The Sacred Laws of the Aryas, Part I (Bühler) — Clarendon original, page scans + full text

e.g. those of Ajvalayana, vSankhayana, Gobhila, and Para- skara^ include a great many rules which bear indirectly only on the performance of the offerings in the sacred domestic fire. Thus on the occasion of the description of the initiation of Aryan students, Aj-valayana inserts directions regarding the dress and girdle to be worn, the length of the studentship, the manner of begging, the disposal of the alms collected, and other similar questions^ The exclusion of such incidental remarks on subjects that are not immediately connected with the chief aim of the work, is almost complete in Apastamba's Gr/hya-sutra, and reduces its size to less than one half of the extent of the shorter ones among the works enumerated above. It seems impossible to explain this restriction of the scope of Pra^na XXVII otherwise than by assuming that Apa- stamba wished to reserve all rules bearing rather on the duties of men than on the performance of the domestic offerings, for his sections on the sacred law.

A second and no less important argument for the unity of the whole Kalpa-sutra may be drawn from the cross- references which occur in several Praj-nas. In the Dharma- sutra we find on various occasions, where the performance of a ceremony is prescribed, the expression yathopadei-am, according to the injunction, added. In two of these passages, Dh. I, i, 4, 16, and II, 7, 17, 16, the Gr/hya- sutra is doubtlessly referred to, and the commentator Haradatta has pointed out this fact. On the other hand, the Gr/hya-sutra refers to the Dharma-sutra, employ- ing the same expression which has been quoted from

' Asvalayana Gnhya-siitra I, 19, cd. Stenzler.

XIV APASTAMBA.

the latter. Thus we read in the beginning of the chapter on funeral oblations, Gr?hya-sutra, Pa/ala 4, KhsLnda. 21, ma- sij-raddhasyaparapakshe yathopadej-a?;z kala//, ' the times for the monthly funeral sacrifice (fall) in the latter (dark) half of the month according to the injunction.' Now as neither the Gr/hya-sutra itself nor any preceding portion of the Kalpa-sutra contains any injunction on this point, it fellows that the long passage on this subject which occurs in the Dharma-sutra II, 7, 16, 4-32 is referred to. The expression yathopadei-am is also found in other passages of the Grzhya-sutra, e. g. towards the end of Kha;^<^a 7 and in the beginning of Kha;/^a 8, and must be explained there in a like manner. There are further a certain number of Sutras which occur in the same words both in the Pra^-na on domestic rites, and in that on the sacred law, e.g. Dh. I, i, i, 18; I, i, 2, 38; I, i, 4, 14. It seems that the author wished to call special attention to these rules by repeating them. Their recurrence and literal agreement may be considered an additional proof of the intimate connexion of the two sections.

Through a similar repetition of, at least, one Sutra it is possible to trace the connexion of the Dharma-sutra with the ^rauta-sutra. The rule r/tve va ^ayam upeyat, 'or he may have conjugal intercourse with his wife in the proper season,' is given, Dh. II, 2, 5, 17, with reference to a householder who teaches the Veda. In the chapter on the /faturmasya sacrifices it occurs also, as Haradatta has stated, and applies there to the sacrificer. In this case the repetition of the same words cannot be accidental, for the Sutra contains an irregular grammatical form, rztve for r/tvye. If the Dharma-sutra were the production of a different author and a later addition, the Pseudo-Apa- stamba would most probably not have hit on this peculiar irregular form. The repetition of the Sutra, under these circumstances, may be taken to show that the 5rauta-sutra and the Dharma-sutra belong to the same author.

Who this author really was, is a problem which cannot
be solved for the present, and which probably will always
remain unsolved, because wc know his family name only.

Introduction. Xv

For the form of the word itself shows that the name
Apastamba, just like those of most founders of Vedic
schools^ e. g. Baudhayana, Bharadva^a, Aj-valayana, Gau-
tama, is a patronymic. This circumstance is, of course^
fatal to all attempts at an identification of the individual
who holds so prominent a place among the teachers of the
Black Ya^ur-veda.

