The fact that the idea of cyclical time is largely absent in Vedic Hinduism may in part explain its greater interest in explaining the ‘origin’ of the universe. Even in the case of cyclical time such an explanation may be required, but when required the necessity is perhaps felt less urgently from the fact of its happening so often. Be that as it may, the Vedic hymns are full of attempted cosmogonies, modeling the emergence of the universe on a whole variety of creative paradigms visible around them. Creatures are born from eggs or living beings – the oviparous and viviparous accounts of creation are obviously suggested by them. There is even the model provided by grass growing on a field. Things which bring things into being – causes which create effects – are all grist to the mill; thought, speech, sacrifice, down to a blacksmith.

When we turn to the Smṛti literature, however, this colourful variety is compromised in the monotonous regularity of creation which a pulsating universe requires. And this is where we make our suggestion: to couple the two.

The Vedic literature speculates on various kinds of possibilities regarding the origin of the universe. Smṛti literature, on the other hand, provides different occasions for the origin of a universe which continually appears and disappears. Could the two then not be combined – with the universe originating in different ways, as it does so again and again – with a quality in its manner to match the quantity of manifestations?

Let us begin with the claim that Hinduism does not have a word for itself. A. L. Basham writes:

There are probably over 300 million Hindus in the world, most of them in India, but also many in other parts of Asia, and in Africa and the West Indies. Though they form one of the largest and most important groups of the world, their faith is indefinable in a few words. It is possible to define the Christian or Muslim as the man who attempts to follow what he believes to be the teachings of Christ or Muhammad respectively, but Hinduism had no such single founder. Some modern sociologists have defined Christians and Muslims as those who consider themselves as such, but a similar definition cannot be applied to Hindus, for probably most of them have never even heard the word Hindu, and have no name for their religion. It was once said that anyone might be considered a Hindu who respected the Brāhman and his cow, and maintained the rules of caste, but his definition would exclude many of the most earnest of modern Hindus, as well as a number of unorthodox Hindu groups of earlier times. We can perhaps best briefly describe a Hindu as a man who chiefly bases his beliefs and way of life on the complex system of faith and practice which has grown up organically in the Indian sub-continent over a period of at least three millennia.[i]

Then comes the claim that the Hindu does not have a word for religion:

In classical India – again if we exclude personal religion, or religiousness, there is no word for our concept. In the threefold trivarga of mundane life, the realm of human behavior is classified into those actions that one does for the sheer enjoyment of them (kāma), those that are means to some end (artha), and those that are duties (dharma). The last of these, dharma, ranging in its reference from propriety to public law, from temple ritual to caste obligations, and much more, has on occasion been proffered by moderns as a term signifying systematic religion for Hindus. It does include a good deal of what the modern Western student regards so, as normative ideals and as sociological pattern; though it includes also a certain amount of matter that falls outside such a concept.[ii]

Next comes the claim that Hinduism does not have a word for caste:

The Hindus have not any name for the caste institution, which seems to them part of the order of nature. It is almost impossible for a Hindu to regard himself otherwise than as a member of some particular caste, or species of Hindu mankind. Everybody else who disregards Hindu dharma is an ‘outer barbarian’ (mlechchha) no matter how exalted his worldly rank or how vast his wealth may be. The proper Sanskrit and vernacular term for ‘a caste’ is jāti (jāt), ‘species’, although, as noted above, the members of a jāti are not necessarily descended from a common ancestor. Indeed, as a matter of fact, they are rarely, if ever, so descended. Their special caste rules make their community in effect a distinct species, whoever their ancestors may have been. [iii]

Finally we learn that Hinduism does not have a word for ‘conversion.’

