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The Sacred City of the Hindus (An Account of Benares in Ancient and Modern Times)

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The Sacred City of the Hindus (An Account of Benares in Ancient and Modern Times)

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Specifications

	Publisher: Gyan Publishing House, New Delhi
	Author M. A. Sherring
	Language: English
	Pages: 388
	Cover: HARDCOVER
	9x6 inch
	Weight 680 gm
	Edition: 2024
	ISBN: 9789362082268
	HBW809

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Book Description

About the Book "The Sacred City of the Hindus: An Account of Benares in Ancient and Modern Times" by M.A. Sherring offers a detailed portrayal of Varanasi, or Benares, a revered city in India. It covers its historical, cultural, and religious significance from ancient times to the present. Sherring explores the city's temples, shrines, and ghats, discussing associated rituals and customs. Additionally, the book examines social and political dimensions including the caste system and British colonial influence. A valuable resource on Indian culture, religion, and history, it provides insight into one of the world's holiest cities.

About the Author Matthew Atmore Sherring (1826-1880), usuallycited as M.A. Sherring, was a Protestant missionary in British India who was also an Indologist and wrote a number of works related to India. He wrote a significant book (The Sacred City of the Hindus: An Account of Benares in Ancient and Modern Times). He wrote books like The Indian Church during the Great Rebellion, The Tribes and Castes of the Madras Presidency, The Hindoo Pilgrims, and many more.

Preface THE history of a country is sometimes epitomized in the history of one of its principal cities. The city of Benares represents India, religiously and intellectually, just as Paris represents the political sentiments of France. There are few cities in the world of greater antiquity, and none that have so uninterruptedly maintained their ancient celebrity and distinction. In Benares, Buddhism was first promulgated; in Benares, Hinduism has had her home in the bosom of her most impassioned votaries. This city, therefore, has given impulse and vigour to the two religions which to this day govern half the world. An account of a city of such remarkable associations, which has occupied such a prominent place in the annals of the human race, is not without its importance, and ought not to be devoid of interest. Having resided in it for several years, I have enjoyed peculiarly favourable opportunities for becoming acquainted with its inner life and character. The task I have set myself is not that of discussing the religious systems existing there,-which would be an unnecessary undertaking, it having been so frequently accomplished by abler hands,-but of giving a representation of Benares as she was in the past, and as she is in the present. Her early condition-her connexion with ancient Buddhism her architectural remains her famous temples, holy wells and tanks, and numerous gháts or stairs leading down to the Ganges-the legends concerning them the peculiar customs at the temples-the ceremonies of the idolater-the modes of worship the religious festivals, and other topics, illustrative of the character which Benares maintains as the sacred city of India, are dwelt upon, with some amount of detail, in this volume. I have deemed it of moment, also, in a book of this nature, to make some observations on the influence which education, European civilization, and, above all, Christianity, are now exerting upon the city. As Benares has held a foremost place in the history of India for two thousand five hundred years, at the least, so, in all likelihood, she is destined to retain that position in the new era of enlightenment which has already dawned upon the land. Portions of this work have, at various times, appeared in print, in contributions to the Calcutta Review and the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, and in a Lecture delivered before the Benares Institute, published in the Transactions of that Society. I would express my warmest thanks to CHARLES HORNE, Esq., C.S., late Judge of Benares, for his very valuable assistance in the archæological researches de-scribed in this book, especially in Chapters xix. and xx. My thanks are also due to J. H. B. IRONSIDE, Esq., C.В., Magistrate of Benares, for his kindness in placing at my disposal a paper on the Melas or Festivals of Benares, drawn up by Babu Sital Prasád, Deputy Inspector of Schools. I would likewise acknowledge my great obligations to D. TRESHAM, Esq., Head Master of the Government Normal School, Benares, for his excellent photographs of the city, from which the illustrations of this volume have been taken.

Introduction ALIKE as to limits and as to influence, the Indian kingdoms of former times were, with few exceptions, inconsiderable; such of them as lay conterminous were often at open feud; and their cities, or fortified towns, constituted, in fact, their only stable boundaries. It was, probably, with the dominion of the Kâsis as it was with other seats of Hindu power. Deriving its origin from some city, as Pratishthâna, or Vârâņasi, it must have acquired extent and consideration by very gradual development. At least since a hundred and twenty years before our era, Vârâņasî, as denoting a city, has been a name Vide infra, p. xxv., note 1. Also called Varanasi and Varanasi, according to the Haima-kośa and the Sebdaratnávali, respectively. The latter of these vocabularies is of small authority. A rational system of Romanized spelling would give us, instead of Benares, Banaras. The form बनारस was the work, perhaps, of the Muhammadans. It should appear that the metathesis of rand n, in the original word, must be later than the times of Få Hian and Hionen Thsang. Vide infra, p. xxviii., notes 1 and 2. In the ordinary belief of the vulgar of Benares, the name of their city is connected with Raja Banar,-a mythical magnate, of whom mention is associated with that of the reformer Kabir, of the beginning of the fifteenth century. Asiatic Researches, Vol. XVI., p. 57. "According to some of the Muhammadan accounts," says Mr. James familiar to Brahmanical literature. The word is crudely referred, by modern inventiveness, to a combination of Varana and Asi; and all the other explanations that we have of its source are equally questionable. Prinsep, but without naming his voucher for the statement, Benares "was governed by a Raja Banår, at the time of one of Mahmûd's invasions, or in A.D. 1017, when one of his generals penetrated to the province, and defeated the Raja." Benares Illustrated, p. 9. General Cunningham states that Raja Banår is traditionally believed to have rebuilt Benares about eight hundred years ago. Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, for 1863, Supplementary Number, p. xcvi. Vârâņasi is specified more than once in Patanjali's Mahábháskya. On the age of that work, see my edition of Professor Wilson's translation of the Vishnu-puráno, Vol. II., p. 189, ad calcem. So allege the Pandits of the present day; repeating, no doubt, a long-current conceit of their predecessors: see the Asiatic Researches, Vol. III., pp. 409, 410. This notion, though it has found expression in the Araish-i-mahfil and other recent Muhammadan books, is, I believe, only implied in the Purâņas.

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