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II
The so-called Fire-worshippers certainly do not worship the fire, and they naturally object to a name which seems to place them on a level with mere idolaters. All they admit is, that in their youth they are taught to face some luminous object while worshipping God (p. 7), and that they regard the fire, like other great natural phenomena, as an emblem of the Divine power (p. 26). But they assure us that they never ask assistance or blessings from an unintelligent material object, nor is it even considered necessary to turn the face to any emblem whatever in praying to Ormuzd. The most honest, however, among the Parsis, and those who would most emphatically protest against the idea of their ever paying divine honours to the sun or the fire, admit the existence of some kind of national instinct—an indescribable awe felt by every Parsi with regard to light and fire. The fact that the Parsis are the only Eastern people who entirely abstain from smoking is very significant; and we know that most of them would rather not blow out a candle, if they could help it. It is difficult to analyse such a feeling, but it seems, in some respects, similar to that which many Christians have about the cross. They do not worship the cross, but they have peculiar feelings of reverence for it, and it is intimately connected with some of their most sacred rites.
But although most Parsis would be very ready to tell us what they do not worship, there are but few who could give a straightforward answer if asked what they do worship and believe. Their priests, no doubt, would say that they worship Ormuzd and believe in Zoroaster, his prophet; and they would appeal to the Zend-Avesta, as containing the Word of God, revealed by Ormuzd to Zoroaster. If more closely pressed, however, they would have to admit that they cannot understand one word of the sacred writings in which they profess to believe, nor could they give any reason why they believe Zoroaster to have been a true prophet, and not an impostor. 'As a body,' says Mr. Dadabhai Naoroji, 'the priests are not only ignorant of the duties and objects of their own profession, but are entirely uneducated, except that they are able to read and write, and that, also, often very imperfectly. They do not understand a single word of their prayers and recitations, which are all in the old Zend language.'
What, then, do the laity know about religion? What makes the old teaching of Zoroaster so dear to them that, in spite of all differences of opinion among themselves, young and old seem equally determined never to join any other religious community? Incredible as it may sound, we are told by the best authority, by an enlightened yet strictly orthodox Parsi, that there is hardly a man or a woman who could give an account of the faith that is in them. 'The whole religious education of a Parsi child consists in preparing by rote a certain number of prayers in Zend, without understanding a word of them; the knowledge of the doctrines of their religion being left to be picked up from casual conversation.' A Parsi, in fact, hardly knows what his faith is. The Zend-Avesta is to him a sealed book; and though there is a Guzerati translation of it, that translation is not made from the original, but from a Pehlevi paraphrase, nor is it recognised by the priests as an authorised version. Till about five and twenty years ago, there was no book from which a Parsi of an inquiring mind could gather the principles of his religion. At that time, and, as it would seem, chiefly in order to counteract the influence of Christian missionaries, a small Dialogue was written in Guzerati—a kind of Catechism, giving, in the form of questions and answers, the most important tenets of Parsiism. We shall quote some passages from this Dialogue, as translated by Mr. Dadabhai Naoroji. The subject of it is thus described:
A few Questions and Answers to acquaint the Children of the holy Zarthosti Community with the Subject of the Mazdiashna Religion, i. e. the Worship of God.
Question. Whom do we, of the Zarthosti community, believe in?
Answer. We believe in only one God, and do not believe in any besides Him.
Q. Who is that one God?
A. The God who created the heavens, the earth, the angels, the stars, the sun, the moon, the fire, the water, or all the four elements, and all things of the two worlds; that God we believe in. Him we worship, him we invoke, him we adore.
Q. Do we not believe in any other God?
A. Whoever believes in any other God but this, is an infidel, and shall suffer the punishment of hell.
Q. What is the form of our God?
A. Our God has neither face nor form, colour nor shape, nor fixed place. There is no other like him. He is himself singly such a glory that we cannot, praise or describe him; nor our mind comprehend him.
