Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v2.c13.26

v2.c13.26

steed, whence then springs a man, and whence does he not spring? To whom belongs anything definite, and to whom does it not belong? Whence does it come, and whence not? What connection have beings here on earth even with their own limbs? As fire out of the sun, the precious stone, plants, so do beings arise out of the union of the (thirty named) components. Why, just as thou seest thine own self in thyself through thy self, dost thou not see thine own self in others through thy self?” (xii, 320.111 ff.).¹ Through a blinding of perception do men fall into desire (kāma). From desire men come into anger,² then into greed and blindness, into self-confidence and pride, and into self-seeking, from self-seeking then into works, through works into bonds of love,³ through love at once into suffering,⁴ and thus giving occasion for birth and death⁵ by undertaking works leading to pleasure and pain, they come to that dwelling in the womb which begins with the begetting, and is brought about by seed and blood, is moist with excrement and water, and fouled with the products of the blood. Overwhelmed by the thirst for life (tṛṣṇā), bound by these things, ever and again led off astray to them,⁶ let man know that women are the continuers of the web of the Saṃsāra. They are the ploughed field of nature (of matter, prakṛtyāḥ kshetrabhūtās), men manifest themselves as the soul; therefore let the man before all things leave them behind him, one and all. They are witches of a dreadful kind, they bewilder those without understanding, they are the ever-abiding, passion-bewoven embodiment of sensuality (indriyāṇām).⁷ Therefore are the children born from passion, animated in them, as the source. Just as the vermin (such as lice, etc.) which has come into being from our own bodies, and yet is not deemed our own property¹ is put away from our bodies, so let the vermin also which is looked on as our own property, and yet is not property of ours,¹ and is called “children”, be put away from us. Through seed and (menstrual) fluid children are born from the body, of themselves (svabhāvāt), or through the working of the karman—let the wise man look beyond them. . . . Whatever instrument of the mind is put forth in the fruit of the womb by the karman, which forms the germ, this arises out of the impulse of the self² through the spiritual element accompanied by the urge of passion. From the urge of passion after sound the ear comes into being of him whose self is developing, from the urge of passion after shape the eye, the nose from the wish to perceive smell, the skin for touch (for the feeling brought about through touch, and its objects). In like wise the wind is in the Prāṇa and Apāna, it is Vyāna, Udāna, and Samāna, the fivefold function of the body.³ Wrapped round with the limbs born with him, born out of the karman, as his body, man is born, with the limbs of body and soul, which have their beginning and end in pain, and in pain their middle course” (xii, 213.3 ff.).⁴