The Inner Conflict of Tradition: Essays in Indian Ritual, Kingship, and Society c17.14

c17.14

When the dharma shows an essential “fault line,” we should expect the caste order to be similarly broken. In fact, this has already become apparent from our discussion of the conjunction of caste and karma. Far from forming a coherent whole, caste and karma are at opposite ends and mutually disruptive. The point is that karma refers to the individual’s fate; caste and its svadharma, however, refer to the collectivity. As we saw, it is the caste-bound collectivity that determines the individual’s karma and thereby prevents him from working out his own salvation. Only when man realizes his individuality to the full extent and steps out of collectivistic society, will he be able to stop the inexorable karma mechanism. This, rather than an organistic theodicy, is the actual message of the karma doctrine. It breaks away from the collectivistic world toward individual salvation. Here the organicist restraints of caste are in conflict with the rationalistic karma doctrine. The juxtaposition of caste and karma, then, is indeed a volatile mixture. For the consequence of the karma doctrine is no less than a call to deconstruct the world. It is not fortuitous that its first formulation in the Upanishads takes the form of a secret doctrine not to be publicly divulged but to be discussed in private, outside the assembly.²⁴ Its ultimate consequence, world renunciation, threatens to break up society. Understandably, renunciation has always encountered muted but obstinate hostility.²⁵