Though Hinduism has no one creed, yet there are at least two doctrines held by nearly all who call themselves Hindus.  One may be described as polytheistic pantheism.  Most Hindus are apparently polytheists, that is to say they venerate the images of several deities or spirits, yet most are monotheists in the sense that they address their worship to one god.  But this monotheism has almost always a pantheistic tinge.  The Hindu does not say the gods of the heathen are but idols, but it is the Lord who made the heavens:  he says, My Lord (Rama, Krishna or whoever it may be) is all the other gods.  Some schools would prefer to say that no human language applied to the Godhead can be correct and that all ideas of a personal ruler of the world are at best but relative truths.  This ultimate ineffable Godhead is called Brahman[7].

The second doctrine is commonly known as metempsychosis, the transmigration of souls or reincarnation, the last name being the most correct.  In detail the doctrine assumes various forms since different views are held about the relation of soul to body.  But the essence of all is the same, namely that a life does not begin at birth or end at death but is a link in an infinite series of lives, each of which is conditioned and determined by the acts done in previous existences (karma).  Animal, human and divine (or at least angelic) existences may all be links in the chain.  A man’s deeds, if good, may exalt him to the heavens, if evil may degrade him to life as a beast.  Since all lives, even in heaven, must come to an end, happiness is not to be sought in heaven or on earth.  The common aspiration of the religious Indian is for deliverance, that is release from the round of births and repose in some changeless state called by such names as union with Brahman, nirvana and many others.

3. The Buddha

As observed above, the Brahmans claim to direct the religious life and thought of India and apart from Mohammedanism may be said to have achieved their ambition, though at the price of tolerating much that the majority would wish to suppress.  But in earlier ages their influence was less extensive and there were other currents of religious activity, some hostile and some simply independent.  The most formidable of these found expression in Jainism and Buddhism both of which arose in Bihar in the sixth century[8] B.C.  This century was a time of intellectual ferment in many countries.  In China it produced Lao-tz[u] and Confucius:  in Greece, Parmenides, Empedocles, and the sophists were only a little later.  In all these regions we have the same phenomenon of restless, wandering teachers, ready to give advice on politics, religion or philosophy, to any one who would hear them.

At that time the influence of the Brahmans had hardly permeated Bihar, though predominant to the west of it, and speculation there followed lines different from those laid down in the Upanishads, but of some antiquity, for we know that there were Buddhas before Gotama and that Mahavira, the founder of Jainism, reformed the doctrine of an older teacher called Parsva.