THE IDEAS OF SIN AND SALVATION
"Conscience does make cowards of us _all_."
--SHAKESPEARE.
[Sidenote: Recapitulation.]
[Sidenote: The new Theism.]
In the new India, as fish out of the water die, many things cannot
survive. We have seen the educated Hindu dropping polytheism, forgetting
pantheism, and adopting or readopting monotheism as the basis of his
religious thinking and feeling. For modern enlightenment and Indian
polytheism are incongruous; there is a like incongruity between Indian
pantheism and the modern demand for practical reality. Likewise, both
polytheism and pantheism are inconsistent with Christian thought, which
is no minor factor in the education of modern India. Further, the theism
that the educated Hindu is adopting as the basis of his religion
approaches to Christian Theism. The doctrines of the Fatherhood of God
and the Brotherhood of Man have become commonplaces in his mouth.
[Sidenote: Homage to Christ Himself]
Likewise, the educated Hindu is strongly attracted to the person of
Jesus Christ, in spite of His alien birth and His association with Great
Britain. There is a sweet savour in His presence, and the man of any
spirituality finds it grateful to sit at His feet. That familiar
oriental expression, hyperbolical to our ears, but ever upon the lips in
India to express the relationship of student to trusted professor, or of
disciple to religious teacher, expresses exactly the relationship to
Jesus Christ of the educated man who is possessed of any religious
instinct. To such a man the miracles, the superhuman claims, the highest
titles of Jesus Christ, present no difficulty until they are formulated
for his subscription in some hard dogmatic mould. Then he must question
and discuss.
[Sidenote: Transmigration forgotten.]
Again, the educated Hindu finds himself employing about the dead and the
hereafter not the language of transmigration, but words that convey the
idea of a continuation of our present consciousness in the presence of a
personal God. For life is becoming worth living, and the thought of life
continuing and progressing is acceptable. This present life also has
become a reality; a devotee renouncing the world may deny its reality;
but how in this practical modern world can a man retain the doctrine of
Maya or Delusion. It has dropped from the speech and apparently out of
the mind of the educated classes.
[Sidenote: The ideas of Sin and Salvation by faith in Jesus Christ not
yet dynamical.]
I have suggested that those features of Christianity that are proving to
be dynamical in India will be found to be those same that are proving to
be dynamical in Britain. The converse also probably holds true, as our
religious teachers might do well to note. The doctrines of Sin and
Salvation through faith in Jesus Christ do not yet seem to have
commended themselves in any measure in India. Positive repudiation of a
Christian doctrine is rare, but the flourishing new sect of the
North-West, the [=A]ryas, make a point of repudiating the Christian
doctrine of salvation by faith, although not explicitly denying it in
their creed. Over against it they set up the Justice of God and the
certainty of goodness and wickedness receiving each its meed. One can
imagine that salvation by faith in Jesus Christ, the outstanding feature
of Christianity, may have been unworthily presented to the [=A]rya
leaders, so that it appeared to them merely as some cheap or gratis kind
of "indulgences." The biographer of the Parsee philanthropist, Malabari,
a forceful and otherwise well-informed writer, sets forth that idea of
salvation by faith, or an idea closely akin. He is explaining why his
religious-minded hero did not accept the religion of his missionary
teachers. "The proud Asiatic," he says, "strives to purchase salvation
with work, and never stoops to accept it as alms, as it necessarily
would be if faith were to be his only merit." The unworthy presentation
of "salvation by faith" may have occurred either in feeble Christian
preaching or in anti-Christian pamphlets. Neither is unknown in India;
and anti-Christian pamphlets have been known to be circulated through
[=A]rya agencies.
[Sidenote: The ideas of sin incompatible with pantheism.]
