180-450: Vedanta ( / v eɪ ˈ d ɑː n t ə / ; Sanskrit : वेदान्त , IAST : Vedānta ), also known as Uttara Mīmāṃsā , is one of the six orthodox ( āstika ) traditions of textual exegesis and Hindu philosophy . The word "Vedanta" means "conclusion of the Vedas ", and encompasses the ideas that emerged from, or aligned and reinterpreted, the speculations and enumerations contained in
360-457: A bhedabheda -based synthesis of the teachings found in the diverse Upanishads , and while there may have been other similar syntheses in the past, only the Brahma Sūtras have survived to the present day. The Bhagavadgītā , with its syncretism of Samkhya , Yoga , and Upanishadic thought, has also been a significant influence on Vedantic thought. All Vedāntins agree that scripture (śruti) is
540-534: A "formulation of truth," but also to "the ultimate and basic essence of the cosmos," standing at the "summit of the hierarchical scheme, or at the bottom as the ultimate foundation of all things." Brahman is "beyond the reach of human perception and thought." Atman likewise has multiple meanings, one of them being 'self', the inner essence of a human body/person. Various ideas about the relation between Atman and Brahman can be found. Two distinct, somewhat divergent themes stand out. Older upanishads state that Atman
720-478: A Bhedābheda Vedāntic viewpoint." Badarayana summarized the teachings of the classical Upanishads and refuted the rival philosophical schools in ancient India like the sāṃkhya system. The Brahma Sutras laid the basis for the development of Vedanta philosophy. Though attributed to Badarayana, the Brahma Sutras were likely composed by multiple authors over the course of hundreds of years. The estimates on when
900-418: A carpenter builds a chariot. The various philosophical theories in the early Upanishads have been attributed to famous sages such as Yajnavalkya , Uddalaka Aruni , Shvetaketu , Shandilya , Aitareya, Balaki, Pippalada , and Sanatkumara . Women, such as Maitreyi and Gargi , participate in the dialogues and are also credited in the early Upanishads. There are some exceptions to the anonymous tradition of
1080-622: A dead language in the most common usage of the term. Pollock's notion of the "death of Sanskrit" remains in this unclear realm between academia and public opinion when he says that "most observers would agree that, in some crucial way, Sanskrit is dead." Upanishads Divisions Sama vedic Yajur vedic Atharva vedic Vaishnava puranas Shaiva puranas Shakta puranas The Upanishads ( / ʊ ˈ p ʌ n ɪ ʃ ə d z / ; Sanskrit : उपनिषद् , IAST : Upaniṣad , pronounced [ˈʊpɐnɪʂɐd] ) are late Vedic and post-Vedic Sanskrit texts that "document
1260-528: A divine potency that is inconceivable. He is all-pervading and thus in all parts of the universe (non-difference), yet he is inconceivably more (difference). This school is at the foundation of the Gaudiya Vaishnava religious tradition. The ISKCON or the Hare Krishnas also affiliate to this school of Vedanta Philosophy. The history of Vedanta can be divided into two periods: one prior to
1440-433: A focus on Indian philosophies and Sanskrit. Though written in a number of different scripts, the dominant language of Hindu texts has been Sanskrit. It or a hybrid form of Sanskrit became the preferred language of Mahayana Buddhism scholarship; for example, one of the early and influential Buddhist philosophers, Nagarjuna (~200 CE), used Classical Sanskrit as the language for his texts. According to Renou, Sanskrit had
1620-591: A language competed with numerous, less exact vernacular Indian languages called Prakritic languages ( prākṛta - ). The term prakrta literally means "original, natural, normal, artless", states Franklin Southworth . The relationship between Prakrit and Sanskrit is found in Indian texts dated to the 1st millennium CE. Patañjali acknowledged that Prakrit is the first language, one instinctively adopted by every child with all its imperfections and later leads to
1800-623: A later date for the Upanishads than has generally been accepted. Bronkhorst places even the oldest of the Upanishads, such as the Brhadaranyaka as possibly still being composed at "a date close to Katyayana and Patañjali [the grammarian]" (i.e., c. 2nd century BCE). The later Upanishads, numbering about 95, also called minor Upanishads, are dated from the late 1st-millennium BCE to mid 2nd-millennium CE. Gavin Flood dates many of
1980-658: A limited role in the Theravada tradition (formerly known as the Hinayana) but the Prakrit works that have survived are of doubtful authenticity. Some of the canonical fragments of the early Buddhist traditions, discovered in the 20th century, suggest the early Buddhist traditions used an imperfect and reasonably good Sanskrit, sometimes with a Pali syntax, states Renou. The Mahāsāṃghika and Mahavastu, in their late Hinayana forms, used hybrid Sanskrit for their literature. Sanskrit
SECTION 10
#17327805954322160-508: A lower Brahman endowed with qualities as the creator of the universe: Ramanuja, in formulating Vishishtadvaita Vedanta, rejects Nirguṇa – that the undifferentiated Absolute is inconceivable – and adopts a theistic interpretation of the Upanishads , accepting Brahman as Īśvara , the personal God who is the seat of all auspicious attributes, as the One reality. The God of Vishishtadvaita
2340-454: A natural part of the earliest Vedic language, and that these developed in the centuries after the composition had been completed, and as a gradual unconscious process during the oral transmission by generations of reciters. The primary source for this argument is internal evidence of the text which betrays an instability of the phenomenon of retroflexion, with the same phrases having sandhi-induced retroflexion in some parts but not other. This
2520-479: A negative evidence to Pollock's hypothesis, but it is not positive evidence. A closer look at Sanskrit in the Indian history after the 12th century suggests that Sanskrit survived despite the odds. According to Hanneder, On a more public level the statement that Sanskrit is a dead language is misleading, for Sanskrit is quite obviously not as dead as other dead languages and the fact that it is spoken, written and read will probably convince most people that it cannot be
2700-546: A pan-Indo-Aryan accessibility to information and knowledge in the ancient and medieval times, in contrast to the Prakrit languages which were understood just regionally. It created a cultural bond across the subcontinent. As local languages and dialects evolved and diversified, Sanskrit served as the common language. It connected scholars from distant parts of South Asia such as Tamil Nadu and Kashmir, states Deshpande, as well as those from different fields of studies, though there must have been differences in its pronunciation given
2880-539: A pluralism of worldviews. While some Upanishads have been deemed 'monistic', others, including the Katha Upanishad , are dualistic . The Maitri is one of the Upanishads that inclines more toward dualism, thus grounding classical Samkhya and Yoga schools of Hinduism, in contrast to the non-dualistic Upanishads at the foundation of its Vedanta school. They contain a plurality of ideas. The Upanishads include sections on philosophical theories that have been at
3060-464: A precision closer than a few centuries is as stable as a house of cards". Some scholars have tried to analyse similarities between Hindu Upanishads and Buddhist literature to establish chronology for the Upanishads. Precise dates are impossible, and most scholars give only broad ranges encompassing various centuries. Gavin Flood states that "the Upanisads are not a homogeneous group of texts. Even
3240-578: A refined and standardized grammatical form that emerged in the mid-1st millennium BCE and was codified in the most comprehensive of ancient grammars, the Aṣṭādhyāyī ('Eight chapters') of Pāṇini . The greatest dramatist in Sanskrit, Kālidāsa , wrote in classical Sanskrit, and the foundations of modern arithmetic were first described in classical Sanskrit. The two major Sanskrit epics, the Mahābhārata and
3420-538: A restrained language from which archaisms and unnecessary formal alternatives were excluded". The Classical form of the language simplified the sandhi rules but retained various aspects of the Vedic language, while adding rigor and flexibilities, so that it had sufficient means to express thoughts as well as being "capable of responding to the future increasing demands of an infinitely diversified literature", according to Renou. Pāṇini included numerous "optional rules" beyond
3600-613: A school of Vedanta. The schools of this tradition emphasize that the individual self ( Jīvatman ) is both different and not different from Brahman . Notable figures in this tradition are Nimbārka (7th century) who founded the Dvaitadvaita school, Bhāskara (8th–9th century), Ramanuja's teacher Yādavaprakāśa , Chaitanya (1486–1534) who founded the Achintya Bheda Abheda school, and Vijñānabhikṣu (16th century). Influenced by Buddhism, Advaita vedanta departs from
3780-439: A similar phonetic structure to Tamil. Hock et al. quoting George Hart state that there was influence of Old Tamil on Sanskrit. Hart compared Old Tamil and Classical Sanskrit to arrive at a conclusion that there was a common language from which these features both derived – "that both Tamil and Sanskrit derived their shared conventions, metres, and techniques from a common source, for it is clear that neither borrowed directly from
SECTION 20
#17327805954323960-518: Is bhakti . Vallabha opposed renunciation of monistic sannyasa as ineffective and advocates the path of devotion ( bhakti ) rather than knowledge ( jnana ). The goal of bhakti is to turn away from ego, self-centered-ness and deception, and to turn towards the eternal Krishna in everything continually offering freedom from samsara . Chaitanya Mahaprabhu (1486 – 1533) was the prime exponent of Achintya-Bheda-Abheda . In Sanskrit achintya means 'inconceivable'. Achintya-Bheda-Abheda represents
