Hinduism / by Monier Williams.

  • Monier Monier-Williams
Date:
1877
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hinduism / by Monier Williams. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    own. This he has done with great perspicuity and beauty of language in the Bhagavad-glta, combining various theories into one system, by interweaving, so to speak, threads from the Sankhya, Yoga, and Vedanta, so as to form a many-coloured woof of thought, which is shot across a stiff warp of the doc- trine of faith (bhakti) in Krishna, and of stern devotion to caste duties (dharma). Of these cross threads the most conspicuous are those of the Sankhya, for which the author of the Gita has an evident predilection. As a necessary result of its composite character, the work is, of course, full of inconsistencies. The whole composition is skilfully thrown into the form of a dramatic poem, something after the manner of the book of Job or a dialogue of Plato. The speakers are the two most important personages in the Maha- bharata—Arjuna and Krishna. Arjuna is, perhaps, the real hero of that epic. He is the bravest, and yet the most tender-hearted of the five sons of Pandu. The god Krishna, who is identified with Vishnu, and in this philosophical dialogue is held to be the Supreme Being himself, had taken form as the son of Devaki and Ahisudeva, who was brother of KuntI, wife of Pandu. Hence the god was cousin of the sons of Pandu, brother of Dhrita-rashtra, the sons of these brothers being of course related as cousins to each other. In the great war which arose between the two families of Pandu and Dhrita-rashtra (see p. 112), repre- senting two Ivshatriya races contending for supremacy, Krishna refused to take up arms on either side, but consented to act as the charioteer of Arjuna, and to aid him with his advice. At the commencement of the Bhagavad-glta the two contending armies are supposed to be drawn up in battle-array, when Arjuna is struck with sudden compunction at the idea of fighting his way to a kingdom through the blood of his kindred, and asks Krishna’s opinion as to his
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