Sama Veda

The ''Samaveda'' (, , from '' सामन्'', "song" and ''वेद'', "knowledge"), is the Veda of melodies and chants. It is an ancient Vedic Sanskrit text, and is one of the sacred scriptures in Hinduism. One of the four Vedas, it is a liturgical text which consists of 1,875 verses. All but 75 verses have been taken from the Rigveda. Three recensions of the ''Samaveda'' have survived, and variant manuscripts of the Veda have been found in various parts of India.

While its earliest parts are believed to date from as early as the Rigvedic period, the existing samhita text dates from the post-Rigvedic Mantra period of Vedic Sanskrit, between c. 1200 and 1000 BCE or "slightly rather later," roughly contemporary with the Atharvaveda and the Yajurveda. Along with the Samhita layer of text, the ''Samaveda'' includes Brahmana texts, and a final layer of the text that covers philosophical speculations (Upanishads). These layers of the compilation date from the post-Rigvedic Mantra period of Vedic Sanskrit, likely around the 6th century BCE.

Embedded inside the ''Samaveda'' are the widely studied ''Chandogya Upanishad'' and '' Kena Upanishad''. These Upanishads are considered as primary Upanishads and have had influence on the six schools of Hindu philosophy, particularly the Vedanta school. The Samaveda laid important foundations for subsequent Indian music.

It is also referred to as ''Sama Veda''.

Dating and historical context

Michael Witzel states that there is no absolute dating for Samaveda and other Vedic texts. He estimates the composition of the samhita layer of the text chronologically after the Rigveda, and in the likely range of 1200 to 1000 BCE, roughly contemporary with the Atharvaveda and the Yajurveda.Michael Witzel (2003), "Vedas and Upaniṣads", in The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism (Editor: Gavin Flood), Blackwell, , pages 68-70

There were about a dozen styles of Samavedic chanting. Of the three surviving versions, the Jaiminiya preserves the oldest surviving tradition of Samavedic chanting.Bruno Nettl, Ruth M. Stone, James Porter and Timothy Rice (1999), The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, Routledge, , pages 242-245

Text

The ''Samaveda'' is the Veda of Chants, or "storehouse of knowledge of chants". According to Frits Staal, it is "the Rigveda set to music".Frits Staal (2009), Discovering the Vedas: Origins, Mantras, Rituals, Insights, Penguin, , pages 4-5 It is a fusion of older melodies (''sāman'') and the Rig verses. It has far fewer verses than Rigveda,James Hastings, , Vol. 7, Harvard Divinity School, TT Clark, pages 51-56 but Samaveda is textually larger because it lists all the chant- and rituals-related score modifications of the verses.

The Samaveda text contains notated melodies, and these are probably the world's oldest surviving ones. The musical notation is written usually immediately above, sometimes within, the line of Samaveda text, either in syllabic or a numerical form depending on the Samavedic ''Sakha'' (school).

Recensions

R. T. H. Griffith says that there are three recensions of the text of the Samaveda Samhita:Griffith, R. T. H. ''The '', , page vi
* the ''Kauthuma'' recension is current in Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha, West Bengal, and for a few decades in Darbhanga, Bihar,
* the in the Maharashtra, Karnataka, Gokarna, a few parts of Odisha, Andhra Pradesh,
* and the ''Jaiminiya'' in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala.

