Theosophy - The Brotherhood of Religions - by Annie Besant - Adyar Pamphlets No. 24
Adyar
Pamphlets No.24
The Brotherhood of Religions
by Annie Besant
Theosophical Publishing House, Adyar, Madras. India
First Printed, February 1913 and Reprinted,
October 1919
[Page
1] A
READER, pausing for a moment on the above title, may very well ejaculate: " Well
! whatever else religions may be, most certainly they are not brotherly." And
it is unhappily true that if we look into the religious history of the immediate
past, we shall find therein very little brotherhood; rather shall we find
religions fighting the one against the other, battling which shall be predominant
and crush its rivals to death; religious wars have been the most cruel; religious
persecutions have been the most merciless; crusades, inquisitions, horrors
of every kind, blot with blood and tears the history of religious struggles;
what mockery it seems, amid ensanguined battle-fields and lurid flames of countless
stakes, to prate of "
the Brotherhood of Religions ".
Nor is it even between
religion and religion that the continual strife is carried on. Even within
the pale of a single religion, sects are formed, which often wage war against
each other. Christianity has become a byword among non-Christian nations
by the[Page
2] mutual
hatreds of the followers of the "Prince of Peace". Roman Catholics and
Anglicans, Lutherans and Calvinists, Wesleyans, Baptists, Congregationalists,
etc., disturb the peace of the nations with their infuriated controversies.
Great Britain and Ireland are now paying the legacy of hatred entailed
by the cruel wrongs inflicted on Roman Catholics by the terrible penal
code created by a Protestant Parliament; at the present moment (1907)
the United Kingdom has been precipitated into a great constitutional
struggle by the hatreds of Anglicans and Nonconformists, who cannot
even agree on a minimum of common Christian teaching, which may be
taught in the national schools to the children of all Christians. France
is rent in twain and is in danger of civil war, as a result of the revenge
of Freethinkers on the Roman Catholic Church for the wrongs inflicted in
the days of its supremacy. In Belgium, political issues are
decided by the clerical or anti-clerical majority. Islãm has the
fierce quarrels of its Shiahs and Sunnis, while both unite in denouncing
the infidel Sûfi. Even in Hinduism there are now bigoted camps
of Vaishnavas and Shaivas, who denounce each other with a narrowness borrowed
from missionary examples. Religious controversy has become the type of everything
most bitter and most unbrotherly in the struggles of man with man.
It was not always thus.
The antagonism between religions is a plant of modern growth, grown out of[Page
3] the
seed of an essentially modern claim — the claim of a single religion
to be unique and alone inspired. In the elder world there were many religions,
and for the most part religion was a national thing, so that the man of one
nation had no wish to convert the man of another nation. Each nation had
its own religion, as it had its own laws and its own customs, and men were
born into and remained in the creed of their fatherland. Hence, if we look
back into the history of the elder world, we shall be struck with the rarity
of religious wars. Even when the Hebrews invaded Palestine, and murdered
the idolatrous dwellers in the land, it was a war of conquest, prompted by
ordinary greed, and a war between Jahveh, their particular God, and the Gods
of the invaded people; in fact, the general ancient tendency to take into
their own religion the Gods of the conquered tribes showed itself many times
in their history; this tendency was bitterly denounced by their prophets,
not as heresy, but as a national apostasy from their own particular Deity,
who had liberated them from Egyptian tyranny and had conquered Palestine
for them. We shall further observe that, within a single religion, there
were many schools of thought which existed side by side without hatred.
Hinduism has its six darshanas — six "points of view" — and,
while the philosophers wrangle and debate, and each school defends its own
position, there is no lack of brotherly feeling, and all
the philosophies are still taught[Page
4] within
one tol or pãthashãlã — religious
school. Even in one philosophic system, the Vedãnta, there are three
recognized subdivisions; and Advaita, Vishishtãdvaita, and Dvaita —
differing on the most fundamental of teachings, the relation between God
and the separated spirit — dwell side by side; and fellow-students
in the same school learn one, or two, or all of them without attacking each
other's orthodoxy. A man may belong to any one of the three, or to none of
them, and yet remain a good Hindû, though, as said above, in these
modern days, religious sectarianism has become more bitter.
In
the mighty Empire of Ancient Rome, all creeds were welcomed, all religions
respected, even honoured. In the Pantheon — the temple of all
Gods — of Rome, the images that symbolized the Gods of every subject
nation were to be found, and the Roman citizens showed reverence to
them all. And if a new nation came within the circle of the Empire, and that
nation adored a form of God other than those forms already worshiped, the
images or symbols of the Gods of the new daughter-nation were borne with
all honour to the Pantheon of the Motherland, and were reverently enshrined
therein. Thus thoroughly was the elder world permeated by the liberal idea
that religion was a personal or a national affair, with which none had the
right to interfere. God was everywhere; He was in everything; what
mattered the form in which He was adored ? He was one unseen eternal
Being, with[Page
5] many
names; what mattered the title by which He was invoked ? The watchword of
the religious liberty of the elder world rings out in the splendid declaration
of Shî Krshna: "However men approach Me,
even so do I welcome them, for the path men take from every side is
Mine".
