History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v2.c24.s1.534

v2.c24.s1.534

*Snāna* or *Samāvartana*:—(Taking the ceremonial bath after finishing Vedic study and returning from the teacher's house). Some sūtrakāras such as Gaut. (VIII. 16), Āp. gṛ. XII. 1, Hir. gṛ. 9. 1 and Yāj. I. 51 employ the word 'snāna' for this saṁskāra, while Āśv. gṛ. III. 8. 1, Baud. gṛ. (II. 6. 1), Āp. Dh. S. I. 2. 7. 15 and 31, Bhār. gṛ. II. 18 employ the word samāvartana. The Khādira gṛ. (I. 3. 2-3, III. 1. 1) and Gobhila III. 4. 7 use the word 'āplavana' (which means snāna). Manu (III. 4) uses both 'snāna' and 'samāvartana' in "a *dvija* being permitted by his teacher, may take the ceremonial bath and return from his teacher according to the rules laid down (in his own gṛhyasūtra) and then marry a a girl &c". Aparārka (p. 76) explains this verse by saying that it makes a distinction between snāna and samāvartana. The distinction consists in this: snāna or ceremonial bath indicates the completion of the period of student-hood. A man who wants to remain a brahmacārin all his life need not undergo this saṁskāra. Samāvartana literally means 'return from the teacher's house to one's home'. If a boy learns under his own father, then literally speaking there will be no return in his case from a teacher's house. Medhātithi⁹⁶⁹ (on Manu III. 4) puts this position forcibly. Samāvartana is not a necessary *aṅga* (adjunct) of marriage and therefore he who learnt the Veda in his father's house may, though there is no return (to the father's house from the teacher's house), enter on matrimony. Some hold that Samāvartana is an *aṅga* of marriage and consists in the ceremonial bath. If it be said that the gerundial termination (tvā in snātvā in Manu III. 4) conveys distinction between snāna and samāvartana, the reply is that Manu will later on speak of samāvartana as the saṁskāra of snāna.