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Leila's Books
THE ORIENTAL CHRIST
THE ORIENTAL CHRIST
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an excerpt from the beginning of the PREFACE:
I HAVE often asked myself what right I have to handle the life of Christ. The answer has been uniform. My spirit craves to utter itself on that endless theme. I anticipate the disapproval of authoritative ecclesiastics. I foresee the surprise of one-sided theists. I have a clear prevision of the sarcasm and reproach of clear-headed combative scholars. But my line of speculation scarcely coincides with theirs. Mine are but human prayerful endeavors to realize the character and spirit of the Son of God. Mine are but attempts to accept, assimilate, and embody ideal humanity. The Bible has been my guide; and devout thinkers, both living and dead, have been my companions. I pretend not to criticise, far less to teach! In my long wanderings and solitudes, in my dark isolations and seasons of spiritual exile, I have labored to seek, and rejoiced to find, pure, simple, glorious manhood in the Son of Man. And I feel constrained to speak on the subject to the spirit of the living, and the dead, and the unborn. If I stand before the tribunal of the times, it is not as a man assuming superiority, teachership, or wisdom over any, but simply as one uttering aloud his own thoughts.
Nearly twenty years ago, my troubles, studies, and circumstances forced upon me the question of personal relationship to Christ. Though for a short time taught in a government college in Calcutta, where no moral or religious instruction is ever given, and where, on the contrary, a good deal of the opposite influence is directly and indirectly imbibed, I was early awakened to a sense of deep inner unworthiness. Placed in youth by the side of a very pure and powerful character, whose external conditions were similar to my own, I was helped to feel — in the freshness of my susceptibilities, by the law of contrast — that I was painfully imperfect, and needed very much the grace of a saving God. In the Brahmo Somaj, this consciousness of imperfection soon developed into a strong sense of sin. The doctrine of original corruption never preoccupied my boyhood or youth, the fear of eternal punishment never biassed my thought or aspiration. I was never taught to feel any undue leaning toward the Christian Scriptures, or the Christian religion. Mine was a strong unforced consciousness of natural and acquired unworthiness. Keshub Chunder Sen's early melancholy had, perhaps, an effect on me. No doubt, his severe morality affected and partly moulded my character. The influence of Christian doctrines might perhaps be diffused in the moral atmosphere of the land of my birth. Definite recollection, or conscious analysis does not give me any clue into how or why it was. But this I do very clearly remember that as the sense of sin grew on me, and with it a deep miserable restlessness,, a necessity of reconciliation between aspiration and practice, I was mysteriously led to feel a personal affinity to the spirit of Christ. The whole subject of the life and death of Christ had for me a marvellous sweetness and fascination. I repeat, I can never account for this. Untaught by any one, not sympathized with even by the very best of my friends, often discouraged and ridiculed, I persisted in according to Christ a tenderness of honor which arose in my heart unbidden. I prayed, I fasted at Christmas and Easter times. I secretly hunted the book-shops of Calcutta to gather the so-called likenesses of Christ. I did not know, I cared not to think, whither all this would lead.
About the year 1867, a very painful period of spiritual isolation overtook me. I have repeatedly during such seasons lost the sympathy of friends, and sought my God alone. But one of the severest trials was at the time to which I make allusion. I was almost alone in Calcutta. My inward trials and travails had really reached a crisis. It was a weekday evening, I forget the date now. The gloomy and haunted shades of the summer evening had suddenly thickened into darkness; and all things, both far and near, had assumed an unearthly mysteriousness. I sat near the large lake in the Hindu College compound. Above me rose in a sombre mass the giant, grim, old seesum tree, under the far-spreading foliage of which I have played so often, and my father played before me. A sobbing, gusty wind swam over the water's surface, the ripples sounded on the grassy bank, the breeze rustled in the highest regions of the great tree. My eyes, nearly closed, were yet dreamily conscious of the gloomy calmness of the scenery. I was meditating on the state of my soul, on the cure of all spiritual wretchedness, the brightness and peace unknown to me, which was the lot of God's children. I prayed and besought heaven. I cried, and shed hot tears....
