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Art. XXV.—Notes on the Mahābhārata, with special reference to Dahlmann's “Mahābhārata.”1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

M. Winternitz
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Extract

In his important “Contributions to the History of the Mahābhārata,” Dr. Bühler has proved that in Kumārila's time, i.e. in the first half of the eighth century, there existed a Mahābhārata, attributed to the sage Vyāsa, which was not merely an epic poem, but was looked upon as a Smṛti, or sacred tradition; and that it contained not only the Çānti and Anuçāsana Parvans, but also many other portions found in our editions of the Mahābhārata, which have been repeatedly declared to be “late additions.” Dr. Bühler has further shown that inscriptions of about A.D. 500 quote the Mahābhārata as an authority on sacred law, and describe it as a bulky work, containing 100,000 verses. And as we must allow some time, say a century or two, for the gradual development of this sacred character, he concludes “that the Mahābhārata certainly was a Smṛti or Dharmaçāstra from A.D. 300, and that about A.D. 500 it certainly did not differ essentially in size and in character from the present text.” Dr. Bühler adds that further researches “will in all probability enable us to push back the lower limits, which have been thus established provisionally, by four to five centuries and perhaps even further.”

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Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 29 , Issue 4 , October 1897 , pp. 713 - 759
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Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1897

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References

page 713 note 2 “Indian Studies.” By G. Bühler and J. Kirste. No. II. Contributions to the History of the Mahābhārata. (Sitzungsberichte der k. Akademie d. Wiss. in Wien, Phil.-hist. Classe, Bd. cxxvii, No. xii, 1892)

page 716 note 1 See Bühler, , “Contributions,” etc., p. 19 seqqGoogle Scholar.

page 717 note 1 Compare the rules given by Vāsiṣṭha (xvii, 77–80) concerning a woman whose husband has gone abroad, and who has not heard of him for five years. She is to act like a widow, that is to say, she must join some man related to her husband. But as long as there is any member of the family, she shall on no account go to a stranger.

page 718 note 1 See also Bühler, G., in S.B.E, vol. ii, pp. xx, xxiGoogle Scholar; vol. xxv, pp. xciv, cix; J. Jolly, “Recht und Sitte” (Bühler', s “Grundriss,” ii, 8)Google Scholar, p. 70 seq.; and the same, “Tagore Law Lectures,” 1883, pp. 152–164.

page 719 note 1 Colebrooke, , “Hindu Law of Inheritance” (Calcutta, 1810), translates (pp. 301, 304–5)Google Scholar: “The son of the wife is one begotten on a wife by a kinsman of her husband, or by some other relative.” “A child, begotten by another person, namely by a kinsman, or by a brother of the husband, is a wife's son (Kṣetraja).” He also quotes Viçveçvara from the Madana-Pārijāta as saying: “A son begotten, under a formal authority, by a kinsman being of equal class, or by another relative, is a wife's son.” Stenzler translates “Frauensohn ist der mit der Frau durch einen naheren oder ferneren Verwandten ihrea Mannes erzeugte.” Mandlik, V. N.: “Vyarahára Mayúkha and Yájñavalkya Smṛti” (Bombay, 1880)Google Scholar, translates: “Kṣetraja (the son of the wife) is one begotten on a wife by a Sagotra (kinsman) of her husband or by another.” By any other man? Röer, E. and Montriou, W. A., “Hindu Law and Judicature” (1859)Google Scholar, translate: “A son begotten by a relative [of the husband] or by another [duty authorized],” which is a little better.

page 719 note 2 See ProfessorJolly's, note in S.B.E., vol. vii, p. 62Google Scholar. In his “Tagore Law Lectures,” 1883, p. 164, note 1, Professor Jolly says that the opinion regarding the appointment of any member of the Brahman caste “appeared to be the view of Vijñāneçvara,” and he also refers to Gautama, xviii, 6. But surely yonimātrād vā does not mean ‘any Brahman.’ In S.B.E., vol. vii, p. 312, he rightly says that “the term yonimātra is ambiguous, and may be referred to ‘relatives on the mother's side’ as well.”

