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TILE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
SEPTEMBER, 1928
THE HOME OF THE UPANISADS.
BY UMESH CHANDRA BHATTACHARJEE, M.A., B.L. WHERE were the Upanigads born? In what particular area, in what part of India, were these remarkable books brought into existence? Was it in the East or West or North or South, that these speculations first saw the light of day?
The question does not imply that all the Upanişads were born in one place, during one period of time and among one homogencous sect of men. On the contrary, we have very good reasons to believe that the growth of this literature and its development was spread out over a fairly long period of time, and that all of these books were not written in the same locality and certainly not by the same hand.
The name Upanişad comprises a considerable number of books; and between an Upaninad like the Isa and one called the Allopanişad, there exist all the differences that may possibly exist between two books of the same class. And even between Upanişads which are more akin to each other, a difference of time and of place and also of authorship, may easily be noticed. Not only so, but, just as in the case of the Vedas proper, the different Sakhis imply temporal and geographical differences, and just as these differences are traceable in, among other things, the different readings of the Texts, so, among the Upanişads too, there exist different readings of common passages and common anecdotes, which indicate that differences of time and place have left their mark on these texts and these stories. The fact of different reading has been recognised even by Sayaņa, in his commentary on the Narayaniya Upanisad (quoted by Max Müller, History of Sanskrit Literature, p. 122n.) : " Tadiya-påthasampradayo desavisenesu bahubidho drsyate, etc." So, a difference of time and of place may be detected not only among the diverse books, but even in the readings of the same book; for instance, in the anecdote of Balaki and Ajatasatru, which occur in the Brhadaranyaka and the Kausitaki, and in the story of Praváhana Jaibali, which occurs in the Chándogya, the Brhadaranyaka and the Kausitaki, though the main incidents are the same, still verbal differences in the accounts given are noticeable, indicating a difference of time and authorship.
As to authorship, however, indigenous tradition has a tendency to conceal it. The Upanişads constitute a part of the revealed literature of the country, and as such, according to the orthodox way of thinking, do not owe their origin to any human hand. But modern scholarship has not been baffled in its inquiry in this direction. It is possible now to draw definite conclusions, at least about the class of men among whom this literature was developed ; and we are pretty certain that this was a sect of Brâhmanas, mainly itinerant, but sometimes also owning a settled home, who were the fathers of this cult. But whatever that may have been, this literature was not the product of one hand-it could not possibly have been
So, when we ask the question about the home of the Upanisady, we do not imply that they were like an individual book, written by one hand, at a certain place, like John Bunyan writing his Pilgrim's Progress, within the four walls of the prison-house, or like Gray writing his Elegy in a Country Church-yard. We are quite alive to the varied differences among the books of the Upanişads. But they still have a family likeness about them; it is not in name only that they agree; the same—at any rate, a similar, trend of thought runs through them all, or, in any case, a great majority of them. This fact it is that is emphasised in Vedanta-Sutra i. 1. 10. (Gatisámányát,) where it is claimed that all the Vedântas proclaim Brahma as the cause of the universe. Now, we only want to know where, in which particular part of India, was this speculation started and developed ? The question necessarily implies that it is possible to fix, broadly, the limits of the territory within which Brahma-vidyê was originally cultivated.
Our enquiry in this matter will depend on three kinds of testimony: (i) the testimony of Sruti literature other than the Upanişads ; (ü) the testimony of the Upanişads themselves; and (iii) the testimony of the later Sanskrit literature, e.g., the Puranas, etc.
