Sean Hillman, 2011
M.A. (c) Religion (Buddhist Studies)/Bioethics
B.A. East Asian Studies
Department and Centre for the Study of Religion
Joint Centre for Bioethics
University of Toronto, CANADA
Most intriguing, when considering epic as genre, are the ideas concerning the relationship between authorial/performer intent and reader/audience experience and the debate over the existence or non-existence of an original text.
Richard P. Martin’s Epic as Genre states that the “…genre [is] inhered in its performers” and the “notion of “epic” will not be too large if it expands to fit the performance repertoire…and the cognitive/aesthetic capabilities of their audiences” (Martin 2008, p.15) To me, having spent a great deal of time in the Buddhist texts, this is reminiscent of the question of the authenticity of the teachings of the Buddha, and I suppose by extension, to that of other teachers/founders as well. Did the Buddha teach differently but simultaneously to all of the disciples present for a discourse in order to most appropriately address each individual’s specific needs, or, rather, did they each receive a single message differently according to their own capacity to understand what was being taught? This question also reminds me of Monty Python’s rendition of the Sermon on the Mount in “Life of Brian,” the satirical story that follows a fellow born in the manger next door to Jesus of Nazareth. He and his mother are so far back from Jesus during the discourse, they have trouble hearing and the listeners start coming up with their own ideas of what is being taught:
Jesus: How blest are the sorrowful, for they shall find consolation. How blest are those of gentle spirit. They shall have the earth for their possession. How blest are those who hunger and thirst to see right prevail. They shall be satisfied. . .
Mandy: Speak up!
Brian: Mum! Shh!
M: Well, I can't hear a thing! Let's go to the stoning…
Man: I think it was "Blessed are the Cheesemakers."
Mrs. Gregory: What's so special about the cheesemakers?
G: It's not meant to be taken literally. Obviously it refers to any manufacturers of dairy products.
Martin makes it clear that the performer/author does not operate from their own side, but in interdependent mutuality. This takes the form of a shared context as “…the performance depends on an audience and performer’s unspoken awareness of the totality of a story and its conceivable permutations.” (Martin 2008, p.18) Also, the preferences of the audience drive performance, not the performer or their intent, as “…audience interest [is] the determining factor in how unspecified, as to time and place, a story can be, and what belief it engenders.” (Martin 2008, p.17) and “[a]s dozens of field studies show, the total “epic” is in fact never performed unless elicited by an outsider…” (Martin 2008, p.18)
To take this even further, Lowell Edmunds’s in his Epic and Myth, attempts to show that he original author and story, if they even existed at all, actually disappear altogether. He states that "on the occasion of any retelling, the present, individualist version is authoritative one" (Edmunds p.32) and "authorship disappears in proportion as story succeeds." (Edmunds p. 33)
Martin’s emphasis on ‘performance’ is also helpful to remind of the pre-written origins of story-telling, so easily forgotten in our age of digital media where we are even losing our reliance on hardcopy books.
The linguistic bent of Katz’s article The Indo-European Context thrilled me. If I had chosen another field of study after religion, Asian Studies and anthropology it would have definitely been linguistics. The relationship between thought, behaviour and language has always been fascinating to me. Now, after studying many languages over the years but finally becoming very proficient in one other than English to the point where I can comfortably say that I am bilingual, I can never look at language the same again. The struggle of acquiring the ability to speak and read a language other than my mother tongue has fundamentally changed the way that I think and communicate. However, Katz in his says in regard to the differences in refinement and in being robust that there is “no way to measure…since all languages manifestation of a single very real underlying Human Language.” (Katz: p.20) I have trouble with this view and it seems that later, Katz himself defeats this idea by stating that if “cognates, [have] arisen, via a series of regularly chartable successful speech errors from a distinct form…” which I would take to mean that some languages are closer to their original form than others and therefore we can measure the refinement of a language in relation to its prototype.
Interesting to see the source of Chinese referred to as Proto-Sino-Tibetan (Jones p.21), as discrete from Proto-Indo-European (from which Sanskrit is said to have come), since Tibetan is very much related to Sanskrit. The Proto-Tibetan must refer to Tibetan before the influence of the Sanskrit alphabet. The fact that Tibetans have great difficulty pronouncing certain Sanskrit syllables/phonemes (Vajra is pronounced Bendza) would attest to this.
