It cannot be shewn that the motive leading to what is called sacred prostitution was the same in all countries; in India, for example, it appears to have had very much to do with the desire for children which we have described as common with the easterns; so common was it that the one object of woman’s life was marriage and a family. This, and the more rapid development of the female in that part of the world than in others, and the impression that dying childless she would fail to fulfil her mission lies at the basis of the early betrothals and marriages which appear so repulsive and absurd to European ideas. There is a further desire, however, than that of simply having children, especially in India; the desire is for male children, and where these fail, it is common for a man to adopt a son, and in this his motive is a religious one. According to prevalent superstition, it is held that the future beatitude of the Hindu depends upon the performance of his obsequies, and payment of his debts, by a son, as a means of redeeming him from an instant state of suffering after death. The dread is of a place called Put, a place of horror, to which the manes of the childless are supposed to be doomed; there to be tormented with hunger and thirst, for want of those oblations of food, and libations of water, at prescribed periods, which it is the pious and indispensable duty of a son to offer.
The “Laws of Manu” (Ch. ix., 138), state:—“A son delivers his father from the hell called Put, he was therefore called puttra (a deliverer from Put) by the Self-existent (Svayambhû) himself.” The sage Mandagola is represented as desiring admission to a region of bliss, but repulsed by the guards who watch the abode of progenitors, because he had no male issue. The “Laws of Manu” illustrate this by the special mention of heaven being attained without it as of something extraordinary. Ch. v., 159, “Many thousands of Brahmanas, who were chaste from their youth, have gone to heaven without continuing their race.”
Sir Thomas Strange, many years ago Chief Justice of Madras, wrote very fully concerning the Hindu law of inheritance and adoption, and we learn from this great authority that marriage failing in this, its most important object (that is to say securing male issue), in order that obsequies in particular might not go unperformed, and celestial bliss be thereby forfeited, as well for ancestors as for the deceased, dying without leaving legitimate issue begotten, the old law was provident to excess, whence the different sorts of sons enumerated by different authorities, all resolving themselves, with Manu, into twelve, that is the legally begotten, and therefore not to be separately accounted:—all formerly, in their turn and order, capable of succession, for the double purpose of obsequies, and of inheritance. Failing a son, a Hindu’s obsequies may be performed by his widow; or in default of her, by a whole brother or other heirs; but according to the conception belonging to the subject, not with the same benefit as by a son. That a son, therefore, of some description is, with him, in a spiritual sense, next to indispensable is abundantly certain. As for obtaining one in a natural way, there is an express ceremony that takes place at the expiration of the third month of pregnancy, marking distinctly the importance of a son born, so is the adopting of one as anxiously inculcated where prayers and ceremonies for the desired issue have failed in their effect.
The extreme importance to the Hindu of having male offspring, and the desire to get such children as the result of marriage rather than by adoption—a practice allowed and inculcated as a last resort, has led to that extensive prevalence of Lingam worship which is such a conspicuous feature in India. In nearly every part of that vast empire are to be seen reproductions of the emblem in an infinite variety of form, and so totally free from the most remotely indecent character are they, that strangers are as a rule totally ignorant of their meaning. We have even known, within the last few years, specimens of the smaller emblems being put up for sale in this country, of whose meaning the auctioneer professes himself for the most part ignorant, volunteering no other statement than that they were charms in some way connected with Hindu customs and worship.
It is—being a representation of the male organ—represented, of course, in a conical form, and is of every size, from half-an-inch to seventy feet, and of all materials, such as stone, wood, clay, metal, &c. Lingas are seen of enormous size; in the caves of Elephanta for instance, marking unequivocally that the symbol in question is at any rate as ancient as the temple, as they are of the same rock as the temple itself; both, as well as the floor, roof, pillars, pilastres, and its numerous sculptured figures, having been once one undistinguished mass of granite, which excavated, chiselled, and polished, produced the cavern and forms that are still contemplated with so much surprise and admiration. The magnitude of the cones, too, further preclude the idea of subsequent introduction, and together with gigantic statues of Siva and his consort, more frequent and more colossal than those of any other deity, necessarily coeval with the excavation, indicate his paramount adoration and the antiquity of his sect. Lingas are seen also of diminutive size for domestic adoration, or for personal use; some individuals always carrying one about with them, and in some Brahman families, one is daily constructed in clay, placed after due sanctification by appropriate ceremonies and prayers, in the domestic shrine, or under a tree or shrub sacred to Siva, the Bilva more especially, and honoured by the adoration of the females of the household.
It is rather singular that while many Hindus worship the deity of male and female in one, there are distinct sects which worship either the Lingam or the Yoni; the first being apparently the same as the phallic emblem of the Greeks, the membrum virile: and the latter pudendum muliebre.
The interesting ceremony connected with the obsequies which we have just said can be the most effectually performed by a male child, and which gives rise to the intense longing both on the part of husband and wife for such offspring, is called Sradha, and is of daily recurrence with individuals who rigidly adhere to the ritual. It is offered in honour of deceased ancestors, but not merely in honour of them, but for their comfort; as the Manes, as well as the gods connected with them, enjoy, like the gods of the Greeks, the incense of such offerings, which are also of an expiatory nature, similar, it is said, to the masses of the Church of Rome. Over these ceremonies of Sradhi presides Yama, in his character of Sradhadeva, or lord of the obsequies. It is not within our province to give a detailed account of these ceremonies, but owing to their connection with the subject generally of our book, a brief outline will no doubt prove interesting.
A dying man, when no hopes of his surviving remain, should be laid upon a bed of cusa grass, either in the house or out of it, if he be a Sudra, but in the open air, if he belong to another tribe. When he is at the point of death, donations of cattle, land, gold, silver, or other things, according to his ability, should be made by him; or if he be too weak, by another person in his name. His head should be sprinkled with water drawn from the Ganges, and smeared with clay brought from the same river. A Salagrama stone ought to be placed near the dying man; holy strains from the Veda or from the sacred poems should be repeated aloud in his ears; and leaves of holy basil must be scattered over his head.
Passing over the ceremonial more especially connected with the burning of the corpse as not particularly relative to our subject, we proceed. After the body has been burnt, all who have touched or followed the corpse, must walk round the pile keeping their left hands towards it, and taking care not to look at the fire. They then walk in procession, according to seniority, to a river or other running water, and after washing, and again putting on their apparel, they advance into the stream. They then ask the deceased’s brother-in-law, or some other person able to give the proper answer, “Shall we present water?” If the deceased were a hundred years old, the answer must be simply, “do so:” but if he were not so aged, the reply is “do so, but do not repeat the oblation.” Upon this they all shift the sacerdotal string to the right shoulder, and looking towards the south, and being clad in a single garment without a mantle, they stir the water with the ring finger of the left hand, saying, “waters, purify us.” With the same finger of the right hand, they throw up some water towards the south, and after plunging once under the surface of the river, they rub themselves with their hands. An oblation of water must be next presented from the jointed palms of the hands, naming the deceased and the family from which he sprung, and saving “may this oblation reach thee.”
After finishing the usual libations of water to satisfy the manes of the deceased, they quit the river and shift their wet clothes for other apparel; they then sip water without swallowing it, and sitting down on soft turf, alleviate their sorrow by the recital of such moral sentences as the following, refraining at the same time from tears and lamentation:—