Traditional
148-478: Varaha Upanishad ( Sanskrit : वराह उपनिषद् , "boar") is a minor Upanishad of Hinduism composed between the 13th and 16th centuries CE. Composed in Sanskrit , it is listed as one of the 32 Krishna Yajurveda Upanishads, and classified as one of 20 Yoga Upanishads. The text has five chapters, structured primarily as a discussion between Vishnu in his Varaha (boar) avatar and the sage Ribhu. The discussion covers
296-557: A bed of thorns and other forms of self-mortification. The Jainism text Sthananga Sutra claims that the Ajivikas performed severe penances and self-mortification as part of their Tapas practice. A mention of the ascetic practices of Ajivikas is found in Chinese and Japanese Buddhist literature, where they are spelled as Ashibikas . Ajivikas were a Śramaṇa religion, just like Buddhism and Jainism, and these competed with each other. Most of
444-514: A boar in Indian mythology . The term Upanishad means it is knowledge or "hidden doctrine" text that belongs to the corpus of Vedanta literature presenting the philosophical concepts of Hinduism and considered the highest purpose of its scripture, the Vedas . The text is also known as Varahopanishad. The text is listed as 98th in the modern era anthology that consists of 108 Upanishads. A Sanskrit text, it
592-429: A control on desires, and is a form a self purification. Mahavira , the 24th Tirthankara undertook ascetic Tapas for twelve years, after which he attained Kevala Jnana (liberating supreme knowledge). Ajivikas was another ancient Indian religion which survived through about 13th-century CE, but became extinct thereafter, in which Tapas was a central concept as a means of salvation. According to Arthur Basham,
740-674: A dead language in the most common usage of the term. Pollock's notion of the "death of Sanskrit" remains in this unclear realm between academia and public opinion when he says that "most observers would agree that, in some crucial way, Sanskrit is dead." Tapas (Sanskrit) Tapas ( Sanskrit : तपस्, romanized: tapas) is a variety of austere spiritual meditation practices in Indian religions. In Jainism , it means asceticism (austerities, body mortification); in Buddhism , it denotes spiritual practices including meditation and self-discipline; and in
888-659: A female. Before he reached his enlightenment, the Buddha tried asceticism (self-mortification) of the type found in other Śramaṇa religions (Jainism), and this is referred to as Tapas (Tibetan: dka' thub , Chinese: kuxing , Japanese: kugyo , Korean: kohaeng ). Post-enlightenment, the Buddhist doctrines of the Middle Way and Noble Eightfold Path did not include ascetic practices. The Buddha, in multiple Buddhist texts, such as Majjhima Nikaya and Devadaha Sutta , attributes
1036-433: A focus on Indian philosophies and Sanskrit. Though written in a number of different scripts, the dominant language of Hindu texts has been Sanskrit. It or a hybrid form of Sanskrit became the preferred language of Mahayana Buddhism scholarship; for example, one of the early and influential Buddhist philosophers, Nagarjuna (~200 CE), used Classical Sanskrit as the language for his texts. According to Renou, Sanskrit had
1184-477: A hen upon her eggs - a process that is essential to hatching and birth. The Vedic scholars used mother nature's example to explain and extend this concept to the hatching of knowledge and spiritual rebirth. Some of the earliest reference of tapas , and compound words from the root tap is found in many ancient Hindu scriptures, including the Ŗig Veda (10.154.5), Shatapatha Brahmana (5.3 - 5.17), and Atharva Veda (4.34.1, 6.61.1, 11.1.26). In these texts, tapas
1332-532: A language competed with numerous, less exact vernacular Indian languages called Prakritic languages ( prākṛta - ). The term prakrta literally means "original, natural, normal, artless", states Franklin Southworth . The relationship between Prakrit and Sanskrit is found in Indian texts dated to the 1st millennium CE. Patañjali acknowledged that Prakrit is the first language, one instinctively adopted by every child with all its imperfections and later leads to
1480-643: A limited role in the Theravada tradition (formerly known as the Hinayana) but the Prakrit works that have survived are of doubtful authenticity. Some of the canonical fragments of the early Buddhist traditions, discovered in the 20th century, suggest the early Buddhist traditions used an imperfect and reasonably good Sanskrit, sometimes with a Pali syntax, states Renou. The Mahāsāṃghika and Mahavastu, in their late Hinayana forms, used hybrid Sanskrit for their literature. Sanskrit
1628-439: A living body ("Vital airs" of Prāṇa , Apāna , Uḍāna , Samāna , and Vyāna ), five rudimentary principles of perception, and the faculties of knowledge – Manas (mind) which produces uncertain knowledge, Buddhi (intelligence) which leads to certain knowledge, "Chitta" (emotional consciousness) which produces doubts and fluctuations in knowledge, and " Ahankara " (ego) which produces egoism. These total 24 tattvas, states
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#17328528358121776-446: A means of liberation, while many Jainism scholars have in turn strongly criticized Dharmakirti opinion and analysis, explaining why their approach to ascetic Tapas is appropriate. According to Hajime Nakamura and other scholars, some scriptures of early Buddhism suggest that ascetic Tapas was a part of Buddhist practice in its early days, wherein body-mortification was an option for the Buddhist monk in his spiritual practice. In
1924-454: A natural part of the earliest Vedic language, and that these developed in the centuries after the composition had been completed, and as a gradual unconscious process during the oral transmission by generations of reciters. The primary source for this argument is internal evidence of the text which betrays an instability of the phenomenon of retroflexion, with the same phrases having sandhi-induced retroflexion in some parts but not other. This
2072-479: A negative evidence to Pollock's hypothesis, but it is not positive evidence. A closer look at Sanskrit in the Indian history after the 12th century suggests that Sanskrit survived despite the odds. According to Hanneder, On a more public level the statement that Sanskrit is a dead language is misleading, for Sanskrit is quite obviously not as dead as other dead languages and the fact that it is spoken, written and read will probably convince most people that it cannot be
2220-546: A pan-Indo-Aryan accessibility to information and knowledge in the ancient and medieval times, in contrast to the Prakrit languages which were understood just regionally. It created a cultural bond across the subcontinent. As local languages and dialects evolved and diversified, Sanskrit served as the common language. It connected scholars from distant parts of South Asia such as Tamil Nadu and Kashmir, states Deshpande, as well as those from different fields of studies, though there must have been differences in its pronunciation given
2368-568: A part of the Buddhist tradition in Sri Lanka by the 3rd century BCE, and this tradition continued through the medieval era in parallel to sangha style monastic tradition. In the Mahayana tradition, asceticism with esoteric and mystical meanings became an accepted practice, such as in the Tendai and Shingon schools of Japanese Buddhism. These Japanese practices included penance, austerities, ablutions under
2516-413: A particular person experiences, whether pleasant or painful, or neither pleasant nor painful, all this has its cause in what was previously done. For this reason, the elimination of previous deeds through penance [ Tapas ] and the non-performing of new deeds [ kamma ] is tantamount to non-inflow in the future. From the non flow in the future, there is destruction of deeds. From the destruction of deeds, there
2664-451: A personal endeavor of discipline, undertaken to achieve a goal. One who undertakes tapas is a Tapasvin . The fire deity in Hinduism, Agni , is central to many Hindu rituals such as yajna and homa . Agni is considered an agent of heat, of sexual energy, of incubation; Agni is considered a great tapasvin . The word tapasvi refers to a male ascetic or meditator, while tapasvinī to
2812-513: A professor of Indology at the University Ca 'Foscari of Venice, were recorded in the medieval period of India's Advaita and Yoga-rooted traditions, possibly in the middle of the 2nd millennium CE, but may well represent already established ideas and practices before the epic and medieval period, given that they use concepts and terminology rooted in the 1st millennium BCE Vedic era text , such as pranava , Atman, and Brahman. According to Ananda,