The first time that
religious persecution stained the annals of Imperial Rome was when young
Christianity came into conflict with the State, and the blood of Christians
was shed, not as religious sectaries but as political traitors, and as disturbers
of the public peace. They claimed supremacy over the older religions, and
thus provoked hatreds and tumults; they attacked the religions which had
hitherto lived in peace side by side, declaring that they alone were right
and all others wrong; they aroused resentment by their aggressive and intolerant
attitude, causing disturbances wherever they went. Still more, they gave
rise to the most serious suspicions of their loyalty to the State, by refusing
to take part in the ordinary ceremony of sprinkling incense, in the fire
before the statue of the reigning Emperor, and denounced the practice as
idolatrous; Rome saw her sovereignty challenged by the new religion, and
while carelessly tolerant of all religions, she was fiercely intolerant of
any political insubordination. As rebels, not as heretics, she flung the
Christians to the lions, and chased them from her cities into caves and
deserts.[Page
6]
It was this claim of Christianity
to be the only true religion, which gave birth to religious persecution,
first of Christianity, then by it.
For as long as your religion is yours, and mine is mine, and neither claims
to impose his religion on the other, no question of persecution can arise.
But if I say: "Your conception of God is wrong and mine is right, I only
have the truth, and I only can point out the way of salvation, if you do not
accept my idea, you will be damned"; then, if l am logical and in the majority,
I must be a persecutor, for it is kinder to roast misbelievers here than to
allow them to spread their misbelief, and thus damn themselves and others for
ever. If I am in a minority, I am likely to be persecuted for men will not
readily tolerate the arrogance of their fellow men, who will not allow them
to look at the heavens save through their special telescope.
Christianity,
from being persecuted, became dominant, and seized the power of the State.
The alliance between the State and the Church made religious persecution
half political. Heresy in religion became disloyalty; refusal to believe
with the Head of the State became treason against that Head; and thus
the sad story of Christendom was written, a story which all men who love
Religion — be they Christians or non-Christians — must read
with shame, with sorrow, almost with despair. And how the "Divinity that
shapes our ends" has marked with national ruin the evil results of
unbrotherliness in religion! Spain carried[Page
7] on a fierce persecution
against the Moors and the Jews; she burned them by thousands, she
tortured and mangled them; weary of slaughter she exiled them, and her
roads were strewn with corpses during that great exodus, corpses of old
men, of women, of nursing mothers, of little children; the tears, the cries
of the weak she crushed so pitilessly, became the Avengers who hounded
her to ruin, and she sank, from being Mistress of Europe, to the little-regarded
Power she is today.
Islãm
caught from Christianity the deadly disease of persecution, and forsook
the wise teachings of Ali to tread the evil path of slaying the infidel.
The name of Muhammad the Merciful was used to sharpen the swords of
his followers, and in India the doom of the Mogul Empire rang out in the
cries of the dying, slaughtered for their faith by Aurangzeb. In India, as
in Spain, religious persecution has resulted in political disaster. Thus
is the need for brotherliness enforced by the destruction that waits on
unbrotherliness. A law of nature is as much proved by the breaking of all
that opposes it, as by the enduring of all that is in harmony with it.
The multiplicity of
religious beliefs would be an advantage, not an injury, to Religion, if the
religions were a brotherhood instead of a battle-field. For each religion
has some peculiarity of its own, something to give to the world which the
others cannot give. Each religion speaks one letter of the great Name of
God,[Page
8] the One without a second,
and that Name will only be spoken when every religion sounds out the letter
given it to voice, in melodious harmony with the rest. God is so great, so
illimitable, that no one brain of man, however great, no one religion, however
perfect, can express His infinite perfection. It needs a universe in its
totality to mirror Him, nay, countless universes cannot exhaust Him. A star
may tell of His Radiance, He the Sun of all, A planet may tell of His
Order, revolving in unchanging rhythm. A forest may whisper His
Beauty, a mountain His Strength, a river His fertilizing Life,
an ocean His changeless Changing; but no object, no grace of form, no
splendour of colour, nay, not even the heart of man in which
He dwells, can show out the manifold perfection of that endless wealth of
Being. Only a fragment of His Glory is seen in every object, in every mode
of life, and only the totality of all things, past, present and to come,
can image out in their endlessness His Infinitude.
