Zend Avesta Part 01

SR No.: 007671
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: James Darmesteter
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1895
Total Pages: 2695
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 49 MB

Page 1888

INTRODUCTION.
33
does the Kasika Vritti. But a note of Professor Tåranatha Tarkavakaspati, of Calcutta, says that Para sarya is Vyasa, and the Bhikshu-sätra is the Vedanta-sâtral. If this is correct, the Vedanta-sâtras go very far indeed into antiquity. For Panini can certainly not be assigned to a later date than the fourth century B.C., while that learned scholar, Professor Goldstücker, on grounds of considerable strength, assigned him to a much earlier date. The question thus comes to this, Is the remark of Professor Tåramatha, above set out, correct? I find then, from enquiries made of my venerable and erudite friend Yagüesvar Sastria, the author of the Aryavidyasudhakara, that the note of Taranatha is based on the works of Bhattogi Dikshita, Ságggi Bhalla, and Granendra Sarasvati, who all give the same interpretation of the Sætra in question. It is certainly unfortunate that we have no older authority on this point than Bhattogi. The interpretation is in itself not improbable. Vyása is certainly by the current tradition 8 called the author of the Vedanta-sútras, and also the son of Parásara. Nor is Bhikshu-satra a name too far removed in sense from Vedanta-sutra, though doubtless the former name is not now in use, at all events as applied to the Satras attributed to Bådarayana, and though, it must also be stated, a Bhikshu-sútra Bhashya Vårtika is mentioned co aominc by Professor Weber as actually in existence at the prescat day. Taking all things together, therefore, we may provisionally understand the Bhikshu-sutra mentioned by Parini to be identical with the Vedanta-sätras. But even apart from that identification, the other testimonies we have adduced prove, I think, the high antiquity of those Sotras, and consequently of the Bhagavadgita.
We have thus examined, at what, considering the importance and difficulty of the subject, will not, I trust, be regarded as unreasonable length, some of the principal pieces of internal and external evidence touching the age
Soe Siddhanta Kaumodi, vol. I, p. 593. • See hits Pimial; and see also Buhler's Apastamba in this series, Introd. p codi sole
"The correctness of this tradition is very doubtfal. • lodhche Studien I, 470.
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