X
The Significance of Sanskrit
Sanskrit : the Key to Indian Religious History
Though Sanskrit is claimed to be the oldest
language in the universe, the sanskrit as we
know today is of very recent origin.
“The first epigraphic evidence of Sanskrit is
seen in 150 AD and this inscription is in the
Brahmi script.”
(Encyclopedia Britannica, 1982).
From the fifth
century A.D. classical Sanskrit is seen to be
the dominant language in the inscriptions.
Earlier
documents used Pali and Prakrit. Asoka who
took every care to make his messages
intelligible to the common man used all existing
scripts and languages. These 3rd
Century inscriptions do not include Sanskrit.
It included Prakrit, Greek and Aramaic. But no
Sanskrit is found because it was not in
existence at that time.
Sanskrit was
developed out of Prakrit and other existing
languages during the interval of 100 AD to 150
AD “The first evidence of classical Sanskrit is
found as an inscription dating around A.D.150 in
the Brahmi script. It records the repair of a
dam originally built by Chandragupta Maurya, and
also contains a panegyric in verse, which can be
regarded as the first literary composition in
classical Sanskrit. It is at Girnar in Kathiawar
and was inscribed by Rudradamana, the Saka
Satrap of Ujjayini, on the same rock on which
the Fourteen Rock Edicts of Asoka were also
found.
It is
significant that Rudradamana employed classical
Sanskrit in a region where about four hundred
years before him Asoka had used only Prakrit.
This definitely proves that in the second
century AD Sanskrit was replacing the dialects.
Even so the language did not replace Prakrit
everywhere, but it continued to be used in
inscriptions for something like one hundred
years or even more after this date. However,
from the fifth century A.D. classical Sanskrit
is seen to be the dominant language in the
inscriptions.” ( Hinduism, by Nirad C.
Chaudhuri, Oxford University Press, USA, 1979.)
If that is the
case in what language was the Vedas, Brahmanas,
Aranyakas and Upanishads transmitted since
Sanskrit did not exist? Except for most part of
Rig Veda all others are written in Sanskrit.
What that tells us that they were written only
after the first century AD.
This evidently
puts new and sharp change in the way we look at
Hinduism. In fact Hinduism did not come to
exist before first century. Hinduism is totally
different from the Vedic religion. The mistake
early indologists who came from Europe was to
assume the continuity of Vedic religion and
Hindu religion. Hindu religion itself was a
convenient artificial definition of the British.
Thus apart from
portions of the Veda which were not written in
Sanskrit, all other Vedas, Upanishads, Brahmanas
and Puranas etc were written down later than 100
AD at liberal estimate. They must have been
written down much later in actual fact. A more
realistic estimate will be around 6th
Centaury AD. “The pious view is that the Vedas
are eternal and uncreated and exist essentially
as sound. More conventional, but still pious,
scholarship may still exaggerate the antiquity
of the Vedas, sometimes claiming they go back to
10,000 BC or earlier. Now, however, it looks
like even the oldest parts of the Rg Veda do not
antedate the arrival of the Arya in India,
although the gods and elements of the stories
are older, since they are attested with Iranian
peoples and the Mitanni, with parallels in Greek
and Latin mythology.” (Kelly Ross)
“Thus for
instance the vast amalgamation of Puranic
tradition known as the Skandapurana, as
far as we can speak of it as a single work at
all, cannot be older than the 16th century, as
has been shown in the Groningen Skandapurana
project (see Adriaensen et al 1994). Many
scientific manuals and commentaries were
composed during the 17th and 18th centuries, and
a 19th century compilation, the Sukraniti,
passed for a long time as a genuine ancient
work. And of course Indian scholars of
traditional learning are all the time producing
new Sanskrit literature.” Klaus Karttunen
http://folklore.ee/folklore/vol8/veda.htm
“
Mahabaharatha as given to us could not have been
written before A.D fourth Centaury. Panini, who
is the famous grammarian, has mentioned several
important personalities of the epics of that
period. While the reprints published later have
made several errors, variations and
exaggerations, the main characters and the
imports of the stories remain in tact. There is
no doubt that Geetha came into existence only
during the period of Gupta Empire.”
K.M.Panicker ( A Survey of Indian History p.67)
“It is certain that Manu did not know anything
about the Trinity or their functions as Creator,
Sustainer and Destroyer. Yet by A.D 6th
Centaury this concept was popular as is clear
from the works of Kalidasa” Ramesh Chandra Dutt,
History of Civilizations in
India Vol II P.191
All Hindu myths are developed over a long period
of times, where each myth was built over some
older historical fact or person. This is often
due to confusion of names and times. Most of
them were local stories, which got incorporated,
in the bigger picture. So when a purana was
presented in a codified form it was normally
done in a third person method where this person
sees the act being carried out in some distant
places at distant time. This was indeed the
normal style of story telling of the period. In
the present day art forms of Katha Kala Shepam
and Thullal this is clearly visible.
In A History of Ancient and Early Medieval
India: From the Stone Age to the 12th
century
Upinder Singh says:
“In the Deccan
and South India, Sanskrit inscriptions appeared
along with Prakrit ones in the late 3rd/early
4th century CE, for instance
Nagarjunkonda in Andhra Pradesh. The Sanskrit
element gradually increased. In the
transitional phase of the 4th and 5th
centuries, there were bilingual sanskrit-Prakrit
inscriptions, as well as those in a mixture of
two languages. Thereafter, Prakrit fell into
disuse.
Between the 4th
and 6th centuries, Sanskrit emerged
as a premier language of royal inscriptions all
over India. There after, it attained the status
of a language associated with high culture,
religious authority, and political power not
only in the subvontinent but also in certain
other areas such as Southeast Asia. However, in
the post-Gupta period, there was also an
important parallel trend towards the evolution
of regional languages and scripts. Even
Sanskrit inscriptions show the influence of
local dialects in spellings and words of non-Snsrit
origin.
In
South India, inscriptions in the old tamil
language (and the Tamil-Brahmi script) appeared
in the 2nd century
BCE
and the early centuries CE…….There are examples
of bilingual Tamil-Sanskrit Pallava inscriptions
from the 7th century onwards. …..