And
so also a religion can only show forth some aspects of that myriad-faced
Existence. What does Hinduism say to the world ? It says DHARMA — law,
order, harmonious, dutiful growth, the right place of each, right duty, right
obedience. What does Zoroastrianism say ? It says PURITY — stainlessness
of thought, of word, of act. What does Buddhism say ? It says WISDOM — Knowledge
all-embracing, wedded to perfect Love, love of man, service of humanity, a[Page
9] perfect
Compassion, the gathering of the lowest and the weakest into the tender
arms of the Lord of Love Himself. What does Christianity say ? It says
SELF-SACRIFICE, and takes the Cross as its dearest symbol,
remembering that wherever one human Spirit crucifies the lower nature
and rises to the Supreme, there the Cross shines out. And what does Islãm
say, youngest of the world's great Faiths ? It says SUBMISSION — self-surrender
to the one Will that guides the worlds; and sees that Will everywhere,
so that it cannot see the little human wills that live only as they blend
themselves with It.
We
cannot afford to lose any one of these words, summing up the characteristics
of each great Faith; so, while recognising the differences of religions,
let us recognise them that we may learn, rather than that we may criticise.
Let the Christian teach us what he has to teach, but let him not refuse
to learn from his brother of Islãm, or his brother of any other
creed, for each has something to learn, and something also to teach. And,
verily, he best preaches his religion who makes it his motive power in
love to God and service to man.
Let us see in detail
why we should not quarrel, apart from these general principles. It can be
put in a sentence: Because all the great truths ofreligion are common property, do not belong exclusively to any one Faith.
That is why nothing vital is gained by changing from one religion to
another. You do not[Page
10] need to travel over the whole
field of the religions of the world in order to find the water of truth. Dig
in the field of your own religion, and go deeper and deeper, till you find
the spring of the water of life gushing up, pure and full.
Is the above sentence
on the universality of religious truths true in fact, or is it only verbiage
? Four special lines of study may be followed in order to prove the fact
is thus: common Symbols; common Doctrines; common Stories: common Morals.
Each of these headings might be a section of a book entitled The Brotherhood
of Religions, but in a lecture, or an article,
they can only be touched on superficially, with the hope that the listener,
or the reader, will turn to the library when the sketch has been placed before
him, and make his own the study which has been merely outlined in the
sketch.
SYMBOLS
Everywhere in the temples,
tombs, and other buildings of dead and living religions, the same symbols
are found.
Let
us take the Cross. That the cross was used all over the world as a religious
symbol long before the time of Jesus, called the Christ, is a matter not
for argument but for ordinary reading. Archaeological research has established
it for the past, as observation while travelling establishes it for the
present. The[Page
11] Etruscan
rule was ancient ere infant Rome was born. The Etruscan tombs belonged to
a time so remote that, when some of them were opened in our own days, only
the first man who entered saw the outline of a corpse, ere it was blown into
impalpable dust by the incoming draught of air. But though the man's body was
dust, his works remained, and vessels lying at the feet, bowl and platter and
vase, spoke of his Faith; on those ancient bits of pottery the cross was traced,
telling that the man, whose body had vanished into viewless dust, had died
in surety of immortal life, triumphant over death. From Egypt — where
it is carven on obelisk, painted on inner chambers where lie mummies in
their sarcophagi, frescoed on temple walls — it travelled
eastwards through Assyria, Chaldea and India to China. Assyrian tiles,
Chaldean pottery, Indian temples, and those of China, wear the cross as
treasured symbol of life. Across the Pacific to America
travel still; stand in Mexico, where the ancient temples of Maya and
Quiche are being unburied by unwearied explorers, and see the Cross,
in its Egyptian form, reproduced once more. Travel back across the
Atlantic and land in Scandinavia, and from the ancient sagas you hear
of the hammer of Thor, the cross once again. Leave the purely
religious buildings, and turn to the Masonic Temple, the treasury of
ancient symbolism, and there, brought from ancient Egypt, is the Cross
upon the Rose — Cross, symbol of life, Rose, symbol of matter and symbol
of[Page
12] secrecy as well. Nay, the
very symbol of the R. W. M engraved, or worn as jewel, is but the Cross as
Svastika refolded on itself, until it makes his badge.
Why
is the Cross thus universal ? Because it is the sign of Spirit triumphant
over matter, moulding it, shaping it, forcing it to bear its own impress. It
is the symbol of creative power, of the Supreme God sacrificing Himself
with the limitations of matter, as in later de-spiritualized days it became
the symbol of creative power at the lower, instead of at the higher, pole
of being. For the cross as phallic symbol, whereof so much has been made
in these later days, is but the cross dragged down to earth from heaven;
as, in very truth, the creative power in men, animals and plants, is the
reflection, in gross matter, of the Universal Life whereof we all are
begotten. Holiest of powers, verily, though degraded to vilest uses. And the
Cross meant also, by easy transition, the sure rebirth of life from the tomb
or the pyre, the certainty of immortality. Who then shall say, in any
exclusive sense: "The Cross is mine?" Mine,
as including all. Mine, as excludingnone.
