A Record of the Buddhist Religion as practised in India and the Malay Archipelago/Letter from the Right Honourable Professor F. Max Müller to Mr. J. Takakusu
LETTER FROM THE RIGHT HONOURABLE PROFESSOR F. MAX MÜLLER
TO
MR. J. TAKAKUSU.
- Oxford:
- January, 1896.
My dear Friend,
Ever since I made the acquaintance of Stanislas Julien at Paris, in 1846, being constantly with him while he translated Hiuen Thsang's Travels in India, I felt convinced that the most important help for settling the chronology of mediaeval Sanskrit literature would be found in Chinese writers. I was particularly anxious for a translation of I-tsing's work; and as far back as 1880[1] I expressed a hope that the Record of that great Chinese traveller's stay in India would soon be rendered accessible to us in an English translation. Some of the contents of his book became known to me through one of my Japanese Buddhist pupils, Kasawara; but he unfortunately died before he could finish his translation of the whole Record. From the fragments of his translation, however, I gathered some important facts, which were published first in the Academy, October 2, 1880, then in the Indian Antiquary[2], and in the appendix to my 'India, what can it teach us?' under the title of Renaissance of Sanskrit Literature.
From I-tsing or from any of the Chinese travellers in India we must not expect any trustworthy information on the ancient literature of India. What they tell us, for instance, on the date of the birth of Buddha, is mere tradition, and cannot claim any independent value. It is interesting to know that the name of Pânini and his great Grammar were known to them, but what they say about his age and circumstances does not help us much. All that is of importance on this subject has been collected and published by me in my edition of the Prâtisâkhya, 1856, Nachträge, pp. 12–15.
The date of Pânini can be fixed hypothetically only. It has been pointed out that Patañgali in his Mahâbhâshya speaks of Pushpamitra, and according to some MSS. of Kandragupta also. Kandragupta was the founder of the Maurya dynasty, Pushpamitra was the first of the dynasty which succeeded the Mauryas. As it seems that Patañgali in one place implies the fall of the Mauryas, which happened in 178 B. C., it has been supposed that he must have lived about that time. And this date seemed to agree with the statement, contained in the Râgataraṅginî (1148 A.D.), that his work, the Mahâbhâshya, was known in Kashmir under king Abhimanyu, that is, in the middle of the first century B.C. As there is a series of grammarians succeeding each other between Patañgali and Pânini, it was argued with some degree of plausibility that Pânini cannot have lived later than the fourth century B.C.
But all this is constructive chronology only, and would have to yield as soon as anything more certain could be produced. It was quite right, therefore, that Professor Weber, of Berlin, should point out and lay stress on the fact that Pânini quotes an alphabet called Yavanânî which he (Weber) takes to mean Ionian or Greek. This alphabet, he argues, could not have been known before the invasion of Alexander, and Pânini could therefore not have written before 320 B.C.
Although Professor Boehtlingk maintains that writing, at least for monumental purposes, was known in India before the third century, he has produced no dated inscription to support his assertion, still less has he proved that this non-existent alphabet was called Yavanânî. We cannot deny the possibility that a knowledge of alphabetic writing may have reached India before the time of Alexander; nor need Yavanânî have meant Ionian or Greek. No one has ever held that any one of the Indian alphabets was derived direct from the Greek letters such as they were at the time of Alexander. No writer of any authority has derived these Indian alphabets from any but a Semitic or Aramaic source. Even Semitic (Phenician) inscriptions before that of Eshmunezar at the end of the fifth century B. C. (fourth century, according to Maspero) are very scarce. I only know of that of Siloam about 700 B.C., and that of Mesha about gco B.C. Professor Weber's argument cannot therefore be brushed away by a mere assertion.
Still less could any scholar say that the existence of the ancient Vedic literature was impossible or inconceivable without a knowledge of alphabetic writing. Where the art of alphabetic writing is known and practised for literary purposes, no person on earth could conceal the fact, and I still challenge any scholar to produce any mention of writing in Indian literature before the supposed age of Pânini. To say that literature is impossible without alphabetic writing shows a want of acquaintance with Greek, Hebrew, Finnish, Estonian, Mordvinian, nay with Mexican literature. Why should all names for writing, paper, ink, stylus, letters, or books have been so carefully avoided if they had been in daily use? Besides, it is well known that the interval between the use of alphabetic writing for official or monumental purposes and its use for literature is very wide. Demand only creates supply, and a written literature would presuppose a reading public such as no one has yet claimed for the time of Homer, of Moses, of the authors of the Kalevala, of Kalevipoeg or of the popular and religious songs of Ugro-Finnish or even Mexican races. To say that the art of writing was kept secret, that the Brâhmans probably kept one copy only of each work for themselves, learnt it by heart and taught it to their pupils, shows what imagination can do in order to escape from facts. The facts on which I base my negative vote are these:—
The inscriptions of Asoka are still the earliest inscriptions in India which can be dated, and the tentative character of the local alphabets in which they are written forms in my eyes a proof of the recent introduction of alphabetic writing in different parts of India. I see no reason to doubt the possibility that the Brâhmans were acquainted with alphabetic writing at an earlier time, and I should hail any discovery like that of Major Deane (if indeed they are Indian inscriptions) as an important addition to the history of the migrations of the Hieratic or so-called Phenician alphabet. But that is very different from asserting that writing was known, or must have been known, whether for monumental or literary purposes, before say 400 B.C. I have still to confess my ignorance of any book having been written on palm leaves or paper before the time of Vattagâmani (88-76 B.C.), or of any datable inscription before the time of Asoka.
But though the works of Chinese pilgrims throw little light on the ancient literature, or even on what I called the Renaissance period up to 400 A.D., they have proved of great help to us in fixing the dates of Sanskrit writers whom they either knew personally or who had died not long before their times. I pointed this out in a paper on the Kâsikâvritti[3] published in the Academy, October 2, 1880.
Professor von Boehtlingk, in the introduction to his edition of Pânini's Grammar (p. iv), referred the Kâsikâ-vritti to about the eighth century A. D., on the supposition that Vâmana, the author of the Kâsikâ, Page:A Record of the Buddhist Religion as practised in India and the Malay Archipelago.djvu/19 Page:A Record of the Buddhist Religion as practised in India and the Malay Archipelago.djvu/20 Page:A Record of the Buddhist Religion as practised in India and the Malay Archipelago.djvu/21 Page:A Record of the Buddhist Religion as practised in India and the Malay Archipelago.djvu/22