“The earliest Kannada inscriptions belong to the
late 6th/early 7th cemury
CE. ……….There are some bilingual Sanskrit
Kannada inscriptions and a 12th
century inscription found at Kurgod (in Bellary
districtm Karnataka) is in three languages –
Sanskrit, Prakrit and Kannada. ……
Late 6th century epigraphs of the of
the early Telugu Chola kings mark the beginnings
of Telugu as a language…….Malayalam inscriptions
appear in about 15th century.”
Significance of
Sanskrit
Dr. Alexander
Harris
The earliest
epigraphic evidence on languages employed in
India comes from the inscriptions of Asoka
inscribed in third century B.C. Asoka took care
that his messages were intelligible to all and
he used a particular kind of Prakrit. ……So, the
absence of Sanskrit in his inscriptions
indicates that it did not exist at that time, as
otherwise he would have certainly used it.
In India, before
the Christian era, there were many foreign
invasions which introduced many foreign
languages. These mixing with the early Indian
languages led to what is often called a Prakrit
which was diverse in nature. The first
evidence of classical Sanskrit is attested by an
inscription dating around A.D.150 in the Brahmi
script. It records the repair of a
dam originally built by Chandragupta Maurya, and
also contains a panegyric in verse which can be
regarded as the first literary composition in
classical Sanskrit. It is at Girnar in Kathiawar
and was inscribed by Rudradamana, the Saka
Satrap of Ujjayini, on the same rock on which
the Fourteen Rock Edicts of Asoka were also
found. It is significant that Rudradamana
employed classical Sanskrit in a region where
about four hundred years before him Asoka had
used only Prakrit.
A key evidence
often presented in the dating of Sanskrit is
Patanjali’s Vyakarana - Mahabhasya (Great
Commentary). The Mahabhasya is both a defense of
the grammarian Panini against his chief critic
and detractor Katyayana and a refutation of some
of Panini’s aphorisms. Patanjali is dated
anywhere from 2nd c BC to 5th c AD.
On Patanjali’s date, the composition of the
Mahabhasya and its early tradition, Joshi and
Roodbergen write ,
It is nearly
unanimously agreed that Patanjali has lived
around 140 BC. But as stated by Winternitz, we
are not in a position to confirm that this is
the correct date. The question largely depends
on the other question, namely, whether Patanjali
was the author of the examples he quotes.
According to Tarn, there is nothing conclusive
in Patanajli’s assumed date, precisely because
his grammatical examples are, or in any
particular case may be, not necessarily his own
composition but traditional examples. Nor are
the dates assigned to Panini and Katyayana in
the fourth and third century BC more than a
working hypothesis, that is, ornate guesswork.
……..
The stone
pillar inscription of Samudra Gupta (AD 330 to
380) written in Sanskrit and a late Brahmi
script called the Gupta script is an undated
inscription incised on an Asokan pillar at
Allahabad. Composed by Harisena, a
commander-in-chief of the king it describes
elaborately the moral, intellectual and military
achievements of this king. This inscription
possibly dates 350 AD…………
Another
interesting fact is that the Allahabad
inscription of Samudra Gupta mentions King
Vishnugopa of Kanchi (Pallavas 4th to
9th c
AD) who was defeated by Samudra Gupta and then
liberated about the middle of the 4th c
AD. The southern Pallavas are often linked with
the North Western Pahlavas, however, this is not
conclusive. Through these invasions, the Gupta
language and culture spread south.
The spread of
Sanskrit South is first evidenced by the
Talagunda stone pillar inscription of Kadamba
Kakusthavarman in the Shimoga District,
Karnataka dated between 455 and 470 AD. It is
written in late southern Brahmi inscribed in the
reign of Santivarman (450 to 470 AD). It is a
postthumous record of Kakusthavarman.
Sanskrit then
spreads in the South evidenced by the
inscriptions in Early Grantha, dating from the
5th to 6th c. AD on copper plates and stone
monuments from the kingdom of the Pallavas near
Chennai (Madras). The Grantha alphabet, which
belongs to the writing system of southern India,
was developed in the 5th c.
AD to mainly write Sanskrit. From the fifth
century A.D. classical Sanskrit is seen to be
the dominant language in the inscriptions which
indicates that Sanskrit was replacing the
dialects.
Further more
research on the development of writing scripts
in India certainly puts a rather late date on
these Sanskrit writings. …….
The Grantha
alphabet, which belongs to the writing system of
southern India, developed in the 5th c.
AD and was mainly used to write Sanskrit.
Inscriptions in Early Grantha, dating from the 5th to
6th c.
AD are on copper plates and stone monuments from
the kingdom of the Pallavas near Chennai
(Madras).
A key area of
error is linguistic research, and in India it is
based on the erroneous Aryan theory projecting
civilization in
India
as uncivilized until the entry of the so called
Aryans. Today, groups like the RSS and VHP will
vehemently deny this theory realizing the
implication of the
Indus Valley
discovery in 1920. Scholars write…………
The scriptures
of Hinduism are written in Sanskrit, and
epigraphic evidence clearly shows that they
could not have been written before the second
century A.D. The Christian thought is seen in
the Hindu scriptures and this influence traces
back to Christian Gospel preached by the Apostle
Thomas first to the Pahlavas.
The
bibliographical evidences indicate that the
Vedas are written in the Grantha and Nagari
scripts, and according to tradition Veda Vyasa,
a Dravidian, compiled and wrote the Vedas. The
Grantha script belongs to the southern group of
scripts and Veda Vyasa being a Dravidian would
certainly have used it. Since the earliest
evidence for Grantha is only in the 5th c.
AD, the Vedas were written rather late.”
Dr. Alexander Harris
http://appiusforum.net/sanskrit.html
What does it
mean?
The analysis
shows that the claims of Sanskrit developed
during the Pre-Christian era is a Brahminic
attempt to rewrite history. Seriously it also
would simply mean that Brahmanas and Upanishads
were written well after Second Century AD. The
early determinations of Upanishadic period as 5th
C BC was in total error. The early Students of
Sanskrit among the westerners swallowed the
opinions of the opinions of the pundits who
guided and interpreted for them/ Here for
example is the official stand on Sanskrit by the
Hindu Religious adherents.
“The origin of
Sanskrit can be accredited to the Vedic society.
Vedic Sanskrit is believed to date back to the
2nd millennium BC, when knowledge was handed
down through the generations verbally.
Mystic traditions of India ascribe a wholly
sacred origin to the language, describing it as
the language of the gods.
