple of

South India, the great temple of Çr[=i]rangam at

Trichinopoly. The idol car, gilded and gaudy, is carved with

obscenity; the walls and ceilings are frescoed with

bestiality. It represents Vishnu's heaven.]

[Footnote 63: From this name or title comes the Gita

Govinda, a mystic erotic poem (in praise of the cow-boy god)

exaltedly religious as it is sensual (twelfth century).]

[Footnote 64: VP.l. 2. 63. The 'qualities' or 'conditions'

of God's being are referred to by 'goodness' and

'darkness.']

[Footnote 65: All this erotic vulgarity is typical of the

common poetry of the people, and is in marked contrast to

the chivalrous, but not love-sick, Bh[=a]rata.]

[Footnote 66: Compare Duncker, LII^5. p. 327, More doubtful

is the identification of Nysian and Nish[=a]dan, _ib_. note.

Compare, also, Schroeder, _loc. cit._ p. 361. Arrian calls

(Çiva) Dionysos the _[Greek: oitou dotêra Iudêis]_

(Schwanbeck, Fig. 1.).]

[Footnote 67: This remains always as Çiva's heaven in

distinction from Goloka or V[=a]ikuntha, Vishnu's heaven.

Nowadays Benares is the chief seat of Çivaism.]

[Footnote 68: The doctrine of the immaculate conception,

common to Vishnuism and Buddhism (above, p.431), can have no

exact parallel in Çivaism, for Çiva is not born as a child;

but it seems to be reflected in the laughable ascription of

virginity to Um[=a] (Civa's wife), when she is revered as

the emblem of motherhood.]

[Footnote 69: In RV. v. 41. 4, the Vedic triad is Fire,

Wind, and (Tr[=i]ta of the sky) Indra; elsewhere Fire, Wind,

and Sun (above, p. 42), distinct from the triune fire.]

[Footnote 70: In the Rig Veda the three steps are never thus

described, but in the later age this view is common. It is,

in fact, only on the 'three steps' that the identity with

the sun is established. In RV. 1. 156. 4, Vishnu is already

above Varuna.]

[Footnote 71: Çat. Br. xiv. 1. 1. 5.]

[Footnote 72: For other versions see Mulr, _Original

Sanskrit Texts_, iv. p. 127 ff.]

[Footnote 73: Later interpreted as wives or eyes.]

[Footnote 74: For an epic guess at the significance of the

title _n[=i]laka[n.][t.]ha_, 'blue-throated,' see Mbh[=a] i.

18. 43.]

[Footnote 75: AV. iv. 28; viii. 2; xi. 2. Thus even in the

Rig Veda pairs of gods are frequently besung as one, as if

they were divinities not only homogeneous but even

monothelous.]

[Footnote 76: Brahm[=a]'s mark in the lotus; Vishnu's, the

discus (sun); Çiva's, the Linga, phallic emblem.]

[Footnote 77: The grim interpretation of later times makes

the cattle (to be sacrificed) _men_. The theological

interpretation is that Çiva is the lord of the spirit, which

is bound like a beast.]

[Footnote 78: The commenter, horrified by the murder of the

Father-god, makes Rudra kill 'the sin'; but the original

shows that it is the Father-god who was shot by this god,

who chose as his reward the lordship over kine; and such

exaltation is not improbable (moreover, it is historical!).

The hunting of the Father-god by Rudra is pictured in the

stars (Orion), Ait. Br. iii. 33.]

[Footnote 79: See Weber. _Ind. St._ ii. 37; Muir, iv. 403.

Çarva (Çaurva) is Avestan, but at the same time it is his

'eastern' name, while Bhava is his western name. Çat. Br. i.

7. 3. 8.]

[Footnote 80: The epic (_loc. cit_. above), the Pur[=a]nas,

and the very late Atharva Çiras Upanishad and M[=a]itr. Up.

(much interpolated). Compare Muir, _loc. cit_. pp. 362-3.]

