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The Great Epic of India: Its Character and Origin c6: Chapter Three. Epic Philosophy

The Great Epic of India: Its Character and Origin c6

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English

Contents

Chapter Three. Epic Philosophy

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Sukhād bahutaraṃ duḥkhaṃ jīvite nā 'tra saṃcayaḥ, xii, 331, 16. "There is no doubt that there is more sorrow than joy in life."

Epic Systems

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IN the preceding chapters I have shown that from a synthetic point of view the epic as we have it, judged solely by the literature it recognizes, must be the product of a comparatively late period. In this chapter it is my purpose to sketch as briefly as possible the salient features of the great systems of philosophy expounded in the later epic. To regard them as identical is impossible. To see in them a philosophic chaos, out of which are to arise future systems, is equally impossible. Some of them belong to the latest epic and they have their unity only in the fact that they are all colored by the dominant deistic view of an age that, having passed from pure idealism into dualism, sought to identify the spirit of man with that of a personal God and equate this god with the two separate factors of dualism; a dualism which was not that of spirit and matter of conditioned being, conscious intelligence, as opposed to pure being or spirit (soul), conscious intelligence being itself the only origin of matter, which is merely a form of mind.¹

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¹ See on this point some pertinent remarks by Dr. Everett in the twentieth volume of the Journal of the AOS., p. 309. It is a common error to speak of Sāṃkhya dualism as setting spirit and matter in antithesis, whereas, according to the system, matter is only a development of self-consciousness.

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The importance of a review of this sort lies in the historical background it furnishes to the epic, which represents the last of six approved systems traceable in it: (1) Vedism or orthodox Brahmanism; (2) ātmanism or Brahmaism (properly Brahmanism, but this term connotes a different idea), that is, an idealistic interpretation of life; (3) Sāṃkhya, the dualism spoken of above; (4) Yoga, the deistic interpretation of Sāṃkhya; (5) Bhāgavata or Pāçupata, different but both sectarian interpretations of Yoga; (6) Vedānta or Illusion-idealism. Some of the epic writers support Sāṃkhya; some, Yoga; some, the sectarian interpretation; some, the Māyā, Illusion-theory. Besides these are approved sporadically Vedism and Brahmanism, not to speak of a number of theories not approved.

Heretics

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In the Gītā it is said, 4, 40: “The ignorant and unbelieving man who has a soul of doubt is destroyed; *neither this world nor the next exists*,¹ nor happiness, for him who has a soul of doubt.” The italicized words are those which, at xii, 133, 14, are put into the mouth of the Nāstika, the negator or repudiator of scripture, spirit, or duties. According to epic interpretation, one saying nāsti, in refusing a gift to a priest, is a “negator” no less than he who refuses assent to the orthodox belief. But ordinarily Nāstika is used in the latter sense and connotes a dissenter from received opinion in regard either to the existence of transcendental things or to the authority of hallowed tradition.² Such an unbeliever is threatened with a sudden enlightenment hereafter: “If your opinion is that this world does not exist and that there is no world beyond, the devils in hell will soon change your ideas on that subject.”³ Any number of these unbelievers is known, who deny everything there is to deny. In ii, 31, 70, an unbelieving or heretic king is mentioned among those who pay tribute (in conjunction with a tributary “city of the Greeks”); while in iii, 191, 10, it is said that in the golden age to come there will be “people of truth,” where previously had been established the schools of heretics;

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from which it may be inferred perhaps that Buddhists or Jains are meant, as irreligious heretics would not have religious orders.¹ The Lokāyata or Lokāyatika (doubtful in i, 70, 46) is perhaps less a Buddhist (like Cārvāka, who appears only as a pretended Brahman Parivraj, or priestly mendicant, and friend of the foe) than a devotee of natural science, as Professor Rhys Davids maintains. The doubter’s scriptures are not, however, referred to Bṛhaspati. The code of this ill-reputed sage, whom we have seen as a law-giver, is often enough alluded to, generally in connection with that of Uçanas. The worst that is said of Bṛhaspati’s teaching is that it is drawn from a study of the female intellect, which is full of subtlety and deceit. But he is here only one of many authors of Arthaçāstras, xiii, 39, 10. As a teacher he is extolled.² Materialists and other heretics without special designation appear to fill the whole land. Thus in xii, 19, 23, are mentioned rationalistic Pundits, hetumantaḥ, hard to convince, who are by nature befogged and stubborn, and deny the existence (of a soul). These are opposed to those good men who are “devoted to ceremonies and know the Pūrvaçāstra” (mīmānsā?). “These fools,” it is added, “are despisers of immortality and talkers in assemblies of people; they wander over the whole earth, being fond of speaking and learned in revelation.”³ Others are cited to illustrate the unbelief that consists in a denial of the soul’s unity, ekāntavyudāsa.

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These believe in a soul possessed of desire and hate. An apparent allusion to Jains may be found in the description of the priest who “tramped around Benares astounding the people, clothed in air, clothed like a madman;”¹ but we must be careful not to identify the characters of the epic too quickly with special names. This madman priest, for example, would seem to be rather a Çivaite Brahman than a Jain, and digvāsas is applied to Vidura in his last state and to Nala in his distress.² In the same way, the brown and yellow robe does not necessarily refer to a Buddhist, any more than does the statement that one goes to heaven who builds a Vihāra, xiii, 23, 99; for these terms are common property. “What makes you so glorious?” asks one woman of another, who replies: “I did not wear the yellow robe, nor bark-garments, nor go shorn or with matted hair,” xiii, 123, 8. Here quite possibly Buddhists may be referred to; but when I read that Çiva’s devotees are of two sorts, householders, and those “whose sign is tonsure and the yellow robe,” māuṇḍyaṃ kaṣāyaç ca, xiii, 142, 22; and see that the yellow robe is also worn as a sign of grief, Nala, 24, 9; R. vi. 125, 34, and that “the wearer of the yellow robe” is excluded from Çrāddha, xiii, 91, 43, I am by no means sure that even in the most tempting passage this robe indicates a Buddhist, unless, indeed, for some of these passages we may assume that Çivaite and Buddhist were already confused.

