India's Problem, Krishna or Christ Part 7

It willingly appropriates much of their teaching and ritual. It placed in its pantheon its arch-enemy, Buddha, and has dignified many of the demons of the primitive cult of South India in the same way. And herein lie the subtle power and supreme danger which inhere in it to other faiths.

(_d_) It must also be remembered that the faith of India is an ethnic faith, with no ambition to reach to other peoples beyond that peninsula.

This faith has a hundred ways of expelling and excommunicating its members and only one doubtful door by which it may receive outsiders, namely, by the formation of a new caste.

Christianity, on the other hand, is preeminently a missionary religion. It claims to be the universal faith. The last commandment of the Lord upon earth and the first work of the Holy Spirit upon His descent was to propagate the faith and to carry it to many lands and peoples. Hinduism is conserved by its social organism of caste; Christianity, by its leavening influence upon all that comes in contact with it, and the outreaching power of its life within.

(_e_) Another difference is observable in the fact that while Christianity is always held as a system of saving truth to be believed, Hinduism, in its acceptance, does not involve the necessary belief of any doctrine or system of doctrine. It is well understood that a man of any belief, or of no belief, may be a genuine and orthodox Hindu provided he observes caste rules and ceremonies. It has been more than once insisted upon that a man may accept Christ as his Saviour and His religion as his firm belief and still remain a Hindu if he only submit to the demands of caste. Not a few Hindus are trying to live up to this strange dual system today! And I fear some native Christians have not got rid of the same delusion.

(_f_) There is also a marked difference in the moral standards of the two faiths. In a certain sense the moral code of Brahmanism, at its best, is lofty if not perfect. It enjoins a man not to lie, not to steal, not injure another, to be just, brave, hospitable and self-controlled. Some savage races inculcate, with more or less severity, the same moral lessons. But to Hindus as to savages these injunctions have represented the moral code; and whoever, among them, attains unto these, mostly negative, virtues, is deemed worthy of praise. In a sense the ten commandments communicated through Moses, obtain among Christians and are enjoined upon them today. But they, rather than represent the Christian's ideal, indicate only the low water mark of his moral requirements. To say of a Christian gentleman today that he does not steal, or does not lie, is rather an insult than a compliment, since it a.s.sumes that he possesses only what is now considered a very elementary form of morality, such as the lower cla.s.ses and children are supposed to practice. It is only as we follow Jesus Christ and sublimate this code in love (Matt. 22:37-40) that we rise to the full significance and divine content of morality. The Christian code rests not in negation, but commands a life of outgoing, active love. A lofty altruism must permeate his every act and give colouring to his whole life. Christ not only introduced and emphasized this golden rule; He taught that it was absolutely necessary (John 12:25; Matt. 5:44).

To the Hindu, on the other hand, the _lex talionis_ is a law of life still enforced. See, _e.g._, Vishnu Purana 5:19. He never thinks nor is he commanded by his religion to think, of aught but outward conformity to a moral code which is altogether inadequate to keep, direct and inspire him in life. This difficulty is, of course, enhanced when we remember that in the whole realm of Hindu life-whether it be of G.o.ds or of men-there is no one who looms up as a perfect example. It is therefore little wonder that in India today morality is at so low an ebb and that even the code which prevails there is so sadly and universally violated.

Hopkins aptly remarks in this connection: "This Christian ideal of today, which makes fair-mindedness, liberality of thought, and altruism the respective representatives of the savage virtues of manual honesty, truth-speaking and hospitality, is just what is lacking in the more primitive ideal formulated in the code of savages and of Brahman alike....

In India all the factors of the modern code are entirely lacking at the time when the old code was first completely formulated. Liberality of thought comes in with the era of the Upanishads; but it is a restricted freedom. Altruism is unknown to pure Brahmanism."

Conclusion.

Considering therefore these two faiths in all their characteristics and tendencies we are warranted in concluding that Hinduism must wane and vanish. It is an ancient faith and has survived not a few storms. It has a strong place in the hearts of a great people. But the leaven of dissolution and death is mightily at work within it today. The times are changed, new circ.u.mstances are bringing in a revolution of thought.

Foreign ideas, language and customs are the rage; a new civilization, the deadly foe to the strongholds of the faith, is supplanting the old. This faith has nothing to offer with a view to meeting this new and complicated situation. It opposes all progress; through its pundits and orthodox defenders it antagonizes modern civilization and scientific advancement at every point. It is given up to degrading idolatry and a debasing, all-absorbing ceremonialism. It is the foster-mother of ignorance.

