The Vedas and Maxmuller

 

The Vedas and Maxmuller

Authored by Shri Sudhindra

Reproduced by Dr. Vivek Arya

It is said : “All is fair in love and war.’’ We can safely add a rider and say that politics knows no scruples and since International Christianity is a totalitarian political creed she considers no means as foul or unfair to achieve her ends which is to force the entire world to go on its knees before her. With this object Christianity has adopted in the past, and will continue to adopt in future, many an innovation to uproot the Vedic Dharma of the Hindus. Her missionaries have impersonated as Hindu sanyasis ; they have tried to implant a false Veda and one of their numbers, Max Muller, attempted, deliberately, to misinterpret the Vedas! These acts, or rather misdeeds, can hardly be the doings of saintly hearts dedicated to the service of man whom God had created in His own image. Nor should they look forward to salvation because of this. 

At one stage of human history the Romans had attempted, though unsuccessfully, to Romanise religion. Later when Christian political powers became militarily strong they planned to Christianise politics. Of the latter we find more than one examples in this country. 

When on the fateful 23rd June 1757, Clive defeated the forces of Suraj-ud-Dowla at Plassy (Bengal) the British East India Company virtually took over political control of India. As a result the Company now needed more Englishmen to assist in the administration of this enormous empire. 

A very large number of the Englishmen who came out to India were the products of Christian Church seminaries from where nearly all of them came out with one common conviction that the whole world must be baptised and made Christian. One such Englishman who came out to India in 1834 was Thomas Babigton Macaulay on whom, later, a Lordship was conferred for the services he had rendered to the Church and the State. 

What type of a man was this Macaulay is usually not sufficiently well known in this country. He was the son of Zachary Macaulay and the grandson of Rev. John Macaulay, a Presbyterian (one of the different sects of Christianity) minister at Inverary ; Babington Macaulay’s mother was Selina Mills, the daughter of a Quaker. Babington Macaulay was “‘severely educated’’ in the rigid Calvinism (Christian religious belief expounded by John Calvin, the French theologian—it was a rigid creed and the transgressors were severely punished—one, Servetus, was burned alive). Thomas Babington Macaulay is introduced to the world as a “‘historian, essayist and a politician’? but to call him an historian would be a misnomer. In a cyclopaedia we read about him that ——

"in 1848 appeared the first two volumes of his History of England—this brilliant rhetorical exposition, although touched with partisanship and with a tendency to paradox, has attained the position of a classic.” 

This need give us no surprise if we do not lose sight of the fact that in his childhood he had received severe Christian education. His young mind had gathered a bias which like any one else he too could not give up when he started writing. He believed, perhaps honestly. that there is but only one true religion in the world and that is Christianity. We get a very clear glimpse of this attitude in one of his essays which he wrote in April 1839 when he was a mature man, 39 years old. In ‘Education in India' he writes  (Historical Essays by Lord Macaulay, pp. 387, 389) : 

“The education of the people, conducted on those principles of morality which are common to all forms of Christianity, is highly valuable as a means of promoting the main object for which Government exists...There is assuredly no country where it is more desirable that Christianity should’ be propagated.”

                         Macaulay had first come out to India in 1834 as the legal advisor to the Council of India and had stayed here for four years. In 1839 he was in England, was elected an MP and evidently wrote the above lines as a result of his experience and observation in this country during the four years of his stay. That Macaulay had a sharp intellect and a forceful pen no one denies. But it seems his rigid and severe education which he: received as a Christian child stood all his lifetime in his way of becoming an impartial man and a scholar. He gave another proof of his bigoted religious zeal and partisanship when he successfully intervened for the introduction of English language. Arthur W. Jose is of the opinion (The Growth of the Empire, p. 204) that:

 “by a resolution of March 7, 1835, the brains as well as the. swords of all India were placed at the disposal of the (British) Indian Government.’’

 The object of the British Government, which was to try to make India a perpetual slave, appeared for a while to have been achieved but Macaulay had his eye on a far distant target. It was to convert India and the Hindus to Christianity. Only thus the political and cultural slavery of the Indians would be complete. This enemy of India and India’s ancient culture and religion who has been paraded so often and so long as a friend of India unwittingly gave himself away when he wrote a letter, October 12, 1836, to his father. The letter reads (The Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay by Rt. Hon’ble Sir George Otto Trevelyan Bart, pp. 329, 330): 

“Calcutta. October 12, 1836—My Dear Father...Our English schools are flourishing wonderfully—the effect of this education on the Hindoos is prodigious. No Hindoo who has received an English education, ever remains sincerely attached to his religion. Some continue to profess it as a matter of policy, and some embrace Christianity. It is my belief that, if our plans of education are followed up, there will nor be a single idolater among the respectable castes in Bengal thirty years hence. And this will be effected without any efforts to proselytise, without the smallest interference with religious liberty by natural operation of knowledge and reflection. I heartily rejoice in the prospect.—Ever yours most affectionately, T.B. Macaulay.” 

