he resemblance of some of the above ideas to the teaching of the
Gospels is striking, and, as has been seen, the story of Kabir's
birth might have been borrowed from the Bible, while the Kabirpanthi
Chauka or religious service has one or two features in common
with Christianity. These facts raise a probability, at any rate,
that Kabir or his disciples had some acquaintance with the Bible or
with the teaching of Christian missionaries. If such a supposition
were correct, it would follow that Christianity had influenced the
religious thought of India to a greater extent than is generally
supposed. Because, as has been seen, the Nanakpanthi and Sikh sects
are mainly based on the teaching of Kabir. Another interesting though
accidental resemblance is that the religion of Kabir was handed down
in the form of isolated texts and sayings like the Logia of Jesus, and
was first reduced to writing in a connected form by his disciples. The
fact that Kabir called the deity by the name of Rama apparently does
not imply that he ascribed a unique and sole divinity to the hero king
of Ajodhia. He had to have some name which might convey a definite
image or conception to his uneducated followers, and may have simply
adopted that which was best known and most revered by them.

4. The Kabirpanthi Sect in the Central Provinces.

The two principal headquarters of the Kabirpanthi sect are at Benaires
and at Kawardha, the capital of the State of that name, or Damakheda
in the Raipur District. These appear to be practically independent
of each other, the head Mahants exercising separate jurisdiction over
members of the sect who acknowledge their authority. The Benares branch
of the sect is known as Bap (father) and the Kawardha branch as Mai
(mother). In 1901 out of 850,000 Kabirpanthis in India 500,000 belonged
to the Central Provinces. The following account of the practices of
the sect in the Province is partly compiled from local information,
and it differs in some minor, though not in essential, points from
that given by Bishop Westcott. The Benares church is called the
Kabirchaura Math and the Kawardha one the Dharam Das Math.

One of the converts to Kabir's teaching was Dharam Das, a Kasaundhan
Bania, who distributed the whole of his wealth, eighteen lakhs of
rupees, in charity at his master's bidding and became a mendicant. In
reward for this Kabir promised him that his family should endure
for forty-two generations. The Mahants