So far, no one could object to this Catechism, and it must be clear that the Dualism, which is generally mentioned as the distinguishing feature of the Persian religion—the belief in two Gods, Ormuzd, the principle of good, and Ahriman, the principle of evil—is not countenanced by the modern Parsis. Whether it exists in the Zend-Avesta is another question, which, however, cannot be discussed at present.52
The Catechism continues:
Q. What is our religion?
A. Our religion is 'Worship of God.'
Q. Whence did we receive our religion?
A. God's true prophet—the true Zurthost (Zoroaster) Asphantamân Anoshirwân—brought the religion to us from God.
Here it is curious to observe that not a single question is asked as to the claim of Zoroaster to be considered a true prophet. He is not treated as a divine being, nor even as the son of Ormuzd. Plato, indeed, speaks of Zoroaster as the son of Oromazes (Alc. i. p. 122 a), but this is a mistake, not countenanced, as far as we are aware, by any of the Parsi writings, whether ancient or modern. With the Parsis, Zoroaster is simply a wise man, a prophet favoured by God, and admitted into God's immediate presence; but all this, on his own showing only, and without any supernatural credentials, except some few miracles recorded of him in books of doubtful authority. This shows, at all events, how little the Parsis have been exposed to controversial discussions; for, as this is so weak a point in their system that it would have invited the attacks of every opponent, we may be sure that the Dustoors would have framed some argument in defence, if such defence had ever been needed.
The next extract from the Catechism treats of the canonical books:
Q. What religion has our prophet brought us from God?
A. The disciples of our prophet have recorded in several books that religion. Many of these books were destroyed during Alexander's conquest; the remainder of the books were preserved with great care and respect by the Sassanian kings. Of these again, the greater portion were destroyed at the Mohammedan conquest by Khalif Omar, so that we have now very few books remaining; viz. the Vandidad, the Yazashné, the Visparad, the Khordeh Avesta, the Vistasp Nusk, and a few Pehlevi books. Resting our faith upon these few books, we now remain devoted to our good Mazdiashna religion. We consider these books as heavenly books, because God sent the tidings of these books to us through the holy Zurthost.
Here, again, we see theological science in its infancy. 'We consider these books as heavenly books because God sent the tidings of these books to us through the holy Zurthost,' is not very powerful logic. It would have been more simple to say, 'We consider them heavenly books because we consider them heavenly books.' However, whether heavenly or not, these few books exist. They form the only basis of the Zoroastrian religion, and the principal source from which it is possible to derive any authentic information as to its origin, its history, and its real character.
That the Parsis are of a tolerant character with regard to such of their doctrines as are not of vital importance, may be seen from the following extract:
Q. Whose descendants are we?
A. Of Gayomars. By his progeny was Persia populated.
Q. Was Gayomars the first man?
A. According to our religion he was so, but the wise men of our community, of the Chinese, the Hindus, and several other nations, dispute the assertion, and say that there was human population on the earth before Gayomars.
The moral precepts which are embodied in this Catechism do the highest credit to the Parsis:
Q. What commands has God sent us through his prophet, the exalted Zurthost?
A. To know God as one; to know the prophet, the exalted Zurthost, as the true prophet; to believe the religion and the Avesta brought by him as true beyond all manner of doubt; to believe in the goodness of God; not to disobey any of the commands of the Mazdiashna religion; to avoid evil deeds; to exert for good deeds; to pray five times in the day; to believe on the reckoning and justice on the fourth morning after death; to hope for heaven and to fear hell; to consider doubtless the day of general destruction and resurrection; to remember always that God has done what he willed, and shall do what he wills; to face some luminous object while worshipping God.
Then follow several paragraphs which are clearly directed against Christian missionaries, and more particularly against the doctrine of vicarious sacrifice and prayer:
'Some deceivers, [the Catechism says,] with the view of acquiring exaltation in this world, have set themselves up as prophets, and, going among the labouring and ignorant people, have persuaded them that, "if you commit sin, I shall intercede for you, I shall plead for you, I shall save you," and thus deceive them; but the wise among the people know the deceit.'