2960-573: A refined and standardized grammatical form that emerged in the mid-1st millennium BCE and was codified in the most comprehensive of ancient grammars, the Aṣṭādhyāyī ('Eight chapters') of Pāṇini . The greatest dramatist in Sanskrit, Kālidāsa , wrote in classical Sanskrit, and the foundations of modern arithmetic were first described in classical Sanskrit. The two major Sanskrit epics, the Mahābhārata and
3108-534: A restrained language from which archaisms and unnecessary formal alternatives were excluded". The Classical form of the language simplified the sandhi rules but retained various aspects of the Vedic language, while adding rigor and flexibilities, so that it had sufficient means to express thoughts as well as being "capable of responding to the future increasing demands of an infinitely diversified literature", according to Renou. Pāṇini included numerous "optional rules" beyond
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#17328528358123256-428: A search for truth and Tapas (meditation). The Mundaka Upaniṣad also emphasizes the importance of Tapas as a means to attain spiritual knowledge and realization: By Truth can this Self be grasped, by Tapas, by Right Knowledge, and by a perpetually chaste life. Meditation and achievement of lucid knowledge is declared essential to self-realization in ancient scriptures. Texts by Adi Sankara suggests Tapas
3404-439: A similar phonetic structure to Tamil. Hock et al. quoting George Hart state that there was influence of Old Tamil on Sanskrit. Hart compared Old Tamil and Classical Sanskrit to arrive at a conclusion that there was a common language from which these features both derived – "that both Tamil and Sanskrit derived their shared conventions, metres, and techniques from a common source, for it is clear that neither borrowed directly from
3552-580: A simile of an artist practicing dance to an orchestra, balancing a vessel on her head. She is focused only on the stability of the pot, in the same manner a practitioner of Yoga always contemplates on the Brahman. The yogic practice should be centered on the "spiritual sound" only. Immersion and self-absorption in music is a form of yoga. Varaha encourages introspection, and states that a person discerning his own mistakes will be free of attachments in life. Varaha emphatically states that Kundalini or corporeal energy
3700-533: A state a Jivanmukta (self-realized person). The verses 4.21–4.30 describe the characteristics of a Jivanmukta; Ayyangar and Aiyar state as follows: The concept and characteristics of Jivanmukta in Varaha Upanishad is similar, states Sprockhoff, but other Upanishads develop these ideas further and in greater depth. Chapter 5 of the Varaha Upanishad is dedicated to Yoga, as a discussion between Ribhu and his student Nidagha. There are three types of Yoga, states
3848-486: A student in a field of knowledge) requires tapas , and tapas is enabled by the state of brahmacharya. This state sometimes includes tapas such as vrata (fasting, sacrifice of food), sram (philanthropic social work, sacrifice of income), silence (sacrifice of speech), and asceticism (bare minimum living, sacrifice of comfort). Oldenberg notes that Brahmana scripture suggests that the Brahmachari should carry tapas to
3996-597: A waterfall, and rituals to purify oneself. Japanese records from the 12th century record stories of monks undertaking severe asceticism, while records suggest that 19th century Nichiren Buddhist monks woke up at midnight or 2:00 AM daily, and performed ascetic water purification rituals as a part of Tapas . Other practices include the extreme ascetic practices of eating only pine needles, resins, seeds and ultimately self-mummification, while alive, or Sokushinbutsu ( miira ) in Japan. Elsewhere, in mainstream Buddhism, over time
4144-481: Is "other than aggregate of these 96 Tattvas", and those who worship him in his Varaha avatar and know these 96 tattvas remove their Ajnana (ignorance), achieve salvation regardless of which order of life they are in, whether they have shaven head, or head full of hair, or maintain a head with only a tuft of hair. The Varaha, in the 83 verses of Chapter 2, explains to Ribhu how to achieve the most exalted knowledge of Brahmavidya , and then what it is. He tells Ribhu that
4292-423: Is Brahman. And when a practitioner of Yoga becomes a Jivamukta (liberated soul), he knows that his Atman is the ultimate perfection. To an enlightened person who has realized Brahman, the two words "bondage" and "moksha" mean "mine" and "not mine". "Mine" is linked to a person, but "not mine" relates to one who is liberated from all thinking and knows Atman. In verses 2.75 through 2.87, the Varaha Upanishad defines
4440-509: Is I, states Vishnu. "Become that, Ribhu; Thou am I verily", suggests Vishnu. Those high souled ones, who with the firm conviction that "I am the Brahman", are the Jivanmukta , states verse 2.43 of the text. According to the Upanishad, the entire universe evolves by Sankalpa (a thinking, ideation process), one becomes what one thinks, metaphysics affects physics, and it is ideation that helps retain
4588-692: Is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages . It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late Bronze Age . Sanskrit is the sacred language of Hinduism , the language of classical Hindu philosophy , and of historical texts of Buddhism and Jainism . It was a link language in ancient and medieval South Asia, and upon transmission of Hindu and Buddhist culture to Southeast Asia, East Asia and Central Asia in
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4736-460: Is akin to that of Latin and Ancient Greek in Europe. Sanskrit has significantly influenced most modern languages of the Indian subcontinent , particularly the languages of the northern, western, central and eastern Indian subcontinent. Sanskrit declined starting about and after the 13th century. This coincides with the beginning of Islamic invasions of South Asia to create, and thereafter expand
4884-472: Is considered one of the 32 Upanishads under the Krishna Yajurveda or Black Yajurveda. Classified as a Yoga Upanishad, the author, authenticity, and source of this Hindu text has been in question, and it is a late Upanishad. Varaha Upanishad was not listed in the anthology of known Upanishads published in the 17th century by Dara Shikoh , in the early 19th-century Henry Thomas Colebrooke anthology, or in
5032-538: Is described as the process that led to the spiritual birth of ṛṣis - sages of spiritual insights. The Atharva Veda suggests all the gods were tapas -born ( tapojās ), and all earthly life was created from the sun's tapas ( tapasah sambabhũvur ). In the Jāiminiya-Upanisad Brāhmaņa, life perpetuates itself and creates progeny by tapas , a process that starts with sexual heat. Sanskrit tapasyā (neuter gender), literally "produced by heat", refers to
5180-455: Is destruction of pain. From the destruction of pain, there is destruction of feeling; from the destruction of feeling, all pain will become erased. Thus say, o monks, those free of bonds [Jainas]. "O Niganthas , you... These ascetic Tapas practices is also confirmed by Jainism texts such as Uttarajjhyayana . The Buddhist scholar Dharmakirti strongly criticizes the Jaina practice of Tapas as
5328-566: Is found in everything, and doing meditation for just 48 minutes (a muhurtha ), will expand his wisdom to the state of "Pratyagatman", the state of Atman which is forever liberated. It means living close to Jivatma (soul) and Paramatman (the Supreme Soul). The Upanishad states that knowledge of Brahman results in knowing spiritual truth in the Paroksha (indirect cognition) way, but Sakshatkara (direct realization) results in knowing that his own soul
5476-452: Is found in the writing of Bharata Muni , the author of the ancient Natya Shastra text. The early Jain scholar Namisādhu acknowledged the difference, but disagreed that the Prakrit language was a corruption of Sanskrit. Namisādhu stated that the Prakrit language was the pūrvam ('came before, origin') and that it came naturally to children, while Sanskrit was a refinement of Prakrit through "purification by grammar". Sanskrit belongs to
