The Ancient Hindus

Article 2. The Ancient Hindus That ample portion of Asia which lies like a great triangle with its base at the Himalayas and its apex thrust into the Indian Ocean was inhabited in remotest times by a people called Indi, a name derived from that of the Indus River. Indi is transliterated as Indians, Hindoos or Hindus. The history of the ancient Hindus is very obscure, but it is certain that they were making headway in literature and the sciences at no long time after the founding of Egyptian and Chaldean culture. For ages the Hindus lived in villages with no centralized government. It was not until the 7 century b. c. that states were formed and kings set up to rule. The most ancient sources of Hindu philosophy are certain sacred books called by the name of Veda (science), some of which were composed as early as the 15 or the 12 century b. c. In course of time the living language of the people grew to be very different from the language of the Vedas, and other books were written to explain and interpret these; such books were the Brahmanas and the Upanishads. In the 6 century b. c. still other writings appeared, and these led to the forming of different kinds or schools of philosophy : these schools were called Orthodox or Heterodox Schools in accordance with their agreement or disagreement with the doctrine of the old Vedas. Following the periods of religio-philosophical literature in old India, we shall discuss: a) The Vedic Philosophy; b) The Brahmanistic Philosophy; c) The Orthodox Schools of Philosophy; d) The Heterodox Schools of Philosophy.

a) The Vedic Philosophy. The sacred books called Vedas are four: Rig-Veda, Sama-Veda, Yajur-Veda, and Atharva-Veda. These books contain a vague system of religion and very little philosophy. The following points are to be noted by the student of the History of Philosophy:

1— There are traces of an indubitable monotheism in the Vedas, but only traces. Belief in many gods, who are personifications of parts of the world or of natural phenomena, is openly taught (materialistic and naturalistic polytheism). The chief gods are Agni, light; Varuna, dawn; and Indra, the firmament. Of these, Varuna is the most notable, and, indeed, is sometimes described as having attributes possible in a supreme Being only.

2— The Vedic account of the origin of things is so mixed and vague that contradictory doctrines can be drawn from it. Thus we have, on the one hand, a kind of material evolution of things from a primordial chaos ; and, on the other hand, we find the world described as an outpouring or manifestation of the Absolute, i. e., of an infinite Being.

3— The human soul is sometimes described as the principle of breathing in man, and sometimes as the principle of thought. It is immortal, and is destined for reward or punishment in a life to come in accordance with its good or evil conduct during earthly life. The soul does not enter into retribution immediately upon being released from the body by death. For a time it hovers about the corpse and about places it frequented during fleshly life. The Hindus sometimes represented the hovering soul under the figure of a bird. This is the first hint of metempsychosis in Hindu philosophy—that later and crude belief in transmigration of souls and renewed existences. When the soul has completed its time of hovering, it is admitted into a heaven of sensual delights, or is banished to a place of torment.

4—Moral laws come from the gods, and sin consists in a violation of these laws. Sin is a bodily rather than a spiritual matter; it is not necessarily dependent upon man’s will, and it may be transmitted by generation. Sin is absolved by rites and sacrifices prescribed in the Vedas.

b) The Br ahmanist ic Philosophy. The Brahmanistic Philosophy is contained in the Brahmanas and the Upanishads—books written between the 8 and the 5 century b. c. to explain the Vedas. The Brahmanas are mainly religious ritual; the Upanishads, while thoroughly Brahmanistic in doctrine, attack problems of philosophy. In its earliest form the Brahmanistic doctrine involved the notion of a supreme and personal Deity called Prajapati, but this Deity soon gave place to deified powers of nature, which were considered to be outpourings or manifestations of a supreme, but impersonal and indeterminate, being called Brahma. The following points are to be noted by the student of Brahmanistic Philosophy :

1— A hidden power called Brahma is latent in all things. Man’s soul or breathing-faculty—called Atman—while seemingly a separate being, is really identified with Brahma, as is all else in the universe.

2— There are two doctrines to account for the origin of things. One explains the world as the literal outpouring of Brahma (materialistic pantheism) ; the other explains the world as an illusory manifestation of Brahma. The latter doctrine declares that the world as such is maya or illusion, and has no real existence, Brahma being the one and only reality.

3— Each man feels that he is an individual, and that other men are individuals. To man’s natural view the world is a vast collection of individual things. All this is a lamentable mistake. There is no reality except Brahma, one and absolute;

individuality is a painful illusion. As long as a man allows himself to be deceived by the illusion of multiple individuality in the world, he will suffer ; and this suffering will go on through successive reincarnations. The conviction of individuality accounts for all the woes of man. That a man feels aches and pains, that he has worries and mental distress, that he is grieved by bereavements, is altogether due to his mistaken conviction that he is an individual among other individuals.

