The religion specially identified with Persia is Zoroastrianism, and the B. of Zoroastrianism ia commonly kno«Ti as Zend-Avesta. Properly, how- ever, 'Avesta' is the text, — like the Indian 'V'eda' it means 'knowledge,' — and 'Zend' is the com- mentary or annotation upon it. The commentary is in a diflerent language from the text. The latter consisted originallj* of 21 books, but practi- cally only one of these has survived. It consists of three parts — the Yasna, a collection of liturgies along with some hymns ; the Visperad, consisting of sacrificial litanies ; and the Veudidad, an ancient law book, with which are incorporated a number of legendary narratives. While the prevailing character of the Zend-Avesta is that rather of a book of devotion than of the records of a religion, a Bible in our sense, there is discernible within it a variety of religious conceptions which illustrate its essentially composite character. At the same time it contains many passages of an extremely noble and spiritual cliaracter, and the religion of which it is the monument has had no inconsider- able influence upon both Judaism and Christianity.
The only other sacred book of the first rank which it is necessary for us to notice is the Koran of the Moliainmedans. The name signifies ' read- ing.' It has already been remarked that the Koran difiers from other sacred literatures in being the production of one man. Mohammed is its author, the revelations being wTitten down by the followers of the prophet, after whose death the fragments were gathered together and formed, unfortunately with a total lack of arrangement, into the unity of a single book. The attunipts of modern scholars to set the suras or cha[)ter8 in chronological order has largely increased the interest of the book, and thrown light upon the spiritual development of the prophet himself. In such an arrangement the earliest utterances are seen to be full of emotional fire, brief, poetic, pointed. The later are longer and more prosaic, dealing with all varieties of subjects, personal and domestic, ciWl as well as religiou.s. They contain
BIBLE
also elements drawn from Jewish and Christian sources. Yet the Koran throughout claims to be inspired in the strictest sense, its words are the words of God Himself.
II. The Bible in relation to the Litera- ture OF OTHER Religions. — What, then, is the relation of the literature thus briefly described to the Christian Scriptures? It is not necessary to depreciate the former in order to exalt the latter. We have already noted that there is wisdom, truth, and spirituality in these books of non- Christian faiths. They and the religions with which they are connected have been the light of generations of human beings. They are associ- ated with the civilisations of the world and its great historical e])0chs. What we have now to ask is, whether, a[>art from the question of Divine Revelation, to which we sliall presently advert, any of them possess the qualities fitting them to become the sacred books of the world, or whether the B., from this point of view, has any manifest superiority over them ? If we turn to Confucian- ism and its authoritative literature, we find every- where a consecration of the past, even where it is not understood, which is the deadly enemy of progress ; the life of the people is bound in fetters of nabit and ceremony which political chanr;es and revolutions have not sufficed to break. Ihe characteristics of the Chinese mind, with its want of comprehensiveness, and excessive attention to minute detail, are reflected in its ' classics.' Moral and spiritual life is crushed out under the burden of external precepts and directions, and there is a determined adherence to the level of the purely human, an avoidance of all reference to the divine, which ignores and tends to mutilate the higher side of man's being, and to deprive him of an ideal. It is no wonder that the mysticism of the Tao-ti-Kin;j had an attraction for those out of whom the spiritual life was not wholly crushed. But Taoism, notwithstanding its philosophical and ethical excellences, 'as a religion is a dismal failure, and shows how little philosophy and morals can do without a historical religious framework to support them ' (Menzies). The sacred literature of India is characterised not only by its immense extent, but bj the great variety of standpoints re- presented in it. What failed to meet tlie wants of a single people can scarcely be exj>ected to satisfy the entire iiuman race. The \ edic hymns ex- hibit the instability of polytheism, 'llie Brah- manic system endeavoured to meet this defect by means of its philosophical developments ; but in so doing unfitted itself to be a popular religion. Hence India, during the supremacy of Brahmanism, had in reality two religions, the sjieculative and the idolatrous and mythical. The separation be- tween the two tended to intensify tlieir several peculiarities, as well as to degrade the popular faith— a difliculty which was only partially met by the incarnation ideas which emerge in tiie great Epics. Even Buddhism, which presents a personal object of aflection and imitation to the worshiijper, is condemned by its onesidedness. If in Con- fucianism we have a religious i)Ositivism which will not look at the Divine, in Buddhism we have an agnosticism which cannot find it. It is a religion of despair ; it cannot become the spring of human eflbrt, jiromote civilisation, or contribute to social progress. The sacred books which have sprung np on soil like this, reflecting the peculiarities of their origin, must be held a.s falling short of the required conditions on which alone they could supersede all others. Zoroastrianism as a religion may be said to be already dead, modern I'arsism being a conipa; atively uninfluontial modiliration of it. The Zend-Avesta is of interest, as we have seen, for the noble elements contained in it, and