Gita Rahasya -Tilak 7

Karma Yoga Sastra -Tilak

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY The (Jurujnanavasistha-tattvasarayana of the Madras Presidency is a very ancient work according to some, but I am not of that opinion, because it contains a reference to 108 Upanisads and it cannot be said that all of them are ancient ; and if one considers the Suryagita, we find in it a reference to Qualified-Monism (visistadvaita), and in some places the arguments too seem to have been adopted from the Bhagavadgita , and therefore, one has to come to the conclusion that even this work was written much later on, possibly even after the date of Sri Samkaracarya. Although there were many gitas, yet inasmuch as the Bhagavadgita was of unquestionable excellence, as shown above, later philosophers, following the Vedic cult, thought it proper not to take much notice of the other gitas and to examine only the Bhagavadglta and explain its import to their co-religionists. The examination of a work is of two kinds ; there is the internal examination and the external examination. If one considers the book as a whole and extracts the inner meaning, the import, the implied meaning, or conclusions Bought to be proved by it, that is called the " internal examination ". Considering where a particular work was written, who wrote it, what kind of language is used in it, to what extent good sense or sweetness of sound are to be found in it from the poetical point of view, whether the diction of it is grammatically correct, or it contains any old archaic constructions, what opinions, places or personages are mentioned in it, and whether or not such references enable you to determine the date of the work or the social conditions availing at the time when the work was written, whether the ideas in the book are original or are borrowed from some one else, and if borrowed, then which they are, and from whom they are borrowed, etc. — which is an exposition of the purely external aspects of the book, — is called the " external examination " of the work. Those ancient commentators who have written -commentaries ( bhasya ) or criticisms ( tlka ) on the Glta have not given much attention to these external aspects. Because, -considering these matters, while examining a supernatural work like the Bhagavadglta, would, in their opinion, be like wasting time in merely counting the petals of an excellent flower, instead of admiring its scent, colour or beauty or in criticising the combs of a honey-comb full of honey ; but following the example of Western critics, modern scholars are now devoting much attention to the external examination of the Gita. One of these has counted the archaic constructions in the Gita and come to the conclusion that this work must have been written at least a few centuries before the birth of Christ ; and that, the doubt that the path of Devotion described, in the Gita may have been adopted from the Christian religion ( which was promulgated at a later date ) is absolutely without foundation. Another scholar has taken it for granted that the atheistic opinions which have been mentioned in the 16th chapter of the Gita, must, most probably, be Buddhistic, and come to the conclusion that the Gita must have come into- existence after the date of Buddha.