Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v2.c21.s1.t4: D. Social Sins

Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v2.c21.s1.t4

Language
English

D. Social Sins

v2.c21.s1.t4.1

These inscriptions dealing with excommunications also contain some details about offences which may be grouped under social sins. Since the regulations of the early canonists regarding these are too numerous to be mentioned here,² we shall be content with a brief account of some of the social sins as they appeared to the people of Vijayanagara. It was their inherent orthodox bent of mind, as we shall presently have to explain, which made them include the following imprecations at the end of almost every grant.

v2.c21.s1.t4.2

² Manu, XI, pp. 430-83; Vasiṣṭha, XX, pp. 102-9; Baudhāyana, II, 1-2, pp. 211-23; Āpastamba, I, 8, 22-9, pp. 75-92; Gautama, XIX, pp. 274-99; Viṣṇu, XLVI-LVII, pp. 149-89.

v2.c21.s1.t4.3

sva-dattāṁ para-dattāṁ vā yō harēta vasundharām|
shashṭi-varsha-sahasrāṇi vishṭhāyāṁ jāyate krimiḥ||
dāna-pālanayōr mmadhyē dānāt śrēyo' nupālanaṁ|
dānāt svarggaṁ avāpnōli pālanād achyutaṁ
padam||³

v2.c21.s1.t4.4

³ E. C., XI, Cd. 2, text, p. 3. The verses mean: "Whoso usurps a gift made by himself or by another shall assuredly be born as worm in ordure for sixty thousand years. Of making a gift oneself or maintaining another's, the maintaining is the best: for he who makes a gift obtains svarga, but he who maintains one obtains final beatitude". Rice, My. Ins., Intr., p. xxiii.

v2.c21.s1.t4.5

But more severe words had to be uttered against those who violated grants; and these, as we have already remarked, sometimes took a formidable shape: "Be it the thief or plunderer prowling by night or day, be it the honourable mahāmaṇḍalēśvara, the emperor who rules the world, or the king of kings, who thinks to himself I will seize the villages, lands, or grants bestowed in this place,—at the mere word, thrust him, with his father and mother and all into the hell filled with worms, for seventy seven crores of years, and continue to visit him with all manner of torments, do you see, O Sin ! Whoso says I am afraid of the land endowments of this god, and trembling in mind like a coward attacked by a serpent, joins his hands in reverence and goes away, let Baira bring him quickly to Kailāsa, do you see, O Merit ! That such merit and sin will be contracted is verily true, do you see, all people ! If you doubt this you will go to hell." Such were the imprecations and benedictions of a grant dated A. D. 1356 of the famous general Naḍegonṭe Malla.¹

v2.c21.s1.t4.6

¹ E. C., XI, Cd. 3, p. 2, op. cit.

v2.c21.s1.t4.7

In about A. D. 1371 when Mēlpuṇḍi Kunniyarasa was ruling the nāḍu, Bōdharūpa Bhāgavar-arasu of the auspicious Purushōttama-parishad, with others, had a copper-plate grant engraved ending in the following manner: "Whoso does not pay as laid down by the amachchān after examination of the temple and the requirements of the worship, shall be looked upon as a traitor conspiring to murder the king of the very nāḍu in which he was born, and incurs the penalty of the man who cuts off the nose of him who having bound on the right side seizes on the left, and of one who takes to wife a woman within the prohibited degrees of relationship."²

v2.c21.s1.t4.8

² E. C., I, No. 9, p. 55 (2nd ed.).

v2.c21.s1.t4.9

An epigraph dated A. D. 1430 contains these imprecations : "Whoso destroys this work of merit, becomes as if a sinner born of an adulteress, or born of a notoriously bad woman, born in a vile family, or again of a Chaṇḍāli ; a slaughterer of cows, a drunkard, a murderer of guru, wife and Brahmans, or a thief of gold."³

v2.c21.s1.t4.10

³ E. C., XI, Cd. 29, p. 9.

v2.c21.s1.t4.11

A record dated A. D. 1530 declares that "those who by force take away land given to Brahmans will boil in the hell called Kumbhipāka, as many years as the Brahmans from whom they seized it, with their families and descendants, are in suffering therefrom. Whoso carries off the money of an agrahāra saying it is for the tribute to the king, or the gift to obtain a wife, or a contribution to save the village, incurs the guilt of incest with his mother".¹

v2.c21.s1.t4.12

¹ Rice, *My. Ins.*, p. 39. Cf. Fleet, *I. A.*, IV, p. 329.

