and ascetics, although the tenets of this great Vedanta teacher may be said virtually to constitute the creed of intelligent Brahmans generally.
Whilst Sankara’s chief title to fame rests on his philosophical works, as the upholder of the strict monistic theory of Vedanta, he doubtless played an important part in the partial remodelling of the Hindu system of belief at a time when Buddhism was rapidly losing ground in India. Not that there is any evidence of Buddhists ever having been actually persecuted by the Brahmans, or still less of Sankara himself ever having done so; but the traditional belief in some personal god, as the principal representative of an invisible, all-pervading deity, would doubtless appeal more directly to the minds and hearts of the people than the colourless ethical system promulgated by the Sakya saint. Nor do Buddhist places of worship appear as a rule to have been destroyed by Hindu sectaries, but they seem rather to have been taken over by them for their own religious uses; at any rate there are to this day not a few Hindu shrines, especially in Bengal, dedicated to Dharmaraj, “the prince of righteousness,” as the Buddha is commonly styled. That the tenets and practices of so characteristic a faith as Buddhism, so long prevalent in India, cannot but have left their marks on Hindu life and belief may readily be assumed, though it is not so easy to lay one’s finger on the precise features that might seem to betray such an influence. If the general tenderness towards animals, based on the principle of ahimsa, or inflicting no injury on sentient beings, be due to Buddhist teaching, that influence must have made itself felt at a comparatively early period, seeing that sentiments of a similar nature are repeatedly urged in the Code of Manu. Thus, in v. 46-48, “He who does not willingly cause the pain of confinement and death to living beings, but desires the good of all, obtains endless bliss. He who injures no creature obtains without effort what he thinks of, what he strives for, and what he fixes his mind on. Flesh-meat cannot be procured without injury to animals, and the slaughter of animals is not conducive to heavenly bliss: from flesh-meat, therefore, let man abstain.” Moreover, in view of the fact that Jainism, which originated about the same time as Buddhism, inculcates the same principle, even to an extravagant degree, it seems by no means improbable that the spirit of kindliness towards living beings generally was already widely diffused among the people when these new doctrines were promulgated. To the same tendency doubtless is due the gradual decline and ultimate discontinuance of animal sacrifices by all sects except the extreme branch of Sakti-worshippers. In this respect, the veneration shown to serpents and monkeys has, however, to be viewed in a somewhat different light, as having a mythical background; whilst quite a special significance attaches to the sacred character assigned to the cow by all classes of Hindus, even those who are not prepared to admit the claim of the Brahman to the exalted position of the earthly god usually conceded to him. In the Veda no tendency shows itself as yet towards rendering divine honour to the cow; and though the importance assigned her in an agricultural community is easily understood, still the exact process of her deification and her identification with the mother earth in the time of Manu and the epics requires further elucidation. An idealized type of the useful quadruped—likewise often identified with the earth—presents itself in the mythical Cow of Plenty, or “wish-cow” (Kamadhenu, or Kamadugha, i.e. wish-milker), already appearing in the Atharvaveda, and in epic times assigned to Indra, or identified with Surabhi, “the fragrant,” the sacred cow of the sage Vasishtha. Possibly the growth of the legend of Krishna—his being reared at Gokula (cow-station); his tender relations to the gopis, or cow-herdesses, of Vrindavana; his epithets Gopala, “the cowherd,” and Govinda, “cow-finder,” actually explained as “recoverer of the earth” in the great epic, and the go-loka, or “cow-world,” assigned to him as his heavenly abode—may have some connexion with the sacred character ascribed to the cow from early times.
