History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c93.386
History of Dharmaśāstra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c93.386
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v7.c93.386.1
According to the Pūrvamīmāṁsā Veda is eternal, self-existent and of absolute authority, one fails to understand how sages could have authority at the beginning of the Kali-yuga to prohibit what the Veda enjoined or permitted. This seems to be a fiction invented to accommodate as Dharma the changes in people's ideas and practices that had occurred. It would have been honest and straightforward if the writers on Dharmaśāstra had said that changed circumstances required that the words of the Veda or of the old smṛtis should not be followed. And there is nothing novel or revolutionary in saying this. Both Manu²⁰⁷¹ and Yājñavalkya prescribe that one should not observe but give up, what was (once) deemed to be dharma, if it had become hateful to the people and if it would end in unhappiness and not lead to the attainment of heaven. Even the Mitākṣarā follows this precept of the two smṛtis and expressly says that unequal distribution (at partition) of ancestral wealth, though found in the Śāstras, should not be followed because people had come to hate it. It may be noted that the word used by Yāj. and others is 'lokavidviṣṭa' or 'lokavikruṣṭa' (hated or reviled by the people) and not 'śiṣṭa-vidviṣṭa', the idea being that even if orthodox learned *paṇḍits* insist that people must follow what the Veda and smṛtis declare to be Dharma, common people may give up practices condemned by them or hateful to them.
v7.c93.386.2
This attitude recognizes the historical facts that practices change in the course of centuries and common people are entitled to ignore the dicta even of the Veda (much more of the smṛtis). To the question why should one not be allowed to marry one's mother's sister or mother s sister's daughter if a maternal uncle's daughter can be married, the Smṛticandrikā replies ' we do not say that she could not be married according to Śāstra, but she should not be married as people abhor such a marriage' and it quotes Yāj I. 156 (by oversight it ascribes the verse to Manu). In modern times when any change or reform in religious or social practices is suggested, Pandits calling themselves Sanātanis put forward the pleas that the proposed change or reform is opposed to the śāstras, that the controversy should be carried on according to the Mīmāṁsā rules, that all Smṛti and other dicta should be so construed as to lead to *samanvaya* (consistent arrangement of apparently discordant texts), that the historical approach leads nowhere and should not be resorted to. All these objections are here briefly dealt with.
v7.c93.386.3
It has been shown how from Vedic times to the present day great changes have taken place in religious ideas, worship and practices, how smṛtis from Gautama, Āpastamba, Manu downwards espouse conflicting views so much so that as early as the Mahābhārata Vyāsa ²⁰⁷² had to protest that 'rationalisation is unstable, Vedas are in conflict with each other, there is no single sage whose opinion is held to be authoritative (by all), the truth about Dharma is enveloped in a cave (i. e. it cannot be clearly discerned) and that therefore the path (to be followed) is the one followed by the great mass of people' The Mīmāṁsā does not often lead to certain conclusions and it has already been seen how great Mīmāṁsā writers like Śabara, Kumārila, Prabhākara differ among themselves on numerous topics and it would be further illustrated later on how even great Mīmāṁsakas evolve highly conflicting conclusions in the interpretation of simple smṛti passages.
v7.c93.386.4
Change is the one absolute in the long history of our religious and social ideas and what those who appeal to the historical approach mean is that the smṛtis were composed by human authors during a period of 1500 or 2000 years and were greatly influenced by the then prevailing religious and social atmosphere, that many of their dicta cannot be fully reconciled so as to form a consistent code of conduct, that they cannot be regarded as forever binding on all Hindus, that in the 20th century our people are free to introduce or recognize such changes as are required or have already taken place among the people in the changed circumstances and that this course is sanctioned even by Manu and Yājñavalkya and medieval eminent authors and works on the Dharmaśāstra such as the Mitākṣarā and the Kalpataru. It is of course clear that changes in practices and principles should not be made merely for the sake of change or for the whims of some leader, but the governing principle of conscious change should be the feelings and needs of common people, while retaining the foundations on which society has been based for thousands of years.