page 720 note 1 The words sagotreṇetareṇa vā (ii, 128) may be nothing else but a short reference to this passage.

page 720 note 2 “It is quite probable that the practice of Niyoga was originally confined to widows, like the well-known Hebrew custom of the levirate.” “The supposition that the levirate is the principal and original form of the Niyoga is favoured by the general history of the family relations in India.”—Jolly, J., “Tagore Law Lectures,” 1883, pp. 153–4Google Scholar.

page 722 note 1 “Das Mahābhārata,” i, pp. 154–5; ii, pp. 172–3.

page 723 note 1 The story about the sons who tie their old father to a raft and throw him into the water seems to be old, and may be a survival of an ancient custom of dealing with the aged, similar to the customs of the Massagetes and Padaei related by Herodotus (i, 216; iii, 99). The story, on the other hand, which relates how Dĩrghatamas is insulted by his wife Pradveṣī, and how he consequently establishes the fixed rule (maryādā) that henceforth a woman shall always have to adhere to one husband, whether he be alive or dead, and that a woman who goes to another man shall go to hell, thus forbidding any kind of remarriage of widows (mṛte jīvati vā tasmin nāparaṃ prāpnuyān naram | abhigamya paraṃ nārī patiṣyati na saṃçayaḥ ||), is strangely out of place in a chapter treating of Niyoga. The whole chapter swarms with incongruities (the text, also, is anything but settled; see e.g. v. 29, where the sentence ity anyonyaṃ samābhāṣyate Dī;rghatamasam munim has no verb), and deserves a careful analysis, with which also the Vedic and Pauranic stories of Dīrghatamas would have to be compared.

page 724 note 1 It is very remarkable that Kṣemendra, in his Bhāratamañjarī (i, 466), only mentions the birth of one son, viz. Aṇga:

vallabhāyāṃ Sudoṣṇāyām (sic) Aṇgākhyo janito nṛpaḥ||

The stories of the birth of Dīrghatamas, and of Dīrghatamas and his wife and sons, are not quoted by Kṣemendra.

page 727 note 1 Unless we credit the Ṛṣis with a great deal of tact—they do not say one word about his being childless and, on that account, unable to' go to Heaven—there would seem to be here also one of those many breaks in the narrative, which make it so difficult to believe in Mr. Dahlmann's ‘Einheitlichkeit.’

page 727 note 2 In Kṣemendra's Bhāratamañjarī (i, 528 seqq.) no mention is made of this introductory story (Mahābhārata, i, 120,1–25). Kṣemendra only says that Pāṇḍu, after the curse of the antelope, resigned his throne, went into the forest, accompanied by his wives, and that one day he addressed Kuntī, complaining of his childlessness and soliciting her to raise up a Kṣetraja by means of a Brāhmaṇa.

page 728 note 1 How impossible it is to assume that the same author who wanted to write a Dharmaçāstra could have given one list of five sons in i, 74, 99, and another of thirteen sons in i, 120, 32, has been pointed out by Professor Jacobi, Gotting. Gel. Anz. 1896, p. 70. I am, however, inclined to think that the passage, i, 74, 99:

svapatnīprabhavān pañca labdhān krītan vivardhitān |

krtān anyāsu cotpannān putrān vai Manur abravīt ||

contains not a list of five sons, but is really a short summary of Manu's list of twelve sons (ix, 166 ff.). For it seems better to translate svapatnīprabhavān pañca ‘five sons born from one's own wife’ (including the aurasa, kṣetraja, gūdhotpanna, kānīna, and sahoḍha of Manu, ix, 166, 167, 170, 172, 173); labdhān might include both the datrima and svayaṃdatta of Manu, ix, 168, 177; krītan = krītaka, Manu, ix, 174, vivardhitān =apaviddha, Manu, ix, 171, kṛta=kṛtrima, Manu, ix, 169, and anyāsu cotpannān might include the paunarbhava and çaudra of Manu, ix, 175, 178. I give this only as a conjecture, adding that I do not believe for a moment that the çloka in question belonged to the original context of Mahābhārata, i, 74. It is almost inevitable that in such a passage numerous interpolations were made at different times.

