Famous Maury an dynasty originated from Magadha in eastern India is credited for a rule of 137 years between 322 BC to 185 BC, a period of great happenings for the social, economic, political and religious developments in Indian subcontinent. Chandragupta established it with the help of Chanakya by overthrowing Nanda dynasty. It was a time when Alexander's appointed satrap Seleucus was losing hold of western India to many smaller size clans. Chandragupta took advantage of this situation and advanced rapidly to western area and significantly expanded his empire right up to Arabian Sea.
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| Mauryan Dynasty |
Mauryan Empire became the largest empire of the whole world of that time and the largest ever on Indian subcontinent and covered the regions of Hindu Kush (Afghanistan), Indus Valley (Pakistan), Bengal, and Himalaya to down south (excluding Tamil Nadu, part of Andhra / Karnataka and Kerala). Having established the systems recommended and perfected by Chanakya, the empire is credited with efficient systems for tax collection, administration, internal security, and security of borders. This facilitated exponential growth in internal and external trade, agriculture and economics as also in arts and crafts. With the exception of Kalinga war, this period enjoyed peaceful periods filled with social harmony; religious transformation and expansion of sciences and knowledge. There was all round peace and prosperity, urbanization was going along fine, newer professions were evolving.
Over 1700 years had passed since the compositions of Rig-Veda and around 700 years since the composition of older Brahmanas. During all these years, pure Vedic rituals have gone in background and were practised by a small proportion of the society due to falling belief in the effectiveness of rituals for securing final liberation. Another big reason of rituals getting non attractive was reduced knowledge and dedication required to carry out these practices in recommended way of elaboration. On the other hand, 'Brahman' of Upanishads was faceless and considered too far away by common man and beyond reach. But several, rather wrong practices like class segregation, treatment to women in general, untouchability for people from lowest caste, violence to animals, were resulting in keeping a large part of population on the periphery of religious systems. It was a fit ground for people to lose interest or for many people to turn indifferent to Vedic practices. Both Jainism and Buddhism had taken roots under these conditions but were still in initial stage.
All religious thoughts were getting due acceptance with their own practitioners. Many people were freely experiencing hopping over from one ideology to another. Dharma Gurus were busy promoting each one's own line of ideology by continuously moving from one place to another in the empire. The emperors of this dynasty are not known to have very strong association with Vedic religion and were more interested to follow mono orthodox sects. Jain thinkers who actually got their entry into South through his army influenced Chandragupta very much. Ashoka's father, Bindusar Gupta was known to favour Ajivakas while King Ashoka followed his own recipe which was closer to Buddhism but not one hundred per cent identical. He is said to, however, move much closer to actual Buddhism during advancing stage of his life. Incidentally, his brother named Vitashoka had actually been a strict Buddhist as he renunciated his royal background and preferred a life of Monk following teachings of the Buddha. (Armstrong, Great Transformation, The Beginning of Our Religious Traditions) Ashoka started stone edicts which were nothing but the best of advertising and media promotion that could have been achieved by the state at that point in history. His edicts grew in content and direction over the years. These edicts are by far the loudest actual non-controversial historical facts about India of that time other than the oral and documented Shruti and Smriti literature.
Writings on these edicts are neither Buddhist Dhamma (the word Dharma as written in Pali, the language of Buddha) nor Vedic Dharma hut is a broader code of human behaviour. The values advised for following were universal in character like honesty, truthfulness, compassion, obedience, mercy; and benevolence. In summary, these writings recommended people to go for maximizing good deeds and minimizing faults. Incidentally; promoters of Sanatan Hindu Dharma will later on adopt most of these values. Actually, these values are applauded by all known religions of the world.
Let us look at the contents of his 11th Rock Edict:
"...(one should do) good behaviours towards slaves and servants, obedience to mother and father, generosity towards friends and acquaintances and towards Brahmins and renouncers and abstaining from killing living beings. Father, son, brother, master, friend, acquaintance, relatives and neighbours should say "this is good, this we should also do" By doing such act, there is gain in this world and in the next. There is infinite merit through the gift of "dhamma"
King Ashoka founded many hospitals (including hospitals for animals-certainly a first for the whole world), ensured free supply of medicines, planted trees along the roads, got the water wells dug for villages not having access to river water, got rest houses constructed at bigger roads for stay of travellers, got drinking water points operated at pilgrimage sites and initiated many such other public conveniences throughout his empire. This is indeed the idealistic empire reflected in perfect world of "Ram Rajya" so highly praised towards the end in Ramayana.
Coming back to edicts, there are a total of 19 rock edicts and nine pillar edicts found across India, Nepal, Pakistan and Afghanistan. Interestingly, Iranian artisans carried out stone carving for many of these edicts. These edicts also had carvings for bulls and elephants, which is like a continuation from Sindhu Sarasvati Culture. Love of the King for animals has been exhibited in the writings advising public to exercise refrain from killing animals as he himself did. Conspicuous absence is for any text out of Vedas or rituals and any reference to caste or class; a complete disconnect with Vedic tradition. One obvious reason is that the dynasty originated and flourished in Magadha where Vedic traditions were never so strong as these were in the hinterland of Ganga Yamuna. It is not to say that Vedic traditions had not reached to that part in east of India. These have certainly reached but history suggests that the basic mood of society from Magadha was more inclined towards Buddhism ideals rather than Vedic ideals.