To appreciate the attitude of the Hindu mind to the doctrines of Sin and
Salvation, we must return again to the rough division of Hindus
into--first, the mass of the people, polytheists; secondly, the educated
classes, now largely monotheists; thirdly, the brahmanically educated
and the ascetics, pantheists. It is only with the monotheists that we
have now to deal. As already said--to the pantheist the word sin has no
meaning. Where all is God, sin or alienation from God is a contradiction
in terms. The conception of sin implies the _two_ conceptions of God and
Man, or at least of Law and Man; and where one or other of these two
conceptions is lacking, the conception of sin cannot arise. In
pantheism, the idea of man as a distinct individual is relegated to the
region of Maya or Delusion; there cannot therefore be a real sinner.
Does such reasoning appear mere dialectics without practical
application, or is it unfair, think you, thus to bind a person down to
the logical deductions from his creed? On the contrary, persons denying
that we can sin are easy to find. Writes the latest British apostle of
Hinduism, for the leaders of reaction in India are a few English and
Americans: "There is no longer a vague horrible something called sin:
This has given place to a clearly defined state of ignorance or
blindness of the will."[119] I quote again also from Swami Vivekananda,
representative of Hinduism in the Parliament of Religions at Chicago in
1893. It is from his lecture published in 1896, entitled _The Real and
the Apparent Man_. His statement is unambiguous. "It is the greatest of
all lies," he says, "that we are mere men; we are the God of the
Universe.... The worst lie that you ever told yourself is that you were
born a sinner.... The wicked see this universe as a hell; and the
partially good see it as heaven; and the perfect beings realise it as
God Himself. By mistake we think that we are impure, that we are
limited, that we are separate. The real man is the One Unit Existence."
Such is the logical and the actual outcome of pantheism in regard to the
idea of sin, and such is the standpoint of Hindu philosophy.
[Sidenote: Sankarachargya, the pantheist's, confession of sins.]
Or if further illustration be needed of the incompatibility of the ideas
of pantheism and sin, listen to the striking prayer of Sankarachargya,
the pantheistic Vedantist of the eighth century A.D., with whom is
identified the pantheistic motto, "One only, without a second."[120] It
attracts our attention because Sankarachargya is professedly confessing
sins. Thus runs the prayer: "O Lord, pardon my three sins: I have in
contemplation clothed in form thee who art formless; I have in praise
described thee who art ineffable; and in visiting shrines I have ignored
thine omnipresence."[121] Beautiful expressions indeed, confessions that
finite language and definite acts are inadequate to the Infinite, nay,
contradictions of the Infinite, expressions fit to be recited in prayer
by any man of any creed who feels that God is a Spirit and omnipresent!
But in a Christian prayer such expressions would only form a preface to
confession of one's own _moral_ sin; after adoration comes confession.
Whether, like Sankarachargya, we think of the Deity objectively, as the
formless and literally omnipresent Being, the _pure Being_ which,
according to Hegel, equals nothing, or whether like Swami Vivekananda we
think of man and God as really one, all differentiation being a delusion
within the mind--there is _no second_, neither any second to sin against
nor any second to commit the sin.
[Sidenote: The masses and the sense of sin.]
[Sidenote: Prescriptions for sinners.]
For the ignorant masses, the sense of sin has been worn out by the
importance attached to religious and social externals and by the
artificial value of the service of a hereditary monopolist priesthood.