The diffusion of Vaiṣṇavite and Śaivite ideas outside India is enough to show that Hinduism, too, was a missionary religion; at a very early date a Hinduist movement took root in the Hellenistic world and penetrated as far as Egypt. The decline of Hinduism after the Moselm period must not be allowed to obscure this fact. The old lawgivers say that to be a Hindu, or, more exactly, to belong to one of the three Āryan classes, means to have been born in a certain area of Hindustan, the Āryāvarta (or homeland of a the Āryas); but this assertion need not be taken literally. Hinduism long ago advanced beyond the limits assigned to it by the laws of Manu, by means of conquest or peaceful absorption, by marriage, and by adoption. Hinduism has not a word to express the process of conversion so frequently referred to in Buddhist and Jaina apologetics, books written by the converted for those to be converted; but passages can be cited from the Mahabharata which show that people of low caste, enemies and foreigners who were received into the Hindu fold. Many people wanted to raise their status and to be admitted to the Ārya society; others fell away from it through marriage outside its ranks and by transgressions and misfortunes. A passage of Patañjali attests that the Śakas and the Yavanas could perform sacrifices and accept food from an Ārya without contaminating it. The fact is that Hinduism is a way of life, a mode of thought, that becomes second nature. It is not so much its practices that are important, for they can be dispensed with; not is it the Church, since it has no priesthood, or at least no sacerdotal hierarchy. The important thing is to accept certain fundamental conceptions, to acknowledge a certain ‘spirituality’, a term much abused in current parlance. For many Hindus it would be quite legitimate to take Jesus as iṣṭadevatā, without even regarding him as an avatāra, so long as Indian tradition were acknowledged.[iv]

If we couple this with the fact that those who take to Hinduism in the West do not to admit to doing so, we have the spectacle of countless unacknowledging people converting people anonymously though a nameless process, to a religion which does not even have a name.

[ii] Wilfred Cantwell Smith, The Meaning and End of Religion: A New Approach to the Religious Traditions of Mankind (New York: Mentor, 1963 [1991]) p. 55-56

[iii] No longer traceable.

[iv] Louis Renou, Religions of Ancient India (New York: Shocken Books, 1968) pp. 54-56

A remarkable exception to this statement is Louis Renou, who has consistently argued that Hinduism is a missionary religion. He makes the following salient statements in his connection:

The expansion of Hinduism from at least the second century onwards over the whole of South-East Asia, from Burma to Java and Bali, is well known. The facts have been partially obscured by the predominance of Buddhism….

It should be remembered that Buddhism played little role in the developing science and technology: for the diffusion of grammar and poetics, for example, it made use of treatises of Hindu inspiration, thinly disguised as Buddhist works.

The diffusion of Vaisnavite and Saivite ideas outside India is strong enough to show that Hinduism, too, was a missionary religion; at a very early date a Hinduist movement took root in the Hellenistic world and penetrated as far as Egypt. The decline of Hinduism after the Moslem period must not be allowed to obscure this fact.

Hinduism long ago advanced beyond the limits assigned to it by Manu, by means of conquest or peaceful absorption, by marriage, and by adoption.

Hinduism has not word to express the process of conversion….

…at a later date, a Brahmanical corps was formed in Combodia.

To confine Hinduism to the circumference of India, however, would be to bypass its missionary character.

Louis Renou even offers some advice to modern Hindus on this point.

Some people think that Hinduism should cease to be ethnical in character (assuming that it ever has been so), and become once more a missionary religion. There are already several organizations for spreading a knowledge of Hinduism in the West, but very often their propaganda does not reach the right circles. When Hinduism is ‘exported’, it tends to be regarded as a kind of theosophy – after all, the basic doctrinal principles of theosophy are rooted in Hinduism – or as a brand of Christian Science, tinged with pseudo-Vedāntism. It can only become a force for good in the world when it emerges in India itself as a purified form of religion, free from primitivism and the cult of images. Extreme practices, such as Haṭhayoga and Tantrism ‘of the left’, which often make such a deep impression on Europeans, never constitute the main strength of a religion; they are special features that should not be intimated outside of their land of origin.

Louis Renou is thus prepared to accept Hinduism as a missionary religion, both in the past and the future unlike many other scholars of Hinduism, both Indian and Western.

The stories of Satī and Sāvitrī are among those which have been have been held up as ideals for Hindu women. But in the popular Hindu imagination they have not merely been held up as ideals for Hindu women. They have been held up as upholding a particular kind of ideal for Hindu women—that of devotion to the husband. There are good reasons for this. Both the stories are heavily freighted with conjugal devotion. But is that the only ideal they hold up to women?

