Sruta Sarita

SR No.: 001940
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Jitendra B Shah
Publisher: Shardaben Chimanbhai Educational Research Centre
Publication Year: 2001
Total Pages: 310
Language: English, Prakrit, Hindi
Classification: Book_Devnagari & Articles
File Size: 18 MB

Page 51

42
ŚRUTA-SARITĀ
were avoiding the drink (Kāthaka Sam, XIII. 2). And in Chāndogya-Up (V. 2. 5) we find that the King Aśvapati declares that there was no drunkard in his kingdom. Here we must distinguish between a drunkard and a person who drinks Surā.
Even Pāṇini and Gșhyasūtra testify to the fact that intoxicating drinks were common amongst the people. Even the women were served with the wine on the occasion of entry of the bride in the home for the first time. At the time of marrige the women who danced were served with Surā. But here it should be noted that Dharmasūtra though acquainted with evil of the surā and other intoxicating drinks prohibited them for Brahmins and students only. The rest were allowed to have the particular type of intoxicating drinks?. But Bodhāyana mentions that the Brahmins in the North had a peculiar custom of drinking liquor.
Though the evil effects such as loss of wealth, insanity, absence of consciousness, loss of knowledge, life, wealth and friends etc. were well-known to the Vedic Aryans, we have evidence to show that for a long time they were not able to eradicate the evil even from the religious ceremonies. "Kautilya mentions the existence of shops of liquor having many rooms and provided with beds and seats and other comforts such as scents and garlands. ... Manufacture of wine was the monopoly of the state but on festive occasions right of private manufacture of bear for four days was recognised on payment of licence fees'.' It is surprising that only for a Brahmin woman it is said that if she drinks surā she will not have a company of her husband in the next world,
The Veda and the Vedic literature-Brāhmanas, Grhya-and Dharmasūtras and Smrtis, in all of them there are the traces of prohibition but one is astonished to find that there is, as regards the prohibition, a distinction between the various types of intoxicating drinks; as for example, Soma is not prohibited but a particular type of Surā is prohibited, and that also not always. Further, while prohibiting Surà a distinction is also made between the four Varnas, Sūdra is allowed to drink sură but not the Dvijas—i. e. the first three Varnas. Even in Śrāddhas the grandfathers are not given the Surā but the grandmothers are offered. In Abhiseka the Surā was compulsory item in concluding ritual. Manu has two conflicting statements about Madya—the intoxicating drinks.
According to some there is no sin in drink(a 4970 97 HÈ...) etc. and the others count the drink as one of the great sins. The early Tantras as is wellknown propagated the drinking of Madya even for liberating the soul or for the union with God Śiva and the Śakti, the mother goddess. But the later Tantras tried to interpret the madya in other way. In the times of Rāmāyana and