On Historicity

May 6, 2017 / HinduEyes / 0 Comments

Our inquiry into the nature of the contemporary Hindu identity continues with one commonly asked question: “So, did the stories of the Itihāsa texts, the Rāmāyaṇa and the Mahābhārata, really happen? Are they historical? Were Rama and Krishna real? I need to know!” Answers to this question have contributed to the formulation of our transactional identity at the global level, and, as we discussed in the last post, this question arises as a response to criticism from cultures that value historicity, despite the unimportance of its answer in our philosophies.

For decades, many groups (both scientific and cultural, Hindu and non-Hindu) have attempted to prove or disprove the historicity of these texts. But Hindus were never concerned about the historicity of the Rāmāyaṇa or the Mahābhārata! For example, not once does Śaṅkarācārya in his commentary on the Bhagavad Gītā attempt to show that Kṛṣṇa was historical. He simply had faith in the reality of Kṛṣṇa, in the sense that what Kṛṣṇa taught through the Bhagavad Gītā was addressing real problems we face in life, and not some fictional reality. Hindus believed these stories and characters were real, in that we developed a sense of faith and devotion in the characters of Rāma or Kṛṣṇa, and could learn from them, but we did not need to believe they were historical. How could there be so many versions of the Rāmāyaṇa if Rāma was historical? Which version do we believe? If we say the first one (by Vālmīkī), then how do we explain the deviation from the original in the later versions, such as the Rāmacaritamānasa by the poet-saint Tulsīdās, which many people consider to be equally (or even more) authoritative? Why were our ancestors not worried about the “original” story? And most importantly, how come we are so interested in proving the historicity of these texts today?

There is a well-known story of Tulsīdās that indicates this point. When Tulsīdās was asked, “How can you know Rāma’s life so clearly?” his answer was simply, “Because I was there!” This answer indicates to us that he was not interested in Rāma’s historicity, but certainly believed in the reality of Rāma, and that these two things did not depend on each other for him (and other Hindus of older times).

“But if you say that Rāma and Kṛṣṇa were not historical, then why do we call their stories itihāsa, which we translate as history? What does the word itihāsa mean? If we derive it as iti ha āsa, or ‘indeed this is as it was’, then how can we say it did not happen?”

If history, as the word is understood today, was so important to us, then why was no other history book written? Why are there only two itihāsa books? Is that all that happened in history? We must ask ourselves: What was the purpose of writing these texts? Was it to tell us about some events that took place thousands of years ago? Or was it for some other, deeper purpose? We know that the Ṛṣis never wrote anything without some goal in mind, without some purpose beyond just information, as we established in a previous post. So what was that purpose?

In the case of itihāsa, it was to explore the entire history of mankind as such, as opposed to the history of one man or group. This means that the themes explored in these texts encompass, according to the Ṛṣis, the entire range of themes, experiences, and choices that mankind can possibly go through. The Mahābhārata speaks for itself:

यदिहास्ति तदन्यत्र। यन्नेहास्ति न तत् क्वचित्॥ — (म० भा० १।६२।५३)

yadihāsti tadanyatra; yannehāsti na tat kvacit (Mahābhārata 1.62.53)

“That which is here (in this story) can be found elsewhere (in the world); (but) that which is not here cannot be found anywhere (else).”

By a study of these texts, humankind sees its own biography in an allegorical way. These texts became classics not because they are historical, but because they can be directly relevant to every person in every age.

