M.) or the Vṛiddha-Manu (Old M.), who are often found quoted, and
apparently represent one, if not two, larger recension's of this Smṛiti.
The oldest existing commentary on the Mānava-Dharmaśāstra is by
Medhātithi, who is first quoted in 1200, and is usually supposed
to have lived in the 9th or 10th century. He had, however, several
predecessors to whom he refers as pūrve, “the former ones.” The
most esteemed of the commentaries is that of Kullūka Bhaṭṭa,
composed at Benares in the 15th century.
Next in importance among Smṛitis ranks the Yājñavalkya Dharmaśātra.[1] Its origin and date are not less uncertain—except that, Yājñavalkya. in the opinion of Professor Stenzler, which has never been questioned, it is based on the Manusmṛiti, and represents a more advanced stage of legal theory and definition than that work. Yājñavalkya, as we have seen, is looked upon as the founder of the Vājasaneyins or White Yajus, and the author of the Śatapatha-brāhmaṇa. In the latter work he is represented as having passed some time at the court of King Janaka of Videha (Tirhut); and in accordance therewith he is stated, in the introductory couplets of the Dharmaśāstra, to have propounded his legal doctrines to the sages, while staying at Mithilā (the capital of Videha). Hence, if the connexion between the metrical Smṛitis and the old Vedic schools be a real one and not one of name merely, we should expect to find in the Yājñavalkya-smṛiti special coincidences of doctrine with the Kātīyasūtra, the principal Sūtra of the Vājasaneyins. Now, some sufficiently striking coincidences between this Smṛiti and Pāraskara's Kātiya-Gṛihyasūtra have indeed been pointed out; and if there ever existed a Dharmasūtra belonging to the same school, of which no trace has hitherto been found, the points of agreement between this and the Dharmaśāstra might be expected to be even more numerous. A connexion between this Smṛiti and the Mānava-gṛihyasūtra seems, however, likewise evident. As in the case of Manu, ślokas are quoted in various works from a Bṛihat- and a Vṛiddha-Yājñavalkya. The Yājñavalkya-smṛiti consists of three books, corresponding to the three great divisions of the Indian theory of law: āchāra, rule of conduct (social and caste duties); vyavahāra, civil and criminal law; and prāyaśchitta, penance or expiation. There are two important commentaries on the work: the famous Mitāksharā,[2] by Vijñāneśvara, who lived under the Chālukya king Vikramāditya of Kalyāṇa (1076-1127); and another by Aparārka or Aparāditya, a petty Sīlāra prince of the latter half of the 12th century.
The Nāradīya-Dharmaśāstra, or Nāradasmṛiti,[3] is a work of a more practical kind; indeed, it is probably the most systematic and businesslike Nāradasmṛiti. of all the Smṛitis. It does not concern itself with religious and moral precepts, but is strictly confined to law. Of this work again there are at least two different recensions. Besides the text translated by Dr Jolly, a portion of a larger recension has come to light in India. This version has been commented upon by Asahāya, “the peerless”—a very esteemed writer on law who is supposed to have lived before Medhātithi (? 9th century)—and it may therefore be considered as the older recension of the two. But, as it has been found to contain the word dīnāra, an adaptation of the Roman denarius, it cannot, at any rate, be older than the 2nd century; indeed, its date is probably several centuries later.
The Parāśara-smṛiti[4] contains no chapter on jurisprudence, but treats only of religious duties and expiation's in 12 adhyāyas. The Parāśara. deficiency was, however, supplied by the famous exegete Mādhava (in the latter half of the 14th century), who made use of Parāśara's text for the compilation of a large digest of religious law, usually called Parāśara-mādhavīyam, to which he added a third chapter on vyavahāra, or law proper. Besides the ordinary text of the Parāśara-smṛiti, consisting of rather less than 600 couplets, there is also extant a Bṛihat-Parāśarasmṛiti, probably an amplification of the former, containing not less than 2980 (according to others even 3300) ślokas.
Whether any of the Dharmaśāstras were ever used In India as actual “codes of law” for the practical administration of justice is very doubtful; indeed, so far as the most prominent works of this class are concerned, it is highly improbable.[5] No doubt these works were held to be of the highest authority as laying down the principles of religious and civil duty; but it was not so much any single text as the whole body of the Smṛiti that was looked upon as the embodiment of the divine law. Hence, the moment the actual work of codification begins in the 11th century, we find the jurists engaged in practically showing how the Smṛitis confirm and supplement each other, and in reconciling seeming contradictions between them. This new phase of Indian jurisprudence commences with Vijñāneśvara's Mitāksharā, which, though primarily a commentary on Yājñavalkya, is so rich in original matter and illustrations from other Smṛitis that it is far more adapted to serve as a code of law than the work it professes to explain. This treatise is held in high esteem all over India, with the exception of the Bengal or Gaurīya school of law, which recognizes as its chief authority the digest of its founder, Jīmūtavāhana, especially the chapter on succession, entitled Dāyabhāga.[6] Based on the Mitāksharā are the Smṛitichandrikā,[7] a work of great common-sense, written by Devāṇḍa Bhaṭṭa, in the 13th century, and highly esteemed in Southern India; and the Vīramitrodaya, a compilation consisting of two chapters, on āchāra and vyavahāra, made in the first half of the 17th century by Mitramiśra, for Rājā Vīrasiṃha, or Bīrsinh Deo of Orchhā, who murdered Abul Fazl, the minister of the emperor Akbar, and author of the Āīn i Akbarī. There is no need here to enumerate any more of the vast number of treatises on special points of law, of greater or less merit, the more important of which will be found mentioned in English digests of Hindu law.
