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Vyasa

व्यास · वेदव्यास · कृष्णद्वैपायन · Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana Vyāsa

Account combining history, theology and tradition

Legendary sage, called Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana, to whom tradition ascribes the division of the Veda into four, the composition of the Mahābhārata —with the Bhagavad Gītā— and of the eighteen Purāṇas, and whom it identifies with Bādarāyaṇa, author of the Brahmasūtras, and with the commentator on the Yogasūtras. In the Mahābhārata he is at once author, narrator and grandfather of both sides. Philology sees in him a figure of authority built by the texts, composed between the fourth century BCE and the first millennium CE.

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Vyāsa y sus discípulos ven llegar a Śuka (Razmnāma)

Vyāsa y sus discípulos ven llegar a Śuka (Razmnāma) · Public domain

In their words

«Whatever is spoken about virtue, wealth, pleasure, and salvation may be seen elsewhere; but whatever is not contained in this is not to be found anywhere.»

Mahābhārata, Ādiparvan (1.56.33 de la edición crítica; sección LXII de la trad. de K. M. Ganguli, dominio público); versión española del investigador

Mahābhārata — Vyasa

Their central idea

Subtle dharma (sūkṣma dharma): One of the ideas running through the Mahābhārata is that dharma, the right order of conduct, is 'subtle' and hard to know: norms conflict, the just lose and the victors doubt their victory.

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Biography

5 min read

The one who arranged the texts

Vyāsa means in Sanskrit "the divider" or "the arranger", and it is less a name than a function. Tradition so calls Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana, "the dark one born on an island", and ascribes to him a body of work no human being could have written: the division of the single Veda into four collections, the composition of the Mahābhārata —the longest poem of Antiquity—, the eighteen great Purāṇas, the Brahmasūtras and the classical commentary on the Yogasūtras. No external document attests him. Philology sees in Vyāsa an author figure created within the texts to give them authority, and the history of religions a composite in which attributions were deposited over more than a thousand years.

Son of a sage and a ferry-girl

The Mahābhārata tells of his birth. The sage Parāśara, Vasiṣṭha's grandson, was crossing the Yamunā in the boat of Satyavatī, a fisherman's daughter; he desired her, wrapped her in a mist and made her conceive on an island in the river. The child was born that same day, grew up at once and left to practise austerities with a promise: he would come whenever his mother called him. Because he was born on an island he was called Dvaipāyana; because he arranged the Veda, Vyāsa. Years later Satyavatī married King Śaṃtanu, and when her sons died without issue she called on Vyāsa to beget heirs with the widows, according to the custom of niyoga. From those unions were born Dhṛtarāṣṭra, blind, Pāṇḍu, pale, and Vidura, the son of a servant. The author of the poem is thus the grandfather of the two sides that destroy each other in it.

Author and character

Vyāsa enters and leaves his own work. He counsels the Pāṇḍavas in exile, grants Sañjaya divine sight so that he may narrate the war to the blind king, consoles the survivors and, years after the battle, makes the dead warriors rise for one night from the waters of the Ganges so that their families may see them again. The poem presents itself as a chain of recitations: Vyāsa teaches it to his disciple Vaiśampāyana, who recites it at King Janamejaya's snake sacrifice, and the bard Ugraśravas repeats it before the sages of the Naimiṣa forest. Bruce Sullivan has read this Vyāsa as a Brahmā-like figure, creator and seer of the "fifth Veda"; Alf Hiltebeitel as the author who writes himself into the text to guide its reading. The famous episode in which Gaṇeśa writes at his dictation is found in the vulgate, but the critical edition relegates it to an appendix because it is missing from many manuscripts.

A library in eighteen books

The Mahābhārata calls itself a "collection of a hundred thousand stanzas"; divided into eighteen books (parvan) and completed by the Harivaṃśa, it narrates the rivalry between the Kauravas and the Pāṇḍavas up to the great war of Kurukṣetra and its aftermath, but it also contains tales such as those of Nala and Sāvitrī, a version of the story of Rāma and entire books of teaching on dharma, politics and liberation. The poem itself declares: "what is here may be found elsewhere; what is not here is nowhere". The Bhandarkar Institute of Pune published its critical edition between 1919 and 1966. There is no agreement on its date: John Brockington describes a growth over several centuries, between the fourth century BCE and the fourth CE; Hiltebeitel and James Fitzgerald argue for a written composition, relatively rapid, in the last two centuries BCE, followed by enlargements.

The Bhagavad Gītā

In the sixth book, the Bhīṣmaparvan, when the armies are drawn up, the warrior Arjuna refuses to fight his kinsmen and Kṛṣṇa, his charioteer, answers him in seven hundred stanzas in eighteen cantos: the Bhagavad Gītā. Tradition ascribes it to Vyāsa as compiler of the poem, and the narrative frames the dialogue within Sañjaya's account to the blind king, made possible by the sage's gift. Since the first English translation, Charles Wilkins's of 1785, it has been the most widely read Indian text outside India; those of Kashinath Trimbak Telang (1882) and Edwin Arnold (1885) are now in the public domain.

Arranger of the Veda and the Purāṇas

The Purāṇas make Vyāsa a cosmic office: in each dvāpara age of the world a Vyāsa appears who distributes the Veda, and the Viṣṇu Purāṇa lists twenty-eight, among them Vasiṣṭha, Vālmīki and Parāśara, down to Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana, the one of the present era. He gave the Ṛgveda to Paila, the Yajurveda to Vaiśampāyana, the Sāmaveda to Jaimini, the Atharvaveda to Sumantu and history and the Purāṇas to Lomaharṣaṇa. The Bhāgavata Purāṇa adds that after all this Vyāsa was still dissatisfied, until Nārada advised him to sing the deeds of Kṛṣṇa: thus the Bhāgavata was supposedly born, which he taught to his son Śuka. Ludo Rocher has shown that the attribution of the Purāṇas to Vyāsa is a formula of authority for texts composed throughout the first millennium and beyond.

Bādarāyaṇa and the commentary on yoga

Two philosophical treatises also shelter under his name. The Brahmasūtras, the basis of Vedānta, are ascribed to Bādarāyaṇa, whom later Vedāntic tradition identifies with Vyāsa; scholarship distinguishes the two and dates the redaction of the aphorisms to the first centuries CE —Hajime Nakamura proposed 400–450—. The commentary on the Yogasūtras (Yogabhāṣya) has been ascribed to Vyāsa since the medieval commentators, but Philipp Maas and Johannes Bronkhorst maintain that aphorisms and commentary form a single work, the Pātañjalayogaśāstra, of c. 325–425.

