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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
One might, however, object that the Indians themselves have not at all seen any inconsistency in this combination of Pantheism and Theism; in many other passages of the Mahabharata (e.g. just at its commencement, Anukramanikaparvan, vv. 22-24), in the Puranas and elsewhere, Krishna, i.e. Vishnu, is indeed often enough identified with the universal Soul. And in the system of Râmânuja, the Brahman is conceived to be thoroughly personal,-as an all-powerful, all-knowing and all-merciful Ruler of the Universe which is pervaded by His godly spirit. Why should not have (therefore) the author of the Gità composed the poem under this belief itself in which the theistic and the pantheistic elements lay side by side?
[Text p. 11] To this I reply as follows. The identification of Krishna with Brahman, his being regarded as the universal Soul, belongs to a period posterior to the original Bhag. a period filled with syncretic inclinations. This can be proved from the Gitá itself as it has come down to us.
As is well-known, Krishna comes to be regarded as the Supreme Principle first in the later parts of the Mahabharata. The Gitd, however, does not belong to its later interpolations. The Gitâ, even in the revised form in which it lies before us, is regarded rightly as one of the older episodes of the Mahabharata. (Holtzmann, op. cit., part II, 121; Hopkins, Great Epic, 205, 402.) Indeed Holtzmann (I, 127) would "ascribe the oldest parts of the Bhag. unhesitatingly to the older poem." Even if I do not subscribe to this latter statement still on ground of its language and its metre, the relative antiquity of the Bhag. cannot be doubted. With this also quite fits in (the circumstance) that in the Gita Krishna stands forth almost thoroughly as a person, and that his identification with Brahman is expressed in clear words only in a few passages (which also will be discussed more closely shortly). I shall here only call attention to Bhag. VII. 19: "At the end of many lives the man of knowledge approaches me realising that Vasudeva is everything.' Such a high-souled person is very difficult to find." That is, Krishna was very seldom regarded as the all (or Brahman), but he was almost always regarded as a personal God. Does not the reviser of the Gita express here in quite clear words that the identification of Krishna with Brahman was at his time first in (process of) growth? In the first verse of the twelth Adhyaya, which in my opinion belongs to the older poem, those who revere the unchangeable and unknowable Brahman are placed in opposition to the Theists who worship Krishna, with a preference for the latter (verse 2), and with a remark that the difficulties [in the way] of the Theists for obtaining eternal welfare are lesser [than for the Avyakta-Upisakas) (verse 5).
[Text p. 12] Hopkins, Great Epic, 398, characterises the third of the periods postulated by him in the development of the Mahabharata-text in these words:" Re-making of the epic with Krishna as all-god, &c."; for the preceding second period, [a Mahabharata tale with Pandu heroes, lays and legends combined by the Puranic diaskeuasts] Hopkins lays
7 For more on this point, see part IV of this Preface.
