SVCC organized the lecture ‘A Survey of the Persian Translations of the Bhagavadgita’ delivered by Dr. Alireza Esmailpour [1986- ] on 27th December 2023. Dr. Esmailpour, PhD Ancient Languages and Cultures, Tehran University, is an Iranian Indologist. His dissertation titled: ‘Shakuntala: Translation, Description, and Dictionary of Frequencies’ was published as a book. He has been teaching and studying Indology for the past ten years.
Director, SVCC started the programme with his inaugural remarks. He stated that if one wants to identify a single common factor in all Indic religions, disregarding all differences - It is the Concept of Karma and Transmigration. The result of Karma is indomitable and inevitable. Many schools of Indian Philosophy even do not accept the existence of God but they never refute the law of Karma. Whatever you do will come to you and it creates a kind of bondage. Therefore, you have to abstain from bad Karma. It had been a general idea. The Bhagavadgita shows a radical deviation and opines that it is not the Karma that binds us but the doership. So if we can perform our duties without the ego of doership the result of Karmas cannot affect us. This is called Karma Yoga. We cannot perform Karmayoga without knowing that we are distinct from body, mind, and intellect. This knowledge of the real self of ours is called Jnana yoga. The introduction of these two paths makes the Gita so special that it has been considered the gist of all Indian spiritual evolution.
Dr. Esmailpour said in his lecture that the Bhagavadgita is unequivocally an authoritative scripture of all sects of the Vedic religion. The tradition of translating the Gita into Persian goes back more than 500 years. The lecture provided a review of several ancient and modern Persian renderings done by both Indians and Iranians. The lecture was divided into three parts: 1. a short introduction about the content and position of Gita; 2. An explanation of the importance of the Persian translations of this book in the Mughal era; and 3. a look at the three prominent Persian translations of the Gita that have been done in the past decades. The ultimate goal of introducing these translations was to examine and explain the different approaches of the translators to the Bhagavadgita and reflect on their idea of the translation and sometimes their preferred school of thought in the Persian text.
14 окт 2024
