Sanskrit literature is vast, comprehensive, varied and ancient. It is impossible to master all the Sanskrit works as it would take many years while human life is very short.
There are hundreds of scholars who have willingly launched into this vast sea of Sanskrit literature to explore the available gems.
Among the great scholars, L. Sternbach stands out for his wonderful and dedicated work. He was very attracted to the Subhasita Sanskrit verses and devoted his whole life to collecting them. The whole Sanskrit world admired him and he was given the title ‘Subhasitavidwan’.
His life’s goal was to publish all the Subhasitas in English translation with detailed annotations. So he was in search of a suitable scholar and found Mr. Bhaskaran Nair, Director-Professor of Vishveshvaranand Vedic Research Institute, Hoshiapur, India. So he requested in 1966 the head of the Sanskrit department, Jagannath Agarwal, to persuade Acharya Vishwa Bandhu to pardon the scholar for this worthwhile cause. It is worth mentioning here that Acharya Vishwa Bandhu, during the days of partition in 1947, came from Lahore with huge Sanskrit literature to hide it in big jute sacks at great risk. He founded the great Vishweshvaranand Vedic Research Institute at Hoshiapur.
Six years passed. In 1972 he wrote to the Acharya that the Maha-Subhasita Samgraha work was for him as a child and he intended to bequeath the entirety of his fortune after his and his mother’s death to the Institute that would take care of it. of the publication of this work.
As promised, she has given her all for this great cause leaving a small amount to take care of her elderly mother. Perhaps this is a unique event of a foreign scholar who sacrificed all his life and wealth for the publication of the Subhasite verse.
Consequently, the team headed by Bhaskaran Nair has published eight volumes of the great work containing around 14,000 verses.
Sternbach has written many books. One of them is ‘Aphorisms and Proverbs in the Katha-Sarit-Sagara’. From the Katha-Sarit Sagara, the ocean of streams of stories, containing almost a thousand aphorisms and proverbs, he has selected about 697 wise sayings.
His English translation is always excellent. He is also famous for his footnotes and friends of his would comment that his work often contains more footnotes than text.
For a sample, we can cite the following:
No one is able, even trying their best, to overcome the incalculable monsters of the wonderfully working Destiny.
No one can calculate the whims of Fate or the waves of the sea.
The good and evil done by a man return to himself.
Think for a moment, an American by birth has given everything for the sake of Sanskrit. At the same time, he did not forget his duty towards his mother.
Sanskrit lovers from all over the world and Indians in particular will always remember this great soul.
We salute the great American Sanskrit scholar Ludwik Sternbach!
