CHAPTER X.

FAMILY LIFE AND SOCIAL CUSTOMS AS THEY APPEAR IN THE SUTRAS

 

THE general period of the Sutras extends from the sixth or seventh century before Christ to about the second century. It is evident that the different Vedic schools had Sutras which were revised, or replaced by new Sutras, at various periods, and that some of these extended into later centuries than others. Thus it would be a mistake to limit all the Sutras of all the schools to certain centuries. The Sutras are manuals of instruction; and those which are of interest historically formed but a part of a large volume, which was intended primarily for the guidance of religious teachers and treated mainly of the sacrifice and other religious matters. Except for students of ceremonial details these sacrificial works are of no interest. What concerns us at present is that portion of the whole which goes by the name of Grihya and Dharma Sutras, that is, manuals of conduct in domestic and social relations. In some cases the rules given in these two divisions are identical; and the two divisions are treated in such a way as to condense one division for the sake of not repeating directions given in the other. For our purpose they may be regarded as forming one body containing rules of life not especially connected with the performance of the greater sacrifices. They differ mainly as representing the views of different schools on minute points or as products of different parts of the country, and as earlier or later opinions. All of them claim to be based upon Vedic teaching. Thus the Grihya and Dharma Sutras of Apastamba form but a few chapters of a work called the Kalpa, of which twenty-four chapters teach the proper performance of sacrifice and only two treat of the sacred law, while one abridged chapter gives the rules for the performance of domestic ceremonies. Again this special 'law-book' is not a law-book having universal application, but is a product of a Vedic school belonging to the Andhras in the south-east of India; and, thirdly, it combats some of the opinions expressed by writers on the same subject. Somewhat similar conditions prevail in the case of the other Sutras.

They are, in short, local manuals which form complete wholes only by virtue of their subject-matter, but which, to their authors, were merely sections of a greater work, the chief importance of which lay in the handing down of traditional knowledge in regard to religious practices. They may be regarded, however, as the first steps in the evolution of legal literature; for the metrical Shastras or law-books are only the extension and completion of the rules of the Dharma Sams, with a gradual increase in the part allotted to civil and criminal law and a relaxation of the bond connecting the Sutras with definite Vedic sects. The Dharma Sutras are more universal; the Grihya Sutras reflect individual schools. But even the Grihyas are not Shrauta (divinely revealed), but Smarta (sacred tradition).

The content of the Grihya Sutras, as is implied by the name, is narrower than that of the Dharma Sutras. The first contain, however, to all students of folklore a store-house of material in regard to rites and superstitions connected with home life, such as no other body of literature in the world presents. In the first place, the life of man is traced religiously from boyhood to burial. Every important phase of a man’s existence is accompanied with its appropriate rite; and, incidentally, what to do and what not to do, injunctions, prohibitions, taboos, are taught as general rules of conduct. The greater events, birth, marriage, death, are described in their religious setting, each with minute detail, so that not only are the sacred texts cited which should be repeated on every occasion, but the physical acts to which the texts are ancillary are described. For example, such a text must be repeated while a dead man’s bones are being collected. The one who collects them must pick them up with such and such fingers and place them in just such a jar. The wedding verses are indicated; the bride must make just so many steps and pour out grain with her hands held in just such a position, etc. Some of the Vedic schools, instead of embracing all the Sutras in one work as a Kalpa Sutra, have apparently laid so much stress on these domestic rites that the manuals have become independent works, thus fore-shadowing what happened later in the case of the Shrastras. The complete work, embracing all kinds of Sutras, belongs, as was to be expected, to the Yajurveda schools, since the priests of this Veda were from the beginning particularly concerned with manual exercises in arranging the altar, etc., and the details of sacrifice; while the priests of the other Vedas had to do more with the recitation and chanting of the sacred texts. Nevertheless, the literature of the Rigveda also contains both Shrauta and Grihya Sutras, as does that of the Samaveda. Finally, the Atharvaveda possesses not only a Vaitana Shrauta Sutra but a Kaushika Sutra, which is in part a Grihya Sutra but contains also directions for carrying out the many magic ceremonies connected with the text of that unique Veda.

The Grihya Sutras 

The preponderance of domestic ceremonies in the Grihya Sutra results in Dharma, or social, matter being introduced rather adventitiously, as when the rules concerning the choice of wives are given, whereas Grihya, domestic, rules belong as much to the Dharma Sutras as to the Grihya Sutras themselves. The difference is that the weight in the Dharmas is laid on the wider relation of man to the state, so that those sections which deal with the family become condensed and subordinate. Specimens of southern Grihya Sutras are also not lacking. Thus as the Dharma of Apastamba reflects a South-Indian origin, so also the Grihya Sutra of Khadira belongs to Southern India; and it is an indication that Sutra literature extends far beyond the time of Buddha that this should be the case. Such also may be surmised to be the fact (rather than that Vedic schools were domiciled in South India at a much earlier period) from the circumstance that the Sutra of Khadira is a later and more concise version of the Sutra of Gobhila. There are other examples of this endeavor to revise a Sutra on lines of economy, each later writer reducing the work of his predecessor as much as possible or convenient, conciseness being the test of Sutra excellence. Gobhila’s work is detailed and lengthy; Khadira’s is virtually the same work in condensed form. Everything that could be omitted, such as explanatory digressions, smaller details of ceremonies, etc., was left out, solely to make the work easier to remember. But clearness as well as conciseness was aimed at and attained by a fresh arrangement of the older matter.

