Chapter 5.2 - The Sauradharma-purana (study)

This work [sauradharma-purana] has been mentioned in the Bhavisya-purana' together with the 'eighteen Puranas', 'the Biography of Rama' (i.e. the Ramayana), the Mahabharata, the Visnudharma, the Sivadharma and other sacred works which are to be known by the technical term 'Jaya'. So, according to the Bhavisya-purana it was an early work dealing with the duties of the Sauras. But unfortunately its title has not been included in any of the lists of Upapuranas known to us. Yet we have taken it to be an Upapurana for two reasons. Firstly, it appears to have I See Bhavisya-purana I. 4. 87 b-89 astadasa-puranani ramasya caritam tatha// visnudharmadayo dharmah sivadharmas ca bha ata// karsnam vedam pancamam tu yan mahabharatam smrtam// saura dharmas ca rajendra naradokta mahipate/ jayeti nama etesam pravadanti manisinah// (The printed ed. wrongly reads 'srautah' for 'saurah' in the fourth line. Cf. Bhavisya-purana I, 216, 36-37 quoted on p. 113 above). The above verses, as quoted in Laksmidhara's Krtya-kalpataru (1. p. 25), Hemadri's Caturvarga-cintamani (II. i. pp. 19-20), Candesvara's Krtya-ratnakara (p. 30), Raghunandana's Smrti-tattva (I. p. 71), Narasimha Vajaperin's Nityacara-pradipa (I, p. 22), and Mitra Misra's Viramitrodaya, Paribhasaprakasa (p. 17), read the second line as 'visnudharmadi sastrani sivadharmas ca bharata' and the fourth line as "sauras ca dharma rajendra manavokta mahipate,"

348 STUDIES IN THE UPAPURANAS had the form and contents of a Puranic work; and secondly, the Visnudharma, Visnudharmottara, Sivadharma and Sivadharmottara have been regarded as minor Puranas by various authorities. The Sauradharma has been drawn upon in Ananta-bhatta's Vidhana-parijata (II, p. 696), Gadadhara's Kalasara (p. 129), Gopalabhatta's Haribhakti-vilasa (p. 773), Ganapati's Ganga-bhakti-tarangini (folios 3 ob and 31 a-b), Raghunandada's Smrti-tattva (I, p. 142, and II, Pp. 41 and 48), Srinathacarya-cudamani's Krtya-tattvarnava (folios 77 b-78 a), Vacaspati-misra's Krtya-cintamani (p. 2), Hemadri's Caturvarga-cintamani (II. i, p. 1000, II. ii, pp. 552-7, and III. ii, pp. 114, 150, 179), Sulapani's Vrata-kala-viveka (p. 18), and in the Samvatsara-pradipa (fol. 39 a). So, this work cannot be dated later than 1000 A.D. We shall see below that the Sauradharmottara, which must have been written later than the Sauradharma, preceded Jimutavahana by a few centuries. Hence the Sauradharma must have been written earlier than 800 A. D. We cannot push the above date farther up, because we are not sure that the Sauradharma, drawn upon by the Smrti-writers, was the same as the 'Saura Dharma' mentioned in Bhavisya-purana 1.4.89 and I. 216. 37° Some of the verses, ascribed to the Sauradharma in the Smrti Nibandhas, show that in this work, as known to the Smrti-writers, Vasistha spoke to king Mandhatr at least in some of its parts, but according to the Bhavisya-purana Narada (or Manava) spoke out the *Saura Dharmas' or 'the (religious) duties of the Sun-worshippers'.* As the Visnudharma and the Sivadharma, mentioned in the Bhavisya-purana, belonged to the Vaisnavas and the Saivas respectively, there can be little doubt about the fact that the 'Saura Dharma', known to the Bhavisya, must have dealt principally, if not entirely, with the duties of the Sun-worshippers. From the evidence of the quoted verses also we understand that the Sauradharma, as known to the Smrti-writers, was a work of the Sauras and that at least in some parts of this work Suta reported what he had heard from Vyasa on the interlocution between Vasistha and Mandhatr. Most of these quoted 2 For the relevant verses of the Bhavisya-p, see the immediately, preceding foot-note and also p. 113 above.

SOME LOST SAURA AND VAISNAVA UPAPURANAS 349 verses relate to fasting on the Ekadasi Tithi, two to the religious duties in the month of Magha (magha-krtyani), and one to the eatables in the Kamya-vrata; and there is one long extract, quoted in Caturvarga-cintamani, II. ii, pp. 552-7, which deals with the Surya-vrata to be performed every month from Margasirsa by placing a golden image of the Sun in a silver chariot. In the verses ascribed to the Sauradharma in the Vidhana-parijata and the Caturvargacintamani there is mention of the Tulasi plant, of which three leaves are to be eaten up by the persons observing the Kamya-vrata and the Surya-varta every month from Margasirsa.