Hindu Law and Custom (Recht und Sitte) c7.127

c7.127

The theory that the transition from the Sūtra form to the Śloka form was connected and coeval with the transition of the sacred law from the Vedic Caraṇas to special schools of Dharma, must, in the nature of things, remain a hypothesis, which, however, gains a great amount of probability for reasons of various kinds. Thus from the close relationship between the M. and the Mah. it becomes understandable that the epic Śloka was selected for both, be it that the epic already existed at an earlier time in its present form or was brought into this form at the same time as M. Like the epic, M. too is meant for the great mass of the people or at least for the educated, acquainted with Sanskrit. And as the epic was transformed from a simple description of battles and war-scenes into a didactic poem—a Smṛti,¹ there developed out of the Dharmasūtras, the handbooks of the schools of the Brahmans, the metrical presentation of the Dharma which should be equally binding on everybody. Also the time of origin of our M. and the Mah. in their present form is approximately the same. As M. in its essential parts and view of its relations to Bṛh. and Nār. can hardly be assigned to a period later than the 2.-3. century A. D., so the Mah. too according to the researches of Bühler, must have existed in approximately its present form at least about 300-500 A. D. ¹