Abstract

HERNANDEZ QUIROZ, Anselmo. The Divine Realization suggested by Vāmadeva: A Study of the Exegetical Vedic and Vedānta Tradition Regarding the Hymns 4.26 y 4.27 from the Ṛg Veda. Estud. Asia Áfr. [online]. 2016, vol.51, n.3, pp.531-570. ISSN 2448-654X.

The Ṛg Veda (ca. XII BCE) is the oldest Sanskrit literature text that has come down to us. It is arranged with hymns (sūktas) ordered in ten cycles (maṇḍalas). These last ones can be divided according to their composers in two main groups: 1) second to seventh cycles, and 2) the first, eight, ninth and tenth cycles. The composition of each one of the cycles that belongs to the first group is related with a primary seer (ṛṣi) in specific, while the seers of the second group are associated with more than one hundred altogether. The fourth cycle is associated almost in its entirety with the Vedic seer Vāmadeva who, particularly, in the hymns 4.26 and 4.27, suggest the theme of divine realization, that it is to say, of personal identification with the gods. Moreover, Vāmadeva recurs in both hymns to metaphors that imply as its vehicle the freedom of an eagle, the theft of the soma brought down from the supreme domain and the subsequent drunkenness caused by the ingestion of this excellent drink that much like to the gods. It may be noticed that the commentator Śaṅkara (ca. VIII CE) as well as Sāyaṇa (ca. XIV CE) have specifically employed the sacred verse (mantra) 4.26.1 in order to give a foundation in each case to its own exegesis about the divine realization. In this article I provide, briefly, a textual excursus that connects the exegetical Vedic tradition with the tradition of the Vedānta, with respect to the non-dualist version, represented by Śaṅkara, as well of a monist version which, I will argue, is represented by Sāyaṇa. In the first section I carry out a new translation of both hymns with notes recollected principally from the following texts: Aitareya Brāhmaṇa, Nirukta, Aṣṭādhyayī, Bṛhaddevatā and Sarvānukramāṇī. Here I seek to verify the comments made by Sāyaṇa in regards to the concept of divine realization. In the second section I present, in retrospective, certain links between the late Vedic philosophy and the philosophy of Vedānta through quotations gathered from classical Upanishadic texts and the Brahma Sūtras, closely following in this turn the commentary of Śaṅkara, also with regard to divine realization. My hypothesis is that in early Vedic thought the doctrine of divine realization was codified in theistic terms and after, in the late period, in impersonal philosophical terms.

Keywords : Exégesis védica; doctrina vedānta; hermenéutica del Ṛg Veda; vidente védico Vāmadeva; realización divina.