Who is Brahmacarin and What is Brahmacarya? From the Mytho-Poetic to the Religio-ethical. A New Interpretation of Early Indian Social-Intellectual History
This dissertation explores the evolving meanings and their implications of brahmacārín and brahmacárya (or brahmacariya in Pāli) in early Indian intellectual history, specifically in the Vedic and early Buddhist periods. Brahmacāŕn is conventionally defined by scholars as “Vedic student” or “chaste (or celibate) student,” as if the two definitions were expressions of an identical commitment. However, a Buddhist brahmacārín (monk) living the monastic life does not undergo Vedic training, and a Vedic student is clearly not a Buddhist mendicant—yet both are called “ brahmacārín.” This does not mean that a “Vedic student” may not practice a life of continence, but learning the Vedas and practicing chastity are not necessarily intrinsically related practices. Hence, members of different religious communities may employ these same terms while yet having different phenomena in mind, since neither brahmacārín nor brahmacārya has ever been a notion definitively fixed. This study, therefore, critically reviews the problematic nature of the accepted definitions of these terms.
Our investigation of the conceptual evolution of what is conveyed by brahmacārín and brahmacārya/ brahmacaiya in this period has shown this historical evolution to be both a complex process not reducible to any ready-made delineation and one which belies conventional wisdom. The interchangeability of “Vedic student” and “chaste student” as definitions of brahmacārín is not found in the texts.
The term brahmacārín first appeared in the Rgveda as the appellation of Brhaspati, Master of poetry, in a mythological context, but evolved to the point where it was used by the Buddha to denote a person endowed with religious as well as ethical accomplishments. Brahmacārya, on the other hand, was first employed in the Atharva Veda, again in a mythological setting, to denote the life of discipleship which demands toil, diligence and discipline. In later Buddhist contexts brahmacariya had come to convey an inclusive idea comprehensively signifying the religio-ethical excellence of Buddhism as initiated by the Buddha. The great transformation in thought that occurred in ancient India, as sketched out above, is witness to a broader intellectual evolution which I term “from the mytho-poetic to the religio-ethical.”
