The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c14.s9.t3: 3. Vaiśampāyana's Nītiprakāśikā

The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c14.s9.t3

Language: English

3. Vaiśampāyana's Nītiprakāśikā

c14.s9.t3.1

Vaiśampāyana's *Nītiprakāśikā*⁵ is a small treatise in eight chapters. But it is valuable because it appears to describe the conditions of the political world under which it was composed. The origin of this work may be traced to the very practical need of carrying certain internal reforms through as well as of preparing for war against some specified enemies. The "home" as well as the "foreign" situations have been described in no equivocal or vague and platitudinous manner. We feel that some practical things are in view. The author hastens from point to point in a very businesslike way.

c14.s9.t3.2

⁵ Edited by G. Oppert, Madras 1882,

c14.s9.t3.3

The chapters are described below:

c14.s9.t3.4

I. The Duties of Kings.

c14.s9.t3.5

II. The Science of Archery: the different classes of weapons.

c14.s9.t3.6

III. The Origin of the Sword.

c14.s9.t3.7

IV. The Weapons such as can be thrown or hurled.

c14.s9.t3.8

V. The Weapons such as cannot be thrown: the terrible machines of the *kali yuga* (51-54).

c14.s9.t3.9

VI. The Army Organization.

c14.s9.t3.10

VII. The Military Division.

c14.s9.t3.11

VIII. The Activities of Kings.

c14.s9.t3.12

The political and social *mores* of the times are condemned by Vaiśampāyana as being very deplorable (chapter I, pp. 12, 15). *Dharmanyāya-vyavasthāyām kāraṇam valamerva hi.* Might alone is being treated as right in matters of duty and law, he complains. Wearing the sacred thread has become the sole claim to Brāhmanhood. The author notices some new phenomena in social life with the object, of course, of condemning them. Thus he refers to *lāvanye keśadhāraṇam* (i.e., keeping hair on the head for the sake of beauty). Apparently, he is an upholder of the old practice of wholesale shaving. Then, again, he notices that something like free love has become popular, for he condemns the practice of *svīkāra eva chodvāhe* (i.e. marriage as being accomplished only by the fact of taking a woman).

c14.s9.t3.13

The expansion of such *adharmas* or vices furnishes the *rationale* for the composition of the *Nītiprakāśikā*. We are told that everybody is behaving like the Śūdras and that the kings are no better than thieves. The situation then calls for the promulgation of political science. The story has of course been placed by the author in the hoary antiquity of King Janamejaya of Takṣaśīlā. But the incidents itemized in the treatise leave no doubt that the author is quite a modern fellow and is describing the conditions round about himself.

c14.s9.t3.14

The author of the *Nītiprakāśikā* assumes on the part of the readers the knowledge of the entire science of politics as developed up to his time. He talks glibly of all the categories known to the Hindu theorists in the course of eight verses (chapter I. 49-56) without caring to spend a minute on any of these categories in order to explain them. Besides, he has a fixed arithmetical number attached to each, which indicates how stereotyped *Nītiśāstra* had grown to be in the author's generation. The categories mentioned as well as the number indicated by the author are given below:

c14.s9.t3.15

| 1. | *Guṇas* (Military Strategy and Tactics) | : | 6 |
| 2. | *Rājaguṇas* (Qualities of the king) | : | 6 |
| 3. | *Upāyas* (Policies) | : | 7 |
| 4. | *Rājadoṣas* (Faults of the king) | : | 14 |
| 5. | *Karmāṇi* (Activities) | : | 8 |
| 6. | *Tīrthas* (Officers) | | |
| | a. Enemy's | : | 18 |
| | b. Own | : | 15 |
| 7. | *Charaka* (Spies) | | |
| | a. to watch the enemy's officers | : | 3 |
| | b. to watch one's own | : | 3 |
| 8. | *Vala* (power) | : | 3 |
| 9. | *Aṅgas* (Limbs of the Army) | : | 8 |
| 10. | *Vala* (Divisions of the Army) | : | 4 |

c14.s9.t3.16

In most treatises the *upāyas* or policies *vis-à-vis* other states are known to be four (*sāma*, *dāna*, *bheda* and *daṇḍa*). Vaiśampāyana gives the number 7. And this figure is given also by Mitra-Miśra in the *Rājanītiprakāśikā* (pp. 304-306). The additional three are *upekṣā*, *māyā* and *indrajāla*. It is to be observed, further, that Mitra-Miśra's authority for the three new *upāyas* is the *Viṣṇudharmottara Purāṇa*. The doctrine of seven *upāyas* thus brings Vaiśampāyana chronologically somewhere in the neighbourhood of this *Purāṇa* and Mitra-Miśra.

c14.s9.t3.17

Incidentally be it observed that Oppert (p. 4) fails to understand the category, "seven *Upāyas*," and takes it in the sense of the seven *amgas* of the *saptāmga* state.

c14.s9.t3.18

The international perspectives of Vaiśampāyana are furnished by chapter V. 55-57. There the author speaks of the coming increase in the malpractices of war on account of the expansion of *adharma*, i.e., non-observance of codified duties. The *Nītiprakāśikā* enumerates a number of races through whom these violations of *dharma* are likely to be perpetrated. The list comprises the Hūṇas, Pulindas, Sabaras, Varvaras, Śakas, Mālavas, Konkanas, Āndhras, Cholas, Pāṇḍyas, Keralas, Mlechchhas, Chaṇḍālas, Svapachas, Khaśas, Mavellakas, Lalitthas, Kirātas, and Kukkuras. They are described as *gojonayah*, descended from the cow, *vijonayah* or born of improper, i.e., illicit union, *pāpa*, i.e., sinful or criminal. It is because of such races that *kūṭayuddha*, i.e., wars with improper or forbidden weapons, are going to grow from more to more in future, says Vaiśampāyana. The enumeration is rather puzzling. We are asked to look upon even the Cholas as a condemnable race and place them in the same social rank as the Hūṇas, Mlechchhas, Sabaras and others. The grouping renders them all the offsprings of questionable unions and of course low in social estimation. Besides, the implication is that all of them are used to fighting with forbidden weapons. In any case, the peril or menace of *kūṭayuddha* is a serious proposition in the author's estimation.

c14.s9.t3.19

We seem to read in these fears almost the anxieties of a Grotius facing the questionable morals or negation of morals in the international relations of his times.

c14.s9.t3.20

This perhaps is the immediate cause of promulgating *dhanurveda* or the science of archery. The special feature of the *Nītiprakāśikā* is its military chapters. No matter what be the actual races against whom military preparedness is in view, the treatise owns its origin to a period of warfare and war-mindedness. The work shows the progressiveness and adaptability of the Hindu mind to new conditions. The *Nītiprakāśikā* is a fine specimen of Hindu authors changing the form and matter of their composition when necessary and presenting something very timely and uptodate, nay, entirely new although under old titles. The object of the author is just to militarize the people, as it were, overnight. He has accordingly prepared what is nothing but a military manual. And as for the ordinary topics of *nīti-śāstras*, he has not ignored them but devoted to them just enough attention to entitle the treatise to being described as a contribution to political science.

Linked texts (2)

Viṣṇudharmottarapurāṇa — Sanskrit
Nītiprakāśikā — Vaiśampāyana, Sanskrit