Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v1.c5.325

v1.c5.325

¹ The law books are no less severe. Both the brothers and both the husbands in case of a new marriage must for their defiling offence undertake penances. Āpastamba, ii, 5, 12.22. Brothers stained by re-marriage, the husband of the younger but first-married sister, and the husband of the later-married elder sister must, like the thief, the atheist, the man expelled from his caste, etc., not be invited to a Çrāddha or sacrifice to the dead. Gautama, xv, 16, 18. Cp. xviii, 18, 19. According to Baudhāyana, ii, 1, 1.40 the two brothers, the priest who acted at the wedding, and he that bestowed the bride, must cleanse themselves by a twelve days’ Kṛcchra penance; for the wife a three days’ fast is enough. According to iv, 6.5-7 pañcagavya (a mixture of butter, milk, sour milk, dung and urine of the cow) mixed with rice-gruel is a help. All these four men participators fall into a bad offence, like the murder of one that is not a Brahman, or of a cow, like blaspheming the Veda, adultery, etc. Viṣṇu, xxxvii, 13 ff. So, too, Yājñav., iii, 234 ff. Cp. Manu, xi, 6. Viṣṇu, liv, 16, lays down for the participators just named and the re-married elder sister the Cāndrāyaṇa penance. Parāçara, iv, 24, prescribes for the elder brother, the priest, the bride and her guardian variously graduated mortifications (Kṛcchra, Atikṛcchra, and Cāndrāyaṇa). For the MBh., Vasiṣṭha, xx, 7-10 is particularly enlightening: The two brothers must undergo certain defined penances (Kṛcchra and Atikṛcchra), the younger one hand over his wife to the elder, and the latter take her as his own wife (probably in form, as the expositor says), and then give her back to the other; then the younger must get married to her again. The man who marries a younger sister before the elder has to carry out twelve days’ Kṛcchra, and then wed the elder (probably over and above the other one). The husband