An ongoing and unanswered question for me in religious textual analysis can be put to Jones with regard to similarities found between texts of cultures separated by space and time: Do textual similarities necessarily mean there is contact between them? A contemporary science fiction show, The Event, has the appearance on Earth of humanoid extraterrestrial biological entities who almost exactly resemble humans except for a 1% difference in their DNA, and regarding the similarity one scientist says: "This may point to a common ancestry or parallel evolution." Cannot the latter be so with regard to texts? I think that there is too much haste in pointing to a common origin, inheritance, or a borrowing interaction when textual similarities are found. Cannot certain textual styles develop in parallel? Katz mentions parallel, interdependent traditions, (Katz p.33) but must there be interdependence in the parallel development of texts?
(2)
Reading that “[b]oth the ‘forest-departed’ and the ascetic are denizens of the forest”, (van Buitenen 1975; p.176) I wonder why these two are separated? Perhaps it is to again distinguish between one who has engaged in vanaprastha and the saṃyāsa, as those who are at two different life stages. But, surely, sometimes they are one and the same? I can see 4 possibilities between the two, the ‘forest-departed’ and the ascetic, (the first, the latter, both and neither) but are there 4 possibilities between these two in the Mahābhārata’s “Book of the Forest”?
The introduction to the Rāmāyaṇa suggests that “the epic genre seems to have required such a transitional episode [as the forest book] within the social, political, and ethical problematic they all share”, (p.2) and that the vastly different context of the forest book has been disorienting to contemporary but not traditional readers. Despite my limited exposure to the Rāmāyaṇa and also limited but somewhat greater exposure to the Mahābhārata, I can nevertheless respond to this statement as a contemporary reader of these epics by saying that it is that very transitional nature and vastly different context (as set apart from regular life in the village) that initially drew me to this literature almost 20 years ago. Drawn to them still, now after having spent years pouring over Buddhist, Hindu and Jain scriptures, the tone and setting of these books still fill me with a sense of childlike awe that reminds me of why I was drawn into the world that is India in the first place. No longer driven by childhood parental rebellion, where reading non-Jewish texts was almost blasphemous, my research motivation to find Indian approaches to health and healing brings me back to texts such as these: epics which have historically have not been given enough scholarly attention, and particularly their forest books, specifically because of their unconventional contents that include perspectives on the supernatural, the ascetic and the didactic.
In both introductions, there are parallels drawn to Pali Buddhist works, most importantly stories from the Jātakas, to suggest that the epic versions of these similar stories are recast, re-worked or borrowed from the Buddhist canon. I still find some aspects of this seemingly endless hunt for the non-local origins of religious texts and stories frustrating. To be sure, it is fascinating to consider such trans-local connections as the suggestion that the Indian Bodhisattva became the Arabic Yudasāph and then travelled and transformed yet again into the Greek Iosaph. I even got caught up in the linguistic connections search by thinking that maybe Yudasāph has some etymological connection with the common root from the Hebrew term for for Jews, “Yehudi” becoming “Yuden” in German, but it is taking things too far to suggest that the land of Judah got its name from Buddhist terminology travelling West since about 5 centuries lie between their respective origins (although I am not sure when the terms buddh/bodh originally came to be, and we could very well look at the claims of the infinitely enduring Buddhist past). Even more ridiculous is to try and suggest that any story having to do with generosity, or likewise another quality revered in the Buddhist tradition, must have been originally Buddhist! I am glad van Buitenen put a stop to this by calling generosity an “all-Indian value.” (p.198)
(3)
