Sanskrit Cosmos-Asian Empire-Pune Fortress

Sanskrit is the name, not only of a classical language but also of a rich culture with Oriental foundation which spread far and wide and reigned supreme in the South and South-East Asian subcontinent for over a period of 2000 years. Sanskrit with a prehistory and history of more than 5000 years is the embodiment of the living tradition of India. While it occupied the East since the early centuries of Christian era, the Western world was fascinated by its literature since the late 16th century. Sanskrit has given to the world the oldest literary documents of Religion, Mythology and Philosophy, the Magnum Opus called the Mahabharata, the greatest Epic, masterpieces of poetic imagination such as theShakuntalam, the most popular ethico-narrative compendium called Pancatantra, scientific treatises of unique character such as the Arthashastra and the Natyashastra, intellectual giants like Panini, Aryabhatt, Bhaskra, and Varahamihira and a rich treasure of literature ranging from poetry to mathematics, drama to logic and epistemology. Sanskrit literature with its variegated wealth continues to fascinate the world of academicians, linguists, historians, anthropologists, artists and many other masterminds all over the world. It has bridged the East and the West and has, indeed, become a global phenomenon.The history of Sanskrit begins with the dawn of civilization in India. According to the generally accepted theory Sanskrit was the language of the prayers and songs composed by the Aryans who migrated from some region in Central Asia or Eastern Europe and entered India sometime in the beginning of the first millennium B.C. With the Aryan tribes settling down in different parts of India Sanskrit developed basically as a language of the priestly class. Thus in its infancy Sanskrit was, more or less, a language of religious performance, a holy language. However, there is enough evidence documented in works like Panini's grammar of Sanskrit [5th century B.C.] hich shows that Sanskrit was a spoken language not only of priests and scholars belonging to upper circle, but also of so called uneducated lower class and women. Since the beginning of its growth it had a sister the Prakrit, spoken by the ordinary people. With the rise of Prakrit and its growth into different vernaculars in different parts of the country the use of Sanskrit was confined to the classes and it gradually lost its position as a spoken language. However, it continued, since the beginning of the Christian era as the language of communication among different regions and communities speaking different dialects. Sanskrit achieved this position on account of a number of factors. Firstly, it had already thrived as a language of literary compositions; it was adopted not only by ritualists and the philosophers but also by the intelligentsia, the men of science as well as poetic imagination. Secondly, in addition to its sonorous character, Sanskrit possesses an extraordinary genius which consists in its flexibility within its mathematically perfect structure, adaptability to any language content and ability to generate an infinite vocabulary. Once Sanskrit was chosen by the elite and was accepted as a powerful vehicle of all kinds of intellectual, emotional as well as poetic ideas, it established itself as the lingua franka.Although Gotama, the Buddha had instructed his followers to use the vernaculars for preaching the tenets of Buddhism, the later Buddhists had to resort to Sanskrit as the medium of expression, because then only they were able to communicate and argue with the communities belonging to different sects as well as their main opponents the Hindus. We have thus a fully grown religious literature of the later Buddhism which is the foundation of almost all Buddhists sects existing in the world today. In fact it is this literature bearing which, Sanskrit crossed the boundaries of its native place and traveled to neighbouring countries like China. We have, for example, an account of an Indian scholar Kumarajiva who lived from 344AD 413AD and who was taken by the Chinese General Lu Kuang to the capital of his kingdom and was asked to supervise the work of translation into Chinese of many Sanskrit texts. The celebrated Chinese pilgrim Yi Tsing [635-713] stopped over a place called Srivijaya in the island Sumatra to learn spoken Sanskrit before he went to Tamralipti in Bengal in India to study Buddhism.Sanskrit was thus taught in Sumatra, one of the islands in South East Asia, as early as the seventh century. Another well known Chinese traveler, Hiuan-Tsang [602-644 AD] also contributed to the spread of Sanskrit in ancient China by translating Sanskrit books into Chinese. With the spread of Buddhism in Tibet from seventh century onwards many Sanskrit works were translated into Tibetan. Today Tibetan has preserved a large part of Sanskrit literature, particularly on Buddhism while the original Sanskrit works have been lost.Another interesting feature of the occupation of the land of Asia by Sanskrit is the existence of a large amount of inscriptions in Sanskrit spread over a large area of the South-East Asian countries. As Dr. Sheldon Pollock has observed, Sanskrit was “the paramount linguistic medium by which ruling elites expressed their power from Purushapur (Peshavar) in Gandhara in the north-east of the sub-continent to as far East as Panduranga in Annam (South Vietnam) and Prambanan in Central Java” (The Sanskrit Cosmopolitis. Idealogy and Status of Sanskrit ed. By Jan E.M. Houben, Leiden, 1998, p.198). The largest number of Sanskrit inscriptions is found in Kampuchia. These inscriptions generally record royal deeds. References to the names of learned teachers and their felicitations show that the Hindu priests were invited by the royal families on different occasions. It is thus clear that the Asian Empire of Sanskrit was built by travelers, scholars and priests. Hinduism as well as Buddhism played a major role in the expansion of this Empire.In the West, the German Jesuit Heinrich Roth is credited with the first interaction with Sanskrit. He compiled a Sanskrit grammar as early as in 1660. Before that the Italian scholar Philipo Sasseti visited India and tried to record striking similarities between Sanskrit and Italian. The Christian missionaries, the administrators of the British rulers in India and the scholars from different countries in the West in quest of knowledge of the Orient contributed to the spread of Sanskrit in the Western world. English translations of masterpieces such as Shakuntalam and Geeta gave a Philip to the study of Sanskrit in the West. The collaborative enterprise between Indian and Western scholars for a period of the last two centuries has resulted in the establishment of a new discipline called Indology. Sanskrit is being zealously studied in different Universities in countries in Europe and America (A full account will be presented in the paper). In India the study of Sanskrit is of two types: traditional and modern. Sanskrit is being taught in the traditional method in some traditional schools called Pathashalas as well as some Sanskrit Universities started by the Indian Government. Since the last more than 150 years Sanskrit is being studied as a second language in modern method introduced by the British rules. In almost all the states in the country Sanskrit is one of the subjects taught at the school level. Indian boys and girls are introduced to this language of Indian heritage at the age of six or seven.Pune, the educational capital of Maharashtra is renowned as a seat of Sanskrit learning for more than three hundred years. Sanskrit learning flourished in a number of traditional schools in and around Pune. With the establishment of the University of Pune, Western methods of learning were introduced and that led to the rise of a new generation of Sanskrit scholars trained in both, traditional as well as modern methods of learning. The establishment of Institutes like The Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Vaidik Samshodhan Mandal and transfer of manuscript collections to Pune raised the importance of Pune as a center of Sanskrit studies. Sanskrit scholars from different parts of the world, in search of the old, valuable books as well as profound scholarship have been visiting Pune since the pre-independence period. In the world of Sanskrit studies Pune has an identity of its own. Whereas on the one hand it has preserved the traditional flair of Sanskrit learning the Pune scholarship has imbibed in itself the Western models of higher studies. Due to interaction with the outside world, research in Sanskrit in this city has obtained international character.