252
RISE OF HINDUISM.
Shrinescommonto variousfaiths.
Adam’s
Peak.
doctrines of Brahmanism to China and Japan , together withcertain features of Indian religious art. The snake ornamenta-tion, which figures so universally in the Hindu religion ofIndia , is said to have been carried by Buddhism alike tothe east and the west. Thus, the canopy or baldachino overBuddha ’s head delights in twisted pillars and wavy pat-terns. These wave-like ornaments are conventionalized intocloud curves in most of the Chinese and Japanese canopies ;but some of them still exhibit the original figures thussymbolized as undulating serpents or Nagas. A serpentbaldachino of this sort may be seen in a monastery atNingpo. 1 It takes the place of the cobra-headed canopy,which in Hinduism shelters the head of Siva , or of Vishnu ashe slept upon the waters at the creation of the world. Thetwisted columns which support the baldachino at St. Peter’sin Rome, and the fluted ornamentation so common overProtestant pulpits, are said to have a serpentine origin, andan Eastern source. The association of Buddha with two otherfigures, in the Japanese temples, perhaps represents a recol-lection of the Brahman Triad. The Brahmanical idea oftrinity, in its Buddhist development as Buddha , Dharma(the Law), and Sangha (the Congregation), deeply penetratesthe Buddhism of Japan . The Sacred Tooth of Buddha atCeylon is a reproduction of the phallic linga of India .
Buddhism readily coalesced with the pre-existing religionsof primitive races. Thus, among the hill tribes of EasternBengal, we see the Khyaungthas, or ‘ Children of the River,’passing into Buddhists without giving up their aboriginal rites.They still offer rice and fruits and flowers to the spirits of hilland stream ; 2 and the Buddhist priests, although condemningthe custom as unorthodox, do not very violently oppose it.In Japan , a Buddhist saint visited the hill-slope of HotokeIwa in 767 a.d. ; declared the local Shinto deity to be only amanifestation of Buddha ; and so converted the old idolatroushigh-place into a Buddhist shrine. Buddhism has thus servedas a link between the ancient faiths of India and the modernworship of the Eastern world. It has given sanctity to thecentres of common pilgrimage, to which the great faiths ofAsia resort. Thus, the Siva -worshippers ascend the top ofAdam’s Peak in Ceylon , to adore the footprint of their phallicgod, the Sivapada; the Buddhists repair to the spot to revere
1 The authority for this statement is an unpublished drawing shown tome by Miss Gordon Cumming.
2 See my Statistical Account of Bengal, vol. vi. p. 40, etc.