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Updated: May 9, 2025
The forests, the deserts, and the environs of the temples are filled with these mystics, who, thus separated from external life, believe themselves the subjects of supernatural illumination and power. The Bhagavad-Gita, already spoken of, is the best exposition of this doctrine.
In these works, which relate the conversion of Dharm Das afterwards one of Kabir's principal followers, Kabir is identified with the Creator and then made a pantheistic deity much as Kṛishṇa in the Bhagavad-gîtâ. He is also the true Guru whose help is necessary for salvation. Stress is further laid on the doctrine of Śabda, or the divine word.
One may therefore expect that most Indian Vedantists will, on entering the Bahai Society, make known as widely as they can the beauties of the Bhagavad-Gita. I cannot myself profess that I admire the contents as much as some Western readers, but much is doubtless lost to me through my ignorance of Sanskrit. Prof. Garbe and Prof.
The precise nature and intimacy of this union has given rise to as many subtle theories and phrases as the sacraments in Europe. Vishnuite sects in all parts of India show a tendency to recognize vernacular works as their scriptures, but they also attach great importance to the Upanishads, the Bhagavad-gîtâ, the Nârâyaṇîya and the Vedânta Sûtras.
The doctrine of bhakti is common to both Vishnuites and Śivaites. It is perhaps in general estimation associated with the former more than with the latter, but this is because the Bhagavad-gîtâ and various forms of devotion to Kṛishṇa are well known, whereas the Tamil literature of Dravidian Śivaism is ignored by many European scholars.
Thus the Bhagavad-gîtâ contains the ideas of the Mahayana in substance, though in a different setting: it praises disinterested activity and insists on faith. It is clear that at this period all Indian thought and not merely Buddhism was vivified and transmuted by two great currents of feeling demanding, the one a more emotional morality the other more personal and more sympathetic deities.
Though the members of the sect are sometimes called Ramaites the personality of Râma plays a small part in their faith, especially as expounded by Râmânuja. As names for the deity he uses Nârâyaṇa and Vâsudeva and he quotes freely from the Bhagavad-gîtâ and the Vishṇu Purâṇa. Compared with the emotional deism of Caitanya this faith seems somewhat philosophic and reticent.
Its first great text-book is the Bhagavad-gîtâ, but it is also mentioned in the last verse of the Śvetâśvatara Upanishad and Pâṇini appears to allude to bhakti felt for Vâsudeva. The Kaṭhâ Upanishad contains the following passage: "That Âtman cannot be gained by the Veda, nor by understanding nor by much learning. He whom the Âtman chooses, by him the Âtman can be gained.
The ancient nature gods of the wind and the dawn have little place in the mental horizon of either the Buddha or Bhagavad-gîtâ and even when the old names remain, the beings who bear them generally have new attributes. Still, Vedic texts are used in modern worship and in many respects there is a real continuity of thought.
It is possible that in some of the later works of the Sittars Christian influence may have supervened but most of this Tamil poetry is explicable as the development of the ideas expressed in the Bhagavad-gîtâ and the Śvetâśvatara Upanishad.
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