The is a ' (legal
commentary
Commentary or commentaries may refer to:
Publications
* ''Commentary'' (magazine), a U.S. public affairs journal, founded in 1945 and formerly published by the American Jewish Committee
* Caesar's Commentaries (disambiguation), a number of works ...
) on the
Yajnavalkya Smriti
Yajnavalkya or Yagyavalkya ( sa, याज्ञवल्क्य, ) is a Hindu Vedic sage figuring in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad (c. 700 BCE)., Quote: "Yajnavalkya, a Vedic sage, taught..."Ben-Ami Scharfstein (1998), ''A comparative histor ...
best known for its theory of "inheritance by birth." It was written by
Vijñāneśvara, a scholar in the
Western Chalukya
The Western Chalukya Empire ruled most of the western Deccan, South India, between the 10th and 12th centuries. This Kannadiga dynasty is sometimes called the ''Kalyani Chalukya'' after its regal capital at Kalyani, today's Basavakalyan in th ...
court in the late eleventh and early twelfth century.. Along with the
Dāyabhāga
The ''Dāyabhāga'' is a Hindu law treatise written by Jīmūtavāhana which primarily focuses on inheritance procedure. The ''Dāyabhāga'' was the strongest authority in Modern British Indian courts in the Bengal region of India, although this h ...
, it was considered one of the main authorities on
Hindu Law
Hindu law, as a historical term, refers to the code of laws applied to Hindus, Buddhists, Jains and Sikhs in British India. Hindu law, in modern scholarship, also refers to the legal theory, jurisprudence and philosophical reflections on the nat ...
from the time the British began administering laws in India. The entire , along with the text of the ', is approximately 492 closely printed pages.
Author
Vijñāneśvara lived at Marthur near kalaburagi (Karnataka), near the end of the eleventh century during the reign of
Vikramaditya VI
Vikramaditya VI (r. 1076 – 1126 CE) became the Western Chalukya King after deposing his elder brother Someshvara II, a political move he made by gaining the support of Chalukya vassals during the Chola invasion of Chalukya territory.Sen ...
of the Cālukya dynasty of Kalyāni, one of the great rulers of the Deccan. He was a "profound student of the
Purva-Mimamsa system," a system of exegetical thought focused on the interpretation of the Vedas. Contrary to Derrett's opinion based on Yajnavalkya 2.4 and 2.305 that Vijñāneśvara was a judge, Kane holds that these passages about characteristics of judges do not reflect a social or historical reality, but rather an interpretation based upon Mimamsa.
Date and historical context
Kane places the between 974 CE and 1000 CE, but he says, "there is no evidence to establish the exact time when the work was undertaken." He places it after 1050 CE because it names Viśvarūpa,
Medhātithi
Medhātithi is one of the oldest and most famous commentators on the , more commonly known as the Laws of Manu. The text is a part of the Hindu Dharmaśāstra tradition, which attempts to record the laws of dharma.
Location
There is some debat ...
, and Dhāreśvara, other commentators, as authoritative sources. Derrett places the text between 1121 CE and 1125 CE, a much shorter time frame than Kane, but Kane claims that this time frame is purely arbitrary, and Derrett does not provide the evidence to support his claim. Lingat, however, is content to place the simply at the end of the eleventh century. Historically, Vijñāneśvara was attempting to clarify and explain parts of the , and he was criticizing and discussing earlier commentaries on the same text in an attempt to reconcile differences and further explain the meaning and the significance of the text.
Sources and topics
Vijñāneśvara's commentary "brings together numerous passages, explains away contradictions among them by following the rules of interpretation laid down in the
Purva Mimamsa system, brings about order by assigning to various dicta their proper scope and province...and effects a synthesis of apparently unconnected
injunctions
An injunction is a legal and equitable remedy in the form of a special court order that compels a party to do or refrain from specific acts. ("The court of appeals ... has exclusive jurisdiction to enjoin, set aside, suspend (in whole or in par ...
