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 10.72
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:
यस्माद् बीजप्रभावेण तिर्यग्जा ऋषयोऽभवन् ।
पूजिताश्च प्रशस्ताश्च तस्माद् बीजं प्रशस्यते ॥ ७२ ॥yasmād bījaprabhāveṇa tiryagjā ṛṣayo'bhavan |
pūjitāśca praśastāśca tasmād bījaṃ praśasyate || 72 ||Because through the power of the seed, those born of animals became sages, honoured and extolled, therefore it is the seed that is more important.—(72)
Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):
‘Honoured’—saluted by men.
‘Extolled’—are eulogised with eulogistic words.
‘The seed is the more important’;—as held by those who declare the seed to be the more, important factor. This however is not right; as has been dearly indicated by what was said under 70 above.
Or, what the expression ‘through the power o f the seed’ implies is, not the importance of the seed, but a defect;—the sense being that—‘people might be led to think that, the fact of Mandapāla and others, born of animals, having become sages through the power of the seed, proves the importance of the seed; but in reality, that the children became sages was due, not to the importance of the seed, but to the force of their learning and austerities and to their particularly meritorious acts.—(72)
Comparative notes by various authors
(verses 10.66-73)