History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c91.177

v7.c91.177

The word *bhagavat* calls for a brief notice. It was generally applied to Vāsudeva. The Visṇupurāṇa says 'The word *bhaga* is applied to the six qualities collectively viz. fulness of sway, manliness (or energy), glory, auspiciousness, knowledge and indifference to wordly objects. This noble word *bhagavān* applies to Vāsudeva who is the Highest Brahma and to no one else'.¹⁵⁶⁵ The Visṇupurāna¹⁵⁶⁶ further states that the word '*bhagavat*' may be applied secondarily to others on the ground of possessing special qualities "that person may be called '*bhagavān*', who knows about the creation and dissolution (of the world), about the origin and final destiny of beings, and knows what is *vidyā* and *avidyā* (nescience). Knowledge, strength, power, sway, manliness, splendour—all these in their entirety, excluding the three guṇas (and their effects) that are to be avoided, are expressed by the word *bhagavat*". Bhāgavata is one who worships '*Bhagavat*' (i. e. Vāsudeva). This is an ancient word. It occurs in the Besnagar column inscription (of the 2nd century B C.) of Heliodora, a Greek of Takṣaśīlā and ambassador of Antalikita, who calls himself a bhāgavata (a devotee of Vāsudeva); vide above p. 516 n. 742 and 'Indo-Greeks' by Prof. A. K. Narain (1957), where at end he gives the full Besnagara Ins. of nine lines and its reading (Plate VI). It appears that '*bhagavat*' was rarely applied to Śiva also. The Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad speaks¹⁵⁶⁷ of Śiva as '*bhagavān*'. Patañjali in his bhāṣya on Pāṇini V. 2. 76 speaks of Śivabhāgavata.¹⁵⁶⁸ In the Ghosūṇḍi stone Inscription¹⁵⁶⁹ in Sanskrit (near Nagarī in the Chitorgadh District of Rajputana) there is a reference to both Saṅkarṣaṇa and Vāsudeva as *bhagavat* and it calls them Sarveśvara (about 200 B. C.), while the Besnagara inscription speaks of Vāsudeva alone and Heliodora calls himself *bhāgavata* In some early records such as the Pikira grant of Simhavarman (E. I. vol VII. p. 161) and in Gupta Inscription No. 4 (at p 27) Siṁhavarman and Candragupta (II) son of Samudragupta are called ‘*paramabhāgavata*’. Akrūra is styled mahābhāgavata in Brahmapurāṇa 190 20. Padma VI. 280 27 defines a Mahābhāgavata as noted below.¹⁵⁷⁰