The Ancient and Medieval Architecture of India: A Study of Indo-Aryan Civilisation c15.15

c15.15

The profound critical error which Western writers have made is in supposing that these new court fashions, imported from the West, were any more inspiring to Indo-Aryan artists at the beginning of the Christian era than the "styles" of architecture, principles of anatomy and perspective now taught in Indian schools of art. As a historical chapter in Indian art the Gandharan school is only the Mahâ-Nirvana Tantra, after giving elaborate rules for the consecration and worship of images, adds the warning : “Those who (in their ignorance) believe that Ishwara is (only) in images of clay, or stone, or metal, or wood, merely trouble themselves by their tapas. They can never attain liberation without knowledge. . . . Yoga is the union of the embodied soul with the Supreme Soul ; Pûjâ is the union of the worshipper and the worshipped ; but he who realises that all things are Brahman, for him there is neither Yoga nor Pûjâ.”¹