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 11.144
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:
कृष्तजानामोषधीनां जातानां च स्वयं वने ।
वृथालम्भेऽनुगच्छेद् गां दिनमेकं पयोव्रतः ॥ १४४ ॥kṛṣtajānāmoṣadhīnāṃ jātānāṃ ca svayaṃ vane |
vṛthālambhe'nugacched gāṃ dinamekaṃ payovrataḥ || 144 ||If one needlessly cuts plants grown by cultivation, or those that spontaneously grow in the forest, he shall attend on the cow for one day, subsisting on milk only.—(144)
Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):
Those that grow in a plot of land that has been cultivated with the plough, the spade and other implements, and those that grow by themselves in the forest;—if one cuts these ‘needlessly’—i.e., not for any such purpose as the feeding of cattle and the like,—he should ‘attend on the cow for one day’—with great joy.
‘Subsisting on milk.’—This precludes all other food.—(144)
Comparative notes by various authors
Viṣṇu (50.50).—‘If a man has wantonly cut such plants as grow by cultivation, or such as rise spontaneously in the woods,—he must wait on a cow and subsist on milk for one day.’
Yājñavalkya (3.276).—(See under 142.)