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15. GITA
It has already been mentioned that when the original Gita was altered, the interpolators also made changes in many other works of that time to establish textual support in their favor. It was for this reason that the interpolations were made in the Rig Veda, the Epics, Samkhya Karika, and Yoga Sutra. It is obvious that there could have been numerous alterations in many other texts, still to be detected.
It has also been pointed out that bands of proselytizers for the new Brahmanic faith were organized at four different centers (mathas) during the time of Shankaracharya. These teachers received increasing political protection and patronage. At the same time, the national opponents of the new faith were forced into silence.
In such an atmosphere, the people had to accept the doctrines of the new faith even when they did not agree with them. This enforced obedience of the Indian people towards the newly coined doctrines and codes of behavior which, though beneficial to the Brahmans as a caste, were disastrous to India as a nation, as a political entity, and as a culture.
The repercussions of these changes were so far-reaching that they can not be adequately discussed under any single category. I have, therefore, preferred to cover them under four different subheadings:
(i) political submissiveness;
(ii) philosophical distortions;
(iii) mystification of Yoga; and
(iv) religious and cultural effects.
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