The wilful death of the ascetic Sharabhanga (Pollock 2006: p.55) is a stunning and truly inspiring display of one type of yogic abandonment of the body. The metaphor of his body abandonment being like the snake leaving off its skin shows his placement of the body as one of many vehicles of consciousness, sloughed off for another existence when no longer useful, and his matter-of-fact confidence and self-imposed timely entrance into the transition demonstrates his awareness that his divine station afterwards is secured. His re-attainment youthful radiance during the immolation in the sacrificial fire is a powerful paradox that in the purity of a yogic death there is the youth and vigour which is most cherished in life. His passing beyond the status of brahmins, seers and gods on his way to the world of Brahma as promised by Indra himself, leaves no doubt that this is no ordinary death. What is also striking, but goes by without flourish, is Sharabhanga’s invitation to Rāma, specifically, to witness his transmogrified departure and the unmentioned privilege Rāma has in doing so. Later, the ascetic Sutīkshna mentions that he too has awaited a meeting with Rāma before “leaving my body behind on the earth” (p.61) to ascend to the world of Brahma, but in this case following a different kind of yogic death than Sharabhanga in that it does not seem to involve self-immolation in a sacrificial fire but, rather, sloughing off the mortal frame and leaving dust with dust. The last mention in “The First Ten Years of Exile” of the special death undertaken by ascetics is in reference to the abode of the sage Agāstya where “great beings cast off their bodies and in new bodies ascended to heaven.” (p.91) The nature of this ‘new body’ requires further investigation. Is it an intermediary form, cast off when reaching heaven? Is it a new and lasting from the time of leaving off the human form? Is it a celestial body like the gods, free of impurities?
I was taken by two other matters regarding ascetic practice shown in the first chapter of the Rāmāyaṇa. One was the transformation of the environment by the power of asceticism. Trees and animals alike flourish in the area surrounding a sage, and beasts have gentle temperaments. This is remarkable. Another fascinating mention of the fruit of ascetic practice is the offer of Sutīkshna to the three travellers for them to “enjoy yourself in the worlds won by my asceticism” and that it would be by his grace. (p.61) That this sort of transfer of merit, or the accrued benefits of austerities being passed onto or shared by those other than the practitioner themselves has many implications. What is this ‘grace,’ exactly? As happens during discussions on karma, wouldn’t the compassionate who have such benefits coming to them share them, through their grace, with as many as possible? Wouldn’t it be given especially with the most desperate? Does the recipient require accrued merit themselves to warrant such grace? In that case, would it not be the result of their own efforts, and not a transfer as such?
Time and again, the treatment of (or lack of engagement with) Sīta is pronounced. Sutīkshna does not offer food to her (p.63), addresses only the brothers and refers to her as “a shadow” (p.65) and she bears the weapons of the brothers as a servant would. (p.67) The sage also doesn’t embrace Sīta as he does the brothers, but this and not addressing her directly might be a custom that follows with ascetic celibacy protocol and not necessarily discrimination. The narrator describes her appearance often, such as her large eyes (p.67) and her fair waist (p.77). Aside from one mention of Rāma’s lotus eyes (p.89), he is most often described not by way of his appearance but by way of the qualities of his character, such as his righteousness.
“The Forest Teachings” chapter of the Mahābhārata also denigrates females, by reifying the male. Draupadi feeds Yudhiṣṭhira first then herself (van Buitenen 1975, p.229). The examples Vidura gives for his brother not being influenced by his advice are “like leading a corrupt woman to a scholar’s house,” or an old man being displeasing to a girl. (p.233) These metaphors are hardly flattering to women. Later, Dhrtarāṣṭra thinks that “no other property, however valuable, prevails over a son” and that a “son is even greater than life itself.” (p.237) Without addressing the mention of children as possessions, an entirely different but important concern, it is clear from these statements that the king places more importance on males than females.
