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The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c14.s10: Smriti Nibandhas

The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c14.s10

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English

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Smriti Nibandhas

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¹ Kane: *History of Dharmasastras*, Vol. I. (Poona 1930), pp. 308, 363, 366, 380, 384, 405, 412-413, 425-26, 434-37, 440, 446, 447-453, 456-62.

Law Scholars of the Fourteenth and the Fifteenth Centuries

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Chaṇḍeśvara's *Smriti Ratnākara* is a nibandha or digest of law in seven sections, each called *Ratnākara*. The sections are named: (1) *Kritya* or ceremonial observances and festivities (*vratas*), (2) *Dāna* (gifts), (3) *Vyavahāra* (legal procedure), (4) *Śuddhi* (purification on birth, death etc.), (5) *Pūjā* (worship), (6) *Vivāda* (civil and criminal law), and (7) *Grihastha* (householder). Some of these *Ratnākaras* were composed in the first quarter of the fourteenth century (1314-24). His *Rājanīti Ratnākara* is an independent treatise. It may have been composed in the third quarter of the same century.

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Mādhava, the minister of Vijayanagara, is the author of a commentary on the *Parāśara Smriti*. His work on *Kālanirṇaya* also is famous. Both these treatises were composed in the middle of the fourteenth century (1335-1360).

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Viśveśvara's *Madanapārijāta* is a *smriti* work written for King Madanapāla of Kanauj (1360-70). His *Smriti Kaumudī* is a treatise specializing in the *adhikāra* (rights) and duties of the Sūdra. Two other works, ascribed to him, namely, the *Madana-mahārṇava* and *Tithinirṇayasāra* have become famous.

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A classic in the line of *bhāṣya* is Kulluka's commentary on Manu. The author is a Bengali but belongs to the Benares school by domicile. He draws substantially upon Medhātithi's commentary (c 850) but does not mention Jīmūtavāhana (c 1100-50). His dates are uncertain (c 1250-1425 ?).

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Vāchaspati's *Vivādachintāmaṇi* was written for Harinārāyaṇa of Mithilā towards the end of the fifteenth century.

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The *Sarasvatīvilāsa* was composed under orders of King Pratāparudra (1497-1539) of Orissa in the first quarter of the sixteenth century. The work is authoritative in Southern India. Towards the commencement of the work we come across the Kauṭalyan doctrine of *maṇḍala* ("geopolitical" sphere). It is discussed on the authority of Parāśara, Uśanas, Viṣṇu, Brihaspati, Viśālākṣa, Manu and others.

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During the latter half of the sixteenth century the *Toḍarānanda* was composed by Toḍaramalla (d. 1589), the celebrated Hindu commander and statesman of Akbar the Great. This encyclopaedic work, dealing as it does not only with law but with astronomy and medicine as well, is a few years anterior to but may be taken as contemporaneous with Abul Fazl's *Ain-i-Akbari* (1597).

Raghunandana

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Raghunandana's *Aṣṭāviṁśatitattva* may have been composed about 1570. He is said to have been a fellow-pupil of Chaitanya (1485-1534) under Vāsudeva Sārvabhauma and may have been his junior contemporary and a senior contemporary of Akbar the Great and Abul Fazl. He is by all means anterior to Nīlakaṇṭha and Mitra-Miśra. The *smriti* encyclopaedia of this Bengali jurist may be taken to represent the ideas of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.²

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² M. M. Chakravarti in the *Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal* (Calcutta 1915) in Kane Vol. I. pp. 416-419.

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Raghunandana is a man of Navadvīpa (Bengal). His treatise is a work in twenty-eight sections, each given over to a *tattva* or topic. The treatise as available in print, although not in Devanāgari but in Bengali script however, covers over 690 pages of royal octavo size. The material is made up of some 27,600 verses.³

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³ Edited by Dukkhirām Kāvyaratna (Calcutta 1907).

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Like other *smriti* works the *Aṣṭāvimaśatitattva* also is encyclopaedic. Only, this encyclopaedia covers nothing but the *āchāra* (individual and domestic mores) section of a fullfledged *dharma* or *smriti śāstra*.

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The interests of Raghunandana are as wide as life itself. The influences of the season on the human body and mind as well as those of the diverse tastes are to him important enough for an analysis. The food grains, the vegetables, the salts, the fruits, the waters (including the milk of cocoanuts, for instance), the preparations of milk, (curds, whey, ghee etc.), the sugarcanes, the palms, the onions, the garlics, the fishes, and the meats and so forth have been likewise described with reference to their physiological bearings on man (Text pp. 194-200).

