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Xxxii. the Child Krishna, Christianity, and the Gujars

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Xxxii. the Child Krishna, Christianity, and the Gujars 951 XXXII. THE CHILD KRISHNA, CHRISTIANITY, AND THE GUJARS. BY J. KENNEDY. alleged influence of Christianity on the early development of Hinduism has long been a subject of investigation and controversy. Weber summed up in a masterly manner all that had been said for the one side; while with equal acumen Barth criticised and denied his conclusions. The discussion has had the effect of restricting the controversy to two points, both connected in the main with the worship of Krishna. The first relates to the Hindu doctrine of faith, or bhakti, as an essential condition of salvation, and has been dealt with by Dr. Grierson in a recent number of this Journal.1 The second refers to the origin of the child Krishna, his legend, and his cult, and is the subject of the present essay. The problem may be stated thus. We have in the Krishna of Dwaraka a great nature - god of immemorial antiquity, worshipped in the Kabul mountains and the Indus Valley. We also have a child Krishna who is not a nature-god at all, and has nothing in common with the elder Krishna except the name. The genesis of this child can be traced back to Mathura and to the beginning of the sixth century A.B. This cuckoo nursling usurps the place of the ancient hero; and the multifarious elements of his legend, and the clumsiness with which they have been fitted together, show that he is no natural development, but a forcible adaptation of something foreign. Some of the dramatis personm in the legend are Buddhist and others are Hindu, while the story itself betrays a ' marvellous' 1 J.R.A.S. 1907, p. 311 ft. Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. INSEAD, on 13 Oct 2018 at 16:08:58, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00036881 952 KRISHNA, CHRISTIANITY, AND THE GTJJARS. similitude to the stories, evangelical or apocryphal, of our Saviour's nativity and infancy. How, then, account for the origin of this child? Some regard him as a pure Hindu, and connect his worship with that of the Divine Mothers or some similar source; others would make him a Buddhist. In opposition to these hypotheses it is here maintained that the idea of this child god was suggested by the Christian observances of some tribe of Scythian' nomads, possibly the Gujars. The discussion falls into three divisions. The first deals with the points of historical contact between Christianity and Hinduism during the first five centuries of our era. The second is devoted to an analysis of the history and character of Krishna of Dwaraka. The third part will deal with the origin of the child Krishna and his connection with the nomads. But it is well to remind the reader that in all such discussions one thing should be borne in mind. " The Hindus," said AlberunI, " believe that there is no country but theirs, no nation like theirs, no kings like theirs, no science like theirs."2 The Hindus, although eager to learn from outsiders, have never been willing to admit any obligations. And their boast is supported to some extent by the fact that whatever they have borrowed in religion, science, or art, they have disguised and metamorphosed. Hinduism is a viscous stream which absorbs, transmutes, and disguises everything. And yet it neither acknowledges any obligation, nor admits of any fundamental alteration. The Christianity of the third century, says Harnack, marked everything with the Cross; Hinduism marks everything with its own genius. Professing never to change, it changes incessantly. But it is only the surface which is ruffled; the depths move very slowly or not at all. 1 Scythian is a convenient designation for all the tribes of Central Asia which invaded India between the second century B.C. and the sixth century A.D., since it is devoid of any racial connotation. The tribes on the northern and eastern frontiers of Persia and along the Hindu Kush were, some of them, akin to the Iranians ; others were of Turki stock ; others more or less Mongoloid, as they are at present. (J.K.A'.S. 1906, p. 181 ff.) 2 AlberunI, India, tr. Sachau, i, 22. Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. INSEAD, on 13 Oct 2018 at 16:08:58, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00036881 KRISHNA, CHRISTIANITY, AND THE GUJARS. 