With Jainism it is as with Buddhism; we find censure of such ideal enjoyments as the arts akin to the drama, but also recognition of song, music, dance, and scenic presentations in the Canon.[47] But it is hopeless, in view of the utter uncertainty of the date of that collection, to draw any conclusion from it as to the age of the drama. As in the case of Buddhism, Jainism in its development was glad to have recourse to the drama as a means of propagating its beliefs.[48]
The evidence is conclusive on the close connexion of religion and the drama, and it strongly suggests that it was from religion [[45]]that the decisive impulse to dramatic creation was given. The importance of the epic is doubtless enormous, but the mere recitation of the epics, however closely it might approach to the drama, does not overstep the bounds. The element which fails to be added is that of the dramatic contest, the Agon of the Greek drama. That this was supplied by the development of such primitive vegetation rituals as that of the Mahāvrata, until they assumed the concrete and human form of the Kṛṣṇa and Kaṅsa legend would be a conjecture worth consideration, but without possibility of proof if we had not the notice of the Mahābhāṣya which expressly shows that the story of Kṛṣṇa and Kaṅsa could both be represented by Granthikas, who coloured their faces and expressed vividly the emotions of those whom they represented, but also, in dumb show seemingly, by Çaubhikas. If there did not exist an Indian drama proper, in which these sides were combined when Patañjali wrote, it is fair to say that it would be surprising if it did not develop shortly afterwards, and we have perfectly certain proof that the Naṭas of Patañjali were much more than dancers or acrobats; they sang and recited. The balance of probability, therefore, is that the Sanskrit drama came into being shortly after, if not before, the middle of the second century B.C., and that it was evoked by the combination of epic recitations with the dramatic moment of the Kṛṣṇa legend, in which a young god strives against and overcomes enemies.
The drama which was nascent in Patañjali’s time must be taken to have been, like the classical drama, one in which Sanskrit was mingled with Prākrit in the speeches of the characters. The epic recitations of the slaying of Kaṅsa which he records must have been in Sanskrit, but, if the drama was to be popular—and the Nāṭyaçāstra in its tale of the origin of the art recognizes both its epic and popular characteristics, the humble people who figured in it must have been allowed to speak in their own vernacular; this accords brilliantly with the presence of Çaurasenī as the normal prose of the drama of the classical stage. A different view is taken by Professor Lévi,[49] [[46]]who conceives that the drama sprang first into being in Prākrit, while Sanskrit was only later applied at the time when Sanskrit, long reserved as a sacred language, re-entered into use as the language of literature; India, he contends, was never anxious for contact with reality, and it is absurd to suppose that the mixture of languages was adopted as a representation of the actual speech-usage of the time and circles in which drama came into being. This contention is supported by the observation that a number of the technical terms of the Nāṭyaçāstra are of strange appearance, and the frequency of cerebral letters in them suggests Prākrit origin. The contention can hardly be treated as satisfactory, nor is it clear how it can possibly be reconciled with the evidence of Patañjali. The early drama, it seems clear, was not secular in origin, and Professor Lévi emphasizes its dependence on the cult of Kṛṣṇa; to refuse to use Sanskrit in it, therefore, would be extremely strange, unless we are to assume that the existence of true drama goes back to a period considerably earlier than Patañjali, and that it came into being among a milieu which was not Brahminical. There are very serious difficulties in such a theory; we may legitimately hold that such a literary form as the true drama was not created until the Brahmin genius fused the ethic and religious agonistic motives into a new creation of the highest importance for the literary history of India. The presence of a number of Prākrit terms in the Nāṭyaçāstra is probable, but it does not mean that a theory of drama was first excogitated in Prākrit; the main theory in all its essentials is expressed in Sanskrit, and all that is borrowed from Prākrit is some technical terms of subsidiary importance, borrowed, doubtless, from the minor arts, which go to aid but do not constitute the drama, song, music, dancing, and the mimetic art.
