A Kantian perspective on the Ramayana
Part 5 of 5 – CONCLUDED
UNCHASTITY AND THE IMPLICIT VEDIC IMPERATIVES OF THE RAMAYANA
Vedic law takes a strict view of unchastity, when it is voluntary, whether man or woman, and even when it is between consenting adults. Consensual concupiscence amongst adults, pre-marital or post-marital, which is not illegal in today’s liberal world, was strictly taboo in times past in India. Unchastity, according to Manu, was an “upa-paataka” (an atoneable but grievous sin) (XI.60).
In the “treta yuga”, punishments on the unfaithful husband were much harsher than it was on the unchaste wife. An unchaste husband, for example, had to expiate his crime by having to wear the hide of a donkey for six months, and going door-to-door begging for food in that guise. (Apasthamba Sutra I, 9, 18). He was virtually cast out from the community.
Punishment for the unchaste wife too was harsh but expiatory rites prescribed for her were relatively less difficult than it was for the husband. Manu laid down certain rules for the how unchaste woman were to be treated and they ranged from the extreme of “casting her away” if she had conceived as a result of adultery to the lenient punishment that involved “casting her away” but confined to the house and maintained and in which state she be made to undergo prescribed rites of expiation (such as “govrata” and “chaandraayana“, for example).
Sage Yagnyavaalkya in his “smriti” (I, 72) laid down that “in adultery, purification accrues from the recurrence of the (menstrual) courses, but not if there has been conception, and that in the latter case, the wife should be put away”.
Sage Vasishta in his “smriti” (XXVIII, 2-4) wrote “A wife tainted by sin, whether quarrelsome or a voluntary runaway, or the victim of an outrage, or the victim of thieves (abductors), is not to be cast away. Let her courses be awaited for; by them she will become pure again”.
Sage Atri also held that a woman who had been ravished by mlecchas (foreign barbarians) and evil men is rendered pure again by performing the penance of “praajapatya” and by her (menstrual) courses” (attested to in the Paraashara smriti X.25).
Manu himself clarified that what he meant by “casting the unchaste woman away” was that she should not be allowed to take part in the religious rites of the husband as a chaste wife will be entitled to do. She need not be driven out of the house, in which she may remain in confinement.
We must now try to imagine the state of Rama’s mind when at the end of the Great War he had won, Sita stood before him, rescued and recovered finally.
Until that very moment, the immediate military mission at hand before him had been the sole preoccupation of his mind. He knew he also had to deliver terrible retribution upon Ravana for his crime of abducting a married woman, Sita, out of lustful desire. It was an act which itself carried severe punishment under the Vedic “dharma-saastra”.
Sage Narada (in his “naaradaparisishta” (28)) laid down that “the entire property of a man should be confiscated if he abducts a woman, and he should suffer death if he abducts a virgin girl”: “sarvasvam harato naarim, kanyaam tu harato vadhah:”
The abduction of a married woman was held by Bruhaspati to be a crime of violence (“saahasa”) as well as theft, Narada regarded whoever committed it to be an “aatataayin” — a cardinal sinner of the most heinous kinds.
Sage Vyaasa in his own later “smriti” (“vyavahaaramayukha“) also laid down the punishments to be delivered to an “aatataayin“: “stri-hartaa lohasrayaney dagdhavyo vai kattaagnina” i.e. “the abductor of a woman should be burnt in a raging fire bound to an iron bedstead”.
And finally, Manu and Sage Vasishta themselves had both decreed in their own “smritis” (in VIII. 350 and III.17 respectively) that the punishment for an “aatataayin” was death.
It must be noted here that when Rama tells Sita that “You have now been won back by me. With that mission realized, my own lost honor has been restored fully. But that leaves no place in my heart for you. You may now go wherever you like from here”, it was not really that he intended to humiliate her.
After the war had been won, Ravana killed and Sita rescued, a moment arrived so suddenly that it struck and shocked him. He realized that while he had, on his part, successfully carried out his dhaarmic duty in delivering death as punishment to the “aatattaayin“, Ravana, it was his wife Sita, however, who now was confronted by an extreme moral crisis, a “dharma-sankatam” of the most painful kind…. A stark and severe dilemma appeared out of nowhere, had descended upon her and stood looming there before her on the exhausted battlefields of Lanka, challenging her to act and choose, as it were, between what we know to be the Kantian “categorical” and a “hypothetical imperative”!
Rama was, in effect asking her, “Sita, you stand now rescued and free… You should be happy… But the question is have you made yourself worthy of happiness?”
