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Parallels and Comparisons. Proceedings of the Fourth Dubrovnik International Conference on the Sanskrit Epics and Purā nas

Mislav Ježić Preface by the General Editor The special theme of the Fourth Dubrovnik International Conference on the Sanskrit Epics and Purā ṇ as was Parallels and Comparisons. Since Greg Bailey undertook the effort in his Introduction both of explaining the theoretical importance of these concepts for Indology and philology, and of presenting the different ways in which the concepts have been applied in different articles in these Proceedings, I shall limit myself to a summary and factual survey of articles presented and to some general remarks on the structuring ideas behind this volume. Even if some elements are repeated in both texts, the tasks to be fulfilled and purposes to be pursued by the theoretician and critical reviewer among the members of our Board and by the general editor of the proceedings will differ sufficiently to hopefully justify both of them. The twenty articles published in this volume approach the topic from different viewpoints of their authors. Muneo Tokunaga has looked for all occurrences of the term itihā sa in the Mahā bhā rata and has found that single itihā sas are in the great majority of cases introduced as examples corroborating some moral or legal injunction or philosophical or religious instruction. He sees the origin of itihā sas in the arthavā das of the Brā hmaṇ as, and follows the introducing formula atrā pi udā haranti back to the G hyasū tras, and forward to the Nyā ya concept of udā haraṇ a. Thus he has explained the function of the itihā sas in a surprisingly new light, although in a philologically and statistically so well grounded way that one wonders why nobody had brought the facts together in such way before. We can add that this function of itihā sas as udā haraṇ a could be compared with that of the paradeigmata and exempla in ancient orators and Christian preachers and poets. In the article on the Triṣ ṭ ubh Hymn in the Bhagavadgī tā the typology of textual repetitions distinguishing the compositional or continuity repetitions on the synchronical or syntagmatic axis and reinterpretative or duplication repetitions on the diachronical or paradigmatic axis has permitted to argue that not only the majority (as established already in Ježić 1979 and 1986), but very probably all the triṣ ṭ ubhs in the Gī tā originated from a religious hymn which must have been composed, partly on the basis of the epic layer of the Gī tā , as an independent poem before it was included in the Mahā bhā rata during the bhakti redation of the Gī tā . The article is followed by a tentative reconstruction of the order of stanzas in the hymn. With this analysis and reconstruction, the question about the Ur-Bhagavadgī tā inaugurated almost two centuries ago by Wilhelm von Humboldt has been hopefully finally answered. Georg von Simson investigates the epic hero and mythical character Balarā ma, the brother of K ṣ ṇ a, in the light of his epithets and names like Rauhiṇ eya, Rā ma, Saṃ karṣ aṇ a, etc., of his attributes like the plough, of his relatives like his brother K ṣ ṇ ā and his sister Ekā nā ṃ śā , of his identification with the cosmic snake Śeṣ a, etc. The author thus infers that his mythical character must have been lunar (connected with the waning moon). Von Simson cites evidence from inscriptions, pieces of art, his presentation with other figures, etc., to corroborate his hypothesis. The cumulative evidence he presents in the article is impressive. Nick Allen explores, in the traces of Yaroslav Vassilkov, the parable of the man hanging from a tree over a pit, threatened by wild animals, in the Mahā bhā rata 11.5-8, and compares it with the episode from the Odyssey 12, where Odysseus hangs like a bat, from a fig tree, over the pit formed by the whirlpool Charybdis, threatened from the other side by the multiheaded man-eating monster Scylla. Allen cites some thirty rapprochements between the two passages and proposes that they go back via oral transmission to a common origin in early Indo-European mythic tradition. He relates this comparison to other parallels: that between the Sirens, Scylla and Charybdis with Vargā and her four friends in MBh 1.208, 9, or the Achilles' shield with the