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A History of Indian Literature - Vol. I: Veda and Upanishads - Fasc. 1: Vedic Literature (Samhitas and Brahmanas) PDF

470 Pages·1975·12.26 MB·English
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A HISTORY OF INDIAN LITERATURE JAN GONDA VEDIC LITERATURE OTTO HARRASSOWITZ • WIESBADEN AHISTORY OF INDIAN LITERATURE EDITED BY JAN GONDA VOLUME I Fasc. 1 1975 OTTO HARRASSOWITZ • WIESBADEN JAN GONDA VEDIC LITERATURE (SAMHITAS AND BRAHMANAS) 1975 OTTO HARRASSOWITZ • WIESBADEN CONTENTS Editor's Introduction CHAPTER I Introduction to the Veda in general and the Rgveda in particular 1. General introductory definitions. Composition of the Rgveda 7 2. The text of the Rgveda .. .. 15 3. Chronology; environment and culture 20 4. Development of 'schools'; appendices and ancillary literature 26 5. Commentaries 39 6. Survival of the Veda .. 43 7. Study of the Veda 55 CHAPTER II Poetry, poet, poem 1. Inspiration and poetry .. .. 65 2. The poet 74 3. Sociology and performance .. 79 4. Ritual application 83 CHAPTER III Contents of the Rgveda 1. Introduction 93 2. Invitations and invocations . . .. 101 3. Apri hymns 104 4. Praise 105 5. Prayers 108 6. Myths .. 114 7. Legends .. . v 123 8. History .. .. .. 128 9. Riddles .. .. 132 10. Speculative hymns . . .. . . .. 136 11. Magic , ?f 142 v VI J. Gonda • Vedic Literature 12. Ecstatic practices 149 13. Erotic poetry 151 14. Morals and maxims 153 15. Lyrics; emotions 156 16. So-called ballads 159 17. Nature 161 18. Animals 166 19. Labour songs 167 20. Irony; humour 168 21. Danastutis 170 CHAPTER IV The structure of the Rgvedic poems 1. Stanzas and metres 173 2. Structure of the suktas 178 3. Introductory and final stanzas 185 4. Groupings of stanzas 189 5. 'Composite' hymns 191 6. Similarities and repetitions 193 7. Monologues, dialogues, the akhyana theory .. .. 198 CHAPTER V The style of the Vedic hymns 1. The Rgveda from the stylistic point of view .. .. 211 2. Formulas, parallelism and its corollaries, variation 221 3. Epithets 231 4. Brevity 236 5. Ambiguity 240 6. Imagery 248 7. Similes 254 8. Other stylistic features 261 CHAPTER VI The Atharvaveda 1. Names and position 267 2. Genesis and recensions of the Atharvaveda-Samhita 272 3. The magical sUktas 277 4. Ritual and speculative suktas 288 5. Style and structure 298 6. Ancillary and exegetical literature ,. ,, ,, .. 307 Contents VII CHAPTER VII The liturgical Samhitds 1. The Samaveda 313 2. The Yajurveda 323 CHAPTER VIII The Brdhmanas 1. General introduction 339 2. The texts 344 3. Chronology 357 4. The brahmanas as historical sources 361 5. Interpretation and argumentation 368 6. Disputations 379 7. Myths, legends and narrative episodes 384 8. Style and structure 410 CHAPTER IX The Aranyakas 423 Glossary 433 Abbreviations 437 Index 445 EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY One of the main reasons why Indian thought and Indian civilization make so fascinating a field of study and research lies in their unique history and remarkable structure. Indian civilization has its roots in an ancient heritage, in that pattern of culture which is sometimes called archaic or semi-primitive, sometimes also pre- or non-modern. This culture, or rather structure of the human mind, is, in the main, characterized by presenting, in some essential features, striking contrasts to our modern 'mentalite.' Without being onesidedly intellectual, it gives free scope to the emotional and imaginative sides of human nature; our distinction between the subjective and the objective, our contrast between reality and appearance are almost meaningless; the realm of nature and the realm of man are hardly distinguished; thought often appears wrapped in imagination; logical reasoning is by no means lacking but blended with affective and irrational tendencies; the men of light and leading have a bent for the speculative, more or less visionary, mode of apprehension, transcending experience; they are preferably concerned with man himself, his nature and destiny. On such a basis, reflected in many products of their literature, and without denying these origins, the Indians—anthropologically a mixture of immigrant Aryans and 'autochthonous' peoples of other descent—gradually elaborated a many-sided, highly developed civilization. This civilization is in no small measure characterized by unity in diversity, by homogeneity not- withstanding the utmost variety and complexity of its ethnic composition; by a multitude of languages and a wealth of different cultural patterns; charac- terized also by considerable diversity in mental character and enormous differences in religion and social customs, beliefs and practices varying widely both regionally and, within a given region, from class to class. While preserving the cohesion of its cultural provinces—religion, art, literature, social organi- zation—to an unusual degree and on the other hand acquiring full scope for intellectual effort and pursuits it can glory in remarkable achievements in various fields. Owing to the integration of a large variety of heterogeneous elements the Indian civilization constitutes a very complex and as to its main current remarkably continuous whole. As it covers the whole of life it has social and religious, economic, artistic and literary aspects. From the religious point of view it is an utterly diverse conglomerate of cults, practices, doctrines and ways of life. Viewed from the angle of sociology it is a stratified system of social classes which is, at least in traditional India, not only given religious sanction 2 Editor's Introduction to the History but also, like many other fields of human effort, impregnated by a characteristic view of life and the world. The more or less constant elements of this conglom- erate, the main features of the Indian 'great tradition' are, to a considerable extent, the belief in an eternal, fundamental principle (brahman), the ultimate source and goal of all existence, the One that is the All and sole reality; the recognition of a pristine body of religious literature as an absolute authority, however