culture

So far most of our knowledge about the ethics of ancient India has come to us from the religious writings of the Vedas, Brahmanas, Aranyakas, Upanishads, Jainism, and Buddhism. These are the oldest sources, as there were no significant historians of ancient India except for the Greek and Roman accounts of Alexander’s conquests. Later we shall see what epic poetry revealed about Indian civilization. This chapter will review what we do know about the history of ancient India and then examine the writings about dharma (law, duty), politics, and pleasure.

As we learned from the Vedas, kings and councils of prominent men in varying degrees of monarchy and republican influence ruled ancient India. Megasthenes, a Greek ambassador to India shortly after Alexander’s death, wrote a book on India stating that monarchies were dissolved and democratic governments were set up in the cities. Jainism and Buddhism flourished particularly in the independent clans. According to Buddhist texts, in the sixth century BC there were sixteen major states in northern India of which Magadha, Kosala, and Vatsa were the most powerful.

Vatsa was a prosperous country known for its fine cotton; its capital was Kaushambi. Their heroic king, Udayana, was descended from the Kurus of Bharata and was the subject of several poems and dramas. The cruel King Pradyota of Avanti captured him, but he contrived to escape with the help of Pradyota’s daughter. Interested in Buddhism Udayana was converted by Pindola, but not before he had tortured Pindola with brown ants while in a drunken rage.

Magadhan Ascendancy

Magadha rose to imperial power during the long reigns of Bimbisara (c. 544-491) and his son Ajatashatru (c. 491-460); their relations with the Buddha have been told. Only fifteen years old when his father anointed him king, Bimbisara conquered Anga, which had defeated his father. His son was installed in its powerful capital at Champa, and his diplomatic and matrimonial relations with Pradyota of Avanti also enhanced his power with the annexation of Kashi. The Magadha Empire included republican communities such as Rajakumara. Villages had their own assemblies under their local chiefs called Gramakas. Their administrations were divided into executive, judicial, and military functions. Bimbisara was friendly to both Jainism and Buddhism and suspended tolls at the river ferries for all ascetics after the Buddha was once stopped at the Ganga River for lack of money.

After the death of Bimbisara at the hands of his son, Ajatashatru, the widowed princess of Kosala also died of grief, causing King Prasenajit to revoke the gift of Kashi and triggering a war between Kosala and Magadha. Ajatashatru was trapped by an ambush and captured with his army; but in a peace treaty he, his army, and Kashi were restored to Magadha, and he married Prasenajit’s daughter.

Jain and Buddhist accounts differ slightly as to the cause of Ajatashatru’s war with the Licchavi republic, but precious gems figured in both accounts. This conflict would determine the fate of eastern India and drew the attention of the Buddha, who suggested to the democratic Licchavis that they strengthen themselves by holding full and frequent assemblies while maintaining internal concord and efficient administration honoring elders, institutions, shrines, saints, and women.

However, Ajatashatru sent a minister, who for three years worked to undermine the unity of the Licchavis at Vaishali. To launch his attack across the Ganga River Ajatashatru had to build a fort at a new capital called Pataliputra, which the Buddha prophesied would become a great center of commerce. Torn by disagreements the Licchavis were easily defeated once the fort was constructed. Jain texts tell how Ajatashatru used two new weapons - a catapult and a covered chariot with swinging mace that has been compared to modern tanks.

Approaching the Buddha’s assembly of monks to ask forgiveness for ending the life of his father, Ajatashatru could not understand how at night it could be so quiet near an assembly of more than a thousand people and exclaimed, "Would that my son Udayi Bhadda might have such calm as this assembly of the brothers has!" 1 This conversation with the Buddha was a turning point in the life of Ajatashatru, and after the Buddha’s death the chief disciple, Mahakassapa, entrusted the bulk of the relics to Ajatashatru. The king also repaired the facilities at Rajagriha used by the Buddhists and sponsored the first Buddhist council by providing clothing, food, residences, and medicine for about five hundred monks and elders.