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*Kraya-nirṇaya* deals with the analysis of purchase as a category of law and economics. The authorities cited in regard to diverse aspects of sale and purchase transactions are Manu, Yājnavalkya, Nārada, Brihaspati, and Kātyāyana (Text p. 227).

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The excavation of tanks, the establishment of gods, the construction of boats, and the treatment of diseases are some of the items of social life described in this treatise.⁴ In Raghunandana's discussion of human interests the agricultural lands and their qualities, the plough, the seeds, the bullocks, the art of cultivation etc. have likewise commanded special attention.

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⁴ Pp. 293-296, 297-301, 635-636,

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On *rājanīti* also Raghunandana (pp. 296-297) has something to say. He is a chip of the old Brāhmaṇic diplomacy in the statement that *kritvā samvandhakam chāpi viśvaset śatruṇā na hi*. That is, the king must not trust an enemy even after some relationship (pact) has been established with him. Among the others not to be trusted are the *rājasevī*, i.e., the king's officers. The bad king is always to be feared (*kurājani bhayan nityam*).

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In Raghunandana's judgment the king to be adored by everybody is Kārtyavīrya, the monarch *yena sāgara-paryantā dhanuṣā nirjitā mahī* (by whom the Earth up to the seas was overpowered with his bow). He advises that people should get up in the morning with salutations to Kārtyavīrya.

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The king should be neither *mridu* (mild) nor *dāruṇa* (severe). In the first instance, he is likely to be a failure. In the other case he is likely to excite the people (*tikṣṇādudvijate janah*).

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The authorities of Raghunandana in political morals are the *Matsya Purāṇa*, the *Mahābhārata*, the *Harivamśa*, and the *Viṣṇu Purāṇa*. He does not mention Manu by name. But Manu's phrases are to be met with. In all the twenty-eight sections this encyclopædist has quoted altogether some three hundred authorities.

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In 1816 Raghunandana's hold on the Hindu society of Bengal was described by Rammohun Roy (1772-1833)⁵ as follows: "The whole community in Bengal, with very few exceptions, have since the middle of the last century (c 1750) forsaken their ancient modes of the performance of ceremonial rites of religion and followed the precepts of the late Raghunandan, and consequently differ in the most essential points of ceremonies from the natives of Bihar, Tirhut and Benares."

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⁵ Preface to his English transl. of the *Ishopanishad* (*The English Works of Raja Rammohun Roy*, Panini Office, Allahabad 1906) p. 71.

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Raghunandana was held in great esteem by Rammohun. On the subject of concremation (*sahamaraṇa*) or burning of widows, the so-called *suttee*, against which it was Rammohun's life work to agitate until final penalization by law, he places Raghunandana in an interesting light. He says that "the Smārtta Raghunandana, the modern expounder of law in Bengal, classes concremation among the rites holding out promises of fruition." According to Rammohun, Raghunandana inculcates that learned men should not endeavour to persuade the ignorant to perform rites holding out promises of fruition. Raghunandana is thus interpreted by Rammohun as being opposed to concremation. The verdict of the ancient jurist Angirā to the effect that "there is no other course for a widow besides concremation" is interpreted by Raghunandana, says Rammohun, "as conveying exaggerated praise of the adoption of that course."⁶

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⁶ *Abstract of the Arguments regarding the Burning of Widows* (Calcutta 1830) in *The English Works of Raja Rammohun Roy* (Panini Office, Allahabad 1906) pp. 368, 371-372.

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In the judgment of Rammohun the position of Raghunandana is very high. In the preface to his English translation of the *Īśopaniṣat* (1823) "the great Raghunandana" is cited by him as having quoted the authority of Jāmadagni thus: "For the benefit of those who are inclined to worship, figures are invented to serve as representations of God, who is merely understanding and has no second, no parts nor figure; consequently to these representatives, either male or female forms and other circumstances are fictitiously assigned." In other words, Raghunandana is a rationalist in regard to Hindu image-worship, and Rammohun who is out to defend Hinduism against Christianity accepts Raghunandana as a reliable interpreter of the Hindu images. It is very significant that both as regards *sahamaraṇa* and idolatry Raghunandana should have been treated as authority by Rammohun with a view to fortify his own social reform propaganda. A man who could furnish even Rammohun with social reform ideas is evidently an extraordinary figure in Hindu sociology.

