History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v4.c63.375

v4.c63.375

A brief history of ordeals may be set out here. Ṛg. I. 158. 4–5, wherein⁵⁶¹ the sage Dīrghatamas, son of Ucatha, prays that the fire of faggots heaped tenfold may not burn him and that the rivers in which he was thrown bound hand and foot may not engulf him, are regarded by some as a reference to the ordeal of fire and water. Yet in those verses there is probably no reference to ordeals, but to the cruel treatment of Dīrghatamas by dāsas headed by Traitana. Ṛg. III. 53. 22 also, where it⁵⁶² is said 'he heats the axe (or acc. to Sāyaṇa 'just as the tree is injured by contact with the axe &c.')', does not contain a clear or certain reference to the ordeal of holding the heated axe. Atharvaveda⁵⁶³ II. 12 is held by several Western scholars to contain a reference to the fire ordeal. This also is far from certain, though verse 8 may lend some support to that view⁵⁶⁴. The Pañcaviṁśa (or Tāṇḍya) Brāhmaṇa 14. 6. 6 refers⁵⁶⁵ to the story of Vatsa, who was abused by his step-brother that the former was the son of a śūdra woman, against which Vatsa protested, urged that he was a brāhmaṇa, entered fire to prove the truth of his assertion and came out of fire unscathed. This is referred to by Manu VIII. 116. This is probably the earliest and clearest reference in ancient Sanskrit Literature to the fire ordeal. Next comes the reference to holding in the hand the heated head of an axe by a person accused of theft to prove his innocence contained in the Chāndogya⁵⁶⁶ Upaniṣad VI. 16. 1. Āp. Dh. S. II. 11. 29. 6 refers to inference and divine proof (quoted above n. 542). In another place (II. 5. 11. 3) Āpastamba states that after carefully considering (the charge before him) by means of divine proof and questioning (of witnesses) the king should set about awarding punishment. Śaṅkha-Likhita (n. 552) name four ordeals, viz. those of balance, poison, water and holding red-hot iron⁵⁶⁷. Manu VIII. 114 mentions only two viz. the holding of fire (i. e. red-hot iron) in the hand or plunging in water, but Nār. IV. 251 states that Manu declared five kinds of ordeals. Yāj. II. 95, Viṣṇu Dh. S. IX-XIV and Nār. IV. 252 mention five viz. balance, fire, water, poison and *kośa* (consecrated water). Nārada, however, knew: two more viz. *taptamāṣa* (IV. 343) and *taṇḍula* (IV. 337). Bṛhaspati (S. B. E. vol. 33 p. 315 verses 4 and 5) and Pitāmaha speak of nine (Aparārka pp. 628, 694 respectively).