Organization

The Samaveda comprises two major parts. The first part includes four melody collections and the second part three verse "books" . A melody in the song books corresponds to a verse in the ''arcika'' books. The ''Gana'' collection is subdivided into ''Gramageya'' and ''Aranyageya'', while the ''Arcika'' portion is subdivided into ''Purvarcika'' and ''Uttararcika'' portions. The Purvarcika portion of the text has 585 single stanza verses and is organized in order of deities, while the Uttararcika text is ordered by rituals. The Gramageya melodies are those for public recitations, while Aranyageya melodies are for personal meditative use such as in the solitude of a forest. Typically, stanzas from the Purvarcika collection were sung to melodies described in the Gramageya-Gānas index, and the rules of how the verses mapped to verses is described in the Sanskrit texts such as the ''Puspasutra''.Guy Beck (1993), Sonic Theology: Hinduism and Sacred Sound, University of South Carolina Press, , page 230 note 85

Just as in the Rigveda, the early sections of Samaveda typically begin with Agni and Indra hymns but shift to abstract speculations and philosophy, and their meters shift as well, in a descending order. The later sections of the Samaveda, states Witzel, have the least deviation from substance of hymns they derive from Rigveda into songs. The purpose of the Samaveda was liturgical, and it was the repertoire of the ' or "singer" priests.

The Samaveda, like other Vedas, contains several layers of text, with the Samhita being the oldest and the Upanishads the youngest layer.

Analytics

The Samaveda consists of 1,549 unique verses, taken almost entirely from the Rigveda, except for 75 verses.Michael Witzel (1997),
The Development of the Vedic Canon and its Schools : The Social and Political Milieu
in ''Inside the Texts, Beyond the Texts: New Approaches to the Study of the Vedas'', Harvard University Press, pages = 269-270 The largest number of verses comes from Books 9 and 8 of the Rigveda.Michael Witzel (2003), "Vedas and Upaniṣads", in The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism (Editor: Gavin Flood), Blackwell, , page 76 Some of the Rigvedic verses are repeated more than once. Including these repetitions, there are 1,875 verses in total numbered in the Samaveda recension translated by Griffith.

Contents

The Samaveda Samhita is not meant to be ''read'' as a text, it is like a musical score sheet that must be ''heard''.Frits Staal (2009), Discovering the Vedas: Origins, Mantras, Rituals, Insights, Penguin, , pages 107-112

Staal states that the melodies likely existed before the verses in ancient India, and the words of the Rigveda verses were mapped onto those pre-existing melodies, because some early words fit and flow, while later words do not quite fit the melody in the same verse. The text uses creative structures, called ''Stobha'', to help embellish, transform or play with the words so that they better fit into a desired musical harmony. Some verses add in meaningless sounds of a lullaby, for probably the same reason, remarks Staal. Thus the contents of the Samaveda represent a tradition and a creative synthesis of music, sounds, meaning, and spirituality; the text was not entirely a sudden inspiration.

The portion of the first song of Samaveda illustrates the link and mapping of Rigvedic verses onto a melodic chant:

Multiple melodies were created by clans of sages from a Yonimantra, which is a base Mantra for Sama Chanting. Gautama's Parka was one such example cited by Dr. Damodar Satwalekar in his book Samveda.

Upanishads

Two primary Upanishads of Hinduism are embedded inside the Samaveda – the Chandogya Upanishad and the Kena Upanishad. Both are notable for the lifting metric melodic structure, but it is the Chandogya which has played a historic role in the evolution of various schools of Hindu philosophy. The embedded philosophical premises in the Chandogya Upanishad have, for example, served as foundation for the Vedanta school of Hinduism.Max Muller
Chandogya Upanishad
The Upanishads, Part I, Oxford University Press, pages LXXXVI-LXXXIX, 1-144 with footnotes It is one of the most cited texts in later ''Bhasyas'' (reviews and commentaries) by scholars from the various schools of Hinduism. Adi Shankara, for example, cited the Chandogya Upanishad 810 times in his ''Vedanta Sutra Bhasya'', more than any other ancient text.