An example of the scope and method of a Grihya Sutra may be taken from the directions of Khadira regarding the little oblations to spirits and gods required from a wedded pair. After describing the wedding ceremony, Khadira passes directly to this question of offerings and oblations, describing first briefly the fire used for the purpose of receiving the oblation, thus:

“The domestic fire is that at which he has taken her hand (in marriage) or that on which he has put the last piece of wood (as a student before marriage) or a (fresh) fire twirled out (of wood), the last being pure but not tending to prosperity; or he may get his domestic fire from a frying-pan or from the house of a man who makes many sacrifices, Shudras excepted. The service begins with an evening oblation. After (the fire) has been set in a blaze before sunset or sunrise, the sacrifice (is performed) after sunset (and) after or before sunrise. He should make an oblation of rice-food fit for sacrifice after washing it, if raw, with his hand (but) with a brass bowl if it is (not rice but) curds or milk, or with the rice-pot. With the words ‘Hail to Fire’ (he makes oblation in the middle (of the fire, at eve); secondly in the north-eastern (part of the fire); in the morning, with the words, ‘Hail to Sun’ (he makes the first oblation). The wiping round and other (acts) except sprinkling (of water round the fire) are here left out. Some say ‘let the wife make the oblations’, for this fire is the house-fire and the wife is the house (home). When (the meal) is prepared, evening and morning, she (the wife) must say ‘(It is) ready’, (and he) must say aloud ‘Om’, but softly ‘May it not fail; to thee be reverence’. Of rice-food fit for sacrifice he should make (oblations) to Prajapati; and to (the form of the Fire-god called) Svishtakrit (i.e. good sacrificer) make a ball (offering), depositing it outside or inside (the fire­place) in four places : (one) at the water-barrel; (another) at the middle door; (another) at the couch or privy; and (finally, one) at the heap of sweepings; sprinkle each (offering or the ground with water) both (before and afterwards) and pour out what is left with the water toward the south. Of chaff, water, and scum of boiled rice (let him make a bali offering) when a donation has been made. The gods to whom the bali offerings belong are Earth, Wind, Prajapati, the All-gods, Water, Herbs, Trees, Space, Love or Wrath, the hosts of Rakshasas, the Fathers, and Rudra. He should make the offering in silence; he should make it of any food (but) make it only once in case (a meal) is prepared at different times; and if (prepared) at different places (then he should make the offering of) what belongs to the house-holder (himself). But of all food he should offer (some) in the fire and give the best to a priest; this he should do himself. He should offer the offerings himself from rice (-harvest) to barley (-harvest) or from barley (-harvest) to rice (-harvest); (yea,) he himself should offer them”.

It will have been observed that the religious ceremony of the bali-offering implies a cult midway between that of the Vedic sacrifice and the sectarian sacrifice not countenanced by the orthodox. The bali is a bit of food cast upon the ground at the places named, the recipients being supposed to be the Vedic divinities of a lower order, ending with Rudra, and the hosts of harmful spirits who are thus propitiated. Each divinity has a bali in his appropriate place and at the right time. Thus the offering by the couch is for Love; that flung to the north is for Rudra; that by the door is for (personified) Space; and the offerings to the harmful spirits are given at night. The sprinkling of the offering means (probably) the sprinkling of the ground or place where the offering is cast. The Dharma Sutras also take up this question of offerings. The citation above by implication recognizes only the wife as preparer of the meal. But a rich householder may have his meals prepared by a priest or other member of the ‘reborn’ castes or even by a Shudra. Special rules are necessary in the last case. The slave-cook, being impure, must have his hair and beard and nails cut daily or at least at stated intervals, and it must be the householder who places on the fire the food prepared by Shudras. Then in this case it is the cook who says (when the meal is prepared), ‘It is ready’ and the householder who responds (as Apastamba gives the rule, with a slight variation) ‘Well-prepared food bestows splendor; may it never fail’.

Rites to avert Disaster and Disease

The rites involving the goblins of disaster and disease have naturally a prominent place in the domestic ritual of the Grihya Sutras and afford us glimpses of an otherwise unknown pantheon. The wife herself, who has so little to do with texts, must go outside her house and offer food to the white demon with black teeth, the lord of bad women, and if she bears a child the husband must daily, till the wife’s confinement ends, offer rice and mustard in the fire near the door where the wife is confined, dispersing demons whose names are given : ‘Shanda, Marka, Upavira, Shaundikeya, Malimlucha, Drou'asa, Chyavana”, all indicative of trouble, as are those that follow (apparently a supplementary list), ‘Alikhat, Animisha, Kimvadanta, Upashrati, Haryaksha, Kumbhin, Shatru, Patrapani, Nrimani, Hantrimukha, Sarshaparuna, Chyavana’. But if the child falls ill with epilepsy, ‘the dog-disease’, the father cures him by covering him with a net and murmuring,

“Kurkura, Su-Kurkura, Kurkura (it is) who holds fast the children; scat (chech chet!) dog, let him go; reverence to thee, Sisara, barker, bender; true the gods have given thee a boon, and hast thou chosen my boy? Scat, dog, let him go (as before). True, the Bitch of heaven, Sarama, is thy mother, Sisara is thy father, and Yama's black and speckled dogs thy brothers; but scat, dog, let him go”.

The demon attacking the boy is here called Kumara, the cult is obviously demoniac. In general, the Sutras of this class are concerned not with the greater sacrifices, which are discussed in the Shrauta Sara, called the Havis and Soma sacrifices, but with the so-called great sacrifices of food cooked (paka) and offered on special noon-days and at funeral feasts, four or seven in all, including offerings to serpents as well as to demons and gods.

The last of these domestic ‘cooked-food’ sacrifices introduces a new feature:

“On the full moon day of the month Chaitra he makes (images of) a pair of animals out of meal; (he offers) them and jujube leaves (to the gods); to Indra and Agni a figure with prominent navel; and balls to Rudra”.

