1.#.Opinion : Thursday, 31 Aug 2023. 05:30 3244. /// 1.# Ancient Culture ( Samskaram ) of India ( Bharatham ) - 21. Swami Krishnananda.///

 

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1.#.Opinion : Thursday, 31 Aug 2023. 05:30 3244. /// 

1.# Ancient Culture ( Samskaram ) of India ( Bharatham ) - 21. Swami Krishnananda.///

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Bhagavad Gita & Sanathana Dharmam

Chapter 8: India's Concept of Totality-4.

Post-21.

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The Samadhi Bhasha of Sri Krishna Dvaipayana Vyasa, which is the Bhagavata Mahapurana, is constituted of twelve books, not eighteen. The first book is the introductory chapter, the second book goes into details of creation, etc., the third book has further details of creation, and so on. It is the tenth book that is entirely devoted to the life of Bhagavan Sri Krishna. The tenth book of the Srimad Bhagavata has two parts. The first part of the tenth book, or skanda, which is ninety chapters in length, is devoted to the early boyhood days of Krishna in Brindavan and Mathura—his childhood days—and ends with the death of Kamsa. Krishna's more public family life, at a mature age, is the subject of the second part of the tenth book of the Bhagavata, but Vyasa does not touch the points that we have in the Mahabharata. All the great things about Bhagavan Sri Krishna which are told to us in the Mahabharata we will not find in the Srimad Bhagavata and, vice versa, what we have in the Bhagavata we will not find in the Mahabharata. So the Mahabharata and the Bhagavata put together may be regarded as a complete epic picture of social and divine comedy, with also a touch of tragedy in the end.

The Veda says, “I am afraid of people who approach me without the knowledge of the epics and the Puranas.” This is because the epics and the Puranas—the reference is especially to the Mahabharata and the Bhagavata—explain the inner meaning and potentiality of the Veda. But if we approach the Veda directly without having understood the inner meaning of the epics and the Puranas, the Mahabharata and the Bhagavata, the Veda is afraid: “This man is going to kill me.” We will slaughter the Veda if we try to understand it with our own intellect without having read the Mahabharata and the Bhagavata. As I mentioned, the intellect is not sufficient for the Vedas. The Vedas are deeper intuitions, and as common people cannot have access into this required insight, they have to slowly proceed towards the inner content of the Vedas by having mastered the more easily explained theme of this sacred text through the Mahabharata and the Bhagavata.

Though the epics are two—the Ramayana and the Mahabharata—the Puranas are eighteen in number. The most important of the eighteen Puranas are the Vishnu Purana and the Bhagavata Purana. Actually, the life of Sri Krishna as we have in the Srimad Bhagavata is a condensed and more amplified form of whatever we have about him in the Mahabharata, the Harivamsa and the Vishnu Purana. The Srimad Bhagavata is Vyasa's last work, his Samadhi Bhasha, the final work, and perhaps Vyasa put down his pen after he completed writing it, as it is sometimes said that Shakespeare put down his pen after writing The Tempest. Shakespeare  threw his magic wand into the sea, and Vyasa did not write anything more afterwards, is the story that we hear.

Sometimes the Yoga Vasishtha is also considered as one of the epics, though not normally speaking, because in one verse of the Valmiki Ramayana there is some peculiar suggestion that Valmiki wrote the story of Rama together with a supplement, but what that supplement is, is not mentioned. The Yoga Vasishtha is also said to be, according to common consensus, the work of Valmiki. As the Harivamsa and the Bhagavata are the work of Krishna Dvaipayana Vyasa who wrote the Mahabharata, the Yoga Vasishtha is attributed to the pen of Valmiki.

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To be continued

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JAI HIND

JAI BHARATHAM

VANDHE MADHARAM

BHARAT MATHA KI JAI.

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