This was Rama showing the utmost solicitude of a true husband for a wife making her realize the dire moral predicament she was in… It certainly was not any abuse of marital ethics at all.
(C) DUTY OF SOVEREIGN TO SUBJECTS OVERRIDES EVERY OTHER DHARMA FOR RAMA.
This too is another charge held against Rama by many students and devotees of the Ramayana while examining his conduct in the “Sita-agni-pariksha” episode. They find it unconscionable that he was willing to sacrifice Sita’s own interests, and even damage her dignity, for the sake of being able to boast that he, as king, had adhered to the dhaarmic duty of his high office viz.: to uphold the majesty of the State he ruled and the dignity of its subjects.
This impeachment charge is not an invalid one although, as will be explained below, it hardly is sufficient to succeed as motion that will pass muster in the parliament of human minds that truly understand Dharma and its Categorical Imperatives.
Rama as King, did hold his duty as a sovereign higher than others. That fact was evident from his behavior and words spoken in the last scene in the Yuddhakaanda when after Sita’s ordeal through fire, she is returned by the Fire-God, Agni to Rama, and her chastity proven.
Rama’s behavior then is very revealing and it is best described in Valmiki’s own words in the Yuddhakaandam:
अवश्यं चापि लोकेषु सीता पावनमर्हति |
दीर्घकालोषिता हीयं रावणान्तःपुरे शुभा || ६-११८-१३
“Sita certainly deserves this ordeal of purification at least for proving her chastity to the people who know that this blessed woman had resided for a long time indeed in Ravana’s gynaeceum.
बालिशो बत कामात्म रामो दशरथात्मजः |
इति वक्ष्यति मां लोको जानकीमविशोध्य हि || ६-११८-१४
“The world would otherwise have slandered against me and scandalized my impropriety, saying Rama, the son of Dasaratha, was blinded by his love for Sita and accepted without her chastity being established.”
Rama clearly felt not one bit remorseful about the terrible test of “agni-pariksha” to which Sita had been driven. And he made no secret of the fact either that in his view her ordeal was necessary for the sake of his subject-peoples at large.
But whether in the context of Sita’s “agni-pravesam“, Rama’s sovereign duty did come into conflict with his duty towards his “dharma-patni” is a rather moot matter for the simple reason that Sita herself did not think so, and did not ever seem to hold it as a grouse against her husband.
Sita, on the other hand, did of course berate and put to shame Rama for his callousness, insensitivity and wholly indecorous language used against her… That was evident in these words of hers spoken in sadness and bitterness:
किं मामसदृशं वाक्यमीदृशं श्रोत्रदारुणम् |
रूक्षं श्रावयसे वीर प्राकृतः प्राकृताम् इव || ६-११६-५
“How can you bring yourself to speak such harsh and unbecoming words… words such as might be spoken by a commoner to a woman of his own kind?“
पृथक्स्त्रीणां प्रचारेण जातिं त्वं परिशङ्कसे |
परित्यजेमां शङ्कां तु यदि तेऽहं परीक्षिता || ६-११६-७
“You seem to suspect and disrespect all womanhood since you judge me by the conduct of some ordinary fallen woman!“
न प्रमाणीकृतः पाणिर्बाल्ये बालेन पीडितः |
मम भक्तिश्च शीलं च सर्वं ते पृष्ठतः कृतम् || ६-११६-१६
“That you and I, as once young bride and groom, have had our hands clasped together in holy matrimony means now nothing to you… nor is my devotion to you, my character and all else too!”
In above words, Sita is clearly upbraiding Rama for his lack of chivalry, grace and intemperance of speech, but nowhere do we hear the words from her suggesting in any way that she is distressed about how or why Rama places his own honor in the eyes of the people above her own.
Thus, if Rama can be described as “dharmaviduttamah” (धर्मो धर्मविदुत्तमः), so was Sita equally too qualified to be praised as such. She too knew Dharma and the severe dictates … or Kantian “categorical imperatives” … that it imposes on Kings by which Rama, the emperor-to-be of Ayodhya, too had to act…
Sita knew Dharma as well as, if not better than Rama himself and that is a fact that cannot be missed when we see that even as she readies herself to enter the blazing pyre for the “agni-pariksha“, she invokes the name of Rama as “राघवं सर्वधर्मज्ञं “… i.e. “sarva-dharmagnyam”, which, is in fact, perfectly synonymous with “dharmaviduttamah” …धर्मविदुत्तमः, that the Vishnu Sahasranaamam hails Rama as!:
कर्मणा मनसा वाचा यथा नातिचराम्यहम् |
राघवं सर्वधर्मज्ञं तथा मां पातु पावकः || ६-११६-२७
“If I bear no guilt of transgressions in thought word or deed against Rama, the one who knows all Dharma, I shall certainly remain protected and unharmed by these flames!”
