History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v1.c6.s13.12

v1.c6.s13.12

The analogy of the works of the schools of Āpastamba and others can furnish no proof. There are on the other hand weighty grounds for discarding that analogy altogether. It is a remarkable fact that excepting the three *caraṇas* (of the Black Yajurveda) of Āpastamba, Baudhāyana and Hiraṇyakeśin that arose and flourished in the southern portion of India, no *caraṇa* of any of the other Vedas has an extant dharmasūtra ascribed to the founder of the *sūtra-caraṇa*. An explanation is suggested in the following lines. The Brāhmaṇas in southern India were in the very early days of their colonisation surrounded by an alien culture and by alien customs. It was necessary therefore to formulate distinctly the rules of general conduct for the Aryan community in southern India, that studied the Black Yajurveda. The same necessity did not exist in northern India, where the members of the *sūtracaraṇas* knew their ordinary every day duties very well, and were more or less a homogeneous community with the same ideals and culture. Therefore in the beginning when manuals of śrauta and gṛhya ceremonies were first composed, it was not thought necessary to compose set treatises on *dharma* for each *caraṇa*. Some of the rules of conduct were embodied in the gṛhya sūtras because they were germane to the subjects treated of in them (such as the duties of Brahmacārins and householders, holidays etc.). Works, however, dealing with the general usages prevalent among the Aryan community in various parts of northern India must have been composed early enough. When the knowledge of the existence of the complete set of the sūtra works in the Āpastamba and other *caraṇas* of the Yajurveda in southern India permeated to northern and central India, the leaders of the *caraṇas* cast about for works that would complete the works of their *caraṇas* and bring them in a line with those of Āpastamba and others. Therefore the various *caraṇas* seized upon several dharmasūtras and adopted them in their schools for study. This must have occured at a comparatively early date. For Kumārila, as we saw above, enlightens us as to what dharmasūtras were specially studied in which Vedic schools. The fact that, though Gautama and Vasiṣṭha are said to have been specially studied by the students of the Sāmaveda and the Ṛgveda respectively, there is hardly anything in these dharmasūtras that specially connects them with the two Vedas affords some corroboration of the above hypothesis. This assimilation of independent dharmasūtras into individual *sūtracaraṇas* probably took place before or in the first centuries of the Christian era. Śabara (on Jaimini I. 3.4) seems to make fun of the dharmasūtras when he says that the direction to observe *brahmacarya* for forty-eight years was a device of those who wanted to hide their impotence (Gautama 2. 52, Āp. Dh. S. I. 1. 2. 11-12, Baud. Dh. S. I. 2. 1. speak of *brahmacarya* for 48 years). This shows that these dharmasūtras could not have been regarded as very authoritative by all early writers. Jaimini I. 3. 11 (according to Śabara) denies the independent authority of Kalpasūtras. It appears that the Mānava school, which according to the caraṇavyūha was a subdivision of the Maitrāyaṇīya, dwindled in numbers very early. Kumārila, who was a most learned and profound student of the various branches of Sanskrit literature, nowhere mentioned the Mānavadharmasūtra as studied by followers of the Black Yajurveda, though he mentions Baudhāyana and Āpastamba as studied by them. He places the Manusmṛti even higher than the Gautamadharmasūtra and betrays no knowledge of the existence of the Mānavadharmasūtra. Viśvarūpa who is generally identified with Sureśvara, the pupil of Śaṅkara, remarks that the Mānavacaraṇa is not existent (or found).¹⁵⁰