History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c90.145.2

v7.c90.145.2

816, n 1325) in which ṛk and sāma verses are mentioned separately and ‘purāṇa’ (*purāṇaṁ yajuṣā saha*) is associated with *yajus*, and says this collocation seemed to him highly significant and that he felt fully convinced that the Purāṇa pañcalakṣaṇa and the Mahābhārata owe their origin to the Aśvamedha sacrifice and especially to its Pāriplava ākhyānas. Reasons of available space preclude a detailed examination of this paper. But a few fundamental objections and matters must be mentioned. The words ‘purāṇaṁ yajuṣā saha’ should ordinarily mean (as in passages like Devadattaḥ saputra āgataḥ) no more than ‘Purāṇa and Yajus’. Yāj 1. 101 provides¹⁴⁰² that after the daily bath, a vedic householder should undertake every day the japa of portions of the (three) Vedas, the Atharvaveda, Purāṇas together with Itihāsa and of ādhyātmikī-vidyā (Upaniṣads). There is no special meaning here in the association ‘purāṇāni setihāsāni’ beyond ‘Purāṇas and Itihāsa’. One, therefore, fails to understand how the words ‘purāṇaṁ yajuṣā saha’ are highly significant for arriving at the conviction that Aśvamedha is the origin of Purāṇa and Mahābhārata. Then on p. 202 of the paper in question Prof. Hazra quotes a passage from ¹⁴⁰³ Śaṅkarācārya's bhāṣya on Chāndogya III. 4.