4140-560: Is "not entirely absent in the Early Upanishads". The development of thought in these Upanishadic theories contrasted with Buddhism, since the Upanishadic inquiry fails to find an empirical correlate of the assumed Atman, but nevertheless assumes its existence, "[reifying] consciousness as an eternal self." The Buddhist inquiry "is satisfied with the empirical investigation which shows that no such Atman exists because there
4320-711: Is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages . It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late Bronze Age . Sanskrit is the sacred language of Hinduism , the language of classical Hindu philosophy , and of historical texts of Buddhism and Jainism . It was a link language in ancient and medieval South Asia, and upon transmission of Hindu and Buddhist culture to Southeast Asia, East Asia and Central Asia in
4500-572: Is accessible to the devotee, yet remains the Absolute, with differentiated attributes. Madhva, in expounding Dvaita philosophy, maintains that Vishnu is the supreme God, thus identifying the Brahman , or absolute reality, of the Upanishads with a personal god, as Ramanuja had done before him. Nimbarka, in his Dvaitadvata philosophy, accepted the Brahman both as nirguṇa and as saguṇa . Vallabha, in his Shuddhadvaita philosophy, not only accepts
4680-516: Is akin to that of Latin and Ancient Greek in Europe. Sanskrit has significantly influenced most modern languages of the Indian subcontinent , particularly the languages of the northern, western, central and eastern Indian subcontinent. Sanskrit declined starting about and after the 13th century. This coincides with the beginning of Islamic invasions of South Asia to create, and thereafter expand
4860-643: Is also called Uttara Mīmāṃsā , which means the "latter enquiry" or "higher enquiry"; and is often contrasted with Pūrva Mīmāṃsā , the "former enquiry" or "primary enquiry". Pūrva Mīmāṃsā deals with the karmakāṇḍa or ritualistic section (the Samhita and Brahmanas ) in the Vedas while Uttara Mīmāṃsā concerns itself with the deeper questions of the relation between humans and Divine or Absolute reality. Despite their differences, all traditions of Vedanta share some common features: The main Upanishads ,
5040-460: Is consequently placed after the 5th century BCE, while another proposal questions this assumption and dates it independent of Buddha's date of birth. The Kena , Mandukya, and Isa Upanishads are typically placed after these Principal Upanishads, but other scholars date these differently. Not much is known about the authors except for those, like Yajnavalkayva and Uddalaka, mentioned in the texts. A few women discussants, such as Gargi and Maitreyi,
5220-541: Is considered as northern India. The region is bounded on the west by the upper Indus valley, on the east by lower Ganges region, on the north by the Himalayan foothills, and on the south by the Vindhya mountain range. Scholars are reasonably sure that the early Upanishads were produced at the geographical center of ancient Brahmanism, Kuru - Panchala , and Kosala - Videha , a "frontier region" of Brahmanism, together with
5400-448: Is false or illusive, and that saguna Brahman with attributes is also real. Ramanuja states that God, like man, has both soul and body, and the world of matter is the glory of God's body. The path to Brahman ( Vishnu ), according to Ramanuja, is devotion to godliness and constant remembrance of the beauty and love of the personal god ( bhakti of saguna Brahman ). The Swaminarayan Darshana, also called Akshar-Purushottam Darshan by
5580-452: Is found in the writing of Bharata Muni , the author of the ancient Natya Shastra text. The early Jain scholar Namisādhu acknowledged the difference, but disagreed that the Prakrit language was a corruption of Sanskrit. Namisādhu stated that the Prakrit language was the pūrvam ('came before, origin') and that it came naturally to children, while Sanskrit was a refinement of Prakrit through "purification by grammar". Sanskrit belongs to
Vedanta - Misplaced Pages Continue
5760-504: Is held to be the sole unchanging metaphysical reality and identical to the individual Atman . The physical world, on the other hand, is always-changing empirical Maya . The absolute and infinite Atman - Brahman is realized by a process of negating everything relative, finite, empirical and changing. The school accepts no duality, no limited individual souls ( Atman / Jīvatman ), and no separate unlimited cosmic soul. All souls and their existence across space and time are considered to be
5940-485: Is like blind men leading the blind, it is a mark of conceit and vain knowledge, ignorant inertia like that of children, a futile useless practice. The Maitri Upanishad states, The performance of all the sacrifices, described in the Maitrayana-Brahmana, is to lead up in the end to a knowledge of Brahman, to prepare a man for meditation. Therefore, let such man, after he has laid those fires, meditate on
6120-409: Is more a tradition than a school of Vedanta. The schools of this tradition emphasize that the individual self ( Jīvatman ) is both different and not different from Brahman . Notable figures in this school are Bhartriprapancha, Nimbārka and Srinivasa (7th century) who founded the Dvaitadvaita school, Bhāskara (8th–9th century), Ramanuja's teacher Yādavaprakāśa , Chaitanya (1486–1534) who founded
6300-728: Is much disagreement among the various traditions. Independently considered, they may seem completely disparate due to the pronounced differences in thoughts and reasoning. The main traditions of Vedanta are: Bhedabheda (difference and non-difference); Advaita ( non-dualism ); and the Vaishnavite traditions of Dvaitadvaita (dualistic non-dualism), Vishishtadvaita (qualified non-dualism), Tattvavada ( Dvaita ) (dualism), Suddhadvaita (pure non-dualism), and Achintya-Bheda-Abheda (inconceivable difference and non-difference). Modern developments in Vedanta include Neo-Vedanta , and
6480-418: Is no evidence," states Jayatilleke. The Upanishads postulate Ātman and Brahman as the "summit of the hierarchically arranged and interconnected universe." Both have multiple meanings, and various ideas about the relation between Atman and Brahman can be found. Atman has "a wide range of lexical meanings, including ‘breath’, ‘spirit’, and ‘body’." In the Upanishads it refers to the body, but also to
6660-754: Is one of the most widely commented upon works in Vedanta. This text is so central to the Krishna-centered Vedanta schools that the Vedantin theologian Vallabha added the Bhāgavata Purāṇa as a fourth text to the Prasthānatrayī (three classic scriptures of Vedanta). Vedanta philosophies discuss three fundamental metaphysical categories and the relations between the three. Shankara, in formulating Advaita, talks of two conceptions of Brahman : The higher Brahman as undifferentiated Being, and
6840-584: Is only His grace that leads to redemption and salvation. Madhva believed that some souls are eternally doomed and damned, a view not found in Advaita and Vishishtadvaita Vedanta. While the Vishishtadvaita Vedanta asserted "qualitative monism and quantitative pluralism of souls", Madhva asserted both "qualitative and quantitative pluralism of souls". Shuddhadvaita (pure non-dualism), propounded by Vallabhacharya (1479–1531 CE), states that
7020-539: Is part of Brahman but not identical, while younger Upanishads state that Brahman (Highest Reality, Universal Principle, Being-Consciousness-Bliss) is identical with Atman . The Brahmasutra by Badarayana ( c. 100 BCE) synthesized and unified these somewhat conflicting theories. According to Nakamura, the Brahmasutras see Atman and Brahman as both different and not-different, a point of view which came to be called bhedabheda in later times. According to Koller,
7200-404: Is possible in the world." Modern era Indologists have discussed the similarities between the fundamental concepts in the Upanishads and the works of major Western philosophers . The Sanskrit term Upaniṣad originally meant “connection” or “equivalence", but came to be understood as "sitting near a teacher," from upa "by" and ni-ṣad "sit down", "sitting down near", referring to
7380-532: Is rare in the later version of the language. The Homerian Greek, like Ṛg-vedic Sanskrit, deploys simile extensively, but they are structurally very different. The early Vedic form of the Sanskrit language was far less homogenous compared to the Classical Sanskrit as defined by grammarians by about the mid-1st millennium BCE. According to Richard Gombrich—an Indologist and a scholar of Sanskrit, Pāli and Buddhist Studies—the archaic Vedic Sanskrit found in
Vedanta - Misplaced Pages Continue
7560-599: Is seen as particularly ancient by modern scholars. Of the remainder, 95 Upanishads are part of the Muktikā canon, composed from about the last centuries of 1st-millennium BCE through about 15th-century CE. New Upanishads, beyond the 108 in the Muktika canon, continued to be composed through the early modern and modern era, though often dealing with subjects that are unconnected to the Vedas. The mukhya Upanishads, along with
7740-622: Is sometimes wrongly perceived as the sole representation of Vedantic thought, with Shankara being a follower of Shaivism, the true essence of Vedanta lies within the Vaisnava tradition and can be considered a discourse within the broad framework of Vaisnavism. Four Vaishnava sampradays are considered to be of special significance based on the teachings of Ramanuja, Madhva, Vallabha, and Nimbarka. The number of prominent Vedanta schools varies among scholars, with some classifying them as three to six. Bhedābheda means "difference and non-difference" and
7920-479: Is taken along with evidence of controversy, for example, in passages of the Aitareya-Āraṇyaka (700 BCE), which features a discussion on whether retroflexion is valid in particular cases. The Ṛg-veda is a collection of books, created by multiple authors. These authors represented different generations, and the mandalas 2 to 7 are the oldest while the mandalas 1 and 10 are relatively the youngest. Yet,
