Gṛhya Sūtras

Introduction

The Grihya Sutra deals with 16 Samskaras “ceremonies” and daily yajnas “sacrifices” that mark various stages of a householder’s life. Three sutras, namely, Grihya, Shrauta, and Dharma, constitute the Kalpa sutras that are a collection of scriptures that emerged during different Vedic schools [4]. The Grihya Sutra describes ceremonies for special occasions, seasonal ceremonies, and five daily sacrifices, particularly starting from the inception of life to reaching the final destination, i.e., death. The Hindu scholars believe that Grihya Sutra was composed during the same period when the Hindu law books were composed. The main Grihya Sutras are Sankhayana Grihya Sutra, Asvalayana Grihya Sutra, Paraskar Grihya Sutra, and Khadira Grihya Sutra. Each Veda has a separate Grihya Sutra: the Grihya Sutra of Rig Veda includes Asvalayana and Sankhayana Grihya Sutra, and the method of construction of building and dwelling time has been described [3]. Also the third Grihya Sutra...