It will be seen that according to this theory pre-social condition was one of peace and freedom. When moha or infatuation took possession of the human beings, confusion arose, and the gods, being alarmed, went to Prajāpati Vishṇu who directed his son Virajas to rule over men. It was, however, Pṛithu Vainya seventh descendant from Vishṇu, who was crowned king not only by gods but also by Vishṇu. Not only Pṛithu but also kings since that time are looked upon as part of Vishṇu and are therefore called Nara-devas, i.e. gods in human form. The rudiments of this notion of kingship are traceable even in the Śatapatha-Brāhmaṇa. Let me here quote a passage from this work, bearing on the point. “And as to why a Rājanya shoots, he, the Rājanya, is most manifestly of Prajāpati: hence, while being one, he rules over many.”42 The last sentence is very significant. This precisely forms the basis of the question which Yudhishṭhira asks Bhīshma at the beginning of Chapter 59 whose summary I have just given. The question is: the king is but one of the many human beings and how is it that he rules over them? Bhīshma’s reply is that the king is a nara-deva being part of Prajāpati Vishṇu. This is just what the Śatapatha-Brāhmaṇa says. It is true that this Brāhmaṇa represents a king to be part of Prajāpati only and makes no mention of Vishṇu, but then we must remember that the same Brāhmaṇa43 mentions Prajāpati as an epithet of the god Savitṛi who and Vishṇu represent one and the same Sun deity. This view, therefore, leads us to suppose that the king was originally regarded as a descendant of the sun; and this explains, I think, the etymological meaning of the word chakravartin used in the case of universal monarchs. The Brahmanical, Buddhist and Jaina works are unanimous in saying that preceded by the miraculous chakra a supreme ruler sets out on his expedition of conquest and subjects all petty princes.44 “What can this chakra be? This question has very much exercised scholars and antiquarians. But I cannot help thinking that this chakra must be the chakra of Vishṇu, who according to old Hindu notion, abides in him in part and whose discus alone can legitimately be supposed as affording safety to him against all his enemies. This no doubt reminds us of the Pharaohs of Egypt who were styled Si-re or sons of the Sun-god and who in sculptures are represented as being protected by the rays emanating from the orb of the sun. It is quite possible that in the Brāhmaṇa period the chakra of Vishṇu which granted protection and safety to the kings, was really the orb of the sun darting its rays to them.
The question is here sure to be asked : Were there any checks to the arbitrariness of a king? Those who held the Social Contract theory would be the last persons to condone the misuse of authority by a king. Even such a retired and self-contained Buddhist monk as Āryadeva can scarcely keep his mind unperturbed when he sees the haughtiness of a ruler caused by his ruling power and cannot help blurting out: Gaṇa-dāsasya te darpaḥ shaḍ-bhāgena bhṛitasya kaḥ:45 “What superciliousness is thine, (O king!), who art a (mere) servant of the body politic and who receivest the sixth part (of the produce) as thine wages?” Even those who held the theory of the divine origin of kingship could not have defended or tolerated the misrule and oppression of any king. A theory similar to this, is the theory of the Divine Right of Kings which was started and developed in Europe by the Christian Apostles and Fathers. We know to what absurd and pernicious extent it was carried in Europe. One of the Fathers, Irenoeus e.g., holds that the ruler is not only the minister of God’s remedy for sin but the instrument of his punishment.46 Much the same view was propounded by Fathers St. Ambrosiaster and St. Augustine. It was therefore no wonder at all in his speech to Parliament in 1689 James II of England declared :“Kings are justly called gods; for they exercise a manner of resemblance of Divine power on earth. For if you will consider the attributes of God, you shall see how they agree in the person of a king. God hath power to create or destroy, make or unmake at his pleasure, to give life or send death, to judge all and to be accountable to none. And the like power have kings. They make and unmake their subjects; they have power of raising up and casting down; of life and death; judges over all their subjects and in all cases, yet accountable to none but God. They have power to exalt low things and abase high things and to make of their subjects like men at chess.” Surely enormity