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But xii, 18, 32, “those who cast off the Vedas and wander about as beggars shaved and wearing the yellow robe,” refers distinctly to Buddhists, as I opine. Similarly, the remark “they that are budhas, enlightened, are devoted to Nirvāṇa,” xii, 167, 46, may be put beside the buddhas of xii, 160, 33, who “have no fear of return to this world and no dread of another;” but in the latter section, and in many others, “enlightened,” budha and buddha, refers to Brahmans; and Nirvāṇa in epic teleology usually means bliss, for example the bliss of drinking when one is thirsty, or the bliss of heaven.³ In short, we see here and in a passage cited further on, that Buddhists are sometimes referred to, but we must not call every beggar a Buddhist. The late passage xiv, 49, 3–12, shows that when the Anugītā was written, probably not before our era, these infidels were fairly rampant. The list of them is quite appalling and we may perhaps believe that the “believer in nothing” is a Buddhist and the “shaven and naked” mentioned in the same place is a Jain; while the svabhāvam bhūtacintakāḥ are perhaps materialists. The “course of right is varied” and the view of the author is here that of tolerance. Some of these philosophers deny a hereafter, some doubt all things, some hold the vyāmiçra doctrine of revolution (often mistranslated as evolution) of the universe, and according to the commentator some are adherents of the atomistic theory, bahutvam.

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Contests of these hetuvādins, rationalists, are not discountenanced, but enjoyed as a philosophic treat at the king's court or at a great sacrifice, as in xiv, 85, 27, where “talkative philosophers, eager to outdo each other, discussed many rationalistic arguments.”

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¹ nā 'yaṃ loko 'sti na paro na sukhaṃ saṃçayātmanaḥ. Compare Kaṭha Up., ii, 6, ayam loko nāsti para-iti mānī, punaḥ punar vaçam āpadyate me (Yama).

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² Neglect of Vedic ordinances or denial of Veda is nāstikya, par excellence, according to xii, 270, 67, and xii, 12, 5 (the latter): vedavādāpaviddhāns tu tān viddhi bhṛçanāstikān (also anāstika, ib. 4), for “rejecting the Veda a priest cannot attain heaven,” ib.

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³ Literally, will “make you remember;” yad idam manyase, rājan, nā 'yam asti kutaḥ paraḥ, pratismārayitāras tvāṃ Yamadūtā Yamakṣaye, xii, 150, 19.

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¹ āçramāḥ sahapāṣaṇḍāḥ sthitāḥ satyajanāḥ prajāḥ (bhaviṣyanti).

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² xii, 325, 23. His teaching in xiii, 113, is Buddhistic (5 = Dh. P. 132, and 7 is like Dh. P. 420). On Lokāyata, see Davids, p. 169 of op. cit. above, p. 55.

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³ vāvadūkā bahuçrutāḥ. The denial in nāi ’tad asti must from the context refer to the existence of the soul. For anṛtasyā ’vamantāraḥ in B. must, I think, be read amṛtasya.

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¹ caṅkramīti diçaḥ sarvā digvāsā mohayan prajāḥ . . . unmattaveṣam bibhrat sa caṅkramīti yathāsukhaṃ Vārāṇasyām, xiv, 6, 18, and 22; compare 5, 6.

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² To the author of Das Mbh. als Epos, etc., digvāsas necessarily implies digambara (as Jain), p. 224.

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³ In the epic, nirvāṇa is used in both of its later senses, bliss and extinction, brahmanirvāṇa, bliss of Brahman, like the nirvāṇa, bliss, attained by

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With all this liberality there is often no quarter given to the heretic, especially the Pāṣaṇḍa,¹ who appears to be preeminently a despiser of the Vedas. The reason is the natural one that he who despises the priest's authority naturally despises the priest. “The reason why I was born a jackal,” says a character in xii, 180, 47–48, “is that I was a Punditkin, paṇḍitaka, who was a rationalist, hāituka, and blamer of the Vedas, being devoted to logic and the useless science of reasoning (a telling phrase, repeated in xiii, 37, 12–14), a proclaimer of logical arguments, a talker in assemblies, a reviler and opposer of priests in arguments about Brahman, an unbeliever, a doubter of all, who thought myself a Pundit.”² The Pāṣaṇḍa drinking. On this subject much that is misleading has lately been published, owing to a false historical point of view. But the goal of extinction is also lauded. Thus, in xii, 242, 11–12, one attains to that where going he “grieves not, dies not, is not born, nor reborn, and exists not,” na vartate.

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¹ v. l. in xii, 218, 4; xiii, 23, 67 (other references in PW.); apparently a foreign or dialectic word; especially Buddhists, according to N.

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² ākroṣṭā cā ’bhivaktā ca brahmavākyeṣu ca dvijān . . . mūrkhah paṇḍi-

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and reviler of the Vedas are closely associated, as in xiii, 23, 67, and 72, and like those who here "sell or write down the Vedas," they go to hell. In short, any denial is usually permitted save the denial of the Vedas. The more surprising is it that elsewhere (see below) the Vedas are openly repudiated; but this is only one of the inconsistencies with which the epic teems.

Authority

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What then was authoritative? Characteristic of the contradictory views presented in the epic is the fact that in one place the very authority, pramāṇam, which is insisted upon as the only valid authority, is in another rejected as altogether delusive, and this not by heretics, but by the authors of the respective essays whose combined publications issued in one volume form the pot-pourri of the complete epic.

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The reason for this is obvious. Several forms of religion are advocated in the epic and each has its own test. Oldest and most widely represented is the biblical test. Over and over again we are assured that scripture is authoritative and those who will not accept scripture as the pramāṇam or teststone of philosophy are damned. But beside these vigorous expressions of orthodoxy stands the new faith, which discards altogether the old scripture as an authority. For sacrifices and rites the Vedas are well enough; they are there authoritative. If one wishes to perform rites one must naturally go to the ritual. Such śāstraprāmāṇya and vedaprāmāṇya rules,¹ admitting the necessity of rites at all, remain valid, simply because there are no others. But in all higher matters, as for one who sees no use in rites, the scriptures are but a mass of contradictions.²

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¹ xiii, 84, 20, and 37.

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² One of the minor epic contradictions is that referred to above, p. 46, in regard to the "two brahmans." The orthodox, but not too liberal man, says:

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tamānikaḥ (hence reborn, as a kroṣṭar). Compare Kaṭha Up. ii, 5, svayamdhīrāḥ paṇḍitamanyamānāḥ; Muṇḍ. Up. i, 2, 8; Māitr. Up. vii, 9. The passage in Anuśāsana cited above is a repetition of all these epithets in characteristically free form. Compare, e. g., ҫl. 13, ākroṣṭā cā 'tivaktā ca brāhmaṇānām sadāi 'va hi (here paṇḍitamānī).