8100-591: Is the earliest surviving complete text on Advaita Vedanta. Gaudapada's Kārikā relied on the Mandukya , Brihadaranyaka and Chhandogya Upanishads . In the Kārikā , Advaita (non-dualism) is established on rational grounds ( upapatti ) independent of scriptural revelation; its arguments are devoid of all religious, mystical or scholastic elements. Scholars are divided on a possible influence of Buddhism on Gaudapada's philosophy. The fact that Shankara, in addition to
8280-409: Is the object enjoyed (bhogya) . The Brahman is Krishna , the ultimate cause who is omniscient, omnipotent, all-pervading Being. He is the efficient cause of the universe because, as Lord of Karma and internal ruler of souls, He brings about creation so that the individual souls can reap the consequences of their karma . God is considered to be the material cause of the universe because creation
8460-589: Is the predominant language of one of the largest collection of historic manuscripts. The earliest known inscriptions in Sanskrit are from the 1st century BCE, such as the Ayodhya Inscription of Dhana and Ghosundi-Hathibada (Chittorgarh) . Though developed and nurtured by scholars of orthodox schools of Hinduism, Sanskrit has been the language for some of the key literary works and theology of heterodox schools of Indian philosophies such as Buddhism and Jainism. The structure and capabilities of
8640-471: Is to be used only in support of Scripture’ [Śrī Bhāṣya 2.1.12]. For specific sub-traditions of Vedanta, other texts may be equally important. For example, for Advaita Vedanta, the works of Adi Shankara are nominally central, though other teachers were equally, or even more, influential. For the theistic Vaishnava schools of Vedanta, the Bhāgavata Purāṇa is particularly important. The Bhāgavata Purāṇa
8820-415: Is to discover the relations between ritual, cosmic realities (including gods), and the human body/person, postulating Ātman and Brahman as the "summit of the hierarchically arranged and interconnected universe", but various ideas about the relation between Atman and Brahman can be found. 108 Upanishads are known, of which the first dozen or so are the oldest and most important and are referred to as
9000-462: Is unity of all souls and that the individual soul has the potential to realize identity with the Brahman . Vishishtadvaita is a qualified non-dualistic school of Vedanta and like Advaita, begins by assuming that all souls can hope for and achieve the state of blissful liberation. On the relation between the Brahman and the world of matter ( Prakriti ), Vishishtadvaita states both are two different absolutes, both metaphysically true and real, neither
9180-505: Is unknown. Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan states, "almost all the early literature of India was anonymous, we do not know the names of the authors of the Upanishads". The ancient Upanishads are embedded in the Vedas, the oldest of Hinduism's religious scriptures, which some traditionally consider to be apauruṣeya , which means "not of a man, superhuman" and "impersonal, authorless". The Vedic texts assert that they were skillfully created by Rishis (sages), after inspired creativity, just as
SECTION 50
#17327805954329360-616: The Bhagavad Gita and the Brahmasutra (known collectively as the Prasthanatrayi ), are interpreted in divergent ways in the several later schools of Vedanta . Translations of the Upanishads in the early 19th century started to attract attention from a Western audience. German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer was deeply impressed by the Upanishads and called them "the most profitable and elevating reading which ...
9540-543: The Bhagavadgītā and the Brahma Sūtras are the foundational scriptures in Vedanta. All traditions of Vedanta give a specific exegesis of these texts, collectively called the Prasthānatrayī , literally, three sources . All prominent Vedantic teachers, including Shankara , Bhaskara , Ramanuja , Madhva , Nimbarka , and Vallabha wrote commentaries on these three sources. The Brahma Sūtras of Badarayana serve as
9720-540: The Bhagavata Purana , the Panchatantra and many other texts are all in the Sanskrit language. The Classical Sanskrit with its exacting grammar was thus the language of the Indian scholars and the educated classes, while others communicated with approximate or ungrammatical variants of it as well as other natural Indian languages. Sanskrit, as the learned language of Ancient India, thus existed alongside
9900-684: The Brahma Sutras , the principal Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita , wrote an independent commentary on the Kārikā proves its importance in Vedāntic literature. Adi Shankara (c.800-c.850), elaborated on Gaudapada's work and more ancient scholarship to write detailed commentaries on the Prasthanatrayi and the Kārikā . The Mandukya Upanishad and the Kārikā have been described by Shankara as containing "the epitome of
10080-416: The Achintya Bheda Abheda school, and Vijñānabhikṣu (16th century). Nimbārka (7th century) sometimes identified with Bhāskara , and Srinivasa propounded Dvaitādvaita . Brahman (God), souls (chit) and matter or the universe (achit) are considered as three equally real and co-eternal realities. Brahman is the controller (niyanta) , the soul is the enjoyer (bhokta) , and the material universe
10260-595: The Brahmana and Aranyaka layers of Vedic text, compiled into separate texts and these were then gathered into anthologies of the Upanishads. These lists associated each Upanishad with one of the four Vedas. Many such lists exist but they are inconsistent across India in terms of which Upanishads are included and how the newer Upanishads are assigned to the ancient Vedas. In south India, the collected list based on Muktika Upanishad, and published in Telugu language , became
10440-582: The Chandogya , the oldest. The Aitareya, Kauṣītaki and Taittirīya Upanishads may date to as early as the mid-1st millennium BCE, while the remnant date from between roughly the 4th to 1st centuries BCE, roughly contemporary with the earliest portions of the Sanskrit epics . One chronology assumes that the Aitareya, Taittiriya, Kausitaki, Mundaka, Prasna , and Katha Upanishads has Buddha's influence, and
10620-580: The Dalai Lama , the Sanskrit language is a parent language that is at the foundation of many modern languages of India and the one that promoted Indian thought to other distant countries. In Tibetan Buddhism, states the Dalai Lama, Sanskrit language has been a revered one and called legjar lhai-ka or "elegant language of the gods". It has been the means of transmitting the "profound wisdom of Buddhist philosophy" to Tibet. The Sanskrit language created
10800-613: The Indo-European family of languages . It is one of the three earliest ancient documented languages that arose from a common root language now referred to as Proto-Indo-European : Other Indo-European languages distantly related to Sanskrit include archaic and Classical Latin ( c. 600 BCE–100 CE, Italic languages ), Gothic (archaic Germanic language , c. 350 CE ), Old Norse ( c. 200 CE and after), Old Avestan ( c. late 2nd millennium BCE ) and Younger Avestan ( c. 900 BCE). The closest ancient relatives of Vedic Sanskrit in
10980-753: The Rigveda had already evolved in the Vedic period, as evidenced in the later Vedic literature. Gombrich posits that the language in the early Upanishads of Hinduism and the late Vedic literature approaches Classical Sanskrit, while the archaic Vedic Sanskrit had by the Buddha 's time become unintelligible to all except ancient Indian sages. The formalization of the Saṃskṛta language is credited to Pāṇini , along with Patañjali's Mahābhāṣya and Katyayana's commentary that preceded Patañjali's work. Panini composed Aṣṭādhyāyī ('Eight-Chapter Grammar'), which became
SECTION 60
#173278059543211160-532: The Rigveda , a collection of 1,028 hymns composed between 1500 BCE and 1200 BCE by Indo-Aryan tribes migrating east from the mountains of what is today northern Afghanistan across northern Pakistan and into northwestern India. Vedic Sanskrit interacted with the preexisting ancient languages of the subcontinent, absorbing names of newly encountered plants and animals; in addition, the ancient Dravidian languages influenced Sanskrit's phonology and syntax. Sanskrit can also more narrowly refer to Classical Sanskrit ,
11340-800: The Rudrahridaya Upanishad and the Mahanarayana Upanishad , assert that all the Hindu gods and goddesses are the same, all an aspect and manifestation of Brahman , the Vedic concept for metaphysical ultimate reality before and after the creation of the Universe. The Principal Upanishads, also known as the Mukhya Upanishads , can be grouped into periods. Of the early periods are the Brihadaranyaka and
11520-531: The Rāmāyaṇa , however, were composed in a range of oral storytelling registers called Epic Sanskrit which was used in northern India between 400 BCE and 300 CE, and roughly contemporary with classical Sanskrit. In the following centuries, Sanskrit became tradition-bound, stopped being learned as a first language, and ultimately stopped developing as a living language. The hymns of the Rigveda are notably similar to
11700-497: The Upanishads , focusing, with varying emphasis on devotion and knowledge, and liberation. Vedanta developed into many traditions, all of which give their specific interpretations of a common group of texts called the Prasthānatrayī , translated as "the three sources": the Upanishads , the Brahma Sutras and the Bhagavad Gita . All Vedanta traditions are exegetical in nature, but also contain extensive discussions on ontology , soteriology , and epistemology , even as there
11880-766: The Vākyapadīya , written by Bhartṛhari (second half 5th century,) and the Kārikā written by Gaudapada (early 6th or 7th century CE). Shankara mentions 99 different predecessors of his school in his commentaries. A number of important early Vedanta thinkers have been listed in the Siddhitraya by Yamunācārya (c. 1050), the Vedārthasamgraha by Rāmānuja (c. 1050–1157), and the Yatīndramatadīpikā by Śrīnivāsa Dāsa. At least fourteen thinkers are known to have existed between
