Kitabı oku: «The History of Antiquity, Vol. 4 (of 6)», sayfa 17
The other part of the system, the Vedanta, leaves out of sight the difficult task of proving the idea of Brahman from the Veda, and bringing the two into harmony; it attempts to derive the existence and nature of Brahman from the idea. Brahman – such is the line of argument in the Vedanta – is the one eternal, self-existent essence, unalterable and unchangeable. It developes into the world, and is thus creative and created. As milk curdles, as water becomes snow and ice, Brahman congeals into matter. It becomes first ether, then air, then fire, then water, and then from water it becomes earth. From these elements arise the finer and coarser bodies, with which the souls of the gods, spirits, men and animals are clothed. These souls go forth from Brahman like sparks from a crackling fire – a metaphor common in the book of the law – they are of one essence with Brahman, and parts of the great world-soul. This soul is in the world, but also outside and above it; to it must everything return, for all that is not Brahman is impure, without foundation, and perishable.
In this view there lies a contradiction which could not escape the keen penetration of a reflective spirit. Brahman is intended to be not only the intellectual but also the material basis of the world. It is regarded as absolutely non-material, eternal, and unchangeable, and yet the material, changeable world is to rise out of it; the sensible out of the non-sensible and the material out of the immaterial. In order to remove this dualism and contradiction which the orthodox doctrine introduced into Brahman, the speculation of the Brahmans seized upon a means which if simple was certainly bold: they denied the whole sensible world; they allowed matter to be lost in Brahman. There is only one Being; this is the highest soul (paramatman, p. 131), and besides this there is nothing: what seems to exist beyond this is mere illusion. The world, i. e. matter, does not exist, but only seems to exist, and the cause of this illusion is Maya or deception. Of this the sensible world is a product, like the reflection of the moon in water, and the mirage in the desert. Nature is nothing but the play of illusion, appearing in splendour and then disappearing. It is deception and nothing else which presents various forms to men, where there is only unity without distinction. The movement and action of living beings is not caused by the sparks of Brahman dwelling in them – for Brahman is consistently regarded as single and at rest – but by the bodies and senses, which being of themselves appearance and deception, adopt and reflect the deception of Maya. By this appearance the soul of man is kept in darkness, i. e. in the belief that the external world exists, and the man is subject to the emotions of pain and joy. In his actions man is determined by appearance and by the perception arising out of appearance. In truth Brahman alone exists. It is only deception which allows the soul to believe that it has a separate existence, or that the perceptible world exists, or that there is an existent manifold world. This deceptive appearance of the world, which seems to darken the pure Brahman as the clouds darken the brightness of the sun, must be removed by the investigation which teaches us the truth, that the only existing being is the highest being, the world-soul. In this way the delusion of a multiform world disappears. As the sunlight dispels mists, true knowledge dispels ignorance, and destroys the glamour of Maya. This knowledge is the way to liberation and the highest salvation. The liberation of men from appearance, from the senses and the world of the sense, from the emotions arising from these, is the knowledge that this world of the senses does not exist, that the soul of a man is not separated from the highest soul. Thus man finds the direct path from the sensible world, the body and separate existence, to Brahman, by active thought which penetrates deception. The sage declares: "It is not so, it is not so;" he knows that the highest soul is all, and that he himself is Brahman. Recognising himself as the eternal, changeless Brahman, he passes into the world-soul; he who knows Brahman reposes in it beyond reach of error. As the rivers flowing to the ocean disappear in it, losing their names and form, so the man of knowledge liberated from his name and his form passes into the highest eternal spirit. He who knows this highest Brahman is freed from trouble and sin; from the bonds of the body and the eye; he is lost in Brahman, and becomes himself Brahman.374
