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Mīmāṃsā Sūtra

Some 2,700 Sanskrit aphorisms holding that the Veda's commands need no author, and working out how its sacrifices must be done.

by Jaimini150 passages held

  • Sanskrit, the original language
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Original title
Mīmāṃsāsūtra
First published
250 BCE(aged 50)
Original language
Sanskrit

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Overview

For most of their history these aphorisms were read through the commentary of Śabara, the oldest that survives, and through the two rival schools that Kumārila and Prabhākara built on it from the seventh century on. They are a root text, not a commentary: some 2,700 sūtras, terse statements meant to be memorised and explained by a teacher, in twelve books. Their argument is that right action, dharma, can be known only from the commands of the Veda, and that those commands need no author to vouch for them. The opening lines set this out. The inquiry is into dharma; dharma is whatever a Vedic injunction makes known; perception cannot reach it, since perception grasps only what is already present, while a command says what is to be done. The fifth sūtra adds the claim the school became known for: the bond between a word and its meaning is original, made by no one, so the Veda's knowledge does not rest on any speaker whose reliability could be doubted. From there the sūtras work through the sacrifice: how to tell a command from a passage of praise, which rites are primary and which serve them, what may replace a prescribed substance that is missing, and who is entitled to sacrifice at all. Tradition names Jaimini as their author, yet the text cites Jaimini's view by name beside those of other teachers, Bādari and Bādarāyaṇa among them. Historians date it anywhere from the fourth to the second century BCE. Its rules for reading a text became the working tools of Indian legal interpretation, and Vedānta came to be called the later Mīmāṃsā, Jaimini's school the earlier. In 1990 Francis X. Clooney, an American Jesuit scholar of Hindu thought, published Thinking Ritually, an attempt to recover Jaimini's own system from beneath the commentaries.

Key concepts

What does dharma mean in the Mīmāṃsāsūtra?

Dharma here means what ought to be done: an act that brings good and is known only through a Vedic command. The second sūtra defines it in four words: dharma is a goal marked out by a command. It is not law, virtue or religion in general, but duty as the Veda enjoins it, above all the duty to perform its sacrifices.

What is a sūtra?

A sūtra is a very short statement, often a few words, meant to be memorised and unfolded by a teacher. The Mīmāṃsāsūtra has some 2,700 of them in twelve books. Because they are so compressed, many state only an objection or a reply, with no sign of which is which, and readers have depended on commentaries to tell them apart.

What is an injunction, a vidhi?

An injunction is a Vedic sentence that commands an act, typically by a verb form meaning 'one should': one who desires heaven should sacrifice. For the sūtras it is the core of scripture, the only kind of statement that can make dharma known, and every other passage is read for how it serves an injunction.

What is arthavāda?

Arthavāda is the name for the Veda's passages that praise, blame or tell a story instead of commanding. The sūtras do not treat them as statements of fact to be believed on their own; they form one sentence with a nearby command and serve to recommend the act it prescribes. That rule lets the school keep the whole Veda meaningful while treating action as its point.

What is the difference between a principal act and an auxiliary?

A principal act is done for the sake of its result, an auxiliary for the sake of something else, usually the principal act. The sūtras define the auxiliary, śeṣa, as what exists for another's purpose. Sorting every element of a rite into these two classes is how they decide what must be repeated, what may be transferred to another rite, and what can be dropped.

Themes of the book

What this book returns to, gathered into themes and ordered by how much of the text each one occupies.

A Command With No Author

How can anyone know what ought to be done, when the eye sees only what already exists? The sūtras answer that duty is known from the Veda's commands alone, and that those commands owe their authority to no speaker.

The opening sūtras set out the whole position in a few lines. Dharma, right action, is whatever a Vedic command makes known; perception cannot reach it, because it grasps only what is present to the senses. The bond between a word and its meaning is original, made by no one, so the Veda cannot be wrong in the way a fallible author can. The sūtras defend this against objectors who say words are produced when spoken, or that the Veda mentions human names and must be recent.

  • scriptural authority
  • injunction
  • vedic injunctions
  • scriptural injunctions
  • prescription
  • language
  • textual evidence

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How to Read a Command

Most of the Veda is not commands at all but stories, praise and verses for recitation. What such passages are for, if the scripture's purpose is action, is the problem the sūtras' rules of reading solve.

An objector presses the point early: since the Veda aims at action, any passage that does not prescribe one is useless. The answer is that praise and story belong to the sentence of a command and serve to recommend it, so they are read as part of it. Mantras are explained by what they mean, not used as magic sounds. Where a word's place in the rite is unclear, six kinds of evidence are ranked, from an explicit statement down to a mere name, the stronger overriding the weaker.

  • scriptural interpretation
  • hermeneutics
  • textual interpretation
  • mantras
  • ritual interpretation

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The Anatomy of a Rite

A single sacrifice is a web of acts, some primary and some serving others. Which parts belong to which, what may replace a missing substance and who may sacrifice at all are worked out here, case by case.

Most of the twelve books are this work. An auxiliary act exists for the sake of another, the principal one for the sake of its result; Bādari limits auxiliaries to substances and qualities, Jaimini extends them to acts, since acts too serve a fruit. A model rite lends its details to its variations, and a substitute may stand in for a missing substance because it serves the same purpose. Eligibility is argued too: a wife sacrifices jointly with her husband, and the śūdra, the lowest class, is excluded.

  • ritual unity
  • ritual auxiliaries
  • ritual modification
  • ritual transfer
  • ritual eligibility
  • ritual roles
  • means and ends
  • sacrifice
  • ritual sequence
  • vedic ritual

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Within this work

passages held
150
distinct concepts
138
by passages held, corpus-wide
#414

What this book thinks together

The wheel takes this book’s leading concepts and shows how often they come up together. The wider the band between two, the more of its passages speak of both. Among them, most often together: “ritual interpretation” and “vedic ritual”.
Concept co-occurrence, strongest first 8 concepts, joined by 25 pairings. 82 pairings reach beyond these concepts and are not drawn.
ConceptPaired conceptShared passages
ritual interpretationvedic ritual19
hermeneuticsritual interpretation16
injunctionritual interpretation16
mantrasritual interpretation13
mantrasvedic ritual10
ritual interpretationsacrifice10
hermeneuticsinjunction9
ritual interpretationritual sequence7
injunctionvedic ritual5
sacrificevedic ritual5
injunctionscriptural interpretation4
ritual sequencevedic ritual4
hermeneuticsscriptural interpretation3
scriptural interpretationvedic ritual3
hermeneuticsmantras2
hermeneuticsvedic ritual2
injunctionmantras2
mantrassacrifice2
ritual sequencescriptural interpretation2
sacrificescriptural interpretation2
hermeneuticsritual sequence1
hermeneuticssacrifice1
injunctionritual sequence1
injunctionsacrifice1
mantrasscriptural interpretation1

Works held

The author's work in order, this book marked in place. Your-language title first, the original beneath it where the two differ; side chips show which full texts are held.

  1. -250 Mīmāṃsā Sūtra (Mīmāṃsāsūtra) you are here SA
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