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A History of Hindu Political Theories from the Earliest Times to the End of the First Quarter of the Seventeenth Century A.D. c13: Conclusion

A History of Hindu Political Theories from the Earliest Times to the End of the First Quarter of the Seventeenth Century A.D. c13

Language
English

Conclusion

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We have now brought to a close our survey of the political thought of the Hindu people extending for a period of at least two thousand and five hundred years. We have seen how political speculation beginning in the Vedic Saṁhitās and the Brāhmaṇas, mostly as an adjunct of dogmatic interpretation of the sacrificial ritual, entered upon a career of vigorous and independent growth in three more or less parallel branches of literature,—the Dharmasūtras, the Arthaśāstra, and the Buddhist canon,—of which the second underwent a virtual reconstruction at the hands of its great master Kauṭilya. The Rājadharma sections and chapters of the Mahābhārata, and to a much lesser extent those of the Manusaṁhitā, involve something like a synthesis of the Arthaśāstra material in harmony with the essential concepts of the older canon, while the interesting work of the Buddhist Āryadeva, fragmentary as it is, represents incidentally an independent speculative tradition. In Kāmandaka as well as in the minor Smṛitis and the Purāṇas, the tendency towards decline is already manifest, but an original departure is made by the great scholiasts who boldly attempt to rescue the political ideas of the Smṛitis from the danger of lapsing into theological dogmas. The Jaina works on polity and law, on the other hand, have little independent interest as they for the most part echo the thoughts of the older masters. Finally, amid the general decay of political speculation the Śukranīti makes itself conspicuous by its refreshing originality, while the mediaeval Digests and commentaries on the works of Sacred Law which come within our purview deal in a more conventional way with the concept of kingship.

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Let us endeavour in this concluding chapter to sum up the leading concepts of the Hindu political thinkers and set them forth in the broader perspective of their relation to Western thought. It has, we believe, been abundantly made clear in the foregoing pages that the political ideas of the Hindus present in the main two distinct types, of which one is principally associated with the Brahminical canon, while the other forms the core of the Arthaśāstra and the Nītiśāstra. These two types, it seems to us, are related to each other not as religious and secular, but rather as generic and special, forms of speculation, and so far from flowing in independent channels they frequently cross and recross each other’s path, furnishing thereby one of the strongest incentives to the development of political theory.∗ In considering the generalisations that are attempted in the present place for the purpose of analysis and comparison, it will be well to make due allowance for the existence of these interrelated but distinct strata of thought.

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∗ Cf. pp, 80-81, 160, 215 etc. *supra.*

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Beginning, then, with the fundamental issues, it is obvious that the polity of the Hindu thinkers corresponds neither to the *polis* of classical antiquity nor to the nation-state of modern times, but may be rendered more vaguely as a country-state. We may, however, observe that this Hindu polity is doubtless charged with an ethical meaning and purpose: it is within its own limits a true partnership in a life of virtue. It is no doubt a fact that the king’s office as the grand instrument for repressing the evil tendencies of man’s nature is stressed in the Hindu theory as probably in no other system, while monarchy itself is conceived by some of the authors as arising out of man’s fall from a state of pristine purity.∗ But the monarch’s function is not limited to the protection of the people from anarchy. To him, above all, is assigned the task of enforcing the scheme of duties (dharma) which, it is conceived, is the means of fulfilment of individuals and classes along the path of earthly bliss and heavenly happiness. This conception of the function of the king or the State may suggest comparison with the well-known ideas of Plato and Aristotle, but it presents, we think, on closer inspection at least two peculiar features. For, in the first place, the State represented in the Hindu theory by the office of the king does not directly promote the good life and is not a positive maker of goodness: it promotes virtue indirectly by the agency of the prescribed scheme of duties (dharma). In the second place, the fulfilment of the individual through the State is not absolute, but relative: it is a stage, and a very necessary one, in a course of progressive perfection of which the goal transcends the discipline of organised existence and consists in complete self-realisation.†

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∗ Cf. pp 90-91, 154, 170-171, 174-178 etc., *supra*.

