Brahmanical dharma as a holistic vision of society, and the life well lived therein, was assembled gradually out of disparate elements roughly during the centuries between the two Candraguptas (the founders of the Maurya and Gupta dynasties). It began with Brahmin priestly theorists expanding their professional offerings by formalizing ceremonial practices well beyond the Vedic “high cult” (the ritual described as śrauta , i.e., ordained in the Veda itself, or vaitānika , i.e., “extended” in its use of multiple fires). The new codes of household ritual (Gṛhyasūtras) proposed simple analogues to (and substitutes for) the elaborate śrauta ritual, analogues that could be performed by a householder-ritualist unaided or with the assistance of a single priest. This formalized domestic cult also systematized the life-cycle rites and other household observances, and used this standardized ritualism as a template for an ideal society, a society of the Āryas, the “noble ones.” Every Ārya should, according to this emerging model, exhibit the marks of a properly trained ritual agent, markers that were hierarchically modulated to signal one’s position in the hierarchy of three Ārya social classes (varṇas ). 1
Study of Vedic mantras with a Brahmin preceptor—for non-Brahmins, probably rarely more than token study—and the badges of initiation into such study were presented in the domestic ritual texts as prerequisites of Ārya status. Observance of a common purity code and a set of basic ritual observances, under the advice or with the assistance of a Brahmin expert, constituted further public demonstration of such status, and served as a discipline for ethical formation.
Certain doctrinal formulations were put forward to exemplify the basic ideals of this religion, both for the purpose of catechism, and likely also for use in apologetics in the face of Buddhist, Jainist, and other rival religious doctrines. The most famous of these formulations are the Four Varṇa s (with their respective functions), the Three Debts (to the gods, sages, and ancestors), and the Five Great Acts of Worship (mahāyajña s), all of which appear already in Brāhmaṇa passages. The first works composed to expound this dharma introduce the notion of distinct āśrama s (modes of life), considered at first as alternatives and then, beginning with the Mānava code, as a sequence of four, appropriate (in theory) to all males of the three Ārya classes.
The notion that all Āryas have basic obligations according to a common framework left a defining imprint on prescribed practice, such that nearly every aspect of daily life was regulated under the emergent model of varṇāśramadharma (duties in accordance with birth class and mode of life).
Such were the ideals taught in the older dharma treatises. But after the composition of the Mānava Dharmaśāstra , one begins to hear about another set of observances fundamental to Ārya “best practices” (ācāra ). These practices came to be referred to as “āhnikāni ,” or simply in the singular as “āhnikam ,” daily observance (from ahan , “day”). 2 The particular activities discussed under this heading were mainly the following:
The first thing to note is that the first half of this list contains acts of self-purification, while the latter half comprises acts of worship. 3 The link between them may be the fact that tarpaṇa is performed as an adjunct (an aṅga ) to bathing: after plunging under the water, one stands still half submerged, scoops up water in the cupped hands, and pours it out thrice over the fingertips (the tīrtha , the “passage point” of the hand dedicated to the ancestors) with a dedicatory mantra.
Although all of these observances are well attested in the Veda, this particular grouping, under this particular heading, did not appear in the Dharmasūtras, nor in the Mānava Dharmaśāstra , nor in the Yājñavalkya. However, one can find some of these topics partially grouped together in some late appendices to the domestic codes. Consider, for instance, two appendices of the Pāraskara-Gṛhyasūtra : the Kātyāyana-Pariśiṣṭa-Śauca-Vidhi (“Kātyāyana’s Supplementary Rule of Purification”), with chapters on bodily purification (śauca ) and the rite of sipping water (ācamana ); and the Kātyāyana-Trikaṇḍikā-Sūtra (“Kātyāyana’s Sūtra of Three Short Parts”), consisting of rules for daily bathing, recitation of the Veda at twilight (saṃdhyā-brahmayajña ), and offerings to satisfy (tarpaṇa ) one’s ancestors. 4 These two short works may be roughly contemporary with the later Dharmasūtras, and anyway probably prior to Mānava Dharmaśāstra , based on the way in which the four āśrama s are presented, with the householder listed first preceding the brahmacārin (student), which is implicitly a perpetual status grouped with the vanastha (hermit) and the yati (ascetic).
