DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.636#0501
CHAPTER XX.
Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roys successors.
It was not to be expected that the void caused by the
death of so great a patriot as Rammohun Roy could be
filled up immediately. The Church he had founded in Cal-
cutta languished for a time, notwithstanding that his friend
Dwarkanath Tagore and his learned coadjutor Ramachandra
Vidyabaglsh made efforts to maintain its vitality, the latter
acting very regularly as minister of the Samaj. At length,
after the interval of a'few years, a not unworthy successor
to Rammohun Roy was found in Dwarkanath's son, Deben-
dra-nath Tagore.
This remarkable man, who was born in 1818, and is now,
therefore, sixty-five years of age, received a good English
education at the old Hindu College1, and was the first
to give real organization to Rammohun Roy's Theistic
Church. But he imitated his great predecessor in doing
as little violence as possible to the creed and practice of
his forefathers. He aimed at being a purifier rather than
a destroyer. He had the advantage and disadvantage of
a rich and liberal father. The luxury in which he passed
his youth was for some time a drawback rather than an
aid. It was not till he was twenty years of age that he
began to be conscious of spiritual aspirations. Utterly dis-
satisfied with the religious condition of his own people, and
with the ideas of God presented by Brahmanical teaching, he
1 Under the teaching of a man to whom Bengal is perhaps as much
indebted as to David Hare.
Modern Hindu Theism. Rammohun Roys successors.
It was not to be expected that the void caused by the
death of so great a patriot as Rammohun Roy could be
filled up immediately. The Church he had founded in Cal-
cutta languished for a time, notwithstanding that his friend
Dwarkanath Tagore and his learned coadjutor Ramachandra
Vidyabaglsh made efforts to maintain its vitality, the latter
acting very regularly as minister of the Samaj. At length,
after the interval of a'few years, a not unworthy successor
to Rammohun Roy was found in Dwarkanath's son, Deben-
dra-nath Tagore.
This remarkable man, who was born in 1818, and is now,
therefore, sixty-five years of age, received a good English
education at the old Hindu College1, and was the first
to give real organization to Rammohun Roy's Theistic
Church. But he imitated his great predecessor in doing
as little violence as possible to the creed and practice of
his forefathers. He aimed at being a purifier rather than
a destroyer. He had the advantage and disadvantage of
a rich and liberal father. The luxury in which he passed
his youth was for some time a drawback rather than an
aid. It was not till he was twenty years of age that he
began to be conscious of spiritual aspirations. Utterly dis-
satisfied with the religious condition of his own people, and
with the ideas of God presented by Brahmanical teaching, he
1 Under the teaching of a man to whom Bengal is perhaps as much
indebted as to David Hare.