These images of meal representing living beings are partly due to the new feeling of pity for animals and the desire not to injure life, which plays a part in Brahmanism as well as in Buddhism. It must be admitted, however, that economy had something to do with the substitution of animals of meal for real animals, but ostensibly it is a Vishnuite trait. The general rule in this regard is that attributed to Manu: ‘Animals may be killed (so said Manu) at the Madhuparka and Soma sacrifice and at the rites for Manes and gods’. But it is an old rite of hospitality to kill a cow for a guest; and, as a matter of form, each honored guest is actually offered a cow. The host says to the guest, holding the knife ready to slay the cow, that he has the cow for him; but the guest is then directed to say : ‘Mother of Rudras, daughter of the Vasus, sister of the Adityas, navel of immortality (is she). Do not kill the guiltless cow; she is (Earth itself), Aditi, the goddess. I speak to them that understand’. He adds, ‘My sin has been killed and that of so-and-so; let her go and eat grass’. But if he really wants to have her eaten, he says, ‘I kill my sin and the sin of so-and-so’ (in killing her), and though in many cases the offer of the cow is thus plainly a formal piece of etiquette, yet the offering to the guest was not complete without flesh of some sort; and it is clear from the formulas that any of the worthiest guests might demand the cow’s death, though as the six worthy guests are teacher, priest, father-in-law, king, friend, and Aryan ‘reborn’ man, and all of these were doubtless well grounded in that veneration for the cow which is expressed above by identifying her with Earth (as Aditi), there was probably seldom any occasion to harrow the feelings of the cow-revering hosts. Paraskara mentions only the cow but Shankhayana already substitutes a goat as a possible alternative; he also mentions the gods to which this animal is sacred, that is, he seeks to make the animal offered to the guest a sacrifice to a god. Thus he says that if the animal is offered to the teacher and killed it is ‘sacred to the Fire-god’; if it is offered to a king, it is sacred to Indra, and if to a friend it is sacred to Mitra. Similar additions may be traced in many particulars, sometimes found by comparing one text with another, sometimes clearly interpolated.

Marriage Ceremonies 

The Sutras, while they do not recognize the sects of later days, yet point to the different conception of deity embodied in the two great modern sects worshipping Rudra-Shiva and Vishnu. Thus, as above, Rudra and the Rakshasas are also associated in the rule: ‘When one repeats a text sacred to Rudra, to the Rakshasas, to the Manes, to the Asuras, or one that contains an imprecation, one shall touch water’. On the other hand, when the bridegroom leads the bride to take the seven steps, which form part of the wedding ceremony, he murmurs a blessing at every step : ‘One for sap, two for juice, three for prosperity, four for comfort, five for cattle, six for the seasons, Friend! be with seven steps (mine); be thou devoted to me’. And after each clause he says ‘may Vishnu lead thee’. Similarly, the fact that Vaishravana (Kubera) and Ishana (Rudra-Shiva) are worshipped ‘for the bride­groom’ point to the phallic nature of these cognate spirits.

The Grihya Sutras show that there was no one rite of universal acceptation in those ceremonies most intimately connected with domestic felicity. Indeed, the author of the Ashvalayana Grihya Sutra says expressly that in the matter of weddings, ‘customs are diverse’, and he gives only that which is common usage. Thus he tells how the bride is to go about the fire, mount the stone, pour out grain, game at the pole-star, etc., but does not mention other rites which other Grihya Sutras enjoin. Some of these, however, are of universal interest; and a comparison of the Hindu ceremonies with those of other Aryan-speaking peoples shows that in all probability the Indian ritual has preserved elements reaching far back into prehistoric times.

Thus in the ceremony it is universal usage to walk the seven steps together and for the bridegroom to murmur, as he takes the bride’s hand : ‘This am I, that art thou, that art thou, this am I; Heaven am I and Earth art thou; the (feminine) Rich (Rigveda verse) art thou, the Saman am I. Be thou devoted to me’, and to make the bride mount a stone as an emblem of firmness. But special rules are that women shall come to the bride’s house and eat and drink brandy and dance four times; and that merry girls shall escort the bridegroom to the bride’s house, and that he must do all the foolish (?) things they tell him to do (except when taboo is concerned). Some measure of values may perhaps be obtained from the statement that the fee to the priest who performs the marriage-ceremony is a cow, given by the bride­groom, if the groom is of the same caste as the priest, but a village if the groom is royal, Rajanya, that is a nobleman of ‘kingly’ order, and a horse if the groom is of the third estate (farmer, trader). Obviously the succeeding rule, which is not unique, countenances a sort of sale in that it adds : ‘(The bridegroom must give) to the one who has the daughter one hundred (cows) together with a chariot’. The same rule is found in the Dharma Sutras with the explanation that the gift must be returned, as a sale is not allowed—which only points back to an earlier period when the sale of daughters was allowed.

The distinction among the orders mentioned in the gifts above is only one of innumerable passages in which, as a matter of course and without thought of any other social order, the castes are named as priest, noble or warrior, and people, the last term embracing all those reborn, who are not priests or warriors or slaves. The slaves, Shudras and lower orders, are recognized as part of the social structure. The name itself suggests that the Shudras were originally a conquered people, as Karian became synonymous with slave at Athens. Yet the Shudras were not Pariahs but members of the household, who took part in some of the domestic rites.