This clearly refers to Christian missionaries, but whether Roman Catholic or Protestant is difficult to say. The answer given by the Parsis is curious and significant:
'If any one commit sin,' they reply, 'under the belief that he shall be saved by somebody, both the deceiver as well as the deceived shall be damned to the day of Rastâ Khez.... There is no saviour. In the other world you shall receive the return according to your actions.... Your saviour is your deeds, and God himself. He is the pardoner and the giver. If you repent your sins and reform, and if the Great Judge consider you worthy of pardon, or would be merciful to you, He alone can and will save you.'
It would be a mistake to suppose that the whole doctrine of the Parsis is contained in the short Guzerati Catechism, translated by Mr. Dadabhai Naoroji, still less in the fragmentary extracts here given. Their sacred writings, the Yasna, Vispered, and Vendidad, the productions of much earlier ages, contain many ideas, both religious and mythological, which belong to the past, to the childhood of our race, and which no educated Parsi could honestly profess to believe in now. This difficulty of reconciling the more enlightened faith of the present generation with the mythological phraseology of their old sacred writings is solved by the Parsis in a very simple manner. They do not, like Roman Catholics, prohibit the reading of the Zend-Avesta; nor do they, like Protestants, encourage a critical study of their sacred texts. They simply ignore the originals of their sacred writings. They repeat them in their prayers without attempting to understand them, and they acknowledge the insufficiency of every translation of the Zend-Avesta that has yet been made, either in Pehlevi, Sanskrit, Guzerati, French, or German. Each Parsi has to pick up his religion as best he may. Till lately, even the Catechism did not form a necessary part of a child's religious education. Thus the religious belief of the present Parsi communities is reduced to two or three fundamental doctrines; and these, though professedly resting on the teaching of Zoroaster, receive their real sanction from a much higher authority. A Parsi believes in one God, to whom he addresses his prayers. His morality is comprised in these words—pure thoughts, pure words, pure deeds. Believing in the punishment of vice and the reward of virtue, he trusts for pardon to the mercy of God. There is a charm, no doubt, in so short a creed; and if the whole of Zoroaster's teaching were confined to this, there would be some truth in what his followers say of their religion—namely, that 'it is for all, and not for any particular nation.'
If now we ask again, how it is that neither Christians, nor Hindus, nor Mohammedans have had any considerable success in converting the Parsis, and why even the more enlightened members of that small community, though fully aware of the many weak points of their own theology, and deeply impressed with the excellence of the Christian religion, morals, and general civilisation, scorn the idea of ever migrating from the sacred ruins of their ancient faith, we are able to discover some reasons; though they are hardly sufficient to account for so extraordinary a fact?
First, the very compactness of the modern Parsi creed accounts for the tenacity with which the exiles of Western India cling to it. A Parsi is not troubled with many theological problems or difficulties. Though he professes a general belief in the sacred writings of Zoroaster, he is not asked to profess any belief in the stories incidentally mentioned in the Zend-Avesta. If it is said in the Yasna that Zoroaster was once visited by Homa, who appeared before him in a brilliant supernatural body, no doctrine is laid down as to the exact nature of Homa. It is said that Homa was worshipped by certain ancient sages, Vivanhvat, Âthwya, and Thrita, and that, as a reward for their worship, great heroes were born as their sons. The fourth who worshipped Homa was Pourushaspa, and he was rewarded by the birth of his son Zoroaster. Now the truth is, that Homa is the same as the Sanskrit Soma, well known from the Veda as an intoxicating beverage used at the great sacrifices, and afterwards raised to the rank of a deity. The Parsis are fully aware of this, but they do not seem in the least disturbed by the occurrence of such 'fables and endless genealogies.' They would not be shocked if they were told, what is a fact, that most of these old wives' fables have their origin in the religion which they most detest, the religion of the Veda, and that the heroes of the Zend-Avesta are the same who, with slightly changed names, appear again as Jemshid, Feridun, Gershâsp, &c., in the epic poetry of Firdusi.
Another fact which accounts for the attachment of the Parsis to their religion is its remote antiquity and its former glory. Though age has little to do with truth, the length of time for which any system has lasted seems to offer a vague argument in favour of its strength. It is a feeling which the Parsi shares in common with the Jew and the Brahman, and which even the Christian missionary appeals to when confronting the systems of later prophets.
