Indian Antiquary Vol 03

Author(s): Jas Burgess
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 32

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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[JANUARY, 1874.
The next phase of Krishna Devakiputra after that of the eager scholar in the Chand. Up. is that of the brave hero and warrior of the Vrishni race in which we find him in the Mahd Bhdrata, and on account of which, for example, at the sacrifice of Yudhishthira (2, 1332, 1378, 1384), although himself not a king, he receives before all the assembled kings the gift of honour (argha) due to the worthiest. But in the same epos he appears further as already exalted to semi-divine rank as the wise friend and counsellor of Pandava, of supernatural power and wisdom.* Whatever may have been the causes of this exaltation (and unfortunately they are still beyond our knowledge), this much is certain, that it had already taken place at the time when the Indian sages, who according to an episode of the same epos, made a pilgrimage to the Svetadvipa, the white island,t found there
the worship of Christ the son of the divine maiden in full bloom, which must have appeared I to them as a guarantee for the propriety of the semi-divine exaltation of their own Krishna theson of Devaki, $ and had as its natural consequence its consolidation and wider extension. That this is the true state of the case, and that the present Krishna-worship in India rests also essentially on that pilgrimage of Nárada and the fruitless journey, as it is represented, of his three predecessors Ekata, Dvita, Trita to the Svetadvipa, undertaken, in obedience to an invisible voice, in order to learn there the monotheistio doctrine of its white inhabitants. the doctrine of the unit of the divine power,--the ekinta, -of which the episode in the twelfth book of the Maha Bhdrata has fortunately preserved the legendary account, can scarcely admit of a doubt, since on the one
Compare the passages quoted by Lassen, II, 1108, from an inscription of Kumragupta (whom Lansen supposes to have lived till 270, but Bhau Diji, in the Journal of the B. R.A.S. Soc. No. XXII., p. 115, till 459). "As the conqueror of his foes, Krishna, who is girt with golden beams, honoured Devaki; may be maintain his purpose!" And an inscription we have in Indian and Bactrian writing seems considerably older, belonging perhaps to the first or second century, which contains the name Krishnayasas, and we edited by Bayley with a facsimile in the Journ. As. Soc. Beng. 1854, pp. 57, 59 (conf. 2 der D. M. Ges. 9, 630, 631, where also a facsimile is given). Bayley remarks: “This name, glory of Krishna, would seem to indicate the admission of Krishna into the Hindoo pantheon at the period when the inscription was cat. If, however, this be eventually established, it by no means follows that the name was applied to the same deity as at present, still less that he was worshipped in the game manner.
+ See on this point Råmatap. Up., pp. 277, 278; the word may also mean the "Island of the white men."
I Just as the Greeks sought and found echoes of their mythology everywhere.
& Whose name looks as if it meant "the divine."
|| Endine with his exaltation to Vishnu's place, in which he is frequently glorified in other places of the Maha Bhar. To the legends about Krishna's exploits as an infant I find special allusion only once in the Mahd Bhar. (2, 1436-45); they belong, as do the notices about his sport with the Bhepherdesses, to the latest interpolations into that epos (conf. Wilson's note Vishnu Pur., p. 492). The raising to life of the dead son of Duhsa!A, and other similar stories, are not in the Maha Bhar., but in the Jaimini Bharata. As to the silence of the older Buddhistio texts with regard to the worship of Krishna, vide Burnouf, Introduction, p. 136. That Krishna is named with his brother) Valadeut in Vard. hamihina, but without being brought prominently forward, I mentioned in my Berlin Catalogue of Sansk. Mss. ; tbey appear there is standing on either side of a goddess who bears the curious name Ekanana (vide B. & R.) who is represented now with four arms, now with eight, but in either case holding in one hand a book (! pustakam: the "Book" was in the East in the pre-Muhammadan time & mark of the Jew and Christian), in another & rosary (akshasitra). I do not remember any reference to the identity of Krishna and Vishnu in the Mrichha katt. But in K Alid Asa's works it is complete ; thus in Mahavikdgnimitra, V. 77, an exploit of Krishna's is ascribed to Vishnu (the same thing is done in Bhaubh Ali's Malattmadhava, 123, 6, 104, 6). Vice versa in the Kumdras. 3, 13, an exploit of Vishnu's is transferred to Krishna. In Raghwania 15, 84 K Arishna stands for Vaishnava; conf. ibid. 17, 29 Meghad. 15. In Raghuvansa 6, 49 there is an allusion to Krishna's fight with K Aliya. If we could put KAlid lea at the end of the third century, as I proposed in the preface to my translation of the Malavikdgn. (though I referred to this identification of Krishna with Vishna ws throwing a doubt on that), that
would point to the second centary as the time when the Christian influence must have been felt in India. I am now, however, more inclined to Kern's view, who (Pref. to 2nd ed. of Varshamihira's Brih. Samhita, p. 20) puts Kálid Asa in the sixth century, and I favour this opinion because the special regard shown in the Raghuvansa for King Bhoja and his race (though of course they are in the poem transferred to remote antiquity) Heems to me to point to the glorification of a contemporary prince (conf. my paper on the Ramatap. Up. p. 279n.) The ques. tion how far the works that bear Kálid isa's name, at least the six principal ones (the three dramas with the Meghaduta, Raghuvansa, and the Kumarasambhav) really belong to the same author, has not yet been satisfactorily answered, so that the dates we use here for our purpose do pot carry conviction. In Subandhu's Vasavadatta (which Hall ascribes to the beginning of the 7th century) a deed of Krishna's is ascribed to Hari (Vishnu) in p. vi. of the Introduction and he appears there in several places as Kansa's foe, or in the company of Yaśodi and the cowherd Nanda (in Hall's ed. pp. 11, 12, 29, 150, 286.)
T See Ind. Stud. I, 400; II, 166-9, 398-400: IX, 65; Lassen Ind. Alt. K. II, 1096 ff. Below I give some of the main passages. First in reference to Ekata, Dvita, Trita (who might have reminded us of the three Magi, had not their journey been unsuccessful), we read in Maha Bhar. XII. 12776 #. atha vratasya 'vabhrithe vdg uvdcha' farir in
1176 11 .. ydyam jindsavo bhaktah katham drakshyaths
tam vibhumi ks herod adher uttaratah sveta dvipo mahapra.
bhah !! 78 11 tatra Narayana para manavi chandravarchasak! ekantabhávopagatás te bhaktali purushottamam 1 7911 te sahasrarchisham devam pravišanti sundtanam anindriya ninthara anispandah sugandhina) 11 80 11 ekantinas te purushah Sveta dve paniudsina! gachadhram tatra munayas tatra” tma noh praka
sital 1 81 11 atha srutud vayam sarve vacham tam anarfrinim yathalhydtena mirgena tam desam pratipedire (sic! 3
pers. instead of 1 pers.) 11 82 11 präpya svetam mahadvipam.. vratávasdne cha subhan narán dadrisire (sic, as before)
vayam svetan chandrapratikasan sarvalakshanalakshi.
tan II 86 11 ... vayam tv enan na paśyamo mohifas tasya ma
yaya 1- 11 99 II *** .. wudcha khas tham kim api bhatam tatra
sarirakam 11 803 11 ...gachadham munayah sarve yathagatam ito
birati na sa sakyns tv adhaktena drashfum devah katham
chana 11 806 11