India as Known to Panini: A Study of the Cultural Material in the Ashtadhyayi c8.s2.12

c8.s2.12

The occasional studentships for shorter terms or study of special texts or observance of particular vows points to a new feature in the educational system. These gave to seekers after truth and advanced knowledge, opportunities for specialisation to realise their desires towards self-fulfilment both through the study of texts and prescribed practices. This practice of occasional studentship is also known to the *Upanishads*. *SNĀTAKA*—The student who completes his study is called *snātaka*. The Gaṇasūtra holds it as completion of Vedic study (*Veda-samāpti*, V.4.29). The more proficient *snātaka* was singled out as *nishṇāta* (with his study fully completed). This term for proficiency was later on applied to proficiency in any study or craft, *e.g.* *nishṇātaḥ kaṭakaraṇe*, skilled (*kuśala*) in the art of mat-making (VIII.3.89). The epithet *sragvī* (V.2.121, wearer of garland) appears also to have been applied to a *snātaka*. The *srak* was a sign of graduation and the *Gṛihya Sūtras* differentiate it from the ordinary garland for decoration called *mālā* (V. M. Apte, *Social and Religious Life in the Gṛihya Sūtras*, p. 107). Manu also applies the term *sragvī* to a *snātaka* (*Manu Smṛiti*, III.3). A student who ends his studentship and enters upon the householder's life is condemned by Pāṇini as *khaṭvārūḍha* ('taking to the luxury of sleeping on a cot,' not permitted to a Brahmachārī, II.1.26). *HOUSE-HOLDER*—*Gṛihapati* is the regular name, from the *Ṛigveda* onwards, for the householder as master of the house. Pāṇini refers to him in connection with the Fire kindled at the time of marriage with whose worship commenced his life as a householder (*Gṛihapatinā saṁyukte ñyaḥ*, IV.4.90). The *Kāśikā* treats *Gārhpatya* as the technical term for the Household Fire.