We cannot but acknowledge the capacity of the Indians for philosophic speculations, and the vigour of thought which for the first time in history maintained the thesis that our senses deceive us; that all which surrounds us is appearance and deception – which denies the whole world of things, and in opposition to the evidence of the tangible and actual world, boldly sets up the inward capacity of knowledge, as a criterion against which the evidence of the senses is not to be taken into consideration. For a long time the actual world had been resolved into the transcendental world of gods and saints; this is now contracted into a simple substance, beyond and besides which nothing exists but appearance. Instead of the appearance of the sensible world, in which there is no being, there exists one real being, the one invisible world-soul, which allows the corporeal world to arise into appearance from it like airy bladders, and then again to sink back whence it came. This universal deity is conceived as a being at rest; its activity and development into a sensible world is only apparent. It is a Pantheism which annihilates the world; matter and nature are completely absorbed by the world-soul, are plunged and buried in it; the soul of a man is a being only apparently separated from the world-soul. From these notions the mission of a man becomes clear. He must turn from appearance; he must unite with the world-soul by recognising the fact that all perceptions and emotions come from the world of phenomena, and therefore do not really exist; he must rise to the conception that only Brahman exists, and that man is Brahman. If from an ancient period the Indians were of opinion that they could draw down the gods to men by the holy spirit ruling in their prayers and sacrifices – if the mortification of the flesh in penances can give divine power and force to men – their philosophy is no more than consistent, when by recognising the worthlessness of sensible existence it allows Brahman to wake in the human spirit, and thus re-establishes the unity of man with Brahman.
The system of the Vedanta carried out the idea of Brahman so consistently that the entire actual existence of the world is thus annihilated. When once interest in speculation had been aroused, the reaction against positions of this kind was inevitable. The reality of actual things, the existence of matter, the certainty of the individual existence, must be defended against such a doctrine. On these factors was founded a new system, of which the founder in the tradition of the Brahmans is called the Rishi Kapila. The name Sankhya given to this system means "enumeration," "consideration." It maintains that reason alone is in a position to lead man to a right view, to truth and liberation.375 It also exhibits the boldness arising from the fanciful nature of the Indians; and as the Vedanta took up a position on the idea of Brahman in order to wrest the world from its foundations, the Sankhya system stands on the idea of the soul (purusha) and of nature or matter (prakriti, pradhana). These two alone have existed from the beginning, uncreated and eternal. Nature is uncreated and eternal, creative and without cognition; the soul is also uncreated and eternal; it is not creative but has cognition. All that exists is the effect of a cause. The effect is limited in time and extension, subject to change, and can be resolved into its origin, i. e. into its cause. As every effect supposes a cause, every product supposes a producing force, every limited an unlimited. If the limited or product is pursued from cause to cause, there results the unlimited, eternal, creative, i. e. producing, nature as the first cause of all that is produced and limited. But beside nature there exists a second first cause. Nature is blind, i. e. without cognition; "light cannot arise out of darkness," intelligence cannot be the effect of nature. The cause of intelligence is the soul, which though completely distinct from nature exists beside it. Nature is eternal and one; the soul is also eternal, but manifold. Were the soul one, it could not feel pain in one man at the same time that it feels joy in another. The soul exists as the plurality of individual souls; these existed from the beginning, and are eternal beside nature. But they also entered into nature from the beginning. Their first case is the primeval body (linga), which consists essentially of "I-making" (ahankara), i. e. individualisation, and the primeval elements; the second material body consists of the five coarse elements of ether, air, light, water, earth. Neither the soul nor the primeval body dies, but only the material body.376 The primeval body accompanies the soul through all its migrations; the material body is created anew at the regenerations, i. e. the soul and the primeval body are constantly clothed anew with new materials. The soul itself is uncreated, unchangeable amidst all mutations, and eternal, but it does not carry the consciousness of itself from one body to another. The soul is not creative; it exercises no influence on nature; it is only perceptive, observant, cognising, only a witness of nature. Nature is illumined by the proximity of the soul, and the soul gives witness of nature; nature takes its light from the soul, just as a white crystal appears red in the proximity of a red substance.377