12060-406: The sandhi rules, both internal and external. Quite many words found in the early Vedic Sanskrit language are never found in late Vedic Sanskrit or Classical Sanskrit literature, while some words have different and new meanings in Classical Sanskrit when contextually compared to the early Vedic Sanskrit literature. Arthur Macdonell was among the early colonial era scholars who summarized some of
12240-500: The verbal adjective sáṃskṛta- is a compound word consisting of sáṃ ('together, good, well, perfected') and kṛta - ('made, formed, work'). It connotes a work that has been "well prepared, pure and perfect, polished, sacred". According to Biderman, the perfection contextually being referred to in the etymological origins of the word is its tonal—rather than semantic—qualities. Sound and oral transmission were highly valued qualities in ancient India, and its sages refined
12420-414: The 13th century, a premier center of Sanskrit literary creativity, Sanskrit literature there disappeared, perhaps in the "fires that periodically engulfed the capital of Kashmir" or the "Mongol invasion of 1320" states Pollock. The Sanskrit literature which was once widely disseminated out of the northwest regions of the subcontinent, stopped after the 12th century. As Hindu kingdoms fell in the eastern and
12600-532: The 7th century where he established a major center of learning and language translation under the patronage of Emperor Taizong. By the early 1st millennium CE, Sanskrit had spread Buddhist and Hindu ideas to Southeast Asia, parts of the East Asia and the Central Asia. It was accepted as a language of high culture and the preferred language by some of the local ruling elites in these regions. According to
12780-527: The BAPS, was propounded by Swaminarayan (1781-1830 CE) and is rooted in Ramanuja's Vishishtadvaita . It asserts that Parabrahman (Purushottam, Narayana) and Aksharbrahman are two distinct eternal realities. Adherents believe that they can achieve moksha (liberation) by becoming aksharrup (or brahmarup), that is, by attaining qualities similar to Akshar (or Aksharbrahman) and worshipping Purushottam (or Parabrahman;
12960-480: The Brahma Sutra commentaries by Nimbarka , Ramanuja , Vallabha , Shankara and Madhva . In his conclusion, Ghate determined that Nimbarka's and Ramanuja's commentaries provide the most accurate interpretation of the Brahma Sutras, considering both the passages that emphasize unity and those that emphasize diversity. Gavin Flood suggests that although Advaita Vedanta is the most well-known school of Vedanta and
13140-541: The Brahma Sutras were complete vary, with Nakamura in 1989 and Nicholson in his 2013 review stating, that they were most likely compiled in the present form around 400–450 CE. Isaeva suggests they were complete and in current form by 200 CE, while Nakamura states that "the great part of the Sutra must have been in existence much earlier than that" (800 - 500 BCE). The book is composed of four chapters, each divided into four-quarters or sections. These sutras attempt to synthesize
13320-493: The Brahmasutras state that Atman and Brahman are different in some respects particularly during the state of ignorance, but at the deepest level and in the state of self-realization, Atman and Brahman are identical, non-different. This ancient debate flowered into various dual, non-dual theories in Hinduism. Two different types of the non-dual Brahman-Atman are presented in the Upanishads, according to Mahadevan. The one in which
13500-813: The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad as the area of Videha, whose king, Janaka, features prominently in the Upanishad. The Chandogya Upanishad was probably composed in a more western than eastern location in the Indian subcontinent, possibly somewhere in the western region of the Kuru-Panchala country. Compared to the Principal Upanishads, the new Upanishads recorded in the Muktikā belong to an entirely different region, probably southern India, and are considerably relatively recent. In
13680-425: The Classical Sanskrit language launched ancient Indian speculations about "the nature and function of language", what is the relationship between words and their meanings in the context of a community of speakers, whether this relationship is objective or subjective, discovered or is created, how individuals learn and relate to the world around them through language, and about the limits of language? They speculated on
13860-532: The Dravidian languages borrowed from Sanskrit vocabulary, but they have also affected Sanskrit on deeper levels of structure, "for instance in the domain of phonology where Indo-Aryan retroflexes have been attributed to Dravidian influence". Similarly, Ferenc Ruzca states that all the major shifts in Indo-Aryan phonetics over two millennia can be attributed to the constant influence of a Dravidian language with
14040-521: The Dravidian words and forms, without modifying the word order; but the same thing is not possible in rendering a Persian or English sentence into a non-Indo-Aryan language. Shulman mentions that "Dravidian nonfinite verbal forms (called vinaiyeccam in Tamil) shaped the usage of the Sanskrit nonfinite verbs (originally derived from inflected forms of action nouns in Vedic). This particularly salient case of
14220-476: The Indo-Aryan language underwent rapid linguistic change and morphed into the Vedic Sanskrit language. The pre-Classical form of Sanskrit is known as Vedic Sanskrit . The earliest attested Sanskrit text is the Rigveda , a Hindu scripture from the mid- to late-second millennium BCE. No written records from such an early period survive, if any ever existed, but scholars are generally confident that
14400-519: The Indo-European languages are the Nuristani languages found in the remote Hindu Kush region of northeastern Afghanistan and northwestern Himalayas, as well as the extinct Avestan and Old Persian – both are Iranian languages . Sanskrit belongs to the satem group of the Indo-European languages. Colonial era scholars familiar with Latin and Greek were struck by the resemblance of
14580-584: The Karma doctrine is presented in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad , which is the oldest Upanishad. While the hymns of the Vedas emphasize rituals and the Brahmanas serve as a liturgical manual for those Vedic rituals, the spirit of the Upanishads is inherently opposed to ritual. The older Upanishads launch attacks of increasing intensity on the ritual. Anyone who worships a divinity other than
14760-532: The Muslim rule in the form of Sultanates, and later the Mughal Empire . Sheldon Pollock characterises the decline of Sanskrit as a long-term "cultural, social, and political change". He dismisses the idea that Sanskrit declined due to "struggle with barbarous invaders", and emphasises factors such as the increasing attractiveness of vernacular language for literary expression. With the fall of Kashmir around
14940-496: The Muslim rulers. Hindu rulers such as Shivaji of the Maratha Empire , reversed the process, by re-adopting Sanskrit and re-asserting their socio-linguistic identity. After Islamic rule disintegrated in South Asia and the colonial rule era began, Sanskrit re-emerged but in the form of a "ghostly existence" in regions such as Bengal. This decline was the result of "political institutions and civic ethos" that did not support
15120-499: The Saṃskṛta language, both in its vocabulary and grammar, to the classical languages of Europe. In The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World , Mallory and Adams illustrate the resemblance with the following examples of cognate forms (with the addition of Old English for further comparison): The correspondences suggest some common root, and historical links between some of
15300-574: The Self, to become complete and perfect. But who is to be meditated on? The opposition to the ritual is not explicit in the oldest Upanishads. On occasions, the Upanishads extend the task of the Aranyakas by making the ritual allegorical and giving it a philosophical meaning. For example, the Brihadaranyaka interprets the practice of horse-sacrifice or ashvamedha allegorically. It states that
15480-638: The South India, such as the great Vijayanagara Empire , so did Sanskrit. There were exceptions and short periods of imperial support for Sanskrit, mostly concentrated during the reign of the tolerant Mughal emperor Akbar . Muslim rulers patronized the Middle Eastern language and scripts found in Persia and Arabia, and the Indians linguistically adapted to this Persianization to gain employment with
15660-466: The Upanishads are categorized as "sectarian" since they present their ideas through a particular god or goddess of a specific Hindu tradition such as Vishnu, Shiva, Shakti, or a combination of these such as the Skanda Upanishad . These traditions sought to link their texts as Vedic, by asserting their texts to be an Upanishad, thereby a Śruti . Most of these sectarian Upanishads, for example
15840-460: The Upanishads, god becomes synonymous with self, and is declared to be everywhere, inmost being of each human being and within every living creature. The one reality or ekam sat of the Vedas becomes the ekam eva advitiyam or "the one and only and sans a second" in the Upanishads. Brahman-Atman and self-realization develops, in the Upanishad, as the means to moksha (liberation; freedom in this life or after-life). According to Jayatilleke ,
16020-551: The Upanishads. The Shvetashvatara Upanishad , for example, includes closing credits to sage Shvetashvatara , and he is considered the author of the Upanishad. Many scholars believe that early Upanishads were interpolated and expanded over time. There are differences within manuscripts of the same Upanishad discovered in different parts of South Asia, differences in non-Sanskrit version of the texts that have survived, and differences within each text in terms of meter, style, grammar and structure. The existing texts are believed to be
16200-447: The Vedic Sanskrit in these books of the Ṛg-veda "hardly presents any dialectical diversity", states Louis Renou – an Indologist known for his scholarship of the Sanskrit literature and the Ṛg-veda in particular. According to Renou, this implies that the Vedic Sanskrit language had a "set linguistic pattern" by the second half of the 2nd millennium BCE. Beyond the Ṛg-veda, the ancient literature in Vedic Sanskrit that has survived into
