Materials for the Study of the Early History of the Vaishnava Sect c8.291

c8.291

Dr. Keith next goes on to say, “It is, however, of course possible that the similarity of name is a mere accident: metronymics are very frequent in the *Vaṃśas* of the Upaniṣads, and Kṛṣṇa is not rarely found as a non-divine name; the only point of doubt in this view is the rarity of Devakī, but this is not conclusive; Professor Garbe himself resigns his former view that the Patañjalis of the Mahābhāṣya and the Yoga are identical. Nor can a third possibility be excluded: Kṛṣṇa as a god and a teacher may differ, but Devakīputra may be borrowed by the former from the latter, though this is less probable. We must, to be candid, recognize that our evidence is insufficient to decide the precise facts, and that we cannot build on it the edifice of the Kṛṣṇa who founded the Bhāgavata sect as a mere man. The epic has a god, the Upaniṣad a man, and the means of connexion are not apparent.”