Boston University - HUB Yearbook (Boston, MA)

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5 26 BOSTON UNIVERSITY YEAR BOOK. he is ready, and even desirous, to merge his very will and 1if'e and being in the will and life and being ot' the all-perfect object of his worship. Q23 That the gracious disposition ofthe object worshipped toward the worshippcr can never reach its supreme intensity until the worshipped being is ready, and desirous, to descend from the divine form and 'mode of being and, in ah avatar of compassionate love, take on the form and the limitations of his human worshipper. That in a perfect religion the human subject and the divine object must be set in such rela- tions that it shall be possible for God to become a partaker of hnman nature, and for man in some sense to become a partaker of 'the divine nature. , Profound was the silence which followed this wonderful dis- course. The first to break it was a Professor in the Imperial University of Tokio, a man who, though of European- birth, was incomplete sympathy with the purposes of the Convention. After highly complimenting the Brahmin speaker, he said that he himselt' had long been an admiring student of India's sacred books. lVith the permission ot' the Convention he would like to recite a few lines from one ot' them, the Isa Upanishad, which seemed to'him admirably to express the true relation subsisting between the worshipping soul and the Infinite. 1-Ie then gave the following : Whate'er exists within this universe Is all to be regarded as enveloped By the great Lord, as if wrapped in a vesture. There is one only being who exists Unmoved, yet moving swifter than the mind, Who far outstrips the senses, tho' as gods They strive to reach him, who himself at rest Transcends the fleetest flight of other beingsg Who like the air supports all vital action. He moves, yet moves not, he is far, yet. near, He is within this universe. Whoe'er beholds All living creatures as in him, and him- The universal Spirit-as in all, Henceforth regards no Cl'CRl.l1l'8 with contempt. if Now here --continued the Professor--'4 here' we have the true conception admirably expressed. Because the Universal Spirit is in all things, even in the worshipper, and on the other i

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1 L THE QUEST OF THE PERFECT RELIGION. 25 ing of the object of his Worship, otherwise he is not worshipping. So the being worshipped is thinking of his worshipper, other- wise he is not receiving the worship. Here, then, is mutual simultaneous thought. Each has a place in the consciousness of the other. To this extent they possess a common consciousness. In this fellowship of mutual thought they are mutually related, by it they are vitally and personally connected. This connection may, of course, be of two kinds. If the god is angry with his worshipper, or the worshipper with his god, the relationship is one of hatred and antagonism. If, on the other hand, it is a relation of mutual inclination, -the man sin- cerely seeking to please his god, and the god sincerely seeking to bless his worshipper, it is, of course, a relationship of amity, of good fellowship, of mutual love. But all religions agree that the first of these relationships, that of enmity and estrangement, is ab- normal, one which ought not to be. All religions aim to remove or to transform such a relationship wherever it exists. It is there- fore plain that the perfect religion, if there be one, must require and make the personal relationship between the worshipper and the worshipped a relation of mutual benevolence - a relation of mutual love. Nowhere can there be a perfect religion if the man do not sincerely love his god, and if the god do not sin- cerely love his worshipper. ' Here the speaker raised a most interesting question as to degree. To what extent ought this love to go? There could be but one answer. In a perfect religion the love of the wor- shipper for the worshipped must ot' course be the strongest possible, particularly as the worshipped is himself all-perfect, and hence all-worthy of this love. X So, on the other hand, the love of the worshipped toward the worshlpper ought to be the very strongest possible. What then is thc strongest possible love which the divine can bear to the human and the human to the divine? I cannot enough regret that my limits compel me to suppress his discussion of this pregnant question. I can Only say that from point to point he carried the convictions of his vast audi- ence until he had trinmphantly demonstrated three far-reaching propositions: Q11 That the ever higher and more perfect devo- tion of a worshipper can never reach its supreme intensity until

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THE QUEST OF THE PERFECT RELIGION. 27 hand all things, even the worshipper, are in this Universal Spirit, it is more than possible -it is inevitable - that the divine should have participancy in the human and the human in the divine. Few ol' the great religions ot' the wo1'ld have failed to recognize in some way this basal truth. Even the Shamans of the barbarous tribes claim to exercise divine powers only when personally pos- sessed of divine spirits. In Thibet the faithful see in the distin- guished head olf their hierarchy, the Dalai Lama, - with whose presence we to-day are honored,-fa true divine incarnation. For ages here in Japan the sacred person ot' the Mikado has been recognized as a god in human form. The founders ot' nearly all great religions and states have been held to be descendants, or impersonations, of' the gods. In like manner the apotheosis of dying emperors, Roman and other, shows how natural is the faith that good and great men can take onthe nature and the life divine. Ask India's hundreds of millions. They all aflirm that every human being may aspire to ultimate and absolute identifi- cation with G-od. The even more numerous followers'of,the Buddha hold that, in his enlightenment, Sakya Muni was far superior to any god. Now if such are the conceptions of the actual religions, how certain is it that the ideal, the perfect reli- gion, must provide a recognition of them. I move you, Mr. President, that the propositions ot' our Brahmin orator from Benares be adopted as the voice of this Convention. ' No speaker appearing in the negative, the motion was put and carried without dissent. 4 Thus, with astonishing unanimity, the assembly had reached the final question upon the programme: H By what credentials shall a perfect religion be known? Intenser than ever grew the interest of the delegates. On the answer to this question hung all their hopes as to any prac- tically useful outcome from the holding of this great Ecumenical Convention. Doulily intense was the interest of the on-looking Japanese, for here, in the presence of the World's religions, the highest and most authoritative religious voice ot' their Empire was now to be heard. Breathless was the entire throng as the speaker began : , . X 4' Hail to the Supreme Spirit of Truth. Praise to the Kami of kami --the living essence of the everlasting, ever-living Light.