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The old view is best represented in the saying that Veda, Dharmaçāstras, and ācāra, custom, are the recognized authorities in every matter, as in iii, 207, 83; xiii, 84, 20, and 37. The confused rule of the Veda is referred to in xii, 19, 1–2: “I know the highest and other Çastras and the double injunction of the Veda, ‘Do acts and abandon them.’” “Untrue, according to casuistic reasoning, is the word of the Veda — but why should the Veda speak untruth?” says Vyāsa, xiii, 120, 9, when inculcating the late notion that a small gift is as efficient as a great sacrifice in procuring salvation, a theory that is certainly untrue in the light of the Veda. “Logic has no basis, the scriptures are divided; there is not one seer whose opinion is authoritative,” pramāṇam. “The truth about right is hidden in a cave; the only path is that pursued by the majority,” iii, 313, 117.¹ “Deceitful is the Veda,” it is said in xii, 329, 6. Both scripture and argument, tarka, are useless in comparison with the enlightening grace of God, which alone can illuminate the “mysterious hidden communication of truth,” xii, 335, 5. Such holy mysteries must, indeed, be kept from those who are “burned with books of philosophy,” tarkaçāstradagdha, xii, 247, 18.

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¹ mahājana, if this be the meaning here; apparently only usage is meant: mahājano yena gataḥ sa panthāḥ.

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In the matter of the Veda, the new faith discounts its value by setting beside it the recent books of later cult, exactly as modern sects take as authoritative their own scriptures. Bhīṣma’s words, being inspired by Krishna, are “as authoritative as the words of the Veda,” vedapravāda iva (pramāṇam), xii, 54, 29–30, and Veda, Purāṇa, and Itihāsa are all reckoned as authoritative in xii, 343, 20. But the Gītā is the only authority of the Bhāgavatas, Gītā, 16, 24. Compare also the tirade in xiii, 163, 2–9: “Immediate perception or biblical authority, āgama, what is convincing proof, kāraṇa,

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dve brahmaṇī veditavye çabdabrahma paraṃ ca yat, çabdabrahmaṇi niṣṇātaḥ paraṃ brahmā ’dhigacchati, xii, 233, 30, “when one is thoroughly conversant with the Veda he attains to Brahman;” but the devotee “even by desire of wisdom surpasses the Veda,” api jijñāsamāno ’pi çabdabrahma ’tivartate, ib. 237, 8.

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in these? Answer: “There is many a text to increase doubt. Rationalists say that perception is the only proof. They are children who think themselves wise and believe only in denial, nā ’sti. Recourse to ‘cause’ amounts to nothing.” But though philosophy is really interwoven with religion, we may leave for the present the Bhāgavatas and Çivaites to their religion which is “freed from philosophy,” xiii, 14, 198, and consists in identifying the All-god with their special gods (viii, 33, 51 “one God of various forms”), to consider the more strictly philosophic view of authority.

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Only one view is held by the real philosopher: “Through inference we learn the truth.”¹ Traditional wisdom, āmnāya, as was shown above, is not always recognized, though it is generally admitted. “In āmnāya are established the Vedas; from āmnāya come the Vedas.² . . . Universal opinion says that an āmnāya-declaration is truth, and there is no authority at all, çāstratā, when that which is not authoritative is allowed to stand against the recognized authority of the Vedas,” xii, 269, 33; 261, 9–10. Thus “inference together with scripture,” anumāna and çruta, are the two most substantial tests of truth, xii, 205, 19 and 210, 23, hetvāgama; for “all that is Vedic is the word of God,” xii, 269, 10.³

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¹ anumānād vijānīmaḥ puruṣam, xiv, 48, 6; xii, 206, 23.

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² The commentator becomes confused, and rendering āmnāya by Veda renders vedāḥ by smṛtayaḥ!

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³ sarvam ārṣam vyāhṛtam viditātmanaḥ (= parameçvarasya). The commentator cites Bṛh. Up. ii, 4, 10, niḥçvasitam, in support of plenary inspiration as here inculcated.

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The third authority is the one scorned above, perception, pratyakṣa (xiv, 28, 18, pratyakṣataḥ sādhayāmaḥ, and often, as cited below in the course of this chapter). In the mystic religion of the Yogin this pratyakṣa becomes the intuitive insight of the seer and is the only test of truth, answering to “second sight.”⁴ The Harivaṃça inveighs against the “doubters and curious speculators” who accept any authority save faith, 3, 4, 8 ff.

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⁴ The curious result is thus reached that the crassest materialist and most exalted mystic reject all proofs save pratyakṣa. Only one means by “autopsy” (physical) perception and the other means insight.

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Besides these three, to wit, biblical authority, inference, and direct observation, the fourth “proof by analogy” may be implied in the late conversation of Drāupadī, where, after a passing reference to the ārṣam pramāṇam and pratyakṣa, is added “and thy own birth is the proof by analogy,” upamānam, iii, 31, 11–33. Elsewhere the epic stands philosophically on the Sāṃkhy-yoga basis of three reliable proofs only.

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This result is fully borne out by the terminology. The Vedānta philosophy of the epic is not called by that name. Nyāya may possibly be known, but it is doubtful whether the word ever refers to the system, or the system, except perhaps in one or two late passages, is ever recognized. A brief survey of the facts will make this clearer.

Vedānta

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If the philosophical system were known as such the use of the name would occur as such. But Vedānta seems everywhere to mean Upanishads or what is the same thing, Āraṇyakas.¹ No Vedānta system is alluded to, Vedānta may refer to Sāṃkhya in xii, 196, 7 (where it takes the place of the latter in antithesis to Yoga, as the commentator thinks), but the word more naturally means the teaching of the Upanishads, as usual.² The passages cited above in the chapter on literature exhibit the characteristic usage. Thus in Gītā 15, 15, vedāntakṛd vedavid eva cā’ ham, where Telang rightly takes the reference to be to the Āraṇyakas. So in viii, 90, 114, vedāntavabhṛthaplutaḥ, where Karṇa appeals to Arjuna to observe the law of fighting, since the latter knows the law of fighting and is thoroughly acquainted with the holy scriptures, i. e., he is a moral man (not a Vedānta philosopher). So in ii, 53, 1, kings who are declarers of all the Vedas and versed in the Vedānta, paryāptavidyā vaktāro vedāntāvabhṛthăplutāḥ. Durgā is Sāvitrī, vedamātā tathā vedānta ucyate, “mother of the Vedas and famed (not in philosophy but) in the Upanishads,” vi, 23, 12. A Gandharva is “wise in the knowledge of Vedānta,” xii, 319, 27, and asks questions about Veda and logic, which are answered in Sāṃkhya terms (vedya is puruṣa, for example). The priest who at xii, 349, 56 is said to transmit the knowledge of the Gītā, knows the Jyeṣṭha Sāman and the Vedānta; and he who knows the names of Vishnu is Vedānta-learned, xiii, 149, 123. Again in xiv, 13, 15: “Whoso would kill me (Kāma) by vedāir vedāntāsādhanāiḥ, power derived from the mysteries of the Veda.” I know in fact only two passages where, perhaps, Vedānta might be fairly taken as referring to the philosophy. One of these is in a triṣṭubh verse which has been interpolated (out of all syntactical connection) in xiii, 69, 20, and even here, late as is the verse, it is perhaps more probable that the word is to be taken in its usual sense.¹ The other is found at xii, 302, 71, where the “island of Vedānta” is a refuge to the saints. The “Secret of the Vedānta” cited below is clearly “Upanishads.” The Brahma Sūtra I have spoken of above, p. 16.