What can be affirmed

The historian cannot give Vyāsa dates or a place. He can affirm that his name functioned for two millennia as the seal of the great texts of the Brahmanical tradition and that the Mahābhārata built him as an author present in his work, at once grandfather, witness and narrator. India honours him every full moon of the month of āṣāḍha at Guru Pūrṇimā, the festival of teachers, and counts him among the immortals who still walk the world. In the poem's last book, Vyāsa sums up his teaching in a lament: "With uplifted arms I am crying aloud but nobody hears me: from dharma come wealth and pleasure; why should dharma not be followed?"

Sources: Sullivan, Bruce M. Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana Vyāsa and the Mahābhārata: A New Interpretation. Leiden: Brill, 1990; reed. como Seer of the Fifth Veda: Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana Vyāsa in the Mahābhārata. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1999. · Hiltebeitel, Alf. Rethinking the Mahābhārata: A Reader's Guide to the Education of the Dharma King. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001 (caps. 1–2, sobre Vyāsa como autor y la fecha de composición). · Fitzgerald, James L. (trad.). The Mahābhārata, vol. 7: Book 11, The Book of the Women; Book 12, The Book of Peace, Part One. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. Introducción. · Brockington, John. The Sanskrit Epics. Leiden: Brill, 1998 (Handbuch der Orientalistik, 2. Abt., Bd. 12). Capítulos sobre el Mahābhārata. · Sukthankar, Vishnu S. (ed.). The Mahābhārata for the First Time Critically Edited. Vol. 1: The Ādiparvan, with Prolegomena. Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1933 (edición crítica completa, 1919–1966).

Timeline

A life, year by year

Each point is a documented event. Click to read it, with its source and degree of certainty.

  1. c. 400 BCE – 400

    Formation of the Mahābhārata

    According to John Brockington, the epic grew over some eight centuries, from an oral bardic tradition to a text of a hundred thousand stanzas. This is the range of the work ascribed to Vyāsa, not of a person.

    Disputed

  2. c. 150 BCE

    Written composition, according to Hiltebeitel

    Alf Hiltebeitel and James Fitzgerald argue that the Mahābhārata was composed in writing by a group of Brahmin authors in a relatively short period, between the mid-second century BCE and the turn of the era, and then enlarged.

    Disputed

  3. c. 300 – 1000

    The composition of the Purāṇas

    The great Purāṇas, ascribed to Vyāsa, were composed and reworked throughout the first millennium and later, according to Ludo Rocher; in them Vyāsa appears as the arranger of the Veda in each age of the world.

    Probable

  4. c. 325 – 425

    The Pātañjalayogaśāstra

    The date Philipp Maas proposes for the Yogasūtras and their commentary, which medieval tradition ascribed to Vyāsa and which Maas regards as the work of the same author as the aphorisms.

    Disputed

  5. c. 400 – 450

    Bādarāyaṇa's Brahmasūtras

    Date proposed by Hajime Nakamura for the final redaction of the Brahmasūtras, which Vedāntic tradition ascribes to Bādarāyaṇa, identified with Vyāsa.

    Disputed

  6. 1598

    Vyāsa in the Razmnāma

    Banwari paints Vyāsa with his disciples for an illustrated copy of the Razmnāma, the Persian translation of the Mahābhārata commissioned by Akbar; the folio is in the Victoria and Albert Museum.

    Documented

  7. 1785

    First English translation of the Gītā

    Charles Wilkins publishes The Bhagvat-Geeta, the first translation of the Bhagavad Gītā into a European language.

    Documented

  8. 1883 – 1896

    Ganguli's translation

    Kisari Mohan Ganguli translates the complete Mahābhārata into English, published by Pratap Chandra Roy; it is the only complete public-domain English translation.

    Documented

  9. 1900

    Vivekananda speaks on the Mahābhārata

    Swami Vivekananda devotes a lecture to the Mahābhārata before an American audience and presents Vyāsa as its author.

    Documented

  10. 1919 – 1966

    The Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute's critical edition

    Under the direction of V. S. Sukthankar and his successors, the Pune institute publishes the critical edition of the Mahābhārata, which relegates to appendices the passages missing from many manuscripts, such as that of Gaṇeśa as scribe.

    Documented

Works

Essential works

The works without which their legacy cannot be understood.

Mahābhārata — Vyasa

Traditional attribution · c. 400 BCE

Mahābhārata

महाभारत (Mahābhārata)

The longest epic in world literature, a 'collection of a hundred thousand stanzas' in eighteen books, with the Harivaṃśa as a supplement. It narrates the rivalry between the Kauravas and their cousins the Pāṇḍavas for the kingdom of Hastināpura, the dice game, the exile and the eighteen-day war at Kurukṣetra, with its aftermath. It includes the Bhagavad Gītā and numerous tales and treatises on dharma, politics and liberation, and regards itself as a 'fifth Veda'.

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8 editions

Bhagavad Gītā (The Song of the Lord) — Vyasa

Traditional attribution · c. 200 BCE

Bhagavad Gītā (The Song of the Lord)

भगवद्गीता (Bhagavadgītā)

A dialogue of seven hundred stanzas in eighteen cantos between the warrior Arjuna, who refuses to fight his kinsmen, and Kṛṣṇa, his charioteer, who teaches him to act without attachment to the fruit of action, sets out the paths of knowledge, action and devotion and reveals himself to him in his universal form. It is the most commented text of Hinduism —by Śaṅkara, Rāmānuja, Madhva and so many others— and the most widely read outside India.

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9 editions · amazon.es

Later compilation · c. 300

The eighteen great Purāṇas (traditional attribution)

महापुराण (mahāpurāṇa)

Encyclopaedias of mythology, cosmology, royal genealogies, ritual and devotion. According to the canonical list there are eighteen: Brahma, Padma, Viṣṇu, Śiva (or Vāyu), Bhāgavata, Nārada, Mārkaṇḍeya, Agni, Bhaviṣya, Brahmavaivarta, Liṅga, Varāha, Skanda, Vāmana, Kūrma, Matsya, Garuḍa and Brahmāṇḍa. The lists vary slightly from text to text, and alongside them there are numerous upapurāṇas or minor Purāṇas.