By 400BC a Hindu Indian grammarian by the name
of Pāṇini
had formally recorded rules of Sanskrit grammar.
This is known as the Ashtadhyayi (Aṣṭādhyāyī).
The
Ashtadhyayi consists of eight chapters, each
divided into four sections, or ‘padas’. It
characterises the difference between the
language of the sacred texts and that of common
street language. 3,959 rules of Sanskrit
morphology have been set out, much in the way of
a mathematical function, to define the basic
elements of the language including sentence
structure, vowels, consonants, nouns, and verbs.
Pāṇini’s
work is still used in the teaching of Sanskrit
today.
The
Sanskrit verbal adjective
saṃskṛta-
may be translated as "put together", "well or
completely formed", "refined", "highly
elaborated".[7]
It is derived from the root
saṃ(s)kar-
"to put together, compose, arrange, prepare",[8]
where
saṃ-
"together" (as English same) and
(s)kar-
"do, make". The language referred to as
saṃskṛta
"the cultured language" has by definition always
been a "sacred" and "sophisticated" language,
used for religious and learned discourse in
ancient India, and contrasted with the languages
spoken by the people,
prākṛta-
"natural, artless, normal, ordinary". It is also
called
dēva-bhāṣā
meaning the "divine language" or the "language
of devas or demigods".
It
is essentially a prescriptive grammar, i.e., an
authority that defines (rather than describes)
correct Sanskrit……The term "Sanskrit" was not
thought of as a specific language set apart from
other languages.
“It is
significant that Rudradamana employed classical
Sanskrit in a region where about four hundred
years before him Asoka had used only Prakrit.
This definitely proves that in the second
century AD Sanskrit was replacing the dialects.
Even so the language did not replace Prakrit
everywhere, but it continued to be used in
inscriptions for something like one hundred
years or even more after this date. However,
from the fifth century A.D. classical Sanskrit
is seen to be the dominant language in the
inscriptions.” ( Hinduism, by Nirad C.
Chaudhuri, Oxford University Press, USA, 1979.)
If that is the
case in what language was the Vedas, Brahmanas,
Aranyakas and Upanishads transmitted since
Sanskrit did not exist? Except for most part of
Rig Veda all others are written in Sanskrit.
What that tells us that they were written only
after the first century AD.
This evidently
puts new and sharp change in the way we look at
Hinduism. In fact Hinduism did not come to
exist before first century. Hinduism is totally
different from the Vedic religion. The mistake
early indologists who came from Europe was to
assume the continuity of Vedic religion and
Hindu religion. Hindu religion itself was a
convenient artificial definition of the British.
Thus apart from
portions of the Veda which were not written in
Sanskrit, all other Vedas, Upanishads, Brahmanas
and Puranas etc were written down later than 100
AD at liberal estimate. They must have been
written down much later in actual fact. A more
realistic estimate will be around 6th
Centaury AD.
“The pious view
is that the Vedas are eternal and uncreated and
exist essentially as sound. More conventional,
but still pious, scholarship may still
exaggerate the antiquity of the Vedas, sometimes
claiming they go back to 10,000 BC or earlier.
Now, however, it looks like even the oldest
parts of the Rg Veda do not antedate the arrival
of the Arya in India, although the gods and
elements of the stories are older, since they
are attested with Iranian peoples and the
Mitanni, with parallels in Greek and Latin
mythology.” (Kelly Ross)
“Thus for
instance the vast amalgamation of Puranic
tradition known as the Skandapurana, as
far as we can speak of it as a single work at
all, cannot be older than the 16th century, as
has been shown in the Groningen Skandapurana
project (see Adriaensen et al 1994). Many
scientific manuals and commentaries were
composed during the 17th and 18th centuries, and
a 19th century compilation, the Sukraniti,
passed for a long time as a genuine ancient
work. And of course Indian scholars of
traditional learning are all the time producing
new Sanskrit literature.” Klaus Karttunen
http://folklore.ee/folklore/vol8/veda.htm
“
Mahabaharatha as given to us could not have been
written before A.D fourth Centaury. Panini, who
is the famous grammarian, has mentioned several
important personalities of the epics of that
period. While the reprints published later have
made several errors, variations and
exaggerations, the main characters and the
imports of the stories remain in tact. There is
no doubt that Geetha came into existence only
during the period of Gupta Empire.”
K.M.Panicker ( A Survey of Indian History p.67)
“It is certain that Manu did not know anything
about the Trinity or their functions as Creator,
Sustainer and Destroyer. Yet by A.D 6th
Centaury this concept was popular as is clear
from the works of Kalidasa” Ramesh Chandra Dutt,
History of Civilizations in
India Vol II P.191
All Hindu myths are developed over a long period
of times, where each myth was built over some
older historical fact or person. This is often
due to confusion of names and times. Most of
them were local stories, which got incorporated,
in the bigger picture. So when a purana was
presented in a codified form it was normally
done in a third person method where this person
sees the act being carried out in some distant
places at distant time. This was indeed the
normal style of story telling of the period. In
the present day art forms of Katha Kala Shepam
and Thullal this is clearly visible.
In A History of Ancient and Early Medieval
India: From the Stone Age to the 12th
century
Upinder Singh says:
“In the Deccan
and South India, Sanskrit inscriptions appeared
along with Prakrit ones in the late 3rd/early
4th century CE, for instance
Nagarjunkonda in Andhra Pradesh. The Sanskrit
element gradually increased. In the
transitional phase of the 4th and 5th
centuries, there were bilingual sanskrit-Prakrit
inscriptions, as well as those in a mixture of
two languages. Thereafter, Prakrit fell into
disuse.
Between the 4th
and 6th centuries, Sanskrit emerged
as a premier language of royal inscriptions all
over India. There after, it attained the status
of a language associated with high culture,
religious authority, and political power not
only in the subvontinent but also in certain
other areas such as Southeast Asia. However, in
the post-Gupta period, there was also an
important parallel trend towards the evolution
of regional languages and scripts. Even
Sanskrit inscriptions show the influence of
local dialects in spellings and words of non-Snsrit
origin.
In
South India, inscriptions in the old tamil
language (and the Tamil-Brahmi script) appeared
in the 2nd century
BCE
and the early centuries CE…….There are examples
of bilingual Tamil-Sanskrit Pallava inscriptions
from the 7th century onwards. …..