These right, all is right in the eyes of the millions of India. When one
of the multitude proposes to himself a visit to some shrine or sacred
spot, no doubt the motive often is some divine dissatisfaction with
himself; it is a feeling that God is not near enough where he himself
lives. But what is poured into his ears? By a visit to Dwaraka, the city
of Krishna's sports, he will be liberated from all his sins. By bathing
in the sacred stream of the Ganges he will wash away his sins. All who
die at Benares are sure to go to heaven. By repeating the Gayatri (a
certain verse of the Rigveda addressed to the sun) a man is saved. "A
brahman who holds the Veda in his memory is not culpable though he
should destroy the three worlds"--so says the Code of Manu. The Tantras,
or ritual works of modern Hinduism, abound in such prescriptions for
sinners. "He who liberates a bull at the Aswamedika place of pilgrimage
obtains _mukti_, that is salvation or an end of his rebirths." "All sin
is destroyed by the repetition of Kali's thousand names." "The water of
a guru's [religious teacher's] feet purifies from all sin." "The man who
carries the guru's dust [the dust of the guru's feet] upon his head is
emancipated from all sin and is [the god] Siva himself." "By a certain
inhalation of the breath through the left nostril, and holding of the
breath, with repetition of _yam_, the V[=a]yu Bija or mystical spell of
wind or air, the body and its indwelling sinful self are dessicated, the
breath being expelled by the right nostril."[122] And so on _ad
infinitum_. Superstition, Western or Eastern, has no end of panaceas. We
recall the advertisements of "Plenaria indulgenzia" on the doors of
churches in South Italy. Visiting Benares, the metropolis of popular
Hinduism, the conception of salvation everywhere obtruded upon one is
that it is a question of sacred spots, and of due offerings and
performances thereat.
[Sidenote: The signification of sacrifices to the Indian masses.]
[Sidenote: Description of animal sacrifice.]
What to the masses is _sacrifice_ even, the word which to western ears,
familiar with the term in our Scriptures, suggests acknowledgment of sin
and atonement therefor? It is a mistake to regard sacrifices in India as
expiatory; they are gifts to the Deities as superior powers for boons
desired or received, or they are the customary homage to the powers that
be, at festivals and special occasions. Animal sacrifices are
distinguished from the offerings of fruits and flowers only in being
limited to particular Deities and pertaining to more special occasions.
An actual instance will show the place that sacrifices hold. In a letter
from a village youth to his father, informing him how he had proceeded
upon his arrival at Calcutta, whither he had gone for the University
Matriculation Examination, he reports that he has offered a goat in
sacrifice in order to ensure his success. What he probably does is this.
In a bazaar near the great temple of Kalighat, near Calcutta, the
greatest centre of animal sacrifices in the world, he buys a goat or
kid, fetches it into the temple court and hands it over to one of the
priests whom he has fee'd. The priest puts a consecrating daub of red
lead upon the animal's head, utters over it some mantra or sacred
Sanscrit text, sprinkles water and a few flowers upon it at the actual
place of slaughter, and then delivers it over again to the offerer. Then
when the turn of the offerer, whom we are watching, has come, he hands
over the animal to the executioner, who fixes its neck within a forked
or Y-shaped stick fixed fast in the ground. With one blow the animal's
head is severed from its body. The bleeding head is carried off into the
shrine to be laid before the image of the goddess, and become the temple
perquisite. The decapitated body is carried off by the offerer to
furnish his family with a holiday meal. With his forehead ceremonially
marked with a touch of the blood lying thick upon the ground, the
offerer leaves the temple, his sacrifice finished. Such is animal
sacrifice; if the description recalls the slaughter-house, the actual
sight is certainly sickening. Yet, far as a European now feels from
worship in such a place, and thankful to Him who has abolished sacrifice
once for all, there is no doubt religious gratification to those who go
through what I have described. Our point is that, as Sir M. Monier
Williams declares, in such an offering, "there is no idea of effacing
guilt or making a vicarious offering for sin."[123]
[Sidenote: The educated classes and the idea of sin.]
[Sidenote: The brahma monopoly of nearness to the Deity broken down.]
The educated classes, breathing now a monotheistic atmosphere, although
in close contact with polytheism in their homes and with pantheism in
their sacred literature, have reached the platform on which the idea of
sin may be experienced. A member of that class, a pantheist no longer,
is in the presence of a personal God, a Moral Being, and is himself a
responsible person, with the instincts of a child of that Supreme Moral
Being, our Father. With his education, he knows himself to be
independent of brahmanical mediation in his intercourse with that Being.
