Book-review (pustaka-samikshana)

Book-Review [pustaka-samikshana] / By Prof. K. Chattopadhyaya, Research-Director, Varanaseya Sanskrit University, Varanasi / 476-478

The Gita and Indian Culture:-By H. H. Sri Jaya Chamaraja Wadiar, Orient Longmans, 1963, Price Rupees Three, The Bhagavad-Gita is the central core of the Mahabharata which Poet Rabindranath Tagore considered as the Eternal History of India. The learned Maharaja of Mysore, who is the author of this brochure, has tried to show in the two essays contained in this book how the Bhagavad-Gita represents the perennial philosophy of India. The two essays bear the captions, (1) The Gita on Righteousness and (2) The Conception of Ksetra and Ksetrajna in the Gita. He The Maharaja has started with the statement that he is a devotte of the Gita. This is evident from every line of the work. He is also a follower of the tradition of Sri Sankaracharya, as is natural for the head of a state in which the Srngeri Matha has existed for the last several centuries. He has believed, therefore, that the purport of the Gita lies in Jnana, 'Knowledge'. thinks that "A man of knowledge alone can work of the good of the world (loka-sangraha) by precept and example". He appears to agree with the view that the eighteen verses 54-71 of the second chapter on the sthita-prajna form the substance of the entire teaching of the eighteen chapters of the Gita," a view forcefully defended by a recent commentator on the Gita in Bengali, the retired Professor of Chemistry of the Allahabad University, Sri Kshetra Pada Chatterjee. The Maharaja has tried to show in the first essay that it is only the sthita-prajna who is capable of truly righteous conduct. In the second essay, the author has tried to show the symbolism of the war with which the Gita starts, Kuruksetra is with him the battle field of life. Like the Kauravas and the Pandavas, both belonging to the same family who were at war, non-knowledge and knowledge, which form the whole content of the world, are perennially at war. It is through the victory of

July, 1964] BOOK-REVIEW 477 knowledge that good will prevail. For that knowledge, chapter XIII of the Gita gives to us the necessary materials in short form. The ascent from matter to spirit through life is the journey to be undertaken. This is where Svadhyaya helps. Isvaranugraha or the grace of God acts in the sence of God helping those who help themselves. From the summary and quotations given above, it is clear that this little book is very interesting and useful for the solution of many of our present day problems. It is not necessary that every reader will agree with every statement in the book. The reviewer himself does not. The Maharaja seems to agree with the view that "the full meaning of the Gita can only be captured by repeated reading and study (parayana)". That is what the reviewer was taught by his Guru, the late Mahamahopadhyaya Dr. Ganganatha Jha, who thought that the different Acharyas had pulled the Gita each his own way to the obscuration of the real meaning of this great work. But the reviewer feels that the author of this interesting work has under the influence of Sri Sankaracharya's commentary failed to do full justice to several passages of the Gita which clearly lay emphasis on bhakti (devotion) and prapatti (complete surrender to God). The final teaching of the Gi a appears to be : sarvadharman parityajya mamekam saranam vraja | (XVIII. 66). There are a few mistakes in translation in the book under review. E. g. the second half of verse VI. 35, asamsayam mahabaho mano durnigraham calam || abhyasena tu kaunteya vairagyena ca grhyate || has been translated as "Truth is grasped by Abbyasa and Vairagya" on page 34, whereas manah (mind) of the first half of the verse is the subject of grhyate (is controlled) of second verse. Sri Sankaracharya has also taken that obvious view. In the Kathopanisad passage nayamatma pravacanena labhyah ; pravacanena has been wrongly rendered as "by reading books," (p. 35), whereas the 28

478 puranam - PURANA [Vol. VI., No. 2 word means "exposition of the texts learnt". It cannot mean learning of many Vedic texts, as explained by Sankara, because of what follows, na medhaya na bahuna srutena . For the correct meaning of pravacana, one may refer to a well known passage in Patanjali's Mahabhasya on Panini's grammer, caturbhisca prakaraividyopayukta bhavatyagama- kalena svadhyayakalena pravacanakalena vyavahara kaleneti (Ahnika 1, Kielhorn's edition, Volume I, pp. 5-6). The translation of Satyadharmaya drstay in Isopanisad verse 15, as "to my vision who am truthful and righteous" (p. 30) cannot be defended. The author has followed Sri Sankara charya in taking the word Satya-dharma as a Bahuviihi. But even in a Bahuvrihi the two members cannot be co-ordinates. The first is an adjective or otherwise qualifies the second member. Sankara analyses the compound as Satyam dharmo yasya and not, as the author's translation implies, Satyam ca dharmas ca yasya. In spite of the view of Sankara, probably based on the accent of the compounded word, we cannot take satyadharma to be a Bahuvi ihi compound, because in every other passage of the vast Vedic literature, satya and dharma when compounded as a Bahuvrihi become Satya-dharman and not satya-dharma." may recall in this connexion Panini's 124), applicable to both the classical and the Vedic language. Satya-dharma in the Isopanisad has, therefore, to be explained as a Karmadharaya, meaning the true dharma. That is how the word has been explained by implication in the comment on this verse in Maitrayaniya Upanssad VI. 35 ( esa ha vai satyadharmo yadadityastha sradityatvam ). The fourth case-ending in satyadharmaya is a case of case-attraction due to the following drstaye (meaning satyadharmasya drstaye ) like the well-known passage fagain Rgveda-Samhila I. 50. 1. ma One (V. 4. In spite of these minor points, the book under review is on the whole extremely useful. K. CHATTOPADHYAYA. 1. Vaidika padanukramakosa, Vol. II. p. 1015, XIII, 3231, XIV 3948,