“The earliest Kannada inscriptions belong to the
late 6th/early 7th cemury
CE. ……….There are some bilingual Sanskrit
Kannada inscriptions and a 12th
century inscription found at Kurgod (in Bellary
districtm Karnataka) is in three languages –
Sanskrit, Prakrit and Kannada. ……
Late 6th century
epigraphs of the of the early Telugu Chola
kings mark the beginnings of Telugu as a
language…….Malayalam inscriptions appear in
about 15th century.”
In a way the
name Sanskrit had given way to large misuse by
the religion. Sanskrit when is used for both the
Vedic and the Puranic languages differ
considerably. It bears the relation as between
Latin and English.
"By Ancient
Sanskrit we mean the oldest known form of
Sanskrit. The simple name 'Sanskrit' generally
refers to Classical Sanskrit, which is a later,
fixed form that follows rules laid down by a
grammarian around 400 BC. Like Latin in the
Middle Ages, Classical Sanskrit was a scholarly
lingua franca which had to be studied and
mastered.
Ancient Sanskrit
was very different.
It was a
natural, vernacular language, and has come down
to us in a remarkable and extensive body of
poetry."
http://www.utexas.edu/cola/centers/lrc/eieol/vedol-0-X.html
the Ancient
Sanskrit is referred to here is now called Vedic
which is a direct recognition under pressure to
recognize it as different from Sanskrit language
by the Hindus. This is same as the Persian Indo-
European language of the Zorostrians which is
the language used in Zend Avesta or very close
to it. In sharp contrast Sanskrit is of recent
origin. Archealogical and Linguistic studies
indicates that the language of Sanskrit came
into existence only by the second century AD.
Ujjayini (Ujjain) became a center of Sanskrit
learning and was taken as meridian by Indian
astronomers.
The word
Sanskrit means completed, refined, perfected.
Sam (together) + krtam (created). The Vedic form
of Sanskrit is a close descendant of
Proto-Indo-European, the reconstructed root of
all later Indo-European languages. Vedic
Sanskrit is the oldest attested language of the
Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European family.
It is very closely related to Avestan,
the language of Zoroastrianism. The genetic
relationship of Sanskrit to modern European
languages and classical Greek and Latin can be
seen in cognates like mother and matr
or father and pitr. Other
interesting links are to be found between
Sanskritic roots and Persian, present in such a
striking example as the generic term for 'land'
which in Sanskrit is sthaan and
in Persian staan.
European scholarship in Sanskrit, initiated by
Heinrich Roth and Johann Ernest Hanxleden, led
to the proposal of the Indo-European language
family by Sir William Jones, and thus played an
important role in the development of Western
linguistics. Indeed, linguistics (along with
phonology, etc.) first arose among Indian
grammarians who were attempting to catalog and
codify Sanskrit's rules. Modern linguistics owes
a great deal to these grammarians, and to this
day, key terms for compound analysis are taken
from Sanskrit. The oldest surviving Sanskrit
grammar is Pānini's c. 500 BC Aòsòtādhyāyī ("8
ChapterGrammar").
http://www.haryana-online.com/History/
sanskrit.htm
The Indian
Scripts are originated from two early sources –
one from the Semitic Languages and the other
from the Aryan (Indo-European) Languages. The
early scripts of Brahmi originated from the
Semitic Languages from the 7th
centaury BC while the Kharosti originated from
the Indo-European Languages about the same time.
It is interesting to note the Sanskrit Script as
used today was actually an offshoot of the
Semitic influence rather than Aryan. Certainly
there must have been mutual influence and
interaction during the development. This
interaction between the two major ethnic
languages can be traced back to the Persian
invasion of Israel. Ahasaures, also known as
Artexerxes was probably the husband of Queen
Esther. From then on the relation between the
Aryan and the Semitic people were very cordial.
This led to the mutual influence that we see in
the script and languages.
Sites of Asokan Rock and pillar edicts covers
most of the North and Central India and were
written in the regional languages.
Bilingual edict (Greek and Aramaic) by king
Ashoka,
from Kandahar - Afghan National Museum.
Vedas were
originally written using the Grantha and Nagiri
Scripts. Since the earliest evidence of Grantha
Scripts are found only around 5th c
AD, the Vedas in Sanskrit could not have been
written anytime earlier. It may be argued that
Vedas could have been in oral form. This is a
conjecture. People certainly have been
philosophical even without a written document.
But they are not crystallized until they are
written down.
The first
epigraphic evidence of Sanskrit is seen in 150
AD and this inscription is in the Brahmi script.
(Encyclopedia Britannica, 1982).
From the
fifth century A.D. classical Sanskrit is seen to
be the dominant language in the inscriptions.
The use of
Sanskrit as a language was first observed in the
ramayana (Sundarakanda, 30/17-18).
Shyam Rao
makes the following clear statements in regards
to Sanskrit in his Anti-Sanskrit Scripture'
by Shyam Rao, published by Sudrastan Books,
Jabalpur, 1999 (free from any Copyright). It was
thence reprinted in Dalitstan Journal, Volume 1,
Issue 2 (Oct. 1999)
Vedas
- The word `Sanskrit' does not occur anywhere in
the Vedas. Not a single verse mentions this word
as denoting a language.
Chandasa
- The Vedic language was referred to as Chandasa
even by Panini himself [`Indo-Aryan and Hindi',
S. K. Chatterji, Firma K. L. Mukhopadhyay,
Calcutta-12, p. 63 ], and not as
`Sanskrit'.
Buddha
- The Buddha was advised to translate his
teachings into the learned man's tongue - the `Chandasa'
standard [ Chatterji., p. 64 ], there is no
mention of any `Sanskrit'. The Buddha refused,
preferring the Prakrits. There is not even a
single reference in any contemporary Buddhist
texts to the word `Sanskrit'. This shows that
Sanskrit did not even exist at the time of the
Buddha and that the people at that period, even
the Brahmins themselves, were not aware of
themselves as speaking `Sanskrit'; they referred
to their language as `Chandasa'.
Ramayana
- The word `Sanskrit' occurs for the first time
as referring to a language in the Ramayana : "In
the latter [Ramayana] the term `samskrta'
"formal, polished", is encountered, probably for
the first time with reference to the language" [
Encyclopaedia Brittanica 22 `Langs', p. 616 ] It
is to be noted that extant versions of the
Ramayana date only to the centuries AD.