cannot farther go. Fortunately for India though the divine origin of kings was maintained by some people, it was never pushed to this absurd extreme or, for the matter of that, to any absurd extent. On the contrary, even such a late work as the Śukra-nīti47 says: “The king, who is virtuous, is a part of the gods. He who is otherwise is a part of the demons.” It will be seen therefore that a king is a nara-deva only so long as he is virtuous and that he ceases to be so the moment he goes to the bad. The theory of the divine origin of kings was thus maintained and kept within sober bounds. The Arthaśāstrakāras of India, therefore, nowhere show even the least inclination to defend any misconduct and repression on the part of a king. On the contrary, they are never wearied of impressing on his mind the paramount necessity of controlling passions, such as kāma, krodha, lobha and so forth which are called the Śatru-shaḍ-varga or the six enemies of the king.48 Instances are cited of the rulers who have brought destruction upon themselves, their families and their kingdoms by falling a prey to one or another of these passions. Those who have read Kauṭilya’s Arthaśāstra need not be told what I mean.49 But perhaps it may here be said that the instances Kauṭilya has adduced are all from the Mahābhārata and the Purāṇas and have no bearing on real political life. Is there anything in his book in this connection which relates to actual practice or experience? I may therefore draw your attention to another part of his book where he starts the question: which enemy should be marched against, an enemy strong but of wicked character or an enemy weak but of righteous character? And he answers it by saying that the former should by all means be attacked, for though he is strong, his subjects will not help him but on the contrary will either put him down or go over to the other side. And in support of his position Kauṭilya cites many verses from previous authors, one of which distinctly tells us that “when a people are impoverished, they become greedy; when they are greedy, they become disaffected; when they are disaffected, they voluntarily go to the side of the enemy or destroy their own master.”50 We cannot, therefore, help inferring that in India in the old period at any rate if the subjects were maltreated by a king, they took revenge by joining the enemy’s side if he ever invaded, otherwise by actually putting their king to death. Surely historical instances of wicked and oppressive rulers being deserted or even killed by their subjects must have remained within the living memory of Kauṭilya and his predecessors, otherwise these verses would not have been composed or quoted. And we hear an echo of it even from the Mahābhārata where in at least one place we are told that “the subjects should arm themselves for slaying that king who does not protect them, who simply plunders their wealth,…… and who is regarded and as the most sinful of kings. That king who tells his people that he is their protector but who does not or is unable to protect them, should be slain by his combined subjects like a dog that is effected by the rabies and has become mad.”51 Evidently, therefore, there must have been actual instances of pernicious and sinful rulers being put to death by their subjects. And all these instances must certainly have acted as a powerful deterrent to a king from giving a loose rein to his passions.
But it may be argued that the above considerations at best show that the misrule of an autocrat when it went up to an excess was put down by the people of ancient India, but that they do not necessarily show that the administration of the country was so framed that it did not allow a king to become despotic and uncontrolled. Can we say that the king’s power was not arbitrary hut was restrained by organisations of an opposite character? Now, it is true that in the period we have selected the regal power had considerably augmented as compared to that of the previous periods, but I confess that it could not have become arbitrary. India was then a home of self-governing communities as it continues to be to this day though now to a very limited exten