And what of the double
Triangle, with one apex pointing upwards, and one downwards ? This is as
universal as the Cross, symbol of the interlacing of Spirit and matter, the
fire and water of the elder world. And the five-pointed Star, which is the
Jewel[Page
13] in the Lotus, the Self in
man. And the seven-pointedStar, and
the nine. And the Circle with a Point at the centre, or with a Cross within
it, or a Cross above or
below it. And the Eye, alone or within a Triangle. And the Lotus, or
Lily, of Vishnu and of the Virgin Mary. And the whirling Discus, or
thunderbolt, of China, of Japan, of India, of Tibet, of Greece, of Rome,
of Scandinavia. And the Serpent — of
Good and of Evil — and the Dragon, and the Fruit, and the Tree.
But time fails me to mention a tithe of the common symbols, common
to the earliest antiquity of which traces remain and the latest church
built by the most modern architect. And I have said nothing of the
symbolism of rites and ceremonies, of the tonsure, and the surplice,
and the stole, and the cope; of the upraised hand with two fingers
folded and thumb touching, of pope and pagan priest; of ceremonial
gestures, and symbolical sprinklings — an
endless host of details.
There
is but One God, one Nature, and one Religion. And symbolism is the common
tongue by which all religions tell of their origin from one religion, the
WISDOM-RELIGION, the WORLD-RELIGION, ancient yet ever new; and by which
also they tell the everlasting truths concerning God and Nature, for the
sake of the telling of which they were instituted by the Elder Brothers
of Humanity. Symbolism is the common language, and no religion which uses
it — and all use it — can claim to be unique.[Page
14]
COMMON
DOCTRINES
Let us now pass on
to a consideration of the doctrines which are common to the great religions,
and we shall find that the fundamental verities on which each religion
is built form a common basic structure.
What
are these main doctrines ? The Unity of God; the Trinity of divine manifestation;
the super-physical Hierarchies and their worlds; the Nature of Man; his
Evolution; the great Laws. There are others, but in this brief summary
I must confine myself to the most important.
1-
The Unity of God. Which religion can claim a monopoly of this doctrine
? Question the Hindû;
he answers: " One only, without; a second."
Question the Pãrsî; he tells of Zarvan Akarana, the Boundless.
Question the Hebrew; he replies: "Hear, 0 Israel ! the Lord our God is one
Lord".
Question the Buddhist; he speaks of One, uncreated, universal, whence
creation and particulars come. Question the Christian he answers "There
is one God". Question the son of Islãm; he cries: " God is God, and
there is none other". The great doctors of Islam and the great Vedãnta
pandits of Hinduism reason on the one universal Existence exactly on the
same lines, and these reasonings form one of the bridges between Hinduism
and Muhammadanism over which, we may hope, many a foot will pass in days
to come. [Page
15] Religions, in face of these
categorical statements from each, cannot quarrel as regards the question
of the unity. All each can do is to clothe the one great truth in a different
dress, to label it with a different label. But a man remains the same
man, though he may change his coat, and a truth remains the same truth,
though spoken in different languages. Each religion has its own tongue,
and the varieties of tongue mask the identity of belief.
2. The Trinity of Divine Manifestation. To which religion does the teaching
of the Trinity exclusively belong ? On this point the dead religions of the
past reinforce the living religions of the present — as indeed they do
all root-truths. The philosophical Hindû says: Sat, Chit, Ãnanda;
the popular voice proclaims: Brahmã, Vishnu, Mahãdeva. The Buddhist
tells of Amitãbha, the Boundless Light, Avalokiteshvara and Manjusri;
the Pãrsî, of
Ahura-Mazda, Spento and Angro-Mainyush, and Armaiti; the Hebrew, of
Kether, Binah and Chockmah; the Christian, of Father, Son and Holy
Ghost. The Musulmãn only, for obvious historical reasons, does not join
in the chorus; "He begets not, nor is begotten", says he, alluding to the
Christian teaching; and yet out of Al Qurãn shine the attributes,
the Mighty, the Merciful, the Wise, so characteristic of the triplicity of
Being. This triplicity is best traced by keeping clearly in mind the characteristic
marks of each factor — the first, the Fount of Bliss Eternal, of [Page
16] Self-establishment, of Power;
the second, the Fount of Consciousness, from whom incarnations proceed;
the third, the active Creative Mind which gives existence to the universe.
3.
The Superphysical Hierarchies and Their Worlds. Here the difference
of tongue, of expression, spoken of above, has given rise to much
misconception. In the West, God and its equivalents always mean the
One, it being further declared by Christianity that each of the Three Persons
of the Trinity is God, though in their totality forming one God, not three;
there is a unity of nature with a diversity of characteristics. But this word
God is never applied in the West to the huge superphysical Hierarchies, who
crowd the upper rungs of the ladder of Being. These are Archangels,
Angels, Cherubim, Seraphim, Powers, revered, invoked, often worshiped,
but recognized as the ministers, the agents, of the Supreme. These beings
are recognized by the Parsî as the Ameshaspentas and their hosts; by
the Hebrew and the Muhammadan as Angels; Hindûs and Buddhists call them
Devas — literally Shining Ones, a most appropriate descriptive epithet.