three animals that appear at the centre of the Buddhist painting called the Wheel of Life. Yaroslav Vassilkov in his article studies the epithet mahā bhā ga in the Mahā bhā rata and establishes that it describes a person „ whose share or fate is great“ . He shows that it is applied either to a child born with a blessed future or to a mother who has the luck of giving birth to sons. This single-word study sheds light on the values of the society that produced the epic, as well as on some stylistic and semiotic features (based on precise semantics) of the passages where the word occurs. Adam Bowles explores the sections of the Śā ntiparvan 12, 7-19 and 12, 161 (Ṣ aḑ gī tā ) towards the beginning and end of Bhī ṣ ma's royal instructions to Yudhiṣ ṭ hira. Both sections are multi-participant dialogues with similar themes, structure and discussants. In the sense of J. A. B. van Buitenen's observation that the Mahā bhā rata's „ grand framework was a design“ , Bowles argues that these two sections betray a consciously designed framework to Bhī ṣ ma's royal instructions. They are intended to show Yudhiṣ ṭ hira's transformation due to these instructions. They also provide a narrative arc to the Śā ntiparvan. The Ṣ aḑ gī tā at the same time paves the way to the topic of mokṣ a in the Mokṣ adharmaparvan. Simon Brodbeck follows the careers of some heroes from the Bhā radvā ja lineage: Bharadvā ja himself and his sons Yavakrī ta and Droṇ a, as well as Droṇ a's son Aśvatthā man. Their stories share a common narrative pattern of rivalry, attaining qualifications in an irregular manner, misusing them, losing the attained position, making a vengeful curse, and a supernatural intervention after the ruin, which restores the rivalling parties in a position of equality. In the cases of Yavakrī ta and Droṇ a the pattern is applied once, in the case of Aśvatthā man twice: in the context of Droṇ a's story and in the context of the rivalry with Arjuna. Brodbeck reviews some other cases of social mobility in this article concerned with the narrative pattern in presenting such stories. Sven Sellmer investigates the semantics of mental phenomena in the Mahā bhā rata, taking into account the results of the classical studies concerning the „ Homeric psychology“ . In Homer, the terms for mental events are often used in accordance with the metrical position of the term. Therefore, Sellmer reviews the use of some important nouns from the said semantic field (h d, h daya, manas, buddhi, dhī ) paying attention to the metrical conditions of their use, to the stereotyped expressions in which they occur, and then to the narrative situations in which they are mentioned. Danielle Feller has reviewed the four jumps of Hanumant as described in Rā mā yaṇ a 4, 5, 6 and 7: the jump of the baby Hanumant at the Sun (R 7, 35-36), the jump over the ocean to find Sī tā (R 5, 1), and the two jumps to the „ mountain with herbs“ near Kailā sa and bringing the mountain top (R 6, 61 and 6, 89). Hanumant's jumps would be natural for a monkey, but they attain mythic dimensions and meaning. As in her previous work, Dr. Feller looks for Vedic and post-Vedic mythical models for epic myths and stories, and convincingly argues that they can be found in the myth of the flying mountains (RS, MS, etc.), alluded to implicitly and explicitly in the Rā mā yaṇ a, and the myth of Garuḑ a's theft of the soma (MBh 1.14-30). The latter myth is obviously duplicated in the episode where Garuḑ a flies to fetch medicinal herbs for fallen heroes from the coasts of the milky ocean (R 6, 40), parallelled by the episodes where Hanumant jumps to the mountain to fetch herbs for Rā ma and Lakṣ maṇ a (R 6, 61) or Lakṣ maṇ a alone (6, 89). Further parallels are found between the Govardhana episode, where K ṣ ṇ a defies Indra, the story of Vā yu's saving Mainā ka's wings, where Vā yu defies Indra, and the episode of Vā yu's son Hanumant's jump to the Sun and Airā vata, where Hanumant defies Indra. In the end Hanumant's double character is nicely described: his „ subversive nature“ can be turned into an „ actively benevolent force, working for the good of the world order“ only by his devotion to Rā ma. The prededing nine articles are concerned with epic texts in this volume. Tokunaga looks for parallels to the itihā sas in the Mahā bhā rata in the literary tradition from the Vedas