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Mythological Brahmanism

The Mythological phase of Brahmanism has for its bible the two great legendary heroic poems (Itihasa) called Maha-bharata and Ramayana. Its development was probably synchronous with that of Buddhism. The only hope of arresting the progress of the Buddhistic movement lay in devising human gods and a system of mythology equally attractive, equally suited to the needs and capacities of the mass of the people.

In all probability the Brahmans commenced popularizing their pantheistic doctrines about the time of the rise of Buddhism in the fifth century BC. The Buddha died, and, according to his own teaching, became personally annihilated, but the remains of his body were enshrined as relics in various parts of India, and his memory was worshipped almost as earnestly as his person had been revered. The Brahmans saw this. They knew that the religious cravings of the mass of the people could not long be satisfied either with propitiation of the elements or with their own cold philosophy, or with homage paid to a being held, like Buddha, to be nowhere existent.

They therefore addressed themselves to the task of supplying the people with personal and human gods out of their own heroic poems, the Ramayana and Maha-bharata. They proceeded to Brahmanize the popular songs of a people who, when they first spread themselves over India, were warriors not priests. The principal heroes, whose achievements were the subject of epic song and recitation, underwent a process of deification. The great warrior dynasties were made to trace back their origin, through Brahmanical sages, to the sun-god and the moongod. Myths and legends confirmatory of the divine origin of every great hero were invented and foisted into the body of the poems. In this manner a kind of anthropomorphic mythology, well adapted to the popular mind, was devised. Nor was any amount of polytheism, anthropomorphism, polydemonism, and even fetishism incompatible with their own pantheistic doctrines. The Brahmans in their popular teaching were simply carrying out their own doctrine of evolution. The only problem they had to solve was: how could any theory of evolution be made to comprehend existing superstitions and be best applied to the development of a popular mythology?

Fitly, too, are the highest human manifestations of the eternal Brahma called Brahmans: for they are the appointed mediators between earth and God. None of these emanations can alter their condition in each separate state. According to their acts, they sink into lower or rise into higher grades of being on the dissolution of each bodily frame.

Then be it observed that a series of higher forms of existence above the earth, such as demigods, supernatural beings, inferior gods, superior gods, is traceable upwards from man to the primeval male god Brahma—the first personal product of the purely spiritual Brahma when overspread by Maya or illusory creative force—this male god Brahma standing at the head of creation as the first evolution and hence the apparent Evolver of all the inferior forms. To draw any line of separation between stocks, stones, plants, animals, men, demigods, and gods is, according to the theory of Brahmanism, impossible. They are all liable to run into each other1, and the number of gods alone amounts to 330 millions.

The incarnations of Vishnu are really descents (avatara) on earth of portions of the essence of a divine person already possessing a material form. These descents were undertaken, reasonably enough, for preserving the world when in pressing emergencies, especially when its safety was imperilled by the malice of evil demons; and they are of four kinds and degrees. First, the full descent, as in Krishna, one of the heroes of the Epic poem called Maha-bharata; secondly (though chronologically anterior), the partial descent, consisting of half the god's nature, as in Rama, hero of the other Epic called Ramayana; thirdly, the quarter descent, as in Rama's brother Bharata; fourthly, the eighth-part descent, as in Rama's two other brothers, Lakshmana and Satrughna. Distinct from these is the constant infusion of the divine essence into ordinary men, animals, and inanimate objects. It is well known that men whose lives have been made remarkable by any peculiar circumstances, have been held by the Hindus to be partial incarnations of the divine nature, and have been worshipped accordingly.

The other two members of the Indian triad, Brahma and Siva, have no such human incarnations as those of Vishnu, though the god Brahma is, as it were, humanized in his representatives the priests, called Brahmans. It is true that certain incarnations of both Brahma and Siva are sometimes mentioned (as, for example, the form of Siva called Vlrabhadra), and there are local manifestations of these deities and local descents of Siva in human form. Moreover, Brahma and Siva resemble Vishnu in having wives (called respectively Sarasvati and Parvati), and it may be noted that Siva has two sons, Ganesa, lord of the demon hosts, and Subrahmanya (also called Skanda and Karttikeya), general of the celestial armies, whereas Vishnu has no sons except in his human incarnations1.

But it would be a great mistake to suppose that many deities and divine manifestations are generally worshipped. The gods of the Hindu Pantheon to whom temples are reared and prayers offered are not numerous. Forms of Vishnu, Siva, and their consorts, with the two sons of Siva (Ganesa and Subrahmanya), and Hanuman are the chief temple deities of India. But there are an infinite number of divine and semi-divine beings, good and evil demons, every one of which is held in veneration or dread, and every one of which, from the highest to the lowest, is, like all the others, subject to the universal law of re-absorption into the one divine universal Essence (Brahma). Indeed, at the end of vast periods, called days of Brahma, each lasting for 4,320,000,000 human years, the whole universe is so re-absorbed, and after remaining dormant for equally long periods, is again evolved.