culture

Alexander’s conquests affected only the westernmost portion of India, as most of the empire of the Nandas remained intact. However, within a year or two of Alexander’s departure this great empire was overthrown not by the Greeks but by Chandragupta, the founder of the Mauryan dynasty. According to Greek historians the young Chandragupta met Alexander, angered him, and was ordered to be killed but fled. A Pali work describes how Chandragupta and his minister Chanakya recruited an army from the disaffected people of the Punjab who had resisted Alexander and then overthrew the existing government of the Nandas.

The Greek satraps Nicanor and Philippus were killed; when Alexander’s empire was divided up after his death in 323 BC the Indus Valley had already been lost to Chandragupta; Eudemus left India in 317 BC. Seleucus, the ruler of the eastern portion of the Greek empire, encountered Chandragupta in 305 BC and had to cede the Hindu Kush mountain area for 500 elephants, which enabled him to defeat Antigonus at Ipsus.

Megasthenes was sent as the Greek ambassador to the court at Pataliputra, where he wrote a book on India. A royal road of more than a thousand miles connected the Northwest Territory with this capital. Megasthenes described how Chandragupta ruled this vast empire, who conducted public business and judged causes throughout his waking day. Governors and viceroys and the emperor himself ruled provinces with the help of his council. An intelligence system, which included courtesans, reported to the king. Irrigation was regulated, and the army had more than 600,000 men; but the farmers, whose work was respected even in wartime, outnumbered them.

Literary legends portray Chanakya as the genius behind the throne and the author of Kautilya’s Arthashastra. Jain tradition claims that in the last days of his life Chandragupta was converted and joined their migration led by Bhadrabahu. Chandgragupta ruled for a quarter of a century and was succeeded by his son Bindusara, who ruled for about 27 years. According to a Tibetan source Chanakya also helped Bindusara destroy sixteen towns and master all the territory between the eastern and western seas. Bindusara corresponded with the Syrian king Antiochus I, offering to buy wine, figs, and a sophist; but Greek law prohibited the selling of a sophist. Bindusara appointed his son Ashoka viceroy of Avanti, and about 273 BC Ashoka became emperor of India.

Buddhist texts portray Ashoka consolidating his empire by killing ninety-nine of his brothers, but some consider this an exaggeration to set off the contrast after his conversion, since some of his rock edicts indicate loving care of his brothers. With a sense of his historic mission Ashoka had these rock edicts and stone pillars carved all over India with descriptions of his intentions and actions. These tell a remarkable story of the philosopher king H.G.Wells called the greatest of kings.

The conquest of Kalinga was a turning point in Ashoka’s life. When Kalinga was conquered, 150,000 people were deported, 100,000 were killed, and many times that number died. This had a great impact on Ashoka and he converted to Buddhism. And also attempted to transform his kingdom and the world, though he warned offenders that they might be executed if they disobey. Eliminating capital punishment was not one of his reforms although he did often delay executions. Ashoka expressed his main concern for the next world.

Ashoka renounced the violence of war, stating that he would have to bear all that could be borne. He refused to conquer weaker and smaller states, allowing even forest tribes an equal sovereignty. He wanted all people to enjoy the benefits of non-injury, self-control, fair conduct, and gentleness. As a benevolent monarch he declared all people his children and expressed his desire that all his children obtain welfare and happiness both in this world and the next. He thus engaged in preaching but also worked hard to serve his people. Instead of organizing military expeditions he sent out peace missions throughout his kingdom and beyond to teach virtue and conversion to a moral life by love.

In one of the rock edict Ashoka said he had been an open follower of the Buddha for two and a half years. He abolished royal hunting and animal sacrifices in the capital, reducing the palace’s killing of animals for food from several thousand a day to two peacocks and an occasional deer, and he promised to eliminate even those three. He banned sports involving the killing of animals and cruel animal fighting. In the 26th year of his reign he restricted the killing and injury of parrots, wild geese, bats, ants, tortoises, squirrels, porcupines, lizards, rhinos, pigeons, and all quadrupeds that were neither used nor eaten.

Ashoka provided medicinal plants for people and animals to neighboring kings as well as throughout his own kingdom, seeing no more important work than acting for the welfare of the whole world. He appointed governors who would serve the happiness and welfare of the people, and he insisted on justice and consistent punishments. He commanded that reports be made to him at any hour of the day and at any place, so intent was he in working for the welfare of all. To protect people and beasts Ashoka had trees planted and shelters built at regular intervals along the roads. Mango groves were planted, and wells were dug.