16380-451: The Vedic Sanskrit's bahulam framework, to respect liberty and creativity so that individual writers separated by geography or time would have the choice to express facts and their views in their own way, where tradition followed competitive forms of the Sanskrit language. The phonetic differences between Vedic Sanskrit and Classical Sanskrit, as discerned from the current state of the surviving literature, are negligible when compared to
16560-783: The Vedic Upanishads. The main Shakta Upanishads, for example, mostly discuss doctrinal and interpretative differences between the two principal sects of a major Tantric form of Shaktism called Shri Vidya upasana . The many extant lists of authentic Shakta Upaniṣads vary, reflecting the sect of their compilers, so that they yield no evidence of their "location" in Tantric tradition, impeding correct interpretation. The Tantra content of these texts also weaken its identity as an Upaniṣad for non-Tantrikas. Sectarian texts such as these do not enjoy status as shruti and thus
16740-531: The West due to the influence of the 14th century Advaitin Vidyaranya and modern Hindus like Swami Vivekananda and Ramana Maharshi , most Vedanta traditions focus on Vaishnava theology . The word Vedanta is made of two words : The word Vedanta literally means the end of the Vedas and originally referred to the Upanishads . Vedanta is concerned with the jñānakāṇḍa or knowledge section of
16920-459: The alphabet, the structure of words, and its exacting grammar into a "collection of sounds, a kind of sublime musical mold" as an integral language they called Saṃskṛta . From the late Vedic period onwards, state Annette Wilke and Oliver Moebus, resonating sound and its musical foundations attracted an "exceptionally large amount of linguistic, philosophical and religious literature" in India. Sound
17100-400: The areas immediately to the south and west of these. This region covers modern Bihar , Nepal , Uttar Pradesh , Uttarakhand , Himachal Pradesh , Haryana , eastern Rajasthan , and northern Madhya Pradesh . While significant attempts have been made recently to identify the exact locations of the individual Upanishads, the results are tentative. Witzel identifies the center of activity in
17280-483: The authority of the new Upanishads as scripture is not accepted in Hinduism. All Upanishads are associated with one of the four Vedas— Rigveda , Samaveda , Yajurveda (there are two primary versions or Samhitas of the Yajurveda: Shukla Yajurveda , Krishna Yajurveda ), and Atharvaveda . During the modern era, the ancient Upanishads that were embedded texts in the Vedas, were detached from
17460-417: The basic texts and Vedanta interprets them through rigorous philosophical exegesis to defend the point of view of their specific sampradaya . Varying interpretations of the Upanishads and their synthesis, the Brahma Sutras , led to the development of different schools of Vedanta over time. Vinayak Sakaram Ghate of Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute conducted a comprehensive comparative analysis of
17640-508: The bhedabheda-philosophy, instead postulating the identity of Atman with the Whole ( Brahman ), Gaudapada (c. 6th century CE), was the teacher or a more distant predecessor of Govindapada , the teacher of Adi Shankara. Shankara is widely considered as the apostle of Advaita Vedanta . Gaudapada's treatise, the Kārikā – also known as the Māṇḍukya Kārikā or the Āgama Śāstra –
17820-440: The capacity to understand the old Prakrit languages such as Ardhamagadhi . A section of European scholars state that Sanskrit was never a spoken language. However, evidences shows that Sanskrit was a spoken language, essential for oral tradition that preserved the vast number of Sanskrit manuscripts from ancient India. The textual evidence in the works of Yaksa, Panini, and Patanajali affirms that Classical Sanskrit in their era
18000-516: The classic Upanishads , being less subtle and more formalized. As a result, they are not difficult to comprehend for the modern reader. There is no fixed list of the Upanishads as newer ones, beyond the Muktika anthology of 108 Upanishads, have continued to be discovered and composed. In 1908, for example, four previously unknown Upanishads were discovered in newly found manuscripts, and these were named Bashkala , Chhagaleya , Arsheya , and Saunaka , by Friedrich Schrader , who attributed them to
18180-527: The close relationship between the Indo-Iranian tongues and the Baltic and Slavic languages , vocabulary exchange with the non-Indo-European Uralic languages , and the nature of the attested Indo-European words for flora and fauna. The pre-history of Indo-Aryan languages which preceded Vedic Sanskrit is unclear and various hypotheses place it over a fairly wide limit. According to Thomas Burrow, based on
18360-483: The composition of the Brahma Sutras and the other encompassing the schools that developed after the Brahma Sutras were written. Until the 11th century, Vedanta was a peripheral school of thought. Little is known of schools of Vedanta existing before the composition of the Brahma Sutras (first composition c. 2nd cent. BCE, final redaction 400–450 CE). It is clear that Badarayana, the writer of Brahma Sutras ,
18540-459: The composition of the Brahma Sutras and Shankara's lifetime. A noted scholar of this period was Bhartriprapancha. Bhartriprapancha maintained that the Brahman is one and there is unity, but that this unity has varieties. Scholars see Bhartriprapancha as an early philosopher in the line who teach the tenet of Bhedabheda . Bhedābheda means "difference and non-difference" and is more a tradition than
18720-614: The context of a speech or language, is found in verses 5.28.17–19 of the Ramayana . Outside the learned sphere of written Classical Sanskrit, vernacular colloquial dialects ( Prakrits ) continued to evolve. Sanskrit co-existed with numerous other Prakrit languages of ancient India. The Prakrit languages of India also have ancient roots and some Sanskrit scholars have called these Apabhramsa , literally 'spoiled'. The Vedic literature includes words whose phonetic equivalent are not found in other Indo-European languages but which are found in
18900-653: The crystallization of Classical Sanskrit. As in this period the Indo-Aryan tribes had not yet made contact with the inhabitants of the South of the subcontinent, this suggests a significant presence of Dravidian speakers in North India (the central Gangetic plain and the classical Madhyadeśa) who were instrumental in this substratal influence on Sanskrit. Extant manuscripts in Sanskrit number over 30 million, one hundred times those in Greek and Latin combined, constituting
19080-467: The detailed and sophisticated treatise then transmitted it through his students. Modern scholarship generally accepts that he knew of a form of writing, based on references to words such as Lipi ('script') and lipikara ('scribe') in section 3.2 of the Aṣṭādhyāyī . The Classical Sanskrit language formalized by Pāṇini, states Renou, is "not an impoverished language", rather it is "a controlled and
19260-561: The differences between the Vedanta school and the Mimamsa school was a contribution of Adi Shankara. Advaita Vedanta rejects rituals in favor of renunciation , for example. Early Vaishnava Vedanta retains the tradition of bhedabheda , equating Brahman with Vishnu or Krishna. Sanskrit language Sanskrit ( / ˈ s æ n s k r ɪ t / ; attributively 𑀲𑀁𑀲𑁆𑀓𑀾𑀢𑀁 , संस्कृत- , saṃskṛta- ; nominally संस्कृतम् , saṃskṛtam , IPA: [ˈsɐ̃skr̩tɐm] )
19440-471: The differences between the Vedic and Classical Sanskrit. Louis Renou published in 1956, in French, a more extensive discussion of the similarities, the differences and the evolution of the Vedic Sanskrit within the Vedic period and then to the Classical Sanskrit along with his views on the history. This work has been translated by Jagbans Balbir. The earliest known use of the word Saṃskṛta (Sanskrit), in
19620-460: The distant major ancient languages of the world. The Indo-Aryan migrations theory explains the common features shared by Sanskrit and other Indo-European languages by proposing that the original speakers of what became Sanskrit arrived in South Asia from a region of common origin, somewhere north-west of the Indus region , during the early 2nd millennium BCE. Evidence for such a theory includes
19800-476: The diverse teachings of the Upanishads. However, the cryptic nature of aphorisms of the Brahma Sutras have required exegetical commentaries. These commentaries have resulted in the formation of numerous Vedanta schools, each interpreting the texts in its own way and producing its own commentary. Little with specificity is known of the period between the Brahma Sutras (5th century CE) and Adi Shankara (8th century CE). Only two writings of this period have survived:
19980-490: The early medieval era, it became a language of religion and high culture , and of the political elites in some of these regions. As a result, Sanskrit had a lasting impact on the languages of South Asia, Southeast Asia and East Asia, especially in their formal and learned vocabularies. Sanskrit generally connotes several Old Indo-Aryan language varieties. The most archaic of these is the Vedic Sanskrit found in
20160-439: The entire universe is real and is subtly Brahman only in the form of Krishna . Vallabhacharya agreed with Advaita Vedanta's ontology , but emphasized that prakriti (empirical world, body) is not separate from the Brahman , but just another manifestation of the latter. Everything, everyone, everywhere – soul and body, living and non-living, jīva and matter – is the eternal Krishna . The way to Krishna , in this school,
20340-483: The essence of the concrete physical human body, "an essence, a life-force, consciousness, or ultimate reality." The Chāndogya Upaniṣhad (6.1-16) "offers an organic understanding of ātman, characterizing the self in terms of the life force that animates all living beings," while the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣhad "characterizes ātman more in terms of consciousness than as a life-giving essence." Brahman may refer to
