INTRODUCTION TO ANUGÎTÂ.
LIKE the Bhagavadgîtâ and the Sanatsugâtîya, the Anugîtâ, is one of the numerous episodes of the Mahâbhârata. And like the Sanatsugâtîya, it appears here for the first time in an English, or, indeed, it is believed, in any European garb. It forms part of the Asvamedha Parvan of the Mahâbhârata, and is contained in thirty-six chapters of that Parvan. These chapters--being chapters XVI to LI--together with all the subsequent chapters of the Asvamedha Parvan, form by themselves what in some of our copies is called the Anugîtâ Parvan-a title which affords a parallel to the title Bhagavadgîtâ Parvan, which we have already referred to. The Anugîtâ is not now a work of any very great or extensive reputation. But we do find some few quotations from it in the Bhâshyas of Sankarâkârya, and one or two in the Sankhya-sâra of Vigñâna Bhikshu, to which reference will be made hereafter. And it is included in the present volume, partly because it affords an interesting, glimpse of sundry old passages of the Upanishad literature in a somewhat modified, and presumably later, form; and partly, perhaps I may say more especially, because it professes to be a sort of continuation, or rather recapitulation, of the Bhagavadgîtâ. At the very outset of the work, we read, that, after the great fratricidal war of the Mahâbhârata was over, and the Pândavas had become sole and complete masters of their ancestral kingdom, Krishna and Arguna--the two interlocutors in the Bhagavadgîtâ--happened to take a stroll together in the great magical palace built for the Pândavas by the demon Maya. In the course of the conversation which they held on the occasion, Krishna communicated to Arguna his wish to return to his own people at Dvârakâ, now that the business which had called
1 of which the Asvamedha Parvan is made up.
Although the information here set out from these various sources is not easily to be harmonised in all its parts, the preponderance of testimony seems to he in favour of regarding the portion of the Asvamedha Parvan embraced in our translation as containing three distinct sections, viz. the Anugîtâ, the Brâhmana Gîtâ, and the Gurusishyasamvâda. And some indirect support may be derived for this conclusion, from one or two other circumstances. In the Sânkhya-sâra of Vigñâna Bhikshu--a work which, as we shall see in the sequel, expressly mentions the Anugîtâ--we have a passage cited as from the 'Bhârata 2' which coincides almost precisely with a passage occurring at chapter XXVII of our translation (see p. 335). And, in the Bhâshya of Sankarâkârya, on the Bhagavadgîtâ, chapter XV, stanza 1, we have a citation as from a 'Purâna' of a passage which coincides pretty closely with one which occurs at chapter XX of our translation (see p. 313). If the discrepancies between the quotations as given by Vigñâna Bhikshu and Sankara, and the passages occurring in our text, may be treated merely as various readings-and there is nothing inherently improbable in this being the case-it may be fairly contended, that neither Sankara nor Vigñâna Bhikshu would have used the vague expressions, 'a Purâna,' or even 'the Bhârata,' if they could have correctly substituted in lieu of them the specific name Anugîtâ. And this, it may be said, is a contention of some weight, when it is remembered, that both Sankara and Vigñâna show, in other parts of their writings, an acquaintance with this very Anugîtâ. If this reasoning is correct,
1 from the Anugîtâ which are distinctly stated to be taken from that work. The first occurs in our translation at p. 332, the second at p. 313. Now, if we adopt the conclusion above referred to, regarding the correct titles of the thirty-six chapters which we have translated, it is a mistake to attribute the passages in question to the Anugîtâ. They would, on that view, form part of the Gurusishyasamvâda. Again, in his commentary on the Sanatsugâtîya, Sankara refers to sundry passages which he expressly says are taken from the Anugîtâ, but which are not contained in the Anugîtâ as limited by the evidence we have considered above. One of the passages referred to is taken from chapter XI of our translation, and others are contained in the comments on Sanatsugâtîya I, 6, and on I, 20 and I, 41 2. It is difficult to resist the conclusion to which this positive evidence leads. One cannot possibly explain this evidence upon the view which we have first stated; while, on the other hand, the points which apparently support that view are capable of some explanation on the theory that the Anugîtâ includes all the chapters here translated. And that in this wise. The passages which we have referred to as cited by Sankara and Vigñâna from a Purâna and from the Bhârata may have been actually taken from some other work than the Anugîtâ. Even waiving the fact that the readings are different,--though in regard especially to the quotation given by Sankara it is not one to be entirely lost sight of,--there is this fact which is of great and almost conclusive weight on such a point as this, namely, that we
