Indian Antiquary Vol 47

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 365

GARBE'S INTRODUCTION TO THE BHAGAV ADOITA
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eontributed along with other reasons to the oft-repeated assertion of the post-Christian origin of the Svetasvatara Upanishad.29 I do not believe that this supposition is justified ; [p. 30) and just for this reason that many verses of the Svetdívatara Upanishad are already to be come across in the original Bhag. which according to my view (see below, Ch. IV of this preface) dates from a pre-Christian period. If it could really be proved as Sankara makes us understand, that the Brahma-Sutras oftentimes allude to the Sveta vatara Upanishad, then the existence of the latter in pre-Christian times could be completely vouchsafed for. In determining the antiquity of the idea of) Bhakti in India we might, however, leave for a short time this (point) out of our consideration.
Weber has on oft-repeated occasions asserted the borrowing of the conception of) Bhakti from Christianity, and in making this assertion, he has principally relied upon the remarkable legend contained in the twelfth book of the Mahabharata which says that the sages Närada (Adh. 337, Cal. ed.), Ekata, Dvita and Trita (Adh. 338) had gone to the "Svetad vipa, "the white island,” or “the island of the white ones," and that Narada brought back with him from there the Pâicharâtra doetrine there expounded to him by Narayana. Weber's explanation that this statement could only be explicable "if we recognize therein a tradition of the journey of Indian saints to Alexandria and of their having incurred there an acquaintance with Christianity," is, at the first sight, 30 very tempting. When we read in the Mahabharata that the white men living in the Svetadvipa were filled with the highest passion for the one invisible God Narayana (Mahabharata, XII. 12.798) and that they worshipped him in their hearts with lowly muttered prayers (Mahâbharata, XII. 12,787), the whole, to be sure, sounds as extraordinarily Christian. Lassen himself-who otherwise has firmly set himself against Weber's theory regarding the influence of Christianity in the development of Krishọa-ism-is, by reason of this portrayal of the Svetadvîpa, led to the supposition Ind. Altertum. II?, 1118, 1119) [p. 31] that "certain Brahmins might have learnt to know of Christianity in a land lying to the north-west of their mother-country and might have brought to India some Christian tenets ; ” he is of the opinion that this land might be Parthia " since the tradition that the apostle Thomas had preached gospel in this land is old.”
After reading that remarkable section of the Mahâbhârata) I cannot, however, convince myself that there is contained in the legend the historical kernel which Weber and Lassen believe to find therein. The account is so marvellous and phantastic that I can only perceive therein the representation of a purely mythical land of blessed existence. The view of Barth (Religions de l'Inde, page 132) (=English Trans., Trübner's Oriental Series, p. 221] and of Telang' that there lay here purely a product of poetic fancy appears to be thoroughly conclusive. The Svetadvipa lies north-east (XII, 12,703) or north XII. 12.774) of the Mount Meru (and) on the other side of the Milky Ocean ; the whito
29 E.g., by Webery Ind. Stu., I. 421-423; and Röer in the Preface tu his translation of the Upanishad, Bibl Indi., Vol. XV., p. 36.
30 Die Griechen in Indien : Sitzungsberi. Ber: Aka: Wissensch. 1890, p. 930 ; cf. also Ind. Stu., 1. 400, II. 398 and ff; Die Rama-Tapantya-Upanishad, Abhand. Berlin: Aks: Wissensch., 1864, p. 277. über die Krishna-janmashtami (The birthday festival of Krishna), ibid, 1867, pp. 318-324: Zur Indischen Religionsgoouhichte, p. 30 and elsewhere.
al Pratápa Chandra Ray, Mahabharata trans. XII, p. 762 note, following Telang's preface to his metrical translation of the Bhag., a work not accessible to me, Hopkins also, Religions of India, PR. 431, 139, doon not find any trace of Christianity in wo Svetadvips opine de.