Satapatha Bramhana Part 02

SR No.: 007678
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Julius Eggeling
Publisher: Oxford
Publication Year: 1885
Total Pages: 2521
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 44 MB

Page 883

SECT. I.
THE QUESTIONS OF BÅNG-SZE.
- 327
Confucius said, 'It is not the rule. Anciently, outside the palace, a boy had his master, and at home his foster-mother; they were those whom the ruler employed to teach his son;—what ground should these be for wearing mourning for them ? Formerly duke Kâo of La having lost his mother when he was little, had a foster-mother, who was good; and when she died, he could not bear (not) to mourn for her, and wished to do so. The proper officer on hearing of it, said, “ According to the ancient rule, there is no mourning for a foster-mother. If you wear this mourning, you will act contrary to that ancient rule, and introduce confusion into the laws of the state. If you will after all do it, then we will put it on record, and transmit the act to the future;—will not that be undesirable ?” The duke said, "Anciently the son of Heaven, when unoccupied and at ease, wore the soft inner garment, assumed after the year's mourning, and the cap." The duke could not bear not to wear mourning, and on this he mourned for his fostermother in this garb. The mourning for a fostermother originated with duke Kâo of La?'
of the harem to whom the care of an orphan boy was entrusted ;-it may have been after he ceased to be suckled. The reasoning of Confucius goes on the assumption that mourning should be worn only in cases of consanguinity or affinity; and it may be inferred from this that concubinage was not the most ancient rule in China.
1 See the eleventh article in the forty-third chapter of the Narratives of the School,' where a similar, probably the same, conversation, with some variations, is found. The duke of Lê in it, however, is not Kâo, but Hảo; see paragraph 12, page 315.
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