Sacred Laws of Aryas

SR No.: 007687
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Gorge Buhler
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1897
Total Pages: 1979
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 36 MB

Page 14

INTRODUCTION.
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as seshas or parisishtas, tacked on at the end, and generally marked as such in the MSS.
In the case of the Åpastamba Dharma-sûtra it is, however, not necessary to rely on its position alone, in order to ascertain its genuineness. There are unmistakable indications that it is the work of the same author who wrote the remainder of the Kalpa-sûtra. One important argument in favour of this view is furnished by the fact that Prasna XXVII, the section on the Grihya ceremonies, has evidently been made very short and concise with the intention of saving matter for the subsequent sections on the sacred law. The Åpastambîya Grihya-sûtra contains nothing beyond a bare outline of the domestic ceremonies, while most of the other Grihya-sûtras, e. g. those of Åsvalâyana, Sânkhâyana, Gobhila, and Pâraskara, 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, Âsvalâyana 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 questions1. 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 Grihya-sûtra, 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 Prasna XXVII otherwise than by assuming that Âpastamba 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-sûtra may be drawn from the cross-references which occur in several Prasnas. In the Dharma-sûtra we find that on various occasions, where the performance
1Âsvalâyana Grihya-sûtra I, 19, ed. Stenzler.
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