5624-511: Is important, but not sufficient for spiritual practice. Later Hindu scholars introduce a discussion of ‘false ascetic’, as one who go through the mechanics of tapas, without meditating on the nature of Brahman . Tapas is an element of spiritual path, state Indian texts. The concept is extensively mentioned in the Vedas , and the Upanishads. According to Walter Kaelber, and others, in certain translations of ancient Sanskrit documents Tapas
5772-400: Is inquiry, investigation ( Vicāraṇa ). Discernment and thinning of mind toward other objects ( Tanu-mānasi ) is the third stage, states the text. The fourth stage is harmony, creative union with the subject of knowledge ( Sattva -patti ). Detachment from everything else ( Asamsakti ) is the fifth stage. Conceptual analysis and gaining complete, correct meaning of the topic ( Pada-artha-bhavana )
5920-442: Is interpreted as austerities and asceticism; however, this is frequently inadequate because it fails to reflect the context implied, which is of sexual heat or warmth that incubates the birth of life. The idea of linking austerity, exertion, fatigue and self-renunciation to the ancient idea of heat, brooding and inner devotion, comes from the observed labor every mother puts in caring for its embryo and delivering her baby, regardless of
6068-531: Is manifold, including the gain of body strength and suppleness, acquisition of knowledge of one's own body and its auras, meditation, and Self (soul) knowledge. The axiology in the Varaha Upanishad is presented in Chapter 5 as ten Yamas and ten Niyamas . This list is similar to the list found in other Yoga texts such as the Shandilya Upanishad , as well as by Svātmārāma: The Varaha Upanishad along with
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6216-402: Is of the character of Truth, Knowledge, Bliss, and Fullness, states Varaha Upanisha d in verse 2.16, stands farthest away from Tamas (darkness, destruction, chaos). Varaha states that what one aspires to is part of His own "light", which is all-encompassing. As Atman, self effulgent, Varaha states that "Brahma-Jnanis" are those who see nothing but the Brahman, and they are happy and content in
6364-557: Is one Truth and Absolute Brahman. The "Vishnu is Shiva" and "all is Shiva" theme repeats in verse 4.32, which declares, "The Guru is Shiva, the Veda is Shiva, the Deva is Shiva, the Lord is Shiva, I Varaha am Shiva, all is Shiva, other than Shiva there is naught". The Ultimate Truth, states the text, is that which always is, which preserves its nature over time, and which is unaffected by anything. The Atman,
6512-516: Is palpable Existence and Consciousness, indivisible, without a counterpart, devoid of all visibility, non-ailing, flawless, the Shiva without a double". The text reasserts its non-dualism in Chapter 3, adding that bhakti to Vishnu is the path to liberating knowledge of Brahman. In verse 3.14–3.15, states Ayyangar, everyone is equal in the eyes of god, there is no difference between living forms and human beings based on law, family, caste, or clan, and everyone
6660-524: Is rare in the later version of the language. The Homerian Greek, like Ṛg-vedic Sanskrit, deploys simile extensively, but they are structurally very different. The early Vedic form of the Sanskrit language was far less homogenous compared to the Classical Sanskrit as defined by grammarians by about the mid-1st millennium BCE. According to Richard Gombrich—an Indologist and a scholar of Sanskrit, Pāli and Buddhist Studies—the archaic Vedic Sanskrit found in
6808-479: Is taken along with evidence of controversy, for example, in passages of the Aitareya-Āraṇyaka (700 BCE), which features a discussion on whether retroflexion is valid in particular cases. The Ṛg-veda is a collection of books, created by multiple authors. These authors represented different generations, and the mandalas 2 to 7 are the oldest while the mandalas 1 and 10 are relatively the youngest. Yet,
6956-580: Is the predominant language of one of the largest collection of historic manuscripts. The earliest known inscriptions in Sanskrit are from the 1st century BCE, such as the Ayodhya Inscription of Dhana and Ghosundi-Hathibada (Chittorgarh) . Though developed and nurtured by scholars of orthodox schools of Hinduism, Sanskrit has been the language for some of the key literary works and theology of heterodox schools of Indian philosophies such as Buddhism and Jainism. The structure and capabilities of
7104-665: Is the sixth stage. The seventh or last stage is Turiya (or Turīyagā ), complete consciousness. The text states that AUM is a means for meditating on the nature of Atman and Brahman, wherein "A" represents Akara and Visva, "U" represents Ukara and Taijasa, M represents Makara and Prajna, the Ardhamatra that follows AUM, represents the Turiya . The Varaha Upanishad , in a manner similar to many ancient and medieval era Hindu texts, discusses moksha in this life (rather than afterlife), or Jivanmukti , calling those who have reached such
7252-656: Is the ultimate power of truth. It is further states that prana , the life force, exists in the Nadis (channels, pipes or tubes), which run in the body, emanating from the sole of the foot and running to the skull of the head. The six Chakras beginning with Muladhara are said to be the seat of Shakti. From the neck to the top of the head is said to be the seat of Shambu. Sanskrit language Sanskrit ( / ˈ s æ n s k r ɪ t / ; attributively 𑀲𑀁𑀲𑁆𑀓𑀾𑀢𑀁 , संस्कृत- , saṃskṛta- ; nominally संस्कृतम् , saṃskṛtam , IPA: [ˈsɐ̃skr̩tɐm] )
7400-526: The Bhagavata Purana , the Panchatantra and many other texts are all in the Sanskrit language. The Classical Sanskrit with its exacting grammar was thus the language of the Indian scholars and the educated classes, while others communicated with approximate or ungrammatical variants of it as well as other natural Indian languages. Sanskrit, as the learned language of Ancient India, thus existed alongside
7548-568: The Dalai Lama , the Sanskrit language is a parent language that is at the foundation of many modern languages of India and the one that promoted Indian thought to other distant countries. In Tibetan Buddhism, states the Dalai Lama, Sanskrit language has been a revered one and called legjar lhai-ka or "elegant language of the gods". It has been the means of transmitting the "profound wisdom of Buddhist philosophy" to Tibet. The Sanskrit language created
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#17328528358127696-613: The Indo-European family of languages . It is one of the three earliest ancient documented languages that arose from a common root language now referred to as Proto-Indo-European : Other Indo-European languages distantly related to Sanskrit include archaic and Classical Latin ( c. 600 BCE–100 CE, Italic languages ), Gothic (archaic Germanic language , c. 350 CE ), Old Norse ( c. 200 CE and after), Old Avestan ( c. late 2nd millennium BCE ) and Younger Avestan ( c. 900 BCE). The closest ancient relatives of Vedic Sanskrit in
7844-399: The Jivanmukta as one whose inner state, amongst other things, is neither affected by happiness nor by suffering inflicted on him, who does not shrink out of fear from the world, nor the world shrinks from him with fear, and whose sense of calm and inner contentment is free from anger, fear, and joy toward others. Varaha means boar, specifically referring to the incarnation of Vishnu as
7992-604: The Patanjali text and other Hindu texts on Yoga, states Benjamin Smith, is that which is "a means for perfection of the body and the organs through the lessening of impurities" and a foundation for a yogi's pursuit of perfection. Yama, niyama, asana and pranayama from Ashtanga yoga comes under tapas. Tapas in the Hindu traditions is part of a stage of life, called brahmacharya . The Vedic literature suggests diksa (incubation of
8140-744: The Rigveda had already evolved in the Vedic period, as evidenced in the later Vedic literature. Gombrich posits that the language in the early Upanishads of Hinduism and the late Vedic literature approaches Classical Sanskrit, while the archaic Vedic Sanskrit had by the Buddha 's time become unintelligible to all except ancient Indian sages. The formalization of the Saṃskṛta language is credited to Pāṇini , along with Patañjali's Mahābhāṣya and Katyayana's commentary that preceded Patañjali's work. Panini composed Aṣṭādhyāyī ('Eight-Chapter Grammar'), which became