to the darśanas. In the article on the Triṣ ṭ ubh Hymn in the Bhagavadgī tā the parallels are looked for in the metrical Upaniṣ ads, Kaṭ ha and Śvetā śvatara, and between different adhyā yas of the Gī tā . Von Simson compares different passages on Balarā ma to extrapolate implications for his mythological character, he even looks for parallels to texts in archaeology, art and iconography. In Allen's article the parallels to the Mahā bhā rata are found in the Greek literature: in the Odyssey. Vassilkov looks in his single-epithet study for the parallels between different passages in the Mahā bhā rata. Bowles looks for parallels in the composition of the Śā ntiparvan. Brodbeck finds them in the life careers of several members of the Bhā radvā ja clan, which can be reduced to a model. Sellmer traces the nouns from one semantic field through different passages of the Mahā bhā rata. Feller, in the only article concerned with the Rā mā yaṇ a in this volume, looks for inherent parallels in the Rā mā yaṇ a and external parallels in Vedic mythical models. On all those levels, parallels which are found focus the researchers' attention on comparisons: on correspondences and differences, thus sharpening our understanding of individual expressions, of particular themes, or of the text passages in themselves, in their context, in the text history or literary history, or even between different literary traditions, such as the Indian and the Greek. In the next group consisting of five articles, the authors devoted their attention to the Purā ṇ ic texts, including the Khila of the Mahā bhā rata. Andreas Viethsen discusses different reasons for K ṣ ṇ a's descent or incarnation in the Harivaṃ śa. In the prologue in heaven (HV 40-43) preceding the K ṣ ṇ acarita, the Earth, first, complains that she became overpopulated and thus overburdened, and the Gods decide to take partial incarnations (aṃ śā vataraṇ a) to provoke a war and relieve her of the burden. Immediately thereafter, upon the news that asura Kā lanemi was reborn as king Kaṃ sa in Mathurā , Viṣ ṇ u decides to take incarnation as K ṣ ṇ a to destroy Kaṃ sa. The motif of the overpopulation of Earth appears already in the Mahā bhā rata 58-61. This motif is found in the Greek tradition too, as Vielle 1996 remarks, in the Kypria (F1), which implies that it is very old. We may add that the motif is still older because, according to Burkert 1984, it occurs already in the Babylonian Atrahasis epic and, in a variant version, in Enuma Elish. In the Mahā bhā rata it is „ morally“ modified by the statement that the Gods should take incarnations in order to annihilate the demons, the Daityas and Dā navas, who took births as kings on the Earth, but Vielle thinks that this is a later interpolation. Thus, we have in the Harivaṃ śa a general reason for incarnations of the Gods introducing the war of the Mahā bhā rata, and a special reason for the incarnation of Viṣ ṇ u as K ṣ ṇ a introducing the K ṣ ṇ acarita in the Harivaṃ śa and serving the promotion of k ṣ ṇ aite devotion. Paolo Magnone discusses the notion of tejas, which in Vedic times was just one of „ substance-powers“ like ojas, varcas or yaśas, and in the Purā ṇ ic texts becomes a regular attribute of the parameśvara. Tejas becomes a foundational quality of Brahman, with creative and destructive potential. Magnone explores the tejas mythologemes characteristic for each of the great Hindu gods: Brahman, Viṣ ṇ u, Sū rya, Śiva and Devī . In the mythology of Śiva and Devī , tejas may be complemented by śakti, wherein Magnone sees an influence of the polarized world-view of the Tantras on the Purā ṇ as. Four phases of the attribution of tejas are distinguished: conferral with inception of being, conferral with promotion of a status, withdrawal with demotion from the status, and withdrawal with cessation of being. Kenneth R. Valpey attempts to work through every explicit narrative „ replay“ of the Mahā bhā rata in the Bhā gavatapurā ṇ a in order to highlight how the Bhā gavata „ places K ṣ ṇ a-bhakti as the centerpiece of its persistently brahmanical dharmic world“ . The Bhā gavata consciously recollects events and persons from the Mahā bhā rata's main story. It resignifies central heroes of the Mahā bhā rata as bhaktas „ who have always been so“ , in contrast to the Purā ṇ ic bhaktas „ who become so“ through