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¹ So, for example, in yad uktaṃ vedavādeṣu gahanaṃ vedadarçibhiḥ, tadanteṣu yathā yuktaṃ krama(karma)yogena lakṣyate, xii, 233, 28 (= tad uktaṃ vedavādeṣu . . . vedānteṣu punar vyaktam, 239, 11), a mystery (viz., gambhīraṃ gahanam brahma, 224, 48).

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² sāmkhyayogāu tu yāv uktāu munibhir mokṣadarçibhiḥ, sannyāsa eva vedānte vartate japanam prati, vedavādāç ca nirvṛttāḥ çāntā brahmany avasthitāḥ, three hemistichs, of which the first is repeated in the next çloka, where alone it seems to belong. Conversely, in Gītā 18, 13, the word Sāmkhya is taken by the commentator to mean Vedānta, because here we have a grouping of five karmahetavaḥ not recognized in Sāmkhya. It may be said once for all that the commentator is often useless in philosophical sections, as he wishes to convert Sāmkhya into Vedānta on all occasions.

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¹ vedāntaniṣṭhasya bahuçrutasya, supposed to be governed by vṛttim (dvijāyā) ’tisṛjeta (tasmāi) in the next stanza!

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Mīmānsā does not occur as the name of a philosophical system. I have referred to the Pūrvaçāstravids above, but the word is obviously too general to make much of, though it is used as if it applied to the Pūrva-mīmānsā, for the Pūrvaçāstravidaḥ are here, xii, 19, 22, kriyāsu nirataṃ nityaṃ dāne yajñe ca karmaṇi. This implication is not absolutely necessary, however. The old name for the system, Nyāya, does not seem to be used in the sense of Pūrvamīmānsā.

Nyāya

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The argumentative group of five, explained according to the padārtha in xii, 321, 80 ff., consists of sāukṣmya, sāmkhyakramāu, nirṇaya, and prayojana, which recall, especially in the definition of the last, the corresponding section in the formal Nyāya. The epic gives the following definitions:

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1. Sāukṣmya, subtilty, is where knowledge, in respect to objects of knowledge which are divided, comes from distinction and the intellect rests (on this distinction).

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2. Sāmkhya or saṃkhyā, reckoning, is reckoning the value of weak and valid points and arriving at some conclusion.

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3. Krama, order: when it is decided which should be said first and which last, they call that kramayoga, the application of proper sequence in an argument.

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4. Nirṇaya, ascertainment, is a conclusion that the case is so and so, in cases of duty, desire, gain, emancipation, after recognizing them according to their differences.

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5. Prayojana, motive: where inclination is produced by ills arising from desire or dislike and a certain conduct is followed, that is motive.

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As has been remarked by Mr. K. Mohan Ganguli in his translation, this final definition of prayojana is almost identical with that given by Gāutama i, 24, yam artham adhikṛtya pravartate tat prayojanam: “If one sets an object before one’s self and acts accordingly, that is motive.” So the epic, prakarṣo yatra jāyate, tatra yā vṛttis tat prayojanam, as rendered above. Similarly, the epic definition of nirṇaya is like that of Gāutama in i, 40: “The conclusion reached after hearing what can be said for and against (on both sides) after doubting.” The other members of Gāutama’s syllogism, i, 32, seem to have no connection with the above. The speech to be delivered, it is declared in this passage of the epic, must be nyāyavṛttam (as well as reasonable, not casuistical, etc., sixteen attributes in all).¹

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¹ No explanation is given of the eighteen merits with which the speaker begins. The sixteen attributes may be compared (numerically) with the sixteen categories of the Nyāya.

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We may compare further in the late list of Pundits at i, 70, 42, those with nyāyatattvāmavijñāna, possibly “versed in psychology according to the Nyāya-tattva;” and i, 1, 67, nyāyaçikṣā, Nyāya-system, opposed to Vedādhyātma but also to cikitsā, etc. Also xii, 19, 18, referred to above, p. 87: “Some, rejecting unity, attribute to the ātman desire and dislike,” a Nyāya view. Finally, in xii, 210, 22, nyāyatantrāny anekāni (declared by various people), “systems of logic,” is typical of all remaining cases. Nyāya, then, usually means logic, but occasionally, in the pseudo-epic, the special Logic-system known to us as Nyāya.¹

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¹ For the ordinary use, compare tāis tāir nyāyāiḥ, such arguments, passim. All speculation is Tarka. Compare the remarkable statement, xii, 15, 26: “There are minute creatures whose existence can be argued by tarka (so small that) an eyelid’s fall would be the death of a number of them.”

Vāiçeṣika

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This word is used as an adjective, of guṇas, etc., in the sense of excellent; but the system is unknown in the main epic though it is referred to in the passage cited above, in i, 70, 43–44, and also in ii, 5, 5 (vākya) pañcāvayavayukta, another proof of the lateness of the Kaccit section,² whether the five avayavas here mentioned be terms implying Nyāya or Vāiçeṣika. Kaṇāda’s name appears first in the Harivañça (see below, p. 98, and above, p. 89).

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² The former passage, after mentioning those endowed with nyāyatattvāmavijñāna adds nānāvākyasamāhārasamavāyavicāradāiḥ, viçeṣakāryavidbhiḥ ca . . . sthāpanākṣepasiddhāntaparamārthajñatāṃ gatāiḥ . . . kāryakāraṇavedibhiḥ, which may refer to either system. The passages have been cited by the author of Das Mahābhārata als Epos, etc., p. 226, who admits that the five “avayas,” as he call them twice, imply the Vāiçeṣika system.