t. India was then studded with village, town and provincial corporations which exercised a kind of autonomy in their own spheres and managed their affairs independently or semi-independently of the king.52 A similar organisation of this period was the trade and craft guilds which then flourished in numbers and were so powerful as to keep their own armies and sometimes even lend them to the king. The king was thus in those days surrounded by these tiny but numerous self-governing bodies, with their particularistic jurisdictions, which circumscribed his power. Certainly he could not afford to ignore their existence and is therefore exhorted by all Hindu epics and law-givers to respect their codes of laws and regulations and consult them. The administration of our period must, therefore, have been a system of mutual checks, and could not have left much scope for the development of the king’s arbitrariness. Nay, I go a step further and say that the kings of this period themselves knew that there were great limitations to their power. A typical instance is furnished by the Telapatta-Jātaka. Here we are introduced to a king of Takshaśilā, who is enamoured of a Yakshiṇī or Ogress that has transformed herself into the most beautiful woman. Fully conscious that she had obtained a perfect mastery over the king’s mind, she asks him to give her authority over his whole kingdom. But what reply does the king give though he was hopelessly smitten with her unspeakable charms? Does he hand over the kingdom as she bids him to do? Far from it; on the contrary, he replies: “My love, I have no power over the subjects of my kingdom; I am not their lord and master. I have only jurisdiction over those who revolt or do wrong. So I cannot give you power and authority over the whole kingdom.” But power he had over his palace, and that he gave to her. Here then we have got a king who in distinct and unmistakable words had to confess to his sweetheart that he possessed and wielded no power or authority over his state and that what little power he had was restricted to the punishment of the rebellious or the iniquitous people. A clearer limitation of the kingly power is not possible. The king could not possibly have been invested with uncontrolled and unlimited powers, at least during the period we have selected. Nay, we may proceed a step further and turn to another Jātaka story, the Eka-paṇṇa-Jātaka as it is called. Here we hear king’s son being fierce and passionate and being called Dushṭa-kumāra for that reason. He was handed over to an ascetic for being tamed. The ascetic took the prince to a Nimb plant on which only two leaves had grown and asked him to taste one. The prince did so, but spat it out with an oath to get the taste out of his mouth. He exclaimed: “Sir, to-day the plant only suggests a deadly poison; but if left to grow, it will prove the death of many persons;” and forthwith he plucked up and crushed the tiny growth. Thereupon the ascetic said: “Prince, dreading what the poisonous seedling might grow to, you have torn it up and rent it asunder. Even as you acted to the tree, so the people of this kingdom, dreading what a prince so fierce and passionate, may become when king, will not place you on the throne but uproot you like this Nimb plant and drive you forth to exile.” It is quite clear that the people not only exercised control over the king’s power but also could prevent his son from succeeding to his throne if necessary. An instance of this kind has been mentioned in the Uddyoga-Parvan of the Mahābhārata also. A king called Pratīpa, having become exceedingly aged, made preparations for crowning his eldest and favourite son Devāpi. The latter was no doubt possessed of many virtues, but had contracted a skin-disease, an was, therefore, unfit in the popular opinion to hold the reins of government. The subjects—the Brāhmaṇs and the Town (paura) and Country (jānapada) people—therefore objected. The king burst into tears but had to yield to the popular voice.53 In the Rāmāyaṇa also we find that Daśaratha consecrated his son Rāma as crown-prince only after respectfully securing the consent of the Brāhmaṇs, generals (balamukhya) and the Town (paura) and Country (jānapada) people.54
I have told you before that both the Artha—and the Dharma-śastra ordain that a king shall make good out of his own treasury any property of his subject that has been robbed by thieves but cannot be recovered. It is worthy of note that there is thus a perfect agreement on this point between the Artha-śāstra and the Dharma-śāstra. And certainly they both would not have laid down the law in this manner if such had not been the practice. And this certainly would not have been the practice if the popular voice had not been strong enough to enforce it. So even for such a trifling matter as the stolen property of a private individual the king was controlled by the people! The royal power could not possibly have been absolute, at any rate, in the period we have selected.