The religious origin of the Sanskrit drama in Kṛṣṇa worship is also admitted as part, however, of a wider thesis by Dr. Ridgeway,[50] who contends that Greek drama, and drama all over the world, are the outcome of the reverence paid to the spirits [[47]]of the dead, which again is the source of all religion, a revival in fact of the doctrine of animism in one of its connotations. The contention as applied to the Indian drama involves the view that the actors in the primitive drama were representatives of the spirits of the dead, and that the performance was meant to gratify the dead. It is supported by the doctrine that not only Rāma and Kṛṣṇa were believed once to be men, but that Çiva himself had this origin;[51] all gods indeed are derived from the memory of noble men. The evidence adduced for this thesis is simply non-existent. A valuable collection of material due to Sir J. H. Marshall proves the prevalence throughout India of popular dramatic performances celebrating the deeds of Rāma and Kṛṣṇa, and the modern Indian drama deals also with the lives of distinguished historical characters such as Açoka or Candragupta. But there is nothing to show that the idea of gratifying the dead by the performances of dramatic scenes based on their history was ever present to any mind in India, either early or late. Rāma and Kṛṣṇa to their worshippers were long before the rise of so late an art as drama, just like Çiva, great gods, of whom it would be absurd to think as dead men requiring funeral rites to give them pleasure. Nor is it necessary further to criticize his reconstruction of Vedic religion on the basis of his animistic theory, for these issues of origins have no possible relevance to the specific question of the origin of the Indian drama. Whether elsewhere the worship of the dead resulted in drama is a matter open to grave doubt; certainly in the case of the Greek drama, which offers the most interesting parallel to that of India, the evidence of derivation from funeral games is wholly defective.
Definite support for this view of the origin of drama may be found in the accounts of dramatic performances which are given in the Harivaṅça, the supplement of the Mahābhārata. That work cannot, as has been mentioned, be dated with any certainty or probability earlier than the dramas of Açvaghoṣa, and, therefore, it cannot be appealed to as the earliest mention now extant of the dramatic art. But it is of value as showing how closely [[48]]connected the drama was in early times with the Kṛṣṇa cult, thus supplementing the conclusions to be derived from the Mahābhāṣya, and falling into line with the evidence of Bhāsa.
At the festival performed by the Yādavas after the death of Andhaka, we find that the women of the place danced and sang to music, while Kṛṣṇa induced celestial nymphs to aid the merriment by similar exhibitions, including a representation by the Apsarases, apparently by dancing, of the death of Kaṅsa and Pralamba, the fall of Cāṇūra in the amphitheatre, and various other exploits of Kṛṣṇa. After they had performed, the sage Nārada amused the audience by a series of what may fairly be called comic turns; he imitated the gestures, the movements, and even the laughter of such distinguished personages as Satyabhāmā, Keçava, Arjuna, Baladeva, and the young princess, the daughter of Revata, causing infinite amusement to the audience, and reminding us of the part played by the Vidūṣaka in the drama. The Yādavas then supped, and this enjoyment was followed by further songs and dances by the Apsarases, whose performance thus resembled a modern ballet with songs interspersed.[52]
In a later passage[53] in connexion with the story of the demon Vajranābha, whom Indra asked Kṛṣṇa to dispose of, we learn of an actor Bhadra who delighted all by his excellent power of representation; Vajranābha is induced to demand his presence in his abode, and Kṛṣṇa’s son Pradyumna and his friends disguise themselves to penetrate there; Pradyumna is to be the hero, Sāmba the Vidūṣaka, and Gada the assistant of the stage director, while maidens, skilled in song, dance, and music, are the actresses; they delight the demons by presenting the story of Viṣṇu’s descent on earth to slay the chief of the Rākṣasas, a dramatised version of the Rāmāyaṇa, presenting the figures of Rāma, his brother, and in special the episode of Ṛṣyaçṛn̄ga and Çāntā, that curious old legend based on a fertility- and rain-ritual.[54] After the play the actors showed their skill in depicting [[49]]situations suggested by their hosts, and Vajranābha himself induces them to perform an episode from the legend of Kubera, the rendezvous of Rambhā; after music from the orchestra the actresses sing, Pradyumna enters and recites the benediction, and then a verse on the descent of the Ganges, which is connected with the subject-matter of the piece; he then assumes the rôle of Nalakūbara, Sāmba is his Vidūṣaka, Çūra plays Rāvaṇa, Manovatī Rambhā. Nalakūbara curses Rāvaṇa, and consoles Rambhā, and the audience was delighted by the skilled acting of the Yādavas, who by a magic illusion had presented mount Kailāsa on the stage.
4. Theories of the Secular Origin of the Drama
Professors Hillebrandt[55] and Konow[56] agree in the main in maintaining the view that it is an error to look to religious ceremonies as explaining the origin of the drama. True, these ceremonies have a share in the development of the drama, but they themselves are merely the introduction into the ritual of elements which have a popular origin. We are to believe that a popular mime existed, which, with the epic, lies at the bottom of the Sanskrit drama.