Historical and Literary sources

Historical and literary sources

Krishna is celebrated in the Vaishnava tradition in various stages of his life, such as Maakhan chor (butter thief).

The earliest text containing detailed descriptions of Krishna as a personality is the epic Mahabharata, which depicts Krishna as an incarnation of Vishnu. Krishna is central to many of the main stories of the epic. The eighteen chapters of the sixth book (Bhishma Parva) of the epic that constitute the Bhagavad Gita contain the advice of Krishna to Arjuna on the battlefield. The Harivamsa, a later appendix to the Mahabharata contains a detailed version of Krishna's childhood and youth.

The Chandogya Upanishad, estimated to have been composed sometime between the 8th and 6th centuries BCE, has been another source of speculation regarding Krishna in ancient India. The verse (III.xvii.6) mentions Krishna in "Krishnaya Devakiputraya" (Sanskrit: कृष्णाय देवकीपुत्राय) as a student of the sage Ghora of the Angirasa family. This phrase, which means "To Krishna the son of Devaki", has been mentioned by scholars such as Max Müller as a potential source of fables and Vedic lore about Krishna in the Mahabharata and other ancient literature – only potential, because this verse could have been interpolated into the text, or the Krishna Devakiputra, could be different from the deity Krishna. These doubts are supported by the fact that the much later age Sandilya Bhakti Sutras, a treatise on Krishna cites later age compilations such as the Narayana Upanishad but never cites this verse of the Chandogya  Upanishad. Other scholars disagree that the Krishna mentioned along with Devika in the ancient Upanishad is unrelated to the later Hindu god of the Bhagavad Gita fame. For example, Archer states that the coincidence of the two names appearing together in the same Upanishad verse cannot be dismissed easily.

Yāska's Nirukta, an etymological dictionary published around the 6th century BCE, contains a reference to the Shyamantaka jewel in the possession of Akrura, a motif from the well-known Puranic story about Krishna. Shatapatha Brahmana and Aitareya-Aranyaka associate Krishna with his Vrishni origins.

In Ashṭādhyāyī, authored by the ancient grammarian Pāṇini (probably belonged to the 5th or 6th century BCE), Vāsudeva, son of Vasudeva, and Arjuna, as recipients of worship, are referred to together in the same sutra.

Bala Krishna dancing, 14th century CE Cholasculpture, Tamil Nadu, in the Honolulu Academy of Arts.

Megasthenes, a Greek ethnographer and an ambassador of Seleucus  to the court of Chandragupta Maurya towards the end of 4th century BCE, made reference to Herakles in his famous work Indica. This text is now lost to history, but was quoted in secondary literature by later Greeks such as Arrian, Diodorus, and Strabo. According to these texts, Megasthenes mentioned that the Sourasenoi tribe of India, who worshipped Herakles, had two major cities named Methora and Kleisobora, and a navigable river named the Jobares. According to Edwin Bryant, a professor of Indian religions known for his publications on Krishna, "there is little doubt that the Sourasenoi refers to the Shurasenas, a branch of the Yadu dynasty to which Krishna belonged". The word Herakles, states Bryant, is likely a Greek phonetic equivalent of Hari-Krishna, as is Methora of Mathura, Kleisobora of Krishnapura, and the Jobares of Jamuna. Later, when Alexander the Great launched his campaign in the northwest Indian subcontinent, his associates recalled that the soldiers of Porus were carrying an image of Herakles.

The Buddhist Pali canon and the Ghata-Jâtaka polemically mention the devotees of Vâsudeva and Baladeva. These texts have many peculiarities and may be a garbled and confused version of the Krishna legends. The texts of Jainism mention these tales as well, also with many peculiarities and different versions, in their legends about Tirthankaras. This inclusion of Krishna-related legends in ancient Buddhist and Jaina literature suggests that Krishna theology was existent and important in the religious landscape observed by non-Hindu traditions of ancient India.