1. It ought to have been there pointed out, that the stanza about a young man being bound to rise to receive an elderly person, also occurs in the Manu Smriti 2 in exactly the same words. The omission to note this circumstance in its proper place in the Introduction to the Sanatsugâtîya was due to a mere inadvertence. But the conclusion there hinted at was expressed in very, cautious language, and with many qualifications, out of regard to circumstances such as those which we are now considering. Similar repetitions may be pointed out in other places. The passage about the Kshetragña and Sattva and their mutual relations (see p. 374) occurs, as pointed out in the note there,. in at least two other places in the Mahâbhârata. The passage likewise which occurs at Gîtâ, p. 103, about the 'hands, feet, &c., on all sides,' is one which may be seen, to my own knowledge, in about half a dozen places in the Mahâbhârata. Such cases, I believe, may be easily multiplied; and they illustrate and are illustrated by Mr. Freeman's proposition respecting the epic age in Greece, to which we have already alluded. It follows, consequently, that the quotations from Sankara and Vigñâna, to which we have referred above, do not militate very strongly against the final conclusion at which we have arrived. The testimony of the MSS. and the commentators is, no doubt, of considerably greater force. But Nîlakantha, whatever his merits as an exegete--and even these are often marred by a persistent effort to read his own foregone conclusions into the text he comments on Nîlakantha is but an indifferent authority in the domain of historical criticism. In his commentary on the Sanatsugâtîya, for instance, he tells us that he has admitted into his text sundry verses which were not in the copy used by Sankara, and for which he had none but a very modern voucher, and he very naively adds that he has done so
1.'
Do these thirty-six chapters, then, form one integral work? Are they all the work of one and the same author? These are the questions which next present themselves for consideration. The evidence bearing upon them, however, is, as might be expected, excessively scanty. Of external evidence, indeed, we have really none, barring Sankara's statement in his commentary on the Brihadâranyaka-upanishad 2 that the verse which he there quotes from the Anugîtâ has Vyâsa for its author. That statement indicates that Sankara accepted the current tradition of Vyâsa's authorship of the Anugîtâ; and such acceptance, presumably, followed from his acceptance of the tradition of Vyâsa's authorship of the entire Mahâbhârata. If that tradition is incorrect, and Vyâsa is not the author of the Anugîtâ, we have no means of ascertaining who is the author. And as to the tradition in question, it is difficult, in the present state of our materials, to form any satisfactory judgment. We therefore proceed at once to consider whether the Anugîtâ is really one work. And I must admit at the outset that I find it difficult to answer this question. There are certainly some circumstances connected with the work which might be regarded as indicating
1. Again, in a passage still further on, we have the vocative O Pârtha! where the person addressed is not Arguna at all, but the Brâhmana's wife. Now these lapses are susceptible of two explanations--either we are to see in them so many cases of 'Homer nodding,' or we may suppose that they are errors occasioned by one writer making additions to the work of a previous writer, without a vivid recollection of the framework of the original composition into which his own work had to be set 2. I own, that on balancing the probabilities on the one side and the other, my mind rather leans to the hypothesis of one author making a slip in the plexus of his own story within story, rather than the hypothesis of a deliberate interpolator forgetting the actual scheme of the original work into which he was about to foist his own additions 3. And this the rather, that we find a similar slip towards the very beginning of the work, where we have the Brâhmana Kâsyapa addressed as Parantapa, or destroyer of foes--an epithet which, I think, is exclusively reserved for Kshatriyas, and is, in any case, a very inappropriate one to apply to a humble seeker for spiritual light. This slip appears to me to be incapable of explanation on any theory of interpolation 4. And hence the other slips above noted can hardly be regarded as supporting any such theory. Another circumstance, not indeed bearing
1, suffice to show that the Anugîtâ must have been some few centuries old in the time of Sankarâkârya. For whether we treat the Anugîtâ as a part of the original Mahâbhârata or not, it is not likely that such a scholar as Sankara would have accepted the book as a genuine part of the Mahâbhârata, and as a work of Vyâsa, if it had not been in his day of some respectable antiquity, of antiquity sufficient to have thrown the real author into oblivion, and to have substituted