v2.c21.s1.t4.13

In A. D. 1555 Kṛṣṇappa Nāyaka caused the following imprecations to be written in a gift deed of the village Beluvāḍi which he made for the services of the god Harihara : "Whoso maintains this gift will derive the merit of performing countless horse sacrifices. Whatever sinner unable to let it live, destroys it, will incur the sin of killing cows and Brahmans in the Ganges, of parricide, and of causing a mother to eat the flesh of her son."²

v2.c21.s1.t4.14

² Rice, *My. Ins.*, p. 26, see also p. 42.

v2.c21.s1.t4.15

Bukkaṇa Nāyaka, son of *kandāchāra* Rāchappa Nāyaka, granted the village of Seṭṭihaḷḷi for the god Virūpāksha of Hāsana, in A. D. 1563, "in order that many meritorious and successful expeditions may be to Kṛṣṇappa Nāyaka". This stone inscription relates : "Whoso of the kings, chiefs, accountants, farmers, subjects, or officials of the Hāsana country (*Hāsanada simeya arasugaḷu prabhugaḷu sēnabōvaru gauḍa-prajegaḷu adhi-kārigaḷu ivar oḷagāgi āvanan obbanu tappi anyāyava māḍidare*) fails in the work of merit assigned for the service and offerings of the god Virūpāksha, and does injustice, is guilty of the sin of slaying cows and Brahmans before the liṅga and the Maṇikaraṇika-kshētra of Kāśi, and of incest with his mother and murder of his guru, and will endure torments in the mahā-naraka during many Brahma-kalpas."³

v2.c21.s1.t4.16

³ E. C., V, P.I. Hn. 2, p. 2, P. II, p. 3.

v2.c21.s1.t4.17

An epigraph dated only in the cyclic year Viḷambi Āṣāḍha Śu. 5 but assigned to the year A. D. 1598 June, Wednesday, 28th, mentions the following : "Whoso fails in this (i.e., the order of Tirumala Rājaayya to Pamappa Nāyaka to release the customs dues on Akaḷaṅkajaya's village) (will incur) the order of (i.e., punishment from) the feet of Tirumala Rājaayya, (Tirumala-Rāja-ayyanavara pādad-aṇe), and is guilty of putting poison in the dish offered to Ranganātha, or in the dish offered to the god Narasimha of Madūr". (Ranganātha harivāṇake viśavan ikkida).¹

v2.c21.s1.t4.18

¹ E. C., IV., Gu. 52, p. 45, text, p. 113; Swamikannu, Ind. Eph., V, p. 398.

v2.c21.s1.t4.19

The same idea is repeated in an inscription dated also in A. D. 1598. This epigraph informs us that those who violated the grant shall incur the sin of having put poison into the offerings of the gods Nañjuṇḍēśvara (of Nañjangūḍ), Chelapiḷerāya (of Mēlukōṭe), Ranganātha (of Śrīranga-paṭṭaṇa), Agastyēśvara (of Tirumakūḍalu), and Janārdhana (of Belgoḷa), and of having killed within the temple their own parents, cows and Brahmans. They shall be born successively as the children of the dancing-girls of Nañjangūḍ, Mēlukōṭe and Tirumakūḍalu.²

v2.c21.s1.t4.20

² My. Arch. Report for 1911-12, p. 52.

v2.c21.s1.t4.21

If it is permissible to draw conclusions from the types of imprecations given above, we may say that, among others, the following were considered to be great sins: seizing lands, villages, or grants endowed to a temple and to Brahmans; destroying works of merit; conspiring to murder the ruler of the province; cutting off the nose of a helpless man who had been bound (?); marrying a woman within the prohibited degree; to be born as children of bad women, dancing-girls, or chaṇḍāḷis; to be born in a vile family; to be a drunkard; to murder one's own guru, wife or a Brahman; stealing gold; incest with one's own mother; ravishing one's own sister; killing Brahmans and cows in a holy place or within the precincts of a temple; matricide; patricide; causing a mother to devour the flesh of her own son; and putting poison in the dish of a god in a temple.³

v2.c21.s1.t4.22

³ To these we may add those mentioned by Vemana—disobedience to one's mother, rebellion against father, and despising one's elder brother. Vemana, Verses, Bk. III., v. 12, p. 102. Lakshmīśa gives the popular conception of the five sins: guru-drōha or rashly promising to the guru and failing; daiva-drōha or assuring God and drawing back; svāmi-drōha or not providing for the king's necessity (or of killing the king); *ātma-drōha* or breaking a solemn oath which has been made; and finally, *dharma-drōha* or violating one's own *dharma*. *Jaimini Bhārata*, Sandhi 4, v. 2, p. 51 (Sanderson). See also *ibid.*, Sandhi 5, vv. 66-7, p. 105-6; Sandhi 7, pp. 136-7; Sandhi 9, v. 29, p. 182.

Cites (7)