Hinduism / by Monier Williams.

  • Monier Monier-Williams
Date:
1877
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hinduism / by Monier Williams. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    2nd. Faith in personal deities, which is the Bhakti- mdrga, 1 way of faith/ expressed in the Vaishnava or more human form of Hinduism. Moreover, to account for its polytheism, idol-wor- ship, and system of caste distinctions, popular Hin- duism supposes that the one Supreme Being amuses himself by illusory appearances ; that he manifests himself variously, as light does in the rainbow; and that all visible and material objects, good and bad, including gods, demons, demi-gods, good and evil spirits, human beings and animals, are emanations from him, and are ultimately to be reabsorbed into his essence. Hence it may easily be surmised that the road con- necting the true knowledge and the popular doctrine must have many windings. And it may with truth be asserted that no description of Hinduism can be ex- haustive which does not touch on almost every reli- gious and philosophical idea that the world has ever known. Starting from the Veda, Hinduism has ended in embracing something from all religions, and in pre- senting phases suited to all minds. It is all-tolerant, all-compliant, all-comprehensive, all-absorbing. It has its spiritual and its material aspect, its esoteric and exoteric, its subjective and objective, its rational and irrational, its pure and its impure. It may be compared to a huge polygon, or irregular multilateral figure. It has one side for the practical, another for the severely moral, another for the devotional and imaginative, another for the sensuous and sensual, and another for the philosophical and speculative. Those who rest
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