It is therefore clear from the above that the charge against impeached Rama being too overzealous in upholding a sovereign’s duty towards subject-peoples and riding rough-shod over his duty as loyal husband towards his wife…. that charge is really not impeachable… Not even Sita would brook it!
SITA’S “CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE‘
In the moment that Sita stood forlorn before Rama on that battlefield listening to his blazing, outrageous words he spewed upon her, the mass gathering of “vaanaraas” and “raakshaas” warriors and womenfolk of Lanka stood gaping in stunned and utter shock and awe at what was happening then between the couple. They were baffled at the sudden and sad turn of events which otherwise they had expected should have been a moment of great joy following the reunion between the long separated prince and princess of Ayodhya.
Before Rama had spoken those harsh words, casting aspersion on Sita’s chastity, the thought of her dubious fidelity had never probably even fleetingly crossed their minds. And yet, now that Rama himself had — out of the blue like a thunderbolt, as it were — brought it up, they suddenly all realized that it was a grave and moral principle — a very bitter imperative — that Rama had brought up indeed and it was not really so much about the disowning Sita.
In a flash of an instant, the assembled subjects, allies and armies of Rama, and all of the citizenry of Lanka too, found out that however unpleasant and even “unjust and unfair” Rama’s outburst seemed to be , there was no escaping from the agonizing moral question Rama was always wont to pose to himself and to the rest of the world: “Which noble man, born in an illustrious dynasty like me, will take back a woman who all the world knows lived in another’s abode, (with or without compunction)?”
It is at this point in Kamban’s narrative of the “sita-agnipravesam” that we get a very revealing insight into the deep and painful moral quandary Rama himself faced. The poet puts these poignant words into his mouth:
வந்து இடை ஒரு பழி வந்தால், அது துடைப்பர், தம் உயிரொடும் – குலத்தின் தோகைமார்
“High-born women of pure character…. if, god forbid, a taint or stigma should ever occur to their reputation, they would erase it forthwith by giving up their lives.”
What is implicitly sought to be conveyed in the above words — or, as perhaps we may well not unreasonably infer from them — is this:
“I know that you are not unchaste. You are a high-born lady of sterling character. If you had however fallen prey, either voluntarily or perforce, to the vile advances of Ravana, I am sure you would not be here this moment standing before me… for you would surely have already given up your life in the very moment that Ravana laid hands on you to defile you. But you are now here now and you stand before me! To me that is proof enough of your unblemished body and spirit…
“But then what is proof for me may not be proof enough for the mortals of this world! And you and I must both fear that it will it be not be proof enough too for the citizens of Ayodhya when you and I return there to be anointed soon King and Queen of the kingdom. Would the subjects of Kosala country, and of all its other vassal states and kingdoms, see you then as a chaste or an unchaste woman?”
“Tell me, Sita, what are you going to do about it? And what should I to do about it?”
“If the suspicions of chastity remain ever hanging upon the Queen of Ayodhya, how can you be allowed (under the laws of Manu) to join me as King in the performance of religious rituals and obligatory royal sacrifices that we must both together perform (such as the Ashwamedham, Vaajapeyam or the Raajasuyam)”?
“If you cannot thus join me in the religious duties of the King of Ayodhya, what will you do? Be cast away? Go into confinement in some corner in the palace of Ayodhya and do penance as prescribed in the “dharma-saastra”? Will you atone in private under public gaze for a crime you are guiltless? But then, in the eyes of the world, would your very act of expiation not be regarded as self- incriminating? Would it not be said then that “Why would Sita go and duly submit to atone for the removal of the taint of suspected unchastity if there was no some such taint present in the very first place?
“What therefore will you do now, Sita?!”
“RAAJAA KAALASYA KAARAANAM“
One of the Vedic maxims by which in ancient times monarchs ruled their subjects was “raajaa kaalasya kaaraanam”... i.e. The King is the cause of the complexion of his age, not the other way round.
In other words, on the King rests the ultimate responsibility of good and bad government; and that the zeitgeist, the complexion or atmosphere of the “yuga” in which he lives, will be changed for the better or for the worse depending on how he rules.