1, upwards of thirty centuries before the Christian era. The calculation is avowedly a very rough one, but I think we may, as the result of it, safely fix the third century of the Christian era as the latest date at which the Anugîtâ can have been composed. Let us now endeavour to find out whether we can fix the date as lying within any better defined period. It is scarcely needful to say, that the Anugîtâ dates from a period considerably subsequent to the age of the Upanishads. The passages relating to the Prânasamvâda and so forth, which occur originally in the Upanishads, are referred to in the Anugîtâ as 'ancient stories'--an indication that the Upanishads had already come to be esteemed as ancient compositions at the date of the latter work. It is not necessary, therefore, to go through an elaborate examination of the versions of the ancient stories alluded to above, as contained in the Upanishads and in the Anugîtâ, more especially because it is possible for us to show that the Anugîtâ is later than the Bhagavadgîtâ, which latter work, as we have seen, is later than the Upanishads. And to this point we shall now address ourselves. We have already observed upon the story referred to at the opening of this Introduction, which, historically interpreted, indicates the priority of the Bhagavadgîtâ to the Anugîtâ. This conclusion is confirmed by sundry other circumstances, which we must now discuss in some detail, as they are also of use in helping to fix the position of the work in the history of Sanskrit literature and philosophy. First, then, it seems to me, that the state of society mirrored in the Anugîtâ indicates a greater advance in social evolution than we have already seen is disclosed in the Bhagavadgîtâ. Not to mention decorations of houses and so forth, which are alluded to in one passage of the Anugîtâ, we are here told of royal oppressions, of losses of wealth accumulated with great difficulty, and of fierce captivities; we are told, to adapt the language of a modern English poet, of laws grinding the weak, for strong men rule the
1; and we meet with protests against the amusements of music and dancing, and against the occupation of artisans 2. True it is, that all these indications put together, fail to constitute according to the standard of modern times, would be called a highly artificial state of society. But it seems to me to mark a very perceptible and distinct advance beyond the social condition in which mankind was divided into four castes or classes, with such a division of duties, to put it briefly, as that of preparation for a future world, government of this world, agriculture and trade, and service respectively 3. Artisans, it will be observed, are not even referred to in the Bhagavadgîtâ, nor is there any trice of royal oppressions, or unequal laws. Then as regards music, it may be noted, that there are references to it in the Brihadâranyaka and Kaushîtaki-upanishads 4, without any indications of disapprobation. The protest against music, therefore, and the sister art of dancing, is probably to be explained as evoked by some abuses of the two arts which must have come into prevalence about the time of the composition of the Anugîtâ. A similar protest is found recorded in the Dharmasâstras of Manu and Âpastamba and Gautama 5. We shall consider in the sequel the chronological positions of the Anugîtâ with reference to those Dharmasâstras. But we have already pointed out that the Gîtâ stands prior to them both 6.
Look again at the views on caste which are embodied in the Anugîtâ, and the Bhagavadgîtâ respectively. The reference to the Kshatriya as representing the quality of passion, while the Brâhmana represents the quality of goodness 7, seems to place a considerably larger distance between the Brâhmana, and the Kshatriya than is suggested by the Bhagavadgîtâ, and thus marks an advance in the direction of the later doctrine on the subject. And in connexion
p. 85, and that of the Anugîtâ at p. 255, is not entirely without significance, though much weight would not be due to it, if it stood alone. The expression 'devoted royal sages,' which we find in- the one work, makes way for 'well-read Kshatriyas who are intent on their own duties' in the other. Again, although the passage at p. 353 is undoubtedly susceptible of a different interpretation, it seems to me, that the word 'twice-born' there employed, was meant to be interpreted as meaning the Brâhmanas, and not the three twice-born castes; and if this interpretation is correct, we have here the very proposition upon the absence of which in the Bhagavadgîtâ we have already made some observations 1. That twice-born in the passage in question means Brâhmana only, is, of course, not a proved fact. But-having regard to the passages noted above and to the passage at p. 320, where reference is made to disparagement of Brâhmanas--it is not twice-born there--and in the same clause with disparagement of gods and Vedas, it seems to me that the interpretation we have suggested must be taken to be the true one. And it is to be further noted, that this conclusion is corroborated by a comparison of the passage now under consideration with a passage occurring in the Sânti Parvan 2, in the Râgadharma section of it, where we read that 'the cow is the first among quadrupeds, gold among metals, a mantra among words, and the Brâhmana is the first among bipeds.' The cow and gold occur in the passage in the Anugîtâ also, very near the clause we are now discussing. And it is allowable to argue, that reading the two together, twice-born in the Anugîtâ must be interpreted to be synonymous with Brâhmana in the Râgadharma. And the same conclusion is, to my mind, confirmed indirectly by comparing the clause 'the twice-born among men' of the Anugîtâ with 'the ruler of men among men of that Bhagavadgîtâ, the teaching of which the former work professes to recapitulate.
