Religious Doctrines in the Mahabharata

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1. Background Details

The Mahabharata is a huge monument of Hindu literature. It is generally designated as an 'epic' by Western writers along with the Ramayana of Valmiki, which is shorter, of a different style and does not contain the extensive didactic material that is such a notable feature of the Mahabharata. In the West the term epic generally refers to a work which recounts heroic deeds and while this is undoubtedly true of the Mahabharata, within the Hindu tradition it is recognised primarily as a religious text with the status of scripture. It tells of the acts of Krsna, the Deity manifest on earth, it portrays the behaviour of the righteous and of the wicked and it contains numerous didactic passages, including the Bhagavad- gita, expounding religious doctrines of various types. Therefore although the term epic is retained, the primary understanding of the text is as an authoritative religious literature of crucial significance to the Hindu tradition.

The authorship of the Mahabharata has been the subject of much debate. The traditional view is that it is the work of Vyasa, who in later Hinduism is identified as an incarnation of Visnu appearing to compile and arrange the Vedas and other sacred works. Much of the earlier Western work on the epic followed a text-critical approach in seeking to establish an original Mahabharata which might be distinguished from later accretions included within the work as it stands today. Despite the shortcomings and subjectivity of text-critical methods, most contemporary Western scholars accept the view of Hopkins' that the Mahabharata is not the work of one author but is a composite collection of pieces from different times loosely held together in a final epical form. It is notable, however, that more recent work has tended to move towards the view that the form the text now holds is not random, but is the careful composition of a final redactor or redactors." In van Buitenen's opinion the original story on which the epic is based was composed in the 8th or 9th century B.с., but is now irrecoverable. This was reworked into the present form so that, "the old and new are inextricably bound together" probably not much before 400 B.c. to form the oldest parts of the text as it is known today. These oldest sections comprise the basis of the narrative which has been subjected to subsequent reworkings and interpolations. The long didactic passages were added to the epic over the ensuing centuries to leave the text in its final form probably around 300 A.D. Again according to van Butane, "In particular, the didactic portions of what has been called the pseudo-epic were added to very late, perhaps as late as the fourth century A.D.".

Chronologically, the Mahabharata spans what is arguably the most significant period in the development of the Hindu tradition when the ideas of the Vedic orthodoxy were confronting new philosophies of a radically ascetic nature. It also contains the earliest expressions of the non-Vedic devotional theism which was to become so significant during the first millenium AD, and has had such a profound effect on subsequent Hindu thought. Thus the text embodies the traditional Vedic stress on yajna, the social regulations and ritual duties of dharma-sastra, the ascetic paths to salvation, and devotion to the Supreme Gods, Visnu and Siva.