defilements of the holy sounds - of the Vedas

[Benjamin Fleming]

-----Original Message-----
From: Krishna Kalale <kkalale1 at SAN.RR.COM>
To: INDOLOGY at LISTSERV.LIV.AC.UK <INDOLOGY at LISTSERV.LIV.AC.UK>
Date: Sunday, September 26, 1999 8:03 PM
Subject: Re: defilements of the holy sounds - of the Vedas



>However, it is true that Vedas were not written down for a long time since
>it was transmitted in a tradition of teacher to disciple orally.  I guess
>this view is commonly accepted.
>
    My thing with Smith is that he seems to suggest that the Vedas were
non-textual until Max Muller translated them.

"In the eighteenth century, European visitors to India found themselves
wondering whether the Vedas really existed, since no one in India seemed
ever to have seen or know a copy of these works and were told by Brahmin
teachers, "Veda is whatever pertains to religion; veda is not books".  In
the nineteenth century, on the other hand, the West, in the heyday of its
cultural imperialism, brought its different notion of scripture into India
when the Oxford scholar Max Muller published a printed edition of the
Rg-Veda, thus turning it for the first time into a book, both in theory and
in fact." W. Cantwell Smith <What is Scripture> page 139. (Fortress Press,
1993)

  Jan Gonda, however, has suggested 600 BCE as an approximate date for the
redaction of the Rg Veda.  [Jan Gonda, <Vedic Literature> (sorry no page
reference with me).]  Smith's assertion thus, seems odd to me.  Any further
comments?

Benjamin Fleming

>-----Original Message-----
>From:   Benjamin Fleming [SMTP:cheapies at CABLEREGINA.COM]
>Sent:   Sunday, September 26, 1999 5:16 PM
>To:     INDOLOGY at LISTSERV.LIV.AC.UK
>Subject:        defilements of the holy sounds - of the Vedas
>
>Dear list members,
>I've been reading Cantwell Smith's <What is Scripture?> the chapter called
>"the Hindu Instance"
>in it he suggests that "What the West calls "the" Veda [I think he refers
>to the rg veda] was emphatically not written down." He further suggests
>quoting C. Mackenzie Brown "The written images of an alphabet, far from
>giving visual access to the sacred words of the Veda, were regarded as
>defilements of the holy sounds"
>can anyone confirm or contradict these assertions?
>Thanks in advance
>Benjamin Fleming
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