But we are placed in a somewhat better position with respect to the history of the school which has been named after Apastamba and of the works ascribed to him. Re- garding both, some information has been preserved by tradition, and a little more can be obtained from inscrip- tions and later works, while some interesting details regard- ing the time when, and the place where the Sutras were composed, may be elicited from the latter themselves. The data, obtainable from these sources, it is true, do not enable us to determine with certainty the year when the

Apastambiya school was founded, and when its Sutras were composed. But they make it possible to ascertain the position of the school and of its Sutras in Vedic lite- rature, their relative priority or posteriority as compared with other Vedic schools and works, to show with some amount of probability in what part of India they had their origin, and to venture, at least, a not altogether unsupported conjecture as to their probable antiquity.

As regards the first point, the A'ara;^avyuha, a supple- ment of the White Ya^ur-veda which gives the lists of the Vedic schools, informs us that the Apastambiya school formed one of the five branches of the KlvdUt^ikiya. school, which in its turn was a subdivision of the Taittiriyas, one of the ancient sections of Brahmawas who study the Black Ya^ur-veda. Owing to the very unsatisfactory condition of the text of the ATara^avyuha it is unfortunately not possible to ascertain what place that work really assigns to the Apastambiyas among the five branches of the Khaw(^ikiyas. Some MSS. name them first, and others last. They give either the following list, i. Kaleyas (Kaletas), 2. Skfya.ya.mns, 3. Hira/^yakei-ins, 4. Bharadva^-ins, and 5. Apastambins, or, i. Apastambins, 2,. Baudhayanins,

XVI APASTAMBA.

3. Satyaslia^/nns, 4. Hira/zyakei-ins, 5- Aukheyas^. But this defect is remedied to a certain extent by the now generally current tradition that the Apastambiyas are younger than the school of Baudhayana, and older than that of Satyashad/ia. Hirawyakej-in. Baudhayana, it is alleged, composed the first set of Statras connected with the Black Ya^ur-veda, and was succeeded by Bharadva^a, Apastamba, and Satyasha<^/^a Hirawyake^in, who all founded schools which bear their names ^.

This tradition has preserved two important pieces of information. Firstly, the Apastamba school is what Pro- fessor Max Miiller appropriately calls a Sutra/^arawa, i. e. a school whose founder did not pretend to have received a revelation of Vedic Mantras or of a Brahmawa text, but merely gave a new systematic arrangement of the precepts regarding sacrifices and the sacred law. Secondly, the Sutras of Apastamba occupy an intermediate position be- tween the works of Baudhayana and Hirawyake^in. Both' these statements are perfectly true, and capable of being supported by proofs, drawn from Apastamba's own and from other works.

As regards the first point, Professor Max Miiller has already pointed^ out that, though we sometimes find a Brahma;;a of the Apastambiyas mentioned, the title Apa- stamba-brahmawa is nothing but another name of the Taittiriya-brahmawa, and that this Brahma;/a, in reality, is always attributed to Tittiri or to the pupils of Vaij-am- payana, who picked up the Black Ya^ur-veda in the shape of partridges (tittiri). The same remark applies to the collection of the Mantras of the Black Ya^ur-veda, which, likewise, is sometimes named Apastamba-sawhita. The /Tarawavyuha states explicitly that the five branches of

* Max Miiller, Hist. Anc. Sansk. Lit., p. 371. A MS. of the A'aranavyfiha with an anonymous commentary, in my possession, has the following passage :

^f^^niRf q'^ ^^T Vfifji I ^ti^-g"^ ^MT^^'t ^?lTm^'^ f^TW^qft

^ Max Miiller loc. cit.,p. 194. These statements occur in Mahadeva's commen- tary on the Hirawyakesi-sutras ; see Weber, Hist. Sansk. Lit., p. no, 2nd ed. ^ Hist. Anc. Sansk. Lit., p. 195.

