From considerations like these, not to speak of others that might be urged, we are led to conclude that Krish- naism proper was post-Christian, an outcropping of hu- man and possibly of diabolic nature, that was illustra- ted at tlie foot of Sinai, but which no more resembled its divine original than the lifeless golden calf resembled the living Apis of Egypt. As in the pitiable blur of a palimijsest, Krishnaism has replaced or obscured that which was more precious — the rehgion of Christ, found- ed no less in impregnable truth than in the undying necessities of men. For at the rise of this false religion it is iilain to us that the light of Christianity was re- flected already on the sky of India — light that was sadly jierverted to set forth a feeble caricature of the incarna- tion and life of Christ.
6. As the tenor of our argument has indicated, the criticism of the present age is tlisposed to assign a re- cent origin to Krishnaism, though, at the same time, it does not ignore the existenco of a hero bearing the name of Krishna conspicuous in the early and fabulous history of India. It may be of interest to the reader to have presented somewhat mor6 in detail tlx; views of some of the scholars of the present centurj', conflicting and confused thougli tiiey be, upon the general subject of the relations of Krishnaism to Christiiinity as well as profane rehgions. Arclideacon Hardwick thinks
that the resemblances are no greater than the outward and fortuitous resemblances between other heathen deities, or between some of them and Christ. He illustrates by the incident of the persecution of Her- cules in his infancy by Juno; the dancing of the milk- maids and satyrs of Bacchus, which compares -with that of Krishna ; the concealing of lipoUo in the house- hold of Admetus. He says further, " If Krishna is to be regarded as a purely human and historical hero, doomed to death m childhood from forebodings that his life ^vould prove the ruin of another, we can find his parallel in the elder Cyrus, who had also been in- trusted to the care of herdsmen to preserve him from the vengeance of his royal grandfather, whose death it was foretold he shoidd ultimately accomplish" (i, 285, 286). Colonel Wilford supposes Krislma to have lived about B.C. 1300. Sir William Jones says the story of his birth is long anterior to the birth of Christ, and traces it probably to the time of Homer. He thinks it likely that the spurious gospels of the early age of Christianity were brought to India, and the wildest parts of them repeated to the Hindus, who ingrafted them on the old fable of Kesava, the Apollo of India (Asiatic Pesearches, i, 274). Mr. Bentley (Hindu As- tronomy), in contradiction to Mr. II. Colebrooke, Sir AVilUam Jones, major Moor, and others, boldly charges the whole history of the incarnation of Krishna as a "modern invention" and "fabrication" of the Brah- mans, who, alarmed at the progress of Christianity, in- vented a story not unlike that of Christ, and affixed a name somewhat similar to the hero of it ; all of which they threw back to a very remote age, that it might be impossible successful!}' to contradict it, and then repre- sented that Christ and Krishna were the same person, of whose history the Christians had an incorrect ver- sion. Blr. J. C. Thompson thinks that Ivrishna ante- dates the Brahmanical triad — Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva — and that his great exploits occasioned him later in Aryan history to be identified wdth Vishnu (p. 134). Lassen, an eminent Oriental scholar, refers the origin of the system of avatars, as disclosed in Vishnu, to a period of time at least three centuries before Christ ; while Weber, equally distinguished as a critic, contro- verts his views, and argues that Krishna, the hero or demigod, was no mcarnation, and differed vastly from the Krishna of later times. (See farther Haidwick, ibid, i, 288, note.)
V. Literature. — The "Mahahharata," translated into French by Fauche (Paris, 1803), book x, which is appro- priated to the life of Krishna; the "Bhagavad Gita," episode of the preceding (Wilkins's, 1785, and Thomson's, 1855, transl. into English, and Wm. Schlegel's transla- tion into Latin, 1823) ; the "Vishnu Purdna" (translated by H. H.Wilson, 1842 and 1866, 6 vols.); the '' Maga- vata Purdna" (translated into French by Burnouf, Paris, 1840) ; the " Ilari Vansa" (transl. into French by Lan- glois, Paris, 1842) ; "Analysis of the Agni Purana," in the Journ. of As. Soc. of Bengal, i, 81 ; "Analysis of the Brahma Vaivartha Purana," ibid, -p. 217; also Asiatic Researches, passim, especially vol. xv and xvi; Hard- wick, Christ and other Masters, i, 246-258, 277-293— a valuable and easily accessible resume of the whole sub- ject; H. II. Wilson, Peligion of the Hindus, vol. ii, pas- sim ; Hoefer, Biographie Cenerale, art. Crichnie ; J. I>. Guigniaut, 7?e%«o«A' de VAntiquite, vol. i, bk. i, ch. iii; P. F. Stuhr, Religions systeme der heidnischen Volker des Orients (Berlin, 1836-38, 2 vols. 8vo); M. Pavie, Z/Z/w^a- vat Dasam Askand (Paris, 1852); W. von Humboldt, Ueber die unter dem Namen Bhagavad Gita lekannte Episode des Mahabharata (Berlin, 1826) ; A. Rcmusat, Melanges Asiatiques (Paris, 1825-1829. 4 vols.); P. von Bohlen, Das A Ite Indien (2 vols., 1830-31); Christ. Las- sen,//ifkse/ic Alterthumskunde (4 vols., 1844r-46, chiefly vol. ii); A. F. Weber, /«f/isc/ic?^ Studien (10 vols., 1849- 67, especially the two first vols.) ; Indische Hkitzzen (Berlin, 1857), particularly the essay Die Verbindungen Indiens mit den Ldndern im, Westen; Coleman, Mgthol-