New Ideas in India During the Nineteenth Century - A Study of Social, Political, and Religious Developments by John Morrison
page 95 of 233 (40%)
page 95 of 233 (40%)
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As yet the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j has remained unaffected by the political
aspect of the new national feeling. Early in its history there was, indeed, a section of the Sam[=a]j resolved to limit the selection of scriptures to the scriptures of the Hindus, but the late Keshub Chunder Sen successfully asserted the freedom of the Sam[=a]j, and probably saved it from the narrow patriotic groove and from the political character of the third of the new religious organisations, the [=A]rya Sam[=a]j. [Sidenote: Pr[=a]rthan[=a] Sam[=a]jes or Prayer Associations of S.W. India.] _The Pr[=a]rthan[=a] Sam[=a]jes_ or Prayer Associations of South-Western India.--The history of India is pre-eminently the history of Northern India, that is of the great plains of the Ganges and the Punjab. One may test it by the simple academical test of reckoning what percentage of marks in an examination on Indian history is assigned to the events of the great northern plains. It is the same in the more recent religious history of India. The southern provinces of Bombay and Madras have contributed very little in respect of new religious life, organised or unorganised, compared with the northern provinces of Bengal, the United Provinces, and the Punjab. The Pr[=a]rthan[=a] Sam[=a]jes or Prayer Associations of Bombay and South-western India are monotheistic like the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j, and have their halls for their own worship. But socially they have not severed themselves from their Hindu brethren, and do not figure in the Census as separate. Even compared with the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j, they are few in number. The first Pr[=a]rthan[=a] Sam[=a]j was founded in Bombay in 1867. In Madras there is a small representation of the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j. |
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