COMMERCIAL EDS. + CRIT. EDS.

[Coburn, Tom]

I may have missed some contributions to this interesting discussion,
but based on what I have seen, two voices seem missing.
One is that of V. S. Sukthankar, chief editor of the critical ed of
the Mahabharata, whose comments in the Prolegomenon seem apposite:
"[The] essential fact in Mahabharata textual criticism [is] that the
Mbh is not and never was a fixed rigid text,but is fluctuating epic
tradition . . ., not unlike a popular Indian melody.  Our objective
should consequently not be to arrive at an archetype (which prac-
tically never existed), but to represent, view and explain the epic
tradition in all its variety, in all its fullness, in all its rami-
fications. OURS IS A PROBLEM IN TEXTUAL DYNAMICS, RATHER THAN IN
TEXTUAL STATICS.
   "To put it in other words, the Mahabharata is the whole of the epic
tradition: the ENTIRE Critical Apparatus.  Its separation into the con-
stituted text and the critical notes is only a static representation of
a constantly changing epic text--a representation made for the purpose
of visualizing, studying and analyzing the panorama of the more grand
and less grand thought-movements that have crystallized in the shape
of the text, handed down to us in our Mbh manuscripts."
The other is Wilfred Cantwell Smith, whose attention to implicit and
explicit theological issues in text-critical study converges nicely
with Dominik's recent musings along these lines.  See his "The Study
of the Bible and the Study of Religion" (Jnl. of the American Academy
of Religion 39 #2 (June 1971): 131-40) and the working out of the
implications of this article in comparative context in What Is Scrip-
ture? (Fortress Press, 1993).
Tom Coburn
St. Lawrence University