Caste and Family 

The test of caste is not marriage alone but defilement by eating and touching what is unclean. In this regard the Sutras show only the beginning of that formal theory of defilement which results in a pure man of the upper castes being defiled by the shadow of an impure man, and in the taboo of all contact with the impure. According to Gautama, a Brahman may eat food given by any of the ‘reborn’ who are worthy members of their caste, and if in need of food to support life he may take food and other things even from a Shudra. Food forbidden is that defiled naturally by hairs or insects falling into it and that touched by a woman during her courses, by a black bird (crow), or by a foot, etc., or given by an outcast, a woman of bad character, a person accursed, an hermaphrodite, a police-officer, a carpenter, a miser, a jailer, a physician, a man who hunts without using the bow (i.e. a non-Aryan snarer of animals), a man who eats refuse or the food of a multitude, of an enemy, etc. The list continues with the taboo of food offered disrespectfully and of certain animals. Apastamba allows the acceptance of gifts, including a house and land, even from an Ugra (low caste or mixed caste), though, like the later law-books, his code states that a priest may not eat in the house of anyone of the three orders (varnas) below him; but he may eat the food of any other priest, and according to some  he may eat the food of people of any caste except Shudras and even their food in times of distress. Forbidden by him is the food of an artisan, of people who let houses or land, a spy, an unauthorized hermit (Buddhist?), besides that of surgeon, usurer, and others. Caste is varna or jati, ‘color’ and ‘kin’, the former embracing the latter, as a social order including clans or families. Even in the all-important matter of marriage, caste is not so important as family. The only test, when one seeks a wife, according to Shalikhayana, is that of the family: ‘They ask the girl in marriage, reciting the clan-names’. The text of Ashvalayana expressly mentions as a form of marriage that in which the bridegroom kills the relatives and rapes the weeping girl, evidently a form once countenanced as well as enumerated among possible forms; at any rate it bars out all examination of the bride’s social position. Indeed the marriage rules permit the marriage of a Shudra woman, though as the last of four wives, with a member of the highest caste, whose offspring, of course, being mixed or impure, is not a member of the Aryan reborn, but nevertheless is recognized legally. And what shall we say of those who are not ‘reborn’ although Aryans? The rule in this case is universal that, if priest, warrior, or member of the third estate fail to be reborn in the Veda, i.e. if such a one is not duly initiated into his social order at the proper time, he loses his prerogatives and becomes an outcast : 'No one should initiate such men, nor teach them, nor perform sacrifice for them, nor have intercourse with them’, and further, ‘A person whose ancestors through three generations have been thus outcast is excluded from the sacrament of initiation and from being taught the Veda, that is, they become Vratyas or entirely outcast persons with whom one may not even have intercourse unless they perform special rites.

In general the Grihya Sutras may be said to be the later scholastic codification of rules, formulas, and rites long practised, concerned chiefly with the orderly progress of an individual ideal life, and incidentally with such ceremonies as naturally occur in such a life, that is, besides rites from babyhood to marriage, fixed moon-rites, etc., those concerned with building, holidays, burial, etc. That they are not of Vedic age in their present form, though in substance reverting in part to Brahmana beginnings, may be concluded from their obvious posteriority in respect of language and metre (where verses are cited) to the Brahmanas, not to speak of earlier Vedic texts, as well as from the fact that several Sutras emanate from districts scarcely known even by name to the Brahmanas. The general order of arrangement in the Grihya Sutras is one conditioned by the subject-matter, which is to reveal the whole duty of man as a householder. Most of them begin with the marriage and continue with the birth of a child, the ceremonies at conception and at various stages before birth, at the birth itself, at the naming of the child, when he sees the sun, when he is fed, when his hair is cut, when he becomes a student, and when he returns home from his Guru (tutor) and becomes a householder. Then the child, now grown to a man, marries and the circle begins again. Finally the rite for the burial is described. A few texts take up the round of life at another point, that where the student-life begins. This is the procedure in the case of some of the Black Yajurveda texts (for example, the Manava and Kathaka Sutras), but it makes no difference where one begins; each Sutra follows out the life to the end, and the general uniformity shows that, whatever be the minor discrepancies and divergences of opinion (of which the authors are themselves well aware), the Grihya Sutras as a whole are based upon one model, and that, whether in the northern or southern districts, the lives of orthodox Aryans were governed by a remarkable conformity of ritual. It is not improbable that, as has been suggested by Professor Oldenberg, many of the rites prescribed as general rules were nothing more than formulas of secret magic owned at first by certain families and afterwards become universal property.

The specimen given above will suffice to show the artless style of these didactic Sutras. They have in fact no style save that attained by scrupulous brevity. In the following paragraphs we shall seek rather to illustrate certain phases of the Grihya Sutras as indicative of religious and magical beliefs and of the social environment in which they were produced, or at least for which they were intended.

Religious and Magical Beliefs 

We may begin with reverting to the cure of epilepsy already mentioned. In the course of childhood the boy may be attacked by the dog-demon (epilepsy). What is the father to do? The names of the canine demons have been mentioned above with a parallel passage containing more of the same sort. These are to be averted by a sort of honorific propitiation. They are lauded; but their objectionable behavior in this special case is deprecated. The author of our Sutra contents himself with this. But a rival author or two are not content with the method here advocated. According to them, the father must make a hole in the roof of the royal gaming-hall and pull the boy through it, lay him on his back on dice strewn about, and then, while a gong is sounded, recite the deprecatory words to the dog-demons and pour curds and salt over the boy. Several items of this recipe are of interest, the avoidance of the door, the use of salt and curds to frighten demons, the gong for the same purpose to be beaten on the south side of the hall. These may be said to be universal antidotes; peculiar is the use of the dice, which has no parallel in the similar situations offered by the Sutra. Finally the fact that the father makes a hole in the roof of the gaming-hall shows that it is made of thatch (easily repaired) and leads to the question what sort of architecture is normally to be found implied in the Sutras. The gaming-hall is the public gambling-place which a king is directed to build for the use of his subjects, and curiously enough, with the exception of the householder's own dwelling, it is almost the only reference to edifices found in the Sutras. On the other hand, all the dicta of the Sutras show that such life as is depicted is supposed to be country life; the district and the village are the geographical entities. Cities are not ignored but are despised. Thus there are no ceremonies for urban life. But there is a rite for ploughing, when sacrifice is made to Ashani (the thunder-bolt) and to Sita, (the furrow), as well as to other bucolic deities, Arada, Anagha, etc., as to the greater bucolic gods, Parjanya and Indra and Bhaga, with similar offerings on the occasion of the ‘furrow sacrifice’, the ‘threshing-floor sacrifice’, when one sows, reaps, or takes in the harvest, all indicating that the life portrayed is that of the village agriculturist, who must even ‘offer a sacrifice at mole-heaps to Akhuraja, the king of moles’. So the constant injunctions to ‘go out of the village’, to sacrifice at a place where four roads meet, or on a hill, etc., imply life in villages even for householders and scholars rather than in towns.

