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The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c11.s1.t5: Jolly, 1911-16

The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c11.s1.t5

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English

Jolly, 1911-16

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In 1911 Julius Jolly reported on the contents of the *Arthaśāstra* at the first session of the Internationale Vereinigung für Vergleichende Rechtswissenschaft (International Union for Comparative Jurisprudence) which was held at Heidelberg. The paper was published at Berlin in 1912 in the *Proceedings* of this Session, under the title “Ein altindisches Lehrbuch der Politik” (An Old Indian Textbook of Politics). His “Lexikalisches aus dem Kauṭilya” (Dictionary material from the K.) appeared in the *Indo-Germanische Forschungen* vol. xxxi of 1912. During this period Jolly entertained no doubts about the authenticity and antiquity.

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As author of *Recht und Sitte* (Strasburg 1896), Jolly was specially interested in the laws and morals as well as manners and customs, in one word, the *mores*, as embodied in the *Arthaśāstra*. In the *Zeitschrift der* *Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft* (Leipzig) for 1913 he had a paper entitled *Arthaśāstra und Dharmaśāstra*. In 1914 his pupil Sorabji Taraporewalla's edition of Book II. of the *Arthaśāstra* with notes was published at Allahabad. Jolly's collection of parallel passages from the two sides was being published in the *Z.D.M.G.* during 1914-15 under the title of "Kollektaneen zum Kauṭilīya Arthaśāstra." In one of these papers Jolly referred to the following passage in the *Daśakumāracharita* (chapter VIII): *Iyam* (Daṇḍanītih) *idānīm āchārya Viṣṇuguptena Mauryārthe ṣaḍbhih ślokasahasraih samkṣiptā*, This science of politics was "*idānīm*" (recently?) abridged by Prof. Viṣṇugupta into 6000 *ślokas* for the use of the Maurya or Mauryas. On the strength of the word *idānīm* Jolly considered the *Arthaśāstra* to be not much older than the *Daśakumāracharita* (seventh century A.C.). The position was challenged by Jacobi in the same journal for 1914 in the paper "Ist das Daśakumāracharita gleichzeitig mit dem Kauṭilīya Arthaśāstra? (Is the D. of the same age as the A?). Jolly's "Textkritische Bemerkungen zum Kauṭilya Arthaśāstra" was published in the *Z.D.M.G.* during 1916-17.

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In 1916 the chapters of the *Arthaśāstra* dealing incidentally with technological (chemical, medicinal and toxicological) matters were examined by Jolly in the paper on "Zur Datierungsfrage" (the Question of Dating) published in the *Nachrichten von der Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zur Göttingen*. Jolly's previous work on Hindu medicine also throws light on the question. The results of these researches were later made use of by Otto Stein in *Megasthenes und Kauṭilya* (Vienna 1922. pp. 61-63), by Hillebrandt in *Altindische Politik* (Jena 1923 p. 4), by Winternitz in his paper on "Kauṭilīya Arthaśāstra" in the *Calcutta Review* (April 1924) and by Keith in *A History of Sanskrit Literature* (Oxford 1928, p. 460). These ideas were likewise summarized by Jolly in the introduction to his and Schmidt's edition of the text, vol. I. (Lahore 1923).

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We need not quote here the relevant passages from Kauṭalya and Magasthenes.¹ A few observations are being made on the methodology of Jolly. According to him the metallurgical knowledge displayed in the *Arthaśāstra* is said to be much too advanced for the Maurya times. As for evidences he has to depend on nothing more than what he considers to be the extant chemico-metallurgical literature of the Hindus. A more reasonable proposition should perhaps consist in questioning the finality of the as yet established antiquity of Hindu chemistry itself. It is time to discuss whether the *Arthaśāstra* references (II, XII, XIII, XIV) do not bespeak fragments of chemical texts or of medico-chemical experience older than has yet been studied (e.g. by Prafulla Chandra Ray). Instead of bringing the *Arthaśāstra* down to post-Maurya times it should be within the limits of scientific truth-investigation to push the older epochs of Hindu metallurgy or chemistry further up to the Mauryas. At the present state of our knowledge it is not possible to dogmatize either way. The question should be regarded as an open one.

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¹ The details are to be found in the chapter on the "Data of Ancient Indian Mineralogy."

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A curious argument is presented by Jolly in the course of his studies bearing on *Dharma vis-à-vis Artha*.