The mighty influence of Christianity, on the other hand, is being felt by all in the land; and the thousand-headed, thousand-handed civilization of the West is grasping and slowly transforming all their ideas of life.

Verily India is in the throes of a new birth. Hinduism has done some good, doubtless. It has had a mission in the world and that has unquestionably been, partly, in the conservation of the great doctrine of G.o.d's immanence at a time when the western world had largely forgotten it. But this work is no longer needed. Today this truth is emphasized also by the Christian Church, and in the safe and practical way, in combination and harmony with the personality and fatherhood of G.o.d.

We can therefore look forward with confidence to the ultimate issue of this great conflict and see, through faith, the day when Christ shall reign supreme in that land.

Chapter IV.

THE PRODUCTS OF THE TWO FAITHS IN INDIA. THE HINDU AND THE NATIVE CHRISTIAN-A STUDY.

During the many centuries of its history and working in India Hinduism has had ample opportunity to produce its own type of religious devotee, one who is thoroughly representative of its teaching and life. This type abounds in India today and is a faithful reflection of that faith. We shall now endeavour to study that living embodiment of Hinduism. In one respect it will be but another way of studying the faith itself-perhaps the best of all methods of studying a religion, for it is thus presented in life and action.

Protestant Christianity has not been sufficiently long in India to develop and foster an Indian type of character of its own. And yet we see it rapidly working towards that consummation. A century is too brief a time for this purpose. Moreover, native Christian life in that land is too much under the dominance and guidance of the West to enjoy a large degree of spontaneity; and without spontaneity life is not natural.

Nevertheless, the century that has pa.s.sed has brought into existence the fourth generation of Protestant native Christians in India; and we are able to see, to some extent, among these descendants of native Christians that tendency and bent which will ere long develop into a definite and settled type of its own. For the time being we can only study the native Christian as a prophecy-a prophecy not for many years to be fulfilled in all its details, and yet worthy of study both in itself and for what it suggests.

Let us consider, then, these types of the two faiths which we see in that land.

1. And First, The Hindu.

The Hindu Devotee is a genuine product of his religion, wrought out during thirty centuries on its native heath. He stands before us as a distinct type whose characteristics differentiate him from the followers of any other religion.

It is well to remember here that that modern product-the Hindu of Western culture who is so much in evidence today in India and who sometimes comes West in flowing orange robes and turban to urge his mongrel philosophy upon our fellow-countrymen-is not the type of Hindu appreciated by, or representing, the people of that land. Neither in life nor in teaching does he represent the faith whose name he bears. He is a man who has studied Western thought and religion under the guidance and inspiration, perhaps, of the Christian missionary; and then in an ingenious way strives to interpret his own faith in the light of his Western attainments. He presents to us not orthodox Hinduism, but a mongrel doctrine and philosophy which are as foreign to the teaching of the orthodox Hindu pundit and as alien to the Hindu Scriptures as they are to Western philosophy and faith. It is a significant fact that all these Western-travelled Hindus have first to violate a fundamental injunction of their own religion-namely, that which prohibits sea travelling to a Hindu-before they can visit the West in order to commend their faith. And when they return to their native country they do so as the outcastes of their religion, and can be reinstated only after performing a work of atonement which includes the disgusting act of eating the five products of the cow!

The _real_ Hindu, who stands today as the true exponent of his faith, is a very different man. He would no more cross the seas than he would cut off his right arm; for he knows that he can remain a true Hindu only so long as he remains at home. He is a conservative of the stiffest kind. He thinks on ancient lines and swears by the rishis of old.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Idol Worship.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Religious Mendicants.]

(_a_) Study his prepossessions and then alone can you appreciate his heritage. Though he may not be a scholar or a philosopher, he is nevertheless fortified by a host of religious beliefs and prejudices. A thousand dogmas and prepossessions, the inherited treasures of thirty centuries, are his. He drank them in with his mother's milk; he has breathed them in as an essential part of his daily environment. They are more than second nature to him and const.i.tute largely the world of his thought. His ideas of G.o.d, of himself, of sin, of salvation, of human life-all are far removed from ours and are peculiarly his own. He feels himself to be in the toils of an iron destiny which slowly grinds him to powder. His conception of G.o.d brings him no ray of comfort, or hope of release. His idea is that his sin and suffering of today are the inflictions, by some unknown power, for the sins of supposed former births. So that he must, through countless ages, work out his own salvation-a salvation which indeed means eternal rest; but it is a rest from all thought, emotion, self-consciousness and separate existence as well as from all work.