Let us consider only one of them for the time being—the story of Satī. The story is found in many versions but the following account should suffice. One begins with the general background of the story:

Very long ago there was a chief of the gods named Daksha. He married Prasuti, daughter of Manu; she bore him sixteen daughters, of whom the youngest, Satī, became the wife of Shiva. This was a match unpleasing to her father, for he had a grudge against Shiva, not only for  his disreputable habits, but because Shiva, upon the occasion of a festival to which he has been invited, did not offer homage to Daksha. For this reason Daksha had pronounced a curse upon Shiva, that he should receive no portion of the offerings made to the gods. A Brāhman of Shiva’s party, however, pronounced the contrary curse, that Daksha should waste his life in material pleasures and ceremonial observances and should have a face like a goat. [1]

This may be followed by an account of their wedding.

Meanwhile Satī grew up and set her heart on Shiva, worshiping him in secret. She became of marriageable age, and her father held aswayamvara, or own-choice, for her, to which he invited the gods and princes from far and near, except only Shiva. Then Satī was borne into the great assembly, wreath in hand. But Shiva was nowhere to be seen, amongst the gods or men. Then in despair she cast her wreath into the air, calling upon Shiva to receive the garland; and behold he stood in the middle of the court with the wreath about his neck. Daksha had then no choice but to complete the marriage; and Shiva went away with Satī to his home in Kailās. [2]

It is however the following sequence of events which has made the name of Satī a byword for devotion to the husband in Hindu mythology and Hindu homes.

One day Daksha made arrangements for a great horse sacrifice, and invited all the gods to come and share in the offerings, omitting only Shiva. The chief offerings were to be made to Vishnu. Presently Satī observed the departure of the gods, as they set out to visit Daksha, and turning to her lord, she asked: “Whither, O Lord, are bound the gods, with Indra at their head?” Then Mahādeva answered: “Shining lady, the good patriarch Daksha has prepared a horse sacrifice, and thither the gods repair.” She asked him: “Why dost thou not also go to this great ceremony?” He answered: “It has been contrived amongst the gods that I should have no part in any such offerings as are made at sacrifices.” [3]

This led to trouble.

Then Satī was angry and she exclaimed: “How can it be that he who dwells in every being, he who is unapproachable in power and glory, should be excluded from oblations? What penance, what gift shall I make that my lord, who transcends all thought, should receive a share, a third or a half, of the oblation?” Then Shiva smiled at Satī, pleased with her affection; but he said: “These offerings are of little moment to me, for they sacrifice to me who chant the hymns of the Sāmavada; my priests are those who offer the oblation of true wisdom, where no officiating Brāhman is needed; that is my portion.” Satī answered: “It is not difficult to make excuses before women. Howbeit, thou shouldst permit me at least to go to my father’s house on this occasion.” “Without invitation?” he asked. “A daughter needs no invitation to her father’s house,” she replied. “So be it,” answered Mahādeva, “but known that ill will come of it; for Daksha will insult me in your presence.”

So Satī went to her father’s house, and there she was indeed received, but without honor, for she rode on Shiva’s bull and wore a beggar’s dress. She protested against her father’s neglect of Shiva; but Daksha broke into angry curses and derided the “king of goblins,” the “beggar,” the “ash-man,” the long-haired yogi. Satī answered her father: “Shiva is the friend of all; no one but you speaks ill of him. All that thou sayest the devas know, and yet adore him. But a wife, when her lord is reviled, if she cannot slay the evil speakers, must leave the place closing her ears with her hands, or, if she have power, should surrender her life. This I shall do, for I am ashamed to own this body to such as thee.” Then Satī released the inward consuming fire and fell dead at Daksha’s feet. [4]

The story certainly testifies to Satī’s devotion to her husband and her unwillingness to stand by when he husband is insulted. But there is much more to the story than this. First of all, Satī chooses her own husband, despite paternal opposition to the choice. There is indeed an element of irony in the fact that Satī should be held up as a model wife to those women, whose husbands have not been chosen by them but by their families! Second, Satī shows great physical courage in insisting on going to the father’s house in full awareness of what her father thought of her husband. It is again ironical that such a person should be held up as a model for young women who are usually reared in a sheltered environment and will hardly have had occasions to witness displays of physical courage by women—given the kind of cloistered existence led by most. Third, not only does Satī exhibit physical courage, she also displays great mental toughness. Very briefly, she is self-willed. She tried to have her way. She asserts he rights and reacts strongly when she sees them compromised. Finally, there is this tremendous devotion displayed toward her husband.

