Brāhmanism and Hindūism : Or, Religious Thought and Life in India
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THE GIFT OF HEBER GUSHING PETERS CLASS OF 1892 r: 5226 Cornell University Library BL 2001.M74R3 1891 Brahmanism and Hinduism : or, Religiou 3 1924 023 004 801 The original of tliis book is in tlie Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924023004801 BRAHMANISM and HINDUISM. iDxfovl HORACE HART, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY ff: m^S^»:'-^tmmm}f?SM PORTKAIT OF UrB GATJRI-S ANK AR tJDAT-SA^JKAK, C.S I. NOW SYAMl SRt SAUOIDANANDA-SARASVATI. Seated, aa a Bi-Sliinnn Sannyaal, in meditation (described at p. xxi of the rrefaco). Brahmanism and HINDOISM; OR, RELIGIOUS THOUGHT AND LIFE IN INDIA, AS BASED ON THE VEDA AND OTHER SACRED BOOKS OF THE HINDUS. BY SIR MONIER MONIER-WILLIAMS, K.C.I.E., -M.A., HON. D.C.L. OXFORD, HON. LL.D. CALCUTTA, HON. PH.D. GOTTINGEN, V. P. OF THE .ROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETir, HON. MEMBER OF THE ASIATIC SOCIETIES OF BENGAL AND BOMBAY, AND OF THE ORIENTAL AND PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETIES OF AMERICA, BODEN PROFESSOR OF SANSKRIT, ETC. FOURTH EDITION, ENLARGED AND IMPROVED. NEW YORK: MACMILLAN AND CO. 1891. ' PREFACE. The present volume, although it professes to be only a new edition of a book which has already met with considerable acceptance ^ contains so many improvements and additions that it may be regarded as almost a new work, and as needing a new Preface. Its aim has been stated in the first page of the introductory observations, but there is one expression in the second line which requires explanation. The word ' Englishmen ' must be understood to include all English -speakers everywhere. It has been my earnest endeavour in the following pages to give such a clear account of a very obscure and intricate subject as shall not violate scholarly accuracy, and yet be sufficiently readable to attract ^ The first edition was called ' Religious Thought and Life in India (denoted by the initials RTL. in the new edition of my Sanskrit- English Dictionary published by the University of Oxford), that title being given to it because it was intended to be the first volume of a series treating of the religions of India. When, however, my volume on ' Buddhism ' appeared—a volume printed in larger type— it was thought better to distinguish the third edition of the present work by the title ' Brahmanism and Hinduism,' and this title has also been adopted for this new edition. — vi Preface. intelligent general readers, not merely among the 38 millions of the United Kingdom, but among the 60 millions of the United States of America and among the rapidly developing populations of the colonies of Great Britain. Nor do I despair of its attracting a few readers in India itself, where many thoughtful English-speaking Hindus—educated by us—are not always able to give a clear explanation of their own religious creeds and practices. At any rate those of my fellow-countrymen who are now living in India and working among the natives in their own country, will probably be interested in much of what I have here written, and will sym- pathize with me in my difficulties. To all, in short, who, speaking a language destined to become the dominant speech of the civilized globe, are likely to take an interest in the origin, growth, and present condition of a religious system . radically and diametrically opposed to Christianity, and yet presenting many remarkable points of contact with Christianity a system, too, which of all non- Christian religions is perhaps the best key to ,the study of ' Comparative Religion,' as Sanskrit is the best key to the study of ' Comparative Grammar '—this volume is addressed. And I may here draw attention to the fact that the founder- of the Boden Professorship had a religious object in providing by his munificent bequest for the study of Sanskrit in the University of Oxford ^ ; and if the Boden Professor is to carry that object into effect, — ^ are : enable his The words ' To countrymen to proceed in the conversion of the natives of India to the Christian rehgion.' Preface. vii he is bound to bring his knowledge of Sanskrit to bear not only on the promotion of philological studies, but also on the elucidation of Indian religious systems with a view to their refutation. This is no easy task and its difficulty is enhanced by the close intertwining of religion with social and domestic life in every part of India. It is often asserted that the Hindus are the most religious people in the world. Those who make this assertion ought, of course, to define what they mean by the word ' religious.' What is really meant, I think, is that among all the races of mankind the Hindus are the greatest