dramatic encounters with the deity, and who are caused to suffer due to K ṣ ṇ a's absence. The Bhā gavatapurā ṇ a seeks to present itself as the definitive „ commentary“ on the Mahā bhā rata. The dharmic life for this Purā ṇ a is enacted by using all the emotions, including even the destructive ones leading to the conflagration in the epic, as vehicles for sanctification and liberation within a dharmic world embodied in the absolute personage of K ṣ ṇ a. Christè le Barois reviews two stories concerning the śaivite sage Upamanyu who is mentioned in a broad range of literary works, without ever being attached to a narrative cycle: in the mahā purā ṇ as, upapurā ṇ as, sthalapurā ṇ as and in Anuśā sanaparvan 14-18. One story describes the asceticism of Upamanyu as a child in worshipping Śiva in order to reach the milky ocean. The other story tells about the visit of K ṣ ṇ a to the hermitage of Upamanyu in order to make asceticism to worship Śiva. Some texts contain both stories, some one of them, and in the Mahā bhā rata - one is encapsulated in the other. Some versions contain specialist ritual instructions, sometimes very sectarian in nature. Upamanyu is connected with the transmission of a special religious knowledge entitled śivaśā strapravakt tā . Horst Brinkhaus studies four Nepalese Mahā tmyas (from the 14th to 16th c.). Three of them are Hindu works: Paśupatipurā ṇ a, Nepā lamahā tmya and Himavatkhaṇ ḑ a. One is Buddhist: Svayaṃ bhū purā ṇ a. In the beginning, the contents of the Mahā tmyas were confined to local sites, myths about them, and their praise. They belong to the „ little tradition“ . Later on, the texts assumed much larger dimensions, and the contents started mirroring the contents of the „ great tradition“ of the pan-Indian Purā ṇ as. Among the Hindu texts, that was especially the case with the Himavatkhaṇ ḑ a, which has taken over locally tinged contents from the Paśupatipurā ṇ a and the Nepā lamahā tmya, and extended them to fit the great framework of world history, cosmography and Śaiva theology. The Buddhist Svayaṃ bhū purā ṇ a in different versions, on the other hand, bears witness to its purā ṇ ization not only by its name (not Mahā tmya nor Sthalapurā ṇ a, but Purā ṇ a), but also by its borrowing from other texts, including one extended passage from the Himavatkhaṇ ḑ a, which has been only superficially adapted to Buddhism, and used as a kind of introductory frame-story. In the preceding group consisting of five articles the parallels were looked for in different Purā ṇ ic and epic texts, within the framework of an interrelated tradition of Purā ṇ ic texts, and sometimes even beyond the boundaries of the Indian tradition. Viethsen's discussion on the relative chronology of the textual passages concerning the reasons for K ṣ ṇ a's incarnation is based on comparison of the Mahā bhā rata and its khila, and, in the background, of the Indian and Greek traditions. Magnone studies an important notion as it occurs in various Purā ṇ ic texts in various religious contexts. Valpey compares the Bhā gavatapurā ṇ a with the Mahā bhā rata to show how it pretends to present itself as a definitive (devotional) commentary on the great epic. Barois follows different versions of two stories about the śaivite sage Upamanyu through a wide range of Purā ṇ ic texts and the parvan 13 of the Mahā bhā rata. And Brinkhaus surveys four Nepalese Mahā tmyas, three Hindu and one Buddhist, and extrapolates from their mutual intertextual relationship and their relationship to the pan-Indian Purā ṇ as the process of their purā ṇ ization. The following six articles could be taken again as a group discussing the parallels between the Purā ṇ ic and Tantric texts, between the Hindu and Buddhist texts, between the Hindu and Jaina texts, and, finally, between the Sanskrit and modern literary themes in vernacular languages. Olga Serbaeva Saraogi takes the yoginī s to be an essentially śaiva Tantric concept. They can appear on four different plans: as a real woman, a super- or sub-human female, a cosmic energy or the Absolute. Serbaeva studied the representation of the feminine aspect in the Krama school of the Kashmir śaiva Tantrism. She notices that the Purā ṇ ic texts accept, the younger they are, the more Tantric elements, including the interest in the feminine. Looking for the description of the śaiva