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0 editions

Brahmasūtras (Aphorisms on Brahman) — Vyasa

Traditional attribution · c. 400

Brahmasūtras (Aphorisms on Brahman)

ब्रह्मसूत्र (Brahmasūtra), también वेदान्तसूत्र

Some 555 aphorisms in four books systematising the teaching of the Upaniṣads on Brahman: its nature, the refutation of other schools (Sāṃkhya, Buddhists, Jains), the means of realisation and the fruit of liberation. Their concision makes them intelligible only with a commentary, and each school of Vedānta —Śaṅkara, Rāmānuja, Madhva— founded its doctrine on its own.

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4 editions · amazon.com

Complete works (30)

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Quotations

Quotations located in a specific work. Each carries its provenance and its level of confidence.

Whatever is spoken about virtue, wealth, pleasure, and salvation may be seen elsewhere; but whatever is not contained in this is not to be found anywhere.

dharme cārthe ca kāme ca mokṣe ca bharatarṣabha / yad ihāsti tad anyatra yan nehāsti na tat kvacit

VerifiedMahābhārata, Ādiparvan (1.56.33 de la edición crítica; sección LXII de la trad. de K. M. Ganguli, dominio público); versión española del investigador

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Last words

There are no verifiable records of their last words.

There is no record of his death: tradition counts him among the ciranjīvins, the immortals who will live until the end of the age. His last words in the Mahābhārata are the closing verses of the Svargārohaṇaparvan, but they are not presented as the words of a dying man.

Source: Wikipedia (inglés), «Vyasa», sobre la Guru Pūrṇimā (Vyāsa Pūrṇimā), los cirañjīvin y los lugares de culto asociados.

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What their work answers

Twelve great human questions and what their texts allow us to answer, with references. We never put words in their mouth.

  • What is the Absolute? Does God exist?

    Formless Brahman and the supreme Lord: the Gītā holds both

    Both personal and impersonalStated explicitly

    In the Bhagavad Gītā, which tradition ascribes to Vyāsa, the Absolute has two faces that the text does not separate. On one side is the supreme brahman, beginningless, of which it cannot be said that it is or that it is not (13.12); on the other, Kṛṣṇa presents himself as the Lord who sustains the world, the «supreme spirit» beyond both the perishable and the imperishable (15.16–18), and even says that he is the foundation of brahman itself (14.27). Chapter 12 compares those who worship the unmanifest with those who worship him, and declares the first path harder. The Brahmasūtras, ascribed to Bādarāyaṇa, whom tradition identifies with Vyāsa, define brahman as that from which the birth, subsistence and dissolution of the world proceed (1.1.2).

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  • Who am I? Is there a true self?

    The embodied one is neither born nor dies; the ego believes it acts

    The Self is the AbsoluteInferred from their doctrine

    The Bhagavad Gītā distinguishes sharply between the embodied one (dehin) and the body: the former is neither born nor dies, is not wounded by weapons nor wetted by water, and changes bodies as one changes clothes (2.20–22). The sense of being the author of one's acts belongs to material nature: one deluded by the ego (ahaṃkāra) thinks «I am the doer», when it is the qualities of nature that act (3.27). Chapter 13 identifies the knower of the field in all bodies with Kṛṣṇa himself, and the one who attains wisdom «becomes brahman» (18.54). The Gītā thus invites one to recognise oneself as an eternal Self, witness of the activity of body and mind.

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  • Why do we suffer?

    From attachment comes desire, from desire anger, and from anger ruin

    Craving and attachmentStated explicitly

    The Bhagavad Gītā describes a precise chain: whoever dwells on the objects of the senses becomes attached to them; from attachment comes desire, from desire anger, from anger delusion, and thence the loss of memory and intelligence, down to ruin (2.62–63). When Arjuna asks what drives a person to do wrong even against his will, Kṛṣṇa answers that it is desire, which turns into anger, the insatiable enemy (3.37). The remedy is not to stop acting, but to act without attachment to the fruit. Behind desire lies an ignorance that veils knowledge (5.15). The Mahābhārata as a whole, for its part, shows the collective suffering to which the greed and pride of a lineage that destroys itself can lead.

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  • What happens after death?

    It is not slain when the body is slain: it changes bodies like clothes

    What I am is never born and never diesStated explicitly

    The Bhagavad Gītā's answer is born on a battlefield: Arjuna does not want to kill his kinsmen, and Kṛṣṇa teaches him that the embodied one is neither born nor dies, is eternal and ancient, and is not slain when the body is slain (2.20). As a man discards worn-out clothes and puts on new ones, so it discards worn-out bodies and enters others (2.22); for one who is born death is certain, and for one who dies, birth. What one remembers on leaving the body determines where one goes (8.6), and whoever thinks of Kṛṣṇa at death reaches him and is not born again (8.5, 8.15–16). The Mahābhārata tests this teaching in the yakṣa's question to Yudhiṣṭhira: the greatest wonder is that, seeing everyone die, each believes himself immortal.

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  • How is liberation or salvation attained?

    Action without attachment, knowledge and, finally, refuge in the Lord alone

    Through devotion and surrenderStated explicitly

    The Bhagavad Gītā presents several paths: action without attachment to the fruit (karmayoga), knowledge (jñāna), meditation and devotion (bhakti). It does not set them against one another but integrates them, and the text culminates in surrender. Kṛṣṇa says that only by exclusive devotion can he be known and seen as he is (11.54); that whoever offers him with love a leaf, a flower, a fruit or water, he accepts it (9.26); and, at the end, he asks Arjuna to abandon all duties and take refuge in him alone, for he will free him from all evil (18.66). The Brahmasūtras, ascribed to Bādarāyaṇa, whom tradition identifies with Vyāsa, assert instead that the human goal is attained through the knowledge of brahman (3.4.1).

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  • Is a teacher necessary?

