Reading section 50

But the occurrence of Indian legends in the Apocryphal Gospels is more important for it shows that, though in the early centuries of Christianity the Church was shy of this oriental exuberance, yet the materials were at hand for those who chose to use them. Many wonders attending the superman's birth were deliberately rejected but some were accepted and oriental practices, such as asceticism, appear with a suddenness that makes the suspicion of foreign influence legitimate.

Not only was monasticism adopted by Christianity but many practices common to Indian and to Christian worship obtained the approval of the Church at about the same time. Some of these, such as incense and the tonsure, may have been legacies from the Jewish and Egyptian priesthoods. Many coincidences also are due to the fact that both Buddhism and Christianity, while abolishing animal sacrifices, were ready to sanction old religious customs: both countenanced the performance before an image or altar of a ritual including incense, flowers, lights and singing. This recognition of old and widespread rites goes far to explain the extraordinary similarity of Buddhist services in Tibet and Japan (both of which derived their ritual ultimately from India) to Roman Catholic ceremonial. Yet when all allowance is made for similar causes and coincidences, it is hard to believe that a collection of such practices as clerical celibacy, confession, the veneration of relics, the use of the rosary and bells can have originated independently in both religions. The difficulty no doubt is to point out any occasion in the third and fourth centuries A.D. when oriental Christians other than casual travellers had an opportunity of becoming acquainted with Buddhist institutions. But the number of resemblances remains remarkable and some of them--such as clerical celibacy, relics, and confession--are old institutions in Buddhism but appear to have no parallels in Jewish, Syrian, or Egyptian antiquity. Up to a certain point, it is a sound principle not to admit that resemblances prove borrowing, unless it can be shown that there was contact between two nations, but it is also certain that all record of such contact may disappear. For instance, it is indisputable that Hindu civilization was introduced into Camboja, but there is hardly any evidence as to how or when Hindu colonists arrived there, and none whatever as to how or when they left India.

It is in Christian or quasi-Christian heresies--that is, the sects which were rejected by the majority--that Indian influence is plainest. This is natural, for if there is one thing obvious in the history of religion it is that Indian speculation and the Indian view of life were not congenial to the people of Europe and western Asia. But some spirits, from the time of Pythagoras onwards, had a greater affinity for oriental ways of thinking, and such sympathy was specially common among the Gnostics. Gnosticism consisted in the combination of Christianity with the already mixed religion which prevailed in Alexandria, Antioch and other centres, and which was an uncertain and varying compound of Judaism, Hellenistic thought and the ideas of oriental countries such as Egypt, Persia and Babylonia. Its fundamental idea, the knowledge of God or Gnosis, is clearly similar to the Jñânakâṇḍa of the Hindus[1133], but the emphasis laid on dualism and redemption is not Indian and the resemblances suggest little more than that hints may have been taken and worked up independently. Thus the idea of the Demiurgus is related to the idea of Iśvara in so far as both imply a distinction not generally recognized in Europe between the creator of the world and the Highest Deity, but the Gnostic developments of the Demiurgus idea are independent. Similarly though the Aeons or emanations of the Gnostics have to some extent a parallel in the beings produced by Brahmâ, Prajâpati or Vâsudeva, yet these latter are not characteristic of Hinduism and still less of Buddhism, for the celestial Buddhas and Bodhisattvas of the Mahâyâna are justly suspected of being additions due to Persian influence.

Bardesanes, one of the latest Gnostic teachers (155-233), wrote a book on Indian religion, quoted by Porphyry. This is important for it shows that he turned towards India for truth, but though his teaching included the pre-existence of the soul and some doctrine of Karma, it was not specially impregnated with Indian ideas. This, however, may be said without exaggeration of Carpocrates and Basilides who both taught at Alexandria about 120-130 A.D. Unfortunately we know the views of these interesting men only from the accounts of their opponents. Carpocrates[1134] is said to have claimed the power of coercing by magic the spirits who rule the world and to have taught metempsychosis in the form that the soul is imprisoned in the body again and again until it has performed all possible actions, good and evil. Therefore the only way to escape reincarnation (which is the object of religion) and to rise to a superior sphere of peace is to perform as much action as possible, good and evil, for the distinction between the two depends on intention, not on the nature of deeds. It is only through faith and love that a man can obtain blessedness. Much of the above sounds like a caricature, but it may be a misrepresentation of something analogous to the Indian doctrine that the acts of a Yogi are neither black nor white and that a Yogi in order to get rid of his Karma creates and animates many bodies to work it off for him.