Tantrics in the Purā ṇ as on the one hand, and for borrowings from the śaiva Tantras concerning the Yoginī -related passages on the other, Serbaeva was able to establish a tentative comparative chronology of the śaiva Purā ṇ ic and śaiva Tantric texts as presented in a table at the end of her article. In that intricate table among the oldest epic and Purā ṇ ic texts one finds e. g. the Mahā bhā rata, Vā yupurā ṇ ā or Skandapurā ṇ a (the early Groningen version ; already influenced by Brahmayā mala), and among the oldest Tantric texts e. g. the Niḥ śvā satattvasaṃ hitā , Svacchadatantra or Brahmayā mala (Picumata). On the other hand, amongst the youngest Purā ṇ ic texts influenced by the Tantras there are e. g. the Agnipurā ṇ a, Śivapurā ṇ a or Skandapurā ṇ a (the young version, Nag Publishers), and amongst the youngest Tantric texts still influencing them there are e. g. the Kubjikā matatantra, Pratiṣ ṭ hā nalakṣ aṇ asamuccaya or Jayadrathayā mala. The transfer of Tantric „ secret“ contents to the „ popular“ Purā ṇ ic texts is due, according to Serbaeva, to the royal interest in them. Renate Söhnen-Thieme investigates, in the traces of Heinrich Lüders and Rudolf Franke, corresponding stories in the Jā takas and the Mahā bhā rata. She enumerates 17 stories with animal (9) or with human protagonists (8) appearing both in the Buddhist and Brahmanic epic version. In the Mahā bhā rata they appear in books 1, 3, 5 (4 tales), 7, 13, 14 and especially 12 (9 tales). Some are not included in the CE text. Söhnen-Thieme analyses four cases in the article, three animal tales and one with human protagonists, in which a similar moral is supported by close verbal agreement, which might allow conclusions about the priority of a version. The moral of these stories is the value of unanimity, the power of truth, the danger of hypocrisy, and the highest virtue of a king. From the evidence of the examples investigated, Söhnen-Thieme concludes that those stories in the older parts of the Mahā bhā rata which are shared with the Jā takas are likely to reflect pre-Buddhist sources, whereas in appendix passages of the Mahā bhā rata, especially in the NE recension, stories common to the Mahā bhā rata and Jā taka may have been borrowed from the Jā taka tradition. Especially in the cases where Mahā bhā rata expands the story and develops it into a different direction, one may infer that it changed an existing, probably a Buddhist, source, whereas the cases of closer agreement point to a common pre-Buddhist source. However, each case has to be studied separately with utmost philological care, taking into account various possibilities of intertextual influence. Klara Gönc Moačanin also explores the relationship between the Mahā bhā rata and the Buddhist tradition in the traces of Lüders, and concentrates on the parallel between the Vidhurapaṇ ḑ itajā taka and the dice game episode in the Sabhā parvan. The correspondences include the situation – the game of dice, the protagonists - Vidhura vs. Vidura, Dhanañ jaya vs. Arjuna Dhanaṃ jaya, the place of the capital – Indapatta vs. Indraprastha. The differences are striking – Dhanañ jaya is king, not Yudhiṣ ṭ hira, the game is not about the division of the kingdom, but the stake in the game is the minister Vidhura, the motive is not the wish to rule the kingdom, but the wish of the wife of the Nā ga king to hear words of wisdom from Vidhura, and the general Puṇ ṇ aka's love for the king's daughter. Gönc Moačanin stresses that the core of the Jā taka must be the gā thā s, accepts Alsdorf's claim that a half of them (ca. 150) could be genuine, perceives the Jā taka story as a yakkha / yakṣ a tale in contradistinction to the epic as a part of the Great Tradition, and suggests that both stories, the Buddhist and the epic one, must have originated from the „ floating literature“ (an older term for non-recorded oral tradition) which must have undergone Buddhist, epic and narrative stylizations in the works that have come down to us. In that process each of the three traditions must have used the elements from that common source for its own purposes. Eva De Clercq, after the study of the Jaina Rā mā yaṇ as in the previous volume, turns her attention to the Jaina K ṣ ṇ acaritas in this one. Both are parts of the Jaina Purā ṇ a tradition, created – according to P. S. Jaini – in order to