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identifiable, since the text never refers to any other scriptures by
name or even scriptural traditions.
1.1.5 Redaction Criticism
After enumerating the results of tradition and source
criticism, redaction criticism must next attempt to dissipate the
anonymity cloaking the identity of the groups of compilers and
redactors who shaped the text of Svacchandatantram. Once again,
in the absence of external evidence, redaction criticism can only
reexamine the internal techniques, concerns, and values displayed
in their handling of strata and traditions. Only these exist as clues
to their if not individual, at least collective identities and
dates, that in turn may further indicate the age and provenance
of Svacchandatantram.
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The preceding discussion of the rules for dating, and the
number of strata and sources, has indirectly touched on many of
these techniques. In general, any textual discontinuity signals a
another textual layer just as fault lines in geology indicate the
intersection and overlapping of different plates. Naturally, this
procedure risks fabricating a fallacious compositional history from
mere lapses and inadvertancies possibly stemming from a single
hand. And the superimposition of alien ideals of textual unity can
distort less "logical" but traditional patterns of organization.
Nevertheless, the recurrence of strands of similar material in
different texts externally corroborates, in most cases, the results of
internal criticism in unraveling the work woven by anonymous
generations. Moreover, for a tradition where innovation must
masquerade as original revelation, the strands representing
different sources or traditions become obscured in convincing
compilations.
Among these textual discontinuities, differences in style, such
as metre, vocabulary, and degree of standardness in usage, more