Verse 1.28-29 [Creation dependent upon ‘Karma’]

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

यं तु कर्मणि यस्मिन् स न्ययुङ्क्त प्रथमं प्रभुः ।
स तदेव स्वयं भेजे सृज्यमानः पुनः पुनः ॥ २८ ॥

yaṃ tu karmaṇi yasmin sa nyayuṅkta prathamaṃ prabhuḥ |
sa tadeva svayaṃ bheje sṛjyamānaḥ punaḥ punaḥ || 28 ||

Each being, when created again and again, naturally conformed to that same act to which the lord had, at first, directed him.—(28)

 

Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):

The meaning of this verse is as follows:—Even though Prajāpati, being the supreme director of the creation of things, can create living creatures just as he chooses, yet, as a matter of fact, he creates them, not without reference to the actions done by them during the preceding cycles; he makes the creature born in that family of creatures which is indicated by the act done by it during the previous cycle,—and never in any other family; if the creature has, in the past, done a good act, it is led to be born in a family in which it would be enabled to experience the good results of that act,—in such families for instance, as ‘God,’ ‘Man’ and so forth; if, on the other hand, the acts of the creature have been bad, it is born in such families as ‘animals,’ ‘evil spirits’ and the like. What happens is that at the beginning of each new creation, the acts done by creatures in the previous cycle come out, after having, during Dissolution, lain latent within their source; just in the same manner as the Elements, the Organs and the Constituent Attributes come out at the beginning of each creation, after having lain latent within their source, in the Boot Evolvent. And the reason for this lies in the fact that the law relating to the ‘residue of the past’ (affecting the future) applies with equal force to the case in question also.

Question:—“If the coming into existence (of a creature) is dependent upon its own past acts, where then does the almighty power of Prajāpati come in? Of what sort too would be the almighty power which is dependent upon extraneous influences?”

Answer:—It is only when the said almighty power is there and (active) that the world comes into existence; how then can the said power he said to have no effect at all? In fact, neither continuance, nor production, nor dissolution (of the world) is possible except when that power is present,—the power of God being ever present, at all times. In reality, what lead to a creature being born are (1) acts done by itself, (2) the will of Prajāpati and (3) the evolution of the Root Evolvent. It is by all this set of causes that this world is produced, exists and becomes dissolved. The mere fact of Prajāpati being influenced by the things does not deprive him of his almighty power. The case stands upon the same footing as a king bestowing upon his servants and dependents the rewards for acts done by them; exactly in the same manner Prajāpati assigns to each creature what is in accordance with its previous acts; and yet neither the King nor Prajāpati cease to be ‘all-powerful.’

Objection:—

“The meaning assigned to the verse does not appear to be its right meaning at all. What appears to be its right meaning is that the Creator is entirely independent in assigning their work to the creatures. The verse thus means as follows:—‘Every creature conformed to,—i.e., carried on—that same action—in the form either of doing harm to others, or its contrary,—to which the Lord had directed it at—at the beginning of creation’; that is, man does not have recourse to actions, cither entirely on the advice of his father and other elders, or by his own will; in fact, whatever good or bad action he performs, he does wholly in accordance with Prajāpati’s directions, entirely uninfluenced by the advice of any other person.

‘When created again’—i.e., when born again, whether in another cycle, or in this same cycle,—it is Prajāpati alone who directs all animate beings to be the doers of actions; hence even past good and bad acts arc done by them only in obedience to the directions of Prajāpati; this has been thus declared:—‘They become agents without being masters of their own actions; to the good or the bad act they are led on by God’; and again ‘this ignorant creature has no control over his pleasure and pain; it is only as led on by God that he goes to heaven or to hell.’”

To the above we make the following reply:—If the suggested explanation were accepted, (1) it would mean the abandoning of the idea of an inseparable connection between Actions and their results,—(2) it would also mean that all human effort is useless (everything being determined entirely by the independent will of God),—(3) and it would mean that the injunctions of the Agnihotra and such acts, as well as the worshipping of Brahman, are entirely futile; in fact it would come to this that actions for visible or invisible results would be undertaken by only such men as are ignorant of the nature of God; while those who are of opinion that the doing of actions and the enjoying of their results are dependent on the will of God would never engage in any form of activity; they would keep away from activity under the impression that ‘even though an action may be done, its result may not follow (if God so wished it), and even though we may not do the act, we may enjoy its results (if God so willed it).’ Especially because the desire for being the doer of a certain act does not arise in the man forcibly through the prompting of God, as illness arises from unwholesome food; on the other hand, if the said desire is held to be determined by the connection between the action and its result,—the idea being that ‘this result follows from this action’—then it would not be true that ‘the Lord directed the man to the act’ (as the text says).

