Vinaya Texts

SR No.: 007684
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: T W Rhys Davids, Hermann Oldenberg
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1881
Total Pages: 2523
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 47 MB

Page 1789

xxviji
LAWS OF MANU.
the word Vaikhanasa here denotes a Sastra or Satra promulgated by Vikhanas, in which the duties of hermits were described at length. The correctness of this opinion seems to me indisputable. For the word mata, 'opinion,' in Manu's verse, requires that the preceding part of the compound should denote either a person, or a school, or a work. If we take vaikhânasa in the sense of hermit in the forest, we obtain the meaningless translation, 'a hermit may subsist on flowers, &c., following the opinion of hermits.' It is, therefore, necessary to interpret vaikhânasa with the commentators in the sense of vaikhånasa sâstra, and to refer it to a particular work which taught the duties of hermits. The existence of such a book is attested not only by Manu's commentators, but also by other ancient and modern authors. Baudhayana mentions it explicitly?, and seems to give a short summary of its contents in the third chapter of the third Prasna of his Dharmasastra. Haradatta, the commentator of Åpastamba and Gautama, also appears to have known it. In his notes on Gautama III, 2, he gives the derivation of vaikhånasa, a hermit in the forest, saying, 'The vânaprastha is called vaikhânasa, because he lives according to the rule promulgated by Vikhanas,' and adds, 'For that (sage) chiefly taught that order. If the statements made to me by Indian Pandits are to be trusted, we may even hope to recover the work in course of time. It must be an exceedingly ancient book, as the secondary meaning of vaikhânasa, a hermit, which can have arisen only in the manner suggested by Haradatta“, occurs in the
* Medh. Aetas ATH AT THE VAT fefemeti Hà fena: 11 Gov. The aparenta pia fen: u Kull. Serant auer: 1
rafufiançanta esta fema: Il Nand. 791[ET]THAR fae[er]HAT प्रोक्तं सूक्तं [] तर हि वानप्रस्थधर्मस्य पूर्णोपदेशः क्रियते ॥ Nar. पैखानसमते वानप्रस्थमते॥
· Baudh. Dharma. II, 11, 14; Sacred Books of the East, vol. xiv, p. 259. • वैखानसो वानप्रस्थः । विखनसा प्रोक्लेन मार्गेण वर्तत इति । तेन हि स WWUTTA of afga: 11
* The double vriddhi in vaikhânasa is according to the analogy of the words enumerated in the âkriti-gana anusatikadi, Pân. VII, 3, 30.
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