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| The Hindu Phenomenon |
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HINDU NATIONALISM : THE FIRST PHASE |
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| Keshub
Chandra Sen provides a fascinating example of how the Hindus coped
with the Christian and the Western challenge. He was a great admirer
of Christ so much so that it was believed by, among others, Max
Mueller that he was ready to be converted. And not without reason.
For he said: "It is Christ who rules British India, and not
the British Government. England has sent out a tremendous moral
force in the life and character of that mighty prophet, to conquer
and hold this vast empire. None but Jesus ever deserved this bright,
this precious diadem, India, and Jesus shall have it."11
Yet Keshub Chandra was strongly attracted and influenced by
Ramakrishna Paramhansa, the teacher of S wami Vivekanand and the
first of the great saints of the modern period who have helped shape
the India we know.
David Kopf gives three reasons for this attraction which deserve attention. First, Ramakrishna was not susceptible to formal education, English or indigenous; this separated him from other Brahmos of whatever ideological bent. Secondly, Ramakrishna's Tantric way of sublimating the sensual drive for women into a spiritual drive for the Divine Mother appealed to Keshub Chandra. Third, Ramakrishna claimed to have experienced direct, intuitive contact with all major religious leaders in history. "In this sense, the Hindu Ramakrishna was perhaps more universalist and Brahmo than most of the Brahmo ascetics, who were narrowly Vaishnava." These three aspects of Ramakrishna's career as a mystic were probably strong influences on Keshub from March 1875 onwards, when the two men presumably first met at the Kali temple at Dakshineshwar. Keshub was intrigued by the religious experiments performed by Ramakrishna, and wished to adapt them to his own use, especially those elements of the Sakto tradition in Bengal that emphasized the motherhood of God. (See David Kopf, The Brahmo Samaj and the Shaping of the Modern Indian Mind.)12
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| About Hindu Nationalism: The First Phase |