Why is it only one of these four aspects of Satī’s character-profile—the last—so dominates our perception of her? Is it because historical trends have left this as the only aspect of her example Hindu women could follow—when avenues of self-selection of mates, display of physical courage and expression of will-power were closed to them. And if such is the case then is the last ideal viable in itself—without being nourished by the other three?

[1] Ananda K. Coomaraswamy and Sister Nivedita, The Myths of the Hindus and the Buddhists (New York: Dover Publications, 1967) p. 288-289.

[2] Ibid, p. 288.

[3] Ibid, p. 288-289.

[4] Ibid, p. 288-289.

The geographical connexion between India and Persia historically was a matter of fact that must have been known to both countries in antiquity through the contiguity of their territorial situation. The realms which correspond to-day to the buffer states of Afghānistān and Balūchistān formed always a point of contact and were concerned in antiquity with Persia’s advances into Northern and North-western Indian as well as, in a far less degree, with any move of arrgrandisement on the part of  Hindustan in the direction of Iran. Evidence from the Veda and the Avesta alike attests the general fact.[3]

He supplements this remark with the following footnote:

Arrian, Indica, 9, 12, for example, may be cited in support of this statement; for he avers, on Indian authority, that a ‘sense of justice, they say, prevented any Indian King from attempting conquest beyond the limits of India.’ This assertion certainly seems true for the earliest times.[4]

This chapter also contains the following passage:

Megasthenes, on the other hand, as quoted by Strabo (Georgr. XV, 1, 6, pp.686-687 Cas.), declares that ‘the Indians had never engaged in foreign warfare, nor had they even been invaded and conquered by a foreign power, except by Hercules and Dionysus and lately by the Macedonians.’ After mentioning several famous conquerors who did not attack India, he continues: ‘Semiramis, however, died before [carrying out] his undertaking; and the Persians, although they got mercenary troops from India, namely the Hydrakes, did not make an expedition into that country, but merely approached it when Cyrus was marching against the Massagetae.’[5]

It is also clear, particularly if one is canvassing an Aryan invasion into India, to be able to say that the Indians (and by implication Aryans) could not have gone out in a reverse direction, thereby squelching the possibility of India as the homeland of the Aryans.

Thus the idea that India did not even invade other countries met the emotional needs of both India’s rulers at the time and those who were fighting against them. Is that why one barely finds any reference to the following account of Indian aggression carried out beyond India’s traditional borders:

‘The Yavanas, Kirātas, Gāndhāras, Chīnas, Savaras, Varvaras, Sakas, Tushāras, Kankas, Pahlavas, Andhras, Madras, Paundras, Pulindas, Ramathas, Kāmbojas, men sprung from Brāhmans, and from Kshattriyas, persons of the Vaiśya and Sūdra castes—how shall all these people of different countries practice duty, and what rules shall kings like me prescribe for those who are living as Dasyus? Instruct me on these points; for thou art the friend of our Kshattriya race.’ Indra answers: ‘All the Dasyus should obey their parents, their spiritual directors, persons practicing the rules of the four orders, and kings. It is also their duty to perform the ceremonies ordained in the Vedas. They should sacrifice to the Pitris, construct wells, buildings for the distribution of water, and resting places for travelers, and should on proper occasions bestow gifts on the Brāhmans. They should practice innocence, veracity, meekness, purity, and inoffensiveness; should maintain their wives and families; and make a just division of their property. Gifts should be distributed at all sacrifices by those who desire to prosper. All the Dasyus should offer costly pāka oblations. Such duties as these, which have been ordained of old, ought to be observed by all the people.’[6]

[1] A.L. Basham, “Hinduism”, in R.C. Zaehner, ed., The Concise Encyclopedia of Living Faiths (Boston: Beacon Press, 1959) p.258.

[2] A.L. Basham, The Wonder That Was India (London: Sigwick & Jackson, 1967) p.75.

[3]George Macdonald, “The Persian Dominions in Northern India Down to the Time of Alexander’s Invasion”, in E.J. Rapson, ed., Ancient India (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922) p.321.

[4]Ibid note 1.

[5] Ibid 331.

[6] J. Muir, Original Sanskrit Texts (Delhi: Oriental Publishers, 1972) Part I, p.484-485. This should be distinguished from another account which indicates an attack on the ‘foreigners’ to avenge an earlier invasion by them (ibid p.487-488).

