The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great c33.61

c33.61

The brief reign of Bijjala, the usurping rebel, which terminated by abdication or death in A. D. 1167, was marked by a religious revolution effected by a revival of the cult of Siva and the foundation of a new sect, the Vīra Saivas, or Lingāyats, which is a power to this day.³ Bijjala was a Jain, and, according to one version of the legend, he wantonly blinded two holy men of the Lingāyat sect, and was assassinated in consequence in the year A. D. 1167. The blood of the saints proved, as usual, to be the seed of the church, which had been founded by Basava, the Brahman minister of Bijjala. But in other legends the tale is told quite differently, and the truth of the matter seems to be past finding out. There is, however, no doubt that the rise of the Lingāyats dates from the time of Bijjala. The members of the sect, who are especially numerous in the Kanarese districts, worship Siva in his phallic form, reject the authority of the Vedas, disbelieve in the doctrine of re-birth, object to child-marriage, approve of the re-marriage of widows, and cherish an intense aversion to Brahmans, notwithstanding the fact that the founder of their religion was himself a Brahman.