Materials for the Study of the Early History of the Vaishnava Sect c8.198

c8.198

The rank growth of legend which has clustered round the name of Kṛiṣhṇa Vāsudeva reminds us of the extravagant tales which obscure the genuine history of Kapila, of Buddha, and of Aśoka. The Kṛiṣhṇa stories may not all be either fiction or myth; but they are no better suited to serve as the foundation of sober history than the tales of the *Bhāgavata Purāṇa*, of the *Saddharma-puṇḍarīka*, or of the *Aśokavadāna* are adapted to form the basis of chronicles of the doings of the Sāṁkhya sage, the Sākya reformer or the Maurya monarch. In his *Early History of India* V. A. Smith complains that most writers upon Aśoka’s reign have begun at the wrong end with the late legends, instead of at the right end with the contemporary inscriptions. Similarly most writers upon the life of Kṛiṣhṇa have begun at the wrong end with the late epic and *Purāṇic* legends instead of at the right end with the early *Brāhmaṇas* and *Upanishads*.