Thirdly, it is felt by the Parsis that in changing their religion, they would not only relinquish the heirloom of their remote forefathers, but of their own fathers; and it is felt as a dereliction of filial piety to give up what was most precious to those whose memory is most precious and almost sacred to themselves.
If in spite of all this, many people, most competent to judge, look forward with confidence to the conversion of the Parsis, it is because, in the most essential points, they have already, though unconsciously, approached as near as possible to the pure doctrines of Christianity. Let them but read the Zend-Avesta, in which they profess to believe, and they will find that their faith is no longer the faith of the Yasna, the Vendidad, and the Vispered. As historical relics, these works, if critically interpreted, will always retain a prominent place in the great library of the ancient world. As oracles of religious faith, they are defunct, and a mere anachronism in the age in which we live.
On the other hand, let missionaries read their Bible, and let them preach that Christianity which once conquered the world—the genuine and unshackled Gospel of Christ and the Apostles. Let them respect native prejudices, and be tolerant with regard to all that can be tolerated in a Christian community. Let them consider that Christianity is not a gift to be pressed on unwilling minds, but the highest of all privileges which natives can receive at the hands of their present rulers. Natives of independent and honest character cannot afford at present to join the ranks of converts without losing that true caste which no man ought to lose—namely, self-respect. They are driven to prop up their tottering religions, rather than profess a faith which seems dictated to them by their conquerors. Such feelings ought to be respected. Finally, let missionaries study the sacred writings on which the faith of the Parsis is professedly founded. Let them examine the bulwarks which they mean to overthrow. They will find them less formidable from within than from without. But they will also discover that they rest on a foundation which ought never to be touched—a faith in one God, the Creator, the Ruler, and the Judge of the world.
August, 1862.
IX.
BUDDHISM.53
If the command of St. Paul, 'Prove all things, hold fast that which is good,' may be supposed to refer to spiritual things, and, more especially, to religious doctrines, it must be confessed that few only, whether theologians or laymen, have ever taken to heart the apostle's command. How many candidates for holy orders are there who could give a straightforward answer if asked to enumerate the principal religions of the world, or to state the names of their founders, and the titles of the works which are still considered by millions of human beings as the sacred authorities for their religious belief? To study such books as the Koran of the Mohammedans, the Zend-Avesta of the Parsis, the King's of the Confucians, the Tao-te-King of the Taoists, the Vedas of the Brahmans, the Tripitaka of the Buddhists, the Sûtras of the Jains, or the Granth of the Sikhs, would be considered by many mere waste of time. Yet St. Paul's command is very clear and simple; and to maintain that it referred to the heresies of his own time only, or to the philosophical systems of the Greeks and Romans, would be to narrow the horizon of the apostle's mind, and to destroy the general applicability of his teaching to all times and to all countries. Many will ask what possible good could be derived from the works of men who must have been either deceived or deceivers, nor would it be difficult to quote some passages in order to show the utter absurdity and worthlessness of the religious books of the Hindus and Chinese. But this was not the spirit in which the apostle of the Gentiles addressed himself to the Epicureans and Stoics, nor is this the feeling with which a thoughtful Christian and a sincere believer in the divine government of the world is likely to rise from a perusal of any of the books which he knows to be or to have been the only source of spiritual light and comfort to thousands and thousands among the dwellers on earth.
Many are the advantages to be derived from a careful study of other religions, but the greatest of all is that it teaches us to appreciate more truly what we possess in our own. When do we feel the blessings of our own country more warmly and truly than when we return from abroad? It is the same with regard to religion. Let us see what other nations have had and still have in the place of religion; let us examine the prayers, the worship, the theology even of the most highly civilised races,—the Greeks, the Romans, the Hindus, the Persians,—and we shall then understand more thoroughly what blessings are vouchsafed to us in being allowed to breathe from the first breath of life the pure air of a land of Christian light and knowledge. We are too apt to take the greatest blessings as matters of course, and even religion forms no exception. We have done so little to gain our religion, we have suffered so little in the cause of truth, that however highly we prize our own Christianity, we never prize it highly enough until we have compared it with the religions of the rest of the world.