Besides the introduction of evil spirits and bucolic divinities into the ritual of the domestic service, we find in the Sutras for the first time the recognition of images of the gods, which must be implied by the regulations concerning the deities Ishana, Midhushi, and Jayanta (‘lord’, bountiful one, ‘conqueror’) as well as the ‘lord of the field’, Kshetrapati, who are moved about and given water to drink.

When a boy is initiated he is made to mount a stone with the adjuration to be ‘firm as a stone’ which elsewhere is confined to the bride, and is then given in charge to Kashaka, Antaka, Aghora, Disease, Yama, Makha, Vacini, Earth and Vaishvanara, Waters, Herbs, Trees, Heaven and Earth, Welfare, Glory, the All-gods, all the Bhuts, and all the gods. In this list of demons and deities to whom the boy is given in charge, Vashini as the ‘ruling goddess’ is noticeable. She is probably the mother-goddess who despite all Vedic influence always was the chief spiritual village-power identified with Shiva's wife in various forms. Perhaps too the recognition (in a rite to procure increase of cattle) of a god described merely as ‘He who has a thousand arms and is the protector of cow-keepers’ (Gaupatya), may be a veiled allusion to Krishna-Vishnu.

As the Grihya Sutras in distinction from the Dharma are concerned with domestic superstitions, these may rightly be considered their peculiar contribution to the history of India. Of political and social life they contain almost nothing except as confined within the bounds of the family. The regular routine of the normal life contains a sufficiency of such superstitions, though the underlying reason for them is due in some cases more to mechanical adjustment to a supposed harmony than to spiritual fears. This is the case for example in the regulation that the initiation of the Brahman, Kshatriya, and Vaishya shall take place, respectively, in spring, summer, and autumn, in the eighth, eleventh, and twelfth years after conception, the respective seasons being supposed to represent the castes, as the years represent the metres regarded as peculiar to these castes. Deeper lies the origin of the following :—the rite to drive out of the bride the influence deadly to the husband and to convert it into an influence deadly to her possible paramour; the prayer that the ‘weeping women’ (demons) and Vikeshi may not torment her, nor the Pishachas of the womb, who devour flesh and bring death; the scattering of rice and other grains on the heads of the newly wedded pair; and the corresponding rite according to which the husband ties barley about the wife’s bead, here expressly ‘to have offspring’. Naturally the conjugal relations offer a fruitful field for this sort of thing. Thus we have a rite to make a husband subject to his wife as well as to make her co-wives subject to her, and another very peculiar rite, the object of which is to keep the wife faithful, in which she is regarded much as is the slave around whom, when suspected of estrangement, urine is poured from a horn to keep him magically at home.

Another subject claiming the attention of the Sutra-maker is the efficacy of amulets. These are tied upon the priests, as a sort of final expression of good-will, in the Ashvayuja rite. They are made of lac and herbs. Minor superstitions abound. If one yawns, one must say, ‘May will and wisdom abide in me’, evidently a phase of the popular belief that the soul may escape in a yawn or sneeze. Signs of ill-luck which must be averted by a sacred formula are found in the presence in the house of a dove, of bees, or an anthill, in the budding forth of a post, etc. The transmission of sin is illustrated by the dictum that if one touches a sacrificial post the faults committed at the sacrifice are incurred (ibid. 16, 16); also by the injunction that when one's hair is cut a well-disposed person should gather it up and hide it away, as the well-disposed person (the mother, for example) thus ‘hides the sin in the hair’, probably a refinement on the original notion of not losing one’s soul-strength at the hands of some ill-disposed person. Whether the objection to certain trees as liable to cause eye-trouble, etc., is grounded in fact or fancy, causing the injunction to transplant them, may be questioned, but the original cause has been lost in the maze of superstition, which makes the Ashvattha tree injurious on the east side of the house, the Plaksha on the south, the Nyagrodha on the west, and Udumbara on the north.

Before speaking of the Dharma Sutras in particular it will be necessary here to settle the question as to what is meant by the Aryan, so often mentioned in all the Sutras. While not lacking in moral connotation, so that as a common adjective arya meant noble in heart as well as in race, it is only in the democracy of religious philosophy that such a person as an Aryan slave or barbarian was conceivable. Practically Arya was synonymous with ‘reborn’ and indicated a person of the three upper castes in good standing, antithetic to Shudra and other low-caste or out-caste persons. Yavanas (Greeks) are the most esteemed of foreigners, but all Yavanas are regarded as sprung from Shudra females and Kshatriya males. Gautama says that sundry authorities hold this view. Such rules as that given by Gautama in the case of the violation of an Aryan woman by a Shudra, when compared with Apastamba, prove conclusively that Arya is ‘noble in race’ as distinguished from the ‘black colour’ (the preceding non-Aryans). Mr Ketkar in his History of Caste in India, is rather rash in stating that there was no racial discrepancy felt between Aryan and Dravidian. It is true that those who were out-caste were no longer called Aryans, but no Shudra was ever regarded as Aryan, any more than he could be ‘reborn’. Arya indicated racial distinction from the times of the Rigveda onwards.

We have seen that the Grihya Sutras practically recognize life only as lived in villages. In the Dharma Sutras, as these are later and have to do with wider relations, the town (pur, nagara), appears as a larger unit, though how much larger it is not easy to say; and when we remember that pur is after all only a stronghold or fort, and nagara is anything larger than a village, we must be cautious of too ready belief in large cities. Everything indicates on the contrary that life was still chiefly that of small places and kings were only petty chieftains. There was not supposed to be any school or even studying done in town. The Dharma Sutra of Gautama, regarded as the oldest of extant Dharma Sutras, says expressly that one should not recite the holy texts at any time in a town; and it is assumed, as in the Grihya Sutras, that such life as is described passes normally in villages. Even in the description of the royal residence the hall has a thatched roof. The king still stands up in propria persona and hits a thief with a cudgel; and, if the king fails to strike, the ‘guilt falls on the king’. The commentators, apparently aware of the incongruity in applying such a rule to the kings of their day, attempt to restrict its application as intended for specially evil thieves (of gold); but it is in fact a general rule even as late as Apastamba, who says : ‘A thief shall loosen his hair and appear before the king carrying a cudgel on his shoulder. With that (cudgel) he (the king) shall smite him; if he dies his sin is expiated, but, if the king forgives him, the guilt falls on him who forgives; or he (the thief) may throw himself into a fire or die by starvation’. Thus the later author seeks to excuse the king (but not the thief).

