240 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
As to the age of Manu I have given references to show that Manu Smriti was written by Sumati Bharagava after 185 B.C. i.e. after the Revolution of Pushyamitra. I need say nothing more on the subject.
The date of the Bhagavat Gita is a subject about which there has been a difference of opinion.
Mr. Telang was of opinion that the Geeta must be older than the third century B.C. though he was not able to say how much.
Mr. Tilak……..
In the opinion of Prof. Garbe, [1] the Geeta as we have it, is different from what it originally was. He agrees that the conviction that the Bhagwat Geeta has not reached us in its original form but has undergone essential transformations, is now, however, shared by many Indologists outside India. According to Prof. Garbe, one hundred and forty-six verses in the Bhagwat Geeta are new and do not belong to the original Geeta. As to the date of its composition Prof. Garbe says that it “cannot possibly be placed before the second Century A.D.”
Prof. Kausambi insists that the Geeta was composed in the reign of King Baladitya. Baladitya belonged to the Gupta Dynasty which supplanted the Andhra Dynasty in the year……. Baladitya came to the throne in the year 467 A.D. His reasons for so late a date are two. Before Shankaracharya—who was born in 788 A.D. and who died in 820 A.D.—wrote his commentary on the Bhagwat Geeta, it was an unknown composition. It was certainly not mentioned in the Tatvasangraha by Shantarakshit who wrote his treatise only 50 years before the advent of Shankaracharya. His second reason is this. Vasubandhu was the originator of a school of thought known as ‘ Vijnyan Vad’. The Bramha-Sutra [:] Bhashya contains a criticism of the Vijnyan Vad of Vasubandu. The Geeta contains a reference [2] to the Bramha-Sutra-Bhashya. The Geeta must therefore be after Vasubandu and after the Bramha-Sutra-Bhashya. Vasubandhu was the preceptor of the Gupta King Baladitya. That being so, the Geeta must have been composed during or after the reign of Baladitya.
Nothing more need be said about the date of Shankaracharya. The age in which he lived and wrote is now generally accepted. Something about his life needs to be said. But I will reserve that for another place.
The question of determining the date of the composition of the Mahabharata is next to impossible. Only an attempt to fix the period of its composition can be made. The Mahabharat has undergone three editions and with each editor the title and subject matter has changed. In its original form it was known as ‘Jaya’, Triumph. This original
1 See his “Introduction to the Bhagvatgeeta” English Translation by Prof. Utgikar
2 Geeta Adhya XIII. Shloka 4.