Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j in 1828 was not the introduction of monotheism to
India. In the Indian Christian Church and in Mahomedanism, the doctrine
of one, personal, God had been set forth to India, and in one of the
ancient Hindu philosophical systems, the Yoga Philosophy, the same
doctrine is implied. But in India, Christianity and Mahomedanism were
associated with hostile camps; the Yoga Philosophy was known only to a
few Sanscrit scholars. In Br[=a]hmaism, the doctrine of one personal God
became again natural naturalised in India. That has been its special
service to India, to naturalise monotheism and many social and religious
movements. For in India, things new and foreign lie under a peculiar
suspicion. In the social sphere, the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j repudiates caste
and gives to women a position in society. As Indian _theists_ also, when
their first church was opened in 1830, they gave the Indian sanction to
congregational worship and prayer, "before unknown to Hindus." For, the
brahman interposing between God and the ignorant multitude, the Hindu
multitude do not assemble themselves for united prayer, as Christians
and Mahomedans do; and at the other end of the Hindu scale, the
professed pantheist as such cannot pray. In proof of the latter
statement, we recall the words of Swami Vivekananda, representative of
Hinduism in the Parliament of Religions at Chicago in 1893, in a lecture
"The Real and the Apparent Man," published in 1896. "It is the greatest
of all lies," he writes somewhat baldly, although one is often grateful
for a bald, definite statement, "that we are mere men; we are the God of
the Universe.... The worst lie that you ever told yourself is that you
were born a sinner.... The wicked see this universe as a hell, and the
partially good see it as heaven, and the perfect beings realise it as
God Himself.... By mistake we think that we are impure, that we are
limited, that we are separate. The real man is the One Unit Existence."
Prayer is therefore irrational for a pantheist, for no man is separate
from God.

[Sidenote: Its limited membership.]

The influence of the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j has been far greater than its
numerical success. Reckoned by its small company of 4050 members,[52]
some of them certainly men of the highest culture and of sincere
devoutness, the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j is a limited and local movement,
limited largely to the province of Bengal, and even to a few of the
larger towns in the provinc