In Basilides we find the doctrines not only of reincarnation, which seems to have been common in Gnostic schools[1135], but of Karma, of the suffering inherent in existence and perhaps the composite nature of the soul. He is said to have taught that the martyrs suffered for their sins, that is to say that souls came into the world tainted with the guilt of evil deeds done in another existence. This guilt must be expiated by commonplace misfortune or, for the nobler sort, by martyrdom. He considered the world process to consist in sorting out confused things and the gradual establishment of order. This is to some extent true of the soul as well: it is not an entity but a compound (compare the Buddhist doctrine of the Skandhas) and the passions are appendages. He called God οὐκ ὢν θεός which seems an attempt to express the same idea as Brahman devoid of all qualities and attributes (nirguṇa). It is significant that the system of Basilides died out[1136].

A more important sect of decidedly oriental affinities was Manichæism, or rather it was a truly oriental religion which succeeded in penetrating to Europe and there took on considerably more Christianity than it had possessed in its original form. Mani himself (215-276) is said to have been a native of Ecbatana but visited Afghanistan, Bactria and India, and his followers carried his faith across Asia to China, while in the west it was the parent inspiration of the Bogomils and Albigenses. The nature and sources of his creed have been the subject of considerable discussion but new light is now pouring in from the Manichæan manuscripts discovered in Central Asia, some of which have already been published. These show that about the seventh century and probably considerably earlier the Manichæism of those regions had much in common with Buddhism. A Manichæan treatise discovered at Tun-huang[1137] has the form of a Buddhist Sûtra: it speaks of Mani as the Tathâgata, it mentions Buddhas of Transformation (Hua-fo) and the Bodhisattva Ti-tsang. Even more important is the confessional formula called Khuastuanift[1138] found in the same locality. It is clearly similar to the Pâtimokkha and besides using much Buddhist terminology it reckons killing or injuring animals as a serious sin. It is true that many of these resemblances may be due to association with Buddhism and not to the original teaching of Mani, which was strongly dualistic and contained many Zoroastrian and Babylonian ideas. But it was eclectic and held up an ascetic ideal of celibacy, poverty and fasting unknown to Persia and Babylon. To take life was counted a sin and the adepts formed an order apart who lived on the food given to them by the laity. The more western accounts of the Manichæans testify to these features as strongly as do the records from Central Asia and China. Cyril of Jerusalem in his polemic against them[1139] charges them with believing in retributive metempsychosis, he who kills an animal being changed into that animal after death. The Persian king Hormizd is said to have accused Mani of bidding people destroy the world, that is, to retire from social life and not have children. Alberuni[1140] states definitely that Mani wrote a book called Shâburkân in which he said that God sent different messengers to mankind in different ages, Buddha to India, Zarâdusht to Persia and Jesus to the west. According to Cyril the Manichæan scriptures were written by one Scythianus and revised by his disciple Terebinthus who changed his name to Boddas. This may be a jumble, but it is hard to stifle the suspicion that it contains some allusion to the Buddha, Śâkya-muni and the Bo tree.

I think therefore that primitive Manichæism, though it contained less Buddhism than did its later and eastern forms, still owed to India its asceticism, its order of celibate adepts and its regard for animal life. When it spread to Africa and Europe it became more Christian, just as it became more Buddhist in China, but it is exceedingly curious to see how this Asiatic religion, like the widely different religion of Mohammed, was even in its latest phrases the subject of bitter hatred and persistent misrepresentation.