The object of human life is to obtain liberation from the fetters of the body which bind the soul. The office of true knowledge is to set the soul free from the body, from nature. Man must grasp the difference of the soul and the body; he must understand that beside the body and nature, the soul is a completely self-existent being. The union of the soul and the body is nothing but deception, error, appearance. "In truth, the soul is neither bound nor free, nor a wanderer; nature alone is bound or free or migratory."378 The soul seems to be bound to nature, but is not so. This appearance must be removed; the soul must recognise that it is not nature. When the soul has once penetrated nature it turns from it, and nature turns from the soul. The "unveiling of the spirit" from the case of nature is the liberation of the soul; by knowledge "release is brought about; by its opposite bondage."379 By conceiving the absolute independence of the soul, man sets himself free from nature and his body; the idea of this independence is release. With this idea the man of knowledge surrenders his body; he is no longer affected or disturbed by it; even though his natural life continues, he looks on the body only "as on the movement of the wheel by virtue of the impulse once communicated to it."380
In spite of the sharp contrast in which the doctrine of Kapila stands to the system of the Vedanta, it works, in the last resort, with analogous factors, only it applies them differently. The soul and nature were put in the place of Brahman and Maya. Instead of the one intelligent principle, which the Vedanta establishes in the world-soul, Kapila maintains the plurality of individual spirits. In the Vedanta, it is true, nature exists as an illusion only: still it is a factor, which though it is also appearance, is nevertheless an existence, and in the last resort exists in Brahman; it has ever to be overcome anew, and thus in this system of unity, the basis is really a dualism. In the Sankhya doctrine nature is actually and materially existent; but the intelligent principle has to discover that this actually existent matter is, in truth, not existent for it, and cannot fetter the soul. If in the orthodox system the illusion of nature is to be annihilated by the free passage of the individual into Brahman, the doctrine of Kapila requires in the same way that man should rise to the idea that he is not nature, that the body is not his being, that he is not matter; it requires that man should be conscious of his freedom from nature, that he should return to his independence, in the same way as the Vedanta requires the absorption into Brahman. Then in the one case, as in the other, the individual escapes the restless movement of the world. In both systems the connection of the spirits and nature is only apparent, and the power of this deception in the spirit is removed by knowledge. Both proceed from the idea of an eternal being, self-contained, at rest, unmoved, self-sufficient; this the Vedanta ascribes to Brahman, while the Sankhya explains it as the nature of the soul. Nevertheless there is an important difference. In the Sankhya the intellectual principle is not the divine world-soul, which permits everything to emanate from itself and return to itself; it is the individual self, and besides this and material nature there is no real being, no real essence. If in the Vedanta liberation is the identification with the world-soul or the Godhead, liberation in the Sankhya is the retirement of the soul into itself. According to the Vedanta the liberated man says, I am Brahman; according to the Sankhya, I am not body nor nature.381
In the certainty of conviction which the Sankhya doctrine opposed to the orthodox system, in the clearness with which it drew out the consequences of its point of view, in the boldness of scepticism concerning the gods and revelation, in the courage with which it protested against the regulations of the priests, and the whole religious tradition of the people, lies its importance. By following the rules of the Veda, so said the adherents of this philosophy, no peace can be obtained; the means prescribed by the Veda are neither pure nor of sufficient efficacy. How could it be a pure act to shed blood? – how could sacrifices and ceremonies be of sufficient force? If they really conferred the blessing of heaven, it could only be for a short time; the blessing would merely last till the soul assumed a new body. Temporal means could not give any eternal liberation from evil. The adherents of Kapila explained the gods, including Brahman, to be souls, not much distinguished from the souls of men; the more advanced denied their existence altogether. There was no supreme soul, they said, and no god. Even if there were a god, he must either be free from the world, or connected with it. He cannot be free, for in that case nothing would move him to creation, and if he were connected with the world he would be limited by it, and could not be omniscient.382 Thus not only were the whole doctrine of Brahman and the whole system of gods overthrown, but the authority of the Veda was annihilated on which the Brahmans founded their belief no less than the worship by sacrifice, and with it all revelation, all the positive basis of religious life. The doctrine of Kapila found adherents. From orthodox scholasticism the Indian philosophy very rapidly arrived at rationalism and scepticism, though the latter, like the correct system, moved in scholastic forms and ended with an unsolved dualism.