The Four Philosophies

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In xii, 350, 64 ff. (compare 350, 1, pracaranti) it is said that there are four current philosophies, jñānāni, the Sāmkhyayoga, Pāñcarātra, Vedāraṇyaka (or Vedāh), and Pāçupata. Kapila declared the Sāmkhya; Hiraṇyagarbha, the Yoga;¹ Apāntaratamas is called the Teacher of the Vedas (“termed by some Prācīnagarbha”); Çiva declared the Pāçupata religion; Vishnu, the whole Pāñcarātra. “In all these philosophies Vishnu is the niṣṭhā, or chief thing.”²

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¹ See the note on this verse just below. As Yoga-teacher of Dāityas, Çukra is mentioned, i, 66, 43. Both Vishnu and Çiva are credited with being Yoga-lords (loc. cit. by Holtzmann, Das Mbh. im Osten und Westen, p. 110).

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² In the Vāsudeva religious philosophy of Krishnaism, as expounded in xii, 345, 7 ff., some people, after death, become paramāṇubhūtas, very fine sprites, and enter Aniruddha; then as manobhūtas, or mental entities, they enter Pradyumna; thence they go to Jīva (Saṃkarṣaṇa). Such people are “the best priests and Sāṃkhyas and Bhāgavatas.” Finally, devoid of all unspiritual constituents, trāiguṇyahīna, they enter Paramātman (Kṣetrajña, nirguṇātmaka), or Vāsudeva. These are the four forms of God. The name of God is immaterial. Rudra and Vishnu are one being, sattvam ekam, divided in two, xii, 342, 27 (they are synonyms like bṛhad brahma and mahat, 337. 2, paryāyavācākāḥ çabdāḥ; Vishnu may be called Çiva and Brahman may be called Intellect).

Kapila and his System

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Although it is said, as quoted above, that there is no seer whose authority is authoritative, this is merely a teaching of temporary despair. Kapila is authoritative in all philosophical matters and his name covers every sort of doctrine. He is in fact the only founder of a philosophical system known to the epic. Other names of founders are either those of mere gods or disciples of Kapila. Bādarāyaṇa and Patañjali³ are unknown even as names, and Jāimini and Gāutama appear only as sages, not as leaders of speculation. Çāṇḍilya (otherwise said to be known in the epic) is respectfully cited on Yoga, not as founder but as recommending Yoga concentration.⁴ As a teacher of unconditioned Brahman, Ātreya is lauded in xiii, 137, 3; and in xii, 319, 59, a list of teachers of the twenty-fifth (spiritual) principle is given as having instructed the Gandharva Viçvāvasu: Jāigīṣavya, Asita Devala, Parāçara, Vārṣagaṇya, Bhṛgu, Pañcaçikha, Kapila, Çuka, Gāutama, Ārṣiṣeṇa, Garga, Nārada, Āsuri, Pulastya, Sanatkumāra, Çukra, Kaçyapa, seventeen mixed gods, saints, and philosophers, of whom two are important besides Kapila, namely Āsuri and Pañcaçikha, his pupils; while one system (explained below) is referred also to Asita Devala.

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³ In the Sarvadarçanasaṃgraha it is said that Patañjali made (atha yogānuçāsanam, i, 1) an anuçāsana, or secondary collection (as anu is explained) based on earlier Puranic materials. The verse attributed in this connection to the Yājñavalkya Smṛti (158, 17; p. 239 of Cowell’s translation) has caused the Petersburg Lexicon to postulate, s. v., another Smṛti of the same name. I think it is a mere lapsus for Vyāsa’s Smṛti, for the verse cited (“Hiraṇyagarbha, and no other ancient, is the declarer of Yoga”) occurs xii, 350, 65. It has occurred to me that this verse might imply Patañjali, and the “no other” be a distinct refutation of his claim, the epic preferring divine authority; but this is perhaps too pregnant.

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⁴ pṛthagbhūteṣu sṛṣṭeṣu caturthāçramakarmasu samādhāu yogam evāi’tac (maduktam vākyam) chāṇḍilyaḥ çamam abravīt, xii, 254, 14.

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There seems to be no reason to doubt that Kapila was a real (human) philosopher, and not a mere shadow of a divinity. The fact that his name is also given to divinities proves the opposite as little as does his deification, for it is customary to deify sages and for divinities to have sages' names. A perfect parallel to the use of Kapila in this way is afforded by Kaṇāda, which, as far as I know, occurs first as an epithet of Çiva as supreme god, in the Harivaṃça 3, 85, 15–16:

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yam āhur agryam puruṣam mahāntam
purātanaṃ sāṃkhyanibaddhadṛṣṭayaḥ
yasyā 'pi devasya guṇān samagrāṅs
tattvāṅc caturviṃçatim āhur eke
yam āhur ekam puruṣam purātanaṃ
Kaṇāda-nāmānam ajam maheçvaram
dakṣasya yajñam vinihatya yo vāi
vināçya devān asurān sanātanaḥ

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Kapila's treatise is repeatedly declared to be oldest, but he is not only the oldest, he is the supreme seer, identical with Agni, with Çiva also, and with Vishnu. He is said to have got his wisdom from Çiva.¹

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¹ "Of the treatises declared by metaphysicians that by Kapila is the earliest," xii, 351, 6; agniḥ sa Kapilo nāma, sāṃkhyayogapravartakaḥ, iii, 221, 21. Hall gives a later v. l., sāṃkhyaçāstrapravartakaḥ, Sāṃkhyasāra, p. 18, where most of the epic allusions are collected. As supreme seer, xii, 350, 65; Çiva, xii, 285, 114, where the commentator interprets Sāṃkhya as Vedānta (as often); xiii, 17, 98, and xiii, 14, 323, Çiva as kapila. Kapila is identified with Vishnu in iii, 47, 18; Gītā, 10, 26, etc.; with Prajāpati in xii, 218, 9–10, where

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I have noticed only one passage, xii, 269, 9, where Kapila is presented in the light of adverse criticism from the point of view of orthodox Brahmanism. On seeing a cow led out for sacrifice, Kapila, filled with compassion, cried out O ye Vedas! an exclamation of reproof against the Vedas, as inculcating cruelty to animals. At this he was attacked by the inspired cow with a long discourse, challenging him to show why the Vedas should be regarded as authoritative in any regard, if not in regard to the slaughter of animals.

