A History of Indian Literature v1.c8.s7.9

v1.c8.s7.9

Very many such texts must have existed. Of this we are assured by the Indians themselves, and it is also confirmed by the many quotations from lost Brāhmaṇas, which we find in our texts. However the number of even those Brāhmaṇas which are still preserved is by no means small, and moreover, all of them should be classed among the more extensive works of Indian literature. According to the four Vedic Saṃhitās with which we have become acquainted, the four Vedas, as we know, were distinguished, and to each of the latter several Brāhmaṇas usually belong, which issued from various schools (śākhās). We have seen that the Saṃhitās of the Black Yajurveda already contained, besides the mantras or prayers, also declarations of opinions and discussions on the purpose and meaning of the sacrifice. In these Brāhmaṇa-like parts of the Yajurveda-Saṃhitās we shall see the beginning of the Brāhmaṇa-literature. It was these very directions for the performance of the sacrificial ceremonies and the discussions on the meaning of the ritual, which in the Saṃhitās of the Black Yajurveda were directly connected with the Mantras themselves, it was just these which one Vedic school after another made the subject of individual works. Soon it was regarded as a rule that every Vedic school must possess a Brāhmaṇa. This explains on the one hand the large number of Brāhmaṇas, and on the other hand the circumstance that some works were designated as Brāhmaṇas, which deserve this name neither for their contents nor for their extent, and which belong to the latest productions of Vedic literature. Of this type are many so-called 'Brāhmaṇas' of the Sāmaveda, which are nothing but Vedāṅgas,¹ also the Gopatha-Brāhmaṇa of the Atharvaveda. The latter is one of the latest works of the whole of Vedic literature. There was obviously no Brāhmaṇa at all belonging to the Atharvaveda in early times. It was not until a later period, when a Veda without a Brāhmaṇa could not be imagined, that an attempt was made to fill this gap.¹