As confirmation, it is noteworthy how many of the religious leaders of
modern times, like Buddha of old, are other than brahman by caste. In a
previous chapter the names of a number of these non-brahman leaders were
given. Even the Hindu ascetics of these latter days are more numerously
non-brahman than of old, for in theory only brahmans have reached the
ascetical stage of religious development. Whatever the reason, the
brahmanical monopoly of access to and inspiration from the Deity is no
longer recognised by new-educated India.
[Sidenote: The worship of the new sects--its significance.]
In like manner, the new religious associations seem to feel themselves
directly in the presence of God. Congregational worship, a feature new
to Hindus, is a regular exercise in the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j or Theistic
Association of Bengal, the Pr[=a]rthan[=a] Sam[=a]jes or Prayer
Associations of Western India, and the [=A]rya Sam[=a]j or Vedic
Theistic Association of the United Provinces and the North-West of
India. When Rammohan Roy, the theistic reformer, opened his church in
Calcutta in 1830, he introduced among Hindus congregational worship and
united prayer, before unknown among them and confessedly borrowed from
Christian worship.[124] The public worship in all these bodies is indeed
not unlike many a Christian service, consisting of Prayer to God, Praise
of God, and expositions of religious truth. In a small collection of
hymns, "Theistic Hymns," published some years ago for the use of members
of the [=A]rya Sam[=a]j, we find many Christian hymns expressive of this
personal relationship to God. We find "My God, my Father, while I
stray," and "O God, our help in ages past." Neither of these hymns,
however, it must be noted, contains confession of sin. Curiously
incongruous to our minds is the inclusion among these hymns of poems
like "The boy stood on the burning deck," and "Tell me not in mournful
numbers," and "There's a magical tie to the land of our home," etc.[125]
Even among the Hindu revivalists, judged by that test of the incoming of
public worship, we perceive the growth of the idea of personal
relationship to God. A recent publication of that party is "_Songs for
the worship of the Goddess Durga_." One of them, we may note in passing,
is the well-known hymn, "Work, for the night is coming." All such
personal relationship, we again repeat, is incompatible with pantheism,
and almost equally so with the popular sacerdotalism. Not without
significance do the new theists of Western India call their associations
the Pr[=a]rthan[=a] Sam[=a]jes or Prayer Associations, and give to the
buildings in which they worship the name of Prayer Halls instead of
temples. Let not men say that religion and theological belief belong to
separable spheres.
[Sidenote: The idea of sin naturally accompanies the new monotheism.]
Once more, the public worship and prayer attendant on the new monotheism
of the new religious associations are the signs that the stage has been
reached where sin will be felt and confessed. As yet, however, it cannot
be said that the thought of sin is prominent. In the creeds of the
[=A]rya Sam[=a]j and the Pr[=a]rthan[=a] Sam[=a]jes, the word _sin_ does
not occur. What we find in the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j is as follows. From
the creed of the Southern India Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j, of date about 1883,
we quote paragraph 7: "Should I through folly commit sin, I will
endeavour to be atoned _[sic]_ unto God by earnest repentance and
reformation."[126] From the "Principles of the Sadharan [Universal or
Catholic] Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j," set forth in the organ of the body, we
quote a paragraph 8: "God rewards virtue and punishes sin, but that
punishment is for our good and cannot last to eternity." From a
publication by a third section of the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j, the party of
Keshub Chunder Sen, we quote: "Every sinner must suffer the consequences
of his own sins, sooner or later, in this world or in the next; for the
moral law is unchangeable and God's justice irreversible. His mercy also
must have its way. As the just king, He visits the soul with _adequate
agonies_, and when the sinner after being thus chastised mournfully
prays, He as the merciful Father delivers and accepts him and becomes
reconciled to him. Such reconciliation is the only true atonement."[127]
Even in the last quoted, the expression "adequate agonies" shows its
standpoint regarding salvation from sin to be salvation by repentance,
and not the standpoint of St. Paul, "I live, and yet no longer I, but
Christ liveth in me."