can have had much result. For Ramanuja was a Brahman of the straitest
sect who probably thought it contamination to be within speaking
distance of a Christian.[1086] He was undoubtedly a remarkable scholar
and knew by heart all the principal Hindu scriptures, including those
that teach _bhakti_. Why then suppose that he took his ideas not from
works like the Bhagavad-gita on which he wrote a commentary or from
the Pancaratra which he eulogizes, but from persons whom he must have
regarded as obscure heretics? And lastly is there any proof that such
ideas as the love of God and salvation by faith flourished among the
Christians of Mailapur? In remote branches of the oriental Church
Christianity is generally reduced to legends and superstitions, and
this Church was so corrupt that it had even lost the rite of
baptism and is said to have held that the third person of the
Trinity was the Madonna[1087] and not the Holy Ghost. Surely this
doctrine is an extraordinary heresy in Christianity and far from
having inspired Hindu theories as to the position of Vishnu's spouse
is borrowed from those theories or from some of the innumerable Indian
doctrines about the Sakti.

It is clear that the Advaita philosophy of Sankara was influential
in India from the ninth century to the twelfth and then lost some of
its prestige owing to the rise of a more personal theism. It does not
seem to me that any introduction or reinforcement of Christianity, to
which this theistic movement might be attributed, can be proved to
have taken place about 1100, and it is not always safe to seek for a
political or social explanation of such movements. But if we must have
an external explanation, the obvious one is the progress of
Mohammedanism. One may even suggest a parallel between the epochs of
Sankara and of Ramanuja. The former, though the avowed enemy of
Buddhism, introduced into Hinduism the doctrine of Maya described by
Indian critics as crypto-Buddhism. Ramanuja probably did not come into
direct contact with Islam,[1088] which was the chief enemy of Hinduism
in his time, but his theism (which, however, was semi-pantheistic) may
have been similarly due to the impression produced by that enemy on
Indian thought.[1089]

It is easy to see superficial parallels between Hindu and Christian
ceremonies, but on examination they are generally not found to prove
that there has been direct borrowing from Christianity. For instance,
the superior castes are co