In China,
a rediscovery of Sanskrit
Ananth Krishnan, The Hindu, Published: May 16,
2011 19:01 IST | Updated: May 17, 2011 00:27 IST
The Hindu A class in session
at Peking University with renowned Indian Sanskrit scholar Satyavrat
Shastri teaching Chinese graduate students. Photo: Ananth Krishnan
The Sanskrit programme at Peking University has a long
history, set up in the 1960s and subsequently expanded by renowned
Indologist Ji Xianlin, who translated dozens of works Almost
two millennia after the language first came to China through
Buddhist scriptures, renewed interest in Buddhist studies and
recent discoveries of long-forgotten manuscripts in Tibet have
sparked a revival of the study of the ancient language among
Chinese scholars.
Beijing’s Peking University has now launched
an ambitious programme to train more than 60 Chinese students
in Sanskrit, with the hope of creating a team of researchers
to help translate hundreds of manuscripts containing scriptures
that have been found in Tibet and other centres of Buddhism,
such as Hangzhou in China’s east. “There is a rich
manuscript collection in Tibet, particularly. Many of the originals
have not been recovered, and are only available in Chinese and
Tibetan, so it is important for us to find a way to render them
back into Sanskrit,” said Satyavrat Shastri, a renowned
New Delhi-based Sanskrit scholar and poet, who is in Beijing
this week as a visiting lecturer to meet and advise students
and teachers here.
“What they are trying to do here is invaluable,
and they are making great progress,” Mr. Shastri said,
adding that he was pleasantly surprised by the students’
technical level.
“I was struck by the interest, of both
teachers and scholars, in little details, such as getting the
pronunciation perfect. They recited the Bhagavad Gita with me,
and it was a unique experience. The pronunciation, the metre
[of reciting the verses], was remarkable.”
The Sanskrit programme at Peking University
has a long history, set up in the 1960s and subsequently expanded
by renowned Indologist Ji Xianlin, who translated dozens of
works and is seen by many here as single-handedly introducing
classical Indian culture to a whole generation of Chinese. Today,
the programme hopes to carry forward the legacy of Ji, who died
in 2009.
The university’s efforts received a boost in 2005, when
it was given support by the Ministry of Education to expand
admissions, part of an effort to boost manuscript research.
Now, for the first time, the programme has a
regular annual intake of students at both undergraduate and
post-graduate levels, currently training between 50 and 60 students.
“We want to continue what Ji Xianlin started,”
said Duan Qing, a professor in Sanskrit and Pali who once trained
under Ji. “Our programme is quite mature now, and is the
only complete Sanskrit programme in China.” She attributed
the recent boost in funding to increasing government support
for the humanities, ignored during the People’s Republic’s
first three decades when the country’s focus was on development
alone. “Sanskrit research is being viewed with importance
now,” she said. “India and China were culturally connected.
I don’t think there’s another country in the world
where so many Sanskrit works were translated into another language,
and this has been going on for more 1,000 years.” Ms. Duan
heads the Research Institute of Sanskrit Manuscripts and Buddhist
Literature at Peking University, which is working with regional
governments and hoping to create an archive for lost manuscripts
and palm-leaves. Graduate students will work with the institute
to help translate scriptures.
Yu Huaijin, a PhD student who is studying Kalidasa’s Kumarasambhava,
said she joined the programme because she believed it was playing
the role of “a bridge between two cultures.” “India
and China are neighbours, but they know little about each other,
especially the younger generation. It is a big objective for
me to introduce Indian culture and literature to a Chinese audience,”
she said.
Few Chinese students are interested in Indian
culture, with much greater interest in Western literature. Ms.
Yu, too, was first a student of Western literature — until
she happened to read a translation of the Mahabharata by Ji
Xianlin. “It was a different world,” she said. “And
one that few Chinese are aware of.” Peking University has
also begun working with Sanskrit programmes in universities
in the West, particularly in Germany, to improve both teaching
methods and archiving practices.
Indian universities, have however, appeared
to show little interest in taking forward cooperation. Mr. Shastri,
who is an honorary professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University,
admitted there was “precious little” cooperation between
the two countries. There was room for much more, he said, encouraged
by the positive response to his teaching methods this past week.
“We want to learn Sanskrit through traditional
methods,” one teacher told him. “Not from the West.”
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