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Niraj Mohanka 09/01/2008 The Ramayana of Valmiki is the oldest
work which gives the story of Rama. According to the
German Indologist H. Jacobi, Valmiki composed the Ramayana
somewhere between the 8th and 6th century B.C. but these dates bear
no resemblence to other evidence of the actual occurance of the
epic. All the later Rama literature consisting of numerous dramas
and poems is indebted to Valmiki. These works, therefore, have no
independent value of their own, so far as the historicity of Rama is
concerned. The question that naturally arises is
this. Are there any works in Sanskrit literature which alludes to
Rama in some way and which are older than the Ramayana or whose
material has not been borrowed from the Ramayana? Fortunately
there are a number of such works, and we shall now examine them to find if
they can help in solving our problem. According to the
Ramayana, Rama belonged to the Iksvaku Dynasty. The genealogy
of Iksvaku kings is given in the 12 Puranas and all of them agree
in assigning a definite place to Rama in this genealogy. Although
these Puranas are quite late in their present form, scholars are
agreed that their genealogical accounts are based on the records of the
Sutas (‘Bards’) who were attached to the courts of kings in the
Vedic Age. The skeptical reader may not feel satisfied
with the evidence of works which are themselves late even if they are
believed to contain very ancient material. Luckily we have at our
disposal the testimony of works that are definitely older than the
Ramayana. The Vedic literature which belongs to a period much
anterior to the Ramayana mentions many kings of the Iksvaku Dynasty
to which Rama belonged. Among the ancestors of Rama the names of
Iksvaku, Mandhatr, Purukutsa, Trasadasyu and Tryaruna are found in the
most ancient work of Indian literature, viz. the RgVeda. The
names of Hariscandra and his son Rohita are found in the Aitareya
Brahmana and the name of Bhagiratha occurs in the
Jaiminiya-Upanishad-Brahmana. Among the descendants of Rama,
the name of Hiranyanabha occurs in the Prasna-Upanishad, where he
is expressly called Kausalya, i.e. King of Kosala. The mention of the names of a number of Rama’s
ancestors and descendants without the mention of his own name may still
cause a lurking doubt in the minds of readers about his historicity.
Luckily we are in a position to remove even this lurking doubt. The
name of Rama himself occurs in a hymn of the RgVeda along with
those of three other kings, Duhsima, Vena and Prthu. The fact that
he is called ‘mighty’ shows that he had earned fame for his valorous deeds
even at the time of the composition of this hymn. Since the Indian
literature knows of no famous king of ancient India bearing the name of
Rama other than the hero of the Ramayana, this RgVedic king can be
none other than him. Thus the mention of Rama and of so many of his
ancestors and descendants in the Vedic literature proves his historicity
beyond a shadow of doubt. Two questions, however, still remain to be
answered. If Rama was a historical king, when and where did he
rule? As far as the period when he ruled is concerned, both the
RgVeda and the Puranas agree in assigning him to the later
Vedic Age. His name occurs in the 10th and last book of the
RgVeda, which is regarded by all Vedic scholars to contain the
latest hymns of the collection. These hymns were actually composed
in the later Vedic Age. Thus according to the testimony of the
RgVeda, Rama ruled somewhere in the later Vedic Age circa 2500bc to
2100bc. Let us now examine the Puranic evidence.