Furthermore, even the traditional definitions of itihāsa go far beyond “history” in the way we understand the word “history” today. We have precursors to western definitions of “history” also, in Patañjali’s Mahābhāṣya and in the Amarakośa, but beyond those, let us see how itihāsa texts define themselves with an example from the Mahābhārata:

आर्यादिबहुव्याख्यानं देवार्षिचरिताश्रयम् ।

इतिहासमिति प्रोक्तं भविष्याद्भुतधर्मयुक् ॥

āryādibahuvyākhyānaṁ devarṣicaritāśrayam ।

itihāsamiti proktaṁ bhaviṣyādbhutadharmayuk ॥

It means, “The extensive commentary on enlightened (and other) behavior, explained through the voices and actions of Gods, Ṛṣis, and the like, is known as itihāsa, and is the blueprint for exceptional dharma in the future.” This clearly shows that according to the Mahābhārata’s own understanding of its role as an itihāsa, it does not view itself as a “history” in the western sense. It intentionally uses heroic, grand, and godly characters to communicate its story, ideas, and philosophy in order for its story to be widely retold. And from its popularity today, we can conclude that this strategy worked.

Another well-known example to drive the point home:

धर्मार्थकाममोक्षाणाम् उपदेशसमन्वितम ।

पूर्ववृत्तं कथायुक्तम् इतिहासं प्रचक्षते ॥

Dharmārthakāmamokṣāṇām upadeśasamanvitam ।

pūrvavṛttaṁ kathāyuktam itihāsaṁ pracakṣate ॥ (from the Rājataraṅgiṇī by Kalhaṇa)

This says, “itihāsa is a well-known method of teaching the concepts of dharma, artha, kāma, and mokṣa in story format, presented in the past tense.” In this straightforward verse, we find the underpinnings of itihāsa and its original intentions and format plainly set forth. There is hardly any explanation needed here, but for clarity’s sake: itihāsa is not about “history” as we have been conditioned to believe it is. It is about exploring the vast ambit of possible human experience in all places at all times.

“But we are finding so much archaeological evidence that proves that Rāma and Kṛṣṇa were historical people!”

Claims about ‘proof’ for the existence of Rāma and Kṛṣṇa, and ‘proof’ of the historicity of the Mahābhārata and Rāmāyaṇa have been made by a number of archaeologists, notably during the phase of ‘epic archaeology’ in the 1960s and 1970s in India. Despite these claims, the field of archaeology is not concerned with ‘proving’ or ‘disproving’ the existence of individuals in the past. Archaeological methods of inquiry focus on the longue durée, long-term perspectives such as the development of societies, and change over time, such as settlement patterns, the organization and dynamics of power in societies and between societies, and their subsistence and economic systems. Searching for an individual in the archaeological record is most often a fruitless activity, especially because it deals with differential scales of time — most often archaeologists learn about past activities in timespans of hundred of years, not within individual lifetimes. It is also important to note that within Indian archaeology, the portrayal of archaeology as a ‘hard science’ that will yield ‘facts in the ground’ is deeply problematic, as archaeological data is eventually interpreted subjectively, and can be manipulated to suit different political or nationalist needs. Even then, despite the fact that we can infer lots of things from archaeological data, it cannot tell us about a particular person, especially one around whom scant data is available. We should logically conclude, therefore, that we have not found so much archaeological evidence proving Rāma and Kṛṣṇa’s historical reality.

“Then what about all the evidence that says that the Rāmasetu (Bridge of Rāma) is actually there? NASA has proved it with imagery! What about all the evidence from the names of cities that Rāma visited? All those places are still there today, aren’t they?”

Yes, the NASA pictures show us that there is a stretch of raised land that connects India with Sri Lanka, under the ocean. They also show us that this is a geological formation. But this has nothing to do with whether Rāma was historical or not. Keep in mind that all classical epic literature, whether it be from ancient Greece, Rome, or India, contains a great amount of geographical and political data such as the names of rivers, oceans, continents, cities, and the like, in order for its story to be more alive for its readers. Just because the Odyssey gives us details of all of Odysseus’ travels around southern Europe, visiting Troy, Ismaros, and other landmarks and cities that we can identify today, does not mean that Odysseus is historical. This is the nature of all classical epic literature. To make this point even clearer: we have real landmarks from the Harry Potter series in London and around the UK. Does that mean that Harry Potter is a historical figure? Maybe 1000 years from now some archaeologist will find wands that belonged to Harry Potter fans in the 21st century, or will identify cities that Harry Potter visited. Can he or she conclude that Harry Potter was historical? Definitely not. Why should we apply this kind of logic to the characters from our itihāsa literature? This desire is a result, remember, of our desire to respond to western criticism that places value in historicity. But why should we become slaves to the values of the west? We need not. Yes, from the perspective of our original interlocutors, it is important for Jesus to be historical, because the Christian faith depends upon his historicity for its validity; if he was not historical, then the Christian faith lacks a plausible foundation.¹See a Christian viewpoint about the necessity for Jesus to be historical here: https://www.gci.org/jesus/historical But it is not important for Kṛṣṇa or Rāma to be historical because our faith does not depend on their historicity, for all the reasons given above.