While in this manner one constructive system superseded the other, the formal side of knowledge did not remain without a keen and penetrating examination. The objects and means of knowledge were tested; men occupied themselves with fixing the categories of the idea, of doubt, of contradiction, of fallacies, of false generalisation, and conversion; and at last inquiries were made into the syllogism and the members of it, and more especially into the categories of cause and effect. Researches of this kind quickly grew into a system, the Nyaya or logic, which chiefly used the results of the theory of knowledge to establish the authority of the Veda, and overthrow the arguments brought against the revelation of it.383 In themselves, at any rate in the late form in which we have them, the logical researches of the Indians are scarcely behind the similar works of modern times in the acuteness and subtilty of their categories.
In the period between the years 800 and 600 B.C. the valley of the Ganges must have been filled with the stir of intellectual life. No doubt the times were long past when the ancient hymns of the Veda were sung at the place of sacrifice, when the poems of victory and the heroic deeds of men – the Epos in its original form – were recited at the courts of princes or the banquets of the military nobility – the Kshatriyas. The contest of the Brahmans and the Kshatriyas was also over; the Brahmans had not only gained currency for their teaching in the sphere of religion and the state, but had already developed it to its consequences. They put before the princes and the people the canon of correct life, of purity, of sins and penalties, of punishments beyond the grave and regenerations, and held up the true law to the state. They revised the Epos from their point of view; they established the ritual, they justified every declaration and every ordinance in it from the Veda, the sacred history; they explained the words and the sense of the Veda; they went beyond the opposition of schools and authorities to independent examination of the idea of Brahman, of the causes and connection of the world, and to speculative philosophy. They have so far succeeded that no nation has devoted its interest and power to religion to the same degree as the Indians. The longer they lingered in the magic world of gods and spirits, into which they were plunged by the sacrifices, legends, and doctrines of the Brahmans, the more familiar they became with these dreams, the more passive must they have grown to the actual and prosaic connection of things, the more indifferent to the processes going on in the world of reality. Hence in the end the Indians knew more of the world of the gods than of the things of the earth; they lived in the next world rather than in this. The world of fancy became their fatherland, and heaven was their home. The more immutable the limits of the castes, the heavier the taxation of the state, the greater the caprice of the officers, the less the space left for the will or act of the individual, the more uniform the life, – the more did the people become accustomed to seek their fears and hopes in the kingdom of fancies and dreams, in the world to come. Excluded from action in the state, the Indians turned the more eagerly to the questions of worship and dogma; for that was the only sphere in which movement found nothing to check it, and the separation of the people into a number of tribes, the mutual exclusiveness of the castes and local communities limited the common feeling of the nation on the Ganges to the faith which they all acknowledged.
BOOK VI.
BUDDHISTS AND BRAHMANS
CHAPTER I.
