This is one of a series of papers by Professor Ch. Minkowski (Oxford, UK) about the Indian author by name Nīlakantha Caturdhara (or simply Nīlakantha) who lived and worked in the second half of the 17 century. To modern scholars Nīlakantha is best known as the author of a Sanskrit commentary on the Mаhābhārata called the Bhātabhvadipa, "Light on the Deep Meaning of the [Mahā]bhārata". To this day, Nīlakantha's commentary is the only Sanskrit commentary, available in print, on the whole of the Mahābhārata and, therefore, occupies a prominent position in the studies on the Indian epic. Yet this commentary often frustrates modern scholars with what looks like incompleteness and, moreover, a subjectivity in interpretations. Nīlakantha, in many cases evidently forces upon the text of the Mahābhārata allegorizing interpretations and/or imposes upon the text philosophical meanings derived from Advaita Vedānta. Professor Ch. Minkowski suggests that we may try and read Nīlakantha's commentary on the Mahābhārata not as an auxiliary work for epic studies but rather as an oeuvre in itself, a product of an extraordinary creative mind. Such an analysis of Nīlakantha Bhāratabhāvadipa would, in the long ran, contribute not only to our understanding of Indian culture in the "Early Modern Period", but also to a fuller appreciation of the Mahābhārata itself. In this paper Professor Ch. Minkowski makes an attempt to reconstruct, as much as the available sources permit, the biography of Nīlakantha, the immediate historical context in which he lived and worked, as well as the contents of his works other than the Bhāratabhāvadipa. This commentary itself is also analyzed. In particular, it is demonstrated what kinds of "techniques" Nīlakantha used to impose his meanings upon the text of the Mahābhārata.

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