Sixty Years of Sanskrit Studies Vol.2(Abroad) - Rashtriya Sanskrit

315 Pages·2015·3.3 MB·English

i

AA "k"VÔCnlaLÑre~ AA
Sixty Years of Sanskrit Studies
Vol. 2
i i

Published on the occasion of
15th World Sanskrit Conference
being jointly organised by the
International Association of Sanskrit Studies (IASS)
and the
Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan
(under the Ministry of Human Resource Development,
Government of India)
iii
AA "k"VÔCnlaLÑre~ AA
Sixty Years of Sanskrit Studies
(1950–2010)

Vol. 2: Countries other than India

Edited by
Radhavallabh Tripathi

Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan
iv
Cataloging in Publication Data — DK
[Courtesy: D.K. Agencies (P) Ltd. <[email protected]>]
Ṣaṣṭyabdasaṁskṛtam = Sixty years of Sanskrit studies (1950–2010) /
edited by Radhavallabh Tripathi.
2 v. cm.
Contributed articles.
Includes bibliographical references.
Contents: v. 1. India — v. 2. Countries other than India.
ISBN 13: 9788124606285 (set) 9788124606308 (Vol. 2)
1. Sanskrit language — Study and teaching — India. 2. Sanskrit
language — Study and teaching. 3. Sanskrit literature — India —
History and criticism. 4. Sanskrit literature — History and criticism.
I. Tripathi, Radhavallabh, 1949- II. Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan.
DDC 491.20710954 23
ISBN 13: 978-81-246-0628-5 (set) ISBN 13: 978-81-246-0630-8 (vol. 2)
First published in 2012
© Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan, New Delhi.

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of the copyright holder, indicated above, and the publishers.

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Printed by: D.K. Printworld (P) Ltd, New Delhi
Sanskrit Studies in Argentina v

Contents
Acknowledgements vii
Introduction 1
1. Sanskrit Studies in Argentina 11
— Fernando Tola & Carmen Dragonetti
2. Sanskrit Studies in Austria, Germany and Switzerland 35
— L. Soni and J. Soni
3. Sanskrit Studies in Britain 55
— John Brockington
4. Sanskrit Studies in China 75
— Saroj Kumar Chaudhuri
5. Sanskrit Studies in France 105
— Nalini Balbir & Nicolas Dejenne
6. Sanskrit Studies in Japan 181
— Shashibala
7. Sanskrit Studies in Nepal 203
— Radhavallabh Tripathi
8. Sanskrit Studies in Poland 213
— Anna Trynkowska
9. Sanskrit Studies in Russia 237
— Sergei D. Serebriany
10. Sanskrit Studies in Thailand 253
— Amarjiva Lochan
11. Sanskrit Studies in the United States 259
— Sheldon Pollock
Contributors 311
vi
Sanskrit Studies in Argentina vii

Acknowledgements
We are sincerely grateful to all the authors who have
contributed their papers for this volume and have also checked
the proofs carefully and to the authorities of the Jawaharlal
Nehru University, New Delhi and its Special Centre for Sanskrit
Studies for permitting us to include the articles of Saroj Kumar
Chaudhury and Shashibala, published earlier in the Sanskrit
Across Cultures edited by Shashiprabha Kumar. This volume
would not have taken the present shape but for the meticulous
and assiduous efforts of Shri Susheel K. Mittal of D.K.
Printworld. Thanks are also due to Dr. Prakash Pande, Officer
on Special Duty for Publications, at the Rashtriya Sanskrit
Sansthan for collecting and formatting the articles and
corresponding with their authors.
Radhavallabh Tripathi
Introduction 1

Introduction
Radhavallabh Tripathi
“If I were asked what I consider the most important discovery
which has been made during the 19th century with respect to
the ancient history of mankind, I should say that it was the
simple etymological equation: Sanskrit Dyauṣ-pitṛ= Greek
Zeus Pater = Latin Jupiter”.
Max Müller had made this pronouncement in his Gifford
lectures on Anthropological Religion delivered at the
University of Glasgow in 1891.1 Dandekar calls this an utterance
that ‘may be said to embody the leit-motif of principle writings
of that outstanding scholar.2’ His ulterior motives related to the
propagation of Christianity apart, Max Müller at that time was
confident that Sanskrit is capable of transforming the world
and make a radical change. To an extent this was proved by the
role Sanskrit played at the global level during the eighteenth-
nineteenth centuries. Earlier, William Jones had published the
first printed edition of Abhijñānaśākuntalam with its English
translation in 1786 — an even that created an epoch. Soon after
its publication, William Forster, a German Scholar, translated
Śākuntalam into German and published this translation in 1791.
Forster was not a Sanskritist, and he rendered Kālidāsa’s play
from its English translation. This rendering reached Goethe,
one of the greatest literary figures of the eighteenth century.
We all know how Goethe was enamoured by reading Kālidāsa
and to what extent he was under the spell of Kālidāsa when he
was writing his own magnum opus — The Faust. We are also
aware of his beautiful poem in praise of Śākuntala. Through
Goethe Kālidāsa cast an impact on the generations of German