How a king rules largely consists in how he duly enforces what is known as “DANDANEETHI“, the Law as laid down in the “dharma saastras” of the Vedic ancestors and rishis of yore who bequeathed it to posterity from generation to generation. It pertained to the duties of men and to the penalties attached to their breach.
In the “treta yuga”, the dynasts of the Rama’s ancestry lived, swore and ruled by the dharma-saastra laid down by Sage Manu.
King Dileepan who was Rama’s revered ancestor was praised (by the great Sanskrit poet, Kaalidasaa in the Raghuvamsha I.17) as “one who did not swerve even to the extent of a line from the path of Manu”…. “rekhamaatramapi kshunnaad aamanor-vartamaanaha param…” And thus, Rama in his avatar too assiduously and scrupulously abided by the codes of Dharma and Dandaneethi handed down as Manu-neethi from previous epochs, implicitly believing in what Manu had said (IV.178):
“yenasya pitaro yaathaah: yena yaathaaha pithaamahaah: I
tena yaayaat sathaam maargam tena gacchan na nisyate II
“The path by which one’s fathers have gone, and that by which grandfathers have gone, by following it, one moves forward on the path of the good, and by following it one does not sin”.
And that is why too the Sri Vaishnava poet-philosopher, Vedanta Desika, hailed Rama as “tretaa-yuga-pravartita-kaartayuga-vrttaanta….” (in “raghuveera gadyam“)… “Rama! Your reign in Tretaayuga had all the virtuous facets of Krithayuga!“
In the later epochs after Rama’s time, in the “dvaapara-yuga”, the epic book of “dharma-saastra“, the Mahabhaaratha had this to say on “dandaneethi” in a long passage (“santi-parva, ch.69, vv 74-105):
“Dandaneethi compels men and women to observe ordained, appointed duties and act virtuously. When the King totally ignores Dandaneethi and fails to enforce it, or is careless, idle indifferent or unjust in enforcing it, then men fall away from their appointed duties. Vice becomes rampant and virtue disappears. The performance of Vedic rites and religious rituals and sacrifices then becomes ineffective. The seasons are fraught with evil. Disease thrives and men die prematurely. The clouds do not bring rainfall, and the crops in the field wither. The earth dries up when the king does not observe the rules of the Dandaneethi”.
Given the maxim of “raajaa kaalasya kaaraanam” prevailing universally in the times she happened to live, Sita thus knew very well that in the situation of crisis she was in, in the eyes of a sovereign’s subjects, a lady who was even merely suspected of unchastity, had to find a way somehow to acquit herself of it…. And she knew Rama would not hesitate to impose “dandaneethi” upon her if his own sense of dhaarmic imperative required it.
The ‘categorical imperatives‘ of the age for any woman in the dire moral straits Sita found herself in were clearly spelt out as “… kaalasya kaaraanam”. They were all there in the “smritis” and “dharma-saastraas” of Manu, Narada and Vasishta and Rama, the “raajaa“, was sworn by royal oath to follow them absolutely.
There were only two choices thus left for her and they were:
- Submit to “dandaneethi”, which would require her to perform expiatory rites to purify herself (such as “praajapatya”, “govrata” or “chaandraayana”?!)
- Allow herself to be cast away in the manner in which the “dharma-saastras“ of Manu and others had laid down.
Rama’s question to Sita was thus: “What therefore will you do now, Sita?!” And implied in that question was this element of the Kantian “categorical imperative”:
“Whatever action you commit to yourself now, beware that the act will be one out of your own volition… and you will be acting “as if the maxim of your action will through your will become a universal law of nature”. It will become thus “an absolute, unconditional requirement that it must be obeyed in all circumstances by you … at all times … and must be seen to be justified as an end in itself!
In the Ramayana, we see thus Sita acting in accordance with what was her very own “categorical imperative“.
The first occasion, in the Yuddhakaanda, it was through the “agni-pravesam” that led to her having willingly and voluntarily undergo the ritual of purification by the sacred Vedic fire. She was “Dharma’s patni” — the wife of Dharma himself. It was indeed more for the sake of the world at large than for her own or Rama’s that she had to affirm the categorical imperative.
In the second occasion, in the Uttarakaanda, she was again suspected by the citizenry of Ayodhya of being tainted by unchastity, and when Rama again asked her to put herself one more time through yet another test of “agni-pariksha”, she chose instead the other mode of expiation for unchaste women prescribed in the “dharma-saastra“.
She took leave of the world and of Rama forever…
Rather than letting them “cast her away”, Sita decided that it was “categorical, dhaarmic imperative” that she ought to “cast herself away”… again through an act of her own will.
