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AUGUST, 1916)
MANUSMRITI
125
THE MANUSMRITI IN THE LIGHT OF SOME RECENTLY PUBLISHED TEXTS.
BY HIRALAL AMRITLAL SHAH, BOMBAY.
(Continued from p. 115.) THE at Estare none but those spoken of in Manusmriti I 35. Another sage, Bhrigu, 1 is the father of Parasurama, but evidently he is not referred to here. Hence, if there remains no doubt as regards the redaction by Bhrigu, there should be no doubt about his being earlier than the Buddhist poet either. The latter is supposed to have lived between 27-200 A. D. Bhrigu, then, must have preceded him (considering those times) at least by a century. Therefore, his recension must verge (at least) on the beginning of the Christian era or lie even further back.
Second : let us turn to the antspfl. It quotes Manu about six times. We have already given three quotations ending with " ART" Two more of this type occur on p. 177 (ch. 63) and p. 63 (ch. 25) of that book. The spf is supposed to have been written in the time of Chandragupta, the date of whose accession is 320-315 B. C. Hence, the original Law-book of Manu ( the ATT°) must be placed earlier than 320 B. C. Whether those references to Manu's opinion are taken from the Argo alone, or from it and the Manusmriti as well, we are unable to say definitely, although, circumstantial evidence favours the existence of the Manusmriti even at that date.
(A) The phrase "fa Aru" occurs many a time in the antspero and also in the #T ataifre: (T. S. Series No. 14. 1st ed., 1912.). The commentator on the latter interprets the phrase as follows -"ATTT: mit: froz:" (cf. To affo II 3.3.) We may suppose, then, that "fa Haat:" in the antspfo refers not to the 17", but to the law-books edited by the followers of the school of Manavas. The most prominent of them must be Bhřigu, because Narada and Bțihaspati, who follow Manu in many cases do not treat of politics. Hence" TE HTET: "should refer (to the recension of the Manusmriti by Bhrigu or, in other words, to our present Manusamhita.
The date of Afvaghosha is not yet definitely settled. It is true that he has much in common with Kalidasa. Mr. Nandargirkar tries to prove (cf. Introd. to Buddha by Prof. Sodni p. 10) that he, in his poem (Buddha') III 23, referred to Kumdrasambhava. However, there are argumenta which militate against his hypothesis that (Buddha) " Hair: arriena" pre is a slap at Kalidasa's T RAHE " (VII 65, Kumdra Niro Press. 5th ed., 1908).
In Buddha. V 23, we find " 97 a HTGE" and in I 85 "Hay et a free
989:” Again we have a peculiar construction of 'T' in VI 67 (Prof. Cowell's ed.). We have similes expressed negatively in VI 31 ff. From all these texts we should infer that the habit of using a to modify his ideas is peculiar to Afvaghosha. We need not suppose that he refers to some particular person or a special book, whenever he qualifies his statement. Hence, the priority of Kalidâsa to him is not settled by referring to Buddhao III 23.
6 Jolly, Recht und Sitte, p. 12, seems to conclude from the two quotations in it that the Manaud) were at the time, when this book was written, not generally recognized as a Vedio School (of Law). But the same way of quoting Manu obtained in comparatively quite recent texts. Moreover, we have pointed out in noto No. 3, that Chanakya accepts definitions (of Manu and of others) which are pot his own, without even giving their source. If the Manavdh were not recognised at that time as a Vedio School of Law, it would not have been possible for Chanakya to quote them in his Arthasastra, as inculcating one particular view on the matter.