THE STATES ON THE GANGES IN THE SIXTH CENTURY B.C
The list of the kings of Magadha, preserved not only among the Brahmans, but from the seventh century B.C. downwards among the Buddhists who then came forward to oppose them, allow us to assert with tolerable accuracy that the dynasty of the Pradyotas, which ascended the throne of Magadha in the year 803 B.C., was succeeded in 665 B.C. by another family, known to the Brahmans as the Çaiçunagas.384 The first two kings of this house were Kshemadharman and Bhattya (the Kshatraujas of the Brahmans). In 603 B.C. Bhattya was succeeded by his son Bimbisara. In the reign of this king, according to the ancient sutras of the Buddhists, justice, morals, and religion were regulated in Magadha and the neighbouring states according to the wishes of the Brahmans. In these narratives we find the rules of the law-book generally recognised and carried out in all essential points, and in some respects they are even transcended. The system of exclusive castes is complete. The stricter marriage law, forbidding union with a woman of another caste, is victorious over the more liberal view that the husband fixed the caste. "Brahmans marry Brahmans only, nobles only nobles; a man takes a wife only from an equal family."385 Within the castes those of equal position are divided into separate corporations. Among the Vaiçyas and Çudras, merchants, artisans, barbers, form special castes, in which the occupation of the father descends to the son; the son of a merchant is a merchant, and the son of a butcher a butcher.386 The laws on the order of the castes and forbidden food were strictly observed. The lower and impure castes thoroughly believe in their vocation. The Kshatriya, though sick to death, refuses to take even as a remedy the forbidden onion (p. 169), which the physician hands to him.387 The Chandalas give notice of their approach that the higher castes may not be rendered impure by contact with them; they eat dog's flesh as the law requires, and carry the dead out beyond the gates of the city.388 Invested with the holy girdle, the Brahmans, as the law directs (p. 173), bear continually in their hands the staff of bamboo and the pitcher of water for purification. The learned among them are occupied with the study of the Veda; they recite the hymns, instruct pupils, and hold discussions on theology and philosophy. Occasionally the princes take an interest in these learned contests, and cause the disputations to go on at their courts in their presence; one king favours this system, another that; one protects this school, the other a different school. The penitent Brahmans live as anchorites in the forest, in the mountains, on the holy lakes Ravanahadra and Manasa, under Kailasa, the lofty peak of the Himalayas. Some live in complete solitude, others dwell in such a manner that a whole circle of settlements lie close together.389 The neighbours now and then combine for disputation, others give themselves up in deep solitude to meditation and mortification. At that time hundreds of these penitents are said to have lived on the holy lakes, and the severity of their exercises appears already to have exceeded the requirements of the book of the law. Some fast, others sit between four fires, others perpetually hold their hands above their heads, others lie on hot ashes, others on a wooden bed covered with sharp points.390 Other Brahmans, and it would appear a considerable number, wander as mendicants through the land; others pursue the newly-discovered avocations of astrology and sooth-saying;391 others avail themselves of the permission of the book of the law to drive the plough, and carry on the business of a merchant.392 Others think that they will find an easier path to maintenance and money if they present the kings with poems written in their praise, or give their daughters to be received into the harem of princes. Not all Brahmans could read and write: many confounded Om and Bhur.393
The life of the opulent classes, had become, it is said, easy and luxurious. In such circles no one went without a servant to carry the parasol and keep off the flies. The physician was sent for in every case of sickness, and poor men entreated him not to order too costly remedies. The lot of the beggar was considered miserable, because he could not have a physician in sickness, or obtain medicine.394 Industry and trade flourished in spite of the hindrances thrown in the way by the system of caste, or the taxation, which, as is shown by many indications beside the directions in the book of the law, was severe. That Magadha, even before the sixth century, was the seat of a lively trade, we may conclude from the fact that the merchants are called simply "Magadhas" in the book of the law. Caravans under the guidance of a chief convey the wares from one city to another on camels, elephants, oxen, and asses, or on the shoulders of bearers, till the sea-coast is reached. Stuffs and woven cloths, especially silk of Varanasi, sandal-wood, saffron and camphor, horses from the north, "noble Sindhu horses," are mentioned as the commonest articles of traffic.395 As the most important the book of the law enumerates precious stones, pearls, corals, iron, woven cloths, perfumes and spices, and advises the man who wishes to amass money quickly to go to sea; "he who will obtain wealth most quickly must not despise the dangers and misery of the great ocean." According to the statements of the sutras the merchants go by hundreds over the sea. The costly sandal-woods of