Asokan Script
- The first inscriptions in Indian history are
in Prakrit and not in Sanskrit. These are by the
Mauryan King Ashoka (c. 273 BC - 232 BC ), and
number over 30. They date to the 4th century BC.
The script utilised is not `sacred' Devanagari,
and the language is not `Mother' Sanskrit. They
are mostly in the Brahmi script, while 2
inscriptions are in Kharoshtri. They are in
various Prakrits and some in Afghanistan are in
Greek and Aramaic [`Inscriptions: Their Literary
Value I', R. Basak, `Cultural Heritage of India'
vol. 5, p. 390-406,. p. 390-1 ]. In fact all
inscriptions in India were in Prakrit till the
early centuries AD : "The earlier inscriptions
up to the 1st century AD, were all in Prakrit"
-- [`Prakrit Language and Literature', Cultural
Heritage of India vol. 5, 164-183, A. N. Upadhye.,
p. 164 ]
Satavahana
Inscriptions
- The Satavahanas, the first historical dynasty
of the Deccan, also used a Prakrit language.
There is no usage of Sanskrit. The
Nagarjunikonda insrciptions are by the Satvahana
king Vijaya Satakarni in the early 3rd cetnruy
AD & end with the Ikshvaku Rudrapurusadatta who
ruled for 11 years in the second quarter of the
4th century. Most of the large number of
inscriptions are in Prakrit and only a few
belonging to Ehuvulu Santamula are in Sanskrit
(he ruled during the last 24 years of the 3rd to
the early 4th century AD ) but even most of his
inscriptions are in Prakrit and those which are
in Sasnkrit are heavily influenced by Prakrit [
Bhatt., p. 408 ftn. 46 ].
The Nanaghat
cave inscriptions
in Poona distt. are in Prakrit and are the work
of the Satavahana Satakarni I. They have been
dated to the first half of the 1st century BC.
The contemporary relgiion of this region was
Vedic. Indra and Vasudev are mentioned as the
Vedic gods then worshipped [ Basak, p. 395 ].
The later cave inscriptions of
Nasik
in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD are in the local
Prakrit [ Basak, p. 395 ]. Thus, although the
Vedic religion was followed in the Satavahana
regions, Sanksrit was not in use.
Gandhari
- Even Gandhari existed prior to Sanskrit. The
Pali Dhammapada in Gandhari was discovered at
Khotan in Kharoshtri script. It dates to the 1st
or 2nd century AD. A Gandhari insrcription was
discovered on a copper casket containing relics
of the Lord Sakyamuni [ Basak, p. 393 ].
Kharavela's
Kalinga Inscription
- Kharavela's Kalingan inscription of the 1st
century BC were in a Prakrit of the east indian
type. Interseting is the first mention of the
word Bharatavarsha in an inscription. Kharavela
is described as invading Bharatavarsha, which
then evidently denoted only North India [ Basak,
p. 393 ].
First Sanskrit
Inscription
: 150 AD - The earliest inscription in Sanskrit
is by the Saka Mahakshatrapa Rudradaman at
Junagarh in Gujarat
dated to AD 150. However, even here several of
the words are wrong according to Sanskrit
grammatical rules, some words show Prakrit
influence and a few are un-Paninian [ Basak
397-8 ]. This inscription is several centuries
later than the earliest Prakrit inscriptions,
and are the creation of Sakas, not Arya kings.
In fact all inscriptions in India were in
Prakrit (vernacular languages) till the early
centuries AD .
It is evident
that there was no Sanskrit before 150 AD.
Chandasa was renamed as Sanskrit inorder to
claim predating Sanskrit writings.
Alexander
Harris explains it as follows: http://www.appiusforum.com/sanskrit.html
"The stone
pillar inscription of Samudra Gupta (AD 330 to
380) written in Sanskrit and a late Brahmi
script called the Gupta script is an undated
inscription incised on an Asokan pillar at
Allahabad. Composed by Harisena, a
commander-in-chief of the king it describes
elaborately the moral, intellectual and military
achievements of this king. This inscription
possibly dates 350 AD.
A key
evidence often presented in the dating of
Sanskrit is Patanjali’s Vyakarana - Mahabhasya
(Great Commentary). The Mahabhasya is both a
defense of the grammarian Panini against his
chief critic and detractor Katyayana and a
refutation of some of Panini’s aphorisms.
Patanjali is dated anywhere from 2nd c BC to 5th
c AD.
On
Patanjali’s date, the composition of the
Mahabhasya and its early tradition, Joshi and
Roodbergen write,
It is nearly
unanimously agreed that Patanjali has lived
around 140 BC. But as stated by Winternitz, we
are not in a position to confirm that this is
the correct date. The question largely depends
on the other question, namely, whether Patanjali
was the author of the examples he quotes.
According to Tarn,
there is nothing conclusive in Patanajli’s
assumed date, precisely because his grammatical
examples are, or in any particular case may be,
not necessarily his own composition but
traditional examples. Nor are the dates assigned
to Panini and Katyayana in the fourth and third
century BC more than a working hypothesis, that
is, ornate guesswork.
The spread of
Sanskrit South is first evidenced by the
Talagunda stone pillar inscription of Kadamba
Kakusthavarman13 in the Shimoga District,
Karnataka dated between 455 and 470 AD. It is
written in late southern Brahmi inscribed in the
reign of Santivarman (450 to 470 AD). It is a
postthumous record of Kakusthavarman.
Sanskrit then
spreads in the South evidenced by the
inscriptions in Early Grantha, dating from the
5th to 6th c. AD on copper plates and stone
monuments from the kingdom of the Pallavas near
Chennai (Madras). The Grantha alphabet, which
belongs to the writing system of southern India,
was developed in the 5th c. AD to mainly write
Sanskrit. From the fifth century A.D. classical
Sanskrit is seen to be the dominant language in
the inscriptions which indicates that Sanskrit
was replacing the dialects.
Further more
research on the development of writing scripts
in India certainly puts a rather late date on
these Sanskrit writings."
Earlier
documents used Pali and Prakrit. Asoka who took
every care to make his messages intelligible to
the common man used all existing scripts and
languages. These 3rd Centaury
inscriptions do not include Sanskrit. It
included Prakrit, Greek and Aramaic. But no
Sanskrit is found because it was not in
existence at that time.