Chandogya Upanishad

The Chandogya Upanishad belongs to the ''Tandya'' school of the Samaveda. Like the Brhadaranyaka Upanishad, the Chandogya Upanishad is an anthology of texts that must have pre-existed as separate texts, and were edited into a larger text by one or more ancient Indian scholars.Patrick Olivelle (2014), The Early Upanishads, Oxford University Press, , page 166-169 The precise chronology of the Chandogya Upanishad is uncertain, but it is the youngest layer of text in the Samaveda, and it is variously dated to have been composed by the 8th to 6th centuries BCE in India.Patrick Olivelle (2014), The Early Upanishads, Oxford University Press, , page 12-13Stephen Phillips (2009), Yoga, Karma, and Rebirth: A Brief History and Philosophy, Columbia University Press, , Chapter 1

The Chandogya text combines a metric, melodic structure with a wide range of speculations and philosophical topics. The eighth and ninth chapters of the first book, for example, describe a debate between three men proficient in ''Udgitha'', about the origins and support of ''Udgitha.''Robert Hume
Chandogya Upanishad
1.8.7 - 1.8.8, The Thirteen Principal Upanishads, Oxford University Press, pages 185-186 The text summarizes their discussion as,

Max Muller notes that the term "space" above, was later asserted in the Vedanta Sutra verse 1.1.22 to be a symbolic of the Vedic concept of Brahman. Paul Deussen explains the term ''Brahman'' means the "creative principle which lies realized in the whole world". The text discusses Dharma and many other topics:

Kena Upanishad

The Kena Upanishad is embedded inside the last section of the ''Talavakara Brahmanam'' recension of the Samaveda. It is much shorter, but it too delves into philosophical and spiritual questions like the Chandogya Upanishad. In the fourth chapter, the Kena Upanishad states, for example, that all beings have an innate longing for spiritual knowledge, for self-awareness.Paul Deussen, Sixty Upanishads of the Veda, Volume 1, Motilal Banarsidass, , page 208 This knowledge of Atman-Brahman is ''Tadvanam'' (transcendental happiness, blissfulness). In its final paragraphs, the Kena Upanishad asserts ethical life as the foundation of self-knowledge and of Atman-Brahman.

Manuscripts and translations

The Kauthuma recension has been published (Samhita, Brahmana, Shrautasutra and ancillary Sutras, mainly by B.R. Sharma), parts of the Jaiminiya tradition remain unpublished. There is an edition of the first part of the Samhita by W. Caland and of the Brahmana by Raghu Vira and Lokesh Chandra, as well as the neglected Upanishad, but only parts of the Shrautasutra. The song books remain unpublished.

A German edition of Samaveda was published in 1848 by Theodor Benfey, and Satyavrata Samashrami published an edited Sanskrit version in 1873. A Russian translation was published by Filipp Fortunatov in 1875. An English translation was published by Ralph Griffith in 1893. A translation in Hindi by Mridul Kirti called "Samveda Ka Hindi Padyanuvad" has also been published recently.

The Samaveda text has not received as much attention as the Rigveda, because outside of the musical novelty and melodic creativity, the substance of all but 75 verses of the text have predominantly been derived from the Rigveda. A study of Rigveda suffices.

Cultural influence

The Indian classical music and dance, states Guy Beck, is rooted in the sonic and musical dimensions of the Sama Veda, along with the Upanishads and Agamas. The Samaveda, in addition to singing and chanting, mentions instruments. The rules and suggestions for playing various instruments form a separate compilation, called the ''Gandharva-Veda'', and this Upaveda is attached to the Samaveda. The structure and theory of chants in the Samaveda have inspired the organizing principle for Indian classical arts and performances, and this root has been widely acknowledged by musicologists dealing with the history of Indian music.SS Janaki (1985), The role of Sanskrit in the Development of Indian Music, Journal of the Music Academy, Vol. 56, pages 67, 66-97

See also

* Hinduism
* Historical Vedic religion
* Rigveda
* Vedas

References

Sources

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External links

* Ralph Griffith,
''Hymns of the Samaveda''
1895, full text, (online at sacred-texts.com)

Veda Prasar Samiti (MP3 examples of vedic chants)


Samaveda Song Books in Devanagari with svara marks and musical notes file for download

7 swaras in samaveda

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Indian poetics
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