Letters reveal a man and this letter throws bare the ignominious mind and heart that this British Lord concealed behind the veneer and polish of English education. The docile and peace loving Hindu was told, as he is being briefed today, that English was the window to the world and that the English schools were opened to spread education. But this letter written by Macaulay to his father and which he would have very much wished to have been destroyed after having been received and read exposes Macaulay, who masqueraded as a Friend of India, as a bigoted Christian missionary. He rejoiced at the prospects of this land and its people becoming in the next thirty years, by 1866, Christians. He rejoiced, it appears, at the prospects of succeeding in his plans of education which aimed at slow but sure and complete destruction of the culture and faith of those of whom he feigned, professed and pretended to be friend. He was like a ‘ravening wolf in the clothing of sheep’ and that is why those who understand the role he played as a great enemy of India often exclaim in utter disgust that if Parmatman would save us from our such friends we would ourselves take care of our enemies ! 

In the holy Bible (New Testament, Luke IX: 62) we get this to read as reported to have been said by Jesus Christ: 

“No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God. "

Macaulay, who had been severely educated in his childhood, having once put his mind, heart and muscles to the inglorious and irreligious job of destroying Hinduism did not want, like a true Christian, to look back. As a servant of God he was prepared to do all within his power to fit himself for the Kingdom of God. His plans of education included, without any doubt, additional plans of attack on Hinduism from different directions. His keen eyes were in search of someone who would prove handy and agree to become a tool in his hand to further his mission. He was in search of a scholar who could, and would, translate to twist and interpret (or rather misinterpret) Hindu Shastras to Macaulay’s liking. Macaulay’s eyes fell on Friedrich Max Muller (1823-1900) who was a German by birth. He picked him for his purpose. 

At this point we shall allow ourselves a little diversion and explain another side-event which had gone a long way in the wilful and planned misinterpretation of the Vedas in which Max Muller was to engage himself. One Col. Boden had founded at Oxford the Boden Chair of Sanskrit. That the intention and the purpose behind the founding of this chair of Sanskrit was only and exclusively to find ways and means to convert the Hindus to Christianity is very clear from Col. Boden’s will that he made before his death. Writing the Preface of his Sanskrit-English Dictionary M. Monier Williams makes a mention of Col. Boden’s will in these words: 

“I must draw attention to the fact that I am only the second occupant of the Boden Chair, and that its Founder, Colonel Boden, stated most explicitly in his Will (August 15, 1811 A.D.) that the special object of the munificent bequest was to promote the translation of Scriptures into Sanskrit so as to enable his countrymen to proceed in the conversion of the natives of India to the Christian religion."

It was thus at Oxford, the much advertised seat of learning, that the conspiracy to kill Hindu culture and convert Hindus to Christianity was hatched. Macaulay was a product of this cell and to this cell had been attached in his fruitful years that scholar of Sanskrit whom we know today as Max Muller. 

We have no ground to believe that Max Muller had originally himself wanted to misinterpret the Vedas. He was a man and a scholar of integrity and, perhaps like nearly all scholars, a man without any means. The political conditions in Germany in those days were so unsettled that it must have imposed additional strains, mental and monetary, on Max Muller. So when Macaulay called Max Muller for discussions Max Muller saw in this interview a rare chance for continuing his scholarly researches which must have been extremely dear to his heart. This infamous interview (28th December, 1855) between Macaulay and Max Muller was the real undoing of Max Muller. In 1855, while Macaulay was an experienced worldly man of about 55 years, Max Muller was an immature young man of 32. Against Macaulay who was a politician and, as the saying goes, who had already arrived, Max Muller was a scholar...a man of letters and thought...still struggling to make his mark in the difficult field of scholarship that he had chosen for himself. The youthful ambitions in his scholarly heart gave him many a painful pangs. The simple. inexperienced scholar in him was no match for the crafty politician that was Macaulay. From what Mux Muller said afterwards about this interview we can safely presume that Macaulay had put all his might, skill, craft and rhetoric to subdue, vanquish and win over the scholar Max Muller. Max Muller had to choose between a life of unknown, squalor and want and in the end die unsung and unremembered and a life of fame and plentiful which Macaulay promised him. He knew and realised that in his acceptance of Macaulay’s proposition lay hidden the chance of succeeding as a scholar and in the refusal the possibility of fading into oblivion. Macaulay had made up his mind either to win over Max Muller to his side or jettison him and render him completely innocuous. He was prepared to attack the young scholar with all his might and his job was made easy by the unpreparedness of Max Muller who was caught off balance. Without any doubt Macaulay used every means to confuse, confound and muddle Max Muller’s independent thinking to prevent him from reaching, for himself, a sane, just and correct decision. To achieve this Macaulay very much used, and played upon, Max Muller’s emotions to defeat him. He gave such heavy and alternate doses of ‘fear’ and ‘hope’ that under the well planned onslaught Max Muller’s determination to resist gave way and he succumbed. ‘‘Fame is the thirst of youth” and “is the last infirmity of a noble mind.” The noble mind of young Max Muller fell a prey before the rosy prospects of fame held out before him by this British politician. Max Muller was now in Macaulay’s bag. 

