Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v1.c6.77

v1.c6.77

In these last two cases the husband of the women is at any rate dead; but both of them belong rather to our case than to the real niyoga or levirate; and it is to be particularly noted that in the place last mentioned the begetter by proxy has to be paid. It is in the light, too, of this that Pāṇḍu’s words just given, about him “that is better” than he (i, 120.37), are undoubtedly to be understood; and no less so his utterance: “Men in their misfortune yearn after a son from a more excellent substitute in begetting.¹ (So) men acquire offspring that bestows the fruits of pious order, and is more excellent than even that from their own seed—so has Manu, the son of him that sprang from himself, spoken” (i, 120.35-36). Here uttama devara certainly points also to a Brahman; from him a better progeny naturally springs from the seed of the nobility. No less are Pāṇḍu’s words in i, 120.22-23 probably aimed at the Brahman’s acting as the love-proxies for others: “Here on earth, therefore, the best of men (narottamāḥ) are born for the sake of offspring (that is, to get it for others). How can offspring arise on a field, as I arose on my father’s field through the great Ṛishi (Vyāsa)?”