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† The Hindu goal of life, mokṣa or nirvāṇa, may be thought to present a parallel to the Stoic or the Augustinian conception of a spiritual city embracing universal humanity. But this apparent likeness really masks fundamental differences. The Hindu view involves not merely the idea of communion or fellowship on the basis of absolute equality but that of complete identity, and it posits the unit of cosmic creation, not merely of cosmic humanity, conceived as the manifestation of the Absolute. Furthermore, it is not based on the notion of a sharp antithesis between the city of Cecrops and the city of God, but it holds the latter to be the crown and completion of the former. Thirdly and lastly, the Hindu idea, differing in this respect from the idea of St. Augustine but resembling the notions of the Stoics, is not represented by a visible symbol on earth, but is realised in the inner nature of man.

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Let us next consider what ideas of the Individual's place in relation to the State are involved in the political theories of the Hindus. We may, we think, point out three lines of approach towards the solution of this problem. In the first place, the Hindu authors, as we have elsewhere observed, conceive the social order of which the king is a member as produced by the will of the Supreme Spirit, Brahman,∗—a conception equivalent to the notion that society is an expression of the cosmic order or the universal law. Secondly, the theory of the king's divine creation in the Manusamhitā and the Mahābhārata was, as we think, formulated deliberately with the object of counteracting the individualistic tendencies of the Buddhist canon expressed in this case in its remarkable theory of Contract.† Nevertheless and this brings us to the last point, the Brahminical idea of the social order implies that the Individual is charged with a bundle of duties which owe their existence not to the will of the king or the State but is derived from the same source as the latter, namely, the will of the Supreme Spirit.∗

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∗ *Cf.* pp. 60-61, supra.

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† *Cf.* p. 172, supra.

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∗ Aslo vide pp. 15-16 supra.

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Turning to the other aspects of the Hindu political theory, we may observe that it distinguishes although not completely between the concepts of the State and society—a distinction which could not have presented itself within the narrow limits of the Greek city-state. In the Brahminical social order, it is true, the king's function is envisaged in its entirety so as to include his political as well as his domestic activities, but his essential task, it is repeatedly urged, is executive government and the administration of justice.† Next, we may consider what we think to be the pivot of the Brahminical social scheme, namely, the differentiation of the ruling and the fighting Kṣattriya or king from the teaching and sacrificing Brāhmaṇa. This presents at first sight a remarkable analogy to the dualism of Church and State in mediaeval European thought, but a closer study reveals important differences between the two sets of ideas. For apart from the fact just mentioned, namely, the absence of a complete separation of the concepts of State and society in the Hindu theory, it has to be remembered that the antithesis between the secular and the religious concerns and interests of man involving as its necessary corollary two distinct jurisdictions, is foreign to the Hindu mind. On the contrary the Hindu view, looking upon both as equally necessary in their proper places for the fulfilment of the individual, applies itself to their synthesis and reconciliation to the end of perfecting man's progressive nature. For the above reason the question of the Brāhmaṇa's position in relation to the Kṣattriya or the king has not, we think, the same significance as that of the mutual relations of Church and State in European theory.

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† Cf. supra, pp. 62, 164-165, etc.

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The Hindu political theory, as we have repeatedly observed, is essentially the theory of the monarchic State,—resembling in this respect much of the mediaeval and modern European thought and differing from the thought of classical antiquity. Let us then endeavour to set forth, more or less in relation to the parallel Western ideas, the principal features of the Hindu idea of kingship.∗ As we have observed elsewhere, the Hindu authors frequently declare the king to be created by the Divine will, and the Mahābhārata, in particular, suggests in its elaborate stories of the king's creation that kingship is the divinely ordained remedy for man's sin. The Hindu thinkers more often conceive the king to partake of a divine nature as embodying the essence of Viṣṇu or of the eight guardian deities, or at least by virtue of the resemblance of his functions to those of the gods. From these arguments follow as a natural corollary the duties of non-injury, obedience and the like on the part of the subjects with reference to their ruler.† These ideas and notions will at once suggest to the student of European thought striking analogies in the speculations of the mediæval Church. The Hindu writers, however, more frequently mention in justification of the king's authority the essential importance of kingship from the standpoint of the Individual and the society\*—a conception which, as we have just observed, may be matched in Greek philosophical thought. Incidentally it may be noticed as illustrating the peculiar development of the Hindu view that Kauṭilya derives from his implied theory of Contract an additional plea for the king's prerogative of taxation, while Śukra discovers a fresh basis of the king's rule in the latter's personal merit.†

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∗ A detailed comparison of the Hindu theories of kingship with the Western theories of Social Contract and of Divine Right is reserved for the Appendix.