 In India we usually fail to appreciate fully the harm that Christianity has done to us by robbing us of our intellectuals and thinkers. By a calculated process she has always tried and attempted to siphon off to her side the intelligentsia of our society—the thinkers who can influence the masses. According to this Christian plan. concerted attempts were made in Calcutta to convert to Christianity Raja Ram Mohan Roy, the great Indian intellectual. Conscious of their failure to succeed in Raja Ram Mohan Roy’s conversion the Rev. Deocar Schmid had written to the Secretary of the Church Missionary Society London on December 1, 1819 to say that 

“I know how much interest you take in what concerns Ram Mohan Roy. I cannot altogether be silent about him, altho’ I have not any joyful news to report. His state of mind is still quite the same.” 

Raja Ram Mohan had ultimately smashed all their hopes when he told these Christian Fathers : “I was born a Hindu and shall die a Hindu.” Max Muller had very high regard for the teachings of the Vedas and had his thinking been not subverted by Macaulay he might have been one of the greatest supporters and exponents of the Vedic Truths. In his conversion we not only lost a possible friend but instead got a bigoted enemy. The loss was therefore double fold. 

We have ample evidence to prove to the hilt that Max Muller himself was unhappy over the decision he had taken. He was conscious of the wrong he had committed on the advice and instigation of Macaulay. After his interview with Macaulay on December 28, 1855 Max Muller had said with a heavy heart: 

“I went back to Oxford a sadder man and a wiser man.” 

Sadder because as a scholar he had yielded to the politician ; because he had succumbed to the temptation of gold which, he knew, had undone many a scholar in the past. In the bargain thus struck between him and Macaulay he had agreed to prostitute his scholarship for a purpose in which, till then at least, he hardly had any faith. He had bartered away his pen and brain for the glittering gold mohars. He was sadder because it simultaneously announced the death of the free Max Muller in him and the birth of the slave Max Muller. We (the Hindus) have in this country a very well known saying which is very dear to our hearts. According to this : “For the family sacrifice the individual ; for the community the family ; for the country the community and for the soul (atma) the whole world.” According to a similar Christian saying : 

“What doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his own soul.”?

 Max Muller was sad because he had faltered both as a true Christian and as a true Vedantist ; he had sold his atma (soul) to feed his body. He was a wiser man because he had now shed all his spiritually ideological thinking in order to live and lead a comfortable worldly life. As time passed, Max Muller grew, in this respect, wiser and yet more wise except perhaps during the last few years of his life when he might have been repenting. Man can be as great an hypocrite as he wishes to be but an intellectual can easily outdo, outstrip and outdistance an average man in this field and Max Muller was no exception. He was paid by the British East India Company for misinterpreting the Vedas and in all fairness to him it must be admitted that he did well and to his best ability the job that was assigned to him and for which he, his pen and his scholarship had been hired. In this respect he was a conscientiously honest man though the same cannot be said of him as a scholar. In India we often hear it said that it is extremely hard and difficult to be a sadhu but any one might easily become a ‘missionary’ which at its best is a mercenary profession like many another. Max Muller had now turned a Christian missionary and he did what is usually expected of one. He bent all his energies, henceforth, in running down Hinduism just for the sake of running it down. He admits this in one of his letters written in 1866 A. D. to his wife. He says (Life and Letters of Frederick Max Muller):

 “This edition of mine and the translation of the Veda will Hereafter tell to a great extent on the fate of India—it is the root of their religion and to show them what the root is, I feel sure, is the only way of uprooting all that has sprung from it during the last three thousand years.”

