system and made it a masterpiece of imperial spoilation for the use of all foreign exploiters, who became–masters of the country ere long.,
Buddhism was a religion for all, for the poor and the lowly as affectively as for the prince, and that was the chief source of its popularity. In the success . of the new religion, the Brahmans saw the weakness of their on creed which derived its strength, not from its ability to satisfy or ennoble the people’s life but from their enforced weakness and ignorance. They therefore began to reshape the Brahmanichl. religion with a view to gaining popular support for it. Even then they did not think of extending the true benefits of that religion which they enjoyed to the other people as well. Instead, they built up a. separate branch of Brahmahism, a branch of fictions, legends, rank idolatry, superstitious beliefs and grue.; some ceremonies, and worship of the Brahmans in addition to that of the numerous gods and goddesses. “They set themselves to gradually, construct synthetic religion out’ of the Aryan -and the non-Aryan cults which would afford spiritual enlightenment and consolation to the-general public. This is the vast system of idolatry dealt with in the Puranas.”*
“The Puranas constitute the special literature of the Sudras, whose rites and ceremonies they exclusively regulate. The Shruties and the Smrities are claimed as the exclusive law books of the Brahmans only.” Both the Ramayana and the Mahabharata were finally recast at this period with– many new stories and legends added, so as to fascinate the ignorant masses. That their authors had a motive to discredit Buddhism is seen from a passage, in the
* Page 170 Epochs of .Civilisation, by Pramanath Bose.
- 473, Vicissitudes of Aryan Civilisation in India, by M. M. Kunte.
Ramayana. “In Ramayana, Rama is made to say that Buddha is a thief, the Tathagata is a Nastik Atheist. A wise man who can help it should therefore not be inclined towards Nastika.”*
“It is also probable that in opposition to the Buddhists who used the common language to teach their religion, the 14habliarata, which dagove have shown was given a religious form by (about 300 A. D.), mainly to counteract the influence of Buddhism was entirely written in Sanskrit, the language of the orthodox religious books of the Aryans of India.
“The Brahmanical Puranas originated in the stories partly to be traced to the Ramayana and the mahabharata, and partly such as were narrated in every house from generation to generation and constituted the folklore of Buddhistic-India”
It was very often as we shall see hereafter, with the help of foreigners that the Brahmans propagated the new religion. These foreign people, such as the Sakas, the Yu-chis, the Arabs and Turks and Raj-puts had come to India from countries where idolatry and secret rituals were the prevailing religion of the people. They could not easily divest themselves of their superstitions and belief in black magic. Their presence tended to degenerate the Sanghas, but at the same time they proved to be valuable helpmates to the Brahmans in their efforts to popularize the religion of the Puranas. “The Puranas began to be recast when the worship of Hindu deities rose in popular estimation about the time of Wema-Kadphises (a foreign king and champion of Hinduism) circa 250 A. D. and the process
* Page 377, Epie India, by C. V.
Pam 332-333. Epic India,. by C. V. Vplia.
Page 472, Vieinitudes of Aryan Civiliration in India. by M. M.
Kul.
continued through the Gupta period to a much later date and new Puranas appeared from time to time; and it has hardly ceased even to this day, since we find Mahatmyams springing up now and then though not Puranas in a complete shape.”*
Buddhism had given rise to numerous great monasteries, stupas and halls of worship all over the country which by their magnificence as well as the appeal of their teachings attracted huge congregations and inspired them to give lavishly of their wealth for their construction and maintenance. It was too clear a lesson for the Brahman priests to lose sight of, and they set about rivaling the Buddhist institutions by the construction of temples which by their external grandeur and by the awful mystery of their dark interior held popular imaginations in superstitious reverence. “But because the Buddhist edifices attracted the populace and made an impression upon it, the Brahmans made efforts to build large temples where the heroes of the Rarnayana and the Maliabharata were adored.”