    Learn from the sages who have seen the truth, serving and questioning them

    IndispensableStated explicitly

    The Bhagavad Gītā is itself a scene of teaching: Arjuna, paralysed, declares himself Kṛṣṇa's disciple and asks him for instruction (2.7). Kṛṣṇa explains that this knowledge was handed down from teacher to teacher since ancient times and was lost over time (4.1–2), and advises seeking it by prostrating, questioning and serving the sages who have seen the truth, for they will teach it (4.34). Tradition made Vyāsa the teacher par excellence: the one who divided the Veda and transmitted it to his disciples, and whose birth is celebrated on the full moon of āṣāḍha, Guru Pūrṇimā, the festival in which teachers are honoured. The seat from which the texts are recited is still called the «seat of Vyāsa».

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  • Is the world real?

    The world is the Lord's nature, which Arjuna sees whole in his form

    Manifestation of the divineStated explicitly

    In the Bhagavad Gītā, Kṛṣṇa says that the world proceeds from his twofold nature (prakṛti): the lower, made of earth, water, fire, air, space, mind, intellect and ego, and the higher, the life principle that sustains the universe (7.4–6). Everything is strung on him like pearls on a thread (7.7). In chapter 11, Arjuna receives divine sight and beholds the entire universe, with its gods and its armies, in Kṛṣṇa's body. The world here is not a dream, but the divine unfolded, although the Gītā also calls māyā the power by which the Lord produces it, which is hard to cross (7.14). The Brahmasūtras hold that brahman is both the material and the efficient cause of the world (1.4.23).

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  • What is love?

    Whoever loves me is in me, and I in him; you are dear

    Longing and unionStated explicitly

    In the Bhagavad Gītā love is above all devotion (bhakti), and it is reciprocal. Kṛṣṇa says he is the same towards all beings, but that those who worship him with devotion are in him and he in them (9.29). He accepts what is offered with love, be it a leaf or a little water (9.26), and at the end declares to Arjuna that he is very dear to him and that, if he fixes his mind and his devotion on him, he will come to him (18.64–65). Love so understood is the force that leads the being to its source. It also has an ethical side: the devotee the Lord loves is the one who hates no being, is friendly and compassionate, without possessiveness or egoism, equal in pain and pleasure (12.13–20).

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  • Are we free, or is everything determined?

    Nature's qualities act; the deluded believes himself the author

    There is no doerInferred from their doctrine

    The Bhagavad Gītā states that all actions are performed by the qualities (guṇa) of nature, and that only one deluded by the ego thinks «I am the doer» (3.27). The sage, absorbed in reality, thinks that he does nothing while he sees, hears or breathes (5.8). In chapter 11, after showing him his universal form, Kṛṣṇa tells Arjuna that the warriors have already been slain by him and that Arjuna is merely his instrument (11.33); and in chapter 18, that the Lord dwells in the heart of all beings and turns them as if mounted on a machine (18.61). The freedom that remains is not that of a separate agent, but that of acting without attachment, offering one's acts and renouncing the idea of being their author.

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  • Why meditate or pray?

    Fix the mind on the Lord, who calls the disciple friend

    Friendship with GodInferred from their doctrine

    The Bhagavad Gītā describes meditation in detail: sitting in a clean, steady place, holding body, head and neck erect, fixing the gaze and stilling the mind like a flame that does not flicker where no wind blows (6.10–19). But the object of that concentration is not a void: the yogin is to sit «intent on me», with his mind on Kṛṣṇa (6.14). Practice culminates in a personal relationship. Kṛṣṇa imparts his teaching to Arjuna because he is his devotee and his friend (4.3), accepts what is offered with love (9.26) and assures him that, fixing his mind on him, he will come to him (18.65). Meditating and praying thus converge in dealing with a Lord who knows and loves whoever turns to him.

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  • Can reason know the ultimate?

    Brahman is known through scripture; reasoning alone has no firm footing

    Scripture and reasoningStated explicitly

    The Brahmasūtras, which tradition ascribes to Bādarāyaṇa and identifies with Vyāsa, establish from the outset that scripture is the source of the knowledge of brahman (1.1.3) and that reasoning on its own lacks a firm foundation, because what one thinker proves a cleverer one refutes (2.1.11). Reasoning is not discarded: the whole text is an exercise in interpretation that reconciles passages and refutes other schools, such as Sāṃkhya or Buddhism. But its role is to serve scripture, not to replace it. The Bhagavad Gītā says the same in the field of conduct: let scripture be the authority in deciding what to do and what not to do (16.24), and whoever abandons it to follow his whim does not reach perfection.

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  • Withdraw from the world or transform it?

    Your right is to action, never to its fruits

    Contemplation in actionStated explicitly

    The Bhagavad Gītā is born of a thwarted renunciation: on the battlefield, Arjuna lets fall his bow and would rather live on alms than kill his kinsmen. Kṛṣṇa replies that no one can stop acting even for an instant, that true renunciation is not abandoning action but attachment to its fruits, and that each must fulfil his own duty (svadharma) even if imperfectly. Let right deeds be the motive, not the fruit which comes from them; live in action (2.47). The model is Janaka, who attained perfection through action (3.20). The Mahābhārata, for its part, devotes two whole books to Bhīṣma's teaching on the duty of the king and on conduct in times of crisis.

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Affinities & tensions

Affinities and tensions

Calculated question by question from their positions. The reason for each agreement or clash, on click.

Anecdotes and stories

Anecdotes and stories

Hagiographic accountrelato épico

Born on an island in the Yamunā

Satyavatī, the adopted daughter of a chief of fishermen, ferried travellers across the Yamunā in her boat. Her body smelt of fish, and so she was called Matsyagandhā. One day the sage Parāśara boarded the boat and desired her; she reminded him that they were in sight of the sages on both banks, and he wrapped the river in mist. He also promised her that she would keep her virginity and that her smell would become perfume. On an island in the river, that same day, the child was born, who grew up at once, asked his mother's leave to go and practise austerities and promised to come whenever she called him. Because he was born on an island he was called Dvaipāyana; because of his dark skin, Kṛṣṇa. Satyavatī would call him years later, having become queen of Hastināpura, when the dynasty was left without heirs.

Origin of the story: Mahābhārata, Ādiparvan, section LXIII of Ganguli's translation (and Satyavatī's account to Bhīṣma, section CV). It is epic legend with no verifiable historical basis.

Source: Ganguli, Kisari Mohan (trad.). The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa. Calcuta: Bharata Press (P. C. Roy), 1883–1896. Ādi Parva, secc. I, LXII, LXIII y CV–CVI; Bhishma Parva, secc. II; Asramavasika Parva, secc. XXXII; Svargarohanika Parva, secc. V. Project Gutenberg n.º 15474–15477.

