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he adds, "In the practice of work there must be an offering to Brahma."

(j) Sarvabhāvena. The Hindu commentators explain this word to mean with all thy soul or self (atman having both. meanings). Madhusudhana says, with the same impression, "by heart and voice and deed." Lassen's version is "omni reverentia;" Thomson's, "in every state of life," which is inadmissible. Burnouf has, I think correctly, "de toute ton âme.” (k) Sarvadharman parityajya. "Cunctis religionibus dimissis" (Lassen). Telang has "forsaking all thy duties," i.e., religious duties or offices chiefly. Here our author is in direct opposition to the Vedantist system. The perfect Yogin abandons all external or bodily acts of worship for a pure worship of devout meditation. Burnouf and Lorinser add "other" to "duties," as if the injunction was for a Vishnu cult alone; but there is no good ground for this addition. Sridhara says, "All these duties will be done in the worship (bhakti) of Me."

(1) Smritir labdha. There is a wide difference in the translation of these words. The Hindu commentators explain them as meaning that he had regained his proper form, or, as we say, he had recovered himself. Telang translates them by "I recollect myself." Smriti means (1) memory, and (2) the system of doctrines received by tradition, as that which was handed down by memory from pious sages, in contrast with that which had been heard from the gods (śruti, revelation). Lassen's version is "recordatio est accepta a me." But I question whether smriti ever means self-possession, and Arjuna had not recovered his memory, for he had forgotten nothing. The meaning seems to be that he had received the holy doctrine which is expounded in the preceding chapters, and, accepting it, he was ready to do as Krishna desired, i.e., to fight. Burnouf's version is "J'ai reçu la sainte tradition, and this interpretation Lorinser and Galanos accept.

APPENDIX.

I.

ON THE DATE AT WHICH THE BHAGAVAD GITA WAS PROBABLY WRITTEN, AND ON THE THEORY THAT IT WAS WRITTEN UNDER AN INFLUENCE DERIVED FROM A KNOWLEDGE OF CHRISTIAN DOCTRINES.

On

IN a German translation of the poem by Dr. Lorinser, published at Breslau in 1869, it is maintained that the author of the Bhagavad Gītā must have been acquainted with the doctrines of the Christian faith, and that an influence was superimposed on his Brahmanic training from this source. The evidence brought forward in support of this theory is chiefly an assumed or real resemblance of some passages in the poem to corresponding passages in the Christian sacred books. the other hand, K. T. Telang, a Hindu advocate of Bombay, has prefixed a long dissertation on this subject to an English translation of the work, in which he controverts Dr. Lorinser's theory, and claims an antiquity for the Bhagavad Gitā extending so far back as the fourth century B.C., or even to an earlier date. If this could be proved, then Dr. Lorinser's theory is at once destroyed. Each of these writers has approached the subject under the influence of an evident bias, and each is disposed to attach more weight to his arguments or illustrations than they are able to bear.

It must be admitted, I think, that Dr. Lorinser finds re

semblances in passages that have little in common, or may be explained as representing thoughts or expressions that may be found in any cultured race; but K. T. Telang gains nothing in support of his theory by assuming that the Bhāguri Tīkā, alluded to in Patanjali's Mahābhashya, was very probably a commentary on a work of Brihaspati, who is assumed to be the founder of the Lokayatika sect, probably referred to in chap. xvi., and that Patanjali's date may be taken to be prior to the beginning of the first century B.C. He admits that the argument is based, "in very great measure, not on ascertained facts, but on mere presumptions." From the absence of historical data in Hindu literature generally, we cannot determine with certainty when Brihaspati or Patanjali lived. Of the age of the former we have, I believe, no certain knowledge; for the latter, we can determine the limits, with high probability, within which his date may be fixed. Krishna Bhandarkar says that "he probably wrote the third chapter of his Bhashya (Commentary on Panini's Grammar) between 144 and 142 B.C." Professor Weber, however, assigns 25 A.C. as his probable date. It may be assumed, then, that he flourished some time between these dates; and when it is considered that the Yoga system attributed to him had been existent long enough to fall into a corrupt state on the part of some of its disciples,1 and to become the basis of the new eclectic system maintained in the Bhagavad Gītā, it is evident that the latter work must have been composed at a much later time, probably some centuries later, than the date of Patanjali. We may compare this modification of the Yoga doctrines with the Neo-Platonism of the Alexandrian school, which arose fully four centuries after the great master

