Materials for the Study of the Early History of the Vaishnava Sect c8.292

c8.292

It is not so easy to refute an improbable historical theory as it is to propound it, but on the other hand the *onus probandi* rests upon him that propounds it. Dr. Keith admits that his evidence "is insufficient to decide the precise facts," but nevertheless remarks that the similarity between the names of the two Kṛṣṇas may be a mere accident as in the case of the Patañjalis of the *Mahābhāshya* and of the Yoga. We readily admit that a mere similarity of names is no proof of identity. But in the case of the two Kṛṣṇas the similarity extends further than this. The epic Kṛṣṇa is the son of Devakī,¹ the Kṛṣṇa of the *Upanishad* is also called the son of Devakī. The epic Kṛṣṇa is often styled *Achyuta*. The epithet, as Hill points out, figures in the *Upanishad* passage about the pupil of Ghora. The teacher of the Upanishadic Kṛṣṇa belonged to a family (Āṅgirasa) closely associated with the Bhojas,² the kindreds of the Epic Kṛṣṇa.³ The Kṛṣṇa of the *Upanishad* and his preceptor Ghora Āṅgirasa were worshippers of the sun. We are told in the *Śānti-parva* of the *Mahābhārata*⁴ that the *Sātvata-vidhi* expounded by the epic Kṛṣṇa had been declared in days of yore by the sun himself, *Prāk-śūrya-mukha-niḥsṛta*, and in the *Karṇa-parva* *Angirasī śruti* is praised by Krishna as the best of all revealed texts, *śrutināmutlamā śrutiḥ*.¹ The pupil of Ghora is taught the worship of the "noblest of all lights," *Jyotiruttamamiti*, "high above all darkness," *tamasaspari*, and also the virtues of *Tapodānamārjjavam . ahiṃsā satyavachanam*. The Epic Krishna teaches practically the same thing in the *Gītā* ²—