Professor Max Muller, in his last great work on the "Six Systems of Hindu Philosophy", has remarked as follows: -

"The longer I have studied the various systems, the more have I become impressed with the view taken by Vijnana Bikshu and others that there is behind the variety of the Six Systems, a common fund of what may be called National or Popular Philosophy, a large Manasa lake of philosophical thought and language, far away in the distant north and in the distant past, from which each thinker was allowed to draw for his own purposes."

And it would have certainly surprised him if one had told him that one need not go neither to the distant north nor to the distant past to discover what this National or Popular Philosophy was, from which each thinker drew his own inspiration, and a study of the two popular Hindu Religions of Modern India - we mean Saivaism and Vaishnavism - will convince any' one that they inherit to-day all the thought and traditions of by-gone ages, as the Modern Hindus themselves represent lineally their old ancestors who were settled in Bharata Khanda, since the days of the Rig Veda; and their religion of to-day is as much a living faith, suited to all sorts and conditions of men, whether peasant or pandit, sinner or saved.

Saivaism is based on the vedas and agamas.

Saivaism comprising in its fold Saktaism and Ganapatyam 'and worshippers of God Subrahmanya etc., counts among its followers, the majority of Hindus, and it accordingly claims to represent the old traditional and parent religion of the days of the Vedas and Upanishats, Agamas or Tantras, and ltihasas and Puranas, and bases its authority on these ancient revealed books and histories. It claims God Siva to be the author of the Vedas and Agamas. Says Sri Nilakanta Sivacharya in his Sutra Bashya:

* A paper read before the Convention of Religions, at Calcutta, 1909.

"We see no difference between the Veda and the Sivagama. Even the Vedas may properly be called Sivagama, Siva being the author thereof. Accordingly Sivagama is twofold, one being intended for the three higher castes, the other being intended for all. The Vedas are intended for people of the three castes, and the other for all. Siva, alone as the author of the Veda, is declared in the following passages of Sruti and Smriti."*

"He is the Lord of all Vidyas,"

"(The Veda) is the breath of the Mighty Being."

"Of these eighteen Vidyas of various paths, the original author is the wise Sulapani Himself. So says the Sruti."

It will be therefore important to trace Modern Saivaism from the traditions and thought and language of the past.