Query: Did classical Indian philosophers revise their works?

Fred Smith frederick-smith at UIOWA.EDU
Fri Dec 21 04:35:22 UTC 2001


I don't have time to do this now, with a stack of student papers still to
read, but
one way to test this is to look at authors who wrote two commentaries on the
same work. Two such cases come readily to mind. The first is Abhinavagupta,
who wrote two comms on Utpaladeva's I"svarapratyabhijñAkArikA, the
Vimar"sinI on the text itself and the Viv.rtivimar"sinI on Utpaladeva's lost
autocommentary. The second is Appayya DIkSitA, an exciting figure who deseves
much more attention than he has received from scholars. He wrote two comms on
the BrahmasUtras, one an advaita subcommentary called Kalpataruparimala, and
the other, called "SivArkamaNidIpikA, on the BrahmasUtrabhASyam of "SrIkaNTha,
a "Saiva oriented commentary. Of course, you would have to determine which was
written first, whether a shift in viewpoint, if any, was little more than an
academic exercise, etc. But, hey, there might be a dissertation there!

Fred Smith

Frederick M. Smith
Associate Professor of Sanskrit and Classical Indian Religion
School of Religion                    Dept. of Asian Languages
                              & Literature
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"Insanity is doing the same old thing, the same old way, while expecting
different results." Albert Einstein





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