Study Of Mahabharata

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

Page 12

**to010) terms-of the goodies and the baddies. In the Mahābhārata this is so extreme as to have led to the so-called inversion theory', according to which the Kauravas were actually the original heroes and the Pāņdavas the original villains. There can be few now who would adhere to this theory-Duryodhana and Duḥśāsana are ill equipped to serve as epic heroes--but the facts for which it sought to account remain to trouble us."27
Even less has to be said of the mythological theory of Alfred Ludwig (1832-1911), who thought that the original poem telling of the feud between two tribes was later transformed into a seasonal myth. Duryodhana represents winter while Bhima, the son of Vāyu, is spring, the period of the equinoctial storms. In the second half of the nineteenth century the nature-myth method was applied to Indian religion by Adalbert Kuhn and Max Müller. One finds it still accepted by Keith in his book on The Religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads (Cambridge, 1925, p. 58), and, although nowadays totally rejected by Indologists, it still crops up in general works on the history of religion.20
An entirely new vision on the epic is to be found in the abovementioned book by Joseph Dahlmann S. J. (1861-1930). Dahlmann's work caused a great stir in Indological circles. Winternitz wrote that by giving rise to a veritable "Dahlmannliterature" it revived studies on the epic.30 Dahlmann vigorously proclaimed the unity of the epic. The central theme of the Mahābhārata is the dharma, the religious and sacred law. The poet describes the battle between dharma and adharma. Sukthankar summarizes the main conclusions of Dahlmann as follows: “(1) The epic is a well defined unity. (2) All the different parts of the poem are joined together with some distinct
and definite purpose, and answering admirably that purpose. (3) The unity of plan and aim was conceived in the mind of one single individual,
who carried out the work in terms of this preconceived unity. (4) Therefore successive expansion, and one or more recasts of the poem are
out of the question. (5) The date of the poem as composed or compiled by the diaskeuast is cer
tainly not later than the fifth century B. C.1 According to Sukthankar, "of all foreign critics of the Mahābhārata (Dahlmann] inay be said to approach nearest to any real understanding of the Great Epic of India " (op. cit., p. 19).
On three points Sukthankar criticised Dahlmann. In the first place Dahlmann's views regarding the unity and homogeneity of the text were much exaggerated. Sukthankar states that the critical edition of the epic shows that large blocks of