Dharma: Its Early History in Law, Religion, and Narrative

Hiltebeitel, Alf (著)

作者

Hiltebeitel, Alf (著)

出版日期

2011.08.11

頁次

747

出版者

Oxford University Press

出版者網址

http://www.oup.com

出版地

New York, NY, US [紐約, 紐約州, 美國]

資料類型

書籍=Book

使用語言

英文=English

關鍵詞

dharma; Sanskrit epics; Mahābhārata; Rāmāyaṇā; Buddhacarita; Manu; The Laws of Manu; Aśoka Maurya; itihāsa; yuga; kalpa; royal dharma; rājadharma; women's dharma; strīdharma

摘要

From a verbal root meaning “to hold” or “uphold,” dharma is taken to have been the main term by which Buddhism and Hinduism came, over about five centuries, to describe their distinctive visions of the good and well‐rewarded life. From about 300 BCE to about 200 CE, Buddhist and Brahmanical authors used it to clarify and classify their mutual and contending values in relation to dramatically changing historical conditions. Before this, the term had no such centrality, and after it, each tradition came to define normative dharma separately as the term's interreligious dimension lost interest. This book about dharma in history thus attempts to get at the concepts and practices associated with the term mainly during this window, which opens on dharma's vitality as it played, and was played, across political, religious, legal, literary, ethical, and philosophical domains and discourses about what “holds” life together. It examines what dharma meant in eleven texts, including text clusters like the Aśokan edicts and the canonical Buddhist Three Baskets, that can be said to have made dharma their central concern. These eleven “dharma texts,” nine “major” (including those just mentioned, the dharmasūtras, the Sanskrit epics, The Laws of Manu, and the Buddhacarita), and two “minor” (the Yuga Purāṇa and a set of Buddhist prophesies of the end of the Buddhist dharma), are explored for their treatments of dharma as experienced “over time” during this period of dynamic change. Each chapter brings out ways in which dharma is interpreted temporally: from grand cosmic chronometries of yugas and kalpas to narratives about divine plans, implications of itihāsa or “history,” war, and peace, gendered nuances of genealogical time, royal biography (even autobiography with Aśoka), guidelines for the royal life including daily routines, householder regimens including daily obligations and life‐stages, and monastic regimens including meditation.

Acknowledgments xi
Abbreviations xv

1. Introduction 3
A. Classical Dharma Texts and Their Relative Dating 5
B. Three Critical Editions 11
C. Paradigm Shifts on Dharma: The Case of the Mahābhārata 20
D. Chapter by Chapter 29

2. Aśoka Maurya 35
A. Aśoka’s Incriptions 36
B. A Comprehensive Dhamṃa 45

3. A Vedic History of Dharma 51
A. Dhárman in Early and Later Ṛgvedic Usages 52
B. Dhárman as Enigma 58
C. Dhárman and Ṛgvedic Kingship 66
D. Mantra Period and Late Saṃhitā Usages 78
E. The Brāhmaṇas 84
F. The Upaniṣads 91

4. Early Buddhism: Three Baskets of Dharma 103
A. Sūtra Basket Dharma 107
B. Abhidharma Basket Dharma 124
C. Vinaya Basket Dharma 150

5. Post-Vedic Brahmanical Dharma 181
A. Vedic Schools and the Dharmasūtras 182
B. Toward Consensus in Brahmanical Dharma Texts 189
C. What’s New with Manu 196
D. Brahmā in Manu’s Frame Narrative 208
E. Varṇa (Caste), Āśrama (Life Pattern), the King, Śūdras, and Women 215
F. Rājadharma: Establishing a King’s Dharma 228
G. A Day in a King’s Life 233

6. Dharma over Time, I: Big Time Dharma 243
A. Kalpas and Yugas 244
B. Buddhist and hindu Kalpas 246
C. Originary Dharma in Mahābhārata 260
D. Kalpas, Manvantaras, and Yugas in Manu and the Mahābhārata 266

7. Dharma over Time, II: Prophesies of Disaster 273
A. The Yuga Purāṇa 274
B. Variations on the Debacle at Kauśāmbī 298
C. The Yuga Purāṇa and the Kauśāmbī Myth 333

8. Women's Dharma: Śāstric Norms and Epic Narratives 337
A. Strīdharma 338
B. The Law of the Mother 340
C. Mother Gaṅgā 345
D. Mother Kālī Satyavatī 354
D. The Transitional “Three Mothers” 373
F. Mothers Kuntī and Gāndhārī 383
G. Kuntī, Mādrī, and Pāṇḍu among the Hundred Peak Mountain Ṛṣis 393
H. Settling Mother Kuntī and Her Sons Back at Hāstinapura 406
I. Conclusions 410

9. Two Dharma Biographies? Rāma and Yudhiṣṭhira 411
A. The Royal Life as Adventure 412
B. Frames and Frontmatter on Rāma, Yudhiṣṭhira, and Dharma 415
C. Sidestories and Subtables, Foregrounding and Legal Precedent 420
D. Monstrous Encounters 429
E. Questionable Killings: Vālin and Droṇa 453
F. Rāma and Yudhiṣṭhira: Some Comparative Points 479

10. Draupadī and Sītā: Dharmapatnīs of Two Different Kinds 481
A. Family Background, Birth, and Childhood 484
B. Marriage, Divine Plan, Early Signs of Trouble 488
C. Sītā and Draupadī on Their Svadharma 495
D. Captivity and Exile 498

11. Dharma and the Bhagavad Gītā 517
A. Svadharma and Svakarma: Qualities, Merits, and Virtues 518
B. Who Has Svadharma? 529
C. Manu and the Bhagavad Gītā Propoer 553

12. Dharma and Bhakti 569
A. Mapping the Divine Plans 571
B. The Placer and the Ordainer 585
C. “Avatāra” 589
D. Friendship, Hospitality, and Separation 603
E. Ṛṣidharma 607
F. Rāma and Kṛṣṇa as Guests, Hosts, and Friends 616

13. Aśvaghoṣa's Buddhacarita: A Buddhist Reading of the Sanskrit Epics and Their Treatments of Dharma 625
A. Aśvaghoṣa’s Buddhacarita 626
B. The Centrality of Dharma in Aśvaghoṣa’s Buddhacarita 628
C. Aśvaghoṣa of Brahmin, Buddhist Convert, and Scholar 623
D. Aśvaghoṣa and Epic Precedents 635
E. The Buddhacarita and the Rāmāyaṇa 638
F. The Buddhacarita and the Māhābhārata 645
G. Postscript and Aśka 683

Bibliography 685
Index 727

ISBN

9780199897452 (ebook); 9780195394238 (hbc)

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195394238.001.0001

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