Within the mighty fascination of this Vedantism the people have been held through the centuries. And it is a doctrine which renders the highest morality impossible and has proved the mightiest soporific to the conscience. A few years ago a murderer in South India was being led from the court of justice to prison where, soon, he was to be executed for his crime. As he was struggling in the street with the police, a missionary accosted him, urging him to confess his sin against G.o.d and to seek his peace. Whereupon the man replied, "I did not commit the murder; it was the work of G.o.d Himself, in whose hands I am and of whom I am part." To this the missionary replied that this was neither true nor worthy, and that he would soon suffer the full penalty of the law for his crime. "Ah, yes," he exclaimed, "the G.o.d who wrought this in me and through me, will put me to death. It is all his and I am he."

Such is the line of thought which pa.s.ses through the mind of the orthodox Hindu devotee under all circ.u.mstances, be they pleasant or disagreeable.

And it is one of the most difficult things for him, under these circ.u.mstances, to cultivate a true sense of responsibility and a genuine conception of sin as a moral act.

(_b_) See again his ideals. He has many such which influence him largely in his life. Much depends upon what a man regards as the _Summum Bonum_ of life. The supreme blessing which the Hindu ever holds before his eyes, as the highest and last attainment, is union with G.o.d. Not a union of sympathy, but a metaphysical oneness with Brahm. To lose himself entirely in the Divine Being and thus to cease having separate thought or existence, and to pa.s.s out of the turmoil and restlessness of human life into the calm of the pa.s.sionless bosom of the Eternal-this, to him, is the ideal which alone is worthy of human attainment.

Again; we, Christians, look forward to a complete self-realization, to a perfect manhood and a full rounded character as our ideal. The opposite ideal is the Hindu's. He seeks the loss of all that we hold best-the elimination of every ambition and desire, the eradication of all love and altruism, the cessation of all activity-good as well as evil. His ideal is not greatness and goodness of heart, but the renunciation of all that animates and inspires. To him the highest virtue in its n.o.blest activity has no charms; for he claims that he looks above and beyond all this to that absolute equilibrium of soul when pa.s.sion, and when all desire, shall have been killed through self-mortification and self-abnegation and he shall have attained mental poise and repose rather than a perfect character. Thus, in its last a.n.a.lysis, his ideal is an intellectual, rather than a moral, one; for it is again absorption into the Divine Soul; and that he conceives to be the Supreme Intelligence rather than the Perfect Will. This difference of ideal between the two faiths is fundamental and must work for very diverse results.

In harmony with this is the other thought that the body, yea each and every body with which the soul may clothe itself, is an unmitigated evil because it is the highway to suffering and defers the final consummation.

Hence, the Hindu has no respect for the body and longs for the day of final emanc.i.p.ation from flesh and all its ills.

How then shall the soul be freed from its many births so that it may pa.s.s out of this bondage into the final freedom of _Sayutcha_, or emanc.i.p.ation?

To him _Yoga_, the way of meditation, represents the highest way of release. To wean the mind, through this process, from all desire and ambition and thus to reach absolute equilibrium of soul is the object of _Yoga_. This indeed is the only condition whereby the soul can rise above any future contact with earthly bodies.

Consequently the Hindu has, for many centuries, looked to the monastery and the wilderness as the only places where this ideal can be safely and speedily attained. To live among men, and thus to be subjected to corroding cares and to the swaying pa.s.sions of human society, renders the attainment of beatification impossible. Under these circ.u.mstances the soul finds no way of emanc.i.p.ation. Therefore the watchword of the Hindu is, "flee from the world rather than overcome it." For the attainment of those qualities which ensure final repose he immures himself in a _mutt_ or he flees into the forest where, apart from men, he gives himself to self-mortification and meditation that he may speedily find the desired release. At the root of this idea, as its animating motive, lies the worthy ambition of living a better life than the environments of a corrupt society favour. And with this desire is coupled the idea that a full rounded life and a perfected character are not only possible in the solitude of a wilderness but are nowhere else attainable. And thus it is, with many, a silent acknowledgment of failure and of the belief that in the rush and struggle of public life a G.o.dly, heavenly-minded character is impossible. According to the Hindu conception, a man may be successful in business matters, but he cannot be holy or fit for the highest communion with G.o.d unless he spend his time in separation from all his kind.

