Vedic Index of Names and Subjects v1.c3.s19.105

v1.c3.s19.105

(d) Adultery was generally regarded among Āryan peoples as a serious offence against the husband of the woman affected. We accordingly find in the legal literature of India traces of the rule that an adulterer can be slain with impunity if taken in the act.⁵⁰ Weber,⁵¹ however, has adduced some material indicating an indifference to these matters in Vedic times, and Ludwig⁵² has adopted the same view. But, as Delbrück⁵³ has clearly shown, the evidence is not convincing; the cited prescriptions⁵⁴ forbidding connexion with another man’s wife during a certain rite do not imply that such connexion would otherwise be allowed: the ritual of the Varuṇa-praghāsas,⁵⁵ when a wife names her lover or lovers, seems originally to have been a solemn means of banishing the evil brought on a family by a wife’s fall; Yājñavalkya’s famous saying⁵⁶ that no one cares whether a wife is ‘unchaste’ (*paraḥ-puṃsā*) or not is a mere mistranslation,⁵⁷ the expression *paraḥ-puṃsā* really meaning ‘removed from the male persons.’ And the uncertainty asserted in some passages⁵⁸ as to origin from a Ṛṣi is not a sign of doubtful descent, but is due to the fact that Ṛṣihood was a difficult matter to ascertain. None the less woman’s position was lowered by the prevalence of polygamy, and such stories as that of Ahalyā and Indra⁵⁹ are not compatible with a very high standard of morality. A similar conclusion is pointed to by references in the Yajurveda⁶⁰ to relations between the Ārya man and the Śūdrā woman, and by a spell given in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad⁶¹ to expiate relations with the wife of a Śrotriya (Brahmin theologian).