(4)
There are striking parallels in the two epics when the forest books of the Rāmāyaṇa and Mahābhārata are read side-by-side, some of which are hard to see as mere coincidences. Particularly, major events involving rākṣasas appear in almost the same location of the forest books of both epics, within the first several chapters, and they are described similarly as resembling clouds, causing environmental and wildlife disturbances. In the second major chapter of the Rāmāyaṇa forest book (separated from the first only by a slim chapter containing the meeting with the sage Agāstya), “Shurpa-Nakha’s Punishment and Revenge,” the brothers and Sīta meet the rākṣasa that the chapter is named after. Instantly falling in love with Rāma, in introducing herself she self-proclaims as a shape-shifter. (Pollock 2006: p.129) After being teased by the brothers when she professes her love, and mutilated by Lākṣmana after unsuccessfully attacking Sīta, she runs to her mighty brother Khara who is confused as to how one such as herself who is adept at “taking on any form you please” came to be in such a state. (p.135) Angered, the rākṣasa brother sends out a horde of rākṣasas on behalf of his sister to destroy the three forest-dwellers, and the horde is described as being “like clouds driven by the wind.” (p.137) They are slain, and as a bigger and “dreaded troop set forth, a rumbling, mule-gray storm cloud ominously showered down water red as blood.” (p.149) The sun is covered, inauspicious beasts start to clamour, and the environment withers in polar opposition to the flourishing flora and fauna earlier described around the ashrams of seers. In the second chapter of the Mahābhārata’s forest book, “The Slaying of Kirmīra,” a battle with a rākṣasa occurs also. But this may not be enough to warrant mention. As with Shurpa-Nakha, Kirmīra is described as one “who could assume any shape at will.” (van Buitenen 1975: p.241) Similar to the horde in the Rāmāyaṇa, this rākṣasa is “like a monsoon cloud” (p.240) and a “cloud carrying rain.” (p.241) As Kirmīra moves “a gusty wind began to blow, and the sky, overcast by dust, lost its Bear” (p.241) and many animals and plants are terrified by him, an almost identical sequence of poetically described circumstances as with the rākṣasas in the Rāmāyaṇa. Have the texts influenced each other, or can this be explained away by surmising that rākṣasas are typically and symmetrically described in the same way wherever they appear in Indian storytelling? The descriptions are so incredibly similar in manner and locational placement in the respective texts as to raise suspicion of there being some relationship between the texts that brought this about, rather than these aspects appearing in parallel independently.
Another minor parallel between the epics, also involving rākṣasas, is the metaphor of an enemy of those of this class of existence being likened to a thorn. We find such a reference in the Mahābhārata with Kirmīra pledging to destroy Bhīma (who had killed his brother and other close ones) by “excising this thorn of the Rākṣasas!” (p.242) and in the Rāmāyaṇa with Shurpa-Nakha asking her brother to “pluck out this thorn in the side of the rākṣasas, [Rāma] who has made Dāndaka wilderness his home.” (p.145)
In both epics a specific result of a particular negative action is almost exactly replicated, with deceit being said to lead to death in the future. The Rāmāyaṇa has Agāstya tell his visitors that “an ascetic who mistreats a guest is destined to feed on his own flesh in the other world, like the man who bears false witness.” (p.99) Not quite as extreme, the Mahābhārata has Kṛṣṇa stating that “[o]ne who serves with trickery deserves to be killed!” (p.246)
Lastly is just to mention an interesting technique in the Rāmāyaṇa that I anticipate to be repeated, and that is the foreshadowing of impending doom. When Shurpa-Nakha returns to her brother again, after the first horde is defeated, the text says her return is “to Khara’s ill luck.” (p.143) Surely this is pointing to her being the cause of his eventual demise, a technique which seems not to reduce anticipation by spoiling the surprise. Typically such ignorance of the movement of the narrative can cause guessing which some audiences rely on to build excitement, but in this case, knowing the nature of the outcome could very well build just as much excitement.
(5)
With the completion of the Rāmāyaṇa’s “Shurpa-Nakha’s Punishment and Revenge” section of the Book of the Forest, what has piqued my interest are the use of multiple nature similes, repetition as a literary/storytelling device, some concerning aspects of Rāma’s nature (particularly his fury, boastfulness and taunts), and divine weapons in both the Rāmāyaṇa and Mahābhārata (starting with their appearance in the second part of “The Mountain Man” section). I will address the first and last areas of interest here, and save the others for another time.