8288-532: The Rigveda , a collection of 1,028 hymns composed between 1500 BCE and 1200 BCE by Indo-Aryan tribes migrating east from the mountains of what is today northern Afghanistan across northern Pakistan and into northwestern India. Vedic Sanskrit interacted with the preexisting ancient languages of the subcontinent, absorbing names of newly encountered plants and animals; in addition, the ancient Dravidian languages influenced Sanskrit's phonology and syntax. Sanskrit can also more narrowly refer to Classical Sanskrit ,
8436-526: The Rāmāyaṇa , however, were composed in a range of oral storytelling registers called Epic Sanskrit which was used in northern India between 400 BCE and 300 CE, and roughly contemporary with classical Sanskrit. In the following centuries, Sanskrit became tradition-bound, stopped being learned as a first language, and ultimately stopped developing as a living language. The hymns of the Rigveda are notably similar to
8584-922: The Tapas practices vary between the different traditions within Jainism. The Jain text Sarvarthasiddhi , a commentary by Pujyapada, claims that the Hindu Samkhya school emphasizes "knowledge only, no practices", while the Vaisheshikas emphasize "practices only, no knowledge" as part of Tapas and the means of reaching moksha. Another Jain text Tattvartha Sutra , by Umaswati , in chapter 9, asserts that Tapas includes several kinds of meditation. The Tapas in Jainism include internal practices and external austerities. External Tapas include fasting, tolerating hardships inflicted by other people or animals, tolerating all discomfort from weather by nakedness or near nakedness and
8732-406: The sandhi rules, both internal and external. Quite many words found in the early Vedic Sanskrit language are never found in late Vedic Sanskrit or Classical Sanskrit literature, while some words have different and new meanings in Classical Sanskrit when contextually compared to the early Vedic Sanskrit literature. Arthur Macdonell was among the early colonial era scholars who summarized some of
8880-500: The verbal adjective sáṃskṛta- is a compound word consisting of sáṃ ('together, good, well, perfected') and kṛta - ('made, formed, work'). It connotes a work that has been "well prepared, pure and perfect, polished, sacred". According to Biderman, the perfection contextually being referred to in the etymological origins of the word is its tonal—rather than semantic—qualities. Sound and oral transmission were highly valued qualities in ancient India, and its sages refined
9028-414: The 13th century, a premier center of Sanskrit literary creativity, Sanskrit literature there disappeared, perhaps in the "fires that periodically engulfed the capital of Kashmir" or the "Mongol invasion of 1320" states Pollock. The Sanskrit literature which was once widely disseminated out of the northwest regions of the subcontinent, stopped after the 12th century. As Hindu kingdoms fell in the eastern and
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#17328528358129176-521: The 7th century where he established a major center of learning and language translation under the patronage of Emperor Taizong. By the early 1st millennium CE, Sanskrit had spread Buddhist and Hindu ideas to Southeast Asia, parts of the East Asia and the Central Asia. It was accepted as a language of high culture and the preferred language by some of the local ruling elites in these regions. According to
9324-459: The Ajivikas believed in the most rigorous ascetic practices in public. They believed in not harming anything and not being a cause of hurt to any living creature or substance, so they ate refuse, waste products, went deep into forests, mountains or isolated caves to live their austere life. One of the Buddhist canonical texts, Nanguttha Jataka , claims that the Ajivikas perform severe ascetic practices as part of their Tapas , including sleeping on
9472-601: The Brahman, the "Chit, Sat and Ananda", and Janardhana (Vishnu) is such Truth, and they are synonymous, one. Some try to seek Sidhis , asserts the Upanishad, through mantras, religious rituals, time, skill, medicine, or wealth, but such Sidhis are fleeting and fruitless. Be an Atmajnani (one with Self-knowledge) through Yoga, says Vishnu to Ribhu, and to such a person Siddhis are of no importance. The Varaha Upanishad , in Chapter 4, states that individuals gain knowledge through seven stages: First, one must have virtuous desire to learn, discover ( Śubha-iccha ). The second stage
9620-465: The Brahmanical (Vedic) tradition, wherein there is a great deal of overlap in the concepts of Tapas , Yoga, meditation and gnosis (knowledge), yet the term Tapas is rooted in the inner "mystic heat" themes of the Indian religions. The earliest mention of Tapas is in the Vedic texts. The concept of Tapas as symbolism for spiritual rebirth begins in the Vedas . Atharva Veda verse 11.5.3 compares
9768-425: The Classical Sanskrit language launched ancient Indian speculations about "the nature and function of language", what is the relationship between words and their meanings in the context of a community of speakers, whether this relationship is objective or subjective, discovered or is created, how individuals learn and relate to the world around them through language, and about the limits of language? They speculated on
9916-521: The Dravidian languages borrowed from Sanskrit vocabulary, but they have also affected Sanskrit on deeper levels of structure, "for instance in the domain of phonology where Indo-Aryan retroflexes have been attributed to Dravidian influence". Similarly, Ferenc Ruzca states that all the major shifts in Indo-Aryan phonetics over two millennia can be attributed to the constant influence of a Dravidian language with
10064-513: The Dravidian words and forms, without modifying the word order; but the same thing is not possible in rendering a Persian or English sentence into a non-Indo-Aryan language. Shulman mentions that "Dravidian nonfinite verbal forms (called vinaiyeccam in Tamil) shaped the usage of the Sanskrit nonfinite verbs (originally derived from inflected forms of action nouns in Vedic). This particularly salient case of
10212-469: The Indo-Aryan language underwent rapid linguistic change and morphed into the Vedic Sanskrit language. The pre-Classical form of Sanskrit is known as Vedic Sanskrit . The earliest attested Sanskrit text is the Rigveda , a Hindu scripture from the mid- to late-second millennium BCE. No written records from such an early period survive, if any ever existed, but scholars are generally confident that
10360-507: The Indo-European languages are the Nuristani languages found in the remote Hindu Kush region of northeastern Afghanistan and northwestern Himalayas, as well as the extinct Avestan and Old Persian – both are Iranian languages . Sanskrit belongs to the satem group of the Indo-European languages. Colonial era scholars familiar with Latin and Greek were struck by the resemblance of
10508-521: The Muslim rule in the form of Sultanates, and later the Mughal Empire . Sheldon Pollock characterises the decline of Sanskrit as a long-term "cultural, social, and political change". He dismisses the idea that Sanskrit declined due to "struggle with barbarous invaders", and emphasises factors such as the increasing attractiveness of vernacular language for literary expression. With the fall of Kashmir around
10656-489: The Muslim rulers. Hindu rulers such as Shivaji of the Maratha Empire , reversed the process, by re-adopting Sanskrit and re-asserting their socio-linguistic identity. After Islamic rule disintegrated in South Asia and the colonial rule era began, Sanskrit re-emerged but in the form of a "ghostly existence" in regions such as Bengal. This decline was the result of "political institutions and civic ethos" that did not support
10804-645: The Narayana compilations of Upanishads. The text opens by acknowledging Itihasa (Epics, Ramayana and Mahabharata ) and other post-Vedic era texts, thus implying that it was composed in the common era. The text incorporates terminology such as Yogi Siddhi , suggesting that, like other Yoga Upanishads, it was composed after Yoga Sutras of Patanjali and other major Yoga texts. The text also incorporates sections on tantra terminology such as Chakra and Nāḍi in its discussion of Laya , Mantra , and Hatha yoga . The minor Yoga Upanishads, according to Antonio Rigopoulos ,
10952-488: The Saṃskṛta language, both in its vocabulary and grammar, to the classical languages of Europe. In The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World , Mallory and Adams illustrate the resemblance with the following examples of cognate forms (with the addition of Old English for further comparison): The correspondences suggest some common root, and historical links between some of