According to Buddhist texts the four kings who ruled Magadha after Ajatashatru all killed their fathers, though Jain texts claim that his first successor was an adherent of their religion who was assassinated by his political rival, Palaka, the son of the Avanti King Pradyota, who had become powerful by conquering Kaushambi. Finally the people rose up against being ruled by murderers and elected Sishunaga king of Magadha; he destroyed the power of the Pradyotas and took over Avanti as well as Vatsa and Kosala. His son, Kalashoka, succeeded to a powerful empire, but he was murdered by a lowcaste barber named Ugrasena, who founded the Nanda dynasty, which ended the traditional Kshatriyas’ rule by exterminating their principalities. The last king of the Nandas was overthrown shortly after Alexander’s Greek invaders left India in 326 BC, because his people hated him for his wickedness, miserliness, and low origin.

Alexander’s Invasion of India

Although the Persians extended their rule over the western edge of India under Cyrus, Darius, and Xerxes, the only major threat of foreign conquest came when Alexander of Macedon invaded India in 326 BC. According to Greek historians, "None of the Indians ever marched out of their own country for war, being actuated by a respect for justice."2 Arrian also added that all the inhabitants were free, since no Indian was a slave, though he did describe seven castes as the naked wise men, farmers, animal herders, artisans, warriors, supervisors, and royal officials. Tillers of the soil were so respected that even when a war raged nearby they plowed and gathered their crops in peace.

After conquering Bactria Alexander crossed the Hindu Kush Mountains. Taking advantage of rivalries between kingdoms, Alexander gained in advance the allegiance of Shashigupta and eventually Ambhi, king of Taxila. Alexander sent Hephaestion and Perdiccas with half his forces through the Khyber Pass, and they laid siege to the Astenoi for thirty days before their King Astes fell fighting. Alexander also met opposition from the free peoples, and in one of these skirmishes he was wounded while scaling the walls. An Athenian quoted Homer that Ichor flows from the blessed gods, but the conqueror denied this divine implication declaring flatly that it was blood. Because their glorious leader had been wounded, the Greeks massacred the entire population of that tribe. Forty thousand Aspasians were taken prisoner, and the 230,000 oxen captured indicate the prosperity of the area.

The Assakenoi resisted Alexander with tens of thousands of cavalry and infantry in a fortress at Massaga. After the king was killed, the army was led by his mother, Queen Cleophes, and included the local women. After several days of heroic fighting, Alexander offered these brave people their lives if the mercenaries would agree to join his army; the city capitulated. But not wanting to fight other Indians, the seven thousand mercenaries tried to run away from the camp and were slaughtered by Alexander’s soldiers.

Next the town of Nysa surrendered, and the Greeks celebrated with Bacchic revels the taking of a town they thought was founded by Dionysus. Then Alexander delighted in taking the town of Aornus, because he heard that Heracles had failed to do so. These incidents indicate that the motive for these conquests was the glory of mythic renown, since there was no other known provocation or rationale for the invasion of another country so far from home except perhaps to steal their wealth or the propaganda they were spreading Greek culture.

King Ambhi of Taxila responded to Alexander’s messengers with gifts and agreed to surrender his prosperous dominions with the following argument:

To what purpose should we make war upon one another,
if the design of your coming into these parts
be not to rob us of our water or our necessary food,
which are the only things
that wise men are indispensably obliged to fight for?
As for other riches and possessions,
as they are accounted in the eye of the world,
if I am better provided of them than you,
I am ready to let you share with me;
but if fortune has been more liberal to you than me,
I have no objection to be obliged to you.3

Alexander not wanting to be outdone by this generosity gave Ambhi even greater gifts plus one thousand talents in money. However, a Macedonian military governor was appointed over Taxila, and Ambhi provided military support to help the Greeks fight his Indian enemies.