I HAVE often asked myself what right I have to handle the life of Christ. The answer has been uniform. My spirit craves to utter itself on that endless theme. I anticipate the disapproval of authoritative ecclesiastics. I foresee the surprise of one-sided theists. I have a clear prevision of the sarcasm and reproach of clear-headed combative scholars. But my line of speculation scarcely coincides with theirs. Mine are but human prayerful endeavors to realize the character and spirit of the Son of God. Mine are but attempts to accept, assimilate, and embody ideal humanity. The Bible has been my guide; and devout thinkers, both living and dead, have been my companions. I pretend not to criticise, far less to teach! In my long wanderings and solitudes, in my dark isolations and seasons of spiritual exile, I have labored to seek, and rejoiced to find, pure, simple, glorious manhood in the Son of Man. And I feel constrained to speak on the subject to the spirit of the living, and the dead, and the unborn. If I stand before the tribunal of the times, it is not as a man assuming superiority, teachership, or wisdom over any, but simply as one uttering aloud his own thoughts.
Nearly twenty years ago, my troubles, studies, and circumstances forced upon me the question of personal relationship to Christ. Though for a short time taught in a government college in Calcutta, where no moral or religious instruction is ever given, and where, on the contrary, a good deal of the opposite influence is directly and indirectly imbibed, I was early awakened to a sense of deep inner unworthiness. Placed in youth by the side of a very pure and powerful character, whose external conditions were similar to my own, I was helped to feel — in the freshness of my susceptibilities, by the law of contrast — that I was painfully imperfect, and needed very much the grace of a saving God. In the Brahmo Somaj, this consciousness of imperfection soon developed into a strong sense of sin. The doctrine of original corruption never preoccupied my boyhood or youth, the fear of eternal punishment never biassed my thought or aspiration. I was never taught to feel any undue leaning toward the Christian Scriptures, or the Christian religion. Mine was a strong unforced consciousness of natural and acquired unworthiness. Keshub Chunder Sen's early melancholy had, perhaps, an effect on me. No doubt, his severe morality affected and partly moulded my character. The influence of Christian doctrines might perhaps be diffused in the moral atmosphere of the land of my birth. Definite recollection, or conscious analysis does not give me any clue into how or why it was. But this I do very clearly remember that as the sense of sin grew on me, and with it a deep miserable restlessness,, a necessity of reconciliation between aspiration and practice, I was mysteriously led to feel a personal affinity to the spirit of Christ. The whole subject of the life and death of Christ had for me a marvellous sweetness and fascination. I repeat, I can never account for this. Untaught by any one, not sympathized with even by the very best of my friends, often discouraged and ridiculed, I persisted in according to Christ a tenderness of honor which arose in my heart unbidden. I prayed, I fasted at Christmas and Easter times. I secretly hunted the book-shops of Calcutta to gather the so-called likenesses of Christ. I did not know, I cared not to think, whither all this would lead.
About the year 1867, a very painful period of spiritual isolation overtook me. I have repeatedly during such seasons lost the sympathy of friends, and sought my God alone. But one of the severest trials was at the time to which I make allusion. I was almost alone in Calcutta. My inward trials and travails had really reached a crisis. It was a weekday evening, I forget the date now. The gloomy and haunted shades of the summer evening had suddenly thickened into darkness; and all things, both far and near, had assumed an unearthly mysteriousness. I sat near the large lake in the Hindu College compound. Above me rose in a sombre mass the giant, grim, old seesum tree, under the far-spreading foliage of which I have played so often, and my father played before me. A sobbing, gusty wind swam over the water's surface, the ripples sounded on the grassy bank, the breeze rustled in the highest regions of the great tree. My eyes, nearly closed, were yet dreamily conscious of the gloomy calmness of the scenery. I was meditating on the state of my soul, on the cure of all spiritual wretchedness, the brightness and peace unknown to me, which was the lot of God's children. I prayed and besought heaven. I cried, and shed hot tears....
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