History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c90.162

v7.c90.162

Sāmba between 500 and 800 A. D. (p. 91), the Viṣṇudharmapurāṇa between 200-300 A. D. (p. 143), the Viṣṇudharmottarapurāṇa between 400 to 500 A. D. (p. 212) and the present Narasiṁha-purāṇa between 400 to 500 A. D. To examine all his reasons the present writer would have to write another book. Therefore, he proposes to give only a few illustrations of the way in which Dr. Hazra arrives at his dates. But before this is done it is better to mention some of his own findings on the Purāṇas and the four Upapurāṇas mentioned above. On p. 27 he observes that the text of the extant Mahāpurāṇas which are the results of innumerable changes, modifications and interpolations made at different times and by different sects is scarcely reliable and can be used with great caution and careful discrimination. I agree with him. But the same or perhaps worse is the case with the Upapurāṇas. Prof. Hazra himself says ('Studies' vol. I. p. 23) that after the group of 18 principal Purāṇas had been compiled many sub-systems and sects like the Śāktas and Sauras came into prominence and their adherents interpolated chapters in the 18 established Purāṇas and wrote new and independent works styled Purāṇas in order to propagate their own ideas and that some of these latter came to be called Upapurāṇas. The result is that, unless we have critical editions of the Purāṇas and the principal Upapurāṇas on the model of the critical edition of the Mahābhārata at the BORI in Poona, all chapters and often single verses are suspect. But the task of preparing critical editions of even the principal Purāṇas and some of the Upapurāṇas based upon ancient and mediæval mss. collected from all parts of India would be far more colossal and costly than even the critical edition of the Mahābhārata. Therefore, most chronological conclusions about the dates of Purāṇas and Upapurāṇas and about the borrowings of one Purāṇa from another are just tentative at the most and likely to be set aside by new evidence as long as critical editions of Purāṇas and Upapurāṇas are not available.