Cremation, Caste, and Cosmogony in Karmic Traditions.

is always explaining, instructing, knowing, and
exemplifying. The conjurer does not teach, but he
employs his knowledge by leading public rituals and by
initiating novices. He guards treasured secrets until the
day when he must create a performance or a drama
which transforms and overwhelms the novices by
mysteries (ibid:642).
The guru’s knowledge transaction is characterised by a
certain type of distribution. His disciples learn from him
in a personal and enduring relationship, and the guru
succeeds when the knowledge is transmitted.
Fundamental for the guru is that he must always have
enough to teach, and the knowledge must be stable and
consistent through time. He lasts only as long as he has
more to teach. The guru’s knowledge is rational and
logical, and the knowledge is radically decontextualised.
The pupil does not need to have been
there, but only to understand and to remember it. This
implies that this knowledge transaction may transfer
knowledge easily and rapidly across huge areas
(ibid:643-644). The conjurer’s knowledge, on the other
hand, has other characteristics. He reveals secrets by
manipulating concrete symbols. The knowledge is
sacred and limited to a few people; the initiated novices,
who are supposed to be transformed by the rite in itself
and not by what has been transmitted to them of the
knowledge it contains. The performance of rituals at the
climactic day evokes as much nerve and power as
possible. The knowledge in these sacred performances
affects the novices by its force and not by explaining the
knowledge for them (ibid).
Obeyesekere distinguishes between the ethical prophet
and the ethical ascetic. “The prophet is the vehicle of a
transcendental and unitary deity whose soteriological
and ethical message he communicates to the world. The
ethical ascetic, by contrast, discovers the truth of the
world” (Obeyesekere 2002:118). The prophet’s message
comes from God and represents a proclamation of the
divine will. It therefore contains no compromise,
whereas ethical ascetism, which is based on practical
considerations, is vulnerable to revisions and
compromises. “The uncompromising attitude of the
ethical prophet almost inevitably leads him to conflict
with the secular order…and this often brings him into
conflict with the established priesthood and the secular
authority…This was true of Jesus and of Mohammed
and Zoroaster, at least in the initial period of their
reforms” (ibid:119). As seen at Taxila, there was a
mutual tolerance, which indicates either that the
religions were well established, or a kind of guru
tradition combined with an ethical ascetism, or both.
It is possible to see both Zoroastrianism and Buddhism
as attempts to perfect Hinduism by other means.
Hinduism has never insisted on the necessity of one
supreme figure in religious matters and has never agreed
on certain articles and beliefs as essential to all Hindus
(Kinsley 1993:6). Such an open field where knowledge
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is communicated, exchanged, and challenged, is most
likely what one has at Taxila. Differences are accepted
within the overall sphere of religion. Regarding the
complexity of partly incompatible thoughts and beliefs
in Hinduism, a knowledgeable man told me that the
crucial aspect is to believe, not what you believe, and he
used a mountain as a metaphor. The aim is to climb
towards the peak of the mountain, and there is only one
mountain in the world – God – who may have many
names and appear in many forms. This is irrelevant and
not a source of dispute, because there is nevertheless
only one mountain to climb for humanity. The route will
be individual, and there are as many routes as humans,
but they are all leading towards the peak. There are
various ways and paths towards the ultimate aim –
liberation.
This way of thinking may enable the differences within a
community such as Taxila to co-exist, and the situation
seems somehow parallel to the variation within
Hinduism today. Despite the enormous variations, there
was something which united the diverse thoughts and
paths. Taxila as a trade centre par excellence must have
been a cradle for knowledge distribution. Traders may
have limited capability and interest in understanding
other religions since they basically were travelling
engaged in commerce, although there are hints of Greek
Bactrian traders who claimed to be Buddhists (Thapar
1992:26).
I think it is therefore more important to stress the
knowledge contemplation and distribution among gurus,
prophets, and ascetics. As a Buddhist university centre
Taxila would have attracted numerous pilgrims and
scholars operating within the guru tradition although
esoteric elements may have played a role within the
various religious communities. Similarly, the numerous
temples are focal points pilgrims return to. Brahmanism
or Hinduism is, despite the priestly ritual function, a
religion which explains and preaches, at least society
and cosmos as seen from the Brahmans’ perspective, a
world view which creates and maintains the caste
structure. Moreover, the Greeks and the Zoroastrians as
conquerors must have engaged in the transactions of
knowledge, in short; despite esoteric elements which
always exist, Taxila seems to have consisted to a large
extent of a corpus of shared knowledge. The uniformity
of basic principles, which enabled understanding and
tolerance between Greeks, Zoroastrians, Brahmans, and
Buddhists, is probably a consequence of a historical
situation where knowledge has been distributed in a
form similar to a guru’s knowledge transaction. From
Greece to India the institutionalised practice with holy
men or ascetics on continuous pilgrimages or engaged in
philosophical discussion was an intrinsic part of society,
and indeed, these philosophers and holy men may have
been those who created the shared knowledge between
countries and cultures since they were mobile and
evidently have lived among people in “foreign”
countries who had other beliefs than themselves.