page 728 note 2 As if he had read: °bhāve mātā.

page 729 note 1 Puṃsaḥ, nom. plur. as in i, 195 (197), 27 (naikasyā bahavaḥ Puṃsaḥ çrūyante patayaḥ kvacit); iii, 208, 23 (karṣanto lāŋgalaiḥ puṃso ghnanti bhūmiçayān bahūn).

page 729 note 2 Or, “that men obtain the best offspring which confers religious merit from their own seed also” ? ? We expect, of course, something like ātmaçukrābhāve, which Roy translates. Mr. Dahlmann never condescends to give a philological interpretation of the passages to which he refers.

page 729 note 3 How can MrDahlmann, say (p. 82): “Pāṇḍu . . . . beauftragt seine Gemahlin Kuntī, ihm einen Sohn durch seinen ülteren Bruder zu schenken”?Google Scholar

page 729 note 4 Is not this a sarcasm ?

page 730 note 1 This may refer to polyandrous customs prevalent among certain Himalayan tribes.

page 730 note 2 Could that be the godharma which Dīrghatamas followed, i, 103, 24 P

page 730 note 3 3 In i, 103, 31 seqq., Dīrghatamas is said to have established this very maryādā. How can the two passages be ascribed to one author ?

page 730 note 4 The stories of Bhadrā and Vyuṣitāçva, of Çvetaketu and his mother, of Madayantĩ and Vāiṣṭha, and even Pāṇḍu's reference to his own birth, all occur in Kṣemendra's Bhār., i, 534–44. This makes the omissions pointed out above (p. 727, note 2) more remarkable.

page 731 note 1 See Westermarck, E., “History of Human Marriage,” 1891, pp. 510–4Google Scholar; Starcke, C N., “Primitive Family,” 1889, pp. 141–58Google Scholar.

page 731 note 2 See also Jolly, , “Tagore Law Lectures,” 1883, p. 154Google Scholar.

page 732 note 1 This custom is still practised in Abyssinia, if a husband has become a victim of emasculation in battle. See Letourneau, Ch., “Evolution of Marriage,” 1891, p. 265Google Scholar.

page 732 note 2 DrWestermarck, , l.c., p. 78 seqq., rightly refutes the idea that these customs have anything to do with ‘communal marriage.’Google Scholar

page 732 note 3 So far—but only so far—I agree with Professor Holtzmann, l.c., p. 29. I do not believe in Professor Holtzmann's idea of a systematic transformation of the whole of the Mahābhārata, as little as I believe in Mr. Dahlmann's view of the Mahābhārata being the work of one great genius.

page 734 note 1 See “Tagore Law Lectures,” 1884–5, p. 198.

page 734 note 2 See Jolly, J., “Tagore Law Lectures,” 1883, p. 90Google Scholar.

page 734 note 3 “Tagore Law Lectures,” l.c. Compare ProfessorBháttácháryya's, Krishna Kamal remarks in his “Tagore Law Lectures,” 1884–1885, p. 177Google Scholar.

page 735 note 1 Götting. Gel. Anz. 1896, pp. 70–1.

page 737 note 1 I prefer to take bhedabhayāt in this sense, on account of the preceding verses. Roy's translation has “from fear of a division amongst the brothers,” which is not impossible.

page 739 note 1 It ought to be mentioned that while at the end of i, 195, the question is submitted to the three persons named above, in i, 196, all the Pāṇḍavas and King Drupada are assembled around Vyāsa.

page 740 note 1 This sounds strange in the mouth of Vyāsa, who immediately after approves of this law. This seems to have been felt by Roy, who translates: “This practice, being opposed to usage and the Vedas, hath become obsolete”; but can vipralabdha mean that? Vipralabh with such words as dharma, ājrñā, etc., generally means ‘to violate, to break (a law),’ but orginally it means ‘to deceive.’ I therefore translate it by ‘apparently’ (vipralambhena), ‘by a kind of deception.’ But I am doubtful.