Hagiographic accountrelato épico

The grandfather of both sides

When the sons Satyavatī had borne King Śaṃtanu died without issue, the queen had recourse to the custom of niyoga, by which an appointed man could beget an heir on another's widow. She called her first son, Vyāsa, who came from his austerities with the fearsome look of an ascetic: dark, bearded, with blazing eyes. The first widow, Ambikā, closed her eyes in fear, and her son, Dhṛtarāṣṭra, was born blind; the second, Ambālikā, turned pale, and her son, Pāṇḍu, was born pale. Satyavatī asked for a third son, but Ambikā sent a servant in her place, who received the sage without fear: from her was born Vidura, the wisest and most just of the lineage. Dhṛtarāṣṭra's sons will be the Kauravas; Pāṇḍu's, the Pāṇḍavas. The author of the poem is the grandfather of those who exterminate one another in it.

Origin of the story: Mahābhārata, Ādiparvan, sections CV–CVI of Ganguli's translation. Sullivan sees in this episode a central piece in the construction of Vyāsa as an author figure.

Source: Ganguli, Kisari Mohan (trad.). The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa. Calcuta: Bharata Press (P. C. Roy), 1883–1896. Ādi Parva, secc. I, LXII, LXIII y CV–CVI; Bhishma Parva, secc. II; Asramavasika Parva, secc. XXXII; Svargarohanika Parva, secc. V. Project Gutenberg n.º 15474–15477.

Disputedrelato épico (interpolación)

Gaṇeśa the scribe

According to a passage in the first canto, when Vyāsa had conceived the poem in his mind he wondered how to make it known, and Brahmā advised him to call Gaṇeśa to write it down. The god accepted on one condition: his pen would not stop for a single instant. Vyāsa set another: Gaṇeśa would write nothing he had not understood. So, whenever he needed time to compose, the sage dictated a verse of intricate meaning that forced the scribe to stop and think; that is why, the text says, there are thousands of verses of obscure meaning in the poem. The scene, so widespread in iconography and the popular imagination, presents the Mahābhārata as a written book. But it is missing from many manuscripts, and the Pune critical edition removed it from the text and published it in an appendix.

Origin of the story: Ādiparvan, section I of Ganguli's translation (vulgate). Sukthankar's critical edition (1933) relegates it to appendix I of the Ādiparvan because it is missing from many manuscripts: it is regarded as an interpolation.

Source: Sukthankar, Vishnu S. (ed.). The Mahābhārata for the First Time Critically Edited. Vol. 1: The Ādiparvan, with Prolegomena. Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1933 (edición crítica completa, 1919–1966).

Hagiographic accountrelato épico

Sañjaya's divine sight

On the eve of the war, Vyāsa visited his son, the blind king Dhṛtarāṣṭra, and offered him sight so that he might behold the battle. The king refused: he did not wish to see the slaughter of his family, but to hear of it. Then Vyāsa granted the gift to Sañjaya, the king's charioteer and counsellor: nothing that happened on the field, by day or by night, not even what the warriors thought, would escape his eyes; weapons would not wound him and weariness would not overcome him. Thanks to that gift, Sañjaya narrates the whole war to Dhṛtarāṣṭra, including the Bhagavad Gītā. The episode explains within the poem how what happened at Kurukṣetra could be known, and makes Vyāsa the very source of the account we hear.

Origin of the story: Mahābhārata, Bhīṣmaparvan, section II of Ganguli's translation (Jambū-khaṇḍa-nirmāṇa). Text checked.

Source: Ganguli, Kisari Mohan (trad.). The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa. Calcuta: Bharata Press (P. C. Roy), 1883–1896. Ādi Parva, secc. I, LXII, LXIII y CV–CVI; Bhishma Parva, secc. II; Asramavasika Parva, secc. XXXII; Svargarohanika Parva, secc. V. Project Gutenberg n.º 15474–15477.

Hagiographic accountrelato épico

One night with the dead

Years after the war, the blind king Dhṛtarāṣṭra, his wife Gāndhārī and Kuntī, mother of the Pāṇḍavas, lived in retirement in the forest, and the victors visited them. The mothers could not forget their dead sons. Vyāsa promised them that that night they would see what no living person had seen. At nightfall he bathed in the Ganges and called the fallen warriors; then, with a roar, there rose from the waters by thousands Bhīṣma, Droṇa, Karṇa, Dhṛtarāṣṭra's hundred sons, Abhimanyu and Draupadī's sons, with resplendent bodies, free of hatred and rancour. They spent the night with their families and at dawn plunged back into the river; the widows who wished to follow them entered the water and were reunited with them. It is one of the most moving episodes of the poem and the sage's last great intervention in the story of his descendants.

Origin of the story: Mahābhārata, Āśramavāsikaparvan, sections XXXI–XXXIII of Ganguli's translation. Text checked (section XXXII).

Source: Ganguli, Kisari Mohan (trad.). The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa. Calcuta: Bharata Press (P. C. Roy), 1883–1896. Ādi Parva, secc. I, LXII, LXIII y CV–CVI; Bhishma Parva, secc. II; Asramavasika Parva, secc. XXXII; Svargarohanika Parva, secc. V. Project Gutenberg n.º 15474–15477.

Hagiographic accountrelato épico

Śuka's echo

Śuka, Vyāsa's son, attained detachment so young that he decided to leave the world and merge with the Absolute. He rose into the air, passed through a mountain that split as he went, and kept ascending until he became one with Brahman. Vyāsa, full of affection, followed him along the same aerial path; when he reached the place of departure and learned what had happened, he began to lament and to call his son by name, and his voice resounded through the three worlds. Śuka, who had already become the soul of all the elements, answered him with a single syllable, 'bho', in the form of an echo, and the whole universe repeated the answer with him. Ever since, the poem says, mountains and caves give back sounds as if they were still answering for Śuka. The story sets the father's affection against the son's liberation.

Origin of the story: Mahābhārata, Śāntiparvan (Mokṣadharma), sections CCCXXXIII–CCCXXXIV of Ganguli's translation. The Bhāgavata Purāṇa (1.2.2) preserves a version in which the trees answer.

