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Theory of Government in Ancient India (Post-Vedic) c11.s1: Conditions of Success in Republics

Theory of Government in Ancient India (Post-Vedic) c11.s1

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Conditions of Success in Republics

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Gautama Buddha is represented as laying down the conditions which would secure prosperity to the republican Vajjian clans. He gives a dose of conservatism to those who might be inclined to rush headlong into innovations. He insists that time-honoured customs and usages must be maintained. Nothing that is not already established should be enacted. Nothing that has been enacted should be abrogated. The elders must be honoured, esteemed, revered and supported. It must be a point of duty to hearken to their words. Justice and fairness must be followed. Women or girls should not be detained by force or abducted. The spiritual interests should not be neglected. The Arhantas or the Buddhist ascetics must be protected, defended and supported. The sacred temples (Chaityas) must be revered and supported. Turning to constitutional affairs, Buddha wants the republicans to hold full and frequent assemblies. They 1. "meet together in concord and rise in concord and carry out Vajjian business in concord." So long as these wholesome rules were observed, "so long may the Vajjians be expected not to decline but to prosper." ¹

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¹ Digha Nikāya, Mahāparinibbāna Suttanta, translated in Rhys Davids, Dialogues of the Buddha, Part II, pp. 79—85. Buddha repeats the same precepts in the Anguttara Nikāya, VII, 19.

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One of the notable figures in Buddhist literature is Aśvaghoṣa who composed in Sanskrit about the first century A.D. and who may be regarded as the fore-runner of Kālidāsa. Sprung from a Brāhmaṇa family, he was a master of Sanskrit learning. In his Saundara Nandam Kāvyam, Aśvaghoṣa tells us that some princes founded a city but discovered that if its affairs were to prosper they must have a king. The earth without a supremo lord is like the firmament without the moon. So the princes raised to sovereignty one of themselves who was senior to the rest in age, 'discipline,' and accomplishments. Here the kingship rests on the basis of consent and is purely secular in origin, thanks to Buddhist influence. The sceptre is always to be wielded for the sake of virtue, not for the sake of selfish gratification. The king should be the guide and teacher of his subjects.²

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² Saundara Nandam Kāvyam by Aśvaghoṣa, edited by MM. Hara Prasad Shastri, Bibliotheca Indica, New Series, No. 1251. Calcutta, 1910. See Canto I, pp. 7-8; Canto II, p. 9. For Aśvaghoṣa see below Ch. X. Tārānātha says that the author Matriceta was the same as Aśvaghoṣa.

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In the Buddha Charita or Life of Buddha which enjoyed tremendous vogue all over the Buddhist world, Aśvaghoṣa paints Śuddhodana as the mighty and glorious leader of his people. "He illumined his people on every side, showing them the paths which they were to follow."³ He had numberless councillors.⁴ Śuddhodana was not really a king but the chief of a republican clan. But by the time of Aśvaghoṣa republics were a thing of the past and the clansmen were taken to be counsellors. Aśvaghoṣa wants that princes should receive a thorough education.¹ The king takes one-sixth of the produce as price of the protection he affords. Śuddhodhan was gentle and kind to all. Guilty persons were reformed with gentle words.²

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³ Aśvaghoṣa, Buddha Charita, I, 12.

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⁴ Ibid., I, 14.

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¹ Ibid., II, 24.

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² Ibid., II, 42, 44.

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In another remarkable work called Sūtrālaṅkāra (known only through Chinese translations), a collection of pious legends after the Jātaka and Avadāna pattern, Aśvaghoṣa repeats similar ideas. In an interesting passage he wants an heir-apparent to study the following subjects:—

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“The Veda, archery, medicine, sacrifices, astronomy, grammar, the origin of writing, the performance of sacrifices, eloquence, rhetoric, the art of love, interest, purity of families, the ten names, computation, chess, dice, the study of origins, music and song, the art of playing on the conch, dancing and laughter, the art of the prestidigitarian, education, the making of garlands of flowers, massage, the science of precious stones and valuable materials for clothing, silk, sealing, weaving, wax work, strategy, sewing, sculpture, painting, literature, arrangement of garlands, interpretation of dreams, interpretation of the flight of birds, horoscopes of boys and girls, the training of elephants, the art of playing on the tambourine, the rules of battle array, the domesticating of horses, the carrying of the lance, jumping, running, and fording a river.”

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A still more interesting passage occurs in the Vajrasuchi, another of the numerous works of Aśvaghoṣa. Here caste is attacked on psychological ground. All human beings are “in respect of joy and sorrow, love, insight, manners and ways, death, fear and life all equal.”¹

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¹ G. K. Nariman, op. cit., pp. 36–40, 200-201. Both I-tsing and Tārānātha speak of Aśvaghoṣa as a peerless poet.

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Another famous Buddhist author, who, according to Tārānātha, was a king in Saurāṣṭra or modern Gujrāt, wrote a compendium called Śikṣāsamuchchaya, a commentary on his Kārikās. But he is content to repeat the ordinary precepts and is, on the whole, disappointing.

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About the third century A.D. Āryadeva incidentally offered some political reflections in his Chatuhśatikā. The king is the servant of the people and the revenue represents his wages. Righteousness is supreme. If it is forsaken by a king, the world goes to ruin. In all public affairs, military or diplomatic, the rules of morality must be observed. Āryadeva did not believe in the doctrine of Reason of State.²

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² Āryadeva, Chatuhśatikā, pp. 462–464, Ghoshal, Hindu Political Theories, pp. 209–212. Both Yuan Chwang and I-tsing mention Āryadeva as a great and ancient teacher of Mahāyāna.

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The Lalitavistara, one of the most sacred of Mahāyāna texts, a work in Sanskrit prose and mixed Sanskrit verse, which has had many Chinese, Tibetan, and Burmese versions, gives the life of Buddha and frequently refers to royal affairs. but it is content, to repeat, in a fragmentary way, the political wisdom of its predecessors.³

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³ The Lalitavistara, ed. Rajendra Lal Mitra, 1877, and Lefmann, 1902, is placed by Buddhist tradition at the period of the first Council but it is clearly a very late work.

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Both the Jātakas and Dhammapada formed the subject of huge commentaries which have been ascribed to Buddhaghoṣa, The Commentaries on the Jātakas and the Dhammapada. the great Buddhist writer who flourished about the fifth century A.D. But their language and style are so entirely different from the undoubted productions of Buddhaghoṣa that the traditional authorship cannot be accepted.¹ But it has not yet been possible to discover their real authors. The two commentaries breathe the same tone; in fact, the Dhammapada commentary is dependent on that of the Jātakas. The former is probably later than the fifth or sixth century A.D. The Dhammapada Aṭṭha-kathā, as it is called, illustrates the Buddha's dialogues by 299 stories.² The Buddhists who specialised in the art of imparting moral instruction through tales, ransack all walks and situations of life to inculcate ethical doctrines. In the Aṭṭha-kathā, as in the Jātakas, kings and ministers flit across the stage. The worthlessness of regal splendour is only too often brought out but there are numberless exhortations to righteous rule, impartial justice, mercy to the distressed, protection of all. Here, as elsewhere, the ideal of a universal empire is tacitly accepted and approved.

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¹ See Rhys Davids, Buddhist Birth Stories, pp. LXII-LXVI. Winternitz, History of Buddhist Literature, 152-154. Burlingame Buddhist Legends, Introduction, pp. 59-60.

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² The Stories have been translated by E. W. Burlingame, in the Buddhist Legends, Harvard Oriental Series, Vols. 28-30.

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