Caste in India: The Facts and the System c7.s2.2

c7.s2.2

The social life of the Hindus is in theory regulated by books whose authorship is attributed to more or less legendary sages, Manu, Yājñavalkya, Vasisṭha, and many others. The place which they accord to civil organization and to criminal repression has contributed, together with a too slavish translation of their Sanskrit title, to make them known as ‘Law-books’, or, to be more exact, ‘Books of the Law’—*dharmaśāstras*. We must not expect to find that they are codes, for of codes they have neither the origin, the form, nor the authority. We are in a country where the religious inspiration which presided over the early organization of societies has been less than elsewhere supplanted by the birth of a secular government. Hindu society is regulated by religious custom, and the law-books are essentially collections of religious precepts. In the absence of a true legislation and under the ever-increasing authority of the Brahmans, they have in the course of time received a sort of official and public sanction. They have, however, only acquired this late in the day, and then not without reservations; it represents a secondary evolution of their history, and in no wise offers conclusive evidence of their primitive character.