Source: Ganguli, Kisari Mohan (trad.). The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa. Calcuta: Bharata Press (P. C. Roy), 1883–1896. Ādi Parva, secc. I, LXII, LXIII y CV–CVI; Bhishma Parva, secc. II; Asramavasika Parva, secc. XXXII; Svargarohanika Parva, secc. V. Project Gutenberg n.º 15474–15477.

Hagiographic accountrelato purāṇico

Vyāsa's dissatisfaction

The Bhāgavata Purāṇa opens with a scene of crisis. Vyāsa has divided the Veda, composed the Mahābhārata and written for the good of all, and yet, seated on the banks of the river Sarasvatī, he feels empty and does not know why. Then Nārada, his teacher, arrives and gives him the diagnosis: he has spoken much of dharma and little of the glory of God; as long as he does not sing the deeds of Kṛṣṇa, his work will give him no peace. Vyāsa withdraws into meditation, contemplates the divinity and composes the Bhāgavata, which he teaches to his son Śuka. The story serves the Purāṇa to present itself as the culmination of all of Vyāsa's work and to affirm the primacy of devotion (bhakti) over ritual and moral knowledge.

Origin of the story: Bhāgavata Purāṇa, book I, chaps. 4–7. A self-presentation of the Purāṇa itself, composed according to scholarship around the ninth–tenth centuries; summary after Bryant's introduction (2003).

Source: Bryant, Edwin F. (trad. e introd.). Krishna: The Beautiful Legend of God. Śrīmad Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Book X. Londres: Penguin, 2003. Introducción (el marco del Bhāgavata y su atribución a Vyāsa).

Teachings

Teachings

The notions that structure their thought, explained in context.

Subtle dharma (sūkṣma dharma)dharma-sutil
One of the ideas running through the Mahābhārata is that dharma, the right order of conduct, is 'subtle' and hard to know: norms conflict, the just lose and the victors doubt their victory. Yudhiṣṭhira, the king of dharma, stakes his wife at dice and lies to Droṇa; Kṛṣṇa recommends deceptions to win the war; Bhīṣma devotes two whole books to teaching how to act when the rules are not enough. Hiltebeitel has read the poem as an 'education of the dharma king'. Vyāsa's final lament —'from dharma come wealth and pleasure; why is it not followed?'— sums up that tension between ideal and experience.

Ethics of the Mahābhārata.

Source: Hiltebeitel, Alf. Rethinking the Mahābhārata: A Reader's Guide to the Education of the Dharma King. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001 (caps. 1–2, sobre Vyāsa como autor y la fecha de composición).

The fifth Veda (itihāsa)quinto-veda
The Mahābhārata presents itself as a 'fifth Veda': according to the Ādiparvan, Vyāsa taught his disciples 'the Vedas having the Mahabharata for their fifth'. The formula claims for the epic the authority of revelation without belonging to it, and opens it to those who could not study the Vedas, such as women and śūdras. The genre is called itihāsa, 'thus indeed it was': exemplary history, distinct from the poetry (kāvya) of the Rāmāyaṇa and from the Purāṇas, though related to both. Bruce Sullivan has read Vyāsa precisely as the seer of that fifth Veda, a Brahmā-like figure who creates and transmits the sacred word.

The Mahābhārata's self-understanding (Ādiparvan, section LXIII).

Source: Sullivan, Bruce M. Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana Vyāsa and the Mahābhārata: A New Interpretation. Leiden: Brill, 1990; reed. como Seer of the Fifth Veda: Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana Vyāsa in the Mahābhārata. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1999.

Vyāsa as a function: the twenty-eight Vyāsasvyasa-de-cada-era
The Purāṇas turn Vyāsa into a cosmic office. In each dvāpara age, when human capacity declines, a form of Viṣṇu appears as Vyāsa to divide the Veda and make it accessible. The Viṣṇu Purāṇa lists twenty-eight in the present period of the world: among them Vasiṣṭha, Vālmīki, Śakti and Parāśara, and finally Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana; the next will be Aśvatthāman. The doctrine explains how a single name can sign so many texts: Vyāsa is not so much a person as the function of arranging and transmitting revelation, discharged by different sages in different ages.

Viṣṇu Purāṇa, part III, chaps. 3–4.

Source: Dutt, Manmatha Nath (trad.). A Prose English Translation of Vishnupuranam (Based on Professor H. H. Wilson's Translation). Calcuta, 1894. Parte III, secc. III–IV (los veintiocho Vyāsa y la división del Veda). Project Gutenberg n.º 66208.

Action without desire for the fruit (niṣkāma karma)nishkama-karma
The Bhagavad Gītā answers Arjuna's paralysis with a doctrine of action: it is not a matter of renouncing action, which is impossible, but of acting without attachment to results, fulfilling one's own duty and offering the action to the divine. 'Your right is to action alone, never to its fruits', says Kṛṣṇa (2.47). Karmayoga is combined in the text with the path of knowledge (jñāna) and that of devotion (bhakti), and their synthesis explains the work's enormous fortune in modern India, from Tilak and Gandhi to Aurobindo, and beyond.

Bhagavad Gītā, cantos 2–5.

Source: Telang, Kashinath Trimbak (trad.). The Bhagavadgîtâ, with the Sanatsugâtîya and the Anugîtâ. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1882 (Sacred Books of the East 8).

Guru Pūrṇimā (Vyāsa Pūrṇimā)guru-purnima
The full moon of the month of āṣāḍha (June–July) is celebrated in India as Guru Pūrṇimā or Vyāsa Pūrṇimā, the festival on which disciples honour their teachers, and is considered Vyāsa's birthday, venerated as the primordial teacher. In Vedāntic lineages and many monastic orders the rainy-season retreat begins that day. The festival shows how the figure of the compiler of the texts became the archetype of the guru: the one who receives, arranges and transmits knowledge. The seat from which the epic is recited in temples is still called the vyāsapīṭha, ‘Vyāsa’s seat’.

Hindu religious calendar.

Source: Wikipedia (inglés), «Vyasa», sobre la Guru Pūrṇimā (Vyāsa Pūrṇimā), los cirañjīvin y los lugares de culto asociados.

Videos

Videos

Recordings, interviews and documentaries. Videos play from YouTube; they are not hosted here.