The first lesson one is told and taught to draw from their lives is that of love and loyalty for the husband. In the case of Satī, this is exemplified by her burning herself to death rather than witness the indignities being heaped on her husband. In the case of Sāvitrī, it is exemplified in her resolve to bring back her husband even from the land of the dead. This then is the kind of love and loyalty Hindu wives should display towards their husbands.

But is this all that there is to the story? Let us look at the way they acquired their husbands. In both cases, they chose their own husbands, and in both cases they chose them over the objection of their fathers. In the case of Satī, the father, Dakşa, had actually pronounced a curse on the would-be husband because he had not paid homage to father Dakşa on a particular occasion.

Meanwhile Satī grew up and set her heart on Shiva, worshipping him in secret. She became of marriageable age, and her father held a swayamvara, or own-choice, for her, to which he invited the gods and princes from far and near, except only Shiva. Then Satī was borne into the great assembly, wreath in hand. But Shiva was nowhere to be seen, amongst the gods or men. Then in despair she cast her wreath into the air, calling upon Shiva to receive the garland; and behold he stood in the middle of the court with the wreath about his neck. Daksha had then no choice but to complete the marriage; and Shiva went away with Satī to his home in Kailās.[1]

In the case of Sāvitrī, her father asked her to find a groom for herself, as people felt too intimidated by her for him to find a husband for her. Interestingly, Manu says that if the father cannot find a husband for her, the daughter should find one for herself. And she does.

This raises two points for us to consider: (1) Should not the ideal of Sāvitrī be construed as suggesting that women should be encouraged to choose their husbands for themselves, rather than let the parents do so, and (2) Is it possible to be so devoted to one’s husband as Satī and Sāvitrī were, if one does not choose one’s husband on one’s own?

[1] Ananda K. Coomaraswamy and Sister Nivedita, The Myths of the Hindus and the Buddhists (New York: Dover Publications, 1967) p. 288.

From these materials conclusions can be drawn only with much caution. It is easy to frame and support by plausible evidence various hypotheses, to which the only effective objection is that other hypotheses are equally legitimate, and that the facts are too imperfect to allow of conclusions being drawn. It is, however, certain that the Rigveda offers no assistance in determining the mode in which the Vedic Indians entered India. The geographical area recognized in the Saṁhitā is large, but it is, so far as we learn, occupied by tribes which collectively are called Āryan, and which wage war with dark-skinned enemies known as Dāsas. If, as may be the case, the Āryan invaders of India entered by the western passes of the Hindu Kush and proceeded thence through the Punjab to the east, still that advance is not reflected in the Rigveda, the bulk at least of which seems to have been composed rather in the country round the Sarasvatī river, south of the modern Ambālā. Only thus, it seems can we explain the fact of the prominence in the hymns of the strife of the elements, the stress laid on the phenomena of thunder and lightning and the bursting forth of the rain from the clouds: the Punjab proper has now, and probably had also in antiquity, but little share in these things; for there in the rainy season gentle showers alone fall. Nor in its vast plain do we find the mountains which form so large a part of the poetic imagining of the Vedic Indian. On the other hand, it is perhaps to the Punjab with its glorious phenomena of dawn, that we must look for the origin of the hymns of Varuṇa. The highest moral and cosmic ideal attained by the poets, may more easily have been achieved amid the regularity of the seasonal phenomena of the country of the five rivers.[2]

Should not one raise the question here whether Punjab had a dry climate at the time, rather than assume that it must have been so and rule out Punjab as the venue?

Similarly, A. L. Basham narrates a Hindu folktale.

A wealthy merchant, Ratnadatta, has no sons, and his only daughter, Ratnāvalī, much loved and pampered by her father, refuses to marry, despite the pleading of the parents. Meanwhile a desperate thief had been captured by the king, and is led through the streets to the execution by impalement.

“To the beat of the drum the chief was led

to the place of execution,

and the merchant’s daughter Ratnāvalī

sat on the terrace and watched him.

He was gravely wounded and covered with dust,

but as soon as she saw him she was smitten with love.

Then she went to her rather Ratnadatta, and said:

‘This man they are leading to his death

I have chosen for my lord!

Father, you must save him from the king,

or I will die with him!’