page 740 note 2 On Vārkṣī, see Bhāgavata-Purāṇa, vi, 4, 15.

page 740 note 3 These two stories are omitted by Kṣemendra in his Bhāratamañjari, where (i, 1113–1120) Yudhiṣṭhira bases his argument only on Kuntī's words which cannot be falsified, while in i, 1122 it is only said that Vyāsa first heard the opinions of the other persons.

page 740 note 4 Observe how different this reference to the mother's speech is from that discussed above.

page 741 note 1 Cf. e.g. Brhadāraṇyaka Up., iii, 2, 13–4, where Yāiñavalkya says to Ārtabhāga: “Take my hand, O friend. We two alone shall know of this; we will not discuss this in public,” etc.

page 741 note 2 This whole story of the sacrifice of the gods reminds one of many a passage in the Brāhmaṇas and Upaniṣads.

page 742 note 1 No doubt, a golden lotus is meant. But the text merely says: “They saw a lotus in the Ganges.”

page 742 note 2 As ProfessorHoltzmann, , “Mahābhārata,” i, 40Google Scholar, has pointed out, a similar story of Indra, who disturbs the game of Çiya and Pārvatī, and in punishment is afterwards born as a human being, viz. Çālivāhana, occurs in Ananta's Vīracaritra (Jacobi, in “Indisehe Studien,” xiv, p. 100)Google Scholar.

page 742 note 3 This is the first intimation that the youth spoken of is none other than the great Çiva.

page 742 note 4 The first intimation that the weeping woman is Çrī.

page 743 note 1 i, 197, 19: nivartayainaṃ ca mahādrirāajam, ‘turn away,’ or ‘remove this mighty king of rocka.’ The cave seems to be shut up by a rock, like the cave of the Cyclops.

page 743 note 2 i, 197, 23. The reading of the Bombay edition, adyāçeṣasya bhuvanasya tvaṃ bhavādyaḥ, looks like a conjectural emendation. The text of the following verses, also, is in a very bad state, and only a proof that the whole passage is the work of a very unskilled compiler. Take verse 24, where ete'pyevam bhavitāraḥ purastāt can only mean “these have also behaved like that formerly,” with which the following words—tasmād etāṃ darīm āviçya çeshva—“therefore enter the cave and lie there” are very loosely connected.

page 743 note 3 How Indra can be born as a human being (Arjuna) and at the same time as the god Indra beget himself as his own son, does not become clear from v. 27 seq. by any means. “The former Indras,” in v. 27, seems to include all the five Indras, for they mention five gods whom they wish to be their fathers. Yet Indra prays that he may give them a fifth person produced from himself, as if he could remain a god, while (according to vv. 24–5) the five Indras ought all to share the same lot of being born as human beings. That Arjuna is a mystic name of Indra, according to the Çatapatha-Brāhmaṇa (ii, 1, 2, 11; v, 4, 3, 7), must be somehow connected with the Epic-Pauranic tradition which makes Arjuna a son, or a kind of incarnation, of Indra.

page 744 note 1 He is called Dhṛtadhāman in Kṣemendra's Bhāratamañjarī, i, 1142 (Kāvyamāla edition), Ghṛtadhāman or Ghṛtīdhira in the MSS. used by ProfessorKirste, (“Contributions,” p. 40)Google Scholar.

page 744 note 2 This is a çloka in the middle of Triṣṭubh verses, and spurious even on this account.

page 744 note 3 Kṣemendra tells this story only once in i, 879–83, corresponding to Mahābhārata, i, 169.

page 744 note 4 In his notes to Johnson's, F. “Selections from the Mahābhārata,” p. 67Google Scholar.

page 745 note 1 “Literary Remains,” p. 132.

page 745 note 2 Kṣemendra, Bhāratamañjari, i, 1121–45, follows closely the Pañcendropākhyāna of the Mahābhārata. But he tried, by a slight alteration, to connect the beginning of the story a little more closely with what follows. He says:—In days of old, when Yama was engaged in sacrificial work, the whole earth was tormented by the burden of creatures who were freed from death. Then Indra, eager to protect the earth, having seen Brahman, went to the place of Yama's sacrifice. There he saw golden lotuses, etc.