Purification rites are ubiquitous in the Vedic ritual, but the āhnika purifications get into matters that were never addressed elsewhere: defecation, urination, and tooth brushing. Now presumably people knew how to clean their bottoms without a Brahmin telling them how to do it. But it had become an axiom of this new expansion of Brahmanical ritualism that there was a right way of doing everything: the dharma way—material functionality overlain with ritual refinement. The rules later collected under the heading “āhnika ,” though, are scattered in various places in the early rulebooks, and it is the commentators who connect the dots for us.
Medhātithi regards MDh 2.69 as a precedent for taking śauca as a starting point of good practice:
After initiating a pupil, the teacher should at the outset train him in purification (śauca ), proper conduct (ācāra ), fire rituals (agnikārya ), and twilight worship (saṃdhyopāsana ). (MDh 2.69)
But the Mānava itself treats these various topics in many different places, rather than as a group. For example, we find a few stanzas on śauca in its chapter on the Vedic graduate (snātaka ), inserted right into the middle of the long list of special restrictions applying only to that austere figure: 5
4.47 He must never eat food while wearing just a single garment; bathe naked; or urinate on a road, on ashes, in a cow pen, on plowed land, into water, onto a mound or a hill, in a dilapidated temple, onto an anthill, into occupied animal holes, while walking or standing, by a river bank, or at the top of hill.
4.48 He must never void urine or excrement facing the wind, a fire, a Brahmin, the sun, water, or cows.
4.49 Restraining his voice, remaining steadfastly attentive, covering his body, and wrapping his head, he should ease himself after strewing the ground with sticks, clods, leaves, or grass.
4.50 During the day, he should void urine or excrement facing the north, at night facing the south, and at the two twilights in the same way as during the day.
4.51 Under a shadow or in a place that is pitch-dark, a Brahmin may do so during the day or at night facing any direction he pleases, as also when he fears for his life.
4.52 When someone urinates towards a fire, the sun, the moon, water, a twice-born man, a cow, or the wind, his wisdom perishes.
From here, the list of special taboos continues, followed by a list of people from whom the graduate must not accept gifts. Then comes another series of stanzas, which the later scholiasts will include among the daily duties:
4.92 He should wake at the time sacred to Brahman and reflect on matters relating to Law and Wealth [i.e. dharma and artha ], on the bodily discomforts they cause, and on the true meaning of the Veda.
4.93 After getting up and answering the call of nature, he should perform the purifications and, with a collected mind, stand for a long time engaged in soft recitation during the morning twilight and, at its proper time, also during the evening twilight.
4.94 Because they performed their twilight devotions for a long time, the seers obtained long life, wisdom, fame, renown, and eminence in vedic knowledge. (Olivelle trans.)
In fact, later digests such as Devaṇṇa Bhaṭṭa’s Smṛticandrikā (twelfth or thirteenth century) begins their presentation of daily duties by quoting MDh 4.92 and similar stanzas from the Kūrma Purāṇa (2.18.3), and the Yājñavalkya Dharmaśāstra (1.115), which includes pleasure (kāma ) alongside virtue and gain (dharma and artha ) to complete the “set of three” aims of life (trivarga ). This sets the lavatory matters that will follow in the context of more high-minded concerns: the central aims of life and the demands imposed by bodily existence. Here, the Mānava is speaking of the graduate, but the snātaka would eventually come to be taken as the model of the especially pious householder. 6 As part of that process, the snātaka ’s special toilet rules are transferred to householders in general.
