---
type: Reference
bundle: mimamsa-dharma
bundle_version: 0.10.0
id: sabara-bhashya
title: Śabara-Bhāṣya
description: 'Śabarasvāmin''s commentary on the Mīmāṃsā Sūtra, the earliest surviving Bhāṣya and the text through which Jaimini''s sūtras were classically read; the common ground later divided by Kumārila and Prabhākara.'
tags:
- reference
- sabara-bhashya
- sabara
- commentary
timestamp: '2026-07-08'
okf_version: '0.2'
license: CC BY-SA 4.0
---

# Śabara-Bhāṣya

The Śabara-Bhāṣya (Śabarasvāmin, c. 1st century BCE to early centuries CE) is the earliest extant commentary on the Mīmāṃsā Sūtra and the channel through which the sūtras entered the later tradition. Śabara fixes the classical readings of dharma, of the injunctive as the means to it, of apūrva as the unseen link between act and result, and of the subordination of arthavāda and mantra to injunction. His commentary is the shared basis that the two great sub-schools then read differently: Kumārila Bhaṭṭa in the *Ślokavārttika* and *Tantravārttika*, and Prabhākara Miśra in the *Bṛhatī*. This bundle cites the Bhāṣya where a classical reading, rather than the bare sūtra, carries the doctrinal weight.
