Markandeyapurana 27
English (machine translation) 27
- Language
- English
Contents
27.1
The inert one said: / Thus sung to day by day by his mother, / that boy named Alarka grew in age and in intellect.
27.2
Then, reaching adolescence and having received his sacred thread ceremony, / that wise son of Ṛtadhvaja bowed down and spoke to his mother:
27.3
"Tell me, who am bowed in humility, all that I must do here / for the sake of happiness in this world and the next."
27.3.p1
Madālasā said:
27.4
"Child, once consecrated on the throne, pleasing the subjects / must first be done by the king without conflicting with his own dharma.
27.5
Abandoning the seven vices that destroy the root, / oneself must be guarded from enemies against the outward leaking of counsel.
27.6
Just as [a chariot] meets with destruction in eight ways, [or] from a chariot without good wheels, / so too a king undoubtedly [meets with destruction] from the outward leaking of counsel.
27.7
He should distinguish corrupt and incorrupt ministers through the fault of the enemy; / likewise, the spies of the enemy must be searched out with effort by means of spies.
27.8
Confidence must not be placed by the king in friends, trusted people, or relatives; / but through the connection of a purpose, the ruler of men may trust even an enemy.
27.9
Knowing status quo, growth, and decline, having his self multiplied by the sixfold policy, / the ruler of men should be [self-possessed], not following the sway of desire.
27.10
First oneself, and then the ministers, then the servants, / and next the citizens must be conquered by the king; then he may contend with enemies.
27.11
He who, without conquering these first, seeks to conquer his enemies, / with self unconquered and ministers subdued, is afflicted by the host of enemies.
27.12
Therefore, desire and the rest must first be conquered, O son, by the king; / for when they are conquered, victory is certain; conquered by them, a king perishes.
27.13
Desire, anger, greed, infatuation, pride, / and exhilaration—these are enemies that lead to the destruction of kings.
27.14
Remembering Pāṇḍu felled when clinging to desire, / one should turn oneself away; likewise from anger [remembering] Anuhrāda whose sons were slain;
27.15
likewise Aila slain through greed, Vena slain by brahmins through infatuation, / the son of Anāyuṣā through pride, and Bali and Purañjaya through exhilaration.
27.16
By conquering these, everything was conquered by the great-souled Marutta; / remembering this, the king should completely abandon these personal faults.
27.17
The king should learn from the behavior of the crow, the cuckoo, and the black bee, / the deer, the snake, and the peacock, the goose, the rooster, and iron.
27.18
The lord of men should perform the action of an insect against the adversary, / and the king should show the behavior of ants at the proper time.
27.19
The behavior of sparks of fire and the seed of the silk-cotton tree must be understood / by the king through the natures of the moon and sun, for the sake of political wisdom.
27.20
Wisdom should be taken by the king from an unchaste woman, a lotus, a śarabha, / an impaling stake, a pregnant woman's breast, and likewise from a cowherd's wife.
27.21
The king should adopt the five forms of Śakra, the Sun, Yama, Soma, / and likewise Vāyu, in the work of ruling the earth.
27.22
Just as Indra gladdens what is on the earth for four months with the discharge of water, / so should the king [gladden] the people with remissions.
27.23
Just as the sun takes away water with its rays for eight months / by a subtle means alone, so the king [should collect] tolls and the like.
27.24
Just as Yama restrains the beloved and the hated when the time arrives, / so the king should be impartial toward the dear and the hostile, the corrupt and the incorrupt.
27.25
Just as a person becomes filled with joy upon seeing the full moon, / where all the subjects are completely contented in this manner, that is the moon-vow.
27.26
Just as the wind moves secretly among all beings, / so should the king move through spies among the citizens, ministers, and relatives.
27.27
Whose mind is not drawn away by greed, nor by desire, nor by wealth / as it is with others, O child, that king attains heaven.
27.28
Who establishes in their own duty the foolish men who have taken the wrong path / and deviated from their own duty, that king attains heaven.
27.29
In whose kingdom the duties of the castes do not decline, nor the stages of life, / O child, his happiness is eternal here and in the hereafter when he has died.
27.30
This is the supreme duty of a king, and this brings about success: / the establishing in their own duty of men who are led astray by those of bad intellect.
27.31
Only by the protection of living beings is the king one who has accomplished his task; / properly protecting them, he carefully gains a share of dharma.
27.31.p1
Thus ends the twenty-seventh chapter, named 'Discrimination of the Self', in the dialogue between father and son, in the glorious Mārkaṇḍeya Purāṇa.
27.31.p2
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Translations (1)
- The Mārkaṇḍeya Purāṇa — Frederick Eden Pargiter 1888, English
Linked texts (1)
- Mārkaṇḍeyapurāṇa — Vyāsa, Sanskrit