  • Understanding the Mahabharata

    Lecture· EN· 2021· 79 min

    Oxford Centre for Hindu StudiesOfficial channel

  • Mahābhārata - History or Mythology? | Prof. Robert P. Goldman

    Lecture· EN· 2022· 92 min

    Argumentative Indians

  • Dharma and Dharmas: The Moral and Ethical Legacies of the Mahābharata and Rāmāyaṇa

    Lecture· EN· 2022· 109 min

    Karwaan Heritage

  • The Geography of the Mahabharata

    Lecture· EN· 2022· 67 min

    Bhandarkar Oriental Research InstituteOfficial channel

  • From Manuscripts to Masterpieces - Bhandarkar Institute's Mahabharata Publications

    Documentary· EN· 2023· 3 min

    Bhandarkar Oriental Research InstituteOfficial channel

  • Dr. Vishwa Adluri - Mahābhārata: The Principal Monument to Bhakti

    Lecture· EN· 2018· 54 min

    Indian Institute of World Culture - IIWCOfficial channel

  • Wendy Doniger: Cutting the Red Cord of Vengeance — The Oresteia and the Mahabharata

    Lecture· EN· 2021· 37 min

    Einstein ForumOfficial channel

  • Peter Brook on the making of his 1985 production of The Mahabharata

    Interview· EN· 2015· 3 min

    Young VicOfficial channel

  • Mahabharata: the Ancient Indian Epic

    Documentary· EN· 2021· 16 min

    World History EncyclopediaOfficial channel

  • Brahma Sutra with Shankara Bhashyam | Session 13 (Sutra 1.1.4) | Swami Tattwamayananda

    Lecture· EN· 2026· 79 min

    Vedanta Society of New YorkOfficial channel

  • Bharat Ek Khoj | Episode-5 | Mahabharata, Part I

    Documentary· HI· 1988· 49 min

    Prasar Bharati ArchivesOfficial channel

  • Bharat Ek Khoj | Episode-6 | Mahabharata, Part II

    Documentary· HI· 1988· 43 min

    Prasar Bharati ArchivesOfficial channel

  • Juan Arnau. Bhagavad Gita. Tesoros de la Literatura India

    Lecture· ES· 2020· 35 min

    Casa de la India in SpainOfficial channel

  • Diálogo entre Òscar Pujol y Agustín Pániker: «La Bhagavadgītā»

    Lecture· ES· 2023· 76 min

    Casa AsiaOfficial channel

  • «La Bhagavadgītā», conferencia dictada por el Dr. Òscar Pujol

    Lecture· ES· 2023· 90 min

    RDenIndiaOfficial channel

Gallery

Gallery

Images with verified licences. Each keeps its authorship and attribution.

Manuscripts

Manuscripts

Manuscript witnesses and ancient texts, with their custodian and conditions of access.

  • FA · Nastaʿlīq (persa) · Mahābhārata (s. IV a. C.–IV d. C.); traducción persa de la década de 1580

    Razmnāma (traducción persa del Mahābhārata), copia ilustrada de 1598

    Surviving witness
    Copia ilustrada de 1598, hoy dispersa
    Custodian
    Folios dispersos; uno en el Victoria and Albert Museum (Londres) y otro en el Dallas Museum of Art
    Digitisation
    collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O112323/painting-the-…
Manuscripts →

Connections

Connections

Influences, discipleships and affinities. Documented relations are distinguished from similarities identified by analysis.

  • Family of

    Vasishtha

    According to the Mahābhārata, Vyāsa is the son of Parāśara, grandson of Śakti and great-grandson of Vasiṣṭha. A textual, not historical, genealogy.

    Documented relation

  • Disciple of

    Narada

    In the Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Nārada appears as Vyāsa's teacher and advises him to compose the Bhāgavata. A textual relation.

    Documented relation

  • Ideas akin to

    Valmiki

    The two 'authors' of the epics are at once characters in their works and names that authorise whole corpora; the Viṣṇu Purāṇa counts Vālmīki among the twenty-eight Vyāsas.

    Similarity identified by analysis

  • Influenced by

    Patañjali

    Tradition ascribes to Vyāsa the commentary (Yogabhāṣya) on Patañjali's Yogasūtras; Maas maintains that both texts are by the same author.

    Documented relation

  • Influenced

    Adi Shankara

    Śaṅkara commented on the Brahmasūtras, which he ascribes to Bādarāyaṇa (identified with Vyāsa by tradition), and on the Bhagavad Gītā.

    Documented relation

  • Influenced

    Rāmānuja

    Rāmānuja founded his Vedānta on his commentary on the Brahmasūtras (Śrī Bhāṣya) and also commented on the Gītā.

    Documented relation

  • Ideas akin to

    Gaudapada

    The traditional list of Advaita teachers places Gauḍapāda after Vyāsa and his son Śuka; it is a school genealogy, not historically documented.

    Similarity identified by analysis

  • Influenced

    Swami Vivekananda

    In 1900 Vivekananda devoted a lecture to the Mahābhārata and commented on the Gītā on many occasions.

    Documented relation

  • Influenced

    Paramahansa Yogananda

    Yogananda wrote an extensive commentary on the Bhagavad Gītā, God Talks with Arjuna, published posthumously in 1995.

    Documented relation

  • Ideas akin to

    Sri Aurobindo

    Aurobindo made the Bhagavad Gītā one of the foundations of his integral yoga; the relation is one of reception of the work ascribed to Vyāsa.

    Similarity identified by analysis

  • Ideas akin to

    Chaitanya Mahaprabhu

    The Bhāgavata Purāṇa, ascribed to Vyāsa, was the central text of Caitanya's devotion and of the Gauḍīya school.

    Similarity identified by analysis

Linked from other profiles

Sources

Sources

Bibliography and catalogues consulted for this profile.