slaves to the bondage of immemorial tradition—not so much in its bearing on religious beliefs, or even on moral conduct, as on social usages, caste practices, and domestic ceremonial observances. In proof of this it is only necessary to refer to their marriage-customs (see p. 355); but other evidences of this bondage force themselves on the attention of the inquiring traveller at almost every step of his journeyings—in highways and by-ways, on the hills and in the valleys, in towns and in villages, in the dwellings of rich and poor, prince and peasant. And yet, strange to say, these traditional customs, usages, and ceremonial observances, although they constitute the chief element in a Hindu's religion, are nowhere throughout India regulated or enforced by the delegates or representatives of any supreme Head or central religious authority. No doubt one explanation of this fact may be that an Indian's excessive respect for tradition makes the establishment of any central — viii Preface. source of ecclesiastical power, and the exercise of any regularly organized religious government unnecessary. Reverence for opinions and practices held sacred by his ancestors is ingrained in every fibre of a Hindu's character, and is, so to speak, bred in the very bone of his physical and moral constitution. Day by day the pious Hindu offers homage to his father, grandfather, and progenitors, including all the seers, holy men, and patriarchs of antiquity. And even if. this were not so, any centralization of religious authority would be almost impossible, be- cause the Indian body politic is divided into a count- less number of distinct castes, communities and sects, each of which has its own usages and its own form of self-government, consisting, perhaps, of a kind of coun- cil and presiding Head, whose office is to prevent the violation of its own traditions, customs, and rules. It must be borne in mind, too, that there is one tradition respected by all castes and all sects alike namely the superiority of the Brahmans and their right to superintend domestic ceremonies. But see p. 386. Nevertheless it might certainly be expected that at any rate the Brahmans to whom obedience is by common consent due, would be subject to some one supreme Head—to some one centralized spiritual government or authority—from which their sacer- dotal powers would be derived. But no such central authority exists in India. And the Brahmans are themselves split up into priests and laymen, besides countless subdivisions each with its own rules carried out by its own separate council and leaders. Preface. ix Unquestionably this absence of all religious organi- zation among the dense populations of our Indian em- pire has led to an almost total want of order and unity; yet it is attended with one beneficial result, inasmuch as India, with all its intense religiousness, with all its exaggerated sacerdotalism and ceremo- nialism, is free from the despotism,—is unfettered by the dictation of any one autocratic pontiff. At the same time it must be understood that the almost infinite divisions of caste and varieties of caste- observance rest on one unvarying substratum of theological dogma of which the Brahmans are the keepers and exponents. It may be very true that a Hindu who is bound to conform strictly to the social, domestic, and individual observances prescribed by his own caste, is nevertheless allowed great laxity of opinion in regard to his religious creed. It may also be true that he is permitted to choose for himself his own special or favourite divinity, without accepting all the gods of the Hindu Pantheon. It may even be true that while accepting Hinduism he may be at the same time a believer in Buddhism, in Muhammadanism, in Judaism, in Christianity; or may call himself a Theist, a Deist, a Polytheist, a Theosophist, or even an Agnostic. Still for all that, all the varieties of caste- usage, all the multipHcity of domestic ceremonies, all the diversities of sceptical belief are, so to speak, ' roped together ' by one rigid and unyielding line of Brahmanical pantheistic doctrine. Any one who glances at the table of contents ap- pended to these prefatory remarks will see at once that X Preface. a great proportion of the volume before him is em- ployed in expounding the evolution of that doctrine. I fear, however, that some inquirers may possibly consult its pages, who have little time to pursue step by step the gradual development of Indian re- ligious thought, as I have endeavoured to trace it. These need, as an introduction, a more concise answer to the question. What is a Hindu and what is Hinduism ? For their benefit, therefore, I will here endeavour to condense some of the more important points which are set forth at full length in the succeeding pages.