The Mānava also includes a long list of śauca precepts in its chapter on householders, not in connection with the daily routine but within a long section on the purification of persons and articles entailed by contaminating incidents and circumstances, such as death and physical contact with impurity:
5.134 To purify oneself after voiding urine or excrement and to clean any of the twelve bodily impurities, one should use a sufficient amount of earth and water.
5.135 Body oil, semen, blood, marrow, urine, feces, ear-wax, nails, phlegm, tears, discharge of the eyes, and sweat—these are the twelve impurities of man.
5.136 A man intent on purifying himself should apply one lump of earth on the penis, three on the anus, ten on one hand, and seven on both.
5.137 This is the purification for householders. It is twice that much for students, three times for forest hermits, and four times for ascetics.
5.138 After he voids urine or excrement, he must sip water and touch the orifices with water; he must do so every time he prepares to recite the Veda or to eat his food.
5.139 A man who desires bodily purification should first sip water three times and then wipe the mouth with water twice; but a woman or a Śūdra 7 sips and wipes just once. (Olivelle trans.)
The subject then shifts to the purifications required under a wide variety of other circumstances, such a spittle flying from the mouth, beard hairs getting in the mouth, etc. There is no hint in Manu of purification as a daily routine associated with regular morning devotions.
By contrast, in the Yājñavalkya Dharmaśāstra , the precepts for the morning necessities open the section on studentship; as in MDh 4.92–4.94, the morning ablutions do culminate in some acts of recitation and worship to be performed, in this case, by the purified student:
1.15 After the preceptor has initiated the pupil, he should first teach him the Great Calls and then the Veda, and instruct him in the practices of purification.
1.16 At the junctures of the day, with his sacred thread resting on his ear, he should urinate and defecate facing north, and if at night, facing south.
1.17 Taking hold of his penis and getting up, he should diligently purify it with earth and drawn water so as to remove whatever stinks or whatever sticks to him.
1.18 Sitting down in a clean place, facing north or east, with hands between the knees, a twice-born should always “touch water” 8 with the “crossing point of Brahman” (at the base of the thumb).
1.19 The roots of the little finger, the index finger, and the thumb, and the tip of the hand are the ‘crossing points’ sacred to Prajāpati, the ancestors, Brahman, and the gods, respectively.
1.20 Drinking water thrice, wiping (the mouth) twice, he should touch the openings (of his sense organs) with water, but only with water in its natural state, devoid of foam or bubbles.
1.21 Those of the twice-born classes will be purified by water that reaches the heart, the throat, and the palate, respectively, while a woman or a Śūdra (is cleansed by water) that has once touched the edges (of the lips).
1.22 Bathing with mantras dedicated to the divine Waters, wiping off, control of the breath, worship of the sun, and daily murmuring of the Gāyatrī mantra—
1.23 He should murmur the Gāyatrī along with the ‘Head-Mantra’ (āpo jyotī raso ’mṛtaṃ brahma ) and preceded by the ‘Great Calls’ (bhūr bhuvaḥ svaḥ ), each combined with the syllable oṃ —done thrice, this constitutes control of the breath.
1.24 Controlling the breaths, sprinkling, reciting three Ṛg-stanzas dedicated to the divine Waters, he should sit facing west, murmuring the Sāvitrī-stanza until the stars rise.
1.25 He should stand thus facing east at the morning twilight until he sees the sun; then he should perform fire-service at both the twilights. (YDh 1.15–1.25)
Again, we must note that there is yet no suggestion that these particular purity rules are meant to apply on a daily basis to the householder. But we do see here how the bathing is made the prelude to soft recitation (japa ) and twilight worship.
