Local Government in Ancient India c8.37

Language: English

c8.37.1

It is thus clear from the above references that the merchant (*seṭṭhi*) attained at a very early time to a position of much social importance. This was chiefly due to his possession of great wealth derived from trade. Many of these merchants were like millionaires of modern times; we read of a merchant’s son as leading a caravan of 500 wagons. They seem to have been the principal representatives of the householder (*gahapati*) class, the typical burghers of the great towns. Besides being private traders they are also mentioned as representatives of commerce holding an official position in the court. In the *Mahāvagga* (VIII. 1, 16. 17) ‘the Seṭṭhi at Rājagaha, this householder’ is recognized to be doing so much ‘good service both to the king and to the merchants’ guild’ that, when after his suffering from a protracted illness for seven years, his case is pronounced as hopeless by the ‘many very great and world-renowned physicians’ who attended on him, the Magadha king, Bimbisāra, was prevailed upon by a merchant to depute his own physician-in-ordinary, Jīvaka, for his treatment which thus became a matter of communal concern. This particular Seṭṭhi was so rich that he paid 200,000 *kāhāpaṇas* as medical fees.

c8.37.2

It may perhaps be very reasonably assumed that the association of these merchant-princes with the Buddha acted as an effective adventitious aid in advertising the solitary and self-absorbed ascetic, until even the attentions of crowned heads and emperors, like Bimbisāra and Ajātaśatru of the Magadha throne, were drawn to that divine beggar. It was again their munificent financial support and endowment of Buddhism in its very early stages that probably paved the way for its popularity and propagation among the masses. The Buddha’s conversion of the upper classes of society easily established his influence and made it felt among the lower classes or the masses.¹ sermon at Benares he speaks of the supreme religious enlightenment for the sake of which 'the sons of noble families (*kulaputtā*) leave their homes and go into homelessness', for here were '*young Brahmans* like Sāriputta, Moggallāna, Kaccāna, *nobles* like Ānanda, Rāhula, Anuruddha, sons of the greatest *merchants* and highest municipal dignitaries, like Yasa, invariably men and youths of the most respectable classes of society, and with an education in keeping with their social status'. 'Prominent among the "adherents" stand also the two *royal friends* of Buddha, Bimbisāra, the ruler of Magadha, and Pasenadi, the ruler of Kosala, both approximately of the same age as Buddha, and throughout their lives true protectors of his church.

c8.37.3

Then comes Jīvaka, the renowned physician-in-ordinary to Bimbisāra, who was appointed by the king to undertake medical attendance, not on him and his women only, but also on Buddha and Buddha's order; next, the merchant Anāthapindika, who had presented to the order the garden of Jetavana, Buddha's favourite place of resort. In all important places which Buddha touched in the course of his wanderings he found bands of such lay-believers, who went out to meet him, arranged for assemblies in which Buddha spoke, who gave him and his companions their meals, who placed their residences and gardens at their disposal, or made them over to the order as church property. If he went wandering about with hundreds of his disciples, pious votaries were sure to accompany him on his journey with carts and waggons, and they brought necessaries of life, salt, and oil with them, for each in his turn to prepare the wanderer a meal, and crowds of needy folk followed in their train to snatch the remains of these provisions.' And not alone were *male* adherents in the circle of Buddha's followers. For we find the *women* of India zealously engaged as fellow-labourers through charity, assistance, and service, in those practical spheres which the young church opened up for religious usefulness.

c8.37.4

*The stupendous munificence which met the Buddhist order at every step proceeded in great measure, perhaps in the greatest measure, from women* of whom the typical representative was the honourable matron *Viśākhā*, a rich citizen commoner at Sāvatthi, who made the first liberal preparations on a large scale to provide for Buddha's disciples who came to Sāvatthi the chief necessaries of life. For this she thus spoke to Buddha to obtain his permission: ‘I desire as long as I live, sire, to give the brotherhood clothes for the rainy season, to give food to stranger monks who arrive here, to give food to monks who are passing through, to give food to sick brethren, to give food to the attendants on the sick, to give medicine to the sick, to distribute a daily dole of cooked rice, to give bathing-dresses to the sisterhood of nuns.’ Pictures like this of Viśākhā, benefactresses of the church, with their inexhaustible religious zeal, and their not less inexhaustible resources of money, are certainly, if anything ever was, drawn from the life of India in those days: they cannot be left out of sight, if we desire to get an idea of the actors who made the oldest Buddhist community what it was. (Oldenberg, *Buddha*, pp. 155–69.)