Unfortunately, Westerners have translated the word Deva as God, and
hence we have the thirty-three millions of Gods, about whom ignorant
people make fun. The word Brahman is the true equivalent of the English
word God, and Deva is Angel. Every reader of English literature knows that
John Bunyan, in his Pilgrim'sProgress, [Page
17] uses
this very term, the Shining Ones, to designate the Angels; and it is the
natural word for any seer to use, who has seen them flashing through the
empyrean on their missions of administration, of succour, of deliverance.
The Deva, to the Hindû and Buddhist, is exactly the same as the Archangel
and Angel to the Christian and the Musalmãn, and his existence no
more takes from the unity of God in the one case than in the other. It
might as well be argued that the Viceroys, the Judges, the Magistrates,
the Commissioners, the Generals, the Admirals, of the Empire detract from
the supreme authority of the King-Emperor, as that the Devas detract from
the supremacy of God. They administer the laws of nature; they help men,
women and children, save them from many a danger and encourage them in
many a trouble; it is not that they are God — save as we also are
God — but that God
is in them as in us, and those only can understand the polytheism of Hindûs
and Buddhists who realize that "for the sake of the Self is the Deva dear".
How dreary, how lonely, the world would be, were the only intelligences
men and God. How empty it would be, were it not for these Shining Ones
who occupy every rung of the ladder above us. There is a vast ladder of
consciousness from the mineral to the Lord of the Universe, and we are
on one rung of the ladder, differing not in essence from those below us
and those above. Devas do not, any more than men, mar the unity of God. [Page
18]
It is true that the Hindû and
the Buddhist, like the Greek and the Roman Catholic, take advantage
of this ministry of Angels, and invoke these divine
Ministers. Why not ? The Angel, the Deva, incarnates a fragment of
the Universal Self, and the light of Brahman shines through him. Is
it wrong that the weak tendrils of piety, love and worship in the most
ignorant, most foolish, and most undeveloped of the children of the
Universal Father, should twine around the radiant form of some benignant
Intelligence, more readily to be understood, more easily to be worshipped,
than the All-pervading Self ? Idolatry ? Ah no ! not in the evil sense;
wrong idolatry is to worship the separated self; right idolatry is
to worship the Universal Self in any form that stimulates the intelligence,
that quickens the heart.
The
worlds of the Hierarchies are the worlds subtler than the physical, incognisable
by the physical senses. The Hindû and Zoroastrian books
speak largely of these worlds and give many descriptions of them. The
Buddha tells us that He has seen these worlds, "the world below, with all
its spirits, and the worlds above". Christian and Musulmãn believe
in heaven and hell, and their scriptures tell thereof. It is not worth while
to dwell on facts so well known.
4. The Nature of Man. Man is divine, a Spirit, in his innermost nature, and
wears garments of matter. The Hindû proclaims: "I am He." The Chinese
Buddhist speaks of the true man without a position", [Page
19] the
jewel Spirit in the lotus of the body. The Fravarshi of the Zoroastrian is
the Âtmã
of the Hindû. The Hebrew declares: "Ye are Gods," and the Christian
exultantly proclaims that the body is the temple of God. Not so clearly
speaks the Muslim, and yet when we find immortality asserted of man, and
then read that all will perish save the Face of God [Al Kurãn, Chap.
XXVIII] we are forced to conclude that he also recognises the identity
in nature of God and Man.
And
this unity comes out clearly in the Sûfi teaching. Jãmi
declares:
Thou art absolute Being:
all else is but a phantasm,
For in Thy universe
all Beings are one.
Thy world-captivating
Beauty, in order to displayits perfections,
Appears in thousands
of mirrors, but it is one.
In Gulshan-i-Raz we
read:
Thou art the eye
of the reflection while He is thelight
of the eye: . . .
when thou lookest
well to the root of thematter,
He is the Seer, and
the Eye, and the Vision.
It
is sometimes asked: "Has man a Spirit ? " No, he has not. He is a
Spirit and has a body. The body does not possess the Spirit, but the
Spirit possesses the body. It does not own the Spirit, but the Spirit owns
it. The body is transitory, the Spirit is eternal; the body is born into a
world and dies out of it, the Spirit is unborn, undying. If you have [Page
20] ever watched
a dying man, who knew his own nature, and have seen how the living Spirit
rejoiced in the wider, more potent life opening before him as the burden
of the flesh was slipping off, you must have realised the truth of the saying
that there is no such thing as death, in any real sense. Death is the passing
from one room to another, in the house of the universe; death is putting
off a heavy coat, and standing in lighter garments. Man loses by death none
of his spiritual, intellectual and emotional powers; he loses nothing but the
flesh. We are Spirits, Sparks of one Fire, Rays of one Sun; we are in the
image of God's eternity; we are enduring as Himself.