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Kapila appears in this tale as a teacher of unorthodox non-injury and maintains to the end (so that his view is presented as really correct) that not the sacrifice of animals but the "sacrifice (worship) of knowledge" is the best. Elsewhere also we find the same antithesis between the old orthodoxy and the new science of thought, which not only disregards Vedic ceremonies but condemns them (xiv, 28, 7 ff.).

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The best evidence of the authority of Kapila is given not by express statement but by implication in the praise of other systems, which, an important point, are by the same implication looked upon as distinct from that of Kapila, although his name is used to uphold them. Thus Kapila’s own system is called generally the Sāṁkhyayoga, or specifically the Kāpilam.¹ The Sāṁkhyayogins are said to be the models even in teaching of other tendency, as in xii, 347, 22, and nothing better can be said of the Bhāgavatas, here extolled, than that their system is "equal to the Sāṁkhyayoga," not, be it

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¹ "He learned the whole Yoga-çāstram and the Kāpilam," xii, 326, 4; Viriñca iti yat proktam Kāpilam jñānacintakāiḥ sa Prajāpatis evā 'ham, xii, 343, 94 (Kapila, 95). Also Sāṁkhya kṛtānta, Gītā, 18, 13.

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he is called the supreme seer, incorporate in Pañcaçikha (the first pupil of Āsuri, who in turn was a pupil of Kapila). In xii, 337, 8, Kapila is Çālihotra-pitā smṛtaḥ, father of Çālihotra, the veterinary sage (above, p. 12). Kapilaḥ prāha : prītaç ca Bhagavān jñānaṁ dadau mama bhavāntakam, xiii, 18, 4. The Harivaṅça, 3, 14, 4, and 20, speaks of Kapila as the "teacher of Yoga, the teacher of Sāṁkhya, full of wisdom, clothed in Brahman, the lord of ascetics." Compare the supreme spirit as Kapila, xii, 340, 68.

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observed, the same, but as good as the system of Kapila.¹ Amid a list of heroes in xiii, 75, 24–25, we find placed beside battle-heroes, gift-heroes, moral-heroes, etc., only Sāmkhya and Yoga heroes, enrolled to represent philosophy.² As between the two, the implication contained in the words at Gītā 5, 5, “the Yoga gets as good a place as the Sāmkhya,” is that it is the Sāmkhya which is the norm. Sāmkhya is cited alone as the one system of salvation in i, 75, 7: “Salvation he studied, the unequalled system of Sāmkhya.” In contrast with Veda and Vedāṅga, it is the one type of philosophy: “He became learned in the Atharva Veda and the Veda, in the ritual also, and a past-master in astronomy, taking the greatest pleasure in Sāmkhya,” xiii, 10, 37; “Vedas, Aṅgas, Sāmkhya, and Purāṇa,” xiii, 22, 12.

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¹ Sāmkhyayogena tulyo hi dharma ekāntasevitaḥ, xii, 349, 74.

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² So in viii, 33, 49, Yoga and Sāmkhya (ātmanaḥ) represent philosophy.

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The two systems are often separated. Yogapradarçinaḥ stands parallel to Saṃkhyānadarçināḥ, xii, 314, 3–4. “The rules both of Sāmkhya and Yoga” are mentioned, xii, 50, 33. Nārada “knew the difference between Sāmkhya and Yoga,” ii, 5, 7. Çaunaka is “rapt with metaphysics, adhyātma, skilled in Yoga and in Sāmkhya,” iii, 2, 15. The difference is explained in the Gītā as: “The double point of view, niṣṭhā, of the Sāmkhyas, who have jñānayoga; of the Yogins, who have karmayoga.” Sometimes Sāmkhyajñāna on the one hand is opposed to Yoga alone on the other, xii, 315, 18.³ Sometimes the Çāstra is that of the Yoga, as opposed to jñāna of the Sāmkhya, xii, 319, 67; yogaçāstreṣu, 340, 69, etc. Nevertheless, they are, says the Gītā, essentially one system. And so often we find that Vedic practices and the existence of God are claimed for Sāmkhya and Yoga, as if they were one system. The same is true of the practice of austerities or asceticism. “The many names of God are declared in the Rig Veda with the Yajur Veda, in Atharva (and) Sāmans, in Purāṇa with Upanishads, in astronomy also, in Sāmkhya and in Yoga-çāstra, and in Āyur Veda,” to give the bizarre group of xii, 342, 8. “Both gods and demons practise austerity, tapas, which has been argued out, yuktiṭaḥ, of Veda and Sāmkhyayoga,” xii, 285, 192.¹

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³ Compare xiii, 149, 139: yogo jñānaṃ tathā sāmkhyaṃ vidyāḥ çilpādi-karma ca. In the passage cited above, the interesting ariṣṭāni tattvāni are grouped with yoga and sāmkhyajñāna (as objects of research). They are explained elsewhere, xii, 318, 8, as “signs of death,” appearing to one if he cannot see the pole-star or his reflection in another’s eye, etc.

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¹ It may be observed of the terminology that as Yoga means Yogin as well as the system, so Sāmkhya means system or a philosopher of that system. Typical of the pseudo-epic is the circumstance that here Sāmkhyayogāu are personified as two beings along with Nārada and Durvāsas, xiii, 151, 45.

Sāmkhya and Yoga

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But it must be noticed that the claim for the identity of Sāmkhya and Yoga comes from the Yoga side, which is deistic and seeks to make the Sāmkhya so, exactly in the way the Vedānta commentator seeks to make the Yoga passages Vedantic. The distinctive mark of the Yoga, as given above from the Gītā, 3, 3, is, if we translate it in the natural original sense, application to work as opposed to application to understanding; in other words the Yoga laid stress on religious practices, the Sāmkhya on knowledge.² It may be that Yoga also, like Sāmkhya, was originally atheistic and that deistic Yoga was a special development. Nothing could be falser, however, than the supposition that the Yoga and Sāmkhya differ only in method, or the epic assumption that both are a sort of Vedānta inculcating belief in Brahman as the All-soul. Even the Gītā recognizes the distinction between the two schools in saying that the system that recognizes the All-soul (“one entity eternal, undivided, in all divided existences”) is better than the one that recognizes “separate and distinct entities in all existent beings,” 18, 21–22, clearly referring to the fundamental difference between Brahmaism³ and Sāmkhyaism. The practical difference is that formulated at xii, 317, 2 ff., where it is said: “There is no knowledge like the Sāmkhya, no power like the Yoga; these are both one in practice, ekacaryāu, because both destroy death. Foolish people regard them as distinct, but we recognize them as one. What the Yogas see is seen by Sāmkhyas; who sees Sāmkhya and Yoga as one sees truly,” a passage copied from the Gītā, 5, 4–5, and repeated with varied readings in xii, 306, 19.