4—Brahmanistic ethics teaches a man to sink the deceiving conviction of individuality and to realize that self and all things are one in Brahma. This is done by prayers and good works as prescribed in the Brahmanas, by certain sacrificial rites, by abstinence from carnal delights which stress the conviction of individual existence. The whole ethical idea of Brahmanism is liberation from pain. Now, since pain is born of the conviction of individuality, the one ethical effort of this system is the suppression of such conviction. Strangely inconsistent with all this is the Brahmanistic doctrine that all Hindus must recognize the absolute distinction of castes, and must strive for the maintenance of the ancient social order.

c) The Or t hodox Schools of Philosophy. The general doctrine of the Vedas was interpreted by six schools or systems of philosophy, which set out their teachings in sutras or aphorisms. These schools were called “orthodox” because they did not openly disagree with the Vedas. The Orthodox Schools were :

1— The Vedanta, called also Uttara-Mimansa.

2— The Purva-Mimansa.

3— The Sankhya.

4— The Yoga.

5— The Nyaya.

6— The Vaiseshika, which is notable for offering the first attempt of the Hindus at formulating categories or funda-mental classifications of reality. The categories here proposed are: substance, quality, action, universality, particularity, relation.

d) The Heter odox Schools of Philosophy. There were in India several schools of philosophy called “heterodox” because of their disagreement with the Vedic doctrine, and of these the more important were Carvakaism and Buddhism.

1— Carvakaism teaches that nothing exists but that which is bodily (materialism). Soul and spirit are names without meaning. Even intellectual activity is material in its nature. Carvakaist ethics agrees with that of all Hindu systems in positing extinction of pain as the great end to be achieved by man, but it differs in its prescriptions of means for the attaining of that end. Pain, according to Carvakaism, is not extinguished by self-repression, austerities, or meditation on the oneness of self with Brahma. The sole means for extinction of pain lies in free indulgence in all fleshly pleasures. Carvakaism did not endure long in India; it could not in the nature of things, for the Hindus were strongly spiritualistic, and were tenacious of traditions with which Carvakaism was in direct conflict.

2— Buddhism, unlike Carvakaism, had a widespread influence among the Hindus. It originated with Sakya-Muni, who is thought to have lived about the 5 century b. c. This man was of the kingly line of Gautama. From youth he wTas given to solitude and meditation, and for many years he sought in silent introspection the answer to the essential question of all Hindu philosophy: “What will liberate men from the pains of existence?” When he had achieved what he believed to be the true answer, he took the name Buddha—the Enlightened—and set out to preach his doctrine far and wide. From the first he had many followers. Buddhism may be summed up thus : Man strives for happi ness, but cannot attain it in this changing and illusory world, for happiness means changelessness, evenness of being, peace. Man’s soul—which is a real collection of thoughts and acts, and not an illusion like the world—is subject to change, and until this subjection has been ended, there can be no happiness. Now, the thing that makes man subject to the thralhof change and keeps him from happiness is the desire for existence. Because man clings to passing things and mourns their loss, he is ever supplied with new things to cling to, and is ever newly pained by seeing them pass away. Man clings to his own existence, and therefore new existences are continually given to him. He dies, but is straightway born again. He lives in pain, dies once more, and is again born to painful life. And so the despairing round goes on. Obviously, the thing to be got rid of is the desire for existence. Once that desire is perfectly stifled, renewed existences will cease ; man will be at peace ; pain will have been forever put away; the soul will have achieved the changeless state of Nirvana. Nirvana is the only state of happiness; in that blessed state desire is dead, emotions are annihilated; eternal quiet and peace enwraps the weary soul and forever stifles every movement or yearning. The way to Nirvana through the extinguishing of the desire for existence is indicated in the ethical rules of Buddhism. Man must strive to bring absolute calmness into his life, his will, his conduct. There must be no hatred, no anger, no great loves, no looking up to some and down upon others,—therefore, no castes! Let a man dwell meditatively upon the pains of the world, keeping himself aloof the while from worldly things such as wealth, honors, the comforts of easy living, emotional attachments to others. Let him be always grave, mild, deliberate. Let him practise bodily austerities that he may loose his hold upon fleshly existence. For the rest, let a man kill no living thing ; let him not steal, or lie, or covet the spouse of another ; let him not crave wine or other strong drink. In all these forbidden things there is something to feed the desire for existence, which desire it is man’s chief business to kill.

Remarks: All Hindu philosophy is pessimistic, that is, it regards life as pain, and teaches that the greatest good man can hope to attain is release from this pain. Such relief is not to be sought in the simple remedy of self-inflicted death, for re-birth follows death and enters man upon a new round of pain. The old Vedas present some evidences of a primitive monotheism, and thus the Hindu religion-philosophy agrees with that of other ancient peoples in that it contradicts the evolutionist and rationalist theory that monotheism is an outgrowth of inferior religion-forms. Buddhism omits the idea of God and of positive happiness in a life to come; hence, while it is a philosophy, it is not a religion. Popular Buddhism, however, differs by a world of divergence from the philosophical Buddhism described above. Popular Buddhism, to which many thousands in Asia still cling, is nothing but an idolatrous cult which fosters the hope of sensual delights in a life to come. Nor is Popular Buddhism the same throughout Asia; it differs in different localities. Hence, while Popular Buddhism is a religion, it is not one religion.