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Should the *Arthaśāstra* comprising the legal portion (*Dharmasthīyam*), says he, be taken for a composition of the fourth century B.C. then the entire chronology, up till now accepted as valid for the schools of Hindu law, falls like a house of cards. It appears, if we are to follow this kind of logic, that all new discoveries and inventions must be forbidden and penalized in order that the *status quo* of a tradition—albiet scholastic—may not be altered.

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It is strange that Jolly, the author of *Recht und Sitte*, should have considered the *Arthaśāstra* to be a branch of the *Dharmaśāstra*. In Hindu mores there is no room for any one category (*kāma*, *artha* or *dharma*) claiming priority to or precedence over another. This indeed is the first postulate about personality and societal organization in Hindu thought. The secular, worldly, economic, political and social interests (*artha* and *kāma*) of mankind can be traced back to the *Atharva Veda* atmosphere in the Vedic complex. The discussions about them, the solicitude for them, the magical and perhaps Tāntric hocus-pocus in their regard are really as old as anything in Indian culture and intellectual discipline. Some of the oldest folk-elements, the secular interests of diverse economic groups, and non-Aryan or pre-Aryan, nay, depressed and un-Brāhmaṇ classes or races are to be found in the milieu of the *Vrātya*.² As long as the *Atharva* tradition is there one does not have to look for the origins of *Arthaśāstra* in some *Vidyā* bearing on non-*Artha*.

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² For *Vrātya*, see *Supra*, pp. 145-148.

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From a careful study of what Jolly has said in connection with the age of the *Arthaśāstra* it seems that he wants the world to believe that the oldest possible documents of law, morals, arts, industries, sciences etc. bearing on India have already been discovered and that the chronology of Hindu literary documents has been ascertained and fixed for ever. And since the *Arthaśāstra* happened to be discovered long after the *Dharmaśāstras* and other branches of Hindu literature had been discovered and studied, the *Arthaśāstra* must therefore by all means be later than and even derived from those sources. This is a very regrettable attitude in the world of science.

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Formichi, 1914

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At the University of Rome a lecture was delivered by Carlo Formichi in 1914. It was published in the *Rivista Italiana di Sociologia* for March-April of the same year under the title "Pensiero e azione nell' India antica" (Thought and Action in Ancient India). The prejudice among Western nations against the Hindu character as being devoid of force and vitality was due to a hasty generalization, said he. But he believed that by the discovery of *Arthaśāstra* the prejudice was demolished. He believed that this discovery would lead in Italy to a revival of studies in Machiavelli. As a student of *nītiśāstra* Formichi had taken a humanist and cosmopolitan view in his *Salus Populi* or "Welfare of the People" (Turin 1908). There he sought to establish the identities in the political ideas of Machiavelli, Hobbes and Kāmandaka. On certain aspects of the Kauṭalya question Formichi took a very conventional view, however. For instance, writing subsequently in 1924 on the *Arthaśāstra* he observed that the treatise failed to furnish ideas of a great national state. Nothing more than a picture of *piccoli* *stati* was to be seen in Kauṭalya's book. The *Arthaśāstra* was alleged to mirror forth the political condition of India before and after the glorious parenthesis of the Maurya Empire. But still he believed that Kauṭalya was a man whose whole life and talent were devoted to moulding *le base d'un impero in India* i.e. the foundations of an Empire in India.

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Bottazzi, 1914

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The Italian scholar G. B. Bottazzi's *Precursori di Niccolo Machiavelli in India ed in Grecia Kauṭilya e Tucidide* was published at Pisa in 1914. The book described two precursors of Machiavelli, namely, Kauṭalya in India and Thucydides in Greece. In his judgment Kauṭalya was taken to have lived like the Greek historian Thucydides *secoli e secoli prima di Cristo*, i.e. centuries and centuries before Christ. In other words, he accepted the Indian tradition about Kauṭalya's *Arthaśāstra* as being a Maurya work. He believed likewise that Kauṭalya was the minister of Chandragupta. For he says that Kauṭalya was more fortunate in practical life than Machiavelli. The Florentine Secretary had a grand dream to which he, a little bit too enthusiastic, fell a victim, as says Villari. But Kauṭalya, on the other hand, was alleged to be more positive and more political and to have lived to see his ideas fulfilled. Bottazzi assumed that it was to Kauṭalya that Chandragupta Maurya owed his accession to the throne.¹

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¹ For Formichi and other Italian writers see the present author's "Hindu Politics in Italian" (*I.H.Q.*, 1925-26), in which Bottazzi's work has been analyzed in detail. The analysis may be seen in the *Pos. Back. Hind. Soc.* Vol. II. Part II. (1927).

Cites (4)