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*Legal Thought of the Seventeenth Century*

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The seventeenth century is very great in the output of works on law. The two cousins, Kamalākara and Nīlakaṇṭha, Mitra-Miśra, Nanda Paṇḍita and Anantadeva are some of the most remarkable names of this period. Nor must we forget Viśveśvara (1602-85), nicknamed the "Gāgā Bhaṭṭa," who officiated at the coronation ceremony of Śivāji in 1644. He is a nephew of Kamalākara. The treatise entitled *Kāyastha-dharma-dīpa* (1677) is his work in which there is an attempt to raise the Kāyasthas socially.⁷

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⁷ J. N. Sarkar: *Shivaji* (Calcutta 1929), pp. 209-214, 390.

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The writer on the most diverse sciences and the author of some twenty works is Kamalākara, the Deccani jurist. His *Nirṇaya-sindhu* (c 1612) is still influential among the Marathas of the Bombay Presidency. Two other works on the topics of *smriti śāstras* are the *Śūdrakamalākara* and *Vivādatāṇḍava*. The latter deals with the ordinary topics of *vyavahāra*. The former is an interesting work as it is given over exclusively to the rights and duties of the Śūdras. One of his treatises, entitled the *Pūrttakamalākara*, deals with the dedication of tanks, wells, trees, and so forth, the foundation of public buildings, consecration of temples, images, flags etc. and the coronation of rulers. It is strange that he should not have cared to devote a special section or treatise to *rājanīti* like Nīlakaṇṭha, Mitra-Miśra, and Anantadeva.

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Nīlakaṇṭha's *Bhagavantabhāskara* is complete in 12 *mayūkhas* (rays). One of the *mayūkhas* is given over to *rājanīti*. The author was a cousin of Kamalākara and may be taken to have composed his works between 1610 and 1650.

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Mitra-Miśra's *Viramitrodaya* is an encyclopaedic treatise of *nibandha*. Its sections are known as *prakāśas*, one of which is the famous *Rājanītiprakāśa*. A commentary on the *Mitākṣarā* commentary of Yājñavalkya is also from his pen.

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The author's patron was Vīrasimha at whose hands Abul Fazl found his death (1602). Like Nīlakaṇṭha he flourished in the first half of the seventeenth century and is posterior to Raghunandana.

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Nanda Paṇḍita's commentary (called the *Vaijayantī*) on the *Viṣṇudharma sūtra* is still considered to be an authority of the Benares School. Equally authoritative is his treatise on adoption known as the *Dattaka-* *Mīmāṃsā*. His works belong to the first quarter of the seventeenth century.

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A digest of the seventeenth century which is comprehensive in its sections is the *Smṛtikaustubha* (c 1675) by Anantadeva, a Deccani jurist. One of its sections is the *Rājadharmakaustubha* divided into several *dīdhitis* (rays). One *dīdhiti* deals with the virtues and vices of kings, queens, ministers, etc., the coronation ceremony and so forth. In another *dīdhiti* is to be found the description of the law court, the judge, the plaint and other items discussed generally in *vyavahāra*. The work was composed under the orders of Baz Bahadur, ruler of Almora in the Himalayan Hills (c 1638-1678).

Bālambhaṭṭa and Jagannātha

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Two great *nibandha* writers of the eighteenth century were Bālambhaṭṭa the "Maratha" and Jagannātha the Bengali. Both of them came into contact with the British authorities.

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Bālambhaṭṭa's commentary on the *Mitākṣarā* commentary of Yājnavalkya is a late eighteenth century work (c 1775). The author was a Deccani (Maratha) scholar, and a *paṇḍit* to Colebrooke (c 1800). He is said to have died in ripe old age about 1830. Bālambhaṭṭa (1740?-1830?) was therefore a senior contemporary of Rammohun (1772-1833).

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The commentary is curiously enough described in the colophons as being the work of his mother Lakṣmīdevī. There are several rulings in this treatise to endow women with rights of inheritance such as are denied by the masters, Yājnavalkya and Vijnāneśvara, themselves, and of course by others. Sisters, for instance, are authorized by Bālambhaṭṭa to succeed immediately after brothers in case a man dies without a male issue.

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The real Bengali contemporary of Bālambhaṭṭa in *smriti* is Jagannātha Tarkapanchānana (1695-1806), whose life is said to have covered something more than the entire eighteenth century at both ends. But his work, *Vivādabhangārṇava*, a digest, was prepared at the suggestion of the British Government under the inspiration of Jones. Parts of it were translated into English by Colebrooke (1797). He was held in great esteem by Rammohun.

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