 It is clear that the uprooting of the Hinduism was the only mission in which the scholar (?) and savant (?) Max Muller was engaged. In another letter he made a confession of his collusion in the theo-political conspiracy hatched and perfected by the British East India Company to wipe out Hinduism and supplant Christianity. Admitting this guilt, which in the present day we call by the new political name of ‘Subversion’, Max Muller had written (December 16,1868 A.D.) to the Duke of Argyl, the then Minister for India : 

“The ancient religion of India is doomed and if Christianity does not step in, whose fault will it be ?” 

That the ancient Hindu religion of India was doomed was the verdict of Max Muller and since time has proved this prophecy to be utterly false its prophet must now be turning most uneasily in his grave. When Max Muller made this prophecy the post of the British Prime Minister was held by Viscount Henry John Temple Palmerston, better known as Lord Palmerston. At the resignation of Lord Aberdeen, he became the British Prime Minister in the year 1855—the same year in which Max Muller had his infamous interview with Macaulay. Palmerston was a product of another Christian seminary—St. John’s College—and was a Christian like Macaulay. He lent full support to Macaulay in his mission and himself was of the opinion that it was not only the duty of Britain but also in her ultimate interest that Christianity should be propagated in India. During the years 1859-1866 Lord Halifax (Sir Charles Wood) was the Secretary for India and this policy of propagating Christianity in India received his support too as according to him each and every Christian was a link in the chain and a source of strength to the British Commonwealth. With so many powerful supporters around him Max Muller was overawed and found the climate and environments very suitable for the furtherance of his ignominious mission on which Macaulay had launched him. 

Macaulay had planned a multi-pronged attack on Hinduism. From one side Christianity was to be introduced to the Hindu through the medium of Sanskrit and from another Hinduism was to be misrepresented to him through the medium of English. It was therefore thought necessary, officially and unofficially, to decry all other translations and interpretations of the Vedas and commend, uphold, prize, laud, applaud, eulogise and recognise the one and the only one translation by Max Muller which on purpose misinterpreted the Vedic teachings. 

This was a part of the plans of education or rather mis-education Clandestinely thought out by Macaulay to subvert and pervert the Hindu mind and create in it doubt and misgivings about Hinduism. That the purpose was to shut out from the Hindus any interpretation of the Vedas, by a Hindu is clear from more than one vituperations of Max Muller. In one instance, while reviewing the La Bible dans L’ Inde Max Muller wrote that 

“the author scems to have been taken in by the Brahmins in India.” 

Here, has not Max Muller given himself away ? His distrust and mistrust of the Brahmins is symptomatic. He knew it too well that Brahmins as a class were devoted to the reading and the teaching of the Vedas and their (the Brahmins’) interpretation of the Vedas was likely to differ from his. We also realised that there would surely be some voices raised in protest, and of dissent. As a clever strategist, therefore, he planned to run down Brahmins and their teachings. We had made up his mind to disparage and slight all others who differed from his mis-interpretation. His above quoted review was written to reprove, rebuke and censure Louis Jacolliot, the French scholar, who was the author of La Bible dans L’ Inde because in his book he had glorified India by calling her ‘‘the Cradle of Humanity and land of love.” 

The big idea of an universal Christianity had not only been successfully sold to Max Muller but he had also become himself its zealous vendor and a hawker. He had now reached a mental stage where nearly every Christian missionary not only accepts himself but tries to enforce on others the belief that there is but only one true religion in this world and that is Christianity. He reacted impolitely, and often haughtily, towards those who ever opened their mouth, or wrote, to question or even slightly doubt anything that the Bible contained. When another German scholar Dr. Spiegel expressed his opinion that the Biblical theory of the creation of the universe was borrowed from outside, Max Muller retorted, as if stung by a wasp, to say(Chips from a German Workshop by Max Muller, 147). : 

‘A writer Like Dr. Spiegel should know that he can expect no mercy; nay, he should himself wish for no mercy, but invite the heaviest artillery against the floating battery which he has launched in the troubled waters of Biblical criticism.’’ 

Max Muller was being true to his salt and when he said that Dr. Spiegel should expect no mercy for his criticism of the Bible he perhaps implied as much that he should expect, like him, no money either.  That Max Muller was consistent in his antics is evident from another letter (in 1897 A.D.) which he wrote to Shri B.V. Kamesvara Aiyar who had translated in English Sandhya-Vandana and Purushasukta. Decrying Kamesvara Aiyar’s efforts in low tones Max Muller wrote to him :

 “I think you are sometimes unfair to western scholars. Sayana himself offers one or more interpretations of a rik; why should not western scholars be allowed the same privilege ?”