Introduction. Xvu

the Kha«^"ikiya school, to which the Apastambiyas be- long, possess one and the same recension of the revealed texts, consisting of 7 Ka;/^as, 44 Praj"nas, 651 Anuvakas, 2198 Pannasis, 19290 Padas\ and 253,868 syllables, and indicates thereby that all these five schools were Sutra- i^ara;^as.

If we now turn to Apastamba's own works, we find still clearer proof that he laid no claim to the title Rishl, or inspired seer of Vedic texts. For (Dharma-sutra T, 2, 5, 4-5) he says distinctly that on account of the prevalent trans- gression of the rules of studentship no Rhhis are born among the Avaras, the men of later ages or of modern times, but that some, by virtue of a residue of the merit which they acquired in former lives, become similar to i??shis by their knowledge of the Veda. A man who speaks in this manner, shows that he considers the holy ages during which the great saints saw with their mind's eye the uncreated and eternal texts of the Veda to be past, and that all he claims is a thorough acquaintance with the scriptures which had been handed down to him. The same spirit which dictated this passage is also observable in other portions of the Dharma-sutra. For Apastamba repeatedly contrasts the weakness and sinfulness of the Avaras, the men of his own times^ with the holiness of the ancient sages, who, owing to the greatness of their ' lustre,' were able to commit various forbidden acts without diminishing

their spiritual merit ^. These utterances prove that Apa- stamba considered himself a child of the Kali Yuga, the age of sin, during which, according to Hindu notions, no 7?/shis can be born. If, therefore, in spite of this explicit disclaimer, the Sawhit^ and the Brahmawa of the Black

A a

Ya^ur-veda are sometimes called Apastamba or Apastam-
biya, i. e. belonging to Apastamba, the meaning of this
expression can only be, that they were and are studied
and handed down by the school, not that its founder was
their author, or, as the Hindus would say, saw them.

' See also Weber, Ind. Lit., p. 98, 2nd ed. ^ Dharma-sutra II, 6, 13, 8-10; II, 10, 27, 4.

XVIU APASTAMBA.

The fact that Apastamba confined his activity to the composition of Sutras is highly important for the deter- mination of the period to which he belonged. It clearly shows that in his time the tertiary or Siitra period of the Ya^ur-veda had begun. Whether we assume, with Professor Max Miiller, that the Sfltra period was one and the same for all the four Vedas, and fix its limits with him between 600-200 B.C., or whether we believe, as I am inclined to do, that the date of the Sfitra period differed for each Veda, still the incontestable conclusion is that the origin of the Apastambiya school cannot be placed in the early times of the Vedic period, and probably falls in the last five centuries before the beginning of the Christian era.

The correctness of the traditional statement that Apa- stamba is younger than Baudhayana may be made very probable by the following considerations. Firstly, Bau- dhayana^s and Apastamba's works on Dharma have a considerable number of Sutras in common. Thus at the end of the chapter on Penances no less than seven con- secutive Sutras (Ap. Dh. I, 10, 29, 8-14), prescribing the manner in which outcasts are to live and to obtain read- mission into the Brahmawical community for their children, occur in both treatises. Besides this passage, there are a number of single Sutras ^ which agree literally. Taken by itself this agreement does not prove much, as it may be explained in various ways. It may show either that Baudhayana is older than Apastamba, and that the latter borrowed from the former, or that the reverse was the case. It may also indicate that both authors drew from one common source. But if it is taken together with two other

facts, it gains a considerable importance. Firstly, Apa- stamba holds in several cases doctrines which are of a later origin than those held by Baudhayana. With respect to this point the puritan opinions which Apastamba puts forward regarding the substitutes for legitimate sons and

' E.g. Ap. Dh. I, I, 2, 30; I, I, 3, 6 ; I, 2, 6, 8-9; I, 5, 15, 8 are found in the Baudh. Dh., Prasna I, Adhyiya 2.

Introduction. Xix

regarding the appointment of widows (niyoga), and his
restriction of the number of marriage-rites, may be adduced
as examples. Like many other ancient teachers, Baudha-