Idea of Ahimsa and Asceticism in Ancient Indian Tradition

Author(s): Bansidhar Bhatt
Publisher: B J Institute

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THE IDEA OF AHMSA ....
by Bhavabhati in about 628 A.D., since it reflects a similar cultural pattern of the early society. In it, the kind Janaka visited the sage Valmiki who wished to entertain the royal guest by serving the beef. But Janaka refused to eat meat, because since the time his daughter Sita was in difficulties, he accepted the mode of life of an anchorite and was practising religious susterities - ahimsa, etc. - in a penance-grove, cf.
Danda yana - ... nivịtta-mamsastu ... Janakah / sa ... Sita yah ...
daiva durvipa kam upaśrutya vaikha nasah samvșttah I tathâsya katipaye samvatsarams Candradvipe tapo-vane tapas tapyama nasya / (cf. also a king Rama's story in Wezler-1 pp.101 fol).
The alternating mode of life in the forest later turned out to be an extreme, but volutarily mode of life of a renouncer. The germs of renouncer's life lie in the early rituals like the sarvamedha sacrifice. Here, the sacrificer gives a way all what he has gained. He resumes the sacred fire in himself and goes to the forest for ever, where he lives a life of a renouncer and. never returns homes.
Such developments reflect a crucial aspect of "interiorization of the rituals". BĀ.Up (1.4.17) tells us that his atman possesses krtsnata - completeness -, manas is his self, voice is his wife, vital breaths his offsprings, the eye his human and the ear his divine properties, the self is his act. It is equated with the fivefold victim, etc. And, he obtains this all after knowing it thus. He resumes in himself the entire universe and performs the sacrifice in himself and by himself (Heesterman-2 p.23). The Mait.Up. (1.1 and 6.26) considers meditation on atman as the agnicayana ritual and praņa ya mas as pravargya ceremony (cf. also Tait.Up. 2.4-5). His offerings are his own self. His own self leads him after his death. He sees himself in all beings and all beings in himself (cf. SB. 11.1.8.6; BA.Up. 4.5.15). He offers only in his self. He contains in himself the three sacrificial fires, the prana as the garhapatya fire, apana as the dakšiņa fire, vyana as the ahavaniya fire, udana and samana as the sabhya and the avasatha fires respectively (cf. BDS. 2.18.8; Ch.Up. 5.19-23; see also Olivelle-2 p.77, fn.9). He does not perform sacrifices as other grhasthas. His life is full of tapas- obser. vances of vows and penances - which is identified with sacred
8. Heesterman-2 p.26; Schmidt-1 p.651; cf. Skh.SS. 6.15.20 fol.; ASS.
20.24.16; SB. 13.6.2.20.