page 746 note 1 In Kṣemendra's Bhār., i, 1141, Indra requests: “May the fifth of them be my son. May I, by thy farour, not fall down to the earth myself.”

page 747 note 1 Mr. Dahlmann himself says (p. 238): “Weit annehtnharer scheint die Erklärung, dass nach einander çvaitische und vishṇuitische Tendenzen Einfluss auf den Text gewannen und in dem allmäligen Wachsthum des Mahābhārata bald diese, bald jene sektarisch gefärbte Erzählung einfügten. Nun will ich gleich bemerken, dass ich für erne oder die andere Erzahlung dies als sehr wahrscheinlich ansehe.” Possibly he would admit it for our story.

page 747 note 2 “Sacred Books of the East,” vol. xxv, p. xci, note. See now also DrBühler's, important article on the Purāṇas, in the Indian Antiquary, vol. xxv, 1896, pp. 323–8Google Scholar.

page 747 note 3 This applies not only to single verses. Dr. Lüders, in his important article on the Ṛṣyaçŋga legend (“Die Sage von Rṣyas'ṛṅga,” von H. Lüders, Nachrichten der k. Gesellschaft der Wiss. zu Göttingen, Phil.-hist. Kl. 1897, Heft 1), has lately shown that the version of this legend in the Padma-Purāṇa is older than the version in our Mahābhārata. I hope to show on some future occasion that the version of the Çakuntalā episode in the Svargakāṇḍa of the Padma-Purāṇa is probably older than the present Mahābhārata version, and older than Kālidāsa's drama.

page 747 note 4 See Holtzmann, , “Das Mahābhārata,” iv, p. 51Google Scholar; Monier-Williams, , “Indian Epic Poetry,” p. 100, noteGoogle Scholar.

page 748 note 1 The misdeeds of Indra, and especially his slaughter of Viçvarūpa, Tvaṣṭṛ's son, form the subject of many a legend in Vedic literature. See, e.g., Çatap. Br. i, 2, 3, 1 seqq.; Taitt. Saṃh. ii, 5, 1, 1 seqq.

page 748 note 2 In Kṣemendra's Darpadalana iii, 108 seqq., a similar feat is related of Raibhya, who sacrifices his tuft of hair, whereupon a Rākṣasa rises from the fire.

page 749 note 1 See Holtzmann, , “Das Mahābhārata,” iv, p. 54Google Scholar.

page 749 note 2 Holtzmann, l.c., iv, p. 35.

page 750 note 1 The chāayā or counterfeit Sitā is no doubt the māyā or Sitā māyāmayī, produced by Rāvaṇa in the Rāmāyaṇa, vi, 81, 4–5.

page 750 note 2 Rāvaṇakṛtacchāvā-Sītāharaṇakathanam | Rāvaṇavadhānantaraṃ Puṣkaratīrthe tapaç carantyāç chāyā-Sītayā, Lakṣmītvaprāptikathanam | punas tasyā Draupadīrūpeṇa janmavṛttāntakathanaṃ | See Mitra, Rājendralāla, “Notices of Sanskrit MSS.,” vol. iii, p. 229Google Scholar.

page 750 note 3 The story of Sītā, who was Vedavatī in her former birth, is told in the Rāmayāna, vii, 17, and alluded to vi, 60, 10, both passages of later origin. See Jacobi, , “Das Rāmāyana,” pp. 27 seqq., 35Google Scholar.

page 750 note 4 Rasikeçvara is a curious epithet of Çiva. It would seem far more appropriate for Kṛṣṇā, as whose epithet it is quoted in the Petersbourgh Dictionary, s.v.

page 751 note 1 divya, W.; divaṃ, M.; kṛtvā, Wa.; divyaṃ, Ed.

page 751 note 2 svarge, Ed.

page 751 note 3 kṛtayuge, Wa.