Asoka’s
Edict in Prakrit
Sanskrit was
developed out of Prakrit and other existing
languages during the interval of 100 AD to 150
AD "The first evidence of classical Sanskrit is
found as an inscription dating around A.D.150 in
the Brahmi script. It records the repair of a
dam originally built by Chandragupta Maurya, and
also contains a panegyric in verse, which can be
regarded as the first literary composition in
classical Sanskrit. It is at Girnar in Kathiawar
and was inscribed by Rudradamana, the Saka
Satrap of Ujjayini, on the same rock on which
the Fourteen Rock Edicts of Asoka were also
found.
It is
significant that Rudradamana employed classical
Sanskrit in a region where about four hundred
years before him Asoka had used only Prakrit.
This definitely proves that in the second
century AD Sanskrit was replacing the dialects.
Even so the language did not replace Prakrit
everywhere, but it continued to be used in
inscriptions for something like one hundred
years or even more after this date. However,
from the fifth century A.D. classical Sanskrit
is seen to be the dominant language in the
inscriptions. ( Hinduism, by Nirad C.
Chaudhuri, Oxford University Press, USA, 1979.)
"The earliest
epigraphic evidence on languages employed in
India comes from the inscriptions of Asoka
inscribed in third century B.C. Asoka took care
that his messages were intelligible to all and
he used a particular kind of Prakrit. Even more
remarkable is the fact, which has been recently
discovered, that for those people who at the
time lived in Afghanistan, his message was given
in Greek as well as Aramaic. One of the Greek
inscriptions is a translation of the Kalinga
Edict, and the Greek of the inscriptions is not
inferior in style to the classical Greek of
Greek literature. In such circumstances neglect
of Sanskrit by Asoka, if the language was in
use, would be contrary to all his practice.1
So, the absence of Sanskrit in his
inscriptions indicates that it did not exist at
that time, as otherwise he would have certainly
used it." Dr. Alexander Harris: Significance of
Sanskrit.
Thus apart
from portions of the Veda which were not written
in Sanskrit, all other Vedas, Upanishads,
Brahmanas and Puranas etc were written down
later than 100 AD at liberal estimate. They must
have been written down much later in actual
fact. A more realistic estimate will be around 6th
Centaury AD.
"The pious view
is that the Vedas are eternal and uncreated and
exist essentially as sound. More conventional,
but still pious, scholarship may still
exaggerate the antiquity of the Vedas, sometimes
claiming they go back to 10,000 BC or earlier.
Now, however, it looks like even the oldest
parts of the Rg Veda do not antedate the arrival
of the Arya in India, although the gods and
elements of the stories are older, since they
are attested with Iranian peoples and the
Mitanni, with parallels in Greek and Latin
mythology." (Kelly Ross)
Panini
Panini's
Astadhyayi is the main Sanskrit grammar
book. The name Panini came to stand for the
unknown author who started the grammar writing
process. In a later period, Astadhyayi
became even more authoritative through the
contributions of Vartikakara Vararuchi (or
Katyayana) and Bhasyakara (the commentator)
Patanjali. So the complete Astadhyayi is
called Trimunivyakarana (contribution of
three grammarians). The rules, which have been
compiled in Astadhyai, are considered to
be essential for Sanskrit language and
literature. Besides Astadhyai there are
many other famous grammars in Sanskrit.
Panini was born
in Shalatula, a town near to Attock on the Indus
river in present day Pakistan. The dates given
for Panini are pure guesses. Experts give
various dates in the 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th
century BC and there is also no agreement among
historians about his date or to the extent of
the work with which he is honored.
Panini was a
grammarian trying to refine existing languages
(to make a "Sanskrit" language), who gave a
comprehensive and scientific theory of
phonetics, phonology, and morphology. Sanskrit
was the classical literary language of the
Indian Hindus and Panini is considered the
founder of the language and literature. The word
"Sanskrit" means "refined" – it is refined from
some raw material language. A treatise called
Astadhyayi (or Astaka ) is Panini's major work.
It consists of eight chapters, each subdivided
into quarter chapters. In this work Panini
distinguishes between the language of sacred
texts and the usual language of communication.
Panini gives formal production rules and
definitions to describe Sanskrit grammar.
Starting with about 1700 basic elements like
nouns, verbs, vowels, consonants he put them
into classes. The construction of sentences,
compound nouns etc. is explained as ordered
rules operating on underlying structures in a
manner similar to modern theory. In many ways
Panini's constructions are similar to the way
that a mathematical function is defined today.
There is no
means of knowing the date of Panini. The
references to existing authors (there are ten of
them) does not give any indication since we
don’t know about those authors, that Panini per
definition lived at the end of the Vedic period:
he notes a few special rules, marked chandasi
("in the hymns") to account for forms in the
Vedic scriptures that had fallen out of use in
the spoken language of his time, indicating that
Vedic Sanskrit was already archaic, but still a
comprehensible dialect. An important hint for
the dating of Panini is the occurrence of the
word yavanānī (in 4.1.49, either "Greek
woman", or "Greek script") There would have been
no first-hand knowledge of Greeks in Gandhara
before the conquests of Alexander the Great in
the 330s BC. Aside from the more abstract
considerations of long-distance artistic or
philosophical influence, the concrete evidence
we have for direct contact between Greeks and
Indians is largely limited to the period between
the third century BCE and first century CE.",
('Hellenistic India' by Rachel R. Mairs,
University of Cambridge) He mentions documents
which he has referred as Greek (Yavanani). These
would place him after the invasion of Alexander
the great when India came in direct contact with
the Greek. He certainly lived after Buddha
because of his referece to Dharma. How long
after that is still a problem. In general the
any attempt to date Panini is just pure
conjecture. He could have lived well after the
first century AD. Panini’s dating and the
complete grammatical structure is important in
the Sanskrit history since Classical Sanskrit is
normally dated from Panini.
It is not
certain whether Panini used writing for the
composition of his work, though it is generally
agreed that he did use a form of writing, based
on references to words such as "script" and
"scribe" in his Ashtadhyayi.
