A History of Hindu Political Theories from the Earliest Times to the End of the First Quarter of the Seventeenth Century A.D. c10.65

c10.65

† Cf. *Śāntiparvan* LVIII 1-4 where protection is declared to be the cream of the king's duties and is held to be particularly approved by seven specified teachers who are the authors of treatises on the science of polity. In the Manusaṁhitā as well as the *Śāntiparvan* protection is frequently inculcated in the earlier fashion by means of moral and spiritual sanctions. Thus Manu in one place, while urging the king to punish thieves, compares (VIII 303) the king's protection of the subjects to the performance of a sacrifice, and he writes (VIII 306) "A king who protects the created beings in accordance with the sacred law and smites those worthy of corporal punishment, daily offers (as it were) sacrifices at which hundreds of thousands (are given as) fees." On the other hand Manu (VII 111-112) threatens the oppressive king with the loss of life, family, and kingdom. In the Śāntiparvan (LXXI 26-29) Bhīṣma, after declaring the king's protection of the subjects to be his highest duty, observes, "In a thousand years the king expiates the sin which he commits in one day by his failure to protect his subjects from fear. For ten thousand years the king enjoys in heaven the fruit of the merit which he acquires in a single day by just protection of his subjects." In other passages the canonical authors inculcate protection by making the king participate in the spiritual merits as well as demerits of his subjects. Thus Manu observes (VIII 304) in the context from which we have just quoted, "A king who (duly) protects (his subjects) receives from each and all the sixth part of their spiritual merit; if he does not protect them, the sixth part of their demerit also (will fall on him)." Yājñavalkya (I 333) similarly states that the king who justly protects his subjects obtains one-sixth of their merits, since the gift of protection is greater than all other gifts. In chapter LXXV 5-10 of the Śāntiparvan Bhīṣma, asked as to how the king may attain blissful regions, says that the king enjoys a fourth part of the spiritual merit earned by his well-protected subjects. On the other hand the king is liable to one-fourth or one-half or even the whole of whatever evil befalls the kingdom. From this the author draws the practical conclusion that the king who fails to recover wealth stolen by thieves should return its equivalent out of his own treasury.