Legends[1] this fact is sunk in the view that (though sprung from the herdsmen) he was a warrior and a hero. Nor was the teaching concerning this character of Crishna at all rapid in its extension. Its chief seat, according to Lassen[2], in what he expresses as "the earliest times," was Madura; but the first date he mentions in connexion with it is 1017, when a Crishna temple was destroyed by Mahmûd of Ghazna, Lalitâditja, king of Cashmere, built him a temple containing a statue of solid silver, and he reigned from 695 to 732; but the gold armour the image bore would point to his warrior character still prevailing down to this time. Lassen even finds[3] the introduction of the worship of Crishna[4] a subject of opposition by certain Brahmans as late as the tenth century. The great epic poem concerning him, the Gitagovinda, by Gajadeva (still sung at the present day at the Resa festival), was not written till the end of the 12th century[5]. In an inscription at Gajanagara, not very far from Madura, Crishna is mentioned as an incarnation of Vishnu, but the date of this is 1288; and the idea does not seem to have reached Orissa till the end of the 15th century[6].
2.↑ From this exordium we must plainly gather that the original collector of these Tales was himself a Madhjamika, since he begins his work with an invocation of Nâgârg'una, founder of that school. He calls him "second teacher" because his undertaking was, not to supersede, but to develope and perfect the teaching of Shâkjamuni, whom he himself reverenced as first teacher[7].
- ↑ The very earliest, however, do not go very far back; he was never heard of at all till within 200 B.C., and seems then to have been set up by certain Brahmans to attract popular worship, and to counteract the at that period rapidly-spreading influence of the Buddhists. See Lassen, i. 831–839. See also note 1, p. 335, supra.
- ↑ Lassen, iv. 575.
- ↑ Lassen, p. 576.
- ↑ "On trouvera plus tard que l'extension considérable qu'a prise le culte du Krishna n'a été qu'une réaction populaire contre celui du Buddha; réaction qui a été dirigée, ou pleinement acceptée par les Brahmanes." Burnouf, Introd. i. p. 136, n. 1.
- ↑ Lassen, iv. 815–817.
- ↑ Lassen, iv. 576.
- ↑ The best account of his life and teaching is given by S. Wassiljew, of St. Petersburg, "Der Buddhismus; aus dem Russichen übersetzt," to which I have not had access.