Commenting on this letter of Max Muller Shri Kamesvara Aiyar says in his foreword that:

 “If I have here and there appeared to speak lightly of the work of western scholars it is not because I think lightly of their work but because I feel sad that...they appear to me to have failed to grasp the spirit of the Vedic teaching.” 

Max Muller accepted that there could possibly be “one or more interpretations of a rik’ but stubbornly chooses and sticks only to his own interpretation presumably because it serves his nefarious purpose best. It is only religious bigotry that prevents him from accepting the possibility that his interpretation might be wrong and the other man’s correct. He seems to have gradually and completely lost the power to think independently. Of this he gave another proof when he wrote a letter to his son. 

He said : “Would you say that any one sacred book is superior to all others in the world ? It may sound prejudiced but taking in all I say, the New Testament.” When we consider what some other people think of, and have said about, the New Testament and its teachings the statement made by Max Muller looks like the one made by a child who does not mind uttering untruth for a handful of sweets. There can be no doubt that he knew the world shall not believe his word because, as he feared, Ais statement was highly prejudiced. As he wanted to boost himself and his interpretation of the Vedas Max Muller did not like any other interpretation (of the Vedas) to get into the hands of the Hindus. If this happened, he was mortally afraid, the other interpretation might explode the myth of his scholarship built up deceitfully and cunningly on stilts provided by Macaulay and the British East India Company. That is why Max Muller relentlessly criticised and censured the translation of the Vedas done by Swami Dayanand. In his letter (January 29, 1882) addressed to Byramjee Malabaree he advised the Indians to be careful and keep away from those interpretations of the Vedas which like the one by Dayanand Saraswati “over value” their teachings. Max Muller was a past master in the art of running down his rivals and contemporaries. He chose the medium, time and the occasion carefully whenever he wanted to decry any of them. We get a glimpse of the masterly touch in his letter to Byramjee Malabaree. He said,

 “I wanted to tell those few at least whom I might hope to reach in English, what the true historical value of this ancient religion is, as looked upon, not from an exclusively European or Christian, but from a historical point of view. I wished to warn against two dangers, that of undervaluing and despairing the ancient national religion, as is often done by your half-Europeanised youths, and that of overvaluing and interpreting it as it was never meant to be interpreted of which you may see a painful source in Dayanand Saraswati’s labour on the Vedas."

With other odious failings Max Muller combined in him, in good measure, presumptuousness of a religious fanatic. He thought that the Vedas were meant to be interpreted in the way he had done and also that the way they should be interpreted was to be exclusively decided by him. He presumed that he knew more about, and of, the Vedas than the Hindus who grow with them and under their teachings and that he was the only authority to interpret them. This is akin to something like saying that a Jew is more competent to interpret the Quran and Muslim the Old Testament ; that a physicist is more competent than a horticulturist to explain the way different fruits grow. Max Muller indulged too heavily and too often in the abuse of self-publicity and thought that he was always to have the last word. 

What was really wrong with Max Muller is not easy to state with much accuracy. We can nevertheless make some sincere efforts to guess it as best we can. The lofty teachings of the Vedas had tickled his imagination, in the earliest stages of his studies, to an extent that he found it difficult to contain himself. He was young and as Byron said, ‘‘fame is the thirst of youth.” Max Muller wished to be famous and when Macaulay called him into his presence and explained his scheme Max Muller at Once recognised his opportunity. Like Thomas Moore "who woke one morning and found himself famous”, Max Muller found fame within his easy grasp when he met Macaulay. “I am not covetous of gold; but if it be a sin to covet honour, I am the most offending soul alive.” so said the great Shakespeare. When Max Muller saw the possibility of getting gold and honour both he found the temptation too great to resist. He fell a prey to the sin and agreed to do what Macaulay wanted of him, viz., engage in wilful misinterpretation of the Vedas of the Hindus with the explicit purpose and aim of uprooting Hinduism. “Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them” and greatness was virtually thrust upon Max Muller by Macaulay who could have as easily picked up another person as well to do this ignominious task. It is not hard to imagine that Macaulay must have pointed out this possibility to Max Muller and used it to overcome his resistance. When all is said it has to be admitted, however, that unless Max Muller had that grain in him Macaulay would have not been successful in making him agree to undertake the odious and soul killing job. ‘In Fame’s temple”, in the words of Zimmerman, “there is always a niche to be found for rich dunces, importunate scoundrels, or successful butchers of the human race’’ and in search of fame, and gone blind and mad after it, Max Muller undertook the job, and pledged to do it well, of butchering the culture of the Hindus and uproot their Dharma—the task In which he engaged himself thereafter laboriously, systematically and also sincerely. 

