Obscure Religious Cults as Background of Bengali Literature c16.2

c16.2

Another obscure religious cult, that has influenced the growth of Bengali literature to a considerable extent from an ealry period of its history, is Nāthism. As an All-India religious movement Nāthism enjoyed and is still enjoying immense popularity and it influenced the growth of many other modern Indian literatures in the early and the middle periods. The religious and literary history of Nāthism in Bengal is, therefore, intimately connected with that of many other provinces of India as also of the Himalayan regions like Nepal and Tibet. There are many yogic texts in Sanskrit either directly ascribed to the Nāth-gurus (mainly to Gorakh-nāth), or somehow associated with the cult. The Nāth literature in the vernaculars consists mainly of longer narrative poems of the nature of ballads and also stray songs. A general survey of the nature and extent of Nāth literature with particular reference to Bengali will be found in the Appendix (B).