FOUNTAIN HEAD OF RELIGION BY Ganga das
WRT Mr TNCR book named above forwarded :This book I have read already. One
thing I could not match with is, he had presented both sides, with a
mockery towards our beliefs and extolling the west named writers. A small
extract from your book:
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It would not be possible to convince him of the, correctness of our
position by a reference to the works ' of Swami Dayananda Saraswathi. I
will, therefore, quote a passage from no less an authority than Sir William
Hunter* The passage occurs in the -1882 edition of his celebrated book. The
Indian Empire, which shows how far (unlike Mr. “Lover of Truth”) the great
historian, with that love of truth which generally characterises European
enquirers, has not only adopted the position of Swami Dayananda Saraswati
with regard to the relation of Vedic and Puranic religions, but has also
furnished a historical explanation of the same. I shall make no further
apology for quoting this lengthy but very interesting. passage; —
“The Scythic inroads and the ancient Naga and the so-called aboriginal
tribes, have, however, not merely left behind remnants of races in
individual districts. They have affected the character of the whole
population, and profoundly influenced the religious beliefs and domestic
institutions of India. In the Veda we see highly developed communities of
the Aryan stock worshipping bright and friendly gods, honouring women, and
assigning to her important position in the family life. Husband and wife
were the Dampati (couple) or joint rulers of the Indo-Aryan household.
Traditions of the freedom of women among the ancient Arya settlers survive
in the Swayamvara or maiden’s choice of a husband in the epic poems.
" The curtain of Vedic and post-Vedic literature falls upon the scene
before the 5th century B. C. When the curtain rises on the domestic and
religious life of Mediaeval India in the Puranas about the 10th century A.
D., a vast change had taken place. The people were no longer sharply
divided into civilised Aryans and rude non-Aryans but into castes of a
great mixed population.
The Brahmans had indeed an esoteric or philosophical religion of their own.
But the popular religion of the Hindus, that is of the Indian races who had
come under Brahman influences was already in the 10th century, not the old
Vedic worship of bright and friendly gods, but a composite product of Aryan
spiritual conceptions, and non-Aryan superstitions. The position of woman
had also altered for the worse. (KR:?) Husband and wife were no longer
joint rulers of the household. The maiden's own choice had fallen into
disuse, or survived only as a court pageant; the custom of child marriage
had grown up. The widow had been condemned to a life of privation or had
been taught the merit of extinguishing her existence on her husband’s
funeral pyre. (KR: Is this a universal logic?)
“The following chapter will exhibit this amorphous growth popularly known
as Hinduism. Orthodox Hindus are unfortunately in the habit of claiming the
authority of the Veda for their mediaeval institution, for the evil as well
as for the good. As a matter of fact, these mediaeval institutions, which
form the basis of modern Hinduism are the joint product of non-Aryan
darkness, and of Aryan light. The Scythic and Naga and the so-called
aboriginal races with their indifference to human suffering, their
polyandric households, and their worship of fear and blood have left their
mark deep in the Hindu law codes, in the terrorising of the Hindu religion,
and in the degradation of woman. {KR TRUE?} English scholarship has shown
that the worse feature of Hinduism, widow burning, had no authority in the
Veda. When it is equally well understood that the other dark features of
Hinduism also rest, not upon the Vedic scripture, but are the result of a
human compromise between Aryan civilisation and non-Aryan barbarism, the
task of the Indian reformer will be half accomplished. It is with a true
instinct that the great religious movements of India our day reject the
authority of Mediaeval Hinduism and appeal back to the Veda. For the Veda
represents the religious conception and tribal customs of the Aryans in
India before those conceptions and customs were modified by compromises
with the lower'' races. At the end of the last Chapter I mentioned that a
great reformation of Indian faith and practice on the basis of Buddhism is
always a possibility. {KR: encouraging or adding tributes to Buddhism} I
should not close the present one without adding that similar reformation is
equally possible, and as a mailer of fad has been attempted again and again
by applying the test of Veda to the Composite Hinduism which norms the main
common link between the Indian races.
