History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v1.c6.s23.28

v1.c6.s23.28

As Nārada's is regarded as an authoritative smṛti by Viśvarūpa, Medhātithi and other later writers and as Asahāya, who is mentioned by name in the commentary of Viśvarūpa, wrote a comment on Nārada, the Nāradasmṛti must be older by some centuries than the 8th century, the latest date to which Asahāya can be assigned. Bāṇa in his Kādambarī compares the royal palace to Nāradīya.³⁶⁶ Ordinarily Nāradīya standing by itself would denote the Nārada-purāṇa (compare Viṣṇu-purāṇa 3. 6. 21 where we have the form Nāradīya for the purāṇa). The Nārada-purāṇa (Venkateśvara Press edition, Bombay) contains, however, no treatment of rāja-dharma. Bāṇa may have intended a violent pun, meaning ‘the palace where the duties of kings were being expounded (āvarṇyamāna), like the Nāradīya in which rājadharma has not been set forth (avarṇyamāna).’ European scholars like Dr. Jolly and Bühler hold that Bāṇa refers to the extant Nāradasmṛti. But on this explanation also the difficulty is not entirely got over. The extant Nārada can hardly be described as a treatise on rājadharma. It deals only in an indirect way with one aspect of the king’s duties and is rather concerned with vyavahāra and the duties of the subjects towards each other from the strictly legal point of view. If we turn to the Mahābhārata and other works, we shall find that rājadharma meant something different from what is treated of in the Nāradasmṛti. Therefore Bāṇa's reference to the Nāradīya is of a doubtful character. The Rājanīti-ratnākara of Caṇḍeśvara frequently quotes Nārada on politics (pp. 3, 13, 79). These quotations are not traced in the printed Nārada. Therefore it is highly probable that Bāṇa refers to a distinct work of Nārada on politics which has not yet been recovered.