20520-548: The first language of the respective speakers. The Sanskrit language brought Indo-Aryan speaking people together, particularly its elite scholars. Some of these scholars of Indian history regionally produced vernacularized Sanskrit to reach wider audiences, as evidenced by texts discovered in Rajasthan, Gujarat, and Maharashtra. Once the audience became familiar with the easier to understand vernacularized version of Sanskrit, those interested could graduate from colloquial Sanskrit to
20700-485: The first prose period of the Upanishads. The text of three of them, namely the Chhagaleya , Arsheya , and Saunaka , were incomplete and inconsistent, likely poorly maintained or corrupted. Ancient Upanishads have long enjoyed a revered position in Hindu traditions, and authors of numerous sectarian texts have tried to benefit from this reputation by naming their texts as Upanishads. These "new Upanishads" number in
20880-503: The foundation of Indian traditions. For example, the Chandogya Upanishad includes one of the earliest known declarations of Ahimsa (non-violence) as an ethical precept. Discussion of other ethical premises such as Damah (temperance, self-restraint), Satya (truthfulness), Dāna (charity), Ārjava (non-hypocrisy), Daya (compassion), and others are found in the oldest Upanishads and many later Upanishads. Similarly,
21060-412: The foundation of Vyākaraṇa, a Vedānga . The Aṣṭādhyāyī was not the first description of Sanskrit grammar, but it is the earliest that has survived in full, and the culmination of a long grammatical tradition that Fortson says, is "one of the intellectual wonders of the ancient world". Pāṇini cites ten scholars on the phonological and grammatical aspects of the Sanskrit language before him, as well as
21240-690: The fourth chapter of the Kaushitaki Upanishad, a location named Kashi (modern Varanasi ) is mentioned. There are more than 200 known Upanishads , one of which, the Muktikā Upanishad, predates 1656 CE and contains a list of 108 canonical Upanishads, including itself as the last. These are further divided into Upanishads associated with Shaktism (goddess Shakti), Sannyasa (renunciation, monastic life), Shaivism (god Shiva), Vaishnavism (god Vishnu), Yoga , and Sāmānya (general, sometimes referred to as Samanya-Vedanta). Some of
21420-537: The gods Varuna, Mitra, Indra, and Nasatya found in the earliest layers of the Vedic literature. O Bṛhaspati, when in giving names they first set forth the beginning of Language, Their most excellent and spotless secret was laid bare through love, When the wise ones formed Language with their mind, purifying it like grain with a winnowing fan, Then friends knew friendships – an auspicious mark placed on their language. — Rigveda 10.71.1–4 Translated by Roger Woodard The Vedic Sanskrit found in
21600-431: The historic Sanskrit literary culture and the failure of new Sanskrit literature to assimilate into the changing cultural and political environment. Sheldon Pollock states that in some crucial way, "Sanskrit is dead ". After the 12th century, the Sanskrit literary works were reduced to "reinscription and restatements" of ideas already explored, and any creativity was restricted to hymns and verses. This contrasted with
21780-476: The hundreds, cover diverse range of topics from physiology to renunciation to sectarian theories. They were composed between the last centuries of the 1st millennium BCE through the early modern era (~1600 CE). While over two dozen of the minor Upanishads are dated to pre-3rd century CE, many of these new texts under the title of "Upanishads" originated in the first half of the 2nd millennium CE, they are not Vedic texts, and some do not deal with themes found in
21960-486: The intense change that must have occurred in the pre-Vedic period between the Proto-Indo-Aryan language and Vedic Sanskrit. The noticeable differences between the Vedic and the Classical Sanskrit include the much-expanded grammar and grammatical categories as well as the differences in the accent, the semantics and the syntax. There are also some differences between how some of the nouns and verbs end, as well as
22140-432: The largest cultural heritage that any civilization has produced prior to the invention of the printing press. — Foreword of Sanskrit Computational Linguistics (2009), Gérard Huet, Amba Kulkarni and Peter Scharf Sanskrit has been the predominant language of Hindu texts encompassing a rich tradition of philosophical and religious texts, as well as poetry, music, drama , scientific , technical and others. It
22320-412: The linguistic expression and sets the standard for the Sanskrit language. Pāṇini made use of a technical metalanguage consisting of a syntax, morphology and lexicon. This metalanguage is organised according to a series of meta-rules, some of which are explicitly stated while others can be deduced. Despite differences in the analysis from that of modern linguistics, Pāṇini's work has been found valuable and
22500-514: The literary works. The Indian tradition, states Winternitz , has favored the learning and the usage of multiple languages from the ancient times. Sanskrit was a spoken language in the educated and the elite classes, but it was also a language that must have been understood in a wider circle of society because the widely popular folk epics and stories such as the Ramayana , the Mahabharata ,
22680-511: The modern age include the Samaveda , Yajurveda , Atharvaveda , along with the embedded and layered Vedic texts such as the Brahmanas , Aranyakas , and the early Upanishads . These Vedic documents reflect the dialects of Sanskrit found in the various parts of the northwestern, northern, and eastern Indian subcontinent. According to Michael Witzel, Vedic Sanskrit was a spoken language of
22860-429: The more advanced Classical Sanskrit. Rituals and the rites-of-passage ceremonies have been and continue to be the other occasions where a wide spectrum of people hear Sanskrit, and occasionally join in to speak some Sanskrit words such as namah . Classical Sanskrit is the standard register as laid out in the grammar of Pāṇini , around the fourth century BCE. Its position in the cultures of Greater India
23040-401: The most advanced analysis of linguistics until the twentieth century. Pāṇini's comprehensive and scientific theory of grammar is conventionally taken to mark the start of Classical Sanskrit. His systematic treatise inspired and made Sanskrit the preeminent Indian language of learning and literature for two millennia. It is unclear whether Pāṇini himself wrote his treatise or he orally created
23220-602: The most archaic poems of the Iranian and Greek language families, the Gathas of old Avestan and Iliad of Homer . As the Rigveda was orally transmitted by methods of memorisation of exceptional complexity, rigour and fidelity, as a single text without variant readings, its preserved archaic syntax and morphology are of vital importance in the reconstruction of the common ancestor language Proto-Indo-European . Sanskrit does not have an attested native script: from around
23400-406: The most common by the 19th-century and this is a list of 108 Upanishads. In north India, a list of 52 Upanishads has been most common. The Muktikā Upanishad's list of 108 Upanishads groups the first 13 as mukhya , 21 as Sāmānya Vedānta , 18 as Sannyāsa , 14 as Vaishnava , 14 as Shaiva , 8 as Shakta , and 20 as Yoga . The 108 Upanishads as recorded in the Muktikā are shown in
23580-432: The most important literature in the history of Indian religions and culture, the Upanishads document a wide variety of "rites, incantations, and esoteric knowledge" departing from Vedic ritualism and interpreted in various ways in the later commentarial traditions. The Upanishads are widely known, and their diverse ideas, interpreted in various ways, informed later traditions of Hinduism. The central concern of all Upanishads
23760-545: The numbers are thought to signify a wish to be aligned with the prestige of the language. Sanskrit has been taught in traditional gurukulas since ancient times; it is widely taught today at the secondary school level. The oldest Sanskrit college is the Benares Sanskrit College founded in 1791 during East India Company rule . Sanskrit continues to be widely used as a ceremonial and ritual language in Hindu and Buddhist hymns and chants . In Sanskrit,
23940-557: The older texts were composed over a wide expanse of time from about 600 to 300 BCE." Stephen Phillips places the early or "principal" Upanishads in the 800 to 300 BCE range. Patrick Olivelle , a Sanskrit Philologist and Indologist , gives the following chronology for the early Upanishads, also called the Principal Upanishads : Meanwhile, the Indologist Johannes Bronkhorst argues for
24120-412: The only means of knowing (pramāṇa) regarding spiritual matters (which are beyond perception and inference). This is explained by Rāmānuja as follows: A theory that rests exclusively on human concepts may at some other time or place be refuted by arguments devised by cleverer people.... The conclusion is that with regard to supernatural matters, Scripture alone is the epistemic authority and that reasoning
24300-403: The oral transmission of the texts is reliable: they are ceremonial literature, where the exact phonetic expression and its preservation were a part of the historic tradition. However some scholars have suggested that the original Ṛg-veda differed in some fundamental ways in phonology compared to the sole surviving version available to us. In particular that retroflex consonants did not exist as
24480-431: The other." Reinöhl further states that there is a symmetric relationship between Dravidian languages like Kannada or Tamil, with Indo-Aryan languages like Bengali or Hindi, whereas the same relationship is not found for non-Indo-Aryan languages, for example, Persian or English: A sentence in a Dravidian language like Tamil or Kannada becomes ordinarily good Bengali or Hindi by substituting Bengali or Hindi equivalents for