Does this not show that independent and disinterested European enquirers,
who can in no way be suspected of a partiality for the Vedas, have come to
admit that the evil customs and institutions of Hinduism, which are the
cause of the degradation of Hindus, and which the Arya Samaj is so loud in
condemning, are really no part of the Vedic religion? Does this not show
that the modern Hinduism or the religion of Puranas which took its rise on
the downfall of Buddhism, and which Mr, “Lover of Truth” is anxious to
confound with the Vedic religion is really “the joint product of, non-Aryan
darkness and. Aryan light,” or “a compromise between Aryan civilisation and
non- Aryan barbarism.” Sir William Hunter almost regrets the habit of "
orthodox Hindus” to claim the authority of the Veda for their mediaeval
institutions which form the basis of modern Hinduism. But what should we
say of our educated Mahommedan friend coming forward to espouse their
unjust cause, and dubbing this “amorphous growth” as “the Vedic religion,
and then holding the latter accountable for the misdeeds of the former?
The Indian Witlness, a Christian weekly oi Lucknow, published in its issues
of September 10, 17 & 24, 1914, three articles headed ** Are the Vedas the
Fountainhead of Religion ? — A critical examination of the Fountainhead of
Religion'' contributed by one Mr. J. R. Roy, Journalist, Lahore. The gist
of the three articles may be stated under the following three heads : —
(1) “The Vedas are not the oldest books in the world”, and “consequently
they are not the Fountainhead of Religion."
(2) The Christian religion has not borrowed any of its teachings from
Buddhism or any other religions.
(3) The Vedic theory of cosmogony is unscientific. (1) — The Antiquity of
the Vedas
As regards the first point the writer refers to the archaeological
discoveries made in Egypt, Babylonia, and Assyria, as pointing to a
civilisation “ which must belong to 5000 B. C., or even earlier". This,
however, proves nothing against my position. For we claim the Vedas to be
far older still. Nor has Mr. Roy produced any evidence worth the name to
prove the contrary. He quotes Mr. R. C. Dutt (Ancient Hindu Civilisation,
p. 1 0) to the effect that according to some astronomical observations
recorded in a treatise on jyotisha the date of “the final compilation of
the Vedas” is approximately 200 B. C. Then he quotes from Weber (History
of Indian Literature, p. 2) who discredits the value or testimony of the
above-mentioned astronomical date. After giving these two quotations one of
which stultifies the other, the writer strangely remarks; — “These
quotations are enough for our present purpose”!
Later on, he refers to Mr. Bal Gangadhar Tilak’s theory that the Vedas were
compiled 4000 years B. G. Mr. Roy has not quoted from any of Mr. B. G.
Tilak’s books and has evidently fallen into an error in stating his views
as developed in his celebrated work The A retie Home in the Vedas. Speaking
of the period 3000-1400 B. C. Mr. Tilak says: “The compilation of the hymns
into Samhitas algo appears to be a work of the early part of this period ”
— (p. 454). But as regards the Vedic religion itself he says over and over
again hat “its ultimate origin is still lost in geological antiquity” —
(Ibid p. 457). He has proved on “strict scientific and historical grounds”
that the Vedic religion existed among the Aryans when they lived in their
primitive home in the Arctic region in Interglacial period. Says he: “It
has been shown that Vedic religion and worship are both interglacial; and
that though we cannot trace their ultimate origin yet the Arctic
character of the Vedic deities fully proves that the powers of nature
represented by them had been already clothed with divine attributes by the
primitive Aryans in their original home round about the North Pole, or the
Meru of the Puranas” — (ibid, p..453). The Interglacial period according to
him ranges from 10000 to 80U0 B. C., when the post-glacial period begins.
But by this Mr. Tilak does not mean to imply that lie Vedic religion is not
older than 10000 B. C. He only means to say that it can be proved to
have existed at least as early as 1 0000 to 8000 B. C., not that it began
in 10000 or 8000 B. C. Nothing can be clearer than the following: — " All
that we can say is that its beginning is lost in geological antiquity, or
that the Vedic religion is as old as the Aryan language, or the Aryan man
himself We may, however, still assert that for all practical purposes the
Vedic religion can be shown to be beginningless even on strict scientific
grounds ” —{Ibid, p. 458).
Thus even according to an authority referred to by Mr. Roy himself the
Vedic religion is much older than the oldest date yet assigned to the
Egyptian and Babylonian civilisation by any archaeological researches — aye
it is “beginningless.”
KR A write up with a confusion, perhaps written in 1800 ASD so bow to the
British?. Women are over extolled under the creation as a wholesome
product. Good and bad is spread all over. So many things are not directly
told in Vedas; but Gruhya sutras were written falling away from Vedas as
custom practiced in those days. KR IRS 131122
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