He addressed issues of Buddhism in the presence of Buddhists. He also held third Buddhist council at Patliputra, his capital. But there is nothing to say that he didn't talk about Hinduism amidst Hindu thinkers. His dhamma (not to be identified with Buddhist dhamma) was to support all religious thoughts. Perhaps it will not be out of place to brand him a real secular ruler. If his mention is found more in Buddhist literature it is because they were engaged in documenting everything about their religion and were better financed and organized for documenting. Hinduism on the other hand, never had documenting as their strong point. Actually; Hinduism was still not around. What were there were Vedic systems and we have already discussed about its pathetic condition at that time.
But soon after death of King Ashoka in 232 BC, India directly entered in its dark age where one does not come across any document or evidence of happenings until the time when Gupta Dynasty took roots in 320 CE. In the interim period of chaos, many socio political changes took place in and around India. Regional kingdoms of smaller sizes came in existence in North, East and Central India. Greek invaders of Bactria took control of Afghanistan right upto the seashore down south. Then came Iranian and Central Asian fighters in the same territory held by Bactria. The impact of these foreigners was felt culturally more on non-Vedic people as Vedic people treated them unclean and maintained their distance. During 200 BC to 200 AD, India saw Jainism and Buddhism going to its peak and achieving deepest reach in the society and maximum following. Since, both these faiths were evolving out of the total social spectrum, whatever they gained was at the cost of Hinduism.
Resurrection of Classical Hinduism: Popularity gained by Buddhism and Jainism, must have been the pressing situation culminating in resurrection of classical Hinduism and forcing it to reinvent itself to address aspirations of common man. By this time, Hinduism had made its move from Vedic rituals to worship of main Gods comprising trinity of Brahma, Vishnu, Mahesh together with personal Ishta devas such as Ganesha and Durga, Laxmi, Parvati and Sarasvati, etc. Competing sects of Hindus gained very fast popularity as colourful deities of Gods installed in various temples attracted commoner much closely than purity of mantra in difficult Sanskrit verses which had become so difficult to comprehend. Diverse people of India, evolving under cultural baggage of the past, would also have enjoyed the freedom of worshipping various Gods with human forms, in direct contrast of faceless Brahman, which they found much closer to them. This process has been experienced in many other civilizations as well that every time one type of Gods failed to respond to public perceptions, Gods underwent a radical change. In any case, religious movements are found to succeed in compelling circumstances when there are perceptions of something missing from the lives of followers.
Around this time, Indian Religion had changed to become theistic as people started inventing extravagant temples and colourful deities and processions. Regular pilgrimages started for seeking blessings from brilliantly crafted and decorated deities with multiple images of God. By this time, the Indian culture had almost completed its shift from mantra to statues.
Some Gods got popular with different names and different forms to ensure easy identification with populace of a particular part or social group or cultural background. But Shiva and Vishnu came out most popular Gods having wider disciples. This can be safely concluded as emergence of less developed faiths of masses after submerging of the religion of elite, the classical Vedic system of Brahman achievable only either by highly elaborate ritual systems to be performed by select priests or by even more learned Rishis and Yogis practising conquering the Self by meditating inward.
Coupled with sectarian period, rituals also got simplified and ultimately got to the point where just saying a single word 'Aum' and thinking about the proposed activity; the householder was able to complete his rituals without losing the expected benefits. Looks like that even all Brahmins were unable to comprehend the intricacies of Brahmanas and they would have, intelligent as they always were, promoted the simplified sacrificial rituals to suit the requirements and capabilities of common householder. This flexibility of Hinduism to allow reinvention and continuous adaptability to changing scenario is by far the most important feature of Hinduism helping it to survive as long as it has.
Development of regional kingdoms throughout the territories, later called India, also resulted in churning where earlier language, philosophies and dominance of Vedic period lost supremacy. This was also the period of invasions in India. Greeks (Yavanas), Scythians (Shakas), Bactrians, Parthians continued entering India from North West. All these invaders were called barbarians or unclean (mlecchas).
This period is also known for rich cultural integration. Chaos is known to throw unexpected solutions. Throughout the world, such periods have inspired scholars to pool their combined knowledge together against common enemy to preserve their culture for future generations. Especially in religious and social context, chaotic situation is feared only by orthodox and considered as creative opportunity by unorthodox. As such, this period saw a lot of work done for arts and literature. Icons like Buddhist Stupas at Amravati containing stone carvings depicting everyday life is a good example together with some great literature composed during this period.
Arrival of Kushans from central Asia and their penetration right up to Varanasi in the east, resulted in their empire between 78 to 144 CE. King Kanishka (112-144 CE), who was a Buddha follower himself, gave boost to allure conversions to Buddhism. He got biggest stupa constructed at Peshawar as his state capital. But Kushans were also supportive of other religions and are known to have used deities of Hindus, Zoroastrians and Bactrian for minting their coins. This is the time when maximum work got carried out relating to Buddhist part of the carvings at caves located at Bhaja, Karie, Nasik, Ajanta, Ellora which were largely Buddhist sites. Buddhism and Jainism were still competing with Hinduism but peacefully.
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