Since the time of Sankara, or for more than a thousand years, the gods Vishnu and Siva, or Hari and Hara as they are also commonly called—with their wives, especially that of the latter god—have shared between them the Worship. practical worship of the vast majority of Hindus. But, though the people have thus been divided between two different religious camps, sectarian animosity has upon the whole kept within reasonable limits. In fact, the respectable Hindu, whilst owning special allegiance to one of the two gods as his ishṭā devatā (favourite deity), will not withhold his tribute of adoration from the other gods of the pantheon. The high-caste Brahman will probably keep at his home a śālagrām stone, the favourite symbol of Vishnu, as well as the characteristic emblems of Siva and his consort, to both of which he will do reverence in the morning; and when he visits some holy place of pilgrimage, he will not fail to pay his homage at both the Saiva and the Vaishnava shrines there. Indeed, “sectarian bigotry and exclusiveness are to be found chiefly among the professional leaders of the modern brotherhoods and their low-caste followers, who are taught to believe that theirs are the only true gods, and that the rest do not deserve any reverence whatever” (Jog. Nath). The same spirit of toleration shows itself in the celebration of the numerous religious festivals. Whilst some of these—e.g. the Sankranti (called Pongal, i.e. “boiled rice,” in the south), which marks the entrance of the sun into the sign of Capricorn and the beginning of its northward course (uttarāyana) on the 1st day of the month Māgha (c. Jan. 12); the Gaṇeśa-caturthī, or 4th day of the light fortnight of Bhadra (August-September), considered the birthday of Ganesa, the god of wisdom; and the Holi, the Indian Saturnalia in the month of Phālgunḁ (February to March)—have nothing of a sectarian tendency about them; others again, which are of a distinctly sectarian character—such as the Krishna-janmāshṭamī, the birthday of Krishna on the 8th day of the dark half of Bhadra, or (in the south) of Śrāvaṇa (July-August), the Durga-puja and the Dipavali, or lamp feast, celebrating Krishna’s victory over the demon Narakasura, on the last two days of Aśvina (September-October)—are likewise observed and heartily joined in by the whole community irrespective of sect. Widely different, however, as is the character of the two leading gods are also the modes of worship practised by their votaries.
Siva has at all times been the favourite god of the Brahmans,[1] and his worship is accordingly more widely extended than that of his rival, especially in southern India. Indeed there is hardly a village in India which cannot boast of a shrine dedicated to Siva, and containing the emblem of his reproductive power; for almost the only form in which the “Great God” is adored is the Linga, consisting usually of an upright cylindrical block of marble or other stone, mostly resting on a circular perforated slab. The mystic nature of these emblems seems, however, to be but little understood by the common people; and, as H. H. Wilson remarks, “notwithstanding the acknowledged purport of this worship, it is but justice to state that it is unattended in Upper India by any indecent or indelicate ceremonies, and it requires a rather lively imagination to trace any resemblance in its symbols to the objects they are supposed to represent.” In spite, however, of its wide diffusion, and the vast number of shrines dedicated to it, the worship of Siva has never assumed a really popular character, especially in northern India, being attended with scarcely any solemnity or display of emotional spirit. The temple, which usually stands in the middle of a court, is as a rule a building of very moderate dimensions, consisting either of a single square chamber, surmounted by a pyramidal structure, or of a chamber for the linga and a small vestibule. The worshipper, having first circumambulated the shrine as often as he pleases, keeping it at his right-hand side, steps up to the threshold of the sanctum, and presents his offering of flowers or fruit, which the officiating priest receives; he then prostrates himself, or merely lifts his hands—joined so as to leave a hollow space between the palms—to his forehead, muttering a short prayer, and takes his departure. Amongst the many thousands of Lingas, twelve are usually regarded as of especial sanctity, one of which, that of Somnath in Gujarat, where Siva is worshipped as “the lord of Soma,” was, however, shattered by Mahmud of Ghazni; whilst another, representing Siva as Visvesvara, or “Lord of the Universe,” is the chief object of adoration at Benares, the great centre of Siva-worship. The Saivas of southern India, on the other hand, single out as peculiarly sacred five of their temples which are supposed to enshrine as many characteristic aspects (linga) of the god in the form of the five elements, the most holy of these being the shrine of Chidambaram (i.e. “thought-ether”) in S. Arcot, supposed to contain the ether-linga. According to Pandit S. M. Natesa (Hindu Feasts, Fasts and Ceremonies), “the several forms of the god Siva in these sacred shrines are considered to be the bodies or casements of the soul whose
- ↑ Siva is said to have first appeared in the beginning of the present age as Sveta, the White, for the purpose of benefiting the Brahmans, and he is invariably painted white; whilst Vishnu, when pictured, is always of a dark-blue colour.