No one with any clear understanding of the
complexity of his system could conceive that he
worked without written notes using human
notepads. That is exactly what we are asked to
do by those who want to date back Panini. (It is
proposed that he composed it with the help of a
group of students whose memories served him as
'notepads'. Writing first reappears in India
(since the
Indus
script) in the form of the Brāhmī script from
ca. the 6th century BC, though these early
instances of the Brāhmī script are from Tamil
Nadu in southern India, quite distant from
Gandhara in northwestern India. Since Gandhara
was under Persian rule in the 6th century BC, it
would also be possible that he used the Aramaic
alphabet (from a variant of which the Brāhmī
script is likely a descendant). Along with the
understanding that the first sanskrit
documentation is only from the second century AD
we are forced to date panini in the first or
second century AD rather than at the time of
Buddha nor Alexander. One of the Aryan deity was
still Vasudeva as Panini refers and so it was
long before the appearance of the name Krishna
which appears only after the third century AD.
Kushan kings took their Indian name from
Vasudeva until third century AD.
Based on the
Archeological, linguistics and geographical
reasons, the most probable date of Panini is
soon after the first century. The Classical
Sanskrit starts from there. At any rate we do
not have any Sanskrit documents of work of
earlier dates in existence.
While
Panini’s date is unknown we have other
Grammarians whose dates are well established.
Katantravyakarana by Sharvavarman (100
AD),
Chandravyakarana by Chandragomin (c 700
AD),
Vakyapadiya by Bhartrhari (700 AD),
Katantrasutravrtti by Durgasingha (900
AD),
Siddhahemachandranushasana by Hemachandra
(1050-1100 AD), Mugdhavodhavyakarana by
Vopadeva (1200-1250 AD),
Jaumaravyakarana by Kramadishvara
(1200-1250),
Saupadmavyakarana by Padmanabha Datta
(1300-1350),
Harinamamrta by Rupagosvami, (c
1470-1559), and
Siddhantakaumudi by Bhattojidiksita (1700
AD)
Thus in among
the known authors the dates starts from 100 AD.
Thus we can guess that Panini must have lived
sometime in the later half of the first century
which was the time when Sanskrit began to appear
as a language archealogically.
In a similar
manner we can look at the Time Line of Sanskrit
Literature which will again give some clue to
the beginning of the Sanskrit as a language.
We leave aside
the legendary authors like Valmiki and Vedavyasa
whose dates are really not fixed by any
scientific method.
Classical
Sanskrit Literature:
Poems
1.
Asvaghosha (2nd C AD): Buddha charita
2.
Kalidasa (C. 400 A.d.): Raghuvamsa,
Kumara Sambhava
3.
Vishnusharma (c.300-500?): Panchatantra
Stories
4.
Pravarasena (550-600 A.D.): Ravanavaho or
Setubandha
5.
Bhatti : (500-650 A.D.) : Ravanavadha
6.
Vishakadatta (6th century AD):
Mudrarakshasa( The Demon and the Signet Ring).
Devichandragupta and Abhisarikavancitaka
7.
Kumaradasa : (c: 800 A.D.) : Janakiharana
8.
Abhinanda (9th cent.) Ramacarita
9.
Ksemendra (11th cent.)Ramayanamanjari,
Dasavatara-carita
10.
Soacakalyamalla (12th cent.) :
Udararaghava
11.
Cakra Kavi (17th cent.) : Janakiparinaya
12.
Advaita kavi (17th cent.) Ramalingamrta
13.
Mohana svami : (1608 A.d.
Roac(a,)marahasya or Roac(a,)ma Carita (India
Office MS. of 1970 A.D.)
Drama
(1) Bhasa,
(2nd cent. A.d.) (a) Pratima (b) Abhiseka
(2) Bhavabhuti (8th cent.) (a) mahaviracarita
(b) Uttararamacarita
(3) Dinnaga (9th cent.) Kundamala
(4) Murari (900 A.D.) Anargharaghava
(5) Rajesekhara : (10th cent.) Balaramayana
(6) Hanuman: Hanumannataka or Mahanataka
(7) Saktibhadra (9th cent.) Ascaryacudamani
(8) Yasovarman (8th cent.) : Ramabhudaya
(9) Mayuraja : Udattaraghava
(10) Anonymous : (a) Chalit RM (b) Krtya RM (c)
Mayapuspaka (d) Svapnadarsana
(11) Ksirasvami : Abhinavaraghava
(12) Ramachandra (12 cent AD) (a) Raghuvilasa
(b) Raghavabhyudaya
(13)Jayadeva : Prasanna-Raghava (12 cent.)
(14) Hastimalla : Maithikalyana (1290 A.D.)
(15) Subhata : Dutangada (13 cent.)
(16) Bhaskara Bhatta : Unmattaraghava (14 cent.)
(17) Tryasamisradeva : Ramabhyudaya (15 cent.)
(18) Mahadeva : Adbhutaramayana (17 cent.)
(19) Ramabhadra Diksita : Janakiparinaya
Miscellaneous
Poems
(i) Slesakavyas
(1)
Dharnanjaya : Raghavapandaviya (12 cent.)
(2) Madhava Bhatta : Raghavapandaviya
(3) haradatta Suri : Radhava-Naisadhiya
(4) Cidambara : Radhavapandaviya-Yadaviya (1600
A.D.)
(5) Gangadhara Mahadevakavi : (18 cent.)
Sankatanasanastotra
(6) Tulsidas. (17th century AD) : Sri
Ramacharita Manasa (Poetry)
(ii)
Vilomakavyas:
1.
Suryadevi : Ramakrshna-viloma-Kavya (1540
A.D.)
(iii)
Citrakavyas:
1.
Krsna Mohana: Ramalilamrta
2.
Venkatesa : Citrabandha RM
(iv) Amorous
Khandakavyas:
(1)
Venkatadesika : Hamsasandesa or Hamsaduta
(2) Rudra Vacaspati : Bhramaraaduta
(3) Vasudeva : Bhramara-sandesa
(4) Anonymous : Kapiduta
(5) Venkatacarya : Kokilasandesa
(6) Jayadeva Ramagita-Govinda
(7) Krsnacandra : Candraduta
(8) Harisankara : Gitaraghava
(9) Prabhakara : Gitaraghava
(10) Haryacarya : Janakigita
(11) Harinatha : Ramavilasa
(12) Visvanathasimha Sangita Raghunandana
(13) Visvanatha : Raghavavilasa
(14) Somesvara : Ramasataka
Prose Romance
and Campus
1.