Therefore the so-called pious and holy men of that land are ascetics. They eschew human society and seek to renounce all human good and every earthly ambition.

With this purpose, ostensibly, in view there are, as we saw, about 5,500,000 men in India who have given up all earthly employment, who live apart as ascetics and spend their time in roaming around the country as religious mendicants. These people are, in the main, doubtless possessed of the laudable ambition to be holy and to prepare themselves for union with Brahm. And yet, as a matter of fact, they are the most pestilential in their morals of all the people of the land. Many of them, at the same time, both regard themselves and are regarded by their co-religionists as the acme of piety. Nevertheless, they daily trample under foot every command of the decalogue. It is true that a few of them are different from the ma.s.s, and genuinely seek the higher life for the cultivation of which they have separated themselves. But into their ideal of life altruism hardly enters at all. It is not to do good unto others, but to escape contamination from others which is the concern of the Hindu devotee. At the basis of his higher aspirations concern for self is supreme, thoughts of others are absent.

A notable ill.u.s.tration of a high realization of the Eastern ideal we see in the famous Hindu ascetic Swamiji Bhaskara Nanda Sarasvati, of Benares, who recently died and to whom Dr. Fairbairn has referred so cordially. For many years he had given himself to devotion and meditation. He had subdued the body by the rigours of asceticism and had attained preeminence in self-restraint and in the highest wisdom of _yoga_ culture. He had therefore retired from the world, spurned all its allurements, denied all its claims and devoted himself exclusively to thought and meditation. Thus immured within temple walls in the great city of Benares he was utterly oblivious to the sin and sorrow of the swarming mult.i.tudes of that city and did nought to relieve the suffering, or to improve the lives, of his fellow-beings. He died, and over his remains has been erected a shrine to which the thousands go for worship and for inspiration to attain unto that ideal of life which they believe him to have realized.

This ideal has, for centuries, taken possession of the Hindu mind, and never before did it rule with more absolute sway than it does at present.

Another ideal of life with the Hindu is the so-called "path of works." At present this term is synonymous with a life of ceremonialism. In modern parlance "works" means to the Hindu, ceremonial observance. His life is hedged in on all sides by a host of ceremonies and is permeated through and through with a most complicated ritual. There is nothing in the life of a Hindu devotee, whether it be eating, sleeping, bathing or travelling, which is not religiously prescribed both as to time and method. And utterly regardless of the significance of these rites or the appropriateness of them to his life, he deems their observance as essential to his salvation and finds in their daily keeping the highest satisfaction and completest a.s.surance of his spiritual progress.

The Hindu is no rationalist in his religion. He obeys implicitly, and without question, the ritual of his ancestors and finds no interest in the scrutiny or a.n.a.lysis of them.

So, to the ordinary Hindu, especially to him to whom the way of meditation in the wilderness seems impossible, ceremonialism becomes a matter of supreme concern. No other religion has furnished to its followers a more elaborate and pervasive system of observances than this. These rites exercise their influence upon the mind and are wielding today a most potent influence upon Hindu character. A man may think nothing of, nor have any ambition to attain unto, the spiritual aspect of his faith; he may give no time whatever to any of its teachings or spiritual instruction; but if he maintain its ritual with ordinary care he flatters himself with the thought that he has attained a perfection corresponding to his estate.

Moreover, the Hindu is a thorough _fatalist_. He believes that his destiny is "written upon the forehead." Nothing which he may do can affect this destiny. Nor does it seem to be a part of the divine purpose. So far as he is concerned it is an irrevocable fate. This belief manifests itself largely in his life and conduct. It is one of the inconsistencies of the Hindu's thinking that he, at the same time, worships a tribal G.o.d in whose hands he believes his affairs to be, and through whom prosperity can flow into his life for time and eternity; and yet he holds, with equal, yea with greater, persistence, the law of _Karma_, that is, the law of works, according to which law alone future life, both to himself and to all men, must be wrought out even to the last detail. It is strange that a man whose pantheon is so crowded as that of the Hindu, and who believes in such constant divine guidance and interference, should, also, at the same time, maintain a theory of life which practically dispenses with all divine action and makes human life the product of a blind and grinding fate. Nothing is more marked as a characteristic of Hindu thought today than a possession by the people of these mutually conflicting and contradictory views of life.

(_c_) Looking at the Hindu from a social standpoint we see him largely affected by the caste system. Not only is his life in bondage to this system, his view of life, too, is thoroughly coloured by his caste sentiments.