Indian Antiquary Vol 04

Author(s): Jas Burgess
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 89

MARCH, 1875.] THE BHAGAVAD GITA AND CHRISTIAN WRITINGS.
Dr. Lorinser's book, for an indication of his views regarding it. He refers me to a brief mention of the work in question in a rote to an article republished in his Indische Streifen, vol. II. p. 288, where he speaks of Dr. Lorinser's remarkable endeavour to point out in the Bhagavad Gitá coincidences with and references to (Anklänge und Bezietrungen) the New Testa ment, and states that although he regards this attempt of Dr. Lorinser's to be overdone, he is. not in principle opposed to the idea which that writer maintains, but regards it as fully entitled to a fair consideration, as the date of the Bhagavad Gitd is not at all settled, and therefore presents no obstacle to the assumption of Christian influences, if these can be otherwise proved. He adds that he regards Wilson's theory that the bhakti of the later Hindu sects is essentially a Christian doctrine, as according well with all that we know already about the Svet advipa, the Krishnajanmashtami, &c. As regards the age of the Mahabharata, Prof. Weber thinks that it should be borne in mind that in the very passages which treat of the war between the Kaurava s and Pandavas, and which therefore appear to be the oldest parts of that vast epic collection, not only is direct mention made of the Yavanas, Sakas, Pahlavas, and the wars with them (see Prof. Wilson's Academical Prelections on Indian Literature, p. 178), but further that the Yavanadhipa Bhagadatta appears there as an old friend of the father of Yudhishthira (see Indische Studien, V. 152). He concludes that all these passages must be posterior to Alexander the Great, and still continues to regard his calculation that this most original part of the poem was written between the time of Alexander and that of Dio Chrysostom (see Ac. Prel. p. 176) as the most probable.
I am not aware in which, if in any, of his writings Professor Wilson may have expressed the opinion that the Indian tenet of bhakti is essentially Christian. I find no express statement to this effect in his Sketch of the Religious Sects of the Hindus, though he there says that "the doctrine of the efficacy of bhakti seems to have been an important innovation upon the primitive system of the Hindu religion."
On the same general subject Dr. Böhtlingk has favoured me with the following expression of his opinion. He writes: "Neither in the
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Mahabharata nor in later writers have I found any utterances of moral or religious import which could with any probability be referred back to any foreign source. In this department the Indians have themselves reflected so much, and presented their thoughts in such elegant forms, that with their riches they might easily supply the rest of the world. The ethics and the religion of different peoples are not so different from one another that here and there coincidences should not be expected to be found between them. The line of the Katha Upanishad,-sasyam iva martyaḥ pachyate sasyam ivájáyate punah" (like corn a mortal ripens, like corn he is produced again) "sounds as if from the New Testament, but is not therefore borrowed."
I should be glad to find that this subject attracted the attention of any correspondents whose previous studies have qualified them to discuss and elucidate it.
Edinburgh, November 5th, 1874.
II.
Dr. Lorinser considers that many of the ideas and expressions of the Bhagavad Gita are derived from Christianity.
There is, no doubt, a general resemblance between the manner in which Krishna asserts his own divine nature, enjoins devotion to his person, and sets forth the blessings which will result to his votaries from such worship, on the one hand, and, on the other, the strain in which the founder of Christianity is represented in the Gospels, and especially in the fourth, as speaking of himself and his claims, and the redemption which will follow on their faithful recognition. At the same time, the Bhagavad Gitá contains much that is exclusively Indian in its character, and which finds no counterpart in the New Testament doctrine. A few of the texts in the Indian poem also present a resemblance more or less close to some in the Bible. Perhaps the most striking is the declaration of the Bhagavad Gitá, ix. 29, " They who devoutly worship me are in me, and I in them," as compared with John vi. 56, "He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in me, and I in him." But it will be observed that the condition of oneness with the speaker is different in each case; and that it is that oneness with him only that is common to the two texts. (See, however, John xvii. 21-23, where the same reference to the condition of the oneness is not found.)