unknown its contents; a deep-rooted want for assuming, maintaining, and clinging to continuity; a craving for a firm foundation on which to build one's life and ideals, and the confidence that one's own existence and the culture of the community to which one belongs are founded on an eternal and infallible basis; the belief in karman, and its complement, the almost generally accepted doctrine of transmigration; the conviction that man's best endeavour should be directed towards escaping from impermanence or final emancipation; a com- plex 'polytheism' subsumed in a fundamental monotheism; a tendency to mysticism and monistic philosophy; a propensity to assimilate rather than to exclude or to abandon what once has been adopted. This civilization is expressed and reflected by an uninterrupted, immense and utterly varied literary production from the Rgveda onward which, while continually transforming and rejuvenating itself, has always been subject to processes of adaption and assimilation. A more than superficial study of many chapters of this literature requires of the reader, to some degree, familiarization with a non-modern 'mentality'; with a dynamic conception of the cosmic events; with religious convictions indissolubly associated with social life; with a more or less pronounced tendency to be in conformity with tradition and socio-religious norms and ideals; with mythical formulations of thought which, though products of imagination, are far from being mere fantasy; with various forms of speculation that, as a rule unrestricted by disciplined confrontation with the results of objective and analytical investigation, found unlimited possibilities for development. He will be impressed by a luxuriant imagination and a great narrative power; by a sense of the beauty of nature as well as rec- ognition of spiritual values; by the consciousness of man's close and intimate relation with his natural surroundings in general and his fellowship with the other living creatures in particular. If he is not a professional indologist he will learn that India has, throughout many centuries, not only tended to the practice of self-denial, quietism and asceticism, but also to addiction to the pleasures and luxuries of life; that she delighted in the things of the senses no less passionately than in the things of the spirit; that, while aspiring to noble ideals of conduct, tolerance and humanity, she was not averse to extracting all happiness possible from earthly existence. He will hear about cunning and unscrupulous statecraft as well as occasional strenuous effort in the province of applied knowledge and great achievements in art and mathematics. Acquainting himself with the 'modern' literatures he will comprehend the impact of Islam, of the West, the spread of modern ideas, the influence of western ways of life; witness also Editor's Introduction to the History 3 remarkable outbursts of intellectual activity, transformations in social and religious ideas, gradual transitions from a traditional to a modern society, a critical outlook on the past, new aspirations for the future, a zeal for reform and remodelling of the orthodox beliefs and traditional habits. In short, when placed in the context of the cultural inheritance this uniquely rich and many-sided literature will introduce him to the development of the humanitas indica in all its aspects. However, the reader will also have to accustom himself to an unfamiliar historical background, to books of unusual length, to poems and prose works of uncommon structure, frequent repetitions of themes and, not infrequently, richness of material and detail and elaborateness of style. In traditional India the identity, biography, and circumstances in life of the authors and the dates of the composition of their works are as a rule not so important as in the West. In the majority of cases dates are only known approximately. The persons of the authors or compilers are not infrequently obliterated or even fated to remain anonymous for ever. Where we would like to base our historical research on reliable facts the only information given to a student of Indian literature often consists of a mythologized biography or some vague, general and contradictory statements. This is not only due to the fact that most literary works are little historically conditioned but also, and in many cases primarily, to the well- known tendency of pre-literate and traditional societies to subordinate the individual to the group; to the static, and theoretically unchangeable nature of the traditional Indian society and—under the influence of an agelong belief in the secondary reality of all empirical existence, in the almost absolute depend- ence on the power of karman and the continuous divine interference in mundane affairs—to a comparatively weak sense of individuality. With a few noteworthy exceptions all other—medieval and modern—Indian literatures depend on, or are largely influenced by, the ancient Sanskrit back- ground. To say that Sanskrit literature alone exceeds that of Greece or Rome is an error. It is almost boundless, in the sense that nobody knows its extent and the number of its writings. In the course of its prolonged literary existence Sanskrit—cultivated for literary purposes long after it had ceased to be a spo- ken language—underwent various and important changes. While many great authors, fond of displaying their erudition, always endeavoured to comply with the recognized standards, striving after grammatical correctness and stylistic elaboration, there is, especially in technical or non-brahminical works, abundant evidence of a mixed, or popular, incorrect Sanskrit. It will be seen that the origin of most of the 'modern' literatures of the Indo-Aryan languages which, through a Middle Indian (Prakrit) stage, developed from Old Indian, is—like that of the Middle Indian Pali and Ardha-Magadhi—connected with the spread of religious ideas. Whereas, after the arrival of Islam, Muslim and Persian influence extended to all major linguistic areas calling into existence

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