Vaishnavism, Shaivism and Minor Religious Systems v2.c12.47

v2.c12.47

These two accounts seem to represent two stages in the progress of reform. In the earlier one the worship of Vāsudeva and his three other forms is not known. The Supreme God is named Hari, and his worship has not thoroughly emancipated itself from the religion of sacrifices. The reform had no reference to specific historical personages and was promulgated by certain sages who are called Citraśikhaṇḍins and whose names had been handed down by tradition. The later account connects the reform with Vāsudeva and his brother, son and grandson, and the new religion is represented to have been identical with that taught in the Bhagavadgītā. This reformed system is said to have been promulgated by Nārāyaṇa himself. It thus appears that the idea of a religion of devotion arose in earlier times, but it received a definite shape when Vāsudeva revealed the Gītā to Arjuna, and led to the formation of an independent sect when his brother, son and grandson were associated with him as his forms presiding over certain psychological categories or as persons created by him for the purpose. That sect became conterminous with the race of the Sātvatas. We have now to consider who these Sātvatas were.