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² Compare the use in xiii, 84, 40, where it is asked: kena vā karmayogena pradānene ’ha kena vā (can I be purified), i. e., “by application to holy works.” Compare kṛṣiyoga, xiii, 83, 18.

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³ As Vedānta is commonly used of Çamkara’s interpretation, I employ Brahmaism to connote a belief in the All-soul without necessarily implying a concomitant doctrine of Illusion, Māyā.

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Though the pseudo-epic is so like the Gītā, its relative lateness, I may observe in passing, is shown inter alia by the use in this passage of yogam as a neuter noun, xii, 317, 27, etad dhi yogam yogānām,¹ as in xiii, 17, 19; one of the many little points ignored in the unhistorical synthetical method.

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¹ Repeating yoga eṣa hi yogānām in 307, 25.

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This passage, in its admission under cover of fools’ opinion, shows clearly that the two systems could be regarded as identical only by insisting on the objective of each. Both systems gave emancipation, therefore they were one. But one way was that of pure science or knowledge, the other was that of pious work (yoga, tapas) added to this science, a practical divergence that existed quite apart from the question whether the goal was really the same.

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But the epic in other passages, despite its brave pretence, is not content with Sāmkhya science or even with Yoga work. On the contrary, the religious devotees named above throw over both systems. It is true they keep the name, just as these philosophical systems themselves pretend to depend on the Vedas, or as European philosophers used to claim that their systems were based on orthodoxy. But this only shows how important and fully established were these philosophical systems when the sects arose that based salvation on faith and the grace of a man-god, while still pretending to philosophy. They could not unite, for the true Sāmkhya did not teach Brahmaism, but kevalatvam, or absolute separation of the individual spirit from everything else, an astitvam kevalam, or existence apart from all, not apart in Brahman.

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No less irreconcilable with the earlier belief is the later sectary’s view of action, pravṛtti, as due to God. For the older sage was intent on escaping action, which the system regards as due not to spirit but to the inherent quality of its antithesis, Prakṛti. But in the religious substitution of a personal Lord, Īçvara, as synonymous with the Supreme, it is taught that “the Lord created pravṛtti as a picturesque effect” (after electing nivṛtti for himself)¹ Here the roots of the Karma doctrine are cut by the new faith of the quasi monotheism which is reflected in the later pseudo-epic.²

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¹ pravṛttidharmān vidadhe kṛtvā lokasya citratām, xii, 341, 99.

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² This is the “fourfold God,” worshipped by the Ekāntins as having one, two, three, or four forms, identified with Krishna, his son, grandson, and brother, as named above, p. 97. He is maker and non-maker, and takes Prakṛti’s function in “sporting:” yathe ’cchati tathā rājan krīḍate puruṣo ’vyayaḥ.

Fate and Free-Will

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Another side of speculation presents a varied field of belief. Is there such a thing as free-will? The later epic fixes responsibility in turn on the Lord, man himself, puruṣa, luck, haṭha, and Karma, xii, 32, 12, ff.; where Karma is finally recognized as the only agent, as otherwise God would be responsible for sin; and if man were the sole agent there could be none higher than man. As luck would absolve a man, only Karma is left, associated with Time in a sort of dual fatalism, karmasūtrātmaka. Obviously Fate, as Time is here, really undermines the theory of Karma quite as much as does the interposition of the Lord or any other foreign factor. So in xii, 224, 16 ff. and 226, 13 and 21 ff., we find first the reflex of the Upanishads and Gītā, “he who (in imagination) slays and he who is slain are both ignorant,” and then: “The deed causes the deed; but the deed has another creator, Fate, Time. Fate or what will be will be is the cause.” “Sorrow lies in thinking ‘I am responsible’; for I do that which the ordainers ordained when I was born.”³

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³ So 224, 31; 226, 8; 227, 34 and 35: kālaḥ pacati . . . kālaḥ kalayati prajāḥ; 226, 12: “Whatever state one obtains he must say bhavitavyam,” “it was fated,” i. e., independently of Karma. For kāla from kal, cf. Gītā, 10, 30.

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Elsewhere Fate is the Divine power, dāiva, opposed to human effort and to nature, svabhāva, the latter having the implication of the Karma doctrine. Each of these factors is upheld by one or another theorist, while others claim that they all work together, xii, 233, 19, repeated at 239, 4–5. In other places the same Fate that is elsewhere made responsible is scorned, dāivam klībā upāsate, “only eunuchs worship Fate;” and “there is no Fate, all depends on one’s own nature;” the Karma doctrine, svabhāvataḥ, xii, 139, 82; 291, 13.¹

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¹ According to xii, 239, 20, Time is the origin and controller of all things, prabhavaḥ . . . saṃyamo yamaḥ, and all things produced by duality exist according to their own nature, svabhāvena. The nature of the individual spirit is often rendered by this word, as such a spirit is conditioned by its former acts. Below is cited a case where it is a factor of the body, distinct from organs, mind, and spirit. An interesting critique of heretics leads up to xii, 238, 3 ff. (where the word connotes nature as understood by Buddhists and materialists): yas tu paçyan svabhāvena vinā bhāvam acetanaḥ puṣyate sa punaḥ sarvān prajñayā muktahetukān, yeṣāṃ cāi ’kāntabhāvena svabhāvāt kāraṇam matam, pūtvā tṛṇam iṣikāṃ vā, te labhante na kiṃcana . . . svabhāvaṃ kāraṇaṃ jñātvā na çreyaḥ prāpnuvanti te, svabhāvo hi vināçāya mohakarmamanobhavaḥ, “He is a fool who teaches that nature alone exists, or that cause of change is inherent in nature alone” (nature is without intelligence and, çl. 9, only intelligence gives success; hence nature without intelligence would result in nothing; the final opinion given in çl. 6 on svabhāva and paribhāva). C. has a curious v. l. (for pūtvā, etc.) çrutvā nṛṇāṃ ṛṣīṇāṃ vā.