The Dharma Sutras 

The Dharma Sutras add to the data of social life material evidence which shows that there were recognized customs not approved in one part of the country but doubtfully admitted as good usage because locally approved in other parts. For, in discussing usage, Baudhayana expressly says that customs peculiar to the South are to eat in the company of an uninitiated person, in the company of one’s wife, to eat stale food, and to marry the daughter of a maternal uncle or of a paternal aunt, while customs peculiar to the North are to deal in wool, to drink rum, to sell animals that have teeth in the upper and in the lower jaws, to follow the trade of arms, and to go to sea. He adds that to follow these practices except where they are considered right usage is to sin, but that for each practice the local rule is authoritative, though Gautama denies this. Baudhayana also admits the doctrine that a priest who cannot support himself by the usual occupations of a Brahman may take up arms and follow the profession of a warrior; though here again his opinion is opposed to that of the earlier Gautama, who argues that such an occupation on account of its cruelty is not fitted for a priest. Whether the Gautama here represented as opposed be the Gautama whose Sutra has come down to us may be doubted, but the two passages show that caste-integrity was not regarded as essential, for no one could be a warrior and retain the mode of life deemed proper for a priest.

The geography of the Sutras illustrates very forcibly the limited reach of interest at the same time that knowledge of a wider country was thoroughly disseminated. Kalinga on the eastern coast is even the subject of versification, ‘He sins in his feet who visits the Kalingas’, and one who travels to their country must perform a purificatory sacrifice; as must they who visit the Arattas (in the Punjab) or the Pundras and Vangas (in Bengal), while the inhabitants of the country lying about Multan, Surat, the Deccan, Malwa, western Bengal, and Bihar are all declared by Baudhayana to be of mixed origin; and (by implication) their customs are not to be followed. The ‘country of the Aryans’ embraces in fact only the narrow district between the Patiala district in the Punjab and Bihar, and between the northern hills (Himalayas) and those of Malwa; some even confine the definition of Aryavarta (country of the Aryans) to the district between the Ganges and Jumna.

Constant references to the opinions of earlier authorities, indefinitely cited as ‘some’, show that our extant Sutras are but a moiety of the mass lost. Naturally the later authors know by name more authorities than do the earlier. Apastamba discusses `’those whose food may be eaten’ and cites a certain Kanva who declares that ‘who wishes may give’; then a Kautsa, whose opinion is that he who is holy (punya), may give; then Varshyayani who says that ‘anybody may-give’, because, if it is a sinner and the sin remains with him, the receiver cannot suffer, but if it does not remain with him (the giver), then the giving acts as a purification. Again the same author discusses theft. Anyone who takes what belongs to another is a ‘thief’ ; so teach Kautsa, Harita, and Kanva; but Varshyayani says that there are exceptions. ‘Seeds ripening in the pod and food for a draught-ox’ may be taken (without theft), though ‘to take too much’ is a sin. Harita’s opinion is that the owner’s permission must first be given.

These texts in any case are more or less erroneous transmitters of older law. Thus the Sutra law for manslaughter or murder enjoins that one who has killed a warrior shall give for the expiation of his sin a bull and a thousand cows. To whom? The commentator (a priest) says that the passage means give to the priests, whereas the corresponding rule in Baudhayana says that the fine shall be given to the king; and in both passages the commentator explains that the ‘expiation for sin’ may mean ‘to remove the enmity of the murdered man's relatives’, which latter explanation is historically the earlier and probably the true explanation, as it is a parallel to the law permitting compensation for murder as found among other Aryan nations. 

Inheritance

Since, in distinction from the Grihya Sutras, the Dharma Sutras have to do with society rather than with family, it is here that we find the beginning of civil and criminal law, although legal punishments are still retained in part under the head of penance, and the conditions of inheritance, which depend on the family, are partly explained under domestic duties, for these include (as we have seen) the rite of marriage, apropos of which is first defined the family (gotra, gees) into which one may marry. The rule is that a man shall not give his daughter to one belonging to the same gotra, that is, having the same family name, or, in the case of priests, descended from the same Vedic seer, or to one related on the mother’s side within six degrees. Then the rules for inheritance, assuming the meaning of the Sapinda as one within six degrees, make Sapindas the heirs after or in default of sons. The Sapindas here are males only. The widow is excluded, and the daughter (according to Apastamba) inherits only in default of sons, teacher, or pupil, these, however, being recommended to employ the inheritance for the spiritual good of the deceased. Probably the general rule anticipates not the death of the owner but a division of property among the sons during his lifetime. The king inherits in default of the others named, and some say that among the sons only the eldest inherits. These rules are sufficiently vague, but local laws are also provided for in the additional rule : In some countries gold, (or) black cattle, (or) black produce of the earth (grain or iron?) is the share of the eldest. Then in regard to what the wife receives, the Sutra leaves it doubtful whether the rule ‘the share of the wife consists of her ornaments and wealth received from her relations, according to some (authorities)’, is to be interpreted in such a manner that ‘according to some’ refers only to the last clause or to the whole.