Why did Macaulay pick up only Max Muller for doing the abominable and the hideous job and not another European scholar ?. Was Max Muller then the only European who called himself, or pretended to be, a Sanskritist ? We shall endeavour to answer both questions. It is ordinary common sense that for any important mission or project to succeed it is absolutely necessary to have a right person for each right job. Only dirty souls will stoop sufficiently low to do an equally dirty job. An astute politician like Macaulay would not pick up a wrong person and risk his entire scheme. Then, for his project he would pick up only a man who would agree to be hired to become a killer of Hinduism. Macaulay must have made careful and secret enquiries concerning the suitability of Max Muller, his temperament and his inclinations and found him ‘fit’ for the job. 

Macaulay had planned to annihilate, or rather inject poison into the veins of, Hinduism. He was on the lookout for an assassin. As a true ‘fisher of men’ he had thrown his net wide and ultimately caught Max Muller. There were several other Europeans who had equal knowledge of Sanskrit and dabbled in the study and the interpretation of the Hindu Scriptures. However, as honest men and scholars of integrity they owned and accepted, unlike the presumptuous Max Muller, their shortcomings. To illustrate the point we shall here quote what Schopenhauer, another great German scholar, thought of the knowledge of, and the proficiency in, Sanskrit of European scholars :

 “I add to this the impression which the translation of Sanskrita words by European scholars, with very few exceptions, produce on my mind. I cannot resist a certain suspicion that our Sanskrita scholars do not understand their text better than the higher class school boys their Greek or Latin.’ 

We shall also add here the opinion of Swami Dayanand. It reads, 

‘‘The impression that the Germans are the best Sanskrit scholars, and that no one has read so much of Sanskrit as Professor Max Muller, is altogether unfounded. Yes, in a land where lofty trees never grow, even ricinus communis or the castor oil plant may be called anoak. The study of Sanskrit being altogether out of question in Europe, the Germans and Max Muller may there have come to be regarded as highest authorities.”

A self-conceited man that was Max Muller he could not ignore or forgive this forthright criticism of his talents and scholarly abilities and so he did his best to advise people to keep away from translations of the type made by Dayanand Saraswati. Here is another opinion of a great Sanskrit scholar (Guru Datt Vidyarthi) concerning these European Sanskritists and Max Muller: 

‘‘For, if the Vedic philosophy be true, the interpretation of the Vedas, as given at present by Professor Max Muller and other European scholars, must not only be regarded as defective and incomplete, but as altogether false.” 

All these opinions were snuffed out by heavy publicity and the official recognition, which clandestinely supported whatever distorted and falsified versions of the Vedas emanated from the pen which Macaulay had pushed into Max Muller’s fingers. Patronised by the State ( British Government) a quack Sanskritist was insidiously hoisted up as the greatest scholar of this language and to complete the job of uprooting Hinduism his spurious and altogether false interpretations of the Vedas were made the subject of study in Indian schools and colleges to the exclusion of all others. 

  Schopenhauer once said that ‘In India our religion (Bible) will now and never strike root; the primitive wisdom of the human race will never be pushed aside by the events of Galilee, On the contrary, Indian Wisdom will flow back upon Europe, and produce a thorough change in our knowledge and thinking.” All this proved to be a bitter dose for the Christian Max Muller who reacted in the only manner that can be expected of a religious got. He said : 

“Here again the great philosopher seems to me to have allowed himself to be carried away too far by his enthusiasm for the less known. He is blind to the dark side of the Upanishads and he wilfully shuts his eyes against the bright rays of eternal truths in the (Christian) Gospel, which even Ram Mohan Rai was quick enough to perceive behind the mist and clouds of tradition that gather so quickly round the sunrise of every religion.” 