It is worth mentioning, by way of comparison, that the defecatory protocols in the Buddhist Vinaya code (e.g., Cullavagga V.35, VIII.8–10) similarly are concerned with ordaining standards of cleanliness, but they assume the use of latrines with seats, which monks must take turns in using, something rarely encountered in a Brahmanical text, with the notable exception of Kauṭilya’s Arthaśāstra (2.5.6; 3.8.6, 21). This difference might reflect the urban social context of Buddhist cenobitic institutions, as well as the milieu that produced the Arthaśāstra , in contrast with the persistently rural assumptions in most works of Dharmaśāstra. 9
The second, devotional group of daily observances also exhibits a partial parallel with standardized lists of duties found in older sources, the Three Debts and the Five Great Acts of Worship:
The parallel between the āhnika duties and the Five Great Acts of Worship is heightened by the fact that the Śatapatha introduces the rule for each of those offerings with the words ahar ahaḥ , “daily”:
Five indeed are the Great Acts or Worship—which are in fact sustained sacrificial sessions (sattra ): the Worship of Spirits (bhūta-yajña ), the Worship of Men (manuṣya-yajña ), the Worship of the Fathers (pitṛ-yajña ), the Worship of the Gods (deva-yajña ), and the Worship of Veda (brahma-yajña ). Daily one should present scraps of food as tribute (bali ) to spirits; in that way he accomplishes the Worship of Spirits. Daily one should provide at least a pot of water; in that way he accomplishes the Worship of Men. Daily one should pronounce that blessing svadhā [for the ancestors while offering] at least a pot of water; in that way he accomplishes the Worship of the Fathers. Daily one should pronounce that blessing svāhā [for the god while offering] at least a stick of firewood; in that way he accomplishes the Worship of the Gods. Now the Worship of the Veda: the Worship of the Veda is private recitation (svādhyāya ). Daily one recites the private recitation. That is why he should recite the private recitation.(ŚB 11.5.6.1–11.5.6.3)
This model reappears in various configurations throughout in the domestic ritual literature. 10 The medieval nibandhas (digests) simply fold the Great Acts of Worship into the treatment of āhnika (e.g., the thirteenth-century Smṛtyarthasāra ) (see Table 13.1 ).
Table 13.1
| Five Great Acts of Worship | Three or Four Debts | Corresponding Daily Duties |
|---|---|---|
| bali > spirits | ||
| water-pot/food > men | [shelter, food > men: ŚBM, MBh] | |
| water-pot with svadhā > ancestors | sons > ancestors | tarpaṇa |
| homa with svāhā > gods | homa > gods | homa |
| svādhyāya > brahman | brahmacarya > sages | japa + saṃdhyā |
| [ŚBM 11.5.6.1–11.5.6.3; MDh 3.70] | [TS 6.3.10.5; ŚBM 1.7.2.1–1.7.2.5; MBh 1.111.12–1.111.16; MDh 6.35–6.36] |
The fit with the Three Debts would seem less close, until we consider, as Patrick Olivelle has done, that the point of paying a debt to the ancestors by having a son is precisely to ensure that the tarpaṇa waters continue to flow, and the śrāddha s continue to be performed. This connection becomes explicit only in the Mahābhārata (1.111.14). 11
The first work explicitly to prescribe the entire sequence of āhnika duties for the householder—though still without using this label for them and without spelling out the purity rules—is YDh 1.97–1.102:
1.97 A householder should daily perform Smṛti-based rites in the wedding-fire, or even in the fire brought at the time of inheritance, and Śruti-based rites in the extended fires.
1.98 After attending to the ‘bodily concerns’ and following the rules of purity, a twice-born should perform the morning twilight worship, having first cleaned the teeth.
1.99 He should make the fire offerings and murmur the mantras dedicated to the sun with a focused mind; [then] he should study [works expressing] the meaning of the Veda and various treatises.
1.100 Then he should beseech the Lord for success in getting and protecting wealth, and having bathed he should gratify the ancestors and venerate the gods.
1.101 He should repeat the [three] Vedas, the Atharvan mantras, the purāṇa s and itihāsa s, as he is able, and the wisdom concerning the self, so that he will have success from recitation and worship.
1.102 The Great Offerings (mahāmakhāḥ ) are the rites of bali to spirits, svadhā to the ancestors, homa to the gods, private recitation to Brahman, and guest-reception to men.