11100-470: The Shandilya, suggests ten niyamas in the sense of positive duties, desirable behaviors, and discipline. The Varaha's axiological list in Chapter 5 for observances include: The Upanishad makes mention of eleven asanas (Yogic postures), of which two pertain to physiological postures: Mayurasana and Kukkutasana . It describes squatting with folded legs known as Sukhasana , a meditative pose. Varaha gives
11248-616: The South India, such as the great Vijayanagara Empire , so did Sanskrit. There were exceptions and short periods of imperial support for Sanskrit, mostly concentrated during the reign of the tolerant Mughal emperor Akbar . Muslim rulers patronized the Middle Eastern language and scripts found in Persia and Arabia, and the Indians linguistically adapted to this Persianization to gain employment with
11396-666: The Theravada tradition of Thailand, a monastic practice emerged in the 12th-century who did Tapas as ascetic wandering and forest or crematory dwelling monks, with austere practices, and these came to be known as Thudong . These ascetic Buddhist monks are also found in Myanmar, and as in Thailand, they are known to pursue their own version of Buddhism, resisting the hierarchical institutionalized sangha structure of monasteries in Buddhism. Textual evidence suggests that ascetic Tapas practices were
11544-487: The Upanishad is structured as a sermon by Varaha to the sage Ribhu. It has five chapters with a total of 247 verses. In Chapter 1 of the text, Varaha tells Ribhu first about the science of Tattvas, meaning "principles". The Tattvas are said to be 24, 36, or even 96 by some teachers, which Varaha elaborates. In the Tattvas, asserts Varaha, are included the five sensory organs , five organs of action, five vital airs essential to
11692-465: The Upanishad, these being tranquility, self-restraint, doing work without craving for rewards, endurance, faith, and meditation. Varaha states in verse 2.4 that the truly blessed are those who know Brahman and Atman and have thus become one with them. Ribhu then asks Varaha, "Taking birth as a human, that is also a male and a Brahmana is difficult, a Yogi who has studied the Vedanta but who does not know
11840-479: The Varaha adds "Dik", or the four quarters, all Vedic deities who are part of the human body, namely "Vayu" (air, ear), Sun (light, eye), " Varuna " (water, tongue), Ashvini Devas (nose), Agni (fire), Indra , Upendra , and Mrityu (death); it includes the moon , the four-faced Brahma , Rudra , Kshetrajna (the conscious knower of the body), and Ishvara . Vishnu, as Varaha, asserts in verses 1.15 to 1.17, that he
11988-447: The Vedic Sanskrit in these books of the Ṛg-veda "hardly presents any dialectical diversity", states Louis Renou – an Indologist known for his scholarship of the Sanskrit literature and the Ṛg-veda in particular. According to Renou, this implies that the Vedic Sanskrit language had a "set linguistic pattern" by the second half of the 2nd millennium BCE. Beyond the Ṛg-veda, the ancient literature in Vedic Sanskrit that has survived into
12136-451: The Vedic Sanskrit's bahulam framework, to respect liberty and creativity so that individual writers separated by geography or time would have the choice to express facts and their views in their own way, where tradition followed competitive forms of the Sanskrit language. The phonetic differences between Vedic Sanskrit and Classical Sanskrit, as discerned from the current state of the surviving literature, are negligible when compared to
12284-455: The alphabet, the structure of words, and its exacting grammar into a "collection of sounds, a kind of sublime musical mold" as an integral language they called Saṃskṛta . From the late Vedic period onwards, state Annette Wilke and Oliver Moebus, resonating sound and its musical foundations attracted an "exceptionally large amount of linguistic, philosophical and religious literature" in India. Sound
12432-635: The appearances of the world. Following renunciation from this universe, which is also called a Sankalpa, the meditating mind is to be focused on the Nirvikalpa (the unchangeable) or the unchangeable part (metaphysical reality). Varaha in verse 2.64 compares the " samsara " (cycle of rebirth) to the domain of karma, states Billington, one that is like a long dream (" swapna "), a delusion, a sea of sorrow. It defines jivanmukta as someone who has overcome and attained liberation from this samsara through self-knowledge. Varaha explains that through obeisance to Him who
12580-656: The ascetic self-mortification style Tapas practices to Jainism ( Niganthas ), wherein such practices annihilate past Karmas and stop new Karmas from being created, ones that lead to the cycle of rebirths in Saṃsāra . These ancient Buddhist texts are significant in their claims of the existence of Jain Brahmins and ascetics, along with their karma doctrine and reasons for their Tapas practices in ancient times: The Blessed One [Buddha] said, "There are, o monks, some ascetics and Brahmins who speak thus and are of such opinion: 'Whatever
12728-564: The birth of a baby. Both meanings of Tapas are found in various Hindu texts. In some ancient texts, Tapas has the sense of ascetic mortification in a sense similar to other Indian religions, while in the Bhagavad Gita and the Yoga school of Hinduism, the term means self-training and virtuous living in a sense similar to Buddhism. In the Puranas and the texts of the goddess tradition of Hinduism,
12876-447: The body, undergo penance" in order to "burn away past karma " and liberate oneself. The term Tapas means "warmth, heat, fire". The meaning of the word evolves in ancient Indian literature . The earliest discussions of tapas , and compound words from the root tap relate to the heat necessary for biological birth. Its conceptual origin is traced to the natural wait, motherly warmth and physical "brooding" provided by birds such as
13024-440: The capacity to understand the old Prakrit languages such as Ardhamagadhi . A section of European scholars state that Sanskrit was never a spoken language. However, evidences shows that Sanskrit was a spoken language, essential for oral tradition that preserved the vast number of Sanskrit manuscripts from ancient India. The textual evidence in the works of Yaksa, Panini, and Patanajali affirms that Classical Sanskrit in their era
13172-517: The close relationship between the Indo-Iranian tongues and the Baltic and Slavic languages , vocabulary exchange with the non-Indo-European Uralic languages , and the nature of the attested Indo-European words for flora and fauna. The pre-history of Indo-Aryan languages which preceded Vedic Sanskrit is unclear and various hypotheses place it over a fairly wide limit. According to Thomas Burrow, based on
13320-609: The context of a speech or language, is found in verses 5.28.17–19 of the Ramayana . Outside the learned sphere of written Classical Sanskrit, vernacular colloquial dialects ( Prakrits ) continued to evolve. Sanskrit co-existed with numerous other Prakrit languages of ancient India. The Prakrit languages of India also have ancient roots and some Sanskrit scholars have called these Apabhramsa , literally 'spoiled'. The Vedic literature includes words whose phonetic equivalent are not found in other Indo-European languages but which are found in
13468-532: The corpus of Vedanta literature that presents the philosophical concepts of Hinduism. The Varaha Upanishad emphasizes that liberation from sorrow and fear requires a human being to know the non-dualistic nature of existence, oneness between Self, Brahman and Vishnu, and the role of Yoga in self-liberation, and lists ten Yamas (virtues) as essential to a liberation of one's soul: nonviolence, satya , asteya , brahmacharya , compassion, rectitude, kshama , non-hypocrisy, mitahara , and shaucha . The text describes
13616-639: The crystallization of Classical Sanskrit. As in this period the Indo-Aryan tribes had not yet made contact with the inhabitants of the South of the subcontinent, this suggests a significant presence of Dravidian speakers in North India (the central Gangetic plain and the classical Madhyadeśa) who were instrumental in this substratal influence on Sanskrit. Extant manuscripts in Sanskrit number over 30 million, one hundred times those in Greek and Latin combined, constituting