the Malabar coasts are embarked at Çurparaka (which must no doubt be looked for at the mouth of the Krishna); from thence men sailed past Tamraparni (Ceylon) in order to buy precious stones on a distant island.396 In the larger cities the merchants formed corporations, the chiefs of which treat with the kings in the names of the whole;397 some especially-favoured merchants obtained the privilege of receiving their wares free of toll. The great merchants in the cities did not find it necessary to pay at once for the wares which came from a distance. They printed their seal on the bales which they would buy, and paid a small deposit.398 The members of the family work at their occupation in common; while one brother stays at home and attends to the sale, the others go with the caravans or are at sea.399 In these circles no one marries till he has amassed a certain sum of money. The profits of the merchants appear to have been easy and large, though their journeys were attended with danger. They were not only threatened with the exactions of tax-gatherers and attacks of robbers, but were exposed to great temptations in the cities. Mistresses could be found there, "whose bodies were soft as the lotus flower, and shone in gay attire." These, no doubt, gave themselves up to the young travellers at no inconsiderable price.400
The kings of Magadha resided at Rajagriha, i. e. the king's house, a city which lay to the south of the Ganges and the east of the Çona. The sutras mention Prasenajit, king of the Koçalas, who, as already remarked, lay on the Sarayu, and Vatsa, the son of Çatanika, king of the Bharatas, as contemporaries of Bimbisara, king of Magadha, and his son Ajataçatru. Hence the reigns of Prasenajit and Vatsa may be placed in the first half and about the middle of the sixth century B.C. Both princes are mentioned in the tradition of the Brahmans. In the Vishnu-Purana, Prasenajit is the twenty-third ruler of the Koçalas after the great war. Vatsa is the twenty-fifth successor of Parikshit, who is said to have ascended the throne of Hastinapura after the victory and abdication of the sons of Pandu.401 The kings of the Koçalas had built a new city, Çravasti, to the north of their ancient capital Ayodhya; the kings of the Bharatas resided at Kauçambi on the Ganges. To the north of the kingdom of Magadha, on the other bank of the Ganges, lay the commonwealth of the Vrijis on the Gogari, and the kingdom of Mithila; to the east on both shores of the Ganges were the Angas, whose capital appears to have been Champa (in the neighbourhood of the modern Bhagalpur); to the west of Magadha on the Ganges were the Kaçis, whose capital was Varanasi (Benares). The colonies of the Arians had advanced and their territory had been extended to the south both on the east and west. This is not merely proved by the mention of Çurparaka, for the sutras of the Buddhists tell us of a great Arian kingdom on the northern spur of the Vindhyas, the metropolis of which was Ujjayini (Ozene in western writers) on the Sipra, and adjoining this on the coast was the kingdom of Surashtra (Guzerat).402
The life of the kings on the Ganges is described by our authorities in glowing colours. Their palaces are spacious, provided with gardens and terraces for promenading. Besides the women and servants, the bodyguard and the executioners clothed in blue are domiciled in the royal citadels. The princes eat off silver and gold, and are clothed in silk of Varanasi. Friendly princes make handsome presents to each other, e. g. suits of armour adorned with precious stones.403 Their edicts and commands are composed in writing and stamped with the seal of ivory.404 The labours of government are relieved by the pleasures of the chase. In sickness the princes are served with the most select remedies. When Bimbisari's son and successor fell down one day in a swoon, he was placed in six tubs full of fresh butter, and afterwards in a seventh filled with the most costly sandal-wood.405 The harem of the king was numerous, and the women had great influence; the children which they bore were suckled by nurses, of whom one child had at times eight.406 Any one who ventured to cast a look upon one of the wives of the king forfeited his life. When one of the wives of Prasenajit, king of the Koçalas, was walking in the evening on the terrace of the palace she saw the handsome brother of the king, and threw him a bouquet; when this came to the ears of Prasenajit, he caused the feet and hands of his brother to be cut off.407 The same cruel and barbarous character marks all the punishments inflicted by the king. On the order of a king whose mildness and justice are commended, all the inhabitants of the city are said to have been put to death on account of an error committed by one of them.408 If any one had to make a communication to the king, or lay any matter before him, he first besought that he might not be punished for his words. No one approached the king without a present; least of all merchants. Happy events were announced by princes to their cities by the sound of bells. Stones, gravel, and dirt were then removed from the streets, which were sprinkled with sandal-water and strewed with flowers and garlands, and silken stuffs were hung along them. At certain distances jars filled with frankincense were placed; and if a guest of distinction was to be received the ways were cleansed for a considerable space before the gates, smoothed, and perfumed, and furnished with standards, parasols, and resting-places of flowers.409
