Shudras in Ancient India: A Social History of the Lower Order down to circa A.D. 600 c13.571

c13.571

Several texts of the period deny ascetic life to the śūdra. Kālidāsa deliberately repeats the Rāmāyaṇa’s condemnation of the śūdra ascetic Śambūka² who, in his opinion, threatened the security of the established order by trying to acquire merit through asceticism. He commends the punishment of death inflicted on Śambūka by Rāma; and he argues that as a result of this the śūdra obtained the position of the virtuous which he could not secure even by his severe austerity, for this was being done in violation of the rules of his class.³ But on the question of the relation between the varṇas and the āśramas the Śānti Parvan adopts a different attitude. It insists that a brāhmaṇa should go through the four āśramas, but does not make this obligatory on the three other varṇas,⁴ who, however, cannot adopt the life of an ascetic.⁵ This implies that a śūdra, if he so desires can enter the first three āśramas, the fourth being closed not only to him but also to the vaiśya and the kṣatriya. But Kātyāyana refers to the śūdra ascetic who is to be punished by the king if he forsakes the order of the saṃnyāsins.⁶ Yājñavalkya provides that śūdra ascetics should not be fed in the worship of the gods and the ancestors.⁷ This may refer either to Jain and Buddhist monks or to ascetics from the śūdra varṇa.