13764-467: The detailed and sophisticated treatise then transmitted it through his students. Modern scholarship generally accepts that he knew of a form of writing, based on references to words such as Lipi ('script') and lipikara ('scribe') in section 3.2 of the Aṣṭādhyāyī . The Classical Sanskrit language formalized by Pāṇini, states Renou, is "not an impoverished language", rather it is "a controlled and
13912-467: The differences between the Vedic and Classical Sanskrit. Louis Renou published in 1956, in French, a more extensive discussion of the similarities, the differences and the evolution of the Vedic Sanskrit within the Vedic period and then to the Classical Sanskrit along with his views on the history. This work has been translated by Jagbans Balbir. The earliest known use of the word Saṃskṛta (Sanskrit), in
14060-558: The different traditions within Hinduism it means a spectrum of practices ranging from asceticism, 'inner cleansing' to self-discipline by meditation practices. The Tapas practice often involves solitude and is a part of monastic practices that are believed to be a means to moksha (liberation, salvation). In the Vedas literature of Hinduism, fusion words based on tapas are widely used to expound several spiritual concepts that develop through heat or inner energy, such as meditation, any process to reach special observations and insights,
14208-456: The distant major ancient languages of the world. The Indo-Aryan migrations theory explains the common features shared by Sanskrit and other Indo-European languages by proposing that the original speakers of what became Sanskrit arrived in South Asia from a region of common origin, somewhere north-west of the Indus region , during the early 2nd millennium BCE. Evidence for such a theory includes
14356-483: The early medieval era, it became a language of religion and high culture , and of the political elites in some of these regions. As a result, Sanskrit had a lasting impact on the languages of South Asia, Southeast Asia and East Asia, especially in their formal and learned vocabularies. Sanskrit generally connotes several Old Indo-Aryan language varieties. The most archaic of these is the Vedic Sanskrit found in
14504-543: The first language of the respective speakers. The Sanskrit language brought Indo-Aryan speaking people together, particularly its elite scholars. Some of these scholars of Indian history regionally produced vernacularized Sanskrit to reach wider audiences, as evidenced by texts discovered in Rajasthan, Gujarat, and Maharashtra. Once the audience became familiar with the easier to understand vernacularized version of Sanskrit, those interested could graduate from colloquial Sanskrit to
14652-460: The form of Vishnu, how can such an ignorant one become liberated?" Varaha replies in verses 2.7–2.9 that he alone is Supreme Bliss, that apart from the Atman (soul) there exists no Ishvara or phenomenal world. Those who know their Atman (soul) have no notions of Varna (class) or Ashrama (stage in life); they see Atman in all, they become Brahman and reach "Moksha" salvation even without seeking. That which
14800-412: The foundation of Vyākaraṇa, a Vedānga . The Aṣṭādhyāyī was not the first description of Sanskrit grammar, but it is the earliest that has survived in full, and the culmination of a long grammatical tradition that Fortson says, is "one of the intellectual wonders of the ancient world". Pāṇini cites ten scholars on the phonological and grammatical aspects of the Sanskrit language before him, as well as
14948-516: The four means of this knowledge are to practice conduct of one's Varna (class) and one's Ashrama (stage in life), from ascetic austerity and with the help of a Guru (spiritual teacher). The Varaha then states that the path to Brahmavidya is through the capacity to distinguish between the ephemeral and the eternal, detachment from the material world unto the spiritual world. A sincere longing for spiritual liberation and six virtuous qualities ( shama ) are essential in order to achieve Brahmavidya , asserts
15096-410: The goal of Yoga and what is "Samadhi", as follows: The Oneness of the Atman and the mind is attained through Yoga , This Oneness is said to be what is Samadhi. The state of Samadhi, it explains, is akin to salt dissolving in water, and the quality of oneness that results. The Upanishad, in Chapter 3, continues the sermon of Vishnu to Ribhu, that "Ribhu should develop the conviction that he himself
15244-537: The gods Varuna, Mitra, Indra, and Nasatya found in the earliest layers of the Vedic literature. O Bṛhaspati, when in giving names they first set forth the beginning of Language, Their most excellent and spotless secret was laid bare through love, When the wise ones formed Language with their mind, purifying it like grain with a winnowing fan, Then friends knew friendships – an auspicious mark placed on their language. — Rigveda 10.71.1–4 Translated by Roger Woodard The Vedic Sanskrit found in
15392-424: The gods have poured, into the waters of life, I kindle for thee ( tam te tapāmi ), by the law of Varuna.' Desire ( kāma ) is homologized with the concept of Tapas , to explain the feelings and inner energy that leads to sexual intercourse. Agnicayana, Satapatha Brahmana and other ancient texts similarly use the root of the word Tapas to symbolize emotions, biological stages and a mother's effort from conception to
15540-431: The historic Sanskrit literary culture and the failure of new Sanskrit literature to assimilate into the changing cultural and political environment. Sheldon Pollock states that in some crucial way, "Sanskrit is dead ". After the 12th century, the Sanskrit literary works were reduced to "reinscription and restatements" of ideas already explored, and any creativity was restricted to hymns and verses. This contrasted with
15688-478: The intense change that must have occurred in the pre-Vedic period between the Proto-Indo-Aryan language and Vedic Sanskrit. The noticeable differences between the Vedic and the Classical Sanskrit include the much-expanded grammar and grammatical categories as well as the differences in the accent, the semantics and the syntax. There are also some differences between how some of the nouns and verbs end, as well as
15836-447: The lack of any possessions, lack of shelter, walking and wandering alone without fearing anything and without hurting anyone. The internal Tapas include words and inner thoughts (intent) that resonate with the external Tapas (action). The list of internal and external austerities in Jainism vary with the text and tradition, with Tattvartha Sutra , Uttaradhyayana Sutra and Bhagavati Sutra stating: In Jainism , Tapas implies
15984-432: The largest cultural heritage that any civilization has produced prior to the invention of the printing press. — Foreword of Sanskrit Computational Linguistics (2009), Gérard Huet, Amba Kulkarni and Peter Scharf Sanskrit has been the predominant language of Hindu texts encompassing a rich tradition of philosophical and religious texts, as well as poetry, music, drama , scientific , technical and others. It
16132-520: The life form. The concept and reference to 'egg hatching' is replaced in Sanskrit texts written in later centuries, with simply 'brooding' or 'incubation'. In ancient literature of Hinduism dedicated to love, desire, lust, seduction and sex, the root of the word Tapas is commonly used. For example, in Atharva Veda, a mantra recommended for a woman who wishes to win or compel a man's love is, 'Love's consuming longing, this passion this yearning, which
16280-412: The linguistic expression and sets the standard for the Sanskrit language. Pāṇini made use of a technical metalanguage consisting of a syntax, morphology and lexicon. This metalanguage is organised according to a series of meta-rules, some of which are explicitly stated while others can be deduced. Despite differences in the analysis from that of modern linguistics, Pāṇini's work has been found valuable and
16428-1023: The list of tattva increases to 96 in verses 1.8 to 1.14. It includes the six stages of changes (Aiyar translates this to "existence, birth, growth, transformation, decay, and destruction"); six maladies or "infirmities" (hunger, thirst, suffering, delusion, age, and death); koshas or six sheaths ("skin, blood, flesh, fat, marrow, and bones"); six adversities or foes of a body ("longing, anger, craving, arrogance, and malice"); three aspects of " jiva " – "Vishva" (world), " Taijasa " (endowed with light), and " Prajna " (insight into nature of reality); three " Guṇas " or qualities, innate psyche (" Sattva , Rajas , and Tamas "); three types of Karmas (" Prarabdha " (past karma now being enjoyed), " Sanchita " (past karma yet to be enjoyed), and "Agamin" (current karma to be enjoyed later)); five actions ("talking, lifting, walking, excreting, and enjoying"); and tattvas of "thought, certainty, egoism, compassion, kindness, anticipation, sympathy, and indifference". To complete its list of 96,
