History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v5.c71.s1.672

v5.c71.s1.672

⁴¹⁰ The Report on the ‘Doctrine of the Church of England’ published in 1938 by a Commission consisting of some of the highest dignitaries of the English Church makes interesting reading, though to a non-christian the language appears rather full of circumlocution and far from clear and definite. On p. 206 the Report states “The drama of the Last Things as set forth in the medieval ‘Doom’ pictures rests on a tradition which makes use of a more or less literal conception of heaven and hell as specific ‘places’, of which a picture was formed by drawing upon traditional material, more especially the imagery of the Book of Revelation, which is itself largely drawn from Jewish and other pre-christian sources... ......A quasi-literal interpretation of the imagery has in fact generally prevailed among Christians and has been wide-spread even in educated circles almost down to the present day.’ On p. 219 the above Report remarks “As the essence of Hell is exclusion from the fellowship of God, so the essence of Heaven is that fellowship It is not a selfish happiness offered in reward for (*Continued from the last page*) self-suppression at an earlier time, it is fellowship with God who is love ... This is *infinite* bliss to the soul which is purged of self-interest. Heaven is also a fellowship of finite spirits." It will be patent how modern European minds have begun to think of Heaven and Hell in terms analogous to those in which some of the best minds of India thought of them centuries before and after the Christian era. In spite of the glowing pictures of the pleasures of Heaven and terrifying descriptions of the torments of Hell detailed in many of the sacred and popular works in Sanskrit and other Indian languages people have gone on committing all sorts of sins. The ancient machinery of Heavens and Hells must be deemed to have largely failed of its purpose in these days. Large masses of men appear to be slipping into an abyss of despair, misery, hardness of heart, wanton brutality and lawlessness. The lurid accounts of bombings and night raids on big cities, the reports of the bloody battles for six years in the World War No. 2, the harrowing tales of tortures in such prisoners' camps as at Belsen, the phenomenal rise in the prices of all necessities of life (food, clothing and shelter), frequent strikes and struggles between the employed and the industrialists, growing indiscipline, arson, plunder and bestial treatment of human beings on the ground of race or religion have produced hardness of heart and debased large masses of Indian people. It is a very difficult question for our leaders how to revive among the common people of India, (whom Westerners dubbed mild Hindus) the old characteristics of tolerance, peacefulness, goodwill and respect for human life and property, how to build up a new fabric of society, a new civilization and culture on the ancient Upaniṣadic foundations of the pursuit of Reality, brotherhood of man, the unity of all life, and love of mankind even without pressing into service the ancient and medieval literal conceptions of Heaven and Hell.