Finally, do the Neoplatonists, Neopythagoreans and other pagan philosophers of the early centuries after Christ owe any debt to India? Many of them were consciously endeavouring to arrest the progress of Christianity by transforming philosophy into a non-Christian religion. They gladly welcomed every proof that the higher life was not to be found exclusively or most perfectly in Christianity. Hence bias, if not accurate knowledge, led them to respect all forms of eastern mysticism. Apollonius is said to have travelled in India[1141]: in the hope of so doing Plotinus accompanied the unfortunate expedition of Gordian but turned back when it failed. We may surmise that for Plotinus the Indian origin of an idea would have been a point in its favour, although his writings show no special hostility to Christianity[1142]. So far as I can judge, his system presents those features which might be expected to come from sympathy with the Indian temperament, aided perhaps not by reading but by conversation with thoughtful orientals at Alexandria and elsewhere. The direct parallels are not striking. Plato himself had entertained the idea of metempsychosis and much that seems oriental in Plotinus may be not a new importation but the elaboration of Plato's views in a form congenial to the age[1143]. Affirmations that God is τὸ ὄυ and τὸ ἕυ are not so much borrowings from the Vedânta philosophy as a re-statement of Hellenic ideas in a mystic and quietist spirit, which may owe something to India. But Plotinus seems to me nearer to India than were the Gnostics and Manichæans, because his teaching is not dualistic to the same extent. He finds the world unsatisfying not because it is the creation of the Evil One, but because it is transitory, imperfect and unreal.

His system has been called dynamic pantheism and this description applies also to much Indian theology which regards God in himself as devoid of all qualities and yet the source of the forces which move the universe. He held that there are four stages of being: primæval being, the ideal world, the soul and phenomena. This, if not exactly parallel to anything in Indian philosophy, is similar in idea to the evolutionary theories of the Sânkhya and the phases of conditioned spirit taught by many Vishnuite sects.

For Plotinus neither moral good nor evil is ultimate: the highest principle, like Brahman, transcends both and is beyond good (ὑπεράγαθον). The highest morality is a morality of inaction and detachment: fasting and abstinence from pleasure are good and so is meditation, but happiness comes in the form of ecstasy and union with God. In human life such union cannot be permanent, though while the ecstasy lasts it affords a resting place on the weary journey, but after death it can be permanent: the divine within us can then return to the universal divine. In these ideas there is the real spirit of India.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1102: See Scott Moncrieff, _Paganism and Christianity in Egypt_, p. 199. Petrie, _Personal Religion in Egypt_, p. 62. But for a contrary view see Preuschen, _Mönchtum und Serapiskult_, 1903.]

[Footnote 1103: Flinders Petrie, _Man_, 1908, p. 129.]

[Footnote 1104: _J.R.A.S._ 1898, p. 875.]

[Footnote 1105: Hultzsch, _Hermas_, xxxix. p. 307, and _J.R.A.S._ 1904, p. 399.]

[Footnote 1106: Nicolaus Damascenus, quoted by Strabo, xv. 73. See also Dion Caasius, ix. 58, who calls the Indian Zarmaros. Zarmanochegas perhaps contains the two words Śramana and Acârya.]

[Footnote 1107: _See J.R.A.S._ 1907, p. 968.]

[Footnote 1108: See Vincent Smith, _Early History of India_, edition III. p. 147. The original source of the anecdote is Hegesandros in Athenæus, 14. 652.]

[Footnote 1109: See Flinders Petrie, _Personal Religion in Egypt before Christianity_, 1909.]

[Footnote 1110: As I have pointed out elsewhere there is little real analogy between the ideas of Logos and Śabda.]

[Footnote 1111: _Κύκλου δ᾽ ἔξεπταν βαθυπένθεος ἀργαλέοιο_ From the tablet found at Compagno. Cf. Proclus in Plat. _Tim._ V. 330, _ἧς καὶ οἳ παρ᾽ Ὄρφει τῷ Διονύσῳ καὶ τῇ κόρῃ τελούμενοι τυχεῖν εὔχονται Κύκλου τ᾽ αὖ λῆξαι καὶ ἀναπνεῦσαι κακότητος_. See J.E. Harrison, _Proleg. to the study of Greek Religion_, 1908, chap. XI. and appendix.]