Rama’s Dharma: “kim saaram”?
Srimadh Ramayana, the “itihaasa” of both Valmiki and Kamban, that recounts Rama’s life, does cast a strange spell of endless fascination upon anyone reading it and urges us all then to begin a lifelong inquiry, again and again and again….What is this Dharma that Rama taught us all through his avatar?
The great Adi Sankara was once asked by a disciple: “samsaare kim saaram?“…. i.e. “What is the essence of worldly existence?”
Sankara’s terse reply to his disciple was: “bahusah abhi vichintyamanam idam eva.“) I.e. You asked the question thus. Keep asking again and again. That is the meaning of “samsara”.
Likewise, if we were to ask ourselves, “What is the essence of Dharma that Rama followed in his avataara?” (i.e. “raamaavataara dharma rahasya kim saaram?”), the only answer that might afford us some satisfaction is the same pithy one Sankara provided — “You asked the question thus. Keep asking again and again. That is the meaning of Rama’s dharma“.
Socrates once said, “I cannot teach people what is right or wrong. I can only teach them to think about it”. Likewise, we may say too, the “raamaavataara” was not so much intended to teach us Dharma as it was to keep us thinking about it eternally.
For all who are devotees of Rama and the Srimadh Ramayana, and who are keen to understand the metaphysics of morality, their “categorical imperative’ is to keep thinking eternally indeed about Dharma and “Dharmaviduttamaan“
CONCLUDED
REFERENCES AND BIBLIOGRAPHY
- Sri Vedanta Desika: “Dasaavatara Stotram“: https://www.bharattemples.com/dasavatara-stotram-of-vedantha-desika/
- Bhagavath-Gita (Ch.18 shloka 66): https://www.holy-bhagavad-gita.org/chapter/18/verse/66
- William Shakespeare: Julius Caesar
https://www.enotes.com/shakespeare-quotes/not-that-lov-d-caesar-less
- Sri Vishnu Sahasranaamam: https://www.devshoppe.com/blogs/articles/sloka-ramo-viraamo-virajo-margo-neyo-nayo-anayah-with-meaning
- Nietzche: https://www.wakingtimes.com/7-reasons-why-we-must-create-and-recreate-god/
- “Maryada”: Searching for Dharma in the Ramayana- Arshia Sattar – Page 2
- Apasthambha sutra:
- Immanuel Kant: “The Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals”- https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Categorical_imperative#:~:text=Kant%20used%20the%20hypothetical%20imperative%20to%20explain%20his,moral%20choices%20are%20governed%20by%20a%20categorical%20imperative.
- The Four Purusharthaas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puru%E1%B9%A3%C4%81rtha#:~:text=The%20four%20puru%E1%B9%A3%C4%81rthas%20are%20Dharma%20%28righteousness%2C%20moral%20values%29%2C,important%20than%20Artha%20or%20Kama%20in%20Hindu%20philosophy.
- Valmiki Ramayana: Ayodhya Kanda, Aranya Kanda, Kishkinda Kanda, Yuddha Kanda http://valmikiramayan.pcriot.com/Ramayana1.htm
- Kamba Ramayana: Yuddha kandam – https://archive.org/details/vrajeshkumar_gmail_061/06-3%20%E0%AE%AF%E0%AF%81%E0%AE%A4%E0%AF%8D%E0%AE%A4%20%E0%AE%95%E0%AE%BE%E0%AE%A3%E0%AF%8D%E0%AE%9F%E0%AE%AE%E0%AF%8D
- All references to the Hindu Dharmasaastras on Pages-21 through Page 36 together with respective citations sourced from: “Rajadharma”: (Dewan Bahadur K.Krishnaswami Row lectures, University of Madras); by K.V.Rangaswami Aiyangar, Honorary Professor of Economics, Benares Hindu University. Dr. B.R.Ambedkar Open University-Library NO8580- The Adyar Library, 1941.
- Vedanta Desika: “Raghuveera Gadyam” –https://stotranidhi.com/en/sri-raghuveera-gadyam-sri-mahavira-gadyam-in-english/
- Adi Sankara: https://www.kamakoti.org/hindudharma/part21/chap3.htm
- Socrates: https://www.ipl.org/essay/Essay-On-The-Legend-Of-Socrates-F3Z24774AJFR#:~:text=The%20Legend%20of%20Socrates%20%E2%80%9CI%20cannot%20teach%20anybody,know%20nothing%20is%20the%20true%20beholder%20of%20knowledge.