Although he followed Buddhist dharma Ashoka respected all the religious sects and also encouraged his people to do so by guarding their speech in neither praising one’s own sect nor blaming other sects except in moderation. He believed that whoever praises one’s own sect and disparages another’s does one’s own sect the greatest possible harm. "Therefore concord alone is meritorious, that they should both hear and obey each other’s morals (dharma)." He wanted all sects to be full of learning and teach virtue, and he promoted the essence of all religions, their unity in practice, their coming together in religious assemblies, and learning the scriptures of different religions.

Ashoka’s emphasis was on ethical action rather than ritual and ceremonies, which he found of little use. The ceremonies of dharma that he found useful were "the good treatment of slaves and servants, respect for elders, self-mastery in one’s relations with living beings, gifts to Brahmins and ascetics, and so on." For thirty-seven years Ashoka ruled a large empire that included most of India except the southern tip. Yet his efforts were to bring justice and virtue to the whole world. Thanks to his rock edicts and human memory, his admirable intentions will never be forgotten.

Little is known of Ashoka’s successors, but it took about fifty years before the Mauryan dynasty came to an end about 187 BC with the assassination of Brihadratha by his general Pushyamitra and the invasion of the Bactrian Greeks. Pushyamitra was able to drive out the Greeks and ruled for about 36 years, but Buddhists complained that he was a cruel persecutor of their religion who offered gold coins for the killing of monks. The Shunga kings ruled for more than a century and were followed by the Kanvas, whose dynasty in Magadha lasted 45 years and was overthrown in 30 BC. By this point the empire was broken up, and little is known of this history except of some of the Greek rulers in Bactria, such as Demetrius II who conquered the Punjab and northwest India between 180 and 165 BC, Eucratides who was murdered by his son about 150 BC, and Menander who ruled for about 25 years in the late second century BC and was said to have become a follower of the Buddha.

Ashoka recognized three neighboring kingdoms in southern India as Chola, Pandya, and Chera where the Tamil language was spoken. Legends indicate Dravidian and Aryan tribes coming in from the northwest; Agastya was said to have brought farmers from the homeland of Krishna. The Chola ascendancy over the Tamil states began in the first century BC when King Karikala escaped from prison and eventually defeated the combined forces of the Pandya and Chola kings with the help of eleven minor chieftains. King Karikala also invaded the island of Lanka and removed 12,000 inhabitants to work building a fortification at the seaport Puhar. He also had irrigation channels built there at the River Kaveri.

A Buddhist monastery at Mahavihara recorded the early history of Lanka. The pre-Dravidian aborigines were called Nagas and Yakshas. About the fourth century BC people from Bengal led by Vijaya, who had been banished by his father for evil conduct, colonized them; he invaded the island with seven hundred men followed by the importation of a thousand families and many maidens. A century later King Devanampiyatissa sent an embassy to Emperor Ashoka, who sent back envoys to consecrate this king. Ashoka’s son Mahendra and daughter Sanghamitra went to Lanka to convert them to Buddhism, and a branch of the Bodhi tree was planted in the capital Anuradhapura. Devanampiyatissa ruled Lanka for forty years until 207 BC, and his three brothers succeeded him through 177 BC when two Tamil sons of a horse dealer usurped the throne.

In 145 BC the noble Elara from Chola overcame Asela and ruled the island for 44 years with justice for friends and enemies. Legend records that he even had his own son executed for accidentally running over a calf and killing it. Elara introduced their tradition of the bell of justice. However, he was defeated and killed by King Dutthagamani, who established a free and united kingdom in Lanka and was succeeded by his brother Saddhatissa, who ruled from 77 to 59 BC. Upon his death his younger son Thulathana was chosen king by counselors and Buddhist monks, but the elder son Lanjatissa defeated the younger brother and took the throne. Succeeded by his younger brother, who was killed by rebels after ruling for six years, the rebel was killed by another brother Vattagamani, who married the widowed queen in 43 BC. However, soon King Vattagamani faced a Tamil invasion and a rebellion by one of his governors. He tried to quell the rebellion by using the invaders, but then the seven invaders drove him out of the country. His queen and the Buddha’s alms bowl were taken back to India by two invaders while the other five invaders ruled Lanka until 29 BC.