Yogavasistha notes (contd)

# Emboxed stories such as those in the Yoga Vasistha are an Indian speciality; see for example the famous "Ocean of the Streams of Story" collection, the subject of a recent translation by Arshia Sattar in a Penguin Classics paperback, Tales from the Kathasaritsagara. These stories found their way to Europe and into the story works of authors such as Boccaccio and Chaucer.

# Stories specifically of the Yogavasistha type have had a direct influence on some modern European writers, most notably Hermann Hesse, author of Siddhartha. The clearest example is the final story ("The Indian Life") at the end of his novel Magister Ludi, also translated as The Glass Bead Game; this tale is very much like the story of Gadhi and similar stories in the Yogavasistha.

Yogavāsiṣṭha: See also Vasiṣṭha–Ramāyaṇa.
Yogavāsiṣṭha, Comparative study of, and Buddhism. (H). * Acharya, Nandini *** Raipur, 1983, Ph.D.
Yogavāsiṣṭha, Elements of poetry in, * Dubey, Sacchidananda *** Jabalpur, 1983, Ph.D.
Yogavāsiṣṭha men mānasatattva. (H). * Kumar, Varinder *** Punjab (Hspr.), 1995, Ph.D.
Yogavāsiṣṭha: Nature of Liberation and its means. (H). * Dube, Sachidananad *** Jabalpur, 1983, Ph.D.
Yogavāsiṣṭha-Rāmāyaṇa, Elements of poetry in, * Vani, M.B. *** Bombay, 1973, Ph.D.
Yogavāsiṣṭhasya dārśanika-gaveṣaṇam. (S). * Devi, Rama *** Andhra, (In progress).
Yogavāsiṣṭhasya samālocanātmakam adhyayanam. (S). * Joshi, K.C. *** Kumaun, 1992, Ph.D.
Yogavāsiṣṭ¬ha-viśeṣasandarbhe bhāratīya-darśane mokṣa- svarŪpāvadhāraṇam. (S). * Svarupa, Shiva *** Meerut, (In progress).

François CHENET, «Vie et mort selon le Yogavasistha», Revue de l'histoire des religions , 2/1984, [En ligne], mis en ligne le 7 novembre 2005.

François CHENET
Vie et mort selon le Yogavasistha Life and death as Yogavasistha
p. 139-170
Résumé Abstract

L’épopée philosophique du Yogavasistha-Maharamayana , dont la date demeure incertaine (du huitième au treizième siècle apr. J.-C.), professe une philosophie originale située à la croisée du Vedanta non dualiste, du bouddhisme idéaliste et du sivaïsme du Cachemire. The epic philosophical Yogavasistha-Maharamayana, whose date remains uncertain (from eighth to the thirteenth century AD. AD), professing a philosophy original located at the crossroads of non-dualistic Vedanta, Buddhism and idealistic sivaïsme Kashmir . Elle contient notamment une série d’approches convergentes du phénomène de la mort et de méditations sur l’au-delà, à travers lesquelles se dessine une doctrine cohérente. It includes a series of converging approaches to the phenomenon of death and meditations on the afterlife, through which emerges a coherent doctrine. Après avoir décrit le processus de la mort-transition, non sans une grande acuité phénoménologique, le YV établit que les conditions d’existence post mortem consistent dans un tissu de fictions projetées dont le mécanisme de production se révèle analogue à celui du rêve. After describing the process of death-transition, with great acuity phenomenological, YV establishes that the conditions of existence post-mortem in a consistent fabric of fiction whose mechanism projected production is similar to that dream. L’article évoque alors l’interprétation indienne de l’état de rêve et montre ensuite comment le contenu d’expérience propre à l’existence intermédiaire se relie et s’articule aux phénomènes de la croyance et de la création mentale (bhavana) , avant d’élucider la signification métaphysique de l’opposition de la vie et de la mort. The article then refers to the interpretation of the Indian state of dream and then shows how the content of own experience that there are intermediate links and is the phenomena of belief and creative mental (bhavana) before clarifying the meaning of the metaphysical opposition of life and death. L’expérience létale se révèle ainsi comme la pierre de touche de l’idéalité ultime du monde, en sorte que le YV offre un exemple limite de relativisation du schème de la transmigration (samsara) . Experience has proved lethal as well as the touchstone of the ultimate ideal world, so that the YV offers an example limit relativization of the transmigration scheme (samsara).

For a Concordance to the short and longer versions of the text, see:

http://www.indologiewichtrach.ch/site/werkstatt/konkordanz/1.html

4. Study Day, 12.07.2006, organisiert von Sektion 4
Heike Franke

Indo-Persian Translation-Literature: the Laghu-Yogavasistha
H. Franke reported on Persian translations from Sanskrit, commissioned by the Muslim Mughal-emperors Akbar (r. 1556-1605) and Jahangir (r. 1605-1628) as part of the new ideological orientation: The justification of the Mughal-rule on the basis of Islamic religious values turned out to be at least problematical in an empire with a mostly non-Muslim population, especially as the emperors were more and more forced to cooperate with the Hinduistic rajas to support their throne. Because of this, Akbar ordered the scholar Abu ’l- Fazl to develop a legitimating system of the imperial claim to power that was independent of Islam and aimed at an integration of all subjects, regardless of their religious denominations. The translations from Sanskrit to Persian played an important role in the new ideological line of policy. The object of one of these translations was the well-known Laghu-Yogavasishtha, a philosophical text on the question, how to be released from the eternal cycle of life and death. One aspect of the presentation was asking for the methodological tools used by the Persian translators to make a Muslim audience understand the unfamiliar religious culture of the Hindus.