5. His Evolution. Here a question may burst from the lips of some: "You
cannot say that all religions teach the same on this. How can you reconcile
the reincarnation of the Hindû with the special creation of each Spirit
of the Christian ? " Obviously I cannot; the doctrine of a special creation
of each Spirit is modern, unphilosophical and blasphemous, and is wholly
indefensible. But I may urge that as Christianity did not, till A.D. 533, deny
the pre-existence of the Spirit, it is for Christians to explain why they denied
the ancient doctrine and forced a heresy on the Christian world. The
doctrine of reincarnation — the unfolding by the Spirit of its divine
powers through a series of evolving, improving vehicles — is a doctrine
common to all ancient Faiths. Hinduism [Page
21] and Buddhism taught it, or,
more accurately, founded their teachings on it as a well-established natural
fact. The Egyptians based on it their views of the after-death life; Plato,
Pythagoras, and the Greek and Roman world asseverated it. The Jews
taught it, as may be read in Josephus, the Kabbala, and elsewhere.
It was the current doctrine in the time of Jesus, and was alluded to by Him
on more than one occasion; several Church Fathers taught it; the doctrine
persisted in the Christian Church among such sects as the Albigenses; it
reappeared strongly in the Church of England, in the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, and was taught by clergymen of that Church as well
as by learned laymen. A little later Wordsworth sang:
Our birth is but
a sleep and a forgetting.
The soul that rises
in us, our life's star,
Hath elsewhere had
its setting,
And cometh from afar.
Once
more, in our days, is the doctrine being preached in Christendom by clergymen
of the Established Church. There is one sentence, believed by Christians
to have been spoken by their Master, which is a far more compelling argument
than one which turns on the meaning of disputed texts: "Be ye therefore perfect," He
commanded His disciples, "even as
your Father which is in heaven in perfect". Perfect as God is perfect. Is it
pretended that any one of us, frivolous, foolish, limited, can — before
the [Page
22] tomb
receives us, or the fire consumes — become perfect as God is
perfect, all-knowing, all-powerful, all-holy ? What human words may
compass a description of the perfections of the Supreme ? Yet Jesus did
not hesitate to say: "Be ye perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect".
How can this command be obeyed, save in many, many lives, in which we
shall slowly climb the long ladder of perfection ?
Let not the Christian,
then, fail to claim his splendid heritage as a son of God: let him claim
his birthright to reproduce the divine likeness in himself.
The
position of the Musulmãn with regard to reincarnation is doubtful:
some maintain that it can be drawn from Al Quran, but it certainly
forms no part of the ordinary Muhammadan religious education. But in the
thirteenth century A.D we have the Darvesh Jelãl, whose teachings
are preserved in the Mesnavi, and he says:
I died from the mineral,
and became a plant.
I died from the plant,
and reappeared in an animal.
I died from the animal,
and became a man.
Wherefore then should
I fear ? When did I grow less by dying ?
Next time I shall die
from the man,
That I may grow the
wings of the angel.
From
the angel too must I seek advance; all things shall
perish save His Face.
Once
more shall I wing my way above the angels;
I shall become that
which entereth not the imagination,
Then
let me become naught, naught; for the harp-string crieth
unto me;
"Verily, unto Him shall we return." [Page 23]
The
position of the Zoroastrian also is doubtful on this point —
some Pãrsîs affirm it, some deny it; and we can only point to
the fact that Zoroastrianism is "a religion in fragments"; and say that in
the Greek and the neo-Platonic writings, which appear to reproduce the Persian
teachings, after the destruction of the library of Persepolis by Alexander,
the doctrine is taught.
6. The Great Laws. By "the great Laws" I mean the Law of Karma, or that
of cause and effect; and the Law of Sacrifice, or that of the propagation
and the maintenance of life.
The
Law of Karma is stated by science in the invariable sequences which it
calls laws of nature; the theologian calls it divine justice. It is the
rock on which all is built, the true support of all thinking and all activity.
It prevails in all worlds, gross and subtle; it is a universal law. It
is well stated in a Christian verse: "Be not deceived; God is not mocked;
whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap". [Gal, VI
7] Says the Buddha: "If a man speaks or acts with an evil thought, pain follows
him, as the wheel follows the foot of the ox that draws the carriage ... If
a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow
that never leaves him". Hinduism abounds with such passages, and they
may be culled from every scripture. [Page
24]
The Law of Sacrifice is
the statement of the fact that all lives live by the surrender, forced
or voluntary, of other lives; that the outpoured Life of the Supreme is
the support of the world. In the lower kingdoms sacrifice is compelled;
minerals disintegrate that plants may live, plants that animals and men
may live. In the human kingdom, with the great growth of intelligence,
the voluntary association of the individual with the universal Will becomes
possible. In proportion as that association becomes completer, does spiritual
life unfold, and ultimately realise itself. The symbol of the Cross incarnates,
for the Christian, the ideal life of sacrifice; and every aspirant for
Brahmanhood, for Buddhahood, for Christhood, treads the Way of the Cross.