[Footnote 81: According to the epic, men honor gods that

kill, Indra, Rudra, and so forth; not gods that are passive,

such as Brahm[=a], the Creator, and P[=u]shan (xii. 15. 18),

_ya eva dev[=a] hant[=a]ras t[=a]l loko 'rcayate

bh[=r.]ça[=.m], na Brahm[=a][n.]am_.]

[Footnote 82: Barth seems to imply that Harihara (the name)

is later than the _trim[=u]rti_ (p. 185), but he has to

reject the passage in the Hari-va[.n]ça to prove this. On

Ayen[=a]r, a southern god said to be Hari-Hara

(Vishnu-Çiva), see Williams, _loc. cit_.]

[Footnote 83: RV. viii. 6. 30; 1. 50. 10. Weber refers

Krishna further back to a priestly Vedic poet of that name,

to whom are attributed hymns of the eighth and tenth books

of the Rig Veda (_Janm[=a][s.][t.]am[=i]_, p. 316). He

interprets Krishna's mother's name, Devak[=i], as 'player'

_(ib)_ But the change of name in a Vedic hymn has no special

significance. The name Devak[=i] is found applied to other

persons, and its etymology is rather _deva_, divine, as

Weber now admits (Berl. Ak. 1890, p. 931).]

[Footnote 84: In the epic, also, kings become hermits, and

perform great penance just as do the ascetic priests.

Compare the heroes themselves, and i. 42. 23 _raja

mah[=a]tap[=a]s_; also ii. 19, where a king renounces his

throne, and with his two wives becomes a hermit in the

woods. In i. 41. 31 a king is said to be equal to ten

priests!]

[Footnote 85: In fact, the daily repetition of the

S[=a]vitr[=i] is a tacit admission of the sun god as the

highest type of the divine; and Vishnu is the most

spiritualized form of the sun-god, representing even in the

Rig-Veda the goal of the departing spirit.]

[Footnote 86: Skanda (Subrahmanya) and Ganeça are Çiva's two

sons, corresponding to Krishna and R[=a]ma. Skanda's own son

is Viç[=a]kha, a _graha_ (above, p. 415).]

[Footnote 87: Çiva at the present day, for instance, is

represented now and then as a man, and he is incarnate as

V[=i]rabhadra. But all this is modern, and contrasts with

the older conception. It is only in recent times, in the

South, that he is provided with an earthly history. Compare

Williams, _Thought and Life,_ p. 47.]

[Footnote 88: _Ava-t[=a]ra_, 'descent,' from _ava_, 'down,'

and _tar_, 'pass' (as in Latin in-_trare_).]

[Footnote 89: In the _Bh[=a]gavata Pur[=a]na_.]

[Footnote 90: The tortoise _avatar_ had a famous temple two

centuries ago, where a stone tortoise received prayer. How

much totemism lies in these _avatars_ it is guess-work to

say.]

[Footnote 91: Balar[=a]ma (or Baladeva), Krishna's elder

brother, is to be distinguished from R[=a]ma. The former is

a late addition to the Krishna-cult, and belongs with Nanda,

his reputed father. Like Krishna, the name is also that of a

snake, Naga, and it is not impossible that Naga worship may

be the foundation of the Krishna-cult, but it would be hard

to reconcile this with tradition. In the sixth century

Var[=a]hamihira recognizes both the brothers.]

[Footnote 92: Edkins, cited by Müller, _India_, p. 286.]

[Footnote 93: Weber, _Janm[=a][s.][t.]am[=i]_, pp. 259, 318.

Weber describes in full the cult of the "Madonna with the

Child," according to the Pur[=a]nas.]

[Footnote 94: On the subsequent deification of the Pandus

themselves see 1A. VII. 127.]

[Footnote 95: Hence the similarity with Herakles, with whom

Megasthenes identifies him. The man-lion and hero-forms are

taken to rid earth of monsters.]

[Footnote 96: Greek influence is clearly reflected in

India's architecture. Hellenic bas-reliefs representing

Bacchic scenes and the love-god are occasionally found.

Compare the description of Çiva's temple in Orissa, Weber,

_Literature_, p. 368; _Berl. Ak._, 1890, p, 912. Çiva is

here associated with the Greek cult of Eros and Aphrodite.]

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