16576-503: The literary works. The Indian tradition, states Winternitz , has favored the learning and the usage of multiple languages from the ancient times. Sanskrit was a spoken language in the educated and the elite classes, but it was also a language that must have been understood in a wider circle of society because the widely popular folk epics and stories such as the Ramayana , the Mahabharata ,
16724-456: The meaning of the word Tapas evolved, wherein ascetic penance was forsaken, and Tapas meant meditative and spiritual practices. The word Tapas appears extensively in Buddhist literature where, states Richard Gombrich , it does not mean "asceticism or mortification". The term Tapas means "meditation" or "reasoned moral self discipline" or both in Buddhism. According to Bailey and Mabbett, these Buddhist ideas are similar to those found in
16872-501: The modern age include the Samaveda , Yajurveda , Atharvaveda , along with the embedded and layered Vedic texts such as the Brahmanas , Aranyakas , and the early Upanishads . These Vedic documents reflect the dialects of Sanskrit found in the various parts of the northwestern, northern, and eastern Indian subcontinent. According to Michael Witzel, Vedic Sanskrit was a spoken language of
17020-429: The more advanced Classical Sanskrit. Rituals and the rites-of-passage ceremonies have been and continue to be the other occasions where a wide spectrum of people hear Sanskrit, and occasionally join in to speak some Sanskrit words such as namah . Classical Sanskrit is the standard register as laid out in the grammar of Pāṇini , around the fourth century BCE. Its position in the cultures of Greater India
17168-401: The most advanced analysis of linguistics until the twentieth century. Pāṇini's comprehensive and scientific theory of grammar is conventionally taken to mark the start of Classical Sanskrit. His systematic treatise inspired and made Sanskrit the preeminent Indian language of learning and literature for two millennia. It is unclear whether Pāṇini himself wrote his treatise or he orally created
17316-593: The most archaic poems of the Iranian and Greek language families, the Gathas of old Avestan and Iliad of Homer . As the Rigveda was orally transmitted by methods of memorisation of exceptional complexity, rigour and fidelity, as a single text without variant readings, its preserved archaic syntax and morphology are of vital importance in the reconstruction of the common ancestor language Proto-Indo-European . Sanskrit does not have an attested native script: from around
17464-535: The numbers are thought to signify a wish to be aligned with the prestige of the language. Sanskrit has been taught in traditional gurukulas since ancient times; it is widely taught today at the secondary school level. The oldest Sanskrit college is the Benares Sanskrit College founded in 1791 during East India Company rule . Sanskrit continues to be widely used as a ceremonial and ritual language in Hindu and Buddhist hymns and chants . In Sanskrit,
17612-403: The oral transmission of the texts is reliable: they are ceremonial literature, where the exact phonetic expression and its preservation were a part of the historic tradition. However some scholars have suggested that the original Ṛg-veda differed in some fundamental ways in phonology compared to the sole surviving version available to us. In particular that retroflex consonants did not exist as
17760-431: The other." Reinöhl further states that there is a symmetric relationship between Dravidian languages like Kannada or Tamil, with Indo-Aryan languages like Bengali or Hindi, whereas the same relationship is not found for non-Indo-Aryan languages, for example, Persian or English: A sentence in a Dravidian language like Tamil or Kannada becomes ordinarily good Bengali or Hindi by substituting Bengali or Hindi equivalents for
17908-414: The possible influence of Dravidian on Sanskrit is only one of many items of syntactic assimilation, not least among them the large repertoire of morphological modality and aspect that, once one knows to look for it, can be found everywhere in classical and postclassical Sanskrit". The main influence of Dravidian on Sanskrit is found to have been concentrated in the timespan between the late Vedic period and
18056-439: The previous 1,500 years when "great experiments in moral and aesthetic imagination" marked the Indian scholarship using Classical Sanskrit, states Pollock. Scholars maintain that the Sanskrit language did not die, but rather only declined. Jurgen Hanneder disagrees with Pollock, finding his arguments elegant but "often arbitrary". According to Hanneder, a decline or regional absence of creative and innovative literature constitutes
18204-480: The problems of interpretation and misunderstanding. The purifying structure of the Sanskrit language removes these imperfections. The early Sanskrit grammarian Daṇḍin states, for example, that much in the Prakrit languages is etymologically rooted in Sanskrit, but involves "loss of sounds" and corruptions that result from a "disregard of the grammar". Daṇḍin acknowledged that there are words and confusing structures in Prakrit that thrive independent of Sanskrit. This view
18352-554: The process of spiritual rebirth of a student in care of his or her teacher, with the gestation process during the biological birth of a baby in a mother's womb. Tapas is also found in the Upanishads . The Chāndogya Upaniṣad , for example, suggests that those who engage in ritualistic offerings to gods and priests will fail in their spiritual practice while those who engage in tapas and self-examination will succeed. The Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad states that realization of self requires
18500-546: The regional Prakrit languages, which makes it likely that the interaction, the sharing of words and ideas began early in the Indian history. As the Indian thought diversified and challenged earlier beliefs of Hinduism, particularly in the form of Buddhism and Jainism , the Prakrit languages such as Pali in Theravada Buddhism and Ardhamagadhi in Jainism competed with Sanskrit in the ancient times. However, states Paul Dundas , these ancient Prakrit languages had "roughly
18648-490: The relationship between various Indo-European languages, the origin of all these languages may possibly be in what is now Central or Eastern Europe, while the Indo-Iranian group possibly arose in Central Russia. The Iranian and Indo-Aryan branches separated quite early. It is the Indo-Aryan branch that moved into eastern Iran and then south into South Asia in the first half of the 2nd millennium BCE. Once in ancient India,
18796-558: The role of language, the ontological status of painting word-images through sound, and the need for rules so that it can serve as a means for a community of speakers, separated by geography or time, to share and understand profound ideas from each other. These speculations became particularly important to the Mīmāṃsā and the Nyaya schools of Hindu philosophy, and later to Vedanta and Mahayana Buddhism, states Frits Staal —a scholar of Linguistics with
18944-491: The same relationship to Sanskrit as medieval Italian does to Latin". The Indian tradition states that the Buddha and the Mahavira preferred the Prakrit language so that everyone could understand it. However, scholars such as Dundas have questioned this hypothesis. They state that there is no evidence for this and whatever evidence is available suggests that by the start of the common era, hardly anybody other than learned monks had
19092-551: The semi-nomadic Aryans . The Vedic Sanskrit language or a closely related Indo-European variant was recognized beyond ancient India as evidenced by the " Mitanni Treaty" between the ancient Hittite and Mitanni people, carved into a rock, in a region that now includes parts of Syria and Turkey. Parts of this treaty, such as the names of the Mitanni princes and technical terms related to horse training, for reasons not understood, are in early forms of Vedic Sanskrit. The treaty also invokes
