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 2.162 [Equanimity under Ill-Treatment]
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:
सम्मानाद् ब्राह्मणो नित्यमुद्विजेत विषादिव ।
अमृतस्येव चाकाङ्क्षेदवमानस्य सर्वदा ॥ १६२ ॥sammānād brāhmaṇo nityamudvijeta viṣādiva |
amṛtasyeva cākāṅkṣedavamānasya sarvadā || 162 ||The Brāhmaṇa should ever shrink from reverence, as from poison; and he should always seek for disrespect, as for nectar.—(162)
Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):
When the student goes to beg for food, or when the teacher is teaching at home for livelihood,—if he fails to win reverence, he should not allow his mind to be perturbed by it; on the other hand, ‘he should shrink from reverence’; i.e, if what is given to him is given with due respect, he should not regard it as sufficient (simply on that account).
‘Like nectar,’ ‘he should a lways seek for disrespect,’—ill-treatment. The genitive ending has been used (in ‘avamānusya’) by imposing upon the root ‘ākāṅkṣa’ the sense of the root ‘iṅ’ with the preface ‘aḍhi,’ i.e., the sense of thinking of; and thus bringing it under Pāṇini’s sūtra 2.3.52, by which the root ‘iṅ’ with ‘aḍhi,’ governs the genitive. It is on the basis of this similarity that ‘anxiety’ is present in both (desire and thought).
“But what is not offered with respect should not be eaten.”
True; but what the present verse does is to prohibit the perturbation of mind; and.it does not mean tbat food offered with disrespect should be eaten. The sense of all this is that one should look equally upon respect and disrespect; and not that he should actually hanker after disrespect.
Further, the Religious Student may accept even such food as is offered with disrespect; for it is not a regular gift, and hence, does not come under 4.235, where the receiving of gifts offered without respect is decried.—(163)
Explanatory notes by Ganganath Jha
(verses 162-163)
Āpastamba-Dharmasūtra, 1.13.4.—‘If overjoyed, he becomes arrogant; when arrogant, he transgresses Dharma; and transgression of Dharma leads to hell.’