…

And yet, we believe that Rāma and Kṛṣṇa are real. For us, the reality of our deities does not depend upon their historicity, it depends upon their philosophical value; it depends on our ability to learn from their stories, their teachings. We must learn to separate reality from historicity.²See also: This excellent article by S.N. Balagangadhara entitled “What do Indians Need: A History, or the Past? A challenge or two to Indian historians” at http://ichr.ac.in/snb_lec.pdf Whether Kṛṣṇa was born 5,000 years ago, yesterday, or not at all does not change the value of his teachings in the Bhagavad Gītā. Some of the deepest philosophical considerations have taken place in that text, which we completely acknowledge was authored by the sage Veda Vyāsa. Our interest was simply never in proving whether Kṛṣṇa was actually there; we were too busy learning from him through his stories in the Bhāgavata Purāṇa and his teachings in the Bhagavad Gītā.

But let us take a moment to understand one of the biggest mouthpieces of Rāma and Kṛṣṇa’s historicity: the Sangh Parivar. Why would they spend so much energy trying to prove that these characters were real? The Sangh Parivar represents a prolonged voicing of an initial, superficial reaction to the criticism of early western Indology, the details of which we covered sufficiently in our last post. We find that the very questions raised by western Indologists have become the framework for the response of the Sangh Parivar (and other groups with similar motivations). But what goes subtly unnoticed by the people voicing this reactionary language is that just by answering the questions raised, we have succumbed to the categories inherent in the questions.

For example, suppose someone was to ask, “What is your Bible?” The tempting reaction may be to say, “The Bhagavad Gītā.” But simply by answering the question, we have succumbed to the inherent assumptions within it: that there must be a bible, there must be one bible, and that it must be the same for all of us. This means, our beliefs and practices must somehow be congruent or understandable to Christianity, the interrogator. Or when asked, “Who is your Jesus?” to answer that it is Kṛṣṇa, etc., is succumbing to the categories inherent in the question. Instead, we must be confident to say that we have a thousand bibles and a thousand Jesuses, and that our particular beliefs and practices cannot fit into the little box that these questions subtly attempt to place us in. We may say something like, “But the Bible is yours! Why should I have one? I have countless scriptural authorities to rely on. Why do you only have one?”

So what does the Sangh Parivar represent? It represents the initial desire, the initial urge to answer these questions, to defeat them without thinking of the implications of doing so; or the urge to answer these questions from a defensive position in a reactionary way, rather than a position of strength resulting from a deeper understanding of our tradition. Who can blame them, though? Wouldn’t we all like to react to that questioner who questions our identity? But the difference between fools and the wise is this – where the fool reacts, the wise person thinks, then acts. The wise never react.

Maybe not all members of the Sangh Parivar or similar organizations think this way; nevertheless, they are exposed to and conditioned by these reactionary explanations of our tradition, and perhaps do not understand the importance of breaking free from them, for our own psychological freedom from categories that are not natively our own. They become the vehicle for the propagation of a mindset that believes it is Hindu but is host to the very ideals implanted in our psyche by the west. As Steve Biko said, “The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.”

If you are reading this and subscribe to the old way of thinking, change now. It is not too late. Free yourself from the bondage associated with the Hindu identity created by reacting to questions and critique by western Orientalists. Be original, be knowledgeable, be brave.