1 It is even said in the Bhagavad Gītā (iv. 2) that the Yoga system (the meditative devotional system of Patanjali) had been "lost through

Rām

length of time." It was probably revived in its proper form by the author of this book.

had charmed the Athenians by his eloquent discourse. It would not be safe to assume that the course of thought was more rapid among the Hindus fifteen hundred years ago than among the more lively and enterprising Greeks. This adaptation of the Yoga doctrines into a new system is a valid argument in favour of the opinion of Professors Weber and Lassen, that the Bhagavad Gita was not written before the third century A.C.

K. T. Telang is not more successful in arguing that it was written before the time of Buddha because no mention is made in it of Buddha or his doctrines. Its purpose is to establish a school of philosophic religion, and for this end it modifies the teaching of the Sankyha and Yoga systems, forming, with an infusion of a Vedāntist element, a new system, in which Buddhism could find no place. Nor was it necessarily so opposed to the doctrines of Buddha that an attack on the latter would seem unavoidable. It does, however, attack and denounce a certain class of men who reviled every form of religion-the Pyrrhonists of India, who denied the existence of any certain truth, and devoted themselves exclusively to the enjoyments of the present life. These men may not then have formed a distinct school, with teachers and an organisation such as we find at a later period, bearing the name of Lokāyatikas1 or Worldlings, but they were numerous enough to attract attention and rebuke. It is certain that there was some free-thinking in India about the Vedas at an early period; but a school of free-thinkers, openly avowing such atheistic and materialist doctrines as those of Brihaspati and the denounced class in the Bhagavad Ghita, does not appear until a comparatively late date. This class is described in the Vishnu Purāṇa, but this work is certainly later than the sixth century A.C. :-"In a very short 1 From Sans. loka, the present world, because they denied or ignored any other.

time these Asuras (demoniac men, as in the Bhagavad Gītā), deluded by the deceiver, abandoned the entire system founded on the ordinances of the triple Veda. Some reviled the Vedas, others the gods, others the ceremonial of sacrifice, and others the Brahmans. This (they said) is a doctrine that will not bear discussion. (To say that) oblations of butter consumed in the fire produce any future reward is the assertion of a child" (iii. 18).

It will seem strange to an impartial reader of the Bhagavad Gītā that K. T. Telang can say "that the way in which the Vedas are spoken of in more than one passage of the Gitā shows that the composition of the work must be referred to a time when no attack had as yet been made on their authority" (p. vi.), or that it is "the work of one who was himself thoroughly orthodox" (id.) The Vedas are not absolutely rejected by the author of the Gitā. They may have many uses for a prudent Brahman (chap. ii. 46), but the perfect Yogin or devotee rises above all ritual worship by the practice of constant meditation (iv. 37). Works, i.e., religious acts, may have some use as a means to attain to yoga, but when attained, the soul needs only repose (c. vi. 3). The Vedas are even sneered at as "flowery speech," which the ignorant, who are charmed by them, were wont to repeat, thinking in their ignorance that there is nothing but this (ii. 42). They are compared to the sacred fig-tree, "whose leaves are sacred (Vedic) hymns: he who knows it knows the Veda." This fig-tree must be cut down by the strong axe of indifference, ie., by the soul becoming indifferent to all outward things by inward devotion (xv. 1, 3). Devotion (yoga) is the true lustral water: he who is perfect in devotion finds spiritual knowledge in himself, and having obtained it, he enters into supreme repose (in nirvāṇa) without delay. The Yogin (devotee) o'erpasses the holy reward promised in the Vedas in sacrifices, in austerities, and in almsgiving, and attains the

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