Lesson 2: Important Religious Texts.
The Smritis - Dharma Sashtras & The Puranas (Itihases).
The Smritis:
Next in importance to the Sruti scriptures are the Smritis, those scriptures that are begotten from the memories. Actually, all Hindu scriptures except the Vedas are Smritis, derivatives from the Vedas. The Smritis stand next in authority to the Vedas and explain and develop Dharma by laying down the laws that govern Hindu national, social, familial and individual obligations.
The Dharma Sashtras are the books that are expressly called Smritis. The three great law-givers are Manu, who wrote the Manu Smriti or Manava Dharma-Sastra, Yagnavalkya, who wrote the Yagnavalkya Smriti which is next in importance to Manu’s Smriti and Parasara, who wrote the Parasara Smriti. These are the three great law-givers and their Dharma-Sastras are still studied today to gather guidelines for social conduct. In all, there are 18 Dharma Sashtras. The other 15 are those of Vishnu, Daksha, Samvarta, Vyasa, Harita, Satatapa, Vasishtha, Yama, Apastamba, Gautama, Devata, Sankhya-Likhita, Usana, Atri and Saunaka.
The Puranas and the Great Epics are expressly Itihases, historical works, but they also come under the broad range of the Smritis.
As times change, great thinkers from different ages and different parts of the country set down rules that are most appropriate for conduct during that thinker’s particular age. These are the Smriti Laws. They evolve and change as social requirements evolve and change. Thus, the Smritis are always evolving as times and social requirements changes. The Vedas are absolute and unchanging and are the ultimate authority from which the Smritis are derived.
Puranas:
Since the Vedas are written in difficult, often rhetorical, language meant to be utilized by scholars and other learned men and are overbearingly erudite to the common masses the Puranas have been written to popularize the religion of the Vedas. They use simple language and easy-to-understand concepts that the masses are familiar with.
The Puranas are akin to the historical epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. There are five characteristics to the Puranas: history, cosmology: a combination of astrology and astronomy with symbolic illustrations chalking out philosophic concepts, creation after the original being came into existence, genealogy of Kings and Manvantaras – the period of Manu’s rule for 71 celestial yugas.
According to legend, Ved Vyasa is reputed to be the compiler of the Puranas in each age. In this Kaliyuga he is Krishna Dvaipayana.
More practically, since the Puranas were written for ordinary people the sages who wrote them avoided high philosophic thoughts and ideals and transplanted them with allegorical allusions that went down well with the people. Often the Puranas use the lives of great kings and others to get across the teachings of the Vedas and instill within people a love and devotion of the Gods and Goddesses, which is the chief purpose of the Vedas. Thus, the Puranas are a great and interesting potpourri of myths and legends involving the lives of Gods, Goddesses, kings, sages and others. Through these simple tales the sages have illustrated the eternal principles of religion to the common people.
The tales and stories from the Puranas are read by grandparents and parents to children who enjoy them very much. Priests utilize these to easily get across the basic tenets of Hinduism to their followers. Since it is not essential to be very learned in the scriptures to understand the Puranas anyone with basic reading ability can read them out loud and others who are less literate can hear them and learn of Hinduism. Thus, in India, even illiterate people know the stories from the Puranas from hearing them verbally from others. These ancient scriptures are a part of the great oral tradition in India whereby one generation hears these stories and pass them on to the next generation.
In all there are 18 Puranas together with an equal number of Upa-Puranas or subsidiary Puranas. The 18 Puranas can be subdivided into 6 Rajasic Puranas praising Brahma, 6 Sattvic Puranas praising Vishnu and 6 Tamasic Puranas praising Shiva.
The 18 Puranas are:
- Vishnu Purana
- Brahma Vaivata Purana
- Markhandya Purana
- Naradiya Purana
- Srimad Bhagavada Purana
- Garuda Purana
- Padma Purana
- Varaha Purana
- Brahma Purana
- Brahmandya Purana
- Vavishya Purana
- Vamana Purana
- Matsya Purana
- Kurma Purana
- Linga Purana
- Shiva Purana
- Skanda Purana
- Agni Purana
The most well-organized of all the Puranas are the Vishnu Purana and the Srimad Bhagavada Purana while the latter is the most popular. Also popular is a portion of the Markhandya Purana popularly known as Chandi. In this section the appearance of Devi to combat with the asuras is given and Sakta Hindus recite it almost daily as an aid to Devi worship. It is also the primary text for worship of Durga and the other Shakti Goddesses. The Sattvic and Tamasic Puranas tell of the deeds of the avatars of Vishnu and Shiva respectively. They also explain the reasons why these two gods came down to earth. Also each of the three types of Puranas – The Rajasic, Sattvic and Tamasic – extols its God of choice to the detriment of the other two. This is explained away by scholars who say that Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva are taught in the Puranas as being different aspects of the same Supreme Being but, for easy understanding and for inculcating devotion, each of the different types posits its God of choice as the best.
The Puranas are primarily Itihases, historical works, but they are broadly categorized under the Smriti literature of the Hindus.