And when he heard, her father said:

‘What is this you say, my child?

You’ve refused the finest suitors,

the images of the Love-god!

How can you now desire

a wretched master-thief?’

But though he reproached her thus

she was firm in her resolve,

so he sped to the king and begged

that the thief might be saved from the stake.

In return he offered

the whole of his great fortune,

but the king would not yield the thief

for ten million pieces of gold,

for he had robbed the whole city,

and was brought to the stake to repay with his life.

Her father came home in despair,

and the merchant’s daughter

determined to follow

the thief in his death.

Though her family tried to restrain her

she bathed,

and mounted a litter, and went

to the place of impalement,

while her father, her mother and her people

followed her weeping.

The executioners placed

the thief on the stake,

and, as his life ebbed away,

he saw her come with her people.

He heard the onlookers speaking

of all that had happened,

For a moment he wept, and then,

smiling a little, he died.

At her order they lifted the corpse

from the stake, and took it away,

and with it the worthy merchant’s daughter

mounted the pyre.”[3]

He then concludes the account with the following note.

Stories such as this puzzle the social historian. If the texts on the Sacred Law have any relation to real life it is quite incredible that a girl of good class in the 11^th century should have been given such freedom by her parents, or should even have thought of legally marrying a despised outcaste. The story probably looks back to a much earlier time, when social relations very much freer.[4]

The question is: should we not revise our view of filial relations in the 11^th century rather than locate the evidence in a distant past, so that we don’t have to?

It is important to keep these unarticulated assumptions in mind in dealing with the Western reconstruction of India’s past. For the West, the sense of history, or change from one moment to another is important, for that is what history is. What is more, the succeeding moment is often seen as an improvement over the preceding moment in Western culture and this of course constitutes the core idea of progress. As its flip side, one could also posit a concept of regress in other cultures.

The association of these somewhat dissociated meanings might make room for the suggestion that history involves periodization and the manner of periodization is bound to be affected by these loose, but not uninfluential, notions of time in the West. They have a double bearing on the process of historical periodization: (1) the tendency to assume that what is different must belong to a different period of time, for difference is seen to imply change and (2) that this difference either leads to a better or worse condition.

How these assumptions about the relation of temporality to heterogeneity may have affected the Western reconstruction of India’s past therefore needs to be taken into account. How the assumption that differences involve differences in time rather than differences in space might affect historical assessments is best illustrated with examples drawn from the history of Indian philosophy. There is this constant debate in Western histories of Indian philosophy about which school came first and which after, or which system preceded or succeeded which, at the expense of the realization that they may have co-existed, as they did, we know, for thousands of years. This tendency towards longitudinality as an explanation of heterogeneity, is one consequence of working primarily with a model of temporality to explain heterogeneity. The discussion, in the case of the Mahābhārata, of how the Vedic, Kṣatriya and Brāhmaṇa elements must have played a successive rather than a simultaneous role in the composition of the Mahābhārata provides another illustration of this point.

How the assumption of progress or regress affects historical assessments can also be similarly identified. Consider the following statement:

As we contemplate the long procession of Indian history it may at first sight seem little more than an unending procession, with the elephants of states and umbrellas of authority appearing at intervals, interspersed with trains of attendants and disturbed by the brawls of contending factions. An Amurath to Amurath succeeded, it would seem, with intervals of anarchy while one dynasty replaced another. Or it can be seen as a series of invasions, each adding some new element to the population, whose rule is displaced in turn by the next arrivals. Professor A.L. Basham, in a recent inaugural lecture, could see no thread of meaning running through the four and one-half thousand years of which we have some knowledge.[1]

Percival Spear goes on to say, however,

The dynastic and racial view was given its classical form by Mountstuart Elphinstone in his History, which ran through nine editions from 1841 to 1909. The Indian historian is inclined to see Indian history as a splendid Hindu creative achievement leading to a golden age in the fourth and fifth centuries A.D., followed by the humiliation of Muslim conquest and domination, the British episode, and the glorious renaissance and revival of the past and present centuries. The Pakistani may see Indian history as a great Muslim creative achievement superimposed upon a corrupt pagan society and culminating in the Mughal period and the reign of Aurangzeb. The British were the darkeners of the light, the precursors of the modern Indian infidel state. British historians in the past have tended to see Muslim rule as a preface to their own, and their own as a restoration of ordered life in a decayed society and the introduction of fresh light from the West, and more particularly the Western isles.[2]

This concept of progress seems to be at work behind the statement that “British historians in the past tended to see Muslim rule as a preface to their own, and their own as a restoration of ordered life in a delayed society”. Ironically, the author himself ends up by viewing British rule itself in relation to India through the same prism![3]

The survey of the religious history of India points in the same direction. The point has not escaped attention, but it has not been accorded much importance. It lies sandwiched as a caveat between two slices of conventionally Western approaches in the following citation from Louis Renou.

