COMMERCIAL EDS.+CRIT.EDS

[rwl at uts.cc.utexas.edu]

That this discussion is taking place at all on Indology is cause for
rejoicing.  There is a fundamental concern underlying this discussion that
needs to be repeatedly highlighted--what we know about ancient India is
largely derived from the testimony of its textual tradition.  Admittedly,
this testimony is fraught with problems--the biases and distortions of the
authors' world views, the conscientious concern to present ideas as
timeless and anonymous outgrowths of the Vedic tradition, etc.--but what is
most important is that we have the most complete and reliable testimony
possible.

"Critical" editions are valuable because they attempt to do just this.
They preserve and present to the scholarly world the most comprehensive
testimony that can be extracted from the surviving textual tradition.
Editors will always make mistakes, but if they do their job well, they will
have preserved for us the very evidence we use to cast doubt on their
judgement--the variants found in the manuscripts.

Witzel knows this as well as anyone, and when he refers to the presence of
a stemma codicum, this is merely a concise way to refer to the entire
complex of preserving, presenting, and synthesizing the data found in
manuscript collation.  We need not despair that Indian textual traditions
seldom present us with a clean and clear stemma.  This is an important part
of the larger history of a text and its transmission, but a part which can
only be discovered through the tedious and exhausting work of collation.






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Richard W. Larivere                          residence:
Ralph B. Thomas Regents Professor   3415 Cactus Wren
Department of Asian Studies              Austin, Texas 78746-6636
WCH 4.132
University of Texas                           phone 512-327-2746 or 413-3459
Austin, Texas 78712                          fax 512-329-8207 or 327-1284
USA

phone 512-475-6039
fax     512-471-4469
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