The approach of Khara and his battalion to destroy the brothers, brings about many environmental portents such as an early twilight, a solar eclipse, stars appearing in daytime, a pervasive tremor and the rather amazing appearance of a meteorite shower. (Pollock 2006: p.151) I distinguish between meteor and meteorite, unlike the translation which glosses the event as having only to do with meteors, since the former typically means that which burns up in the atmosphere and does not reach the ground and the latter refers to non-terrestrial material that actually makes contact with the ground. In this case, as they “come crashing down,” these materials actually land. The tremor is an interesting occurrence which, like the other environmental signs, at first seems to be caused by the horrible movement by the rākṣasa hordes but is interpreted as an ill-omen signalling Khara’s upcoming demise at the hand of Rāma. Contrastingly, a similar Earth-wide tremor appears in Buddhist accounts of the moments following the enlightenment of Shakyamuni Buddha with the defeat of Mara and the Earth-touching mudra, and yet this is not seen as ominous but as an auspicious good sign. It is a defeat of an altogether different kind, that of inner demons rather than wily external troublemaking rākṣasas of the forest. What is particularly powerful in this section are the multiple nature similes. Effective and affective, they paint a clear picture while also tugging at the listener’s emotions to bring out feelings of suspense, horror and awe. Rāma is like a “smokeless flame in the dark (p.157) and his arrows are “like smoky tongues of fire” (p.167); his bloody wounding is “like the sun at twilight enveloped by coulds” (p.161), while enraged he blazes “like the fire at the end of a cosmic age” (p. 159) and his attack is “like fire in a dry forest” (p.163); an evil person who takes no account of the deeds done with contaminated motivations is “like a lizard that feeds on hailstones” (p.177); in regard to bad actions, “savage creatures…are…like trees cut off at the root;” an agent suffers the results of negative actions “just as trees come into flower with the passing of the seasons” and committing them is “[l]ike eating poisoned food.” Even horrifying events are described with nature similes, such as the state of a rākṣasa felled with arrows to the eyes being described as like “a tree with newly sprouted twigs.” (p.167) Such a stirringly beautiful image applied to such a grave matter! This juxtaposition of life and death brought together is a functionally useful technique both to provide a visceral image in the mind of the reader/audience, and also to set the horror of a murderous death against the calm backdrop of nature. A corpse is indeed imbued with stillness like so much of what one would find in the forest, animate and inanimate. Other similes are almost too many to mention, as they occur in droves in almost every verse. Comparisons to similar events in the past are also used to flesh out the storytelling. It appears, too, that the more important the event, the more comparisons that are made, such as with the death of Khara. Finally succuming to Rāma’s arrows, the moment is compared to three different momentous mythological defeats (p.185). This also shows the assumed background knowledge of the audience by the narrator.
In the climactic battle of “Shurpa-Nakha’s Punishment and Revenge,” the Rāmāyaṇa shows the implementation of divine weapons. After several significant blows from Khara, another desperate moment like the initial moments of the battle where Rāma is alone and seems doomed to the reader and even to the various far-sighted holy beings, Rāma deploys “the mighty bow of Vishnu” (p.173). It does not entirely do the trick, as Khara is left lacking his standard, weapons and chariot but remains alive, and it is for the final death-blow that Rāma “took up the fiery arrow…the arrow given by the wise king of the gods, Indra the munificent.” (p.185) In those dire moments when Rāma’s demise seems certain, with the celestials and other holy beings watching the battle with concern and eagerness but without getting involved, Rāma’s otherworldy skill with arrows (showering thousands of them at a time!) is outdone by the use of divine weapons at turning-points in the battle. Are these weapons, both given by gods and imbued with vast power, vicarious interventions from the god-realm?
In the continuing saga of ‘The Mountain Man” in the Mahābhārata, split up by “The Razing of Saubha” section, we see divine weapons featured prominently as well. Here, though, instead of their implementation we see the beginnings of a journey towards their acquisition by the exiles, a task recommended to Yudiṣthira by the yogin Vyāsa and to be performed by Arjuna. (van Buitenen 1975: p.295) Yudiṣthira requests Arjuna to “[y]oke yourself to awesome austerities” and since “with Indra are all the weapons of the Gods,” he must “[g]o to Sakra, and he shall give you the weapons.” (p.296) Later, while practicing austerities and based on his display of unwavering resolve, he is granted a boon by Indra. Arjuna’s request for divine weapons is met with a condition on the boon to meet Shiva first. (p.297) Here, the gods are clearly involved in the affairs of humans, again, as in the Rāmāyaṇa, intervening indirectly by way of supernatural weapons distribution. However, whereas Rāma seems to receive such weapons as a result of his overall good qualities, in this case in the Mahābhārata the weapons are only granted after much effort is exerted through austerities for the specific purpose of gaining weapons, and then only after certain conditions are met as well.