24660-465: The over-lordship of the earth may be acquired by sacrificing a horse. It then goes on to say that spiritual autonomy can only be achieved by renouncing the universe which is conceived in the image of a horse. In similar fashion, Vedic gods such as the Agni , Aditya , Indra , Rudra , Visnu , Brahma , and others become equated in the Upanishads to the supreme, immortal, and incorporeal Brahman-Atman of
24840-417: The philosophy of "inconceivable difference in non-difference", in relation to the non-dual reality of Brahman - Atman which it calls ( Krishna ), svayam bhagavan . The notion of "inconceivability" ( acintyatva ) is used to reconcile apparently contradictory notions in Upanishadic teachings. This school asserts that Krishna is Bhagavan of the bhakti yogins , the Brahman of the jnana yogins , and has
25020-500: The philosophy of the Swaminarayan Sampradaya . Most major Vedanta schools, except Advaita Vedanta and Neo-Vedanta, are related to Vaishnavism and emphasize devotion ( Bhakti ) to God , understood as Vishnu or a related manifestation . Advaita Vedanta, on the other hand, emphasizes Jñana (knowledge) and Jñana Yoga over theistic devotion. While the monism of Advaita has attracted considerable attention in
25200-414: The possible influence of Dravidian on Sanskrit is only one of many items of syntactic assimilation, not least among them the large repertoire of morphological modality and aspect that, once one knows to look for it, can be found everywhere in classical and postclassical Sanskrit". The main influence of Dravidian on Sanskrit is found to have been concentrated in the timespan between the late Vedic period and
25380-439: The previous 1,500 years when "great experiments in moral and aesthetic imagination" marked the Indian scholarship using Classical Sanskrit, states Pollock. Scholars maintain that the Sanskrit language did not die, but rather only declined. Jurgen Hanneder disagrees with Pollock, finding his arguments elegant but "often arbitrary". According to Hanneder, a decline or regional absence of creative and innovative literature constitutes
25560-515: The principal or main ( mukhya ) Upanishads. The mukhya Upanishads are found mostly in the concluding part of the Brahmanas and Aranyakas and were, for centuries, memorized by each generation and passed down orally . The mukhya Upanishads predate the Common Era , but there is no scholarly consensus on their date, or even on which ones are pre- or post-Buddhist. The Brhadaranyaka
25740-480: The problems of interpretation and misunderstanding. The purifying structure of the Sanskrit language removes these imperfections. The early Sanskrit grammarian Daṇḍin states, for example, that much in the Prakrit languages is etymologically rooted in Sanskrit, but involves "loss of sounds" and corruptions that result from a "disregard of the grammar". Daṇḍin acknowledged that there are words and confusing structures in Prakrit that thrive independent of Sanskrit. This view
25920-473: The quotes attributed to them in later literature, Sharma postulates that Ashmarathya and Audulomi were Bhedabheda scholars, Kashakrtsna and Brahmadatta were Advaita scholars, while Tanka and Dravidacharya were either Advaita or Viśiṣṭādvaita scholars. Badarayana summarized and interpreted teachings of the Upanishads in the Brahma Sutras , also called the Vedanta Sutra , possibly "written from
26100-485: The realist Parinamavada position, which appears to have been the view most common among early Vedantins". In contrast to Badarayana, post-Shankara Advaita Vedantists hold a different view, Vivartavada , which says that the effect, the world, is merely an unreal ( vivarta ) transformation of its cause, Brahman. The Upanishads present an associative philosophical inquiry in the form of identifying various doctrines and then presenting arguments for or against them. They form
26280-609: The regional Prakrit languages, which makes it likely that the interaction, the sharing of words and ideas began early in the Indian history. As the Indian thought diversified and challenged earlier beliefs of Hinduism, particularly in the form of Buddhism and Jainism , the Prakrit languages such as Pali in Theravada Buddhism and Ardhamagadhi in Jainism competed with Sanskrit in the ancient times. However, states Paul Dundas , these ancient Prakrit languages had "roughly
26460-497: The relationship between various Indo-European languages, the origin of all these languages may possibly be in what is now Central or Eastern Europe, while the Indo-Iranian group possibly arose in Central Russia. The Iranian and Indo-Aryan branches separated quite early. It is the Indo-Aryan branch that moved into eastern Iran and then south into South Asia in the first half of the 2nd millennium BCE. Once in ancient India,
26640-435: The ritual of introspection", and that "not rituals, but knowledge should be one's pursuit". The Mundaka Upanishad declares how man has been called upon, promised benefits for, scared unto and misled into performing sacrifices, oblations and pious works. Mundaka thereafter asserts this is foolish and frail, by those who encourage it and those who follow it, because it makes no difference to man's current life and after-life, it
26820-562: The role of language, the ontological status of painting word-images through sound, and the need for rules so that it can serve as a means for a community of speakers, separated by geography or time, to share and understand profound ideas from each other. These speculations became particularly important to the Mīmāṃsā and the Nyaya schools of Hindu philosophy, and later to Vedanta and Mahayana Buddhism, states Frits Staal —a scholar of Linguistics with
27000-542: The same oneness. Spiritual liberation in Advaita is the full comprehension and realization of oneness, that one's unchanging Atman (soul) is the same as the Atman in everyone else, as well as being identical to Brahman . Vishishtadvaita , propounded by Ramanuja (11–12th century), asserts that Jīvatman (human souls) and Brahman (as Vishnu ) are different, a difference that is never transcended. With this qualification, Ramanuja also affirmed monism by saying that there
27180-496: The same relationship to Sanskrit as medieval Italian does to Latin". The Indian tradition states that the Buddha and the Mahavira preferred the Prakrit language so that everyone could understand it. However, scholars such as Dundas have questioned this hypothesis. They state that there is no evidence for this and whatever evidence is available suggests that by the start of the common era, hardly anybody other than learned monks had
27360-516: The scriptural testimony, is considered the most authentic means of knowledge instead. All schools of Vedanta subscribe to the theory of Satkāryavāda , which means that the effect is pre-existent in the cause. But there are two different views on the status of the "effect", that is, the world. Most schools of Vedanta, as well as Samkhya, support Parinamavada , the idea that the world is a real transformation ( parinama ) of Brahman. According to Nicholson (2010 , p. 27), "the Brahma Sutras espouse
27540-416: The self is called a domestic animal of the gods in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad . The Chāndogya Upanishad parodies those who indulge in the acts of sacrifice by comparing them with a procession of dogs chanting Om! Let's eat. Om! Let's drink . The Kaushitaki Upanishad asserts that "external rituals such as Agnihotram offered in the morning and in the evening, must be replaced with inner Agnihotram,
27720-556: The semi-nomadic Aryans . The Vedic Sanskrit language or a closely related Indo-European variant was recognized beyond ancient India as evidenced by the " Mitanni Treaty" between the ancient Hittite and Mitanni people, carved into a rock, in a region that now includes parts of Syria and Turkey. Parts of this treaty, such as the names of the Mitanni princes and technical terms related to horse training, for reasons not understood, are in early forms of Vedic Sanskrit. The treaty also invokes
27900-455: The six are epistemologically valid. For example, while Advaita Vedanta accepts all six pramanas , Vishishtadvaita and Dvaita accept only three pramanas (perception, inference and testimony). Advaita considers Pratyakṣa (perception) as the most reliable source of knowledge, and Śabda , the scriptural evidence, is considered secondary except for matters related to Brahman, where it is the only evidence. In Viśiṣṭādvaita and Dvaita, Śabda ,
28080-615: The social structures such as the role of the poet and the priests, the patronage economy, the phrasal equations, and some of the poetic metres. While there are similarities, state Jamison and Brereton, there are also differences between Vedic Sanskrit, the Old Avestan, and the Mycenaean Greek literature. For example, unlike the Sanskrit similes in the Ṛg-veda, the Old Avestan Gathas lack simile entirely, and it
28260-494: The student sitting down near the teacher while receiving spiritual knowledge (Gurumukh). Other dictionary meanings include "esoteric doctrine" and "secret doctrine". Monier-Williams ' Sanskrit Dictionary notes – "According to native authorities, Upanishad means setting to rest ignorance by revealing the knowledge of the supreme spirit." Adi Shankaracharya explains in his commentary on the Kaṭha and Brihadaranyaka Upanishad that
28440-473: The study of reliable and valid means by which human beings gain accurate, true knowledge. The focus of Pramana is the manner in which correct knowledge can be acquired, how one knows or does not know, and to what extent knowledge pertinent about someone or something can be acquired. Ancient and medieval Indian texts identify six pramanas as correct means of accurate knowledge and truths: The different schools of Vedanta have historically disagreed as to which of
28620-416: The substance of the import of Vedanta". It was Shankara who integrated Gaudapada work with the ancient Brahma Sutras , "and give it a locus classicus " alongside the realistic strain of the Brahma Sutras . A noted contemporary of Shankara was Maṇḍana Miśra , who regarded Mimamsa and Vedanta as forming a single system and advocated their combination known as Karma-jnana-samuchchaya-vada . The treatise on
