Organized Household Production and the Emergence of the Sangha

Abstract

This article attempts to trace social transformations that can be detected through the comparative study of early textual representations—Brahmanical and Buddhist. A comparative study of the early Grhyasutras (800 BCE–400 BCE) with some of the earliest portions of the Vinaya texts (400–200 BCE) is interesting as one can pinpoint shifts and changes within these texts which show that seemingly innocuous social transitions in matters related to production, reproduction and social interdependence at the micro level of the household and community, not only reflect larger trends at the level of the state and society but also have overarching social implications. The Grhyasutras have an emerging consciousness of the household as a social unit and the brahmanical compilers are anxious about how organization of production and reproduction within the household is to be regulated as they understand that the householder is crucial for creating social order. The Vinaya texts, rather than being anxious about household production, are familiar with it and seek to channelize this production to a larger, more elaborate, complex social organization, the sangha, which, although deriving its sustenance from resources generated from households, seeks to carve an identity for itself by being the very antithesis of the household—a community of bhikkus stripped of kinship bonds, not partaking in production or reproduction activities but bound with a common ideology. The social implications of these representations are discussed in this article.