953 I. EARLY CHRISTIAN COMMUNITIES AND INDIA. Missionary zeal has in all ages been able to make converts,1 but any modification of a popular religion by a foreign cult requires a gradual infiltration of ideas and the long-continued contact of different communities. If, therefore, Christianity influenced the development of Hinduism, both must have dwelt together for a consider- able period. There were three such points of contact during the first five centuries — Alexandria, the western sea-coast of the Dekhan, and the north-western frontiers of India; and we have to determine which of the three was in the best position to influence popular Hinduism. We begin with Alexandria. India had direct communication with the Roman Empire by way of Alexandria during the first two centuries of our era; after that time the main tide of traffic was diverted to the Persian Gulf. Now, Dio Chrysostom casually mentions the existence of a small colony of Hindu traders at Alexandria in the time of Trajan, and the Gnostic Basilides was probably acquainted with some of its members.2 We have no further notices of this colony, but it must have come to an end with, or shortly after, Caracalla's massacre of the Alexandrians in 215 A.D., a massacre which involved natives and foreigners in an equal ruin.3 And this was only the beginning of the evils which befell Egypt in the third century. Egypt had 1 Missionary zeal, pagan and Christian. Sir Alfred Lyall has shown in a famous essay that Hinduism is a great proselytising religion, and the same thing might be shown of many of the pagan religions of antiquity. Isis, Mithras, Cybele, and in fact most of the Thracian, Phrygian, Asiatic, and Egyptian cults which overspread the Roman Empire, are instances in point. Missionary zeal was often dangerous to the proselytiser, and Phryne was tried for her life because she had introduced an orgiastic Thracian worship among the women of Athens. 2 Dio Chrys., Orat. xxxii, quoted in my "Buddhist Gnosticism, the System of Basilides" (J.R.A.S. 1902, p. 377 ff.), where the relation of Basilides to Indian beliefs is discussed. 3 Dio Cassius (lxxvii, 22, 23) expressly mentions the slaughter of foreigners. Caracalla expelled the surviving foreigners who were not merchants. Spartian (Caracalla, c. 6) simply says : " Dato militibus signo ut hospites suos occiderent, magnam csedem Alexandrese fecit.'' Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. INSEAD, on 13 Oct 2018 at 16:08:58, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00036881 954 KEISHNA, CHRISTIANITY, AND THE GWABS. ceased to be the granary of Rome, and it had not yet begun to supply Byzantium. The peasants were oppressed with intolerable taxation; many turned brigands. The savage Blemyes raided the upper country, and cut off the caravans between Coptos and the Red Sea. A later massacre laid Alexandria in ruins and reduced its population to a third; and a pretender to the empire and a foreign invasion completed the ruin of the country. But the first and most far-reaching of all these calamities was Caracalla's massacre, which put an end to the direct trade with India. That was transferred in part to Adule, and in part went to swell the trade by way of the Persian Grulf; and the rise of the Abyssinians to power1 and the glory of Palmyra may both be traced to this cause. With Caracalla the hoards of Roman coins in Southern India, which so abundantly illustrate every Roman emperor from Augustus downwards, come suddenly to an end,3 a striking proof of the entire cessation of the Indian trade.3 When the series is resumed in the time of Theodosius and his successors, the finds are smaller and the succession more broken. The travellers who went to India— Cosmas Indikopleustes, the Theban Scholastikos, and others— took ship at Adule. The Indian settlement at Alexandria which came to an end in 215 A.D. was never re-established. In some respects this was of little consequence, since these Indian merchants were not of a class likely to spread a knowledge of 1 In 333 A.D. J3izanes, the ruler of Axum, could boast that he had subdued a large part of Southern Arabia. His Greek inscription, first copied by Salt (Valentia's Travels, iii, 181), has been the subject of much learned discussion. The conquests of the nameless king, whose inscription at Adule Cosmas copied, date from the latter part of the third century according to Glaser (McCrindle's Cosmas Ind., ii, 59). 2 K. Sewell, " Eoman Coins found in India" : J.E.A.S. 1904, p. 591 ff. A few stray coins of Gordian have turned up ; in one case they were brought into the country centuries afterwards; the others may possibly be evidence of the trade of Firmus mentioned in the following note. 3 Vopiscus says of Firmus, the rich Alexandrian merchant and pretender to the empire, whom Aurelian slew : '' Idem et cum Blemyis societatem maximam tenuit et cum Saracenis.
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