[Footnote 1112: Burnet, _Early Greek Philosophy_, p. 94, says that it first occurs in the Busiris of Isocrates and does not believe that the account in Herodotus implies that Pythagoras visited Egypt.]

[Footnote 1113: Whatever may have been the true character and history of the enigmatic people of Mitanni it appears certain that they adored deities with Indian names about 1400 B.C. But they may have been Iranians, and it may be doubted if the Aryan Indians of this date believed in metempsychosis.]

[Footnote 1114: J.E. Harrison, _l.c._ pp. 459 and 564, seems to think that Orphism migrated from Crete to Thrace.]

[Footnote 1115: The question of the Disciples in John ix. 2. Who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? must if taken strictly imply some form of pre-existence. But it is a popular question, not a theological statement, and I doubt if severely logical deductions from it are warranted.]

[Footnote 1116: The pre-existence of the soul seems to be implied in the Book of Wisdom viii. 20. The remarkable expression in the Epistle of James iii. 6 τρόχος τἣς γενήσεως suggests a comparison with the Orphic expressions quoted above and Samsâra, but it is difficult to believe it can mean more than "the course of nature."]

[Footnote 1117: As in their legends, so in their doctrines, the uncanonical writings are more oriental than the canonical and contain more pantheistic and ascetic sayings. _E.g._ "Where there is one alone, I am with him. Raise the stone and thou shalt find me: cleave the wood and I am there" (_Oxyrhynchus Logia_). "I am thou and thou art I and wheresoever thou art I am also: and in all things I am distributed and wheresoever thou wilt thou gatherest me and in gathering me thou gatherest thyself" (Gospel of Eve in Epiph. _Haer_. xxvi. 3). "When the Lord was asked, when should his kingdom come, he said: When two shall be one and the without as the within and the male with the female, neither male nor female" (_Logia_).]

[Footnote 1118: _Hinduism_, p. 549. The original is to be found in Bhartrihari's Vairogyaśatakam, 112.]

[Footnote 1119: _The Buddhist and Christian Gospels_, 4th ed. 1909.]

[Footnote 1120: Mahâvagga, VIII. 26.]

[Footnote 1121: _Lotus_, chap. V.]

[Footnote 1122: VII. 15-21 in _S.B.E._ XLV. p. 29.]

[Footnote 1123: Sam. Nik. XLII. VII.]

[Footnote 1124: Ed. Cowell, p. 611.]

[Footnote 1125: See Rhys Davids, _Buddhist India_, p. 206, and Winternitz, _Ges. Ind. Lit_. II. 91.]

[Footnote 1126: Maj. Nik. VI.]

[Footnote 1127: Gospel of Thomas: longer version, chaps, VI. XIV. See also the Arabic and Syriac Gospels of the Infancy, cf. Lalita-vistara, chap. X.]

[Footnote 1128: Pseudo-Matthew, chap, XXII.-XXIV. and Lal. Vist. chap. VIII.]

[Footnote 1129: Pseudo-Matthew, XIII. Cf. Dig. Nik. 14 and Maj. Nik. 123. Neumann's notes on the latter give many curious medieval parallels.]

[Footnote 1130: See Gospel of James, XVIII. and Lal. Vist. VII. _ad init_.]

[Footnote 1131: See Rhys Davids, _Buddhist Birth stories_, 1880, introduction; and Joseph Jacobs, _Barlaam and Josaphat_, 1896.]

[Footnote 1132: Nos. 12 and 537.]

[Footnote 1133: As is also the idea that γνὣσις implies a special ascetic mode of life, the βίος γνωστικός.]

[Footnote 1134: Irenæus, I. XXV.]

[Footnote 1135: It appears in the Pistis Sophia which perhaps represents the school of Valentinus. Basilides taught that "unto the third and fourth generation" refers to transmigration (see Clem. Al. fragm. sect. 28 Op., ed. Klotz, IV. 14), and Paul's saying "I was alive without the law once" (Rom. vii. 9), to former life as an animal (Orig. in Ep. ad Rom. V. Op. iv. 549).]

[Footnote 1136: For Gnosticism, see _Buddhist Gnosticism_, J. Kennedy in _J.R.A.S._ 1902, and Mead, _Fragments of a faith Forgotten_.]