The Vedic sacrifices were the centre and source of the priests’ power. They had gone out of fashion with the advent of Buddhism. In their place the priests now sought to bring into popular favour the temples of gods and goddesses to cater to the vulgar taste of the ignorant and to serve as the citadels of their own domination and exploitation, the strongholds of caste and the dark dungeons of idolatrous priestcraft. Siva worship was already in vogue in South India and some of the foreign people, such as the Scythians, were followers of that cult. Rama and Krishna were the most popular national heroes, around whom songs and folklore had grown up
* Page 6, Peep into History of Ancient India, by R. G. Bhaudarkar. t Page 460, Vicissitudes of Aryan Civilisation in India, by M. M. Kunte.
throughout the country. The people wanted grand buildings and images of their heroes, not necessarily for worship, but to give free play to the instinctive ‘desire for artistic creation, for Buddhist nationalism had brought out the competitive and constructive instincts of the craftsmen and they delighted to embody their exuberant spirit in buildings and sculpture and statues. The Brahmans had only to divert these tendencies and use them for their own advantage. Buddhism did not give sufficient scope for the shaping arts, as Buddha was the only legitimate object of reverence, and: even in Buddhist monuments the craftsmen pressed into service their native gods and goddesses and heroes to furnish models for their work. The intelligent Brahmans could easily detect this tendency and in their temples they were able to satisfy in a larger measure than in Buddhistic buildings the artistic vanity and fantastic-ism of the people as also their love of pomp and show and mystery. Buildings and images were rising in popular esteem, and to these the Brahmans had only to add their priestcraft in order to make the ideal temple. They succeeded beyond their expectations; the temples proved to be their salvation; they are even to-day the desperate strongholds of priestly fanaticism scattered throughout the length and breadth of the country right across all currents of reform and democratic revivals.
“The Saiva propagandists of the South were the _Brahman reformers of Hinayana Buddhism, as the Vaishnava propagandists of the North had been in earlier times the Brahman reformers of Mahayana Buddhism. The earliest of these Saiva revivalists was Maniklia-Vacagar, a minister of one of the Pandyan kings of Madura about the sixth century A. D. He came to be known as the Hammer of the Buddhists”.*
*Page 218, Aryan Rule in India, by E. B. Havell.
Whatever the Brahmans might do to capture the people’s mind, to satisfy the craving of the multitude. for awe and grandeur and mystery, Brahmanism as a caste-imperialism was not acceptable to any self-respecting Indian so long as he had the ability to resist it. The temples alone could not therefore serve the cause of Brahman supremacy, unless they were backed by .political power, whether Indian or foreign, which would support by force the prerogative of the Brahmans. Therefore, whenever they
could bring a kingiunder their control, they tried to persecute Buddhism in the earlier stages by indirect underhand means, and later on by open ,violent methods. In the first Indian Empire of Chandragupta Maurya, a Brahman, Kautilya was the chief minister and directing genius. His famous Artha Sastra contained clever provisions to check . the growth of Buddhism :—
“No ascetic other than a’ Vanaprast1–;a. (forest hermit) no company other than the one of local birth and no guilds of any kind other than local co-operative guilds shall find entrance into the villages of the kingdom.”* Thus Buddhist monks and Sanglias could not lawfully exist in the villages. Buddhist chronicles state that when Pushyamitra became emperor by usurpation with the help of Brahmans, he burnt their monasteries and killed many of their monks. As we shall see in the next chopter, many an Indian ruler had to stiffer martyrdom at the hands
of the Brahmans because of his love a Buddhism. Such black deeds do not generally come out, done as they are in secret, but what information has leaked through leads us to the irresistible conclusion that a king who did not support. Brahmanism was hardly ever safe on his throne in those days. When the Huns tinder Mihiragula invaded the North-
*B. 11 Chap. I, 48, Arthasastra page 54, Shama Shastry.
Western Province, he won over the Brahmans to his side by “building Saiva temples and /endowing Brahman monasteries, which the lowest of the Ovice born, as vile as their protector, did not disdain to accept.”* The same Mihiragula ordered the wiping out of all Buddhist monasteries and monks in his kingdom.
