What is the 'Manusmriti'? by Rami Sivan
seshadri sridharan
This is a very old question - but one worth dealing with as the lefties refuse to let Manu sleep quietly in the dusty libraries but keep trundling him out to abuse and revile him.
Firstly the Law Book known as Manusmriti or Manvadharma Shastra was not the work of a single author, there are too many inconsistencies and contradictions.
Whatever the original text was there have been hundreds of interpolations over centuries. It contains laws, regulations and customs pertaining to every walk of life but is primarily meant for the members of the first 3 castes. It is “idealistic’ in that it was never a practical text, nor was it every actually applied in any kingdom in ancient India. Laws in India were primarily caste-based - each and every caste was autonomous and created their own laws which governed them. It was only major disputes which were brought to the royal court. The Kings were primarily interested in collecting taxes and left the daily legalities to the caste panchayats and their self-governance.
There are a large number of different Law Books (Smritis) produced by different Law-givers and used in the many countries and districts of India, many of them contradict each other. In South India for example the dominant Smriti is that of Apastamba - Manu being totally ignored.
Manusmriti had lapsed into oblivion centuries ago until He or rather “they” were resurrected and revived by the British. That’s another story!
Manu is hated, traduced and reviled