[Footnote 1137: Chavannes et Pelliot, "Un traité Manichéen retrouvé en Chine," _J.A._ 1911, I, and 1913, II.]

[Footnote 1138: Le Coq in _J.R.A.S._ 1911, p. 277.]

[Footnote 1139: Catechetic Lectures, VI. 20 ff. The whole polemic is curious and worth reading.]

[Footnote 1140: Alberuni, _Chronology of ancient nations_, trans. Sachau, p. 190.]

[Footnote 1141: The account in Philostratus (books II. and III.) reads like a romance and hardly proves that Apollonius went to India, but still there is no reason why he should not have done so.]

[Footnote 1142: He wrote, however, against certain Gnostics.]

[Footnote 1143: Similarly Sallustius (_c._ 360 A.D.), whose object was to revive Hellenism, includes metempsychosis in his creed and thinks it can be proved. See translation in Murray, _Four Stages of Greek Religion_, p. 213.]

CHAPTER LVII

PERSIAN INFLUENCE IN INDIA

Our geographical and political phraseology about India and Persia obscures the fact that in many periods the frontier between the two countries was uncertain or not drawn as now. North-western India and eastern Persia must not be regarded as water-tight or even merely leaky compartments. Even now there are more Zoroastrians in India than in Persia and the Persian sect of Shiite Mohammedans is powerful and conspicuous there. In former times it is probable that there was often not more difference between Indian and Iranian religion than between different Indian sects.

Yet the religious temperaments of India and Iran are not the same. Zoroastrianism has little sympathy for pantheism or asceticism: it does not teach metempsychosis or the sinfulness of taking life. Images are not used in worship[1144], God and his angels being thought of as pure and shining spirits. The foundation of the system is an uncompromising dualism of good and evil, purity and impurity, light and darkness. Good and evil are different in origin and duality will be abolished only by the ultimate and complete victory of the good. In the next world the distinction between heaven and hell is equally sharp but hell is not eternal[1145].

The pantheon and even the ritual of the early Iranians resembled those of the Veda and we can only suppose that the two peoples once lived and worshipped together. Subsequently came the reform of Zoroaster which substituted theism and dualism for this nature worship. For about two centuries, from 530 B.C. onwards, Gandhara and other parts of north-western India were a Persian province. Between the time of Zoroaster (whatever that may be) and this period we cannot say what were the relations of Indian and Iranian religions, but after the seventh century they must have flourished in the same region. Aristobulus[1146], speaking of Taxila in the time of Alexander the Great, describes a marriage market and how the dead were devoured by vultures. These are Babylonian and Persian customs, and doubtless were accompanied by many others less striking to a foreign tourist. Some hold that the Zoroastrian scriptures allude to disputes with Buddhists[1147].

Experts on the whole agree that the most ancient Indian architecture which has been preserved--that of the Maurya dynasty--has no known antecedents in India, but both in structure (especially the pillars) and in decoration is reminiscent of Persepolis, just as Asoka's habit of lecturing his subjects in stone sermons and the very turns of his phrases recall the inscriptions of Darius[1148]. And though the king's creed is in some respects--such as his tenderness for animal life--thoroughly Indian, yet this cannot be said of his style and choice of themes as a whole. His marked avoidance of theology and philosophy, his insistence on ethical principles such as truth, and his frank argument that men should do good in order that they may fare happily in the next world, suggest that he may have become familiar with the simple and practical Zoroastrian outlook[1149], perhaps when he was viceroy of Taxila in his youth. But still he shows no trace of theism or dualism: morality is his one concern, but it means for him doing good rather than suppressing evil.

After the death of Asoka his Empire broke up and races who were Iranian in culture, if not always in blood, advanced at its expense. Dependencies of the Persian or Parthian empire extended into India or like the Satrapies of Mathurâ and Saurâshṭra lay wholly within it. The mixed civilization which the Kushans brought with them included Zoroastrianism, as is shown by the coins of Kanishka, and late Kushan coins indicate that Sassanian influence had become very strong in northern India when the dynasty collapsed in the third century A.D.