History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v5.c71.s1.267

v5.c71.s1.267

Another point to be noted is that as regards the awarding of punishments and prescribing of penances, the matters to be considered were the same viz. whether the lapse was intentional¹⁷⁹ (kāmataḥ) or unintentional (akāmataḥ) or whether it was the first offence or whether it was repeated and what the circumstances as to the time, the place, the caste, the age, the capacity, learning, wealth were. Compare Kauṭilya IV. 10, Gaut. XII. 48, Manu VII. 16 and VIII. 126, Yāj I. 368, Viṣṇu V. 194, Vas. 19. 9 about punishments with Baud.¹⁸⁰ Dh. S. I. 1. 16, Yāj. III. 293 (= Atri verse 248 and Agnipurāṇa 173. 6), Aṅgiras 143, Viśvāmitra, Vṛddha-Hārīta IX. 297, and Vyāghra as regards penances. It is on account of this close connection between punishments and penances that the Prāyaścittatattva, after quoting Devala to the effect that if a man makes no move for taking prāyaścitta for one year, he has to undergo double penance thereafter and to pay a double fine to the king, remarks that the maxim is that prāyaścittas are to be moulded on the lines of punishments¹⁸¹. The Pr. M. (pp. 124–125) quotes Kāśyapa who provides a penance for one that causes mischief to a well, public park, bridge, rampart wall or a temple or idol, then quotes Viṣṇu V. 169 which prescribes the highest fine for a breaker of idols, Manu IX 285 which provides a fine of 500 panas for a breaker of idols and re-instatement of the idol by him and then remarks 'dandavat prāyaścittāni bhavanti'. Nārada divided *sāhasa* into three kinds viz *prathama, madhyama* and *uttama*, the last of which consisted in killing a person with poison or weapon, adultery and rape and injury to life He then provides that when offenders guilty of the first two kinds were punished by the king, they became fit for association with the people, but that one guilty of the *uttama-sāhasa*, though punished by the king, was not fit even to be talked to (Nārada, sāhasa, verse 11).