Madhuvidya

Author(s): S D Laddu, T N Dharmadhikari, Madhvi Kolhatkar, Pratibha Pingle
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 662

REVIEWS
H.R. DIWEKAR, V. P. LIMAYE, R. N. DANDEKAR, C. G. KASHIKAR
and V. V. BHIDE, Ed., Kausikasutra Därilabhāsya, Post-Graduate and Research Department of Tilak Maharashtra Vidyapitha, Poona, 1972, pp. xvi, 36, 136 + 136, 59, Price Rs. 50, £ 3, $ 8.
Among the ancilliary texts belonging to the different Vedas, the Kausikasūtra (KS), belonging to the Atharvaveda, occupies a peculiar position. It is neither a Srauta, nor a Grhya-sutra but "a mixture of two distinct kinds of Sūtras, Atharva-sūtras and Grhya-sütras" (Bloomfield JAOS 14.xxi). The text of the KS itself is not easily intelligible and hence one is often required to take help from the commentary of Dārila and the Paddhati of Kešava. Until recently only extracts from these two texts, published by Bloomfield in JAOS 14, along with the text of the Kausikasutra, were available to scholars. It was therefore necessary to publish the entire text of the commentary of Darila.
This task has now been accomplished by a group of eminent and devoted Sanskrit scholars. Unfortunately they were compelled to base their text on a single manuscript, a microfilm of which was made available to them by the authorities of the University Library at Tübingen (W. Germany). Three other manuscripts of the commentary are known to exist; but these could not be traced by the editors in spite of their great efforts to procure them. The only manuscript, on the other hand, on which the present text is based, is corrupt beyond imagination. The diff. culties of the editors in this situation therefore can be imagined. They must have been required indeed to struggle very hard to obtain a fairly intelligible text out of the corrupt manuscript. A look at the original text, which also has been reproduced in the editon by the off-set process, will convince any onc about the truth of the following statement of the editors: “The editors had literally to wrestle with many passages for hours together--not unoften, in several sittings--before they could restore them to an intelligible form " (p. xiii). One really admires the patience, the tenacity and the ingenuity expended by the editors in bringing out this excellent edition. It is indeed difficult to express adequately our gratitude to the editors for this devoted work.
The edition first gives the text of the KS upto the end of Kandikā 48. This is followed by the commentary of Darila---both as it appears in the original and as read by the editors. In the end are given some very useful and informative Appendices. In the Appendix where citations from the accented texts like the Atharvaveda are given it would have been better to give those citations with accent. In App. A (p. 12) we have a note ( 28.6) on sarvayajñānāin cendrabhaktitvät. In this note we are referred to the
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