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XIV] The Ethics of the Gitā and the Buddhist Ethics 507 as adharma (vice); and, as a result of this adharma, there was a calamity in the kingdom of Rāma in the form of the death of an infant son of a Brahmin. King Rāma went out in his chariot and beheaded Sambūka for transgressing his caste-duties. Instances could be multiplied to show that, when there was a conflict between the caste-duties and the common duties, it was the former that had the greater force. The common duties had their force only when they were not in conflict with the caste-duties. The Gitā is itself an example of how the caste-duties had preference over common duties. In spite of the fact that Arjuna was extremely unwilling to take the lives of his near and dear kinsmen in the battle of Kuruksetra Krşņa tried his best to dissuade him from his disinclination to fight and pointed out to him that it was his clear duty, as a Kşattriya, to fight. It seems therefore very proper to hold that the common duties had only a general application, and that the specific caste-duties superseded them, whenever the two were in conflict.
The Gītā does not raise the problem of common duties, as its synthesis of nivrtti (cessation from work) and pravrtti (tending to work) makes it unnecessary to introduce the advocacy of the common duties; for its instruction to take to work with a mind completely detached from all feelings and motives of self-seeking, pleasure-seeking and self-interest elevates its scheme of work to a higher sphere, which would not be in need of the practice of any select scheme of virtues.
The theory of the Gitā that, if actions are performed with an unattached mind, then their defects cannot touch the performer, distinctly implies that the goodness or badness of an action does not depend upon the external effects of the action, but upon the inner motive of action. If there is no motive of pleasure or self-gain, then the action performed cannot bind the performer; for it is only the bond of desires and self-love that really makes an action one's own and makes one reap its good or bad fruits. Morality from this point of view becomes wholly subjective, and the special feature of the Gītā is that it tends to make all actions non-moral by cutting away the bonds that connect an action with its performer. In such circumstances the more logical course would be that of Sankara, who would hold a man who is free from desires and attachment to be above morality, above duties and above responsibilities. The Gitā, however, would not advocate