Here all the basic elements are in place, along with the recommendation to contemplate dharma and artha at the start of the day, which was mentioned also by Manu (MDh 4.92). Yājñavalkya has even inserted the motif of the Five Great Acts of Worship into the list.
The śauca purity rules (which Yājñavalkya delicately alludes to as śarīra-cintā , “bodily concerns”) are not spelled out, except for the tooth brushing, but Mitramiśra, commenting on YDh 1.98 several centuries later, takes it for granted that the Vedic student’s purity regimen should apply also to the householder. In fact, he tries to make a virtue out the awkward fact that pertinent injunctions are introduced in different chapters by Yājñavalkya and other sages: 12
Given that here [in this passage] things that are prescribed as dharma in the chapter on studentship, etc., are approved also for the householdership, while things that are prescribed in the chapter on householdership, etc., in another smṛti are approved also for studentship, the great sage, likewise intending to affirm the connection in both contexts without distinction, explains only some matters in one chapter, and some only in another. Such, they say, is the concision of the ancient teachers, who attain also a certain elegance in the brevity of their books.
The care of the body discussed earlier applies here as well. Whereas Gautama, when he is prescribing the rules (dharma s) of the student for others as well, with the words ‘And this applies also to other [āśrama statuses] when there is no conflict of rules,’ prefers to invoke the principle of lack-of-conflict itself, which is the basis of this [rule-extension], nevertheless, the Great Sage (Yājñavalkya) in this context prefers an easier mode of instruction by recourse to a prescription, and instructs [that the householder should perform care of the body, etc.], although the topic had already been addressed [in the rules for the student, YDh 1.16–1.17]. The understanding here is that discerning readers will figure out on their own that these two authors, who have shown such brevity in their works, base their choices between equally viable alternatives on their preferences for certain things in certain cases. 13
But some [say that] the repetition of the rules for the care of the body here prescribes only that tooth-cleaning should precede the morning twilight worship, since that [act] is not applicable in the case of a celibate student: tooth-cleaning is forbidden to him by the rule, “He should avoid sitting on a cot, lying down, and tooth-cleaning.” Rather, they say, the reason for repeating the rule is simply to restrict tooth-cleaning to the particular status [of householder].
Mitramiśra thus proposes that the rule for care of the body given at YDh 1.98 (in the householder section) is meant to signal that the rules of purity for the student (given earlier) apply also to the householder (with the added rule of tooth cleaning for the householder), something which other early authorities, like Gautama, preferred to indicate instead by means of a general rule. In other words, Mitramiśra must “discover” the unified āhnika purity protocol to be implied in the indirect presentation of the older authorities.
We find that the Yājñavalkya Dharmaśāstra seems to have been the first treatise to bring together the full set of daily duties for Ārya householders, and only the commentators coin the rubric āhnika and explicitly combine rules earlier prescribed only for the student and graduate. This is in keeping with the fact that the defining characteristic of the Ārya householder in Brahmanical dharma was his embrace of an innerweltliche Askese , a worldly asceticism. Some authorities even distinguish grades of more ascetic householder. 14 But even to be the standard sort of Ārya householder required disciplined adherence to a version of what were originally the ascetic strictures placed on the celibate student—whether a yauvana (juvenile, temporary) or a naiṣṭhika (perpetual, professional) student—as well as the graduate (snātaka ).
The latter two statuses entailed elaborate restrictions on personal conduct intended to hedge, secure, and preserve a special degree of supernormal purity that was deemed necessary to their sacred functions. Just as initiation and training in Veda were being promoted as prerequisites for a life of Ārya piety according to varṇāśrama-dharma —even for those in a non-renunciate āśrama— the student’s or snātaka ’s elaborate standards of bodily purification were transferred (assumed to apply) to the ordinary householder as well, constituting that status as an āśrama , that is, as a formal “religious profession.” Those purity rules, together with the basic duties to recite and make offerings (even notional, semi-interiorized offerings), thus became the “minimum daily requirements” of any Ārya householder. 15