Mahabharata

Topic: Society in Early India: Kinship, Varna-Jati, Women · NCERT: Class 6, Ch 5 "India, That Is Bharat"; Class 6, Ch 8 "Unity in Diversity, or 'Many in the One'"; Class 7, Ch 6 "The Age of Reorganisation"; Class 9, Ch 5 "State and Society up to 1000 CE"; Class 12, Ch 3 "Kinship, Caste and Class - Early Societies"; Class 12, Ch 4 "Thinkers, Beliefs and Buildings"

Meaning

The Mahabharata is a long Sanskrit epic of over 100,000 verses. It was composed over about 1,000 years, from c. 500 BCE onwards, and tells the story of a quarrel between two groups of cousins, the Kauravas and the Pandavas. Tradition names the sage Vyasa as its author.

It matters because it does two jobs at once. It lays down rules for how people should live, and it also shows its own characters breaking those rules. That makes it one of the best sources for the social history of early India.

Explanation

Background: why historians turn to the epic

• For c. 600 BCE – 600 CE there is no census, no survey and no personal diary. Social history has to be built from texts, inscriptions and material remains.
• Historians sort texts into two kinds:
• Normative texts say what people should do. Examples are the Dharmasutras, the Dharmashastras and the Manusmriti.

• Descriptive texts show what people actually did. These include stories, poems and plays.

• The Mahabharata belongs to both groups. This is what makes it so useful.

Main features: rules and rule-breaking together

• It prescribes norms (sets rules). It tells you the right way to behave as a kinsman (a family member), a king or a wife.
• It shows people breaking those norms:
• marriages that do not follow the rule
• succession (passing the throne to the next ruler) that does not follow the rule

• people of one varna (one of the four ranked social orders) doing the work of another varna

• Conformity and deviation are both evidence:

• If a text keeps repeating a rule, the rule was probably being broken.

• If a hero breaks a rule and is still treated as a hero, the rule was not absolute.

• At its centre is a family feud between cousins over land and power. That is why historians use it to study kinship (family ties) and succession.

How the text grew and changed

• The epic was not written in one sitting. It grew over about 1,000 years. The note's timeline places the Ramayana and the Mahabharata together at c. 500 BCE – 400 CE.
• Over these centuries, new stories and new teachings were added.
• It spread across the subcontinent in manuscripts written in many different scripts. Each region kept its own version.

Result: the Critical Edition

• In 1919 a huge project began under V.S. Sukthankar to prepare a Critical Edition of the Mahabharata. A critical edition is one standard text built by comparing many old copies.
• Method:
• Manuscripts were collected from all over the subcontinent.
• Scholars compared them line by line.

• Verses found in most versions became the main text. The rest were printed as variant readings (other wordings).

• Scale: the edition ran to over 13,000 pages and took 47 years.

• Two findings:
• There is a common core of the story from Kashmir to Kerala, which shows one shared Sanskrit tradition across the subcontinent.

• More than half the pages are taken up by regional variants.

• What the variants mean:

• They are not mistakes.
• They show a dialogue between the dominant Sanskritic tradition and strong local practice.
• The "great tradition" never simply wiped out local custom.

Time, place and evidence

• Period: composed from c. 500 BCE over about 1,000 years. The note's timeline places it at c. 500 BCE – 400 CE.
• Language: Sanskrit.
• Spread: the whole subcontinent. A common core of the story is found from Kashmir to Kerala.
• Key people:
• Vyasa is the traditional author.

• V.S. Sukthankar led the Critical Edition from 1919.

• Where the edition was made: the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute (BORI), Pune. It was founded in 1917, works on Sanskrit and Prakrit texts, and holds more than 20,000 ancient manuscripts. [2]

• Scholarly record: Sukthankar also published Critical Studies in the Mahabharata. It sets out the critical notes, the Sanskrit extracts, and the different recensions on which the edition rested. A recension is a whole regional family of manuscripts. [4]
• How historians check the epic: they ask about its language, kind of text, author, audience, date and place before they trust its content. They also compare it with inscriptions and with texts in Pali, Prakrit and Tamil.

Don't confuse with

• Manusmriti: a purely normative law code from c. 200 BCE – 200 CE. It is classed as smriti ("that which is remembered"), which counts as less authoritative than shruti (the Vedas). [3] The Mahabharata is a story that both sets rules and shows them being broken.
• Ramayana: the other great Sanskrit epic. It sits in the same broad period (c. 500 BCE – 400 CE). It is traditionally credited to Valmiki, not Vyasa, and tells the story of Rama, not the Kaurava–Pandava feud.
• Critical Edition of the Mahabharata: a modern scholarly reconstruction (begun 1919, led by Sukthankar, made at BORI Pune). It is not the ancient epic itself. Do not mix up 1917 (BORI was founded) with 1919 (the project began).
• Bhagavad Gita: a part of the Mahabharata, not a separate epic.

Prelims Hooks

• Mahabharata: over 100,000 verses, composed over about 1,000 years from c. 500 BCE. Traditionally attributed to Vyasa.
• Critical Edition: began 1919 under V.S. Sukthankar. It has over 13,000 pages and took 47 years.
• More than half the pages of the Critical Edition are regional variants. A common core runs from Kashmir to Kerala.
• BORI, Pune: founded 1917, holds over 20,000 manuscripts, and is home to the Critical Edition project. [2]
• Order of dates (a common trap): Dharmasutras begin c. 500 BCE → Mahabharata composition begins c. 500 BCE → Manusmriti c. 200 BCE – 200 CE → later Dharmashastras c. 300–600 CE.
• The Mahabharata is both normative and descriptive. The Manusmriti is normative only.

Mains Points

• Deviation is evidence. The epic sets rules on kinship, marriage and succession, and then shows its own heroes breaking them. A rule that has to be repeated again and again was probably contested. So the epic is a better guide to real society than a pure rulebook like the Manusmriti.
• The Critical Edition turned textual study into social history. More than half its pages are regional variants. This shows a continuing dialogue between a dominant Sanskritic tradition and resilient local practice. It is strong evidence against the claim that one uniform social order covered the whole subcontinent.
• Method before conclusion. The epic was composed by Sanskrit-knowing authors over about 1,000 years, so historians read it alongside inscriptions and Pali, Prakrit and Tamil sources. Those sources show that Brahmanical norms were accepted as authoritative but were also questioned and sometimes rejected.

Related concepts

• Dharmasutras
• Dharmashastras
• Manusmriti
• Narada Smriti
• Yajnavalkya Smriti
• Critical Edition of the Mahabharata
• V.S. Sukthankar
• Dharma

Read more

• How historians reconstruct social history