Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v2.c13.40

v2.c13.40

There are many correspondences with the teachings of the Epic just set forth to be found in the discourses on reincarnation, procreation, growth of the fœtus, and birth in the Garbha-Upanishad (transl. by Deussen, *Sechzig Upanischads des Veda*); Yājñavalkya's law book, iii, 67 ff.; and the Purāṇas. These also repeat the doctrine of the Upanishads : The child in the womb remembers its former existences, but through touching the wind of the outer world is at once deprived of its knowledge, after having been driven forth by the Prajāpati or birth wind, a doctrine which in its essentials corresponds to a Jewish one (see Wolfg. Schultze, *Dokumente d. Gnosis*, Jena, 1910, p. 4 ff.). See e.g. Wilson's Vishṇupur., vol. v, p. 203 f.; Agnipur., 369.19 ff.; Garuḍapur., Pretakalpa, xxxii; Mārk.-Pur., x, 1-6; xi (according to cl. 18 the new-born child at once loses its supernatural knowledge through Vishṇu's bewildering māyā or magic powers); Bhāgavatapur., iii, 31 (according to cl. 1 man [jantu] comes into the mother's womb, borne by the male seed, retaḥkaṇācraya = Garuḍapurāṇasārodh., vi, 5); Garuḍapurāṇasārodh., vi, 5 ff.; Abegg, Pretakalpa, vi, 5 ff. (in p. 92, note 5, Abegg gives a number of references); xv, 15-18; Carakasamh., iv, 4; Windisch, *Buddhas Geburt*, etc., p. 12 ff. How wonderful and mysterious the origin of man was in the eyes of the Old Indians the Epic has already shown us. In the Mārkaṇḍeyapurāṇa, pregnancy is called something holy and meritorious (x, 10); and procreation is in the Vedic view an act of sacrifice, a worship of God (see e.g. Chānd.-Up., v, 8; Bṛih.-Up., vi, 4.3). How piously and solemnly, and how ceremoniously it must be entered upon, we are taught at the end of the Bṛihadāraṇyaka-Upanishad (vi, 4.13 ff.) with a pure and elevating, a noble and simple earnestness. And so it goes on, although not with such simplicity, down to the Mahānirvāṇatantra (ix, 94-116).