Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 11, 1900.djvu/11

 TRANSACTIONS OF THE FOLK-LORE SOCIETY.

Vol. XL] MARCH, 1900. [No. I.

THE LEGENDS OF KRISHNA.

BY W. CROOKE, B.A.

{Read at Meeting of 21st June, 1899.)

The cycle of folklore and popular belief which centres round Krishna, one of the most important elements in the neo-Brahmanical creed of modern India, forms an in- teresting chapter in the development of Hindu religious myth and cultus. This neo-Brahmanism is now the work- ing faith which controls the spiritual destinies of two hundred and seven millions of people. It is a faith without a definite creed, with no church, no pope, no convocation. It is the most catholic of the old world religions, providing as it does for the needs of jungle-folk on the borderland of savagery and for those most keen-witted of religious disputants, the Vedantists of Mathura or Benares. It is a great missionary religion, working not in the way with which we are familiar, through societies and an organised body of teachers, but by the agency of shock-headed Jogis and ash-covered Sannyasis. It is one of the most catholic of faiths, because though it has many gods it enforces the worship of no one deity on any of its members.

Hence for the purpose of estimating the prevalence of different forms of Hindu belief statistics are of little value.

VOL. XI. B