This, however, is not the only advantage; and we think that M. Barthélemy Saint-Hilaire has formed too low an estimate of the benefits to be derived from a thoughtful study of the religions of mankind when he writes of Buddhism: 'Le seul, mais immense service que le Bouddhisme puisse nous rendre, c'est par son triste contraste de nous faire apprécier mieux encore la valeur inestimable de nos croyances, en nous montrant tout ce qu'il en coûte à l'humanité qui ne les partage point.' This is not all. If a knowledge of other countries and a study of the manners and customs of foreign nations teach us to appreciate what we have at home, they likewise form the best cure of that national conceit and want of sympathy with which we are too apt to look on all that is strange and foreign. The feeling which led the Hellenic races to divide the whole world into Greeks and Barbarians is so deeply engrained in human nature that not even Christianity has been able altogether to remove it. Thus when we cast our first glance into the labyrinth of the religions of the world, all seems to us darkness, self-deceit, and vanity. It sounds like a degradation of the very name of religion to apply it to the wild ravings of Hindu Yogins or the blank blasphemies of Chinese Buddhists. But as we slowly and patiently wend our way through the dreary prisons, our own eyes seem to expand, and we perceive a glimmer of light where all was darkness at first. We learn to understand the saying of one who more than anybody had a right to speak with authority on this subject, that 'there is no religion which does not contain a spark of truth.' Those who would limit the riches of God's goodness and forbearance and long suffering, and would hand over the largest portion of the human race to inevitable perdition, have never adduced a tittle of evidence from the Gospel or from any other trustworthy source in support of so unhallowed a belief. They have generally appealed to the devilries and orgies of heathen worship; they have quoted the blasphemies of Oriental Sufis and the immoralities sanctioned by the successors of Mohammed; but they have seldom, if ever, endeavoured to discover the true and original character of the strange forms of faith and worship which they call the work of the devil. If the Indians had formed their notions of Christianity from the soldiers of Cortez and Pizarro, or if the Hindus had studied the principles of Christian morality in the lives of Clive and Warren Hastings; or, to take a less extreme case, if a Mohammedan, settled in England, were to test the practical working of Christian charity by the spirit displayed in the journals of our religious parties, their notions of Christianity would be about as correct as the ideas which thousands of educated Christians entertain of the diabolical character of heathen religion. Even Christianity has been depraved into Jesuitism and Mormonism, and if we, as Protestants, claim the right to appeal to the Gospel as the only test by which our faith is to be judged, we must grant a similar privilege to Mohammedans and Buddhists, and to all who possess a written, and, as they believe, revealed authority for the articles of their faith.
But though no one is likely to deny the necessity of studying each religion in its most ancient form and from its original documents, before we venture to pronounce our verdict, the difficulties of this task are such that in them more than in anything else, must be sought the cause why so few of our best thinkers and writers have devoted themselves to a critical and historical study of the religions of the world. All important religions have sprung up in the East. Their sacred books are written in Eastern tongues, and some of them are of such ancient date that those even who profess to believe in them, admit that they are unable to understand them without the help of translations and commentaries. Until very lately the sacred books of three of the most important religions, those of the Brahmans, the Buddhists, and the Parsis, were totally unknown in Europe. It was one of the most important results of the study of Sanskrit, or the ancient language of India, that through it the key, not only to the sacred books of the Brahmans, the Vedas, but likewise to those of the Buddhists and Zoroastrians, was recovered. And nothing shows more strikingly the rapid progress of Sanskrit scholarship than that even Sir William Jones, whose name has still, with many, a more familiar sound than the names of Colebrooke, Burnouf, and Lassen, should have known nothing of the Vedas; that he should never have read a line of the canonical books of the Buddhists, and that he actually expressed his belief that Buddha was the same as the Teutonic deity Wodan or Odin, and Sâkya, another name of Buddha, the same as Shishac, king of Egypt. The same distinguished scholar never perceived the intimate relationship between the language of the Zend-Avesta and Sanskrit, and he declared the whole of the Zoroastrian writings to be modern forgeries.
