Jain Journal 1974 04

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 98

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JAIN JOURNAL
historical religions, when searching for the upper limit, but we can content ourselves with a review of those racial religions, which have developed themselves to the highest known religious forms. There are without any doubt two races, which reached this goal in the religious development, and they are the Semitic and the Aryan race. And these two races we must investigate in respect of the religious development a little bit thoroughly, if we try to understand the import of search for the religious limit.
The religious development of the Semitic race starts from Babylonia and had from its very beginning a tendency westwards. And so we find in the historical times, that it is spread over the whole south-western part of Asia, working a huge influence on Egypt and even the southern parts of Europe. And when the vital powers of Babylonia had been exhausted, a new centre of religious culture grew up in Kanan or Palestine. Two religious systems sprang up from this centre, viz., the Jewish and the Christian religion, which both preserved the westward tendency of the old Semitic religion and invaded in due time the whole of Europe, where there were previous to them quite different racial religions, which had reached a rather highly elaborated level. The Jewish religion went in advance of Christianity to Rome, preparing the soil for the high aspirations of the followers of the apostle Paul, who rather gave up the high ideals of his Master, viz., Christ, in order to establish his religion into a mighty worldly power, in which without any doubt Christianity grew up in the course of centuries due to the primeval efforts of its propagator, the apostle Paul.
Wherefrom the Aryan race came, we do not know exactly, but we do not err too much in saying, that the original seat of the Aryans has been elsewhere in the extreme North, either this or that side of the Ural ranges. From that place the migration of the Aryans went in two directions, viz., to the south-east and to the south-west. In the historical times we find the whole Europe inhabited by the Aryans, who expelled therefrom an unknown aboriginal race (or perhaps several races), and established several centres of a rather high culture with developed systems of religion. The south-east stream of the Aryans went to Iran and therefrom to India, driving in front of them several non-Aryan races. They brought with themselves a highly developed
The theory of the original abode of the Aryans being in the extreme North was started by Prof. H. Jacobi and late B. G. Tilak in pursuance of some remarks about the constellations (specially the Pleiads and the Great Bear) in the Rgveda. (Cf. B. G. Tilak, Arctic Home in the Vedas, Poona, 1903).