INDOLOGY Digest - 7 Feb 2001 to 8 Feb 2001 (#2001-40)

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

Hello Dmitri,

I don't want to fully critique your 200+ page essay, for want of
time and space. A few comments will do -

1. v.rttis = transformations, but of what? v.rttis beginning with
   citta implies that citta is itself the first transformation.
   Again, of what? Is there some preexisting thing that transforms
   into the citta etc., or does the citta come into being anew?

2. Does not your phrase "distortion of sensation" imply "cittasya
   v.rtti", thereby citta(gen)-v.rtti? Similary in your usage of
   the phrase "cittav.rtti called sm.rti" ...

3. Agama - like it or not, south of the Himalayas, "valid testimony"
   is an important pramA.na. I think if you look a little west, you
   will again find importance being given to it, in a different way
   perhaps. Given that the yogasUtra was born in and was transmitted
   in the country south of the Himalayas, why downgrade Agama, going
   by Pyrrho, if not Descartes? Your reinterpretation may well end
   up in the camps of Pyrrhus of Epirus, rather than Pyrrho of Elis.

4. It may or may not be fine methodologically, to assume that YS
   is one thing and the bhA.sya of vyAsa is a completely different
   thing. Objections raised by those who know something about the
   history of the school and its mss. should be taken seriously.
   I think Kengo is one, as he has worked on a critical edition of
   one of the commentaries. He mentioned this earlier on this list.
   Additionally, on what basis do you separate samAdhipAda from
   the latter three pAdas? E.g., sattva-puru.sa-anyatA-khyAti,
   prasa.mkhyaana and dharmamegha occur in the later pAdas. The
   bhA.sya brings up all these terms, under its discussion of
   citta-v.rtti-nirodha in YS 1.2 itself. Can you show that this
   explanation, using concepts from within YS itself, is unsound?
   Have you seen mss. containing only the samAdhipAda and none of
   the other three pAdas?

All this boils down to the following. Is your project a new way
of thinking about Yoga itself, or is it a new interpretation of a
specific text named patanjali's yogasUtra? If the former, you have
greater scope. If the latter, questions pertaining to the text and
its transmission have to be discussed carefully, before proceeding
with reinterpretation.

Best wishes,
Vidyasankar