(6)In “The Session with Mārkaṇḍeya” section of the Mahābhārata, Mārkaṇḍeya’s answers to the questions put to the seer by the Pāṇḍavas reveal much about cosmology and his views, as placed in his mouth by the storyteller, on how results come about. Some more questions can arise from Mārkaṇḍeya’s descriptions. First, it is said that “The Lord of Creatures in the beginning created immaculately pure bodies” and that “[t]hose ancient men…observed good vows, they spoke the truth, they were holy as Brahmā.” (p.575) In the context of beginninglessness, there being infinite past cycles of time and deaths, births and re-deaths of both beings and the universe itself, this ‘beginning’ must surely be referring to the onset of a new cycle. The phrase ‘in the beginning’ here must be referring only loosely to one of many beginnings, one after a cosmic dissolution has occurred followed by a period of quiescence that ends with another beginning. Next, these first humans in the beginning of this particular cycle are abundantly pure in all ways: in their bodily form and in the actions of body, speech and mind. What is odd is the mention of the holding of vows by these men. The nature and content of these vows is not clear, as they are only referred to as ‘good vows.’ If these people are pure in every way, including conduct, why would they need vows? If they are already holy, or we could say, acting naturally in accordance with the natural order, there would be no need for restrictions. Vows tend to bind people from committing inappropriate actions, or as a voluntary practice of penance, where one disallows oneself from particular activities that may or may not be considered as negative. Not eating certain types of flavourful foods is a common self-imposed vow by Jains, for the purpose of purifying karma and also to reduce desire towards objects of the senses. But what are the vows mentioned by Mārkaṇḍeya? What is their purpose? It is hard to say. If the vows have to do with ritual activity, perhaps they are an injunction to perform sacrifices, austerities or other types of offerings or vigorous restraint. Again we can ask, if they are holy and in harmony already, and if such activities are those that are a natural part of this well-balanced order, wouldn't every required activity already be performed by these original pure beings without internally or externally imposed vows?
Another curious aspect of Mārkaṇḍeya’s discourse is the mixture of reasoning in his exaplantion on the origin of results. Regarding this, the seer says that "[s]ome comes from fate, some from chance, some from their acts, what men acquire." (p.576) The differentiation of predetermination, randomness and cause and effect is fascinating, but even more interesting is that these are placed side by each as a trifecta to completely explain how things come to be the way they are for beings. Soon after this, Mārkaṇḍeya is made by the storyteller to prioritise lifestyles by establishing if there are benefits to be had by certain ways of life in this life and/or the next. Here, surprisingly perhaps, Yoga, Veda, "[c]ontrolling their senses and helping the creatures" does not bring benefit in this life and the next but only in the future. The highest practice, it would seem, is abiding in dharma, the Law, as it brings about all things in this and future lives. This would be an indication that this seer is made not only to present the Vedic emphasis of former times less significant, but that dharma is even more important than restraint and compassion.
References
Edmunds, Lowell. “Epic and Myth”. A Companion to Ancient Epic. ed. John Miles Foley. Blackwell Publishing. 2005, 31-44.
Katz, Joshua T. “The Indo-European Context”. A Companion to Ancient Epic. ed. John Miles Foley. Blackwell Publishing. 2005. 20-30.
Martin, Richard P. A Companion to Ancient Epic. ed. John Miles Foley. Blackwell Publishing. 2005. 9-19
Pollock, Sheldon L. (tr., 2006); The Rāmāyaṇa Book Three, The Forest, By Valmiki. New York University Press.
van Buitenen, J.A.B. (Ed., 1975); The Mahābhārata Book III, The Book of the Forest. University of Chicago Press. 1975.