page 751 note 4 tretāyāṃ Rāmapatnī ca, Ed.

page 751 note 5 yugatraye, Ed.; yugaye, M.

page 751 note 6 °gavaḥ, Wa.; °gavāh, M.

page 751 note 7 °guyor or °gryor° W., Wa.; rāmāgryā vājñayā, M.

page 751 note 8 °naṃ, Ed.

page 751 note 9 bhavaṃtvīti, Wa.; bhaviṣyati, W.; bhaviteti, M.; bhavantīti, Ed.

page 752 note 1 See Wilson, H. H., Works, iii, pp. 101–2Google Scholar.

page 753 note 1 I do not know of any parallel to the story told in this Jātaka that Draupadī, though she had fire husbands, had also a love intrigue with a sixth man, who was a cripple.

page 753 note 2 See Actes du sixèieme congrès international des orientalistes tenu en 1883 à Leide. Troisième Partie, section 2: Aryenne (Leide, 1885), pp. 541–2.

page 753 note 3 l.c., p. 540.

page 754 note 1 See Bühler, , “Contributions,” p. 11Google Scholar.

page 754 note 2 Only vv. 1, 5–6, 29, and 44–52 (the story of the maiden praying for a husband) are Çlokas.

page 754 note 3 That it is mentioned in the Parvasaṃgraha, i, 2, 117, is a proof that it is fairly old. For the Parvasaṃgraha must be older than the Mahābhārata of our editions. See Holtzmann, , “Mahābhārata,” ii, p. 8Google Scholar.

page 754 note 4 “Literary Remains,” ii, 131.

page 755 note 1 Works, iii, 340.

page 755 note 2 “Ancient Sanskrit Literature,” p. 47.

page 755 note 3 Indian Antiquary, 1877, pp. 260–2.

page 755 note 4 Hopkins, E. W., “position of the Ruling Caste in Ancient India,” p. 354Google Scholar.

page 755 note 5 See Jolly, , “Tagore Law Lectures,” 1883, p. 155Google Scholar; the same, “Recht und Sitte,” Bühler's, ‘Grundriss,’ ii, 8, 47Google Scholar.

page 756 note 1 See Monier-Williams, , “Indian Epic Poetry,” p. 99, noteGoogle Scholar.

page 756 note 2 See Westermarck, E., “History of Human Marriage,” pp. 452–3Google Scholar.

page 756 note 3 Westermarck, l.c., pp. 116–7.

page 756 note 4 Westermarck, l.c., p. 452; J. Jolly, “Reeht und Sitte,” Bühler's, ‘Grundriss,’ ii, 8, 44Google Scholar.

page 756 note 5 See his excellent article “On the question whether Polyandry ever existed in Northern Hindustan,” in the Indian Antiquary, 1877, pp. 315–7.

page 756 note 6 Indian Antiquary, 1878, pp. 132–5. See also a note by Mr. C. S. Kirkpatrick, ibid., p. 86.

page 756 note 7 l.c., p. 135.

page 757 note 1 Jolly, , “Recht und Sitte,” l.c., p. 48Google Scholar. See also Jacobi, Götting. Gel. Anz. 1896, i, pp. 71–2.

page 757 note 2 Westermarck, l.c., pp. 454–5.

page 757 note 3 l.c., p. 455 seqq.

page 757 note 4 Indian Antiquary, 1878, p. 135. Westermarck, l.c., p. 456. In the Mahābhārata, Arjuna, although living in polyandry, also marries Citrāŋgadā (i, 217) and Subhadrā (i, 221 seqq.).

page 758 note 1 Mahābh., i, 208, 18 seqq.; 212–3.

page 758 note 2 See Westermarck, l.c., pp. 116–7.

page 758 note 3 A missionary report, quoted by Dr. Stulpnagel (l.c., p. 134), says that the cause of polyandry in Kunawar is “not poverty, but a desire to keep the common patrimony from being distributed among a number of brothers. The result is, that the whole family is enabled to live in comparative comfort.”

page 759 note 1 Götting. Gel. Anz. 1896, i, p. 71.