(...Contd)

I shall be treading on difficult and controverted ground in what I am going to say. To what extent has this cult of the God-Man been influenced by Christianity and by the unique position of Christ as Teacher, Mediator, and Redeemer in the Christian religion?
Certainly the doctrine of Bhakti in its essentials is expressed in the Gita. The Gita, as we know it, is generally accepted to have been completed in about 200 B.C. The doctrine of the Fatherhood of God and of salvation through His love and the forgiveness which He gratuitously gives to the repentant is, therefore, part of the Indian tradition. The Vedic tradition itself is rich in examples of this Ishvarin concept. But the Bhakti ideal received its most passionate expression at a much later period. Christianity had come into India, we believe, from the time of the Apostles themselves. There is must less scepticism now in regard to the coming of St. Thomas into India than there used to be.

Political Humanism
The third stream may be called the stream of political humanism. It came with the modern impact between Europe and India, particularly with the introduction of English education more than a hundred years ago.
In reality, it was not merely political humanism, it was also a religious humanism as I have just indicated. It led to those important reformist movements in Hinduism whose influence on Modern India is a matter of everyday knowledge.
But the most far-reaching effect of this impact was undoubtedly on the political and social level. It revitalized certain dormant democratic traditions of Indian life and developed into the concept of the democratic state as understood in the West.
It started the great movements of social reform -- the improvement in the status of women and the abolition of untouchability etc. of which Mahatma Gandhi was the foremost exponent.
I am not concerned with the purely practical results of this political humanism. For our present purpose, it is enough to state that doctrine of the dignity of the human person, the equality of all men and the necessity for recognising this equality not only within the family and the communality circle, but on the civic and national plane, is part of the cultural makeup of the India of today.
But although for purposes of simplification, this latest phase of humanism may be described as political humanism, in reality, it goes much farther and covers a wider ground. It embraces not only man but the entire world of nature. It brings back the naturalism which marks the earliest traditions of Indian art. But to the naturalism of vision and portrayal it adds the element of scientific curiosity, the desire to penetrate the secrets of nature, to harness its forces to the service of man.
All this has led to the scientific renaissance of India which is one of the features of our culture today. Along with this goes the realistic movement in all other aspects of intellectual activity, in literature, for instance -- in the realism of our social novels and dreams; in philosophy -- in the realism which is an important element in the powerful influence of Aurobindo Ghose, the most prominent opponent of the doctrine of the unreality of the world in Modern India.