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262
RELIGIOUS SECTS
The followers are considered as very numerous, especially annongst the Brahmanical tribe: all classes are however admissible, and are equal and alike at the ceremonies of the sect. In the world they resume their characteristic distinctions, and wear the sectarial marks, and usually adopt the outward worship of any other division, whether orthodoxical or heretical. When they assume particular insignia, they are a semi-circular line or lines on the forehead, of red saunders or vermillion, or a red streak up the middle of the forehead, with a circular spot of red at the root of the nose. They use a rosary of Rudráksha
creeds who quit their established observances -- those of other sects who use the articles of the Kaula worship, shall be condemned to repeated generations as numerous as the hairs of the body.” — In fact, the texts of Manu are taken as authorities for the penance to be performed for the crimes of touching, smelling, looking at, or tasting the forbidden articles, except upon religious occasions, and when they are consecrated by the appropriate texts.
It is only to be added, that if the promulgators of these doctrines were sincere, which is far from impossible, they must have been filled with a strange phrenzy, and have heen strangely ignorant of human nature. 1 प्रवृत्ते भैरवीतन्त्रे सर्वे वर्णी द्विजोत्तमाः।
निवृत्ते भैरवीतन्त्रे सर्वे वीः पृथक्पृयक ॥ “Whilst the Bhairavi Tantra is proceeding, all castes are Brahmans - when it is concluded, they are again distinct.” Syamá Rahasya. According to Ward, such of them as avow their creed, leading at the same time a mendicant life, are termed Vyaktávadhútas, or they who are openly free from restraints: those who conceal their creed and observe its practices in privacy are termed Guptávadhútas, the liberated in secret. II, 296.