The Upaniṣads are a particularly delicate case; the problem, stated in simplified form, has been whether the Upaniṣads were pre- or post-Buddhist. Their subject-matter and method of presentation have much in common with Buddhistic writings; the Pāli style seems, indeed, to be a diluted imitation of the Upaniṣadic style. The secular approach of the Upaniṣads is characteristic also of Buddhism and Jainism, those religions of princes. If we work on the presupposition that in India progress is from the simple to the complex, from brevity to elaboration, the Upaniṣads must be regarded as earlier. This is my own view.[4]

The point ends here and is followed by the remark:

But we must not be surprised to see that in India parallel streams of thought may exist side by side without any contact other than an unemphatic rivalry.[5]

But after momentary hesitation, the earlier flow of thought is soon resumed.

If, on the other hand, we believe that the Upaniṣads were only made through Buddhist influence, or, in other words, that ‘it was Buddhism that taught the Indians to philosophize’, we are losing sight of the fact that Vedic speculation is firmly established from the Ṛgveda onwards, not only in the tenth book, but even in what is known as the older Ṛgveda, for example, in iii. 54, 9: ‘I recognize from afar the ancient and immemorial one. We are descended from him, the great Procreator, the Father. The gods who do him homage, in their own vast, separate domain, quickly took up their positions in the intervening space…’ Here we already have a full formulation: the single original principle, and the realm of the gods lying between Man and the Supreme being. Religion and speculation go hand in hand from the very outset.[6]

In other words, Western assumptions of time and space can be potentially distorting when applied uncritically in an Indian context.

We are all familiar with the so-called critical text, otherwise onomastically called the Poona text of the Mahābhārata, which claims to restore the text of the epic to the state it might have been in, towards the end of the Gupta period (or end of the fifth century A.D.) I do not wish to be construed as running down such a massive intellectual and editorial enterprise, of which the critical text is an outcome. I use it myself, why, some of my best friends use it and it is an interesting example of what might result, if the modern tradition of text-critical scholarship is applied to the Mahābhārata.

But should it have been so applied?

In deciding how to deal with a text, we must also bear in mind what the tradition itself has to say about it, or at least seems to imply about it. I would like to spell out three such implications which seem relevant here.

(1) According to tradition, recorded in the Mahābhārata, Kṛṣṇadvaipāyana Vyāsa, taught recensions of it to five of his disciples – Sumantu, Jaimini, Paila, Śuka (his son) and Vaiśampāyana. This is stated in verses 74-75 of the 57^th chapter of the ādiparva, of course as per the critical text. When one turns to the second line of verse 75 one reads: samhitās taiḥ pṛthaktvena bhāratasya prakāśitāḥ. This leaves room for claiming that different (pṛthaktvena) versions of the epic were publicized.

If, then, to begin with, we have five versions of a text, then have we not, in preparing the critical edition, reconstructed something which did not exist to begin with? After all, the version of the Mahābhārata we have claims to be the version imparted by sage Vyāsa to his disciple Vaiśampāyana. This was presumably a unitary identifiable text. We are presuming here only such text of the epic. However, one can see the force of the skeptical thrust of the critique, which, moreover, also operates longitudinally and not just latitudinally. What about the other four?

(2) For the next point we focus only on the Vaiśampāyana version.

