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The Genius of Dnyaneshwar
Dnyaneshwari Verse 10
Chapter 11
The Final Frontier / Philosophy
The Sanskrit word for philosophy is ‘Tattwa–dnyan’. Tattwa meaning the principle and Dnyan to mean knowledge. The word dnyan is from the Indo-European root ‘gn’ (to know; gnosis, diagnosis etc). That founding principle or ‘Tattwa’ has been a source of debate in cultures everywhere as in India, and in India the debate seems to have been very active between 1000 BC to about AD 500 and has provided six different streams of thought. While arguing against each other they also borrowed and depended on each other. Their dates of origin are not clear though their proponents are usually identifiable by names. A lot of this material is dialogical, that is between a teacher and student, between two wise men, sometimes between a father and a son or even between a king and a scholar on a visit to a royal court. However, a majority of their discussions are shown to have taken place in the quietude of forests away from the bustle of the cities and courts. Two more Sanskrit words need to be introduced here. Vedant and Upanishads. The word Ved (from the Sanskrit root Vid=know) has been already introduced and the Vedas are the philosophical texts. The word Vedant is a compounded word. Those philosophical texts that offered the concluding remarks of the ‘Ved’ are Vedant (Ved + ant). This part of the literature is also called Upanishad which literally means ‘sit near’ and its derived meaning is ‘(sit near me, and let us discuss)’. The Upanishads form one of the six streams of Indian philosophy and it is this stream that Dnyaneshwar believes in. Dnyaneshwar does not believe in two entirely different philosophical streams of India—Jainism and Buddhism which deny the primacy of Vedic literature, and have been called materialistic. More about them later. The idol of Ganesha which Dnyaneshwar is describing and using as a model (to mount his metaphors) is a Nepalese version and has six hands. The verse is as follows: