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Vol. XXI, 1997
REVIEWS
159
and twelve to the Southern Version. Moreover he has also utilized twelve commentaries and three epitomes listed under Testimonia. Giving an analysis of the Mss., the editor has noted that there are only three main Versions noted above. He has further noted that over and above genuine 326 interpolations, the Tenth Skandha has bigger to biggest interpolations numbering XXXI. In Appendices I and II, he has given the information about the absence of 20 stanzas (42 lines) on D1, while the first 11 ones (24 lines) are omitted in Cv after X.11,9. In Appendix III, he has noted that after the end of the Tenth Adhyāya, Vulgate Adhyāyas Twelve, Thirteen and Fourteen have not been found in D1 and Nni, Cvd and Cv consider them as interpolated (vigitah), though commented upon. These three Adhyāyas form the Appendix III. These three Adhyāyas are also a later interpolation, since not a slight mention of the incidents narrated in these Adhyāyas is found anywhere in the Bhāgavata Purāna, where several times some references about Krsna's childhood have been given. Again the last stanza of X. 11. 39 has been repeated at the end of the Vulgate 14th Adhyāya. Over and above these three, the editor has given twentysix more Appendices, although the Appendix V and XXI have been split into A and B. Thus in fact the total number of appendices comes to thirty-one. He has observed in this connection that it is a strange thing that only the Tenth Skandha is full of smaller 326 and bigger 31 interpolations, which fact shows that this Skandha was very very popular over the continent and it is for that very reason that a great number of interpolations, small and big, have crept in. He has further noted that Sridhara is the oldest commentator, and still however his version possesses a lot of interpolations as against the Devanāgarī (D1) Version of about the 12th Cent. A. D., possibly both of the same period.
In this Critical Study, which forms section III of his Introduction, the editor has taken stock of the learned findings of the veteran orientalists like Dr. R. G. Bhandarkar, Jacobi, Prof. Winternitz, S. N. Tadpatrikar, surveyed their views, and has considered the Krsna problem afresh. The opinion of Dr. Bhandarkar that nomadic tribes brought the name of Jesus Christ in India is no longer tenable, because in the concluding portions of the Mahābhārata, excluding the Bhagavadgitā, Krsna seems to be considered a superhuman person, in whom we hardly see divinity; he is before us as an able politician, as a superman friend of Arjuna. But in the Gita we find for the very first time that Krsna is not only a superman, but rather as God par excellence, a Parāt-para, Parameśvara, Paramātmā, and Pūrņa-puruşottama, (15. 16-18). It is true that in the Mahābhārata, in very rare places the incidents of Krsna's childhood are found