Max Muller had preconceived notions and ideas engrafted on his mind in favour of Christianity and against Hinduism. He not only saw, as a result, only defects in Upanishads where they did not exist but also wanted every one else to accept his versions. That Max Muller was an enemy of Hinduism in the shining garb of a friend cannot be doubted any more. That he was also a Christian missionary like many others is a fact which we in this country often fail to recognise though he was not the first Christian missionary to attack Hinduism from behind carefully concealed identity. Before Max Muller there was one Robert de Nobili (1577-1656) who was an Italian Jesuit (a sect of Roman Catholics, a member of the Society of Jesus founded by Ignatius Loyala in 1533 and with which St. Xavier was connected) and who came to India in 1605. We get this description of this Nobili in Stephen Neill’s A History of Christian Missions (pp. 183-185) :

 “To win the Indians he would become an Indian, and abandoned everything that could offend, such as the eating of meat and the wearing of leather shoes. He adopted the Ochre (Kavi) robe of the holy man, and as far as could he converted himself Into a Sanyasi Guru. He mastered classical Tamil. To this he was later to add Telugu and Sanskrit: he was, it is believed, the first European ever to “study the ancient classical languages of India. The secret could not be indefinitely kept. A Parava Christian told some of the converts that Nobili was really a Parangi (Farangi). In order to defend himself he wrote a deceleration in in Tamil on Olais, the strips of palm-leaf locally used in place of paper and had it nailed to a tree in front of his house: I am not Parangi, was not born in the land of Parangis nor was I ever connected with their race.” 

This description of Nobili says that to win the Indians he would become an Indian but not a Hindu. The distinction is clever indeed and is intended to cover his impersonation. In another book (Introduction to the Science of Language by A.H. Sayce, Vol I, pp. 43-44) this point is more than made clear by the author who affirms that Nobili transformed himself into a Brahman, learnt Tamil, Telugu, and Sanskrit, adopted the cord (sacred thread), marks, garb, diet and submitted to caste. A man like Nobili who was nothing but an impostor was described by the ‘celebrated philologist Max Muller” as ‘our first Sanskrit scholar’. Birds of the same flock fly together and as a Christian missionary Max Muller could not have but praised Nobili, another Christian missionary, and what he had done. Both had engaged themselves in a covert attack with the fixed purpose of destroying and uprooting Hinduism. Both had a common objective ; only the means and the methods and mediums each chose for himself differed and this was done only to avoid being detected which usually happens when an old method is utilised the second time for the purpose of subverting from within. 

Max Muller did not hesitate, whenever he got a chance, to praise, exalt and extol to the sky Christianity and its virtues. He often overdid it to an extent that immediately he gave himself away. By siding persistently on the side of Christianity, day in and day out, he securely laid the foundation for a solid charge against his sense of impartiality, scholarly integrity and truthfulness. However hard his supporters and admirers might try, their protestations cannot and shall not ever absolve him of the accusation that he suffered incurably from partisanship which he exercised in favour of Christianity. Here is what he once said: 

“History seems to teach that the whole human race required a gradual education, before, in the fulness of ‘times, it could be admitted to the truths of Christianity—that religion, the religion of Buddha, was spread far beyond the limits of the Aryan world and, to our limited vision, it may seem to have retarded the advent of Christianity among a large portion of the human race, But in the sight of Him with whom a thousand years are but as one day, that religion, like all the ancient religions of the world, may have but served to prepare the way of Christ by helping through its very errors, to strengthen-and deepen the ‘ineradicable yearning of the human heart after the truths of God.” 

Max Muller was a Christian Missionary and as one he not only sang songs in. its praise, he also solicited and made efforts to secure converts to his religion. ‘We shall quote one of his letters in extenso to show that he, was always ready to prompt, persuade and encourage .people. to embrace Christian faith. Addressing N.K. Majumdar, a Brahm Samajist, he wrote in 1899:

 “You know, for many years I have watched your efforts to purify the popular religion of India, and thereby to bring it near to the purity and perfection of other religion's, particularly of Christianity. The first thing you have to do is to settle how much of your ancient religion you are willing to give up, if not all, as utterly false, still as antiquated. You have given up a great deal—polytheism, idolatry and your elaborate sacrificial worship. Take then the New Testament and read it for yourself, and judge for yourself whether the words of Christ as contained in it satisfy you or not. Christ comes to you as he comes to us in the only trustworthy records preserved of him in the Gospels. We have not even the right to consider how differently we interpret them ourselves. If you accept His teachings as they are recorded, you are a Christian. Tell me some of your chief difficulties that prevent you and your countrymen from openly following Christ, and when I write to you I shall do my best to explain how I and many who agree with me have met them and solved them. From my point of view, India, at least the best part of it, is already converted to Christianity. You want no persuasion to, become a follower of Christ, then make up your mind to work for yourselves: The bridge has been built for you by those who came before you. Step boldly forward, it will not break under you and you will find many friends to welcome you on the  other shore and among them none more will be delighted than your old friend and fellow labourer F. Max Muller.” 

