Reviews Of Diffeent Books

Author(s): J W De Jong
Publisher: J W De Jong

Page 54

248
REVIEWS
pāramitāśastra, cf. Lamotte, Traité III (Louvain, 1970), pp. VII-VIII; Lamotte, 'Les sources scripturaires de l'Upadeśa et leurs valeurs respectives', Cahiers d'Extrême-Asie 2 (1986), p. 1.
2 VAV 7.17-22 are quoted in the Upadeśa as verses, cf. Lamotte, Traité I (Louvain, 1944), pp. 83–84. 3 Also Nakamura and Tsuji consider Mātrceta to be a follower of Mahāyāna, cf. Nakamura Hajime (ed.), Butten I (Tokyo, 1966), pp. 425–426; Tsuji Naoshiro, Sansukuritto bungakushi (Tokyo, 1973), p. 19. 4 For a study of the different meanings of the word dharma in the VAV see Kanakura Ensho, Memyo no kenkyū (Kyoto, 1966), pp. 104-116 (first published in Bunka 20.4, 1956).
Australian National University
J. W. DE JONG
Pandit Usharbudh Arya, Yoga-sūtras of Patañjali with the Exposition of Vyāsa. A Translation and Commentary. Volume I: Samādhi-pāda. Honesdale, Pennsylvania, The Himalayan Institute of Yoga Science and Philosophy of the U.S.A., 1986, XXI, 493 pp. $16.95.
According to the translator "the purpose of the present translation and commentary is to open the Yoga-sūtras to the serious English-reading, aspirant" (p. 16). He writes that a translation and explanation of the Yoga-sūtras will have to fulfill three conditions: I. to address its subject matter from within the initiatory tradition of the Himalayan masters; II. to incorporate the essentials of information and exposition given in the exegetical tradition of all past commentators whose works are available; III. to remain true to the basic tenets of the formal Sankhya-yoga school of philosophy (p. 4). Dr. Arya refrains from discussing the scholarly problems or even dates of the authorship of the Yoga-sūtras and Vyāsa's Bhāsya. He writes that "like much of the tradition in India we regard the works of Patanjali and Vyāsa as a single composite whole" (p. 8). Dr. Arya is very critical of the works of most scholars who have written on the Yoga-sūtras: “The works of Western scholars such as Ballentyne [i.e. Ballantyne), Boissenain [i.e. Boissevain), Deussen, Eliade, Feuerstein, Frauwallner, Garbe, Hauer, Hopkins, Hultzsch, Jacobi, Janāček, Johnston, Judge, Koelman, von Mangoldt, Pensa and others, as well as the westernized Eastern scholars such as Dasgupta and Takagi, were found to have no bearing on the purpose of this translation” (p. 16). According to him their interest is study, his interest is the practice. However, Dr. Arya does not reject academic methods and remarks that "the academicians will find that all the scholarly norms and rules have been carefully observed, that convictions of the tradition have not been permitted to overcloud the clarity
Indo-Iranian Journal 32: 1989.