There was yet another check to the arbitrariness of a king which we have to notice here. There was placed before him not only the selfish point of view which advised him not to run up to an extreme and cause disaffection among his people but also a higher and spiritual point of view which, I think, was no less efficacious. In Chapter 75 of the Śānti-Parvan we are told that a king attains a fourth part of the spiritual merit or sin that his subjects commit The same idea we find better explained in the Uddyoga-Parvan.55 Here however only one-sixth part of the virtue or sin of the subjects is said to accrue to the king. And the question is started whether any particular Age makes a king what he is or whether it is the king who makes the Age what it is. The question is answered by saying: rājā kālasya kāraṇam, i.e. it is really the king who makes the Age what it is. If he is virtuous and enforces the Daṇḍa-nīti or the science of government in its entirety and in the proper spirit, he will inaugurate the Kṛita Age. But if he is all sinful, the Kali Age must set in. It is thus the king who is held responsible for good or bad government and for making his people virtuous or otherwise. And a belief is expressed that one-fourth or one-sixth part of the merit or sin of his subjects must perforce go to him. In these days when scepticism is rampant and no certitude is felt about the future world, such an expression of the reward and punishment to a king is apt to be looked upon as devoid of any force or meaning. But in ancient times when the spiritual was felt to be more real than the temporal, it is not difficult to imagine how powerful and effective this belief must have been in both stimulating him to good government and deterring him from misconduct and misrule.
1Āmbhīyāḥ is probably a mistake for Āchāryāḥ, as Prof. Jacobi thinks (überdie Echtheit des Kauṭilya in Sitzungsberichte der Köglich Preussiscḥen Akademie der Wissenschaften, p. 837).
2His name has been variously spelt in the printed edition Pārāśaraḥ, Pārāśaraḥ and Pārāśarāḥ. Of course the plural form is inadmissible, where this name has been mentioned along with those of individual authors. Of the remaining two, Parāśaraḥ appears to me to be the correct form because it has been so mentioned in Kāmandaka, VIII.39, where again, the metrical exigencies require Pārāśaraḥ and not Pārāśaraḥ. Pārāśaraḥ stands in the same relation to Pārāśaraḥ as Uśanāḥ of Kāmandaka does to his Kavayaḥ (VIII. 22 & 27).
3Piśuna was another name of Nārada; and we know that he was the author of a work on kingly duties from the passage Nāradīyam=iv-avarnyamana-rajadharmam from the Kādambarī (Bo. Sk. Series, p.91.1.13). This passage cannot possibley refer to the Nārada-Smṛiti, because it does not deal with kingly duties.
4According to the Trikāṇḍasesha, Kauṇapadanta is another name for Bhīshma, and it is not at all improbable that Kaunapadanta’s work is represented by the present Rājadharm-ānuāsana of Bhishma in the Śānti-Parvan of the Mahābhārata.
5The correct form of the name must be Bāhudantiputra as has been shown further on in the text.
6In regard to Svāyambhuva Manu, the author of the Dharmaśāstra vide Adiś.p., 73.9; Śānti-P., 35.43. In respect of Prāchetasa Manu, vide Śānti-P., 57.42, after which two verses from his Rāja-dharmas are quoted. In Vāna-P., 35, 21 also, are referred to the Rāja-dharmas of Manu who can, therefore, be no other than Prāchetasa of course, no scholar will now agree with Bühler in the view he has expressed in SBE., XXV. Intro. lxxvi, n. 1.
7It may be asked whether it is permissible to quote the views and
the name of a god exactly as would bo done in the case of a human being, and it may consequently be doubted whether Kauṭilya Viśālāksha is a divinity or a human being. It may, therefore, contended that up to Kauṭilya’s time Viśālāksha was a human author but was afterwards looked upon as a god and mentioned as such in the Śānti-Parvan. We know, however, that, as a matter of fact Puloma Kāmandaka cites the doctrines and mentions the names of Puloma and Indra, about whose divinity there can bo no question, as if they were human authors, as is clear from VIII. 21. Again, nobody can doubt that the Śānti-Parvan was existing in its present form about 300 A.D., when Kāmāndaka lived. To Kāmāndaka, therefore, Viśālāksha must have been a god, and yet he speaks of the latter as Viśālāksha pmbhashate (VIII. 28). No reasonable doubt, need therefore be entertained as to Kauṭilya’s reference to Viśālāksha being a reference to the god of that name.
8This, 1 think, is clear from the fact that Kāmandaka also speaks of Indra as one of the authors of the Arthasiśtrā (vide the preceeding note).
Lectures on the Ancient History of India Page 10