According to Max Muller Christ comes in the ‘only trustworthy records preserved of Him in the Gospels” and the “bridge has been built’? and there will be ‘“‘many friends to welcome” on the other shore any one who became a Christian. Does all this not smack of monomania and religious zealotry ? This writing which emanated from the pen of the so-called celebrated Max Muller looks like an excerpt taken from some cheap and common place Christian tract issued for free distribution in some mission land. This Christian missionary whom the British Imperialism and the Christian Church extolled as Professor Max Muller, thought that the ancient Hindu religion was false and Christianity was nothing but truth and that the former needed to be purified. Max Muller indulged in dubious writing and knew how afterwards to twist it to his own advantage. Sometimes he brought in other people’s names to impress the reader play upon his emotions or to soften the opposition. In his reply to Schopenhauer he had referred to Raja Ram Mohan Roy in these words: 

"He is blind to the dark side of the Upanishads and he wilfully shuts his eyes against the bright rays of eternal truths in the Gospel, which even Ram Mohan Rai was quick enough to perceive—.” 

The only purpose here of dragging in the name of Raja Ram Mohan Roy is to impress the Hindus and tell them an untruth which on the strength alone of Max Muller’s statement they would reject as a lie. Raja Ram Mohan Roy was a far greater intellectual than the partisan Christian missionary who thus made use of his name. Ram Mohan Roy was an honest and straightforward man who loved and worshipped truth. He wrote several tracts and books during his life time. He wrote against the Sati custom and the Christian Church applauded him when he wrote against. idol worships. As is usually the case the Christian Church tried hard to twist Raja Ram Mohan’s writings to her advantage and present the whole thing as if influenced by the Christian 'Church ‘and as if Raja Ram Mohan Roy had turned a Christian. This is an old tactic which Christianity has employed, often with success, to alienate a Hindu from the Hindu society. At this time efforts were being made actually to convert Raja Ram Mohan Roy to Christianity. The  Christian missionaries and Fathers pestered him so much that they nearly got on his nerves, especially because they tried to impose Christianity on him and the people from the back door. Asa result, Raja Ram Mohan Roy decided to write his The Precepts of Jesus which, when it appeared, made those Christian missionaries very angry and annoyed. According to one Christian writer, Stephen N. Hay, the Assistant Professor of History, the University of Chicago:

“Then, in January, 1820, he (Raja Ram Mohan Roy) published The Precepts of Jesus which immediately aroused the ire of the missionaries, both in Calcutta and at Serampore. As early as February, 1820, The Friend of India (This was the newspaper which was first established by Christian missionaries and which later became The Statesman, now published from Calcutta and New Delhi. The Statesman proudly used to announce its direct descent from the Friend of India published an anonymous article ‘Some Remarks on Publication, entitled ‘The Precepts of Jesus’, This was the review which Deocer Schmid acknowledged privately was his and Joshua Marshman’s work.” 

From the foregoing we can easily understand how mischievously and wrongly did Max Muller use, and bring in, the name of Raja Ram Mohan Roy to gain a hearing. When Max Muller was introduced as a Sanskrit scholar, a savant and a Hindu Rishi born in Germany, many people in this country were easily taken in by this Christian propaganda. Luckily, and as it always happens, the Truth has now gradually started dawning on the gullible Hindu. He knows now for certain that Max Muller was only a Christian missionary and was no better or worse than another though he excelled nearly all others in one respect, viz., he chose for himself a highly sophisticated weapon with which to annihilate Hinduism and which he wielded with dexterity. This truth that he was a Christian missionary is not now hidden from the world. His friends have admitted it to the great chagrin and embarrassment of International Christianity. To quote one here. Rev. Edward Bonverie Pusey D.D., who was educated at Christ Church, Oxford, and was Max Muller’s friend, wrote to him saying : 

“Your work will form a new era in the efforts for the conversion of India, and Oxford will have reason to be thankful tor that ; by giving you a home, it will have facilitated a work of such primary and lasting importance for the conversion of India.” 

The cat is out of the bag and we can be sure no one shall be able again to put it back. How far Macaulay and Max Muller were able to harm and damage, and how much of this damage is irreparable, of it only time and posterity will be the judges. There is no doubt, however, that both strived hard and planned meticulously to murder Hindu culture and Dharma. But as no one can bring about a perfect murder they too failed in their irreligiously ignominious and despicably opprobrious intentions. While Macaulay, who was first and last a politician, could have some valid excuse for engaging himself in this heinous pursuit, there is none to absolve Max Muller, who pretended himself to be a scholar, of the shameful charge of complicity and collusion in this gigantic theo-political plot.