1 Dandekar, R.N. : Max Müller — Comparative Religion and Mythology pub.
in F. Max Müller — What He can Teach Us? Ed. by Heimo Rau,
Shakuntala Publishing House, Bombay, 1974, p.21
2 Ibid. p. 21
2 Sixty Years of Sanskrit Studies: Vol. 2 
and English romantic poets. Moreover, the publication of
Kālidāsa’s work by William Jones, changed the image of India in
the world, and also led to the change in the cultural and
literary scenario at the global level
Forster, who rendered Śākuntala into German from its
English translation was a political activist. In his introduction
to the German translation, he expressed the hope that his
country which is passing through a difficult period of history
will soon need great classics like this to recover from the
wounds that history has given. Forster had also hoped that the
publication of Kālidāsa’s work in German translation will open
vistas for a global understanding — ‘the most delicate feelings
which the human heart can sense, can be just finely expressed
on the Ganges by the dark brown people, as on the Rhine.’3
With the onslaught of orientalism in the 18th and 19th
centuries, the knowledge of Sanskrit in the western world led
to the emergence of new schools and disciplines for study like
comparative mythology, comparative religion and comparative
linguistics. It was through the discipline of comparative
linguistics that interrelationship between ancient languages of
world’s biggest group of linguistic family — the Indo-Aryan —
came to be investigated upon. The school of German
romanticism nurtured by stalwarts like Johann Gottfried
Herder (1744-1803) who also published the second edition of
Śākuntalam’s translation by Forster in 1803, and nourished by
Max Müller himself, very soon paved the way for serious
researches based on philological grounds.
It is evidenced by the articles collected in this volume that
the studies of Sanskrit in various parts of the world have
covered a vast range of texts and topics pertaining to the Vedic
lore, Buddhism, Jainism, Indian philosophy, art, archaeology,
epics and classics, literature and literary criticism; and have
also embraced Iranian studies and South East Asian studies.

3 Q. By Walter Ruben (1984): Kālidāsa : The Human Meaning of his Works,
PPH, New Delhi, p. 6.
Introduction 3
They have helped in creating a better understanding of our
culture and civilisation. The aspects of history, culture and
philosophy are being brought within the purview of Sanskrit
studies, which were pursued earlier largely on the grounds of
linguistics.
— 2 —
The World Sanskrit Conferences (WSCs) organised under the
authority of the International Association of Sanskrit Studies
(IASS) have not only been providing a viable platform to
Sanskrit scholars all around the world for a meaningful
exchange of ideas and to be acquainted with the research
works of each other, but have also given multiple opportunities
to take stock of the progress of Sanskrit studies and their
prospects. Some of the volumes of the News Bulletin of the
IASS, published on the occasion of the WSCs, were devoted to
Sanskrit studies in various countries. The News Bulletin
released on the occasion of the third WSC (Paris, 1977)
contained a list of institutions in various countries with
reference to Sanskrit studies there. Wolfgang Morgenroth
improved upon this model by the way of editing and publishing
the number two of the News Bulletin on the occasion of the
Weimer WSC (1979). The two parts of the News Bulletin number
two, provide valuable sources of information on Sanskrit
studies in as many as 26 countries of the world. In addition to
this special number of the News Bulletin of the IASS, Sanskrit
Studies in GDR in two parts was also brought out on the occasion
of the IV WSC. The first part was devoted to history of Sanskrit
studies in GDR, and the second part comprised a bibliography
of 765 publications from GDR related to Sanskrit studies.
The organisers of the past conferences have also been
bringing out volumes devoted to evaluation and assessment of
Sanskrit studies during the recent decades. After the first WSC,
V. Raghavan4 edited and published the collection of the papers

4 V. Raghavan (Delhi, 1979): Sanskrit and Indology in Centres outside India,
volume I – Part II.