History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v4.c63.1226

v4.c63.1226

On account of certain bodily, mental or other defects and certain conduct also persons were excluded in ancient India from demanding a share on partition and also from taking by inheritance. Gaut. 28. 41, Āp. Dh. S. II. 6. 14. 1, Vas. 17. 52–53, Viṣṇu Dh. S. 15 32–39, Baud. Dh. S. II. 2. 43–46, Kauṭ. III. 5 speak ¹¹⁵¹ of various grounds of exclusion from partition (and inheritance) such as lunacy, idiocy, impotence, excommunication for grave sins or lapses of conduct, blindness, incurable disease, entering a different āśrama (viz. that of forest hermit or *sannyāsa*). These grounds of exclusion probably arose from the fact of the persons labouring under them being regarded as incompetent to perform religious acts and from the close connection between property and its use for religious purposes. Jaimini ¹¹⁵² (VI. 1. 41–42) lays down two propositions, viz. that one who is suffering from an incurable or irremediable bodily defect is not entitled to undertake vedic rites, such as Agnihotra, but that one who has some defect which is remediable may engage in them and Śabara gives a blind man, a deaf man and a cripple as persons who are incompetent to engage in Vedic rites. The story of the brothers Devāpi and Śantanu (vide H. of Dh. vol. II. p. 109) as narrated in the Bṛhad-devatā¹¹⁵³ states that the elder brother Devāpi suffered from a skin disease and so refused the kingdom which went to his younger brother Śantanu. We know from the Mahābhārata that Dhṛtarāṣṭra who was blind from birth, though elder, had to give up the kingdom in favour of his younger brother Pāṇḍu¹¹⁵⁴. The Mit. (on Yāj. II. 135) energetically combats the view put forward by some predecessors that all wealth is meant for sacrifices. They relied on two smṛti passages¹¹⁵⁵ "all *dravya* (all kinds of wealth or movable property) has been created for the sake of sacrifice; therefore all those who are not competent to perform sacrifices are not entitled to share ancestral wealth but are only entitled to food and raiment. Wealth has been created for sacrifices; therefore one should employ it (or spend it) on purposes of dharma and not on women, fools and irreligious people". Kāt. (852) and Bṛ. (S. B. E. 33 p. 371 verse 10) contain similar remarks. The Mit. does not accept this proposition, which argues that on that hypothesis no gifts (apart from sacrifices) that are recommended by the śāstras will be possible, nor can one accomplish two of the *puruṣārthas*¹¹⁵⁶ viz. *artha* and *kāma* (as required by Gaut. IX. 46, Yāj. I. 115) and that the verses quoted above only mean that whatever wealth is collected for sacrifices should be spent only for that purpose even by the sons of the man who collected it, since a smṛti text condemns generally everyone who does not spend wealth collected for a sacrifice for that purpose to becoming a crow or a *bhāsa* (a cock or water fowl) in the next life. The Mit. further argues that the view would be opposed to the conclusion of Jaimini III. 4. 20-24 that the Vedic injunction "one should wear gold on one's person" is merely *puruṣārtha* and not '*kratvartha*'. Aparārka also holds the same view¹¹⁵⁷ and adds that women have the authority to perform pūrtadharma (acts of charity such as construction of wells, temples &c.). Vide H. of Dh. vol. II. pp. 844-45 for *iṣṭa* and *pūrta*.