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The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c9.s10: Divinity Due to Kingship, Not Kingship Due to Divinity

The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c9.s10

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Divinity Due to Kingship, Not Kingship Due to Divinity

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The terms about gods and kings or rather the contexts in which the gods and kings are brought together in Vedic literature have been the source of much trouble in indology. Very often scholars are led to interpret certain passages from the *Rig Veda*, *Atharva Veda*, *Taittirīya Samhitā*, the *Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa* etc. in such a way as to ascribe kingship to divine origin or base the king's authority upon his divinity.³⁵ Many of these texts should mean, in reality, exactly the opposite, namely, that divinity itself comes from kingship.

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³⁵ B. Parsad: *The Theory of Government in Ancient India* (Allahabad 1927) takes the conventional view, pp. 14-15. In the second edition of Ghoshal's *History of Hindu Political Theories* (Calcutta 1927) occurs the following passage (p. 22): "Nevertheless it seems to us that we are still far from reaching a true theory of the king's divinity." This position indicates a susbstantial improvement upon that in the first edition (1923, pp. 27-32) where he made too much of the doctrine of the alleged divinity of the king in the Vedic texts. In the second edition he has been "led to abandon," as he says (p. vi), "the tentative reconstruction of the Vedic polity which I sketched in the first edition of my work." In between appeared my observations on his first edition in the papers entitled "Hindu Politics in Italian" and "On Some Methods and Conclusions in Hindu Politics" in the *I.H.Q.* Sept. 1925—April 1926, December 1926—March 1927. Further improvement is required in connection with his data, for instance, at pp. 23-25 (second edition).

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The import of the story of the *Taittirīya Brāhmaṇa* (II, 2, 10, 1-2)³⁶ should be properly understood. There Indra is a god and therefore he is naturally made a king by Prajāpati, the chief of gods. But the case of Indra's elevation to kingship by "divine sanction," should such an expression be used, cannot be taken to be normal for the kings of *men* in Vedic literature. Kingship in the Vedic texts is as a rule human and secular. In the case of Indra, again, it is not "divine sanction" but the sanction by *the head of his race* that we find in the story. The main noticeable feature in it is the absence of election by Indra's peers, i.e., the gods.

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³⁶ R. L. Mitra: *Taittirīya Brāhmaṇa* (Bibliotheca Indica, Calcutta, 1862), Vol. II. pp. 460-461.

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The texts as a rule tell us in so many words that a person becomes divine through certain actions, ceremonial or otherwise, and that divinity is but a consequence and not the cause or antecedent. We are to understand that Trasadasyu or for that matter anybody becomes a Varuṇa or an Indra as soon as he becomes a king or rather is consecrated. But we are not told that somebody becomes king because he is divine, godlike, descended from the gods or so forth. As soon as a person becomes a king he becomes a god. Quite pharaonic, as it is, a proposition like this is the exact antipodes to the position of those scholars who on the data of Vedic literature want to establish the general thesis that there is such a thing as king's rule by virtue of his divinity.

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In the *Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa* (V. 1, 5, 14) there is an account of the political sacrifice, called the *rājasūya*. In this connection the *rājanya* or king has to practise a ceremonial shooting as he is likewise called upon to do many other ceremonial things.³⁷ The ceremony requires seventeen shootings. It is by seventeen shootings that the king can win or become Prajāpati who is "seventeenfold" or is the outcome of seventeen drums, whatever all this may mean. In any case, we get the following equation:

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³⁷ J. Eggeling: *Satapatha Brāhmaṇa* Part III (Oxford 1894) p. 25.

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King = Prajāpati (Speech or "lord of creatures").

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But in order to get at this equation the Vedic text does not want us to undertake any esoteric or mystical exercise. There is nothing transcendental about it. No external authority, no divine power, raises the king to the level of or makes him identical with, Prajāpati. It is by certain feats of his own,—the seventeen shootings,—that he wins or becomes Prajāpati.

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We shall now take a passage from the *Taittirīya Samhitā* (II, 2, 11, 6) where the result of certain offerings by the king is described as follows:

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"To him becoming Indra his fellows recognize as superior, he becomes the best of his fellows." The passage is very simple. The king becomes Indra, not Indra becomes king. His becoming Indra in this passage is identical in import with his becoming Prajāpati in the previous context.

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In neither case is there anything to suggest that the king's authority is based upon his divinity or that the king rules because of his divinity. From passages like these we derive certain categories relating to the king, as follows :

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1. The king, *rājanya* or *kṣatriya* is the "best," "rules over many" (*Sat. Br.* V. 1, 5, 14), "is apt to thrive amongst many creatures' (*Sat. Br.* XII, 13, 8).

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2. The king acquires his Indrahood and becomes the "most visible form" (*pratyakṣatamān*) of Prajāpati (call it divinity) because of the ceremonial functions. In other words, he is divine because he rules, and not *vice versa*.

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3. As incidents in the ceremonies the king has to offer an "additional oblation" (*Sat. Br.* XII, 13, 8) or to shoot. The shooting and the oblation he has to practise because of the ceremonies and not because of his divinity.

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And the ceremonies he has to undertake because he is a king, and not because he is a god. As a matter of fact, the fellow does not become a god until and unless he has undertaken the ceremonies and offered the oblation or practised the shooting. Everything is to be traced back to kingship. Indeed, we may look upon these passages as but providing us with a definition of the king.

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In this connection it is worth while to call attention to a very important consideration about the concept of divinity in the Vedic *milieu*. Almost everything is often found endowed with alleged divine attributes in the *Vedas*. Everybody who is entitled to the *Srauta* sacrifice becomes divine. The status of divinity is a privilege to which the Brāhmaṇa, the Kṣatriya and the Vaiśya are entitled because of participation in the sacrifice. Only the Śūdra is to this extent disqualified. That is why one should not treat the king as specifically divine in Vedic thought.

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