What is obvious is that the whole matter of inheritance was as yet not regulated by any general state law. Different countries or districts of India have different laws; different authorities differ in regard to the interpretation of these laws; and, finally, different texts of Vedic authority contradict by inference the rule to be got from them. Thus because one Vedic text says ‘Manu divided his wealth among his sons’, it is implied that there should be no preference shown to the eldest; but, on the other hand, another Vedic text says ‘they distinguish the eldest by the heritage’, which countenances the preference shown to the eldest. Now this last point, despite the desire for conciseness, demands consideration at length, so the maker of the Sutra takes it up, arguing that a mere statement of fact is not a rule. For example (he says), the dictum ‘a learned priest and a he-goat are the most sensual beings’ is a statement, but cannot be taken as a rule. Hence, he says, the statement ‘they distinguish the eldest’ is not a rule. But the question remains, why then should the other statement, ‘Manu divided his wealth’, be regarded as a rule? The subject of inheritance is treated first by Baudhayana under the head of impurity, where he says simply that Sapindas inherit in default of nearer relations, and Sakulyas (remoter relations) in default of Sapindas; but afterwards he adds that the eldest son, in accordance with the quotations cited by Apastamba, may receive the best chattel, or the father may divide equally among his sons. Here also the fact that the same subject is treated in different sections shows that as yet the matter of civil law was not treated systematically but incidentally.

It is no part of the present discussion to enter into the confusing details of the laws of inheritance; only to show in what state were these laws at the time of the Sutras. The latest Sutra, however, already stands on a level with the formal law-books, and, for example in this matter of inheritance, is not content with the vague ‘sons’ of the earlier authors but makes a formal classification of the (later legal) ‘twelve sons’, six of whom are entitled to inherit as ‘heirs and kinsmen’ while six (kinds) are ‘kinsmen but not heirs’, among the last being the son of a Shudra wife. 

Royal Duties 

Civil law is in general discussed in the Sutras under the head of royal duties; for it is assumed that the king administers justice both civil and criminal. It is his part to pay attention to the special laws of districts, castes (jati), and families, and make the four orders (varnas, castes in a general sense) fulfill their duties. The summary, in the following order, includes punishing those who wander from the path of duty, not injuring trees that bear fruit, guarding against falsification of weights and measures, not taking for his own use the property of his subjects (except as taxes), providing for the widows of his soldiers, exempting from taxation a learned priest, a royal servant, those without protectors, ascetics, infants, very old men, students, widows who have returned to their families, unmarried girls, wives of servants, and pradattas (doubtful, perhaps girls promised in marriage); but first and foremost, the king is to protect all in his realm. This quaint summary of royal duties does not even belong to the early Sutra period but derives from a text, which in some regards is practically, as it is called, a law-book (Shastra). It reflects, as do the elaboration of details and additions casually made, the fact that even at this comparatively late period the king was still a small local raja, not an emperor.

Although we may agree in general with the judgment of Buhler to the effect that the Dharma Shastra of Gautama takes temporal precedence over the extant Dharma Shastras and Dharma Sutras, yet it is historically as important to remember that this judgment was tempered by the consideration that interpolations occur in the work of Gautama, and that in its present form the language agrees closer with Panini's rules than that of Apastamba and Baudhayana. The title itself of Gautama’s work is Shastra not Sutra, and it is obvious from his chapter on kings that sundry works called Dharma Shastras were in vogue, for he says: ‘The administration of justice (shall be regulated by) the Veda, the Dharma Shastras, the Angas, and the Purfanas (and Upavedas)’, and though the word Upavedas occurs in but one manuscript, and logically Dharma is included under Anga, yet it is not necessary to assume an interpolation for these words, especially as Gautama mentions Manu among teachers of the law, from ‘some’ of whom he cites, though not by name. The Atharvashiras, a late work, is also known to him. It may then be questioned whether each and every rule of Gautama can be cited as being an integral part of the ‘earliest law-book’.

The royal duties as described by Gautama are few. After stating that all the ‘reborn’ (men of the three upper castes) are to study, offer sacrifice, and give alms, and that the priest in addition is to teach, perform sacrifice for others, and receive alms, or, if he does not do the work himself, to practice agriculture and trade, Gautama says that a king’s special additional duty is to protect all beings, to inflict proper punishment, to support learned priests and others unable to work, those free of taxes and temporary students, to take measures for ensuring victory, to learn how to manage a chariot and use a bow, to fight firmly, to divide the spoils of battle equitably, to take a tax of one-tenth, one-eighth, or one-sixth (of produce), to force artisans to pay one day's work monthly, to proclaim by crier lost property, and, if the owner be not found in a year, to keep it, giving one-fourth to the finder (but all treasure-trove belongs to the king), and to protect the property of infants. In the following section the author says that the king is the master of all except the priests; that he is to be moral and impartial, worshipped by all except Brahmans, who shall honor him; that he must protect the castes (orders) and different stages of life (ashramas), and, with the assistance of his chaplain fulfill all his religious duties, as enumerated above. Authoritative in the realm shall be all rules of castes (jati), and families (kula), as well as district-rules not opposed to (Vedic) tradition, while for their respective orders (varga) ploughmen, traders, herdsmen, money-lenders, and artisans may make their owu rules.

In this résumé of royal duties there is no indication or implication of any power greater than that of a small king. But the later Sutra of Apastamba indicates the beginning of that system of government by proxy which obtains in the Shastra of Manu and other Sutras. Nor is Apastamba’s account of royal duties otherwise without interest, since it shows just such a combination of old and new as characterizes the Sutra period. To begin with, after discussing caste-duties in general, Apastamba describes the town where the king is to live:

“I will now explain the duties of a king. He shall build a town (pur), and a dwelling (veshma), each with a door facing south. The dwelling ('palace') is within the pur, and to the east of the dwelling shall be a hall called the ‘invitation’ (guest) place. South of the pur shall be an assembly-house (sabha), having doors on the south and north sides so that it shall be in plain view within and without. There shall be fires in all these places (burning) perpetually, and offering to the Fire (god) shall there be made regularly, just as to the sacred house-fire. He shall put up as guests in the hall of invitation learned priests... and in the assembly-house he shall establish a gaming-table, sprinkle it with water, and throw down on it dice made of Vibhitaka (nuts), sufficient in number, and let Aryans play there (if they are) pure men of honest character. Assaults at arms, dances, singing, concerts, etc., should not take place except in houses kept by the king’s servants...Let the king appoint Aryans, men of pure and honest character, to guard his people in villages and towns, having servants of similar character; and these men must guard a town (nagara) from thieves for a league (yojana), in every direction; villages for two miles (a kos or quarter of a league). They must pay back what is stolen within that distance and collect taxes (for the king)”.

