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[edit] Sri-Narayana, Siva Narayana

This Unitarian body in Eastern Bengal styles itself Sri-narayana, the name of God, and repudiates that of Siva-narayana, the name of the founder.

The Dacca Mahant alleges that the peculiar doctrines of his congretation have prevailed for eleven hundred and forty-five years; and that their Grantha, or book, was unintelligible until Sitala, an inspired Sannyasi, translated it in compliance with a divine command. The translation, consisting of several works in the Devanagari character, is the undoubted composition of the Rajput Sivanarayana of Ghazipur, who wrote it about A.D. 1735.1

The most important of these works are the Guru-nyasa, and Santa-vilasa. The former, compiled from the Puranas, gives an account of the ten Avatars of Vishnu, or Narayana, and is sub-divided into fourteen chapters, of which the first six treat of the author, of faith, of the punishment of sinners, of virtue, of a future state, and of discipline. The latter is a treatise on moral sentiments. The opening lines are, "The love of God, and His knowledge, is the only true understanding."

The Sri-narayanas profess the worship of one God, of whom no attributes are predicated. They pay no regard to any objects of Hindu or Muhammedan veneration, and are more strict Unitarians than either the Sadas, or Satnamis. Polygamy is prohibited, and sobriety, virtue, and charity inculcated. They strive to be tolerant, and not to wound the feelings of any sect by openly scoffing at their religious ceremonies. Finally, they admit all classes and races within the pale, and even half castes, or Eurasians, are occasionally enrolled. In Dacca the large majority of the Sri-narayanas are Dosads, Dhobis, Chamars, and other equally low castes.

As with most Hindu sects there are three grades, the Mahant, the holymen, called Sants,1 and the laity.

The Mahant, or head of the Dacca congregation, a Patit Hindustani Brahman, asserts that when a boy he accompanied Ram Mohan Rai to England. He initiates disciples by whispering a "mantra" into their ear, and presenting them with a parwanah, or certificate of membership.

The Sants are numerous, but as it is not necessary to relinquish worldly occupations, a person working at any trade or profession may become one, on paying a fee of thirty rupees, and on giving presents of muslin to the Mahant, and a feast to all Sants attending.

Sants are objects of reverence, and whenever one dies in a strange place, the Sants on the spot subscribe and bury him. The funeral procession is impressive, but very noisy. The corpse wrapped in a sheet with a roll of cloth wound round the head is deposited on a covered litter. Red flags flutter from the four corners, and a white cloth acts as a pall. With discordant music, and loud singing, the body is carried to the grave, dug in some waste place, where it is laid flat, not sitting as with the Jogis. The bodies of the lay brethren, on the other hand, are always burned.

The chief festival of the Sri-narayanas is held on the Sri-panchami and following day, in Magh (Jan.-Feb.). The Santa, along with representatives of many of the low Hindustani castes, resort to a thatched house, called the Dhamghar, having one large room with verandahs on all sides. At one end is a raised earthen platform on which the open Grantha, garlanded with flowers, is laid, and before this each disciple makes obeisance as he enters. The congregation squats all round the room, the women in one corner, listening to a few musicians chanting religions hymns and smoking tobacco and ganjha, indifferent to the heat, smoke, and stench of the crowded room. The Mahant, escorted by the Sants carrying their parwanas, enters about 1 a.m., when the service begins. It is of the simplest form. The Mahant, after reading a few sentences in Nagari, unintelligible to most of his hearers, receives offerings of money and fruit. The congregation then disperses, but the majority seat themselves in the verandahs and drink spirits. If the physical endurance of the worshippers be not exhausted, similar services are held for several successive nights, but the ordinary one only lasts two nights.

It is sad to think that a religious body, established as a protest against idolatry and the polytheism of the masses, should have so rapidly and so utterly failed to preserve its original standard; but it has only followed in the same downward path all the reformed Vaishnava and saiva sects. The Sri-narayan creed, however, has encountered peculiar difficulties, against which it has succumbed. The lower Hindu castes, ever willing to repudiate Brahmanical interference, and assert spiritual independence, have always been notorious for profligacy and intemperate habits. Intoxication is with them an irresistible passion, and no threats or corrections have the slightest effect in weaning them from the vice. Faithful servants, kind parents, and affectionate husbands, they have no conception of a moral religion; and their untutored minds can neither understand nor comply with a faith inculcating morality and the mortification of all wordly lusts and passions.

1 From Sanskrit Santa, calmed, free from passions.

1 Wilson's "Religious Sects of the Hindus," i, 358. The 1145 years was at first 1145 of the Bengali era, corresponding to A.D. 1738. Buchanan, ii, 137.

[edit] Notes