Page:An Essay On Hinduism.pdf/68

ness" in India, and that there was no "Hindu dharma." To that I may add that there was no need for Hindu consciousness, and secondly, it was not possible that it should have come into existence.

There was no need for any Hindu consciousness because the tribes outside India and their civilization were capable of mixing easily with the people and civilization of India. As all the different tribes in India had exchanged their civilization and formed a common civilization, so with the meeting of other tribes in Central Asia, Hinduism would have become expanded and modified. Hindus had a larger social philosophy and social consciousness beyond the consciousness of tribe and vama. It was a "Mānava," or human consciousness. They were in fact developing a dharma for humanity, but this process was arrested by the rise of the two narrow heresies of semitic origin.

Of these two systems, the one which made its existence felt in India, first, is Mohamedanism.

When the Mohamedans came, they called all people who were in India, but who did not belong to Mohamedan religion, Hindus. The foreigners, at this time, had a "religion" of their own and their own priesthood. They not only denied the authority of the Vedas, but regarded Vedas themselves and other Hindu shāstras as heathen documents. To them the sacred Brāhmaṇa was nothing short of an infidel. All castes and tribes which did not acknowledge Mohamedan religion were Hindus. In Persian language, as I understand, Hindu means an infidel, unfaithful, black, and so forth. To Hindus and specially to Brāhmaṇas the Mohamedans were extremely impure. Mohamedans were noted for their cruelty, and are so even to-day, to a certain extent. The actions of cruelty,