28800-637: The supreme living entity; God). Tattvavada, propounded by Madhvacharya (13th century), is based on the premise of realism or realistic point of view. The term Dvaita, which means dualism, was later applied to Madhvacharya's philosophy. Atman (soul) and Brahman (as Vishnu ) are understood as two completely different entities. Brahman is the creator of the universe, perfect in knowledge, perfect in knowing, perfect in its power, and distinct from souls, distinct from matter. In Dvaita Vedanta, an individual soul must feel attraction, love, attachment and complete devotional surrender to Vishnu for salvation, and it
28980-445: The table below. The mukhya Upanishads are the most important and highlighted. The central concern of all Upanishads is to discover the relations between ritual, cosmic realities (including gods), and the human body/person, postulating Ātman and Brahman as the "summit of the hierarchically arranged and interconnected universe," but various ideas about the relation between Atman and Brahman can be found. The Upanishads reflect
29160-490: The thinkers of Upanishadic texts can be grouped into two categories. One group, which includes early Upanishads along with some middle and late Upanishads, were composed by metaphysicians who used rational arguments and empirical experience to formulate their speculations and philosophical premises. The second group includes many middle and later Upanishads, where their authors professed theories based on yoga and personal experiences. Yoga philosophy and practice, adds Jayatilleke,
29340-505: The transition from the archaic ritualism of the Veda into new religious ideas and institutions" and the emergence of the central religious concepts of Hinduism . They are the most recent addition to the Vedas -- the oldest scriptures of Hinduism, and deal with meditation, philosophy , consciousness , and ontological knowledge. Earlier parts of the Vedas dealt with mantras, benedictions, rituals, ceremonies, and sacrifices. While among
29520-443: The triple ontological essence of the Brahman , but also His manifestation as personal God ( Īśvara ), as matter, and as individual souls. The schools of Vedanta differ in their conception of the relation they see between Ātman / Jīvātman and Brahman / Īśvara : Pramāṇa ( Sanskrit : प्रमाण) literally means "proof", "that which is the means of valid knowledge". It refers to epistemology in Indian philosophies, and encompasses
29700-653: The turn of the 1st-millennium CE, it has been written in various Brahmic scripts , and in the modern era most commonly in Devanagari . Sanskrit's status, function, and place in India's cultural heritage are recognized by its inclusion in the Constitution of India 's Eighth Schedule languages . However, despite attempts at revival, there are no first-language speakers of Sanskrit in India. In each of India's recent decennial censuses, several thousand citizens have reported Sanskrit to be their mother tongue, but
29880-489: The twenty Yoga Upanishads to be probably from the 100 BCE to 300 CE period. Patrick Olivelle and other scholars date seven of the twenty Sannyasa Upanishads to likely have been complete sometime between the last centuries of the 1st-millennium BCE to 300 CE. About half of the Sannyasa Upanishads were likely composed in 14th- to 15th-century CE. The general area of the composition of the early Upanishads
30060-408: The variants in the usage of Sanskrit in different regions of India. The ten Vedic scholars he quotes are Āpiśali, Kaśyapa , Gārgya, Gālava, Cakravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja , Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. In the Aṣṭādhyāyī , language is observed in a manner that has no parallel among Greek or Latin grammarians. Pāṇini's grammar, according to Renou and Filliozat, is a classic that defines
30240-531: The vedas which is called the Upanishads . The meaning of Vedanta expanded later to encompass the different philosophical traditions that interpret and explain the Prasthanatrayi in the light of their respective views on the relation between humans and the Divine or Absolute reality. The Upanishads may be regarded as the end of Vedas in different senses: Vedanta is one of the six orthodox ( āstika ) traditions of textual exegesis and Indian philosophy . It
30420-564: The vernacular Prakrits. Many Sanskrit dramas indicate that the language coexisted with the vernacular Prakrits. The cities of Varanasi , Paithan , Pune and Kanchipuram were centers of classical Sanskrit learning and public debates until the arrival of the colonial era. According to Lamotte , Sanskrit became the dominant literary and inscriptional language because of its precision in communication. It was, states Lamotte, an ideal instrument for presenting ideas, and as knowledge in Sanskrit multiplied, so did its spread and influence. Sanskrit
30600-426: The wife of Yajnavalkayva, also feature occasionally. Each of the principal Upanishads can be associated with one of the schools of exegesis of the four Vedas ( shakhas ). Many Shakhas are said to have existed, of which only a few remain. The new Upanishads often have little relation to the Vedic corpus and have not been cited or commented upon by any great Vedanta philosopher: their language differs from that of
30780-578: The word means Ātmavidyā , that is, "knowledge of the self ", or Brahmavidyā "knowledge of Brahman". The word appears in the verses of many Upanishads, such as the fourth verse of the 13th volume in the first chapter of the Chandogya Upanishad. Max Müller as well as Paul Deussen translate the word Upanishad in these verses as "secret doctrine", Robert Hume translates it as "mystic meaning", while Patrick Olivelle translates it as "hidden connections". The authorship of most Upanishads
30960-627: The work of many authors. Scholars are uncertain about when the Upanishads were composed. The chronology of the early Upanishads is difficult to resolve, states philosopher and Sanskritist Stephen Phillips, because all opinions rest on scanty evidence and analysis of archaism, style and repetitions across texts, and are driven by assumptions about likely evolution of ideas, and presumptions about which philosophy might have influenced which other Indian philosophies. Indologist Patrick Olivelle says that "in spite of claims made by some, in reality, any dating of these documents [early Upanishads] that attempts
31140-502: The Ṛg-veda is distinctly more archaic than other Vedic texts, and in many respects, the Rigvedic language is notably more similar to those found in the archaic texts of Old Avestan Zoroastrian Gathas and Homer's Iliad and Odyssey . According to Stephanie W. Jamison and Joel P. Brereton – Indologists known for their translation of the Ṛg-veda – the Vedic Sanskrit literature "clearly inherited" from Indo-Iranian and Indo-European times
31320-529: Was a manifestation of His powers of soul (chit) and matter (achit) ; creation is a transformation (parinama) of God's powers. He can be realized only through a constant effort to merge oneself with His nature through meditation and devotion. Advaita Vedanta ( IAST Advaita Vedānta ; Sanskrit : अद्वैत वेदान्त), propounded by Gaudapada (7th century) and Adi Shankara (9th century), but popularized by Vidyaranya (14th century) and 19th-20th century neo-Vedantins , espouses non-dualism and monism. Brahman
31500-408: Was a spoken language ( bhasha ) used by the cultured and educated. Some sutras expound upon the variant forms of spoken Sanskrit versus written Sanskrit. Chinese Buddhist pilgrim Xuanzang mentioned in his memoir that official philosophical debates in India were held in Sanskrit, not in the vernacular language of that region. According to Sanskrit linguist professor Madhav Deshpande, Sanskrit
31680-427: Was a spoken language in a colloquial form by the mid-1st millennium BCE which coexisted with a more formal, grammatically correct form of literary Sanskrit. This, states Deshpande, is true for modern languages where colloquial incorrect approximations and dialects of a language are spoken and understood, along with more "refined, sophisticated and grammatically accurate" forms of the same language being found in
31860-472: Was adopted voluntarily as a vehicle of high culture, arts, and profound ideas. Pollock disagrees with Lamotte, but concurs that Sanskrit's influence grew into what he terms a "Sanskrit Cosmopolis" over a region that included all of South Asia and much of southeast Asia. The Sanskrit language cosmopolis thrived beyond India between 300 and 1300 CE. Today, it is believed that Kashmiri is the closest language to Sanskrit. Reinöhl mentions that not only have
32040-738: Was also the language of some of the oldest surviving, authoritative and much followed philosophical works of Jainism such as the Tattvartha Sutra by Umaswati . The Sanskrit language has been one of the major means for the transmission of knowledge and ideas in Asian history. Indian texts in Sanskrit were already in China by 402 CE, carried by the influential Buddhist pilgrim Faxian who translated them into Chinese by 418 CE. Xuanzang , another Chinese Buddhist pilgrim, learnt Sanskrit in India and carried 657 Sanskrit texts to China in
32220-411: Was not the first person to systematize the teachings of the Upanishads , as he quotes six Vedantic teachers before him – Ashmarathya, Badari, Audulomi, Kashakrtsna, Karsnajini and Atreya. References to other early Vedanta teachers – Brahmadatta, Sundara, Pandaya, Tanka and Dravidacharya – are found in secondary literature of later periods. The works of these ancient teachers have not survived, but based on
32400-442: Was visualized as "pervading all creation", another representation of the world itself; the "mysterious magnum" of Hindu thought. The search for perfection in thought and the goal of liberation were among the dimensions of sacred sound, and the common thread that wove all ideas and inspirations together became the quest for what the ancient Indians believed to be a perfect language, the "phonocentric episteme" of Sanskrit. Sanskrit as
#431568