The introduction of the great epic informs us that Vyāsa imparted his poem first to his pupil Vaiśampāyana, who in his turn recited the whole of it at the time of the great snake sacrifice of king Janamejaya. It was then heard by the Sūta Ugraśravas who, being entreated by the Rishis assembled at the sacrifice of Śaunaka in the Nimisha forest, narrates to them the whole poem as he learnt it on that occasion. Even according this tradition, recorded in the epic itself, before it reached its present dimensions, it had passed through three recitations.[1]

There is the further tradition that the size of the epic grew with each recitation, in its threefold recitation as Jaya (8,800 verses); Bhārata (24,000 verses) and Mahābhārata (100,000 verses).[2]

Should it not then be proposed that in the Hindu conception, the Mahābhārata is supposed to grow and not diminish with time. The critical text reduces it from a size of approximately 110,000 verses to approximately 75,000 verses. Thus the telos of the text, as understood in the tradition, is at odds with the very goals of modern scholarship and to that extent, once again, the critical text, in rendering a great service to Indology has also done grievous harm to Hinduism. The critical blow can be softened however. It might be argued that the critical text is only an attempt at a snapshot at one stage of the growth of the text. It is not meant to question the growth of the text itself. So one can still hold a brief for the critical text against a traditionist critique of it, but although one might want to hold on to the belief one may also not want to cling to it.

(3) This brings me to the third point – not only is the text of the Mahābhārata multiple, not only is it dynamic, it is also oral. Here even modern scholars and not merely traditionists note that, in such an oral context, the concept of a critical tradition is perhaps

an artificial concept. Can there be a ‘critical edition’ of the kind of oral transmission that itihāsa represents? Similarly, it is futile to seek out ‘the original text’ of either epic. Critical editions of oral epics are the constructs of scholars; with variant readings and addenda as footnotes they give us an idea of the main story-line as it has developed over time in style and content. This has its uses as we shall see, but on a level which scared narrative often transcends.[3]

Here again the criticism could be softened. Arguably preparing a critical text of a work like the Rāmāyaṇa, on which the tradition confers the dignity of an ādikāvya may, makes more sense. But on the whole the argument has to be taken seriously.

In conclusion, then, what has happened with the preparation of the critical text is that yet another recension of the Mahābhārata has been produced, like the Southern, the Northern, the Kashmiri or the Javanese. Which may be called the Poona recension and which, along with the rest, will constitute the database from which some scholars might try to reconstruct the critical text of the Mahābhārata in the next millennium!

The continual injunctions to the king to ensure that ‘confusion of class’ (varṇa-saṅkara) did not take place indicate that such confusion was an ever-present danger in the mind of the orthodox brāhmaṇ. The class system was indeed a very fragile thing. In the golden age the classes were stable, but the legendary king Vena among his many other crimes, had encouraged miscegenation, and from this beginning confusion of class had increased, and was a special feature of the Kali-yuga, the last degenerate age of this aeon, which was fast nearing its close. The good king, therefore, should spare no effort to maintain the purity of the classes, and many dynasties took special pride in their efforts in this direction.[1]

It has therefore been duly noted that “as described in the law books, these four varnas [brāhmaṇa, kṣatriya, vaiśya, śūdra] were closed groups, and intermarriage between them is forbidden.”[2]

Nor was that all. Just as one dimension of the caste system is represented by varṇa another is represented by jāti,[3] which is typically a smaller endogamous and commensal unit subsumed under the larger category of varṇa. Thus while Manu “mentions about fifty different castes, he lays stress on the fact that there were only four varṇas.”[4] Although one usually encounters the expression varṇasaṅkara, the allied expression jātisaṅkara is also not unknown.[5] Often simply the word saṅkara is used by itself.

The question arises: why was varṇasaṅkara such an issue? It could well be that its connotation varies during the different periods in the history of Hinduism. If, as is sometimes suggested, the varṇa system itself originated in colour differences among different sections of the population,[6] then the fear of varṇa-saṅkara might have reflected the fear of loss of complexion bound to occur through indiscriminate intermarriage. Subsequently, when the basis of caste distinctions came to rest more on vocational and life-style patterns, varṇasaṅkara may have come to reflect the fear of the collapse of normative social and ritual mores, as in the case of Arjuna in the Bhagavadgītā. In still later times, when caste became increasingly defined in terms of endogamy and commensality, the fear of “loss of caste” may have found an echo in the concept.[7]

In sum then, in order to make sense of varṇasaṅkara, one needs to realize how the word varṇa itself made sense. For instance, should the word varṇa we used essentially as a classificatory category, varṇasaṅkara would mean a confusion of categories, or even a category-error!