The Puranas have divided the history of ancient India into 4
Yugas (‘Periods’). What we call the RgVedic Age was divided
by the Puranas into 2 periods called Krta and Treta as is clear
from the occurrence in the RgVeda of the names of kings assigned to
these ages by the Puranas. The later Vedic Age was called the
Dvapara Age and the Post-Vedic Age which began soon after the
Mahabharata War was called the Kali Age. Since Rama is
believed to have lived at the end of the Treta Age with which began the
Later Vedic Period, the Puranas are in complete agreement with the
testimony of the RgVeda. Here we must pause to remove a widespread
misconception. The concept of the 4 Yugas had originally
nothing to do with the cosmological scheme of Kalpas and
Manvantaras. The British historian F.E. Pargiter was the first to
point out the difference which the older Puranas make between the
cosmological periods of Kalpas and Manvantaras on the one hand and the 4
Yugas on the other. This is what he said in his book,
Ancient Indian Historical Tradition (p. 175): “It is declared
repeatedly that these ages prevailed in India
(BharataVarsha)â€. When therefore A. R. Khan says (vide his
article “In the Name of History†published in the Indian Express
dated February 25, 1990) that “there was no habitation in the Treta Yuga
in the area where Ayodhya is locatedâ€, he is only betraying his total
unawareness of the original concept of the four Yugas. The last question that needs our attention is
concerning the region where Rama ruled. Vedic evidence makes it
clear that the early Iksvakus ruled a region far from Kosala or the modern
Awadh. A hymn occurring in the 8th book of the RgVeda and
attributed to a Rsi named Sobhari praises the gifts which the Iksvaku king
Trasadasyu conferred on the Rsi on the bank of the River Suvastu,
the modern Swat. Further the fact that the seat of the government of
King Hariscandra is called, a village in the Aitareya-Brahmana
shows that Ayodhya had still not come into existence. The first king
of the Iksvaku Dynasty who according to Vedic evidence ruled in the
Gangetic region was Bhagiratha, for he is clearly mentioned in the
Jaiminiya-Upanishad-Brahmana as a neighbor of the
Kuru-Pancalas. The Puranas confirm the Vedic evidence by
regarding Bhagiratha as the discoverer of the River Ganga which clearly
mentions that he was the first Iksvaku King to found a kingdom in the
Gangetic region. From his time onwards, the Iksvaku kings seem to
have ruled in the region of Kosala and one of his descendants,
Hiranyanabha, is expressly called Kausalya, that is, King of Kosala, in
the Prasna-Upanishad. It is difficult to say when exactly the
city of Ayodhya was founded but it had definitely come into existence in
the later Vedic Age since it is mentioned in a hymn of the
AtharvaVeda. We therefore need not doubt
that the city Ayodhya existed in the time of King Dasharatha and
that Rama was born here. Before closing the article, it is necessary to
examine the views of the archeologist, Dr. B.B. Lal. He makes
the excavations at Ayodhya the excuse for creating a new tradition
according to which contrary to the firm, well-established and unanimous
literary evidence of millenniums, Rama was born later than the heroes of
the Mahabharata War. Now it is clear that the
painted grayware (PGW) culture, if it is Indo-Aryan,
represents not an early but a late phase of Vedic Aryan
civilization. The fact that excavations in
the lowest levels of the sites connected with the Mahabharata Epic such as
Hastinapura, Barnawa, Bairat, Indarpat, Panipat, Sonepat and Beghpat have
revealed the remnants of this culture, supports this contention.
Hastinapura, Indraprastha and Viratanagara were the latest in the
series of towns that arose during the Vedic Period and
were actually founded in the period when the PGW culture
flourished. When they were deserted or destroyed, no new
town arose on their ruins, with the result that the culture associated
with the time when they were founded remained preserved. On the
other hand, according to the unanimous testimony of the Puranas,
which is confirmed by Vedic evidence, Kusasthala (modern Kannauj),
Varanasi and Ayodhya were the most ancient of the towns founded by Aryan
kings. These cities were several times destroyed and everytime new
cities arose with the same names on the sites of the old
ones. There can be no doubt that the earliest cities of
these names have completely perished and what the excavations have yielded
is the culture of very late cities of these names. If it is asked
why no remnants of the civilization of the time when these cities were
founded have been discovered, we would answer by a counter
question. Why is it that no remnants of the RgVedic civilization
have been found in the Punjab which was the first home of the Indo-Aryans
according to the clear testimony of the RgVeda?
Obviously the RgVedic Aryans were materially much less advanced than the
Indus Valley people and their houses and other things were made of
perishable material which could not survive the onslaught of weather and
other contingencies in the course of millenniums. ![]() You may also access this article through our web-site http://www.lokvani.com/ |
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