/lit/ - Literature

>>14038094
I should have prefaced by saying that I do read the texts, I'm just skeptical of many aspects of the translations. Both the translator's cultural knowledge (I usually read Buddhist texts, and the translators are often European Indologists) and the ability for many of the concepts to be conveyed in Western languages. I know a little bit of Sanskrit and the depth of single words can be very extreme compared to something like English. Take the word (using the English alphabet) kāla. While it is typically translated as "time", it has many additional meanings built into it. Like our word for time, it can also be used to denote eras in time (e.g., the time of kings). Even further, it can denote something that is inevitable, and hence it is sometimes translated as "destiny", "death" etc., hence the (imo) mistranslation of the Bhagavad Gita verse "I am time, the destroyer worlds" by Oppenheimer. I've looked through a few translations of the Gita, and the translations vary quite a bit even when written by steeped in Hinduism (i.e., Nepali and Indian people).

Even going to your example, the sannyasins were undoubtably political, and even assuming no deliberate mistranslation they still will always interpret the texts through their own lens, which is distinct from how a Brahmin far away from the colonial centers (the sannyasins were heavily based in universities) would interpret things