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RELIGION
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Gavā to perform the holy ablution in a sincere belief that by bathing in the Gayā river they could wash off their sins. There were other sacred rivers where similar ablutions were performed. The Buddhist criticism of the belief and the practice was not without its value. But the belief served as a strong inoentivē to bathing in the sacred rivers the water. of which was hygienic and good for health.
During the period under notice there existed in Northern India various orders of Paribbājakas or Wanderers, who, in the language of Rhys Davids, 'were teachers or sophists who spent eight or nine months of every year wandering about precisely with the object of engaging in conversational discussions on matters of ethics and philosophy, nature lore and mysticism, Like the Sophists among the Greeks, they differed very much in intelligence, in earnestness and in honesty'. These wandering ascetics, particularly those who were called Brāhmaṇa Paribbājakas, were representatives of the fourth or last stage of progressive life. They were known as mendicants (bhikkhus) because they depended for their sustenance on alms ocllected from door to door,
1 Monghema, I, p. 36f, Vatthüpama Sutta; Udäna, p. 6, Therigātā, pp. 146 47. Gathās of Punnika
& 'Buddhast Indra, P 141. 8 Anguttara, 1, P 157; B. 0. Law, H18001 zal Gleanings, Ch IE