Sāṃkhya is Atheistic

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In the “one-soul” doctrine just referred to, God himself is energy, kāryātman, the soul of all, the saviour, “the Light which Yogins see,” the Ego, eternal, without characteristics of any sort, ahaṃ ca nirguṇaḥ, xii, 47, 54, 63, 69–70; xiv, 25, 7. He exists “alone with wisdom,” till he makes the worlds, each succeeding æon, xii, 340, 71–72, just as sunrise and sunset follow each other, ib. 75. On the other hand, the epic declares with all plainness that the Sāṃkhya system is devoid of a belief in a personal supreme God. In xii, 301, 1 ff., the question is raised, What is the difference between Sāṃkhya and Yoga? The answer is: “Sāṃkhyas praise the Sāṃ- khya system; Yogas the Yoga system. The pious Yogas say, How can one be freed when one is without a personal God (anīçvaraḥ); while the Sāṃkhyas say that one who knows truly all earthly courses becomes unaffected by objects, and would clearly get released from the body in this way alone. This is the exposition of release given by the very intelligent Sāṃkhyas. But one should take as the means of release that explanation which is given agreeably to his own party. . . The Yogas rely on immediate perception (of truth), while the Sāṃkhyas determine according to their code. For my part, I approve of both,¹ for either system followed according to its code would lead to the highest course (emancipation). Purity, penance, compassion toward all creatures, and keeping vows, are found equally in both (systems), but the (philosophic) exposition is not the same in both.” The last words, darçanaṃ na samaṃ tayoḥ, “the exposition is not the same,” can point here only to the essential difference just indicated by the speaker, namely, that one admits and one denies God. And it is to be noticed that this is the end of the explanation. There is not the slightest hint that the anīçvara or atheistic Sāṃkhyas believe in God (a personal Lord, Īçvara).

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¹ The Yoga has the immediate perception of the mystic: pratyakṣahetavo yogāḥ sāṃkhyāḥ çastraviniçcayāḥ, ubhe cāi ’te mate tattve mama (Bhīṣmasya), çl. 7.

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It must also be remembered that the very term here used to describe the Sāṃkhya belief, far from being admitted as one that connotes a belief in Brahman, is reprehended, not only in the pietistic question above (which may fairly be put categorically as “it is impossible to be saved if one does not believe in a personal God”), but also in the Gītā, which links together as a “creed of devils” the denial of “reality, basis, and personal God,” asatyam apratiṣṭhaṃ te jagad āhur anīçvaram, Gītā, 16, 8, an expression which would have been impossible had the anīçvara doctrine been accepted as simply a formal modification of deism, implying a belief in a background of Brahman.

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I do not think that anīçvara can possibly mean here “not having the senses as master,” as it does in xii, 247, 7, where it is opposed to indriyāṇāṃ vaçyātmā; a passage mistranslated by the author of Nirvāṇa, p. 96, as “ Without the Lord one attains the place of immortality,” though it clearly means: “ Not having (the senses as) a master one attains the immortal state, but being subject to the senses one obtains death.”

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In the theistic religion, the personal God not only supplants the old explanation of spirit, but even takes the place of Prakṛti, the unmanifest unknown Source of the Sāṃkhya, and creates everything, as does egoism in the pure dogma of the Sāṃkhya, as “ the name made by egoism, which is synonymous,” ahaṃkārakṛtaṃ cāi ’va nāma paryāyavācakam, xii, 340, 62. So to the sectary the name is ever indifferent. As to-day he accepts Christ as his own divinity under another name, so he did of old. The passage in the Gītā is well known, which establishes the principle. In xiii, 14, 318, it is said: “ In the Sāṃkhya system the All-soul is called Puruṣa,” i. e. the Sāṃkhyas recognize only Puruṣa, but we say that their Puruṣa is our All-soul. The twenty-fifth, Puruṣa, is thus identified with wisdom, vidyā, xii, 308, 7 ff. In a preceding section, 303, 119, Hiraṇyagarbha is intellect, and is called Viriñca, Aja, etc., “ called by many names in the Sāṃkhya Çāstra.”

Yoga as Deistic and Brahmaistic

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The ancient Yogin tales in the epic show that there are important differences between the older and later view of Yoga. To stand on one leg for years and keep quiet long enough for birds to nest in one’s matted locks was the “ discipline” of the primitive Yogin as he is represented in these tales. But the Yogin of the later epic regards all such practices as crude and unsatisfactory. His discipline is an elaborate course of breathings and mental confinement in bodily postures described as customary in the Yoga Çāstras. So many breathings at such a time and so many at another, minute attention (in a sitting posture) to concentration and meditation, the whole paraphernalia of Patañjali, exercised for a “limited time,”¹ not a word about standing on one leg for years. The difference is more than superficial, however. The one-leg Yogin strove for one thing only, supernatural powers. Tale after tale recounts what powers he gained by these exercises, and these powers were his goal. He was deistic but he had no thought of “entering Brahman,” only of controlling the powers terrestrial, celestial, and elemental. On death his goal is to be a spirit free and powerful, enjoying good things. On the other hand, the Yogin of the pseudo-epic discipline learns all these powers, but “he who practises them goes to hell,” because his goal was not to be a thaumaturge but to be released. Both experienced the apunarbhavakāma, “longing not to be born again,” but the first desired bala, or Yoga “lordship,” aiçvarya, and all his efforts were directed to that end; while the last desired lordship only as a means soon to be rejected for something higher, release, mokṣa, or kevalatva, isolation,² and eventually the recognition of ekatva, unity, of intellect, mind, senses, and universal soul, ātmano vyāpinaḥ, xii, 241, 2–3.³

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¹ xii, 241, 22 ff. evam parimitam kālam (six months) ācaran āsīno hi rahasy eko gacched akṣarasāmyatām. Cf. pratibhā, apavarga, 317, 14.

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² The chapter xii, 289, shows that mokṣa may be simply isolation or independence and does not necessarily connote absorption.

c6.s12.4

³ The whole Yogakṛtya is comprised here in this union as “the highest knowledge.”

c6.s12.5

The Brahmaistic Yogin is an advance on the deistic Yogin. The latter recognizes only isolation, kevalatva. So under the influence of Vishnuism a lecture which teaches Brahman isolation appears revamped as pantheistic Brahmaism.⁴

c6.s12.6

⁴ The compilers are not averse to this practice; it is a common Hindu method of improvement. Either the text is rewritten and interpolated or it is allowed to stand and another section is prefixed or added of the same content differently treated. The rule is that the improvement precedes the original.

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