The Social and Military Position of the Ruling Caste in Ancient India, as Represented by the Sanskrit Epic c2.s5.32
The Social and Military Position of the Ruling Caste in Ancient India, as Represented by the Sanskrit Epic c2.s5.32
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c2.s5.32
The question naturally arises, how far the formal expression of opinion reflects here the true spirit of the soldiers. To this the answer is, as it seems to me, that the chiefs are rightly represented as preferring death to defeat, and as delighting in the fierce shedding of blood; while the masses need these exhortations to encourage them. Every hero, of course, because he is a hero, exults in the battle; only the king of the Pāndus, by what in each case appears to be interpolation, is made to grieve and sorrow over the result of war; and the greatest knight, Arjuna, is made to feel a moral fear of killing before the fight begins.