The student may expand
this brief résumé into a book, and the more he
studies the more clearly will shine out the Brotherhood of Religions, as
expressed in Common Doctrines.
We have still to consider
Common Stories and Common Ethics.
COMMON
STORIES
There are certain stories
which are told of the Founders of Religions, the outline the same in all;
this identity of outline being due to the fact that each Founder is seen
as an incarnation of the Logos, and that the symbol of the Logos in all creeds
is the Sun.[Page
25]
In
very truth the Sun — the source of life and light for the worlds of
his system — is seen in the ancient religions as the body of the Logos,
His manifested form on the plane of physical matter, while in modern religions
the Sun is used as a symbol of the all-pervading Lord, meet image of the One
by whom the worlds are supported. The ever-repeated story of the Sun, the annual
story for our earth, is the root-truth, the root-mythos, in
the physical manifestation of every Founder of a great religion, and Their
human lives ever tell again on the world's stage the drama of the Sun.
This
statement cannot be made in relation to the religion of Islãm,
and the reason is obvious. The great Prophet of Arabia is regarded by
his followers as purely human, and not as an incarnation of the Logos,
and they think rightly; but in all religions whereof the Founder is seen
as a divine incarnation, the outline of the great mythos appears.
The fact has been used as an argument to prove that the Founders had
no historical existence, but that is a mistake. The historical life
contained the events which reincarnated the mythos, and from
the historical figure shone out the rays of the divine Sun; it is not that
the Sun is the Founder, but that both the Sun and He are physical
representatives of the central life of a world-system, and that what the Sun
is to his system the Founder is to His religion.
Mithra of Persia
had for his sign the Bull, as had Osiris of Egypt, because the Bull was the
sign of the [Page
26] Zodiac
for the vernal equinox — the
Resurrection — when the religion was established; Oannes of Chaldea
had the Fish as symbol, for the same reason; Jupiter was Jupiter Ammon;
and Jesus was the Lamb, for the same reason.
The
Divine Founder is born in a secret place, as Shrî Krshna in a dungeon,
the Lord Mithra in a cave, the Lord Jesus in a cave — changed into a stable in
the canonical accounts. The mysteries of Adonis were celebrated earlier, it
is said, in that same cave. The birth is at the winter solstice, and is ever
accompanied by marvellous events, varying with the nation. Devas rain
flowers on Devãki, the mother, and her Divine Son; Angels fill the air
with their songs when Mary, the Virgin Mother, gives birth to the Divine Child;
divine voices chant that the Lord of the earth is born when Neith, the Immaculate
Virgin, brings forth Osiris the Saviour; when Zarathustra is born, the light
from His body fills the room with radiance; Devas chant joyously when the infant
Buddha is born, and in the Chinese writings, though not in the Indian, He is
said to have been born of a Virgin mother, Mãyã, overshadowed
by Shing-Shin, the Spirit. The birth of several of these was heralded by the
appearance of a star. Krshna and Jesus alike are threatened with slaughter
in infancy, the one by Kamsa, the other by Herod. Nãrada declares the
nature of the infant Krshna, Asita speaks of the future glories of the infant
Buddha. [Page
27] Simeon
welcomes the infant Jesus as the world's salvation. Buddha is tempted by
Mãra,
Jesus by Satan. All these Great Ones heal the sick, cure the deformed,
raise the dead.
Thus resembling each
other in their lives, the Founders of the World-Faiths are also alike in
their deaths. Their death is a violent death, come how it may; and it always
springs from the idea of sacrifice, that sacrifice of the Logos by which
the worlds were made, enshrined in the Purusha Sukta of the Rg-Veda.
From that death They rise triumphant, ascending into heaven. Osiris is slain;
His body is divided, like that of the Purusha of the Veda; but He rises and
reigns. Thammuz is wept over, slain; and rejoiced over, arisen. The story
of Adonis is a replica of the Syrian Thammuz. Krshna is pierced by the arrow
of a hunter, and ascends into His own world. Mithra is slain; and arises
again from the death, the salvation of His people. Jesus is killed; but rises
and ascends to heaven. And all the deaths and resurrections fall at the vernal
equinox.
These innumerable likenesses
cannot grow out of chance; they are the signs of a common story, reappearing
continually. The superficial resemblances leap to the eyes as we turn over
the pages of the world-scriptures, and the more we study, the more do the
common stories reveal themselves, the ever repeated fairy-tales of the World-Legend,[Page
28]
COMMON ETHICS
That sublime morality is
a common possession of the World-Religions is a fact too well established
to need argument. All that is necessary here is to give a few quotations,
enough to indicate the rich veins of metal from which these priceless nuggets
are taken.
