Indologica | Digitalisate

Biodata

Kapila. Īśvarakṛṣṇa gibt in den Versen 69 bis 71 seiner Sāṃkhyakārikās eine Genealogie der Lehrer, an deren Spitze der Paramarṣi (= Kapila) steht; ihm folgen Āsuri und Pañcaśikha. Am Schluß der Liste steht Īśvarakṛṣṇa, der die alte Überlieferung in Ārya-Strophen zusammengefaßt hat. Kapila gilt demnach als Urheber des Sāṃkhya-Systems. Die Sāṃkhyasūtras werden ihm aber nur zugeschrieben und stammen aus sehr viel späterer Zeit (der älteste Kommentator, Aniruddha, wirkte um 1500). Surendranath Dasgupta: „The Sāṃkhya sūtra was not referred to by any writer until it was commented upon by Aniruddha (fifteenth century A.D.). Even Guṇaratna of the fourteenth century A.D. who made allusions to a number of Sāṃkhya works, did not make any reference to the Sāṃkhya sūtra, no other writer who is known to have flourished before Guṇaratna seems to have made any reference to the Sāṃkhya sūtra. The natural conclusion therefore is that these sūtras were probably written some time after the fourteenth century. But there is no positive evidence to prove that it was so late a work as the fifteenth century“ (S. Dasgupta: A history of Indian philosophy, Vol. 1, S. 222 [--> 1922 Dasgupta: History of Indian Philosophy Vol. 1]). - Die Berichte über Kapila in den Epen und in den Purāṇas sind legendenhaft. A. B. Keith: „If there was ever a sage, Kapila, who expounded philosophy, he had disappeared into a mass of obscure tradition at an early date. Moreover, there is grave doubt to suspect his real existence at all, in view of the fact that he may owe his name merely to the use of Kapila in the Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad (v, 2) as a description of Hiraṇyagarbha. The likelihood is that the name Kapila is merely that of a divinity which has, for whatever reason, been associated closely with the Samkhya philosophy in its atheistic form ...“ (A. Berriedale Keith: The Sāṃkhya system (1918), S. 40-41).

Lit.: Glasenapp, Helmuth von: Die Philosophie der Inder, S. 198 ff. • [VIAF ID:9848428].