p. 248 the Yoga Sâstra is referred to eo nomine. What Sâstra is here alluded to? Is it Patañgali's, or some other Sâstra dealing with similar topics? Or, again, is it an entirely different matter that is alluded to, and are we not to see in the expression in question an allusion to any system formally propounded? I own, as stated in the note on the passage, that my mind inclines to the last view. There is not very much to say on either side of the question, as far as I am able to understand it. But the view I incline to appears to have one small circumstance in its favour. At p. 249 we have an allusion to persons who understand the Yoga, and to a certain illustration propounded by them. Now who are these persons? My limited knowledge of Yoga literature has not enabled me to trace the illustration anywhere else than in the Kathopanishad, and in the Sanatsugâtîya. It seems to me very unlikely, that the illustration can have been put forward in any work older than the Kathopanishad. And we may, I think, assume it as most probable that the Sanatsugâtîya borrowed it from that work. If so, it is not likely that the Anugîtâ can have referred to any other master of the Yoga than, the author of the Kathopanishad. And then it would seem to follow, that the Anugîtâ must have been composed at a time when, although the Upanishads were looked on with reverence and as works of authority, they were not yet regarded as part and parcel of the Vedic revelation 1. It is impossible not to perceive, that the train of reasoning here is at every stage hedged round with difficulties and doubts. And the inference therefore to which we are led by it must be accepted with proportionate
1 are mentioned in the same way. I am aware that it may be said, that because Upanishads as a class of works are mentioned by Patañgali and Âpastamba, it does not follow that any particular Upanishad, such as the Katha, for instance, also existed at that time. This is quite true. But without going now into the general question, it is sufficient to point out, that on. argument here is concerned merely with the recognition of the Upanishads as a class of works forming part of the Vedic canon. Such recognition must have come later than the period at which the Anugîtâ could speak of a passage in the Katha-upanishad as the utterance of Yogavids, or persons who understood the Yoga.
Turning now to the materials available for ascertaining the relative chronological positions of the Anugîtâ and the rise of Buddhism, we have again to complain of their unsatisfactory character. We will briefly note the two or three circumstances which appear to have a bearing upon this question. In the first place, we have the word Nirvâna used in one passage of the Anugîtâ in the sense of the highest tranquillity, and there the simile of the extinction of the fire Is expressly adduced. On this it may be argued, that if the term Nirvâna had become the well-understood property of Buddhism, such a use of it as we find here would probably not have occurred. Again, we have the injunction that an ascetic must dwell in a town only for one day and no more, while he may, stay at one place during the rains. This is very similar to an injunction prescribed by the Buddhistic teachers also. But
1. It is impossible, therefore, to say that the Anugîtâ borrowed its doctrine from Buddhism. It is, of course, equally impossible on the other hand to say, that Buddhism borrowed its rule from the Anugîtâ. And, therefore, we can build no safe inference upon this fact either. We have next the very remarkable passage at chapter XXXIV, where various contradictory and mutually exclusive views of piety are stated, or rather passingly and briefly indicated--a passage which one most devoutly wishes had been clearer than it is. In that passage I can find no reference to Buddhism. True it is that Nîlakantha's commentary refers some of the doctrines there stated to Buddhistic schools 2. But that commentary, unsatisfactory enough in other places, is particularly unsatisfactory here. And its critical accuracy may be judged from its reference to Saugatas and Yogâkâras apparently as two distinct schools, whereas in truth the Saugatas are Buddhists, and Yogâkâras one of the four principal Buddhist sects. And it must be further remembered, that the interpretations of Nîlakantha, upon which his specifications of the different schools are based, are by no means such as necessarily claim acceptance. If then we d o not find any reference to Buddhism in this passage, that fact becomes certainly a remarkable one. Still, on the other hand, I am not prepared to apply the 'negative argument' here, and to say that inasmuch as Buddhism is not referred to where so many different opinions are referred to, Buddhism cannot have come into existence at the date of the Anugîtâ. It seems to me that the argument will here be a very hazardous one, because if the author of the Anugîtâ was, as we may assume he was, an orthodox Hindu, he might well have declined, although not unacquainted with Buddhism, to put into the mouths of the-seven sages even as a possible view, that