Taxes, Status of Women, etc. 

A learned priest and women are not taxed, nor are children before puberty, temporary students, or ascetics, or slaves who wash feet, or blind, dumb, deaf, and diseased persons. The king goes personally into battle and is exhorted not to turn his back and not to use poisoned weapons or to attack those who supplicate for mercy or are helpless, such as those who have ceased to fight or declare themselves cows (by eating grass, a sign of submission).

Taxes and inheritance form the chief subjects of civil law, together with the vexed question of the status of women. Women may not on their own account offer either the Vedic Shrauta sacrifices or the Grihya sacrifices. A woman is ‘not independent’, either in respect of sacrifice or of inheritance. Widows, if sonless, are expected to bear sons by the levirate marriage. Suttee is not acknow­ledged. Women are property and come under the general rule: ‘A pledge, a boundary, the property of minors, an open or sealed deposit, women, the property of a king or of a learned priest are not lost by being enjoyed by others’.

In proving property, documents, witnesses, and possession are admitted as proof of title by the late Sutra of Vasishtha, and if the documents conflict, the statements made by old men and by gilds and corporations are to be relied upon, an interesting passage as it shows what importance was ascribed to the gilds (Shreni) of the time.

In criminal law, only Apastamba recognizes the application of ordeals. The ordeals, here merely referred to, consist in the application of fire, water, etc., according to the later law-books, but are not defined in the Sutras. Assaults, adultery, and theft are the chief subjects discussed in the Sutras under this head: The fines of the later law are generally represented here by banishment or corporal injury. Most of the regulations are, dominated by caste-feeling. A Shudra who commits homicide or theft or steals land has his property confiscated and suffers capital punishment; but a Brahman priest for such crimes shall be blinded. A Kshatriya (warrior) who abuses a Brahmana (priest) is fined one hundred (coins); a Vaishya (farmer) must pay half as much again for the same offence; but if a Brahman abuses a Kshatriya he pays only fifty coins, and only twenty-five if he abuses a Vaishya, while if he abuses a Shudra he pays nothing, etc. The same caste-interest works outside of criminal law.

Thus the legal rate of interest is set at (the equivalent of) fifteen per cent. per annum; but according to Vasishtha, ‘two, three, four, five in the hundred is declared in the Smriti to be the monthly interest according to caste’. This means that the highest caste pays two, the next caste three, and so on (limited by the scholiast to cases of loans without security). The same author prohibits Brahmans and Kshatriyas from being usurers; but Baudhayana says that a Vaisha may practice usury. That there was, however, a notable laxity in carrying out the supposed inflexibility of caste-rules is evident from the fact that the law­makers expressly permit the upper castes to take to the occupation of the lower when in need of sustenance. Even the Brahman priest who neglects to say his prayers may at the king’s pleasure be forced to perform the work of Shudras. Thus, with certain restrictions as to what he sells, etc., a priest or warrior may support life by trade and agriculture. But a man ‘reborn’ who persists in trade cannot be regarded as a Brahman, nor can a priest who lives as an actor or as a physician. In other words, as may be concluded from the very laws inveighing against them, at the time of the Sutras there were many nominal members of the priestly and royal orders who lived as farmers and traders, perhaps even as usurers (a special law prohibits this), not only acting the part of gentleman farmers but living as humble ploughmen.

Relative Ages of the Sutras 

As touching the outer world, as one is directed to avoid going into towns, so one should avoid visiting foreign places and ‘not learn a language spoken by barbarians’. In religion, as was to be expected, denying the authority of the Vedas, carping at the teaching of the Vedic seers, and wavering in regard to any traditional duty is to ‘destroy one's soul’, and there is no salvation for a man who devotes himself to epicurean ways or to captivating men or to philology. On the other hand the Upanishad doctrine that a priest who is learned and austere and repeats the sacred texts is not tainted with sin, though he constantly commit sinful acts, is a morally destructive teaching already legalized. The highest named god is Brahma or Prajapati, to whom, after the manner of the epic, verses of legal character are assigned. Philosophically the Sutras are dominated by the Vedanta Atman­theory, which appears to be known as a system to Apastamba, whose Sutra seems to have been a work which arose among the Andhras of the south-eastern coast, and probably is not older than the second century B.C. It recognizes, alone among Sutras, a named Purana and its archaic effect linguistically, which in large measure determined Biihler in his conjecture that this Sutra might revert to the fifth century, may well be due to the fact that the Andhras retained linguistic peculiarities long after Parana fixed the northern usage. Apastamba knows the Atharvaveda, as does Vasishtha, who appears to have been a still later writer. It is true that Buhler arranged a chronological series of Sutras of the law in the order Gautama, Baudhayana, Vasishtha, and Apastamba; but in doing so he minimized the late characteristics of Vasishtha (who alone mentions ‘documents’ as legal proofs); and in his remark concerning the fourth Veda he appears to have overlooked the passage at where the four Vedas are mentioned. It is also quite probable that the passage which seems to make Baudhayana earlier than Vasishtha is interpolated, and Buhler himself admits that many other passages have been tampered with. Whatever the earlier text may have been, the present text, with its free use of Shloka verse, its recognition of Dharma Shastras, its citations from Manu, Vishnu, etc., and its possible allusion to the Romans, seems to be the latest of the legal Sutras, though containing much older material. In general, the age to which the Sutras may be assigned cannot well be earlier than the seventh or later than the second century B.C. They represent both the views of different Vedic schools and different localities, from the Andhra country in the S.E. to the countries of the where probably the school of Vasishtha is to be sought. Probably the Grihyas represent the earlier Sutras; the Dharmas as a whole come later : perhaps 300 B.C. would represent the earliest.