[INDOLOGY] Best wishes for a Peaceful Christmas and New Year...

[Howard Resnick]

Dear Jan,

There is a chapter in Sanskritic Bengal, in the Caitanya-caritāmṛta (c 1557) in which Caitanya walks through the Jharikhanda forest and causes tigers, elephants etc to “embrace” and “dance” ecstatically in spiritual love. This episode is found in the Madhya-līlā, chapter 17: https://vedabase.io/en/library/cc/madhya/17/

There is also a translation, published by Harvard Oriental Series, by the late Professor Dimock of Chicago. https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674002852

Best wishes,
Howard



> On Dec 25, 2022, at 1:13 PM, Jan E.M. Houben via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info> wrote:
> 
> Dear All, 
> According to Yoga-sūtra 2.35, अहिंसाप्रतिष्ठायां, तत्सन्निधौ वैरत्यागः ।  
> which apparently means that when someone is thoroughly established in non-violence, (mutual) enmity disappears in his environment. 
> Commentaries and references given for aphorism and referred to for instance in James Wood’s translation emphasize that in this situation *even* wild animals, no more attack their prey. An example is Kirāṭārjunīya 2.55 (meter viyoginī): Vyāsa is looked at by Yudhiṣṭhira: 
> madhurair avaśāni lambhayann   api tiryañci śamaṃ nirīkṣitaiḥ  /
> paritaḥ paṭu bibhrad enasāṃ   dahanaṃ dhāma vilokanakṣamam  //
> “Calming even wild animals by his gentle looks, spreading a blazing radiance around which burns away guilt, (but which yet) can be gazed at (the sage, i.e., Vyāsa son of Parāśara, was seen by the king, Yudhiṣṭhira)” (tr. following Roodbergen 1984, p. 143; cp. also Raghuvaṁśa 13.50, 14.79.)
> Are any more convincing stories or anecdotes known in Sanskrit literature, in which the peace-creating influence suggested in YS 2.35 inspires animals or *even* humans to behave in a more peaceful way ? 
> With best wishes for a Peaceful Christmas New Year to all:
> शान्ते !  ऽस्मिन् लोक एधस्व   विद्यातः प्रेमतस्तथा ।
> तव भक्तजनानां च  कल्याणमस्तु सर्वदा ॥
> -- 
> Jan E.M. Houben
> Directeur d'Études, Professor of South Asian History and Philology
> Sources et histoire de la tradition sanskrite
> École Pratique des Hautes Études (EPHE, Paris Sciences et Lettres)
> Sciences historiques et philologiques 
> Groupe de recherches en études indiennes (EA 2120)
> johannes.houben [at] ephe.psl.eu <mailto:johannes.houben at ephe.psl.eu>
> https://ephe-sorbonne.academia.edu/JanEMHouben
> https://www.classicalindia.info <https://www.classicalindia.info/>
> LabEx Hastec OS 2021 -- L'Inde Classique augmentée: construction, transmission 
> et transformations d'un savoir scientifique
> 
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