Even at present we are not yet in possession of a complete edition, much less of any trustworthy translation, of the Vedas; we only possess the originals of a few books of the Buddhist canon; and though the text of the Zend-Avesta has been edited in its entirety, its interpretation is beset with greater difficulties than that of the Vedas or the Tripitaka. A study of the ancient religions of China, those of Confucius and Lao-tse, presupposes an acquaintance with Chinese, a language which it takes a life to learn thoroughly; and even the religion of Mohammed, though more accessible than any other Eastern religion, cannot be fully examined except by a master of Arabic. It is less surprising, therefore, than it might at first appear, that a comprehensive and scholarlike treatment of the religions of the world should still be a desideratum. Scholars who have gained a knowledge of the language, and thereby free access to original documents, find so much work at hand which none but themselves can do, that they grudge the time for collecting and arranging, for the benefit of the public at large, the results which they have obtained. Nor need we wonder that critical historians should rather abstain from the study of the religions of antiquity than trust to mere translations and second-hand authorities.
Under these circumstances we feel all the more thankful if we meet with a writer like M. Barthélemy Saint-Hilaire, who has acquired a knowledge of Eastern languages sufficient to enable him to consult original texts and to control the researches of other scholars, and who at the same time commands that wide view of the history of human thought which enables him to assign to each system its proper place, to perceive its most salient features, and to distinguish between what is really important and what is not, in the lengthy lucubrations of ancient poets and prophets. M. Barthélemy Saint-Hilaire is one of the most accomplished scholars of France; and his reputation as the translator of Aristotle has made us almost forget that the Professor of Greek Philosophy at the Collège de France54 is the same as the active writer in the 'Globe' of 1827, and the 'National' of 1830; the same who signed the protest against the July ordinances, and who in 1848 was Chief Secretary of the Provisional Government. If such a man takes the trouble to acquire a knowledge of Sanskrit, and to attend in the same College where he was professor, the lectures of his own colleague, the late Eugène Burnouf, his publications on Hindu philosophy and religion will naturally attract a large amount of public interest. The Sanskrit scholar by profession works and publishes chiefly for the benefit of other Sanskrit scholars. He is satisfied with bringing to light the ore which he has extracted by patient labour from among the dusty MSS. of the East-India House. He seldom takes the trouble to separate the metal from the ore, to purify or to strike it into current coin. He is but too often apt to forget that no lasting addition is ever made to the treasury of human knowledge unless the results of special research are translated into the universal language of science, and rendered available to every person of intellect and education. A division of labour seems most conducive to this end. We want a class of interpreters, men such as M. Barthélemy Saint-Hilaire, who are fully competent to follow and to control the researches of professional students, and who at the same time have not forgotten the language of the world.
In his work on Buddhism, of which a second edition has just appeared, M. Barthélemy Saint-Hilaire has undertaken to give to the world at large the really trustworthy and important results which have been obtained by the laborious researches of Oriental scholars, from the original documents of that interesting and still mysterious religion. It was a task of no ordinary difficulty, for although these researches are of very recent date, and belong to a period of Sanskrit scholarship posterior to Sir W. Jones and Colebrooke, yet such is the amount of evidence brought together by the combined industry of Hodgson, Turnour, Csoma de Körös, Stanislas Julien, Foucaux, Fausböll, Spence Hardy, but above all, of the late Eugène Burnouf, that it required no common patience and discrimination in order to compose from such materials so accurate, and at the same time so lucid and readable a book on Buddhism as that which we owe to M. Barthélemy Saint-Hilaire. The greater part of it appeared originally in the 'Journal des Savants,' the time-honoured organ of the French Academy, which counts on its staff the names of Cousin, Flourens, Villemain, Biot, Mignet, Littré, &c., and admits as contributors sixteen only of the most illustrious members of that illustrious body, la crême de la crême.