A naval officer named Onesicritus heard a lecture on ethics from the wise teachers, who received free food in the Taxila marketplace. They admired Alexander’s love of wisdom even though he ruled a vast empire, and they said he was the only philosopher in arms they had seen. They asked about Socrates, Pythagoras, and Diogenes, but felt they paid too much attention to the customs and laws of their country, an illuminating insight from one of the earliest cross-cultural discussions. One of the naked sages, Calanus, refused to talk with Onesicritus because he would not strip off his clothes; but he did show Alexander an analogy of his government by trying to stand on a shriveled hide, which when trod on its edges would not stay flat; but when he stood in the middle, it did. This was similar to the point Dandamis had made when he had asked Onesicritus why Alexander had undertaken such a long journey. A young man named Pyrrho, who went on to found the skeptical school of Greek philosophy, also talked with these sages, causing his entire outlook to change.

Alexander tried to negotiate with the other two major Indian kings, Abhisara and Poros. Abhisara sent gifts and promised to submit, but Poros said that he would meet Alexander on the field of battle. Alexander drafted five thousand Indian troops into his infantry, had a bridge of boats built to cross the Indus River, and met Poros on the banks of the Jhelum River, which his soldiers were finally able to sneak across at night to avoid confrontation with the elephants of Poros. Alexander won this strategic battle fought in the rainy season using flanking movements around the elephants. Thousands were slain, and after receiving nine wounds himself King Poros surrendered. When Alexander asked the defeated king what treatment he wanted to receive, Poros asked only to be treated in a kingly way. Winning Alexander’s respect and friendship, Poros was granted the rule over his own people and later additional territory equal to his own that Alexander also annexed.

Alexander took Sangala by storm, killing 17,000 Indians and capturing 70,000, while only one hundred of his own men were killed, although more than twelve hundred were wounded. Once again Alexander offered to spare independent Indians; but when they fled, about five hundred were caught and killed. He ordered Sangala razed to the ground. He could see no end to war as long as some were hostile to his conquering. Alexander was enthusiastic when he learned of prosperous farmland on the other side of the Hyphasis River, but that July Alexander’s officers and soldiers, seeing the vast plains that stretched to the east, refused to invade any further, having already traveled 11,000 miles in seven years. When Alexander could not persuade them to follow him, he had to admit that the omens had changed. Arranging for Arsaces to pay tribute to the king of Abhisara he left his conquered territory under this king Ambhi and Poros, then planned his voyage back to the sea.

Having built a fleet of a thousand boats and expropriating another eight hundred, in November 326 BC Alexander began the voyage down the rivers to the sea. Hearing of opposition at the confluence of the Jhelum and the Chenab, Alexander marched his army forty-eight miles across the desert to attack the Mallians by surprise. Alexander led the attack personally, and the Greeks killed about five thousand Indians. Impatient with the slowness of those climbing the ladders into the enemy fort, Alexander jumped down into the fort almost alone where an arrow shot him through his breastplate into his ribs. Fighting until he fainted from loss of blood, he was then protected by bodyguards, and the arrow was eventually removed. Alexander recovered, but in revenge all the Indians in the fort were massacred, including the women and children.

Other independent cities of Brahmins revolted; 80,000 Indians were slain by the Greeks, and many captives were auctioned as slaves. After this bloody detour Alexander and his men returned to their ships and sailed down the Indus to the sea and returned to Babylon. On his boat Alexander questioned ten of the naked sages he captured for persuading Sabbas to revolt. Known for their pertinent answers to questions, Alexander threatened to kill those who gave inadequate responses. According to Plutarch these philosophers declared that the most cunning animal is the one people have not found out, that to be most loved one must be very powerful without making oneself too much feared, and that a decent person ought to live until death appears more desirable than life.

Alexander had entered India with an army of 120,000 with 15,000 horses but returned with not much more than a quarter of them, mostly because of disease and famine. Although this conquest did open up communication between the Greeks and the Indians, it seems to me that this could have been done much better without all the killing and plunder.