History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c95.296

v7.c95.296

The sheet anchor of the views of Deussen and Dr. Bhandarkar are the dialogue between Pravāhaṇa Jaivali and Śvetaketu (Br. Up. VI. 2, Chān. Up. V. 3–10) about Pañcāgnividyā and that between Aśvapati Kaikeya and Uddālaka Āruṇi about Vaiśvānara (Chān. V. 11. 24). The latter has been already dealt with. In the former occurs an important passage which has been made much of and misunderstood. Before proceeding to expound the Pañcāgnividyā to Śvetaketu and his father Āruṇi Gautama, Pravāhaṇa Jaivali remarks (Chān. Up. V. 3. 7) 'this vidyā did not go to brāhmaṇas before you; therefore in all worlds domination (or government) has remained with the kṣatriya class alone'. In the corresponding Br. Up. passage the words are 'this vidyā did not reside in any brāhmaṇa before this day, but I shall expound it to you, for, who would like to refuse when you address me thus'²⁵⁶³ (viz. I approach you as pupil). In the Kauṣītaki Up. I, the doctrine of the two paths of Devayāna and Pitryāna is expounded to Āruṇi (and his son Śvetaketu) by Citra Gārgyāyani (v. l. Gāṅgyāyani), but the remarks about kṣatriyas alone being the first possessors of the doctrine do not occur there at all and Gārgyāyani appears to be a brāhmaṇa teacher. The question is: what is meant by 'this vidyā' in the above passages of Chān. and Bṛ. Upaniṣads? In the Upaniṣads (particularly in Chāndogya and Bṛ.) numerous vidyās for the *upāsanā* of *brahman* by men that are not yet far advanced on the path of *brahmavidyā* are dilated upon, such as Udgīthavidyā (Chān. Up. I. 8-9, Bṛ. Up. I. 3), Daharavidyā (Chān. VIII 1. 1-2, Bṛ. Up. I. 3, Vedāntasūtra I. 3. 14-21), Madhuvidyā (Chān. III 1. 1 ff., Bṛ. Up. II. 5. 1-15), Saṃvargavidyā (Chān. IV. 3). In the same way Pañcāgnividyā is an Upāsanā Deussen and others admit (as shown above) that the great and original texts about the identity of the individual self with the Supreme Self and about transmigration of the soul based on works and conduct are those of Yājñavalkya in the Bṛ. Up. The Pañcāgnividyā expatiates upon and is concerned mainly with only one aspect of transmigration viz. the path of those who living in a village practise a life of sacrifices, works of public utility and alms. The five fires and five offerings relate only to the pitryāna path. It contains an esoteric and semi-physical explanation of the process by which persons come to be born again on the earth. At the most it may be argued that some kṣatriya rulers or noblemen claimed to have given an esoteric or metaphorical explanation of the mode of the return of pious men from the moon to the earth again. Nothing positive is said as to whether Pravāhaṇa Jaivali was the ruler of a country or only a kṣatriya (*rājanya* in Bṛ. Up. VI. 2.3, Chān. Up. V. 3.5) but we are told that Aśvapati was king of the Kekaya country in the extreme northwest of India, while the original proclaimer of the immortality of the self and its identity with the supreme self was Yājñavalkya who was in Videha (Mithilā, modern Bihar), which was at least a thousand miles away from Kekaya. Yājñavalkya's philosophy must have taken a long time before it became well known in the distant Kekaya. Conceding for argument that a few rulers like Aśvapati were the first to propound an explanation of the way of the transmigration of pious sacrificers and the like, it is a far cry from that to assume as Deussen does (Ph. Up. p. 20) that the doctrine of the Ātman as the first Principle of the universe was fostered and progressively developed by the kṣatriyas in opposition to the principles of the brahmanical ritual and this assumption is contrary to what he himself states elsewhere in his own work (pp 410, 281, 348)