racter. Thus their tenet of salvation by faith is
thought by many scholars to have been directly derived from the
Gospels; while another article in their creed is the continuance of
conscious individual existence in a future world, when the highest
reward of the good will not be extinction, but the enjoyment of
the visible presence of the divinity whom they have served while
on earth. The Nimanandis worship Krishna, and were the first sect,
Dr. Bhattacharya states, [102] to associate with him as a divine
consort Radha, the chief partner of his illicit loves.

Their headquarters are at Muttra, and their chief festival is the
Janam-Ashtami [103] or Krishna's birthday. Their sect-mark consists of
two white lines down the forehead with a black patch in the centre,
which is called Shiambindini. Shiam means black, and is a name of
Krishna. They also sometimes have a circular line across the nose,
which represents the moon.

6. The Madhavacharyas.

The third great order is that of the Madhavas, named after a saint
called Madhavacharya in southern India. He attempted to reconcile the
warring Sivites and Vishnuites by combining the worship of Krishna with
that of Siva and Parvati. The doctrine of the sect is that the human
soul is different from the divine soul, and its members are therefore
called dualists. They admit a distinction between the divine soul and
the universe, and between the human soul and the material world. They
deny also the possibility of Nirvana or the absorption and extinction
of the human soul in the divine essence. They destroy their thread
at initiation, and also wear red clothes like the Sivite devotees,
and like them also they carry a staff and water-pot. The _tilak_
of the Madhavacharyas is said to consist of two white lines down the
forehead and continued on to the nose where they meet, with a black
vertical line between them.

7. The Vallabhacharyas.

The fourth main order is the Vishnu-Swami, which is much better known
as the Vallabhacharya sect, called after its founder Vallabha, who
was born in A.D. 1479. The god Krishna appeared to him and ordered
him to marry and set up a shrine to the god at Gokul near Mathura
(Muttra). The sect worship Krishna in his character of Bala Gopala
or the cowherd boy. Their temples are numerous all over India, and
especially at Mathura and Brindaban, where Krishna was brought up
as a cowherd. The temples at Benares, Jagannath and Dwarka are rich
an