  1. Wikipedia (inglés), «Vyasa», sobre la Guru Pūrṇimā (Vyāsa Pūrṇimā), los cirañjīvin y los lugares de culto asociados.
  2. Wikidata, «Vyasa», QID Q330521 (sabio legendario, compilador de los Veda y autor del Mahābhārata; LCCN n79109341; GND 119017687; BnF 11928738t).
  3. Sullivan, Bruce M. Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana Vyāsa and the Mahābhārata: A New Interpretation. Leiden: Brill, 1990; reed. como Seer of the Fifth Veda: Kṛṣṇa Dvaipāyana Vyāsa in the Mahābhārata. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1999.
  4. Hiltebeitel, Alf. Rethinking the Mahābhārata: A Reader's Guide to the Education of the Dharma King. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2001 (caps. 1–2, sobre Vyāsa como autor y la fecha de composición).
  5. Fitzgerald, James L. (trad.). The Mahābhārata, vol. 7: Book 11, The Book of the Women; Book 12, The Book of Peace, Part One. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. Introducción.
  6. Brockington, John. The Sanskrit Epics. Leiden: Brill, 1998 (Handbuch der Orientalistik, 2. Abt., Bd. 12). Capítulos sobre el Mahābhārata.
  7. Sukthankar, Vishnu S. (ed.). The Mahābhārata for the First Time Critically Edited. Vol. 1: The Ādiparvan, with Prolegomena. Poona: Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 1933 (edición crítica completa, 1919–1966).
  8. Ganguli, Kisari Mohan (trad.). The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa. Calcuta: Bharata Press (P. C. Roy), 1883–1896. Ādi Parva, secc. I, LXII, LXIII y CV–CVI; Bhishma Parva, secc. II; Asramavasika Parva, secc. XXXII; Svargarohanika Parva, secc. V. Project Gutenberg n.º 15474–15477.
  9. Telang, Kashinath Trimbak (trad.). The Bhagavadgîtâ, with the Sanatsugâtîya and the Anugîtâ. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1882 (Sacred Books of the East 8).
  10. Arnold, Edwin (trad.). The Song Celestial; or, Bhagavad-Gîtâ (from the Mahâbhârata). Londres: Trübner, 1885. Project Gutenberg n.º 2388.
  11. Rocher, Ludo. The Purāṇas. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1986 (A History of Indian Literature, vol. II, fasc. 3).
  12. Dutt, Manmatha Nath (trad.). A Prose English Translation of Vishnupuranam (Based on Professor H. H. Wilson's Translation). Calcuta, 1894. Parte III, secc. III–IV (los veintiocho Vyāsa y la división del Veda). Project Gutenberg n.º 66208.
  13. Nakamura, Hajime. A History of Early Vedānta Philosophy, Part One. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1983 (sobre Bādarāyaṇa y la fecha de los Brahmasūtra).
  14. Maas, Philipp A. «A Concise Historiography of Classical Yoga Philosophy». En Eli Franco (ed.), Periodization and Historiography of Indian Philosophy. Viena: Sammlung de Nobili, 2013, pp. 53–90.
  15. Woods, James Haughton (trad.). The Yoga-System of Patañjali … and the Comment, called Yoga-bhāshya, attributed to Veda-Vyāsa. Cambridge (Mass.): Harvard University Press, 1914 (Harvard Oriental Series 17).
  16. Bryant, Edwin F. (trad. e introd.). Krishna: The Beautiful Legend of God. Śrīmad Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Book X. Londres: Penguin, 2003. Introducción (el marco del Bhāgavata y su atribución a Vyāsa).
  17. Thibaut, George (trad.). The Vedânta-Sûtras with the Commentary by Śaṅkarâkârya. Part I. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1890 (Sacred Books of the East 34). Introducción. Project Gutenberg n.º 16295.
  18. Vivekananda, Swami. «The Mahabharata», conferencia en Pasadena, 1 de febrero de 1900. The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, vol. 4 (Wikisource).
  19. Thibaut, George (trad.). The Vedânta-Sûtras with the Commentary by Râmânuja. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1904 (Sacred Books of the East 48). Project Gutenberg n.º 7297.
  20. Paramahansa Yogananda. God Talks with Arjuna: The Bhagavad Gita. Royal Science of God-Realization. 2 vols. Los Ángeles: Self-Realization Fellowship, 1995.
  21. Wikipedia (inglés), «Bhagavad Gita», sección de traducciones (Charles Wilkins, The Bhagvat-Geeta, Londres, 1785).
  22. Victoria and Albert Museum, «The sage Vyasa with disciples observes his son Suka approaching them», pintura de Banwari para una copia del Razmnāma (traducción persa del Mahābhārata), 1598 (registro O112323).
Rights holder
Textos sánscritos de dominio público. Traducciones con derechos propios: University of Chicago Press (van Buitenen, Fitzgerald), Penguin (Debroy, Smith, Patton, Bryant), Bantam (Miller), SUNY Press (Sargeant, Hariharānanda Āraṇya), Seuil (Biardeau), Kairós, Edaf (Barrio), Trotta (Consuelo Martín), Advaita Ashrama (Gambhirananda). Son de dominio público las de Ganguli (1883–1896), Telang (1882), Arnold (1885), Burnouf (1861), Schroeder (1912), Thibaut (1890–1904), Woods (1914) y Dutt (1894–1897).

Pending confirmation

What this profile has not yet been able to settle. We would rather say so than fill it in.

  • Fechas: no hay nacimiento ni muerte; la línea de tiempo usa las fechas de los textos atribuidos. Las horquillas (Brockington, Hiltebeitel, Nakamura, Maas, Rocher) se resumen sin cita de página: precisarlas.
  • Ediciones en español: solo se han verificado la adaptación de R. K. Narayan (Kairós) para el Mahābhārata y las Gītā de Edaf y Trotta. Buscar con ISBN la Bhagavadgītā de Òscar Pujol (Kairós) y ediciones españolas de los Purāṇa y de los Brahmasūtra distintas de Trotta; también ediciones en italiano, ruso e hindi (Gita Press).
  • Obras atribuidas menores (Vyāsa Smṛti, Devī Bhāgavata, Adhyātma Rāmāyaṇa): falta fuente académica propia y ediciones con ISBN.
  • Sala de lectura: falta la segunda parte de los Vedānta-Sūtras de Thibaut (SBE 38) en una fuente con texto; no se ha encontrado traducción española de dominio público de ninguna obra. Las páginas inglesas por libro del Mahābhārata en Wikisource son esbozos y no se han registrado.
  • Manuscritos: identificar las signaturas de los folios del Razmnāma de 1598 (V&A, Dallas) y añadir el manuscrito de Jaipur (1584–1586).
  • Vídeos: verificar el idioma de otras charlas en hindi de canales académicos (BORI) para equilibrar las lenguas.

Researched on 2026-10-26