The Religion of the Veda: The Ancient Religion of India (from Rig-Veda to Upanishads) c6.19

c6.19

The student of the History of Religions has good reason to think of India as the land of religions in yet another sense. Not only has India produced out of its own mental resources many important religions and theosophic systems, but it has carried on these processes continuously, uninterrupted by distracting outside influences. The Moghul conquests in Northern India introduced Mohammedanism to a limited extent, and Mohammedanism fused with Hinduism in the hybrid religion of the Sikhs. A small number of Zoroastrian Parsis, driven from Persia during the Mohammedan conquest, found a friendly refuge for themselves and the religion of Zarathushtra (Zoroaster) in the West of India. Aside from that there is no record of permanent outside influence on a larger scale, until, in the last century, the above-mentioned Brāhma Samāj, a kind of religious Volapük, or Esperanto, undertakes, in the most praiseworthy spirit, upon a universal theistic platform, to blend and harmonise the best in Hindu religious thought, with the best that may be found in other religions. In this way Hindu religion is more strictly native than any of the great religions of mankind. This is no doubt due mainly to India's geographical isolation, and to her insular secular history. It has had the merit of keeping her religious development continuous and organic. Every important idea has a traceable past history; every important idea is certain to develop in the future. We may say that a body of 3500 years of organic religious growth lies more or less open before the eyes of the student of India's religions, to dissect, to study, and to philosophise upon.