Returning Good for
Evil. Manu says: " By forgiveness of evil the learned
are purified"; " Let him not be angry with the angry man; being harshly
addressed, let him speak softly". In the Sãma-Veda: " Cross the passes
difficult to cross; wrath with peace; untruth with truth". The Buddha
teaches: "A man who foolishly does me wrong, I will return to him the
kindness of my ungrudging love; the more evil comes from him, the more
good shall go from me "; "Let a man overcome anger by love; let him
overcome evil by good; let him overcome the greedy by liberality, the liar
by truth"; "Hatred ceaseth not by hatred at any time; hatred ceaseth by
love". Lao-tze says : "The good I would meet with goodness; the not-good
I would meet with goodness also. The faithful I would meet with faith; the
not-faithful, I would meet with faith also; Virtue is faithful. Recompense
evil with kindness". Confucius answered a questioner: "What you do not wish
done to yourself, do not do to others; when you are labouring for others, let
it be with the same zeal as if it were for yourself." Jesus said: "Love your
enemies, bless [Page
29] them
that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully
use you and persecute you".
Humility and Tenderness. Lao-tze says: "By undivided attention to the
passion-nature, and tenderness, it is possible to be a little child. By putting
away of impurity from the hidden eye of the heart, it is possible to be
without spot. There is a purity and quietude by which we may rule the
whole world. To keep tenderness I pronounce strength". "The sage . . .
puts himself last, and yet is first; abandons himself, and yet is preserved.
Is not this from having no selfishness ? Hereby he preserves self-interest
intact. He is not self-displaying, and therefore he shines. He is not self-approving,
and therefore he is distinguished. He is not self-praising, and therefore he
has merit. He is not self-exalting, and therefore he stands high". Jesus teaches: "Except
ye become as little children, ye cannot enter the kingdom of heaven"; "He
that exalteth himself shall be abased, and he that humbleth himself shall be
exalted".
Righteousness more Important than Forms. Manu lays down of action, "mental,
verbal or corporeal" : "Of
that threefold action, be it known in the world that the heart is the instigator"; " To
a man contaminated by sensuality, neither the Vedas, nor liberality, nor sacrifices,
nor observances, nor austerities, will procure felicity". The Buddha says: "It
is the heart of faith accompanying good actions which [Page
30] spreads,
as it were, a beneficent shade, from the world of men to the world of angels".
Jesus complained: "Ye tithe mint and rue, anise and cummin, and have
omitted the weightier matters of the law — justice, mercy and truth".
Thus might I continue
to quote text after text on every virtue, and from the tree of every religion
similar leaves might be plucked. For all teach the same truths; all are
channels of the one life; every scripture repeats the one message, because
there is only one great Brotherhood of Teachers, and each who comes forth
from it speaks with a single language.
Hence
religions are not rivals, and should not be haters of each other. They
are children of a common parent, giving out for the benefit of mankind
the truths they have learned in the ancestral home. There is a real Brotherhood
of Religions, and all who study the religions of the world must recognize the
identity of their teachings. To a comparative mythologist all religions are
equally false, and are outgrowths of ignorance. To a Theosophist all
religions are true, and are the outgrowth of the WISDOM. Each religion has
an equal right to every truth, and none may claim aught as his exclusively,
"Mine, not thine, nor his". Rather is the true word, "Mine, because thine
and his".
There
is one Religion — the knowledge of God, and all religions are
branches of that stem, the Tree of Life, the roots of which are in heaven
while the branches are outspread in the world of men, The [Page
31] heavenly
root is the WISDOM — not faith, not belief, not hope, but the knowledge
of God which is Eternal Life. From any one of its branches a man may pluck
a leaf for the healing of the nations. Let none deny that which to another
man is truth, for he may see a truth which others do not see; but let none
try to impose his own vision on others, lest he should blind them in forcing
them to see what is not in their field of view. There is but one sun, and
every energy on our earth is but some form of solar force; as one sun feeds
the whole earth, so one Self shines in every heart. There is only one
blasphemy — the denial of God in man. There is only one heresy — the
heresy of separateness, which says: "I am other than thou, we are not
one." We need, for the redemption of the world, more than altruism, noble
as that is. We may learn unselfishness, sacrifice, self-surrender, but
we do not stand established in the One, until we can say: "There are no
others; it is my Self in all". When all man say this, the world will have
its Golden Age: when one man says it in life, his presence is a benediction
wherever he goes. We are brothers, but more than brothers. Brothers have
only a common father; we have a common Self. In all around us, then, let
us see the Glory of the Self, and let us remember that to deny the Self
in the lowest, is to deny it in ourselves and in God.