." In this sense, the commentary is similar to a digest (nibandha) in that it attempts to draw into the commentary outside opinions about the same passages of the text which he is commenting on. Although he is commenting on the , he cites numerous earlier commentators as well, including Viśvarūpa,
Mēdhātithi, and Dhāreśvara. The 's most important topics include property rights, property distribution, and inheritance. This text has become the authority, especially on inheritance, throughout most of India after the British began to move in.
Effect on British India
The , along with the
Dāyabhāga
The ''Dāyabhāga'' is a Hindu law treatise written by Jīmūtavāhana which primarily focuses on inheritance procedure. The ''Dāyabhāga'' was the strongest authority in Modern British Indian courts in the Bengal region of India, although this h ...
, became an influential source for British Courts in India. The was influential throughout the majority of India, except in
Bengal
Bengal ( ; bn, বাংলা/বঙ্গ, translit=Bānglā/Bôngô, ) is a geopolitical, cultural and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal, predom ...
,
Assam
Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...
and some of the parts in
Odisha
Odisha (English: , ), formerly Orissa ( the official name until 2011), is an Indian state located in Eastern India. It is the 8th largest state by area, and the 11th largest by population. The state has the third largest population of ...
and
Bihar
Bihar (; ) is a state in eastern India. It is the 2nd largest state by population in 2019, 12th largest by area of , and 14th largest by GDP in 2021. Bihar borders Uttar Pradesh to its west, Nepal to the north, the northern part of West ...
, where the
Dāyabhāga
The ''Dāyabhāga'' is a Hindu law treatise written by Jīmūtavāhana which primarily focuses on inheritance procedure. The ''Dāyabhāga'' was the strongest authority in Modern British Indian courts in the Bengal region of India, although this h ...
prevailed as an authority for law. The British were interested in administering law in India, but they wanted to administer the law that already existed to the people. Thus, they searched for a text that could be used to help solve disputes among the people of India in manners which were already customary in the sub continent. These disputes often involved property rights or inheritance issues. Thus, the first translation of the was by
Colebrooke in 1810, and it was only this section of the text that gave the British insight on how to deal with inheritance issues. At that point, the held the status of a legislative text because it was used as a direct resource regarding inheritance in the courts of law in most of India.
Translations
Colebrooke did the first translation of the in 1810 because there was an immediate need in the British courts for the "law" (or as close as they could get to the law) regarding inheritance that already existed among the people of India. W. Macnaghten did the second translation, dealing with procedure, in 1829. Finally, J. R. Gharpure provided us with a complete translation of the .
Sub-commentaries
Several sub-commentaries have been written on the , including the ''Subodhinī'' of Viśveśvara (c.1375), the ' of Bālaṃbhaṭṭa Payagunde (c.1770). and the ' of . The ' is notable for having greatly informed
Colebrooke's translation of the , and also for possibly having been written by a woman, Lakṣmīdevī.
The 13th-century
Telugu language
Telugu (; , ) is a Dravidian language spoken by Telugu people predominantly living in the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, where it is also the official language. It is the most widely spoken member of the Dravidian language fam ...
text ''
Vijnaneshvaramu'' is based on ''Mitākṣarā''.
Notes
References
* Suryanath U. Kamat, A Concise history of Karnataka from pre-historic times to the present, Jupiter books, MCC, Bangalore, 2001 (Reprinted 2002) OCLC: 7796041
* K.A. Nilakanta Sastri, History of South India, From Prehistoric times to fall of Vijayanagar, 1955, OUP, New Delhi (Reprinted 2002),
* Charles Li
"Lakṣmīdevī’s 'intellectual petticoats' and the flamewar they inspired."''Texts Surrounding Texts: Satellite Stanzas, Prefaces and Colophons in South-Indian Manuscripts.''
11 June 2021.
External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mitaksara
Hindu law
Ancient Indian law