1. And let us first take the order of householders to which the Anugîtâ gives precedence over the others. One of the injunctions laid down by the Anugîtâ is that the householder should always be devoted to his wife. Against this simple precept, we have a very minute series of rules prescribed by Âpastamba, which it is not necessary to refer to specifically, but which may be seen in several of the Sûtras contained in the first Khanda of the first Patala of the Second Prasna. Compare again the excessive minuteness of the rules regarding the Bali-offering or the reception of guests, as given by Âpastamba, with the simple statement of the Anugîtâ that the five great sacrifices should be performed. There again, I think, we are to see in this difference of treatment the result of a pretty long course of ceremonial progress. Proceeding to the rules regarding the Brahmakârin or student, an analogous phenomenon meets us there. Taking first the subject of food, we have a considerable number of detailed injunctions in Âpastamba, compared with the simple rule of the Anugîtâ, that the student should, with the leave of his preceptor, eat his food without decrying it. Again with regard to alms, whereas the Anugîtâ simply
1. It appears that even before Âpastamba's time, distinctions had been laid down as to the description of girdle staff and cloth to be used by the different castes--distinctions of which there is no hint in the Anugîtâ, where all students, of whatever caste, are spoken of under the generic name. These distinctions appear to me to point very strongly to that ceremonial and doctrinal progress of which we have spoken above. The tendency is visible in them to sever the Brâhmanas from the other castes--by external marks. And that tendency, it seems to me, must have set in, as the merits which had given the Brâhmana caste its original position at the head of Hindu society were ceasing to be a living reality, and that caste was intrenching itself, so to say, more behind the worth and work of the early founders of its greatness, than the worth and work of their degenerating representatives. These comparisons, taken together, appear to me to warrant the proposition we have already laid down with regard to the priority of the Anugîtâ to Âpastamba. If we have not referred to the rules relating to the two other orders of forester and ascetic, it is because the scope for a comparison of those is very limited. Those rules alone would scarcely authorise the inference drawn above; but I can perceive nothing in them to countervail the effect of the comparisons already made. And it must be remembered, that the rules as to foresters and ascetics would be less apt to undergo change than chose as to students and householders.
It appears to me that the view we have now expressed may be also supported by a comparison of the doctrines of the Anugîtâ and Âpastamba touching the duties of Brâhmanas. According to Âpastamba, the occupations lawful
1. If all this has been correctly argued, the conclusion derivable from it is in entire accord with that which we have already drawn, namely, that the Bhagavadgîtâ, the Anugîtâ, and the Dharma-sûtra of Âpastamba, belong to different
1. Now it is reasonable to suppose, that the deities thus specified here must have been among those held in highest repute at the time, the whole significance of the passage where they are mentioned requiring that that should be so. But in our Pantheon as disclosed by our later literature, Mitra and Agni and Varuna occupy but a very subordinate position. Even in Kâlidâsa 2, the subordination of these deities to our celebrated Trinity seems to be quite
1, that the theory of Parasurâma being an incarnation of Vishnu, must have probably originated prior to the time of Bhartrihari, but later than the time of Kâlidâsa. The allusion to Parasurâma in the work before us does not, however, enable us to judge of its chronological position with reference to Kâlidâsa. But the last point discussed renders it unnecessary to consider this question further. It may be noted, by the way, that the Anugîtâ represents Parasurâma, although living in the Âsrama or hermitage of his father, who was a Rishi, as mounting a chariot for the purpose of sweeping away the kinsmen of Kârtavîrya. Whence he obtained a chariot in a hermitage, the Anugîtâ does not explain.