The direction by God, spoken of in the text can be admitted only on the authority of the scriptures; and in the statement—‘that action to which the Lord directed him at first,’—the phrase ‘at first’ is used in reference to the present, since the world is beginningless (so that ‘at first’ could not mean at the beginning of creation)’, and as regards the ‘direction’ or ‘supervision’ by the Lord, this extends over all tilings (not only to Actions), he being the efficient cause of Time and Space (within which all things have their being). [In this way the idea of God’s supervision is not incompatible with the theory that results accrue to men from their own acts.]

Other people offer the following explanation of the verse:—When a personality happens to be born in a different animal-species (from that in which it was born in its former life), it does not require the effects of its former conditions; nor is there the resultant continuity of its former nature; when, for instance, a certain personality happens to be born in the foline species, which species God originally prompted to such acts as the killing of others and the like,—it renounces the quality of mercy which it may have practised during its human existence, and acquires the quality of that species in which it is born, even though this latter quality may not have been taught by any one. What is meant is that the actions due to the nature of the personality being ordained by God are extremely potent, and make the personality forget its former habits.

The idea contained in this verse is further expanded in the following verse.—(28)

 

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

हिंस्राहिंस्रे मृदुक्रूरे धर्माधर्मावृतानृते ।
यद् यस्य सो'दधात् सर्गे तत् तस्य स्वयमाविशत् ॥ २९ ॥

hiṃsrāhiṃsre mṛdukrūre dharmādharmāvṛtānṛte |
yad yasya so'dadhāt sarge tat tasya svayamāviśat || 29 ||

Hurtfulness or harmlessness, tenderness or hard-heartedness, virtue or vice, truthfulness or truth-lessness,—each of these accrued to that being in which he implanted it at creation.—(29)

 

Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):

‘Hurtful’ is that which deprives living beings of life, such for instance, as the Serpent, the Lion and the Elephant;—the opposite of this is the ‘Harmless’; for instance, the several species of the Deer, the Ruru, the Pṛṣat and the like;—‘Tender’ is that which is kind, which causes no suffering to any one;—‘Hard-hearted’ is that which causes pain to others;—the rest are well known.

Out of the said pairs of the line of actions, that which ‘he,’ Prajāpati, in accordance with its previous conduct, ‘implanted,’ assigned, ordained,—in a being,—‘at creation’—at the beginning of creation,—that line of action the created living being acquires by itself.

No significance is meant to be attached to the past tense in ‘accrued’: for even now-a-days we find the qualities inherent in a certain class of beings coming to the individual without teaching, spontaneously.—(29)

Explanatory notes by Ganganath Jha

(verse xviii)

Medhātithi notes two explanations of this verse.

The natural meaning appeal’s to be that ‘each being continues, in each succeeding Birth, to betake itself to the same function that was assigned to it in the beginning by Prajāpati.’

But this being incompatible with the law of Karma, which has been regarded as adumbrated by Manu in I. 41,—Medhātithi has tried his best to get out of the words the meaning that the conditions and activities of each being are ordained in accordance with his past deeds;—but the only argument that he puts forward in support of assigning this meaning is that the literal meaning of the words would give rise to a number of undesirable contingencies. According to Medhātithi, creation is due to the joint action of the three causes—(1) the being’s past acts (2) God’s will and (3) Evolution of Prakṛti.

The confusion of thought in regard to the exact meaning of this and the following two verses is further shown by the fact that Medhātithi (p. 22, l, 27 under verse 30) has thought it necessary to set forth ‘another explanation’ of these texts.

 

Comparative notes by various authors

(verse xviii-xix)

Mahābhārata, 12.232.16.—‘Of the created things, whatever functions became assigned to whichever thing at the beginning of creation, that thing take to those same functions, whenever they are created again and again.’ ‘Harmfulness or harmlessness, gentleness or ferociousness, righteousness or unrighteousness, truthfulness or untruthfulness, with one or the other of these they are obsessed, and hence are they fond of just those.’