Banabhatta. (7th century
AD)Kadambari and Harsha Charita (Ornate prose)
2.
Ksemendra : Brhatkathamanjari
3.
Somadeva : Kathasaritasagara
4.
Bhoja : Campu RM (Many other campus such
as Uttararamayana Campu, etc. based on
Uttarakhanda of RM)
5.
Vasudeva : Ramakatha
Others
Dandin. (7th
century AD): Kavyadarsa
Somadeva Bhatta.
(12th century AD) :Katha Sarit Sagara
(collection of stories)
Again well
established writers of Sanskrit all fall after
the first century AD which fits the
archealogical time frame.
(((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((
Yet we have the
Hindu scholars fooling the public with such
statements as the one that follows:
www.hinduwisdom.info/Hindu_Scriptures.htm
Sanskrit, the language of Hindu scriptures, is
the oldest and the most systematic language in
the world. It originated several thousand years
ago, yet is still used in India.
Here are some
other extraordinary claims:
http://www.encyclopediaofauthentichinduism.org/articles/13_the_origin_of.htm
Swami Prakashanand Saraswati
If you look
to the history of the languages of the world you
will find that they went through a number of
stages of their development. But the Sanskrit
language was absolutely perfect by all means
from the very beginning. Is it not enough
evidence to understand that it is not man-made
and it is a Divine gift?
Because. Its
root system of forming a word and its detailed
grammar have no comparison with any of the
languages of the world, and because it is the
original language, so it is very likely that
some of its daily spoken words could have been
adopted by the other languages which itself is
the evidence that Sanskrit is the mother
language of the world.
http://www.bhagavad-gita.org/Articles/vyasa.html
Vedavyasa Reveals the Vedic Chronology of
Srimad Bhagavad-Gita
Showing great compassion for all living entities
Lord Krishna’s lila avatar and literary
incarnation Krishna Dvaipayana Vedavyasa
composed the authentic historical treatise known
throughout creation as the Mahabharata. The
eighteen chapters of the Bhagavad-Gita are found
in the Bhisma-parva, chapters 25 to 42 of the
Mahabharata and they are the exact words that
Lord Krishna spoke in Sanskrit on the
battlefield of
Kuruksetra,
India
over five thousand years ago in 3137 B.C. The
proof that the Mahabharata is definitely an
authentic historical treatise and not
allegorical or mythological is verified in the
Srimad Bhagavatam, Canto 1, chapter 4, verse 25
But Bhagvata Purana was written in 6/7th C. AD
Bhagavat gita is written in Sanskrit which came
into existence only by 150 AD. So if
Krishna lived in 3137 BC he could not have
delivered it in Sanskrit.
http://www.thevedicfoundation.org/valuable_resources/Sanskrit
The_Mother_of_All_Languages_partIII.htm
The perfection of the pronunciation (of the
consonants and the vowels) and the uniqueness of
the grammar that stays the same in all the ages
from the very beginning of human civilization
and up till today are such features which prove
that Sanskrit is not manmade; it is a Divine
gift to the people of this world
This will bring
us to the subject of the date of the Upanishads.
All Hindu Scriptures other than the Rig Veda are
written in Sanskrit. Essentially therefore they
were written down after the second century AD.
The backdating of Sanskrit Upanishads is a
common form of deceit and is taken by many
historians without asking questions and is
repeated as though it is a truth. Here are some
examples:
http://www.usao.edu/~usao-ids3313/ids/html/hinduism.html
"The Upanishads (basic scriptures of
Hinduism proper)--records of teachings and
discussions of forest hermits, holy men who
accomplished the task of transforming Vedism
into Hinduism during and after the 6th century
B.C.E. The earliest Upanishads date from 900 to
600 B.C.E., and represent the first development
of philosophical reflections in Sanskrit
literature. According to a widespread tradition
the oldest Upanishads are the Isa,
Kena, Katha, Prasna,
Mundaka, Mandukya, Taittiriya,
Aitareya, Chandogya,
Brhadaranyaka, Svetasvatara,
Kaushitaki, and Maitri Upanishads."
http://www.enotes.com/classical-medieval
criticism/upanishads
"Upanishads
Vedic texts, circa seventh-fifth century B.C.
INTRODUCTION
The
Upanishads are ancient texts written in
Sanskrit, representing the religious and
philosophical tradition of Hinduism and India.
Together with the Aranyakas the
Upanishads are found at the end of the
Vedas, the sacred scriptures of Hinduism,
and thus called Vedantas."
http://www.answers.com/topic/upanishads
Upanishads (ūpăn'ĭshădz) ,
speculative and mystical scriptures of
Hinduism, regarded as the wellspring of Hindu
religious and speculative thought. The
Upanishads, which form the last section of the
literature of the Veda, were composed beginning
c.900 B.C. Of the 112 extant Upanishads, about
13 date from the Vedic period and the remainder
are later, sectarian works.
http://www.dlshq.org/religions/upanishads.htm
"Some Western
scholars have fixed the age of the Upanishads as
B.C. 600, or so. They regard that all of them
belong to the pre-Buddhistic period. This is a
sad mistake indeed. The Upanishads are the
knowledge portion, or Jnana-Kanda, of the Vedas.
They are eternal. They came out of the mouth of
Hiranyagarbha, or Brahman. How can one fix the
date of the Upanishads? They existed even
before the creation of this world." Sri Swami
Sivananda
http://www.sanskrit.nic.in/ABOUTSANSKRIT1.htm
"As per the
Indian tradition Sanskrit Language has no
beginning and no ending. It is eternal.
Self-born God has created it. It is divine. It
is everlasting. It was first used in Vedas and
thereafter it has been the means of expression
in other fields."
Here is the last
straw:
The True History and the Religion of India: A
Concise Encyclopedia of ...
By Swami Prakashanand
Saraswati
))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
Thus every
literature that we have in Sanskrit must
invariably fall after the first century.
We cannot refute
the claims that there were literature in India
long before that time. But no body can
substantiate any existence of Sanskrit
literature before 150 AD. This is therefore
definitely applicable to all Upanishads wherein
we have the new concept of Brahman, Atman and
Iswara
None of the
Upanishads could have been written in Sanskrit
any time before the first century AD is certain.
The concepts themselves are embedded in the
vocabulary of Sanskrit.