In connexion with the episode of Parasurâma, may be noted the list which occurs in the course of it, of the
1.
We come next to the enumeration of the principal mountains which is contained in one passage of the Anugîtâ. Those mountains are the Himâlaya, the Pâriyâtra, the Sahya, the Vindhya, the. Trikûtavat, the Sveta, the Nîla, the Bhâsa, the Koshthavat, the Mahendra, the Mâlyavat, and perhaps the Guruskandha. I am not sure whether the last name is intended to be taken as a proper name, or only as an epithet of Mahendra. Now compared with the mountains mentioned in the Bhagavadgîtâ, this is certainly a remarkable list. The Gîtâ mentions only Meru 2 and Himâlaya; while here we have in the Anugîtâ the Sahya,. and Malaya, and Trikûtavat, and Nîla (the same, I presume, with the modem Nîlgiri, the Sanatarium of the Madras Presidency), which take us far to the west and south of the Indian peninsula; and the Mahendra and Mâlyavat, which, coupled with the mention of the river Ganges, cover a considerable part of the eastern districts. The Pariyâtra and Vindhya occupy the regions of Central India. The Anugîtâ, therefore, seems to belong to that period in the history of India, when pretty nearly the whole,
1; he speaks of the dominions of the Pândya kings, and of the Kola and Kerala districts 2; he refers also to the large tanks of the south; and he makes allusions to linguistic usages current in the southern and other provinces 3. Before Patañgali's time there had taken place Mahendra's invasion of Ceylon, and the invading army must have penetrated through the southern provinces. And there had been also put up the great Inscriptions of Asoka, which have attracted so much interest, and are proving such prolific sources of information in various departments of knowledge. One of these inscriptions was at Gañgam, which is not very far from the Mahendra mountain alluded to in the Anugîtâ 4. All these facts support the conclusion drawn by General Cunningham from the correctness of the information given to Alexander the Great by the Hindus of his time, namely, that 'the Indians, even at that early date in their history, had a very accurate knowledge of the form and extent of their native land 5.' And not only do they support that conclusion, they show that the knowledge covered other facts regarding
1. It is, however, difficult to draw any definite chronological inference from this fact. There is further the reference to the attack of Râhu on the sun. It is difficult, in the present state of our knowledge, to say for certain, when the theory of eclipses there implied was prevalent. In the Khândogya-upanishad 2 we have the emancipated self compared to the moon escaped from the mouth of Râhu. And a text of the Rig-veda, quoted by Mr. Yagñesvara Sâstrin in his Âryavidyâsudhâkara 3, speaks of the demon Râhu attacking the sun with darkness. Here again we have another matter of some interest; but I cannot see that any safe deduction can be derived from it, without a more ample knowledge of other relevant matters than is at present accessible. Take again the references to certain practices which look very much like the practices of the Gainas of the present day. Is the Anugîtâ, then, earlier or later than the rise of the Gaina system? It is not safe, I think, to found an answer to this question upon the very narrow basis afforded by the
1. If this is so, the Anugîtâ must be a very ancient work indeed. It is not, however, necessary to further work out this line of argument, having regard to the opinions recently expressed by Mr. Thomas 2, rehabilitating the views enunciated long ago by Colebrooke and others. If those views are correct, and if Gainism was a dominant system in this country prior even to the time of Gautama Buddha, and if, further, we are right in the suggestion--for it is no more it must be remembered--that the Anugîtâ dates from a period prior to the rise of Gainism, then it would seem to follow that the Anugîtâ belongs to some period prior to the sixth century B.C. All this, however, is at present very hypothetical, and we draw attention to it only that the question may be hereafter considered when fuller materials for adjudicating upon it become accessible. Meanwhile, having regard to the views above alluded to as so elaborately put forward by Mr. Thomas, it is possible for us still to hold that, in the present state of our knowledge, the third or fourth century B.C. is not too early a date to, assign to the Anugîtâ, even on the assumption that the precepts contained in that work regarding the care to be taken of worms and insects were borrowed by it from the Gaina system. With this negative result, we must for the present rest contented.