II. Philosophy.[8]—The contemplative Indian mind shows at all times a strong disposition for metaphysical speculation. In the old religious lyrics this may be detected from the very first. Not to speak of the abstract nature of some even of the oldest Vedic deities, this propensity betrays itself in a certain mystic symbolism, tending to refine and spiritualize the original purely physical character and activity of some of the more prominent gods, and to impart a deep and subtle import to the rites of the sacrifice. The primitive worship of more or less isolated elemental forces and phenomena had evidently ceased to satisfy the religious wants of the more thoughtful minds. Various syncretist tendencies show the drift of religious thought towards some kind of unity of the divine powers, be it in the direction of the pantheistic idea, or in that of an organized polytheism, or even towards monotheism. In the latter age of the hymns the pantheistic idea is rapidly gaining ground, and finds vent in various cosmogonic speculations; and in the Brāhmaṇa period we see it fully developed. The fundamental conception of this doctrine finds its expression in the two synonymous terms brahman (neutr.), probably originally “mystic effusion, devotional utterance,”[9] then “holy impulse,” and ātman[10] (masc.), “breath, self, soul.”
The recognition of the essential sameness of the individual souls, emanating all alike (whether really or imaginarily) from the ultimate spiritual essence (parama-brahman) “as sparks issue from the fire,” and destined to return thither, involved some important problems. Considering the infinite diversity of individual souls of the animal and vegetable world, exhibiting various degrees of perfection, is it conceivable that each of them is the immediate efflux of the Supreme Being, the All-perfect, and that each, from the lowest to the highest, could re-unite therewith directly at the close of its mundane existence? The difficulty implied in the latter question was at first met by the assumption of an intermediate state of expiation and purification, a kind of purgatory; but the whole problem found at last a more comprehensive solution in the doctrine of transmigration (saṃsāra). Some scholars have suggested[11] that metempsychosis may have been the prevalent belief among the aboriginal tribes of India, and may have been taken over from them by the Indo-Aryans. This, no doubt, is possible; but in the absence of any positive proof it would be idle to speculate on its probability; the more so as the pantheistic notion of a universal spiritual essence would probably of itself sufficiently account for the spontaneous growth of such a belief. In any case, however, we can only assume that speculative minds seized upon it as offering the most satisfactory (if not the only possible) explanation of the great problem of phenomenal existence with its unequal distribution of weal and woe. It is certainly a significant fact that, once established in Indian thought, the doctrine of metempsychosis is never again called in question—that, like the fundamental idea on which it rests, viz. the essential sameness of the immaterial element of all sentient beings, the notion of saṃsāra has become an axiom, a universally conceded principle of Indian philosophy. Thus the latter has never quite risen to the heights of pure thought; its object is indeed jijñāsā, the search for knowledge; but it is an inquiry (mīmāṃsā) into the nature of things undertaken not solely for the attainment of the truth, but with a view to a specific object—the discontinuance of saṃsāra, the cessation of mundane existence after the present life. Every sentient being, through ignorance, being liable to sin, and destined after each existence to be born again in some new form, dependent on the actions committed during the immediately preceding life, all mundane existence thus is the source of ever-renewed suffering; and the task of the philosopher is to discover the means of attaining moksha, “release” from the bondage of material existence, and union with the Supreme Self—in fact, salvation. It is with a view to this,
- ↑ Edited, with a German translation, by F. Stenzler.
- ↑ Translated by H. T. Colebrooke.
- ↑ Ed. (Bibl. Ind., 1885) J. Jolly, trsl. S.B.E. xxxiii.
- ↑ Edited in Bombay Sansk. Ser. (1893); translated Bibl. Ind. (1887). The chapter on inheritance (dāya-vibhāga) translated by A. C. Burnell (1868).
- ↑ See West and Bühler, Digest, i. p. 55. A different view is expressed by A. Burnell, Dāyavibhāga, p. xiii.
- ↑ Translated by H. C. Colebrooke (1810).
- ↑ The section on inheritance has been translated by T. Kristnasawmy Iyer (1866).
- ↑ Cf. F. Max Müller, Six Systems of Indian Philosophy (1899); R. Garbe, Philosophy of Ancient India (Chicago, 1897).
- ↑ The etymological connexion of brahman (from root varh, vardh) with Latin verbum, English word (corresponding to a Sanskrit vardha), assumed by some scholars, though doubtful, is not impossible. The development of its meaning would be somewhat like that of λόγος.
- ↑ The derivation of ātman (Ger. Atem) from root an, to breathe (or perhaps av, to blow) seems still the most likely. A recent attempt to connect it with αὐτός can scarcely commend itself.
- ↑ See, e.g. A. E. Gough, The Philosophy of the Upanishads, p. 24; A. A. Macdonell, Hist. of Sanskrit Lit. p. 387.