But so long as India had at least a glimmer of national life and freedom, she made incessant efforts to assert her self-respect and thwart Brahman tyranny and it was only when the country ultimately fell a victim into the hands of foreigners that Buddhism was crushed to death and Brahmanism spread its fangs over the prostrate people. “For it was in the Dark Age that religious persecution began in India. Monasteries were demolished, monks were banished, and books were burnt; and wherever the Rajputs became rulers, Buddhist edifices went down and Hindu temples arose. By the end of the loth century, Buddhism was practically stamped out from India, and the work of destruction was completed by the Muslims who succeeded the Rajputs as masters of India.” So complete was the destruction that modern antiquarians and historians who have gathered Buddhist sacred books from all parts of Asia have not succeeded in gleaning any vain-able text from India.
Historians are not yet agreed as to the causes which led to the complete disappearance of Buddhism from India. Some have attributed it to the decadence of the true religion of the Buddha. That was certainly what made Buddhism indistinguishable from the popular religion of ancestor-worship and hero-worship. But a degenerate
* Page 269, History of Aryan Rule in India, by Havell. Epochs of Indian History, by R. C. Dutt.
Buddhism could have prevailed in India as it did in other countries, and in fact it remained, and what has disappeared is only the Buddhist organisations and not the religion. Some writers have treated Buddhism as a sect of Hinduism. We do not know of any Hinduism having existed before the Buddha and if Hinduism did not exist, Buddhism could not have been a sect of it. Before the Buddha there was the Brahman religion’ of sacrifices which was practically confined to the small Aryan community and we know also that the common people must have had their ancient religion of same sort of hero-worship and ancestor-worship and images. But just as the old Vedic religion was a religion of the domestic hearth which the Brahmans subsequently developed into the religion of grand public sacrifices, so the primitive religion of the Indian people was a tribal or domestic one and had no public places of worship like the big temples of later days. Buddhism was a revolt against both the prevailing systems. ‘In fact it was the first organised religion in the modern sense of the term “religion”. It succeeded in driving out the Brahman religion of sacrifices, but gradually succumbed, to the influences of the popular religion.. Its final absorption in the primitive religion was ape to the fact that the Brahmans favored the religion of gods and goddesses and rituals, and not the religion of righteousness.
As an intellectual and learned community, the Brahmans became the leaders .of Buddhism, and succeeded first in thoroughly disfiguring it with ritualism and. images, and last in destroying its separate organisation of monasteries and monks with the help .of the foreign masters who came into power. The Buddhism of Harsha and Nagarjttna did not disappear. It formed the nucleus of the later Hinduism. The real conflict was between the Brahman community and the Buddhist order of monks and monasteries. If the latter remained, the Brahmans could not become the sole leaders of the country, which has always been the prime motive of Brahmanism,. nor could they enforce their system of castes. The rivalry ended in the complete destruction of the external institutions of Buddhism—the monks and monasteries. Brahmans became the undisputed leaders, and thereafter corrupt Buddhism was easily submerged in the new popular religion, Hinduism, which grew out of it. Caste is an entirely independent social order which was neither in the ancient Aryan religion nor in the primitive Indian religion nor in Buddhism. It is the unique contribution of the Brahman priests, and none else ever wanted it, until the country lost its national religion and political freedom, and the Brahmans succeeded in imposing the system upon the people almost at the point of the bayonet with the help of alien masters.
The Jews of Palestine gave birth to a Jesus Christ; but they crucified him and rejected his religion; and their country passed into the hands of the Muslims where Britain now holds the balance .between the Jews and the Muslims. India produced a Buddha, but when she rejected his religion of righteousness, she passed into the hands of the Muslims and Britain now holds the balance between the Hindus and the Muslims. The Jews became the king-. less people of the world and the Hindu’s the only civilised nation that is not master of its own country: ‘The two great religions, Buddhism and Christianity, rejected in the land of their birth, spread far and wide, and now sustain the religious life of the greatest nations of the East and the West, whereas the Hindus and– the. Jews rank as the orphans of humanity.
