Verse 11.61

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:

कन्याया दूषणं चैव वार्धुष्यं व्रतलोपनम् ।
तडागारामदाराणामपत्यस्य च विक्रयः ॥ ६१ ॥

kanyāyā dūṣaṇaṃ caiva vārdhuṣyaṃ vratalopanam |
taḍāgārāmadārāṇāmapatyasya ca vikrayaḥ || 61 ||

Defiling a maiden, usury, breaking of a vow, selling a tank, a garden, one’s wife or a child.—(61)

 

Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):

‘Defiling a maiden’;—i.e., having recourse to her in the spirit of bravado that ‘she has not yet been touched by man’; or, the depriving her of her chastity by touching her generative organ with the toe or such other parts of the body;—in fact doing all these, with the sole exception of actual sexual intercourse;—which latter has been declared to be equal to ‘the violating of the Preceptor’s bed.’

‘Usury’— Making money by this means as a means of living,—even in normal times. Vaśiṣṭha has declared that ‘usury consists in lending money or grains on interest.’ This is a scriptural technicality, not subject to the notions of the ordinary world.

‘Breaking of a vow.’—A ‘vow’ consists in the taking of such resolution as—‘I shall rather starve than partake of food in the house of such and such a person eating at whose place is forbidden’; and if one does not keep to this resolve, it would be ‘breaking of the vow.’

“As a matter of fact, the name ‘vow,’ vrata, is given to a restriction that one voluntarily puts upon himself; and if the resolve is a voluntary one, how could deviation from that constitute a transgression of the scriptures? it has been said that ‘by omitting to do what is enjoined one becomes liable to expiation’; and the resolution in the case in question is not ‘what is enjoined.”’

The answer to this is as follows:—It is true that in the initial stage the vow is purely voluntary; but the keeping of it is what has been ‘enjoined’ by the scriptures. Just as in the case of the Saurya and other sacrifices performed with a view to definite rewards,—the act, in its initial stage, is purely voluntary; but the continuation and completion of it (when once begun) is what is ‘enjoined’; the act could be discontinued only either if the performer had ceased to desire the particular reward, or if the reward were actually obtained; in all such cases the performer would be blamed as being energetic only in undertaking an act.

As regards the observances to be kept by the Accomplished Student, the text is going to lay down a very light expiation for the neglect of these. And this may be regarded as an optional alternative to what is here laid down.

‘Garden’— flower-gardens and parks, etc.

Another Smṛti declares all kinds of land as ‘not to be sold.’—(61)

 

Explanatory notes by Ganganath Jha

‘Vratalopanam’.—‘Breaking a vow voluntarily taken’ (Medhātithi and Nārāyaṇa):—‘breaking the vow of Studentship’ (Govindarāja, Kullūka and Rāghavānanda).

This verse is quoted in Prāyaścittaviveka (p. 192), which has the following notes—‘Kanyāyā dūṣaṇam’ calling a virgin a ‘non-virgin’, or piercing with the finger her private parts,—‘vārdhuṣitvam’ (which is its reading for ‘vārdhuṣyam’) for the Brāhmaṇa or the Kṣātriya,—‘vratāt cyutiḥ’ (which is its reading for ‘vratalopanam’), ‘avakīrṇitvam’, sexual delinquency of the Religious Student,—‘dāraṇām’, even such as have not been married by one,—‘apatyasya’, of the various kinds of children.

 

Comparative notes by various authors

(verses 11.58-66)

See Comparative notes for Verse 11.58.