Manusmriti with the Commentary of Medhatithi
by Ganganatha Jha | 1920 | 1,381,940 words | ISBN-10: 8120811550 | ISBN-13: 9788120811553
This is the English translation of the Manusmriti, which is a collection of Sanskrit verses dealing with ‘Dharma’, a collective name for human purpose, their duties and the law. Various topics will be dealt with, but this volume of the series includes 12 discourses (adhyaya). The commentary on this text by Medhatithi elaborately explains various t...
Verse 5.50
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:
न भक्षयति यो मांसं विधिं हित्वा पिशाचवत् ।
न लोके प्रियतां याति व्याधिभिश्च न पीड्यते ॥ ५० ॥na bhakṣayati yo māṃsaṃ vidhiṃ hitvā piśācavat |
He who does not eat meat like a fiend, disregarding the proper method, becomes popular among men and is not afflicted by disease.—(50)
na loke priyatāṃ yāti vyādhibhiśca na pīḍyate || 50 ||
Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):
‘Proper method’—i.e., of worshipping the Gods and so forth; if one does not eat meat, regardless of this manner, but eats it only in the right manner,—‘he b ecomes popular’—loved by the people: he becomes dear to all.
‘He is not afflicted by disease.’—Diseases are produced if a man eats the flesh of lean and enfeebled animals. For this reason also one should eat meat only in the right manner; and by eating it thus, he ‘is not afflicted by disease.’ By eating meat in any other way, he is always afflicted by disease.
‘Like a fiend.’—The term ‘fiend’ stands for a species of lower animals, which eat flesh always in the wrong manner; hence every one who eats it in the wrong manner becomes like a fiend;—this is the sense of the deprecatory simile.—(50).
Explanatory notes by Ganganath Jha
Cf. The Mahābhārata 13.114.12.