Shudras in Ancient India: A Social History of the Lower Order down to circa A.D. 600 c10.522

c10.522

While stabilising the existing social and economic relations Buddhism and Jainism tried to improve the position of slaves in some other ways. Thus a Dharmasūtra forbids trade in human beings only for the brāhmaṇa,⁶ who can, however, exchange slaves for slaves.¹ But the Buddhist and Jain sources prohibit trade in human beings even for their lay devotees.² Nevertheless, a Buddhist text states that the āryan disciple grows in servitors and retinue,³ which shows that the lay devotees could increase the number of their slaves by other methods. The monks did not keep slaves. A passage from a Jātaka story⁴ has been represented as meaning that the slaves of the bhikkhus go to town to get dainty fare for their sick masters.⁵ But this is based on an incorrect rendering of the passage,⁶ which does not refer to slaves or servants but to other bhikkhus who attended on their sick brethren and who are addressed as āvuso — a term usually applied to the monks.⁷