19240-594: The social structures such as the role of the poet and the priests, the patronage economy, the phrasal equations, and some of the poetic metres. While there are similarities, state Jamison and Brereton, there are also differences between Vedic Sanskrit, the Old Avestan, and the Mycenaean Greek literature. For example, unlike the Sanskrit similes in the Ṛg-veda, the Old Avestan Gathas lack simile entirely, and it
19388-403: The spiritual ecstasy of a yogin or Tāpasa (a vṛddhi derivative meaning "a practitioner of austerities, an ascetic"), even warmth of sexual intimacy. In certain contexts, the term means penance, pious activity, as well as severe meditation. Tapas is based on the root Tap (तप्) meaning "to heat, to give out warmth, to shine, to burn". The term evolves to also mean "to suffer, to mortify
19536-486: The student life expected to be simple and austere, dedicated to the learning. Tapas is a central concept in Jainism. It refers to the spiritual practice of body mortification, penance, and austerities, in order to burn away past karma and stop producing new karma, thereby reaching siddha (liberating oneself). Ascetic Tapas among Jaina monks, both internal and external, is believed to be essential for spiritual growth and kevalya (moksha, liberation). The details of
19684-467: The subjects of Tattvas , the nature and relationship between the individual soul (Self, Atman ) and the Ultimate Reality ( Brahman ), the seven stages of learning, the characteristics of Jivanmukti (inner sense of freedom while living), and the four types of Jivanmuktas (liberated persons). The last chapter of the text is dedicated to Yoga, its goals and methods. It is, as an Upanishad, a part of
19832-591: The term is equivalent to a devotion with intense self-discipline, believed to yield special inner powers. In contemporary usage, any practice that includes hardship and requires perseverance – such as fasting during Vrata – is called Tapas . Patañjali , in his Yoga Sūtra , lists Tāpas as one of the Niyamas (virtuous practices), and describes it in several sections such as 2.32, 2.43 and 4.1. The term includes self-discipline, meditation, simple and austere living or any means of inner self-purification. Tapas in
19980-399: The text was likely composed between the 13th and 16th centuries. Ribhu, after observing Tapas (penance) for 12 long deva years, is visited by Vishnu in his Varaha avatar; the latter asks Ribhu what boon he would like. Ribhu declines all worldly pleasures, and asks Vishnu to explain "that science of Brahman which treats of thy nature, a knowledge which leads to salvation". From this point on,
20128-419: The text, and these are Laya (soft), Mantra (mystic), and Hatha (middle), recommending Hatha Yoga as foremost of three. It discusses various aspects of Yoga, ranging from recommending that healthy food should be eaten in temperate quantities, in small portions, several times a day, to recommending that Yoga should not be performed when one is not feeling well or is very hungry. The goal of Yoga, states Varaha,
20276-432: The text. Some scholars, asserts Varaha, expand the list of tattvas of a human body to 36, by including the five elements – earth ( Prithvi ), air ( Vayu ), water ( Ap ), ether ( Akasha ), and fire ( Agni ); the three bodies – the gross, the subtle and the causal ( Karana ); three states of consciousness – when awake, when dreaming, and when in dreamless sleep; and one jiva (soul). Varaha then describes how
20424-641: The turn of the 1st-millennium CE, it has been written in various Brahmic scripts , and in the modern era most commonly in Devanagari . Sanskrit's status, function, and place in India's cultural heritage are recognized by its inclusion in the Constitution of India 's Eighth Schedule languages . However, despite attempts at revival, there are no first-language speakers of Sanskrit in India. In each of India's recent decennial censuses, several thousand citizens have reported Sanskrit to be their mother tongue, but
20572-477: The universe despite being subject to sufferings. अज्ञस्य दुःखौघमयं ज्ञस्यानन्दमयं जगत् अन्धं भुवनमन्धस्य प्रकाशं तु सुचक्षुषाम् To an ignorant man, the world is filled with misery; while, to a wise man, it is full of bliss, To a blind man, the world is dark; while, to men of vision, it is bright. The Varaha Upanishad asserts the non-dualistic premise that Brahman and Atman are one, and those who know this fear nothing, suffer nothing, and possess fortitude. He
20720-408: The variants in the usage of Sanskrit in different regions of India. The ten Vedic scholars he quotes are Āpiśali, Kaśyapa , Gārgya, Gālava, Cakravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja , Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. In the Aṣṭādhyāyī , language is observed in a manner that has no parallel among Greek or Latin grammarians. Pāṇini's grammar, according to Renou and Filliozat, is a classic that defines
20868-564: The vernacular Prakrits. Many Sanskrit dramas indicate that the language coexisted with the vernacular Prakrits. The cities of Varanasi , Paithan , Pune and Kanchipuram were centers of classical Sanskrit learning and public debates until the arrival of the colonial era. According to Lamotte , Sanskrit became the dominant literary and inscriptional language because of its precision in communication. It was, states Lamotte, an ideal instrument for presenting ideas, and as knowledge in Sanskrit multiplied, so did its spread and influence. Sanskrit
21016-436: The very tip of his existence, which includes not cutting his hair, nail and beard. Thus, during this process of spiritual rebirth and diksa , the tapas observed by a Brahmachari may include silence, fasting, seclusion, chastity, as well other activities. The goal of tapas is to help focus the Brahmachari on meditation, observation of reality, reflection and spiritual rebirth. Brahmacharya and tapasya are interrelated, with
21164-497: The Ṛg-veda is distinctly more archaic than other Vedic texts, and in many respects, the Rigvedic language is notably more similar to those found in the archaic texts of Old Avestan Zoroastrian Gathas and Homer's Iliad and Odyssey . According to Stephanie W. Jamison and Joel P. Brereton – Indologists known for their translation of the Ṛg-veda – the Vedic Sanskrit literature "clearly inherited" from Indo-Iranian and Indo-European times
21312-408: Was a spoken language ( bhasha ) used by the cultured and educated. Some sutras expound upon the variant forms of spoken Sanskrit versus written Sanskrit. Chinese Buddhist pilgrim Xuanzang mentioned in his memoir that official philosophical debates in India were held in Sanskrit, not in the vernacular language of that region. According to Sanskrit linguist professor Madhav Deshpande, Sanskrit
21460-427: Was a spoken language in a colloquial form by the mid-1st millennium BCE which coexisted with a more formal, grammatically correct form of literary Sanskrit. This, states Deshpande, is true for modern languages where colloquial incorrect approximations and dialects of a language are spoken and understood, along with more "refined, sophisticated and grammatically accurate" forms of the same language being found in
21608-472: Was adopted voluntarily as a vehicle of high culture, arts, and profound ideas. Pollock disagrees with Lamotte, but concurs that Sanskrit's influence grew into what he terms a "Sanskrit Cosmopolis" over a region that included all of South Asia and much of southeast Asia. The Sanskrit language cosmopolis thrived beyond India between 300 and 1300 CE. Today, it is believed that Kashmiri is the closest language to Sanskrit. Reinöhl mentions that not only have
21756-722: Was also the language of some of the oldest surviving, authoritative and much followed philosophical works of Jainism such as the Tattvartha Sutra by Umaswati . The Sanskrit language has been one of the major means for the transmission of knowledge and ideas in Asian history. Indian texts in Sanskrit were already in China by 402 CE, carried by the influential Buddhist pilgrim Faxian who translated them into Chinese by 418 CE. Xuanzang , another Chinese Buddhist pilgrim, learnt Sanskrit in India and carried 657 Sanskrit texts to China in
21904-442: Was visualized as "pervading all creation", another representation of the world itself; the "mysterious magnum" of Hindu thought. The search for perfection in thought and the goal of liberation were among the dimensions of sacred sound, and the common thread that wove all ideas and inspirations together became the quest for what the ancient Indians believed to be a perfect language, the "phonocentric episteme" of Sanskrit. Sanskrit as
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