provide the Jaina lay followers with an alternative „ counter tradition“ . Therefore, along with the stories of 24 tī rthaṃ karas and 12 cakravartins, they transmitted stories about 9 triads of heroes, vī ras, the eighth triad being Rā ma, Lakṣ mana and Ravaṇ a, and heroes of all the triads were termed according to the ninth triad - Baladeva, Vā sudeva and Prativā sudeva – showing the paradigmatic importance of the K ṣ ṇ acarita for the Jaina „ counter-tradition“ . The earliest attested authoritative Purā ṇ a on the K ṣ ṇ acarita is the Harivaṃ śa-purā ṇ a by Digambara Jinasena Punnā ṭ a from the 8th c. However, the adventures of K ṣ ṇ a are already briefly represented in the Śvetā mbara canon, in the Antagaḑ a-dasao, thus the tradition is older. De Clercq shows the ways how the episodes from the Harivaṃ śa were purified from inacceptable Hindu elements and adapted to the Jaina doctrine by Jaina writers up to the 16th century. André Couture has similarly devoted his article to the Jaina stories dealing with K ṣ ṇ a's childhood, which have so far attracted less attention from scholars than the Jaina Rā mā yaṇ as. However, important studies have been published by Jacobi, Alsdorf and Ruben. More recently, J. E. Cort and P. S. Jaini (1993) have called attention to the Jaina Harivaṃ śa. The article in this volume proposes a closer comparison between Hindu texts depicting K ṣ ṇ a's childhood, esp. chapters 30 to 78 of the Harivaṃ śa (CE) and the relevant Jaina texts. It focuses on three Sanskrit texts: the Uttarapurā ṇ a of Guṇ abhadra, the Harivaṃ śapurā ṇ a of Punnā ṭ a Jinasena and the Triṣ aṣ ṭ iśalā kapuruṣ acaritra of Hemacandra. The article examines their strategies to adapt the original story to the Jaina religious background. Nicolas Dejenne presents a contemporary version of the deeds of Rā ma Jā madagnya or Paraśurā ma, a long Hindī poem Jay Paraśurā m, written in 1997 by a Brahmin from Madhya Pradesh, Onkarlal Sharma „ Pramad“ . This mahā kā vya is a specimen of a recent literary and socio-political trend in some Brahmanical circles in India to re-evaluate the personality of the Brahmin-warrior Paraśurā ma. The poem tries to represent a kind of Paraśurā mapurā ṇ a by bringing together the largest possible number of episodes involving Paraśurā ma in the Sanskrit epic and Purā ṇ ic literature. Such episodes have already been elaborated by two renowned Indian nationalist writers of the 20th century: K. M. Munshi and R. S. Dinkar. Dejenne first summarizes the poem in 9 sargas (some 180 pages), and proposes to divide it in four sections deriving from different sources that „ Pramad“ has used. Next, he pays attention to Pramad's“ strategies to present the three controversial episodes from the Paraśurā ma legend in the most favourable light: the decapitation of his mother Reṇ ukā , the destruction of the Kṣ atriyas in order to revenge the death of his father Jamadagni, and his defeat by Rā ma Dā śarathi. Finally, the author analyses the values promoted by the poem and represented by Paraśurā ma, which should regenerate the holy land (puṇ yabhū mi) of Bhā rat or India - an ideology close of Hindutva. Those values, however, synthesize the traditional Brahmanical values like knowledge, asceticism, charity, disinterest..., and modern democratic values like equality of citizens, universal education, elimination of poverty, abolishment of differences between castes and between the Hindus and untouchable dalits... The poem Jay Paraśurā m bears witness of the admirable capacity of Hindu myths to undergo reinterpretation over and over again in different historical and ideological contexts. In this last group of articles, parallels and comparisons are looked for in different traditions, religions or epochs. Serbaeva Saraogi, when looking for corresponding Yoginī -related passages in the Purā ṇ as and Tantras, does not study the influence of the Purā ṇ as on the Tantras, but the largely ignored influence of the Tantras on the Purā ṇ as. Söhnen-Thieme scrupulously weighs the probabilities of intertextual relationships between the Buddhist Jā taka stories and the tales included in the Mahā bhā rata formulating some general principles, and yet warning to study each case of parallelism separately. In addition to the stud

Sanskrit; epics; puranas; India

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