One other fact of similar nature to those we have now
1. It is not possible, I conceive, to say finally whether one of these works borrowed these stanzas from the other of them; while, on the other hand, it is quite possible, as already argued by us in the Introduction to the Gîtâ, that all these works were only reproducing from some entirely different work, or that the stanzas in question were the common property of the thinkers of the time. We have no means available for deciding between these conflicting hypotheses.
We have thus noticed all the salient points in the evidence, external and internal, which is available for determining the position of the Anugîtâ in our ancient literature. Nobody who has seen even a little of the history of that literature will be surprised at the quantity or quality of that evidence, or the nature of the conclusions legitimately yielded by it. We have endeavoured to express those conclusions in language which should not indicate any greater certainty as attaching to them than can fairly be claimed for them. The net result appears to be this. The Anugîtâ may be taken with historical certainty to have been some centuries old in the time of the great Sankarâkârya. It was very probably older than the Dharma-sûtras of Âpastamba, but by what period of time we are not in a position at present to define. It was, perhaps, older also than the rise of Buddhism and Gainism, and of the Yoga philosophy; but on this it is impossible to say anything with any approach to confidence. It is, on the other hand, almost certain that it belongs to a period very considerably removed from the older Upanishads.; probably removed by a distance of some centuries, during which 'stories' not contained in the Upanishads had not only obtained currency, but also come to be regarded as belonging to antiquity 2. And yet the period to
1. In this respect, it may be said that the Anugîtâ seems rather to belong to an earlier stratum of thought than even the Sanatsugâtîya, in which a Gñânakânda, as forming a part of the Vedic canon, seems to be recognised 2. But it is abundantly clear, that the Anugîtâ stands, at a very considerable chronological distance from the Bhagavadgîtâ.
Such are the results of our investigation. We have not thought it necessary to discuss the verse or the language of the work. But it must in fairness be pointed out, that upon the whole, the verse and language are both pretty near the classical model. There are, it is true, a few instances of the metrical anomalies we have noticed elsewhere, but having regard to the extent of the work, those instances are far from being very numerous. The language and style, too, are not quite smooth and polished; though, judging from them alone, I should rather be inclined to place the Sanatsugâtîya prior to the Anugîtâ. But that suggests a question which we cannot now stop to discuss.
One word, in conclusion, about the translation. The text used has been chiefly that adopted in the commentary of Arguna Misra, a commentary which on the whole I prefer very much to that of Nîlakantha, which has been printed in the Bombay edition of the Mahâbhârata. Arguna Misra, as a rule, affords some explanation where explanation is wanted, and does not endeavour to suit his text to any foregone conclusion. His comments have been of the greatest possible help to me; and my only regret is that the only copy of his commentary which was available to me, and the use of which I owe to the kindness of my friend Professor Bhândârkar, was not as correct a one as could be desired. I have also looked into the Vishamaslokî, a short work containing notes on difficult passages of the Mahâbhârata.
Footnotes
201:1 In the beginning of his gloss on the Anugîtâ he says, that it proposes to explain difficult passages in the Anugîtâ, &c.--Anugâtâdishu. And at the outset of his gloss on the whole Parvan he says, that in the Anugîtâ we have a statement of the miseries of birth, &c. as a protest against worldly life; in the Brahma Gîtâ we have a recommendation of Prânâyâma, &c.; and in the Gurusishyasamvâda we have a eulogium on the perception of the self as distinct from Prakriti or nature, and incidentally a protest against Pravritti or action.
201:2 p. 21.
202:1 Pp. 15, 21. The latter corresponds to Sankara's quotation above referred to.
202:2 See p. 206 note.
203:1 P. 739, and cf. p. 176 with Vishnu XXX, 44 seq.
203:2 See II, 120.
204:1 See Preface, Sânkhya-sâra, p. 37.
204:2 P. 234.
205:1 In fact the Brâhmana is not identified with the Supreme Being afterwards. But that fact has not much bearing on the question here.
205:2 Cf. Wilson's Dasakumârakarita, Introd. p. 22.
205:3 The third alternative, that a work independently written was afterwards bodily thrown into the Mahâbhârata, is one which in the circumstances here seems to me improbable.
205:4 See also pp. 235, 252, 299.
206:1 See Sankara, Sârîraka Bhâshya, p. 726. That, however, may be a quotation from some other work, It may be noted that the passages quoted in the Bhâshya on Sanatsugâtîya I, 20 and I, 41 are not to be traced in our copies, though expressly stated there to have been taken from the Anugîtâ.
207:1 Cf. Sârîraka Bhâshya, p. 913.
208:1 Cf. Lalita Vistara, p. 17.
208:2 See pp. 325-365.
208:3 See Gîtâ, p. 126.
208:4 See Brihadâranyaka, p. 454, and Kaushîtaki, p. 68.
208:5 See Bühler's Âpastamba I, 1, 3, ix, Gautama II. 13, and Manu II, 179.
208:6 p. 21 seq.
208:7 p. 329.
209:1 p. 24 supra.
209:2 See note at p. 353.
211:1 This seems to be also the implication of the passage at p. 309, where the rules for final emancipation are alluded to.
212:1 They are also referred to in the Buddhistic Lalita Vistara, p. 65.
213:1 See Gautama, pp. lv and 191.
213:2 See also the gloss on chap. XXXIV, st. 14.
216:1 Cf. pp. 358. 360 infra with Âpastamba, pp. 9 seq., 103 seq., 114 seq.
217:1 Cf. also Bühler's Gautama, p. 175.
218:1 In Gautama X, 1-3, the 'pious duties' are called 'obligatory,' the others 'additional for Brâhmanas.' See the note on the passage in Bühler's edition, and c.f. Gautama VIII, 9, 10.
220:1 See p. 345.
220:2 See inter alia, Kumâra II, 20 seq., and VII, 44 seq., and cf. our Bhartrihâri (Bombay Sanskrit Classics), Introd. p. xix.
221:1 See 'Was the Râmâyana copied from Homer?' pp. 56, 51.
222:1 Haug's ed., p. 183. And see generally on these tribes, Wilson's Vishnu Purâna (Hall's ed.), vol. ii, p. 170 seq., and Sânti Parvan (Moksha), chap. 207, st. 42.
222:2 This is also mentioned in the Anugîtâ, but in a different passage. The Nîla is said by Professor Wilson to be a mountain in Orissa. But our suggestion has, I find, been already made by Dr. F. E. Hall also; see on this, and generally, Wilson's Vishnu Palrâna, vol. ii, p.141 seq. (ed. Hall). See also Indian Antiquary, VI, 133 seq.
223:1 Banâras ed., p. 74 (IV, 2, 2).
223:2 p. 60 (IV, I, 4). See also p. 65.
223:3 See Mahâbhâshya, p. 82 (I, 1, 5), p. 16 (I, 1, 1); and cf. Muir, Sanskrit Texts, Vol. ii, pp. 152, 355.
223:4 See Cunningham's Corpus Inscriptionum, I, p. 1.
223:5 See Ancient Geography of India, p. 3. And compare also the information collected in the Periplus of the Eurythryæan Sea (translated by Mr. McRindle), pp. 112-136, where a large number of ports is mentioned as existing on the Indian coasts. The Periplus seems to date from about 90 A. D. (see ibid. p. 5).
224:1 And see, too, Kâlidâsa Kumâra V, st. 84.
224:2 p. 622.
224:3 p. 26. In Kâlidâsa's Raghuvamsa the true explanation of eclipses is alluded to. See Canto XIV, 40.
225:1 As the Buddhists did in sundry instances, Cf. inter alia Bühler's Gautama, pp. lv and 191. And cf. also 'Was the Râmâyana copied from Homer?' pp. 48,49.
225:2 See Mr. Thomas's very elaborate discussion of the whole subject in the journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (New Series), vol. ix, p. 156 seq.
226:1 Cf.. Anugîtâ I, 36 with Yâska (ed. Roth), p. 190.
226:2 Some of the Purâtana. Itihâsas, e. g. that of Nârada and Devamata, are not traceable in any Vedic work known to us. Devamata's name I do not find referred to anywhere else.
227:1 See p. 211 supra.
227:2 See p. 146 supra. The Buddhists seem to have borrowed the division of Karma and Gñânakhândas. See Dr. Ragendralâla Mitra's Lalita Vistara (transl.), p. 21. The division, therefore. was probably older than the first century B.C.