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† Cf. pp. 32, 94-96, 173-184, 225-229, 245, 254-257, 260, etc.

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† Vide pp. 134, 136, 255, supra.

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The above represents one aspect of the Hindu view of the king's position in relation to his subjects. The other aspect which links up the Hindu theory with the view of the mediaeval Church and differentiates it from the theory of Divine Right, is concerned with the safeguards against the abuses of the king's power. Kingship, to begin with, is most often conceived in Hindu thought as an office and not as a lordship. We may prove this by pointing to the arguments noted above, namely, that the king is held in the Brahminical canon to be subject to the paramount law of his order imposing upon him, above all, the duty of protection, that the maxim making the king's taxes his fee for protection runs almost through the whole of Hindu thought, that even the exponents of the doctrine of divine creation contemplate protection to be the specific object of the institution of kingship, and lastly, that the Śāntiparvan explicitly permits the subjects to abandon the king lacking in this essential qualification for his post. Besides thus insisting upon the duties of the king the Hindu authors sometimes, as we have seen, declare justice or righteousness to be the essential principle of kingship,—a view which naturally leads to the differentiation of the good king and the tyrant.

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¹ \* Vide pp. 62-63, 89-92, 170-171, 216-217, 224, etc., supra.

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In developing the principles limiting the arbitrary exercise of the king's authority, the Hindu thinkers occasionally throw out principles and maxims which might be and have been taken to signify the idea of popular sovereignty. Of the former kind is the plea advanced in two passages of the Śāntiparvan in favour of the people's right to tyrannicide. Less conclusive, since it does not contemplate the whole people as participating in the right in question, is Śūkra's advocacy of the deposition of unworthy rulers. We may also mention in this connection, in accordance with the current opinion on this subject, the characteristic Hindu view of the relation of taxation to protection. To the latter class, that of maxims, belongs Śukra's description of the king as the servant of the people by Brahmā's ordination, to which we may add the Buddhist Āryadeva's designation of the king as the servant of the multitude. Granting the validity of these arguments it may, we think, still be doubted whether the Hindu authors arrived at the true idea of popular sovereignty. In

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[^ *]: Cf. pp. 64-65, 97, 184-186, supra. [^ †]: Cf. pp. 100-101. [^ ‡]: Cf. the views of Profs. P. N. Banerjea and D. R. Bhandarkar, quoted, pp. 65-66 footnote, supra. Also cf. Benoy Kumar Sarkar, *Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus*, pp. 174-176. [^ §]: Vide pp. 65, 101, 188, 259 etc. [^ ||]: Vide pp. 209-210, 258.

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the cases mentioned above, it will be noticed that the pleas in favour of the popular control over the king are put forward, except in the dictum of Āryadeva, along with the principles justifying the king’s authority. In the second place, the Hindu authors, again with the solitary exception of Āryadeva, fail to connect their principles and maxims with the idea of the popular will as the source of the king’s authority, such, e.g. as is involved in the Buddhist theory of contract. On the contrary the whole trend of their thought, as we have observed elsewhere,* is in favour of the view that the king derives his office and his authority from the will of the Supreme Being. We are therefore led to the conclusion that though there were germs of the idea of sovereignty of the people in the Hindu theory, these were never worked out into an independent and logically complete system.

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The reflections of the Hindu thinkers on the art of government properly so-called, bear a striking resemblance, as we have seen, to those of certain European thinkers, notably Machiavelli.† In particular, the Florentine’s ruthless sacrifice of morality to political expediency finds its counterpart to a considerable extent in the ideas of the Arthaśāstra, not to say those of the later canonical works of the Brāhmaṇas. We are particularly interested to notice in the present place that the Mahābhārata, while setting just bounds to Machiavellianism, sanctions a limited departure from the strict moral law in furtherance of the interests of the State.

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∗ Vide pp. 65-66 footnote, supra.

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† Vide pp. 102-105, 155-156, supra.

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