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824
GITĀ-RAHASYA OR KARMA-YOGA
they had given up sacrifical ritual, and used to spend their lives in a peaceful place in contemplation of the Almighty, and they used at most to take part in harmless occupations like agriculture etc. for maintaining themselves. The most prominent principles of this sect were to remain celibates, to eschew meat and liquor, not to kill animals, not to take oaths, and to live together socially in monasteries; and, if any one of them acquired any property, to look upon that property as the common property of the society; and if any one had a desire to enter their sect, it was necessary for him to serve as an apprentice for at least three years, and after that to consent to observe certain rules. Their monastery was at Endgi on the western coast of the Dead Sea, and they used to live there peacefully and as ascetics. The respectful references made by Christ Himself and His disciples in the New Testament to the opinions of the Esi sect (Matthew 5. 34; 19. 12; James 5. 12; The Acts 4. 32-35), clearly show that Jesus Christ was a follower of this sect, and He has to a great extent furthered the renunciatory religion of this sect. But though the renunciatory devotional path of Christ is in this way traced to the Esi sect, still it is necessary to give some satisfactory explanation from the historical point of view, as to how the renunciatory Esi path suddenly came into existence out of the original Activistic Jewish religion. Some answer this question by saying that Christ did not belong to the Esi sect. But though this statement is taken as correct, one cannot in that way escape the questions, (i) what was the origin of the renunciatory religion preached in the New Testament of the Bible, and (ii) how such a religion suddenly entered the Activistic Jewish religion; for, the only difference is, that instead of having to explain the origin of the Esi sect, one has to answer these two questions ; because, nothing comes into existence anywhere suddenly. It grows gradually, and the growth starts from a much earlier period ; and it is a well-established rule of Sociology, that where such a growth is not noticed, the matter is usually found to have been adopted from a foreign country or from a foreign people. It is not that the former Christian writers had not realised this difficulty ; but before Europeans had come to know about Buddhism, that is to say, upto the 18th cen
