The Social Organisation in North-East India in Buddha's Time c8.2

c8.2

If we first seek, on the basis of quotations which relate to castes in general, a conception of their meaning, and of their relation to one another, we are confronted at first sight with a circumstance which seems to give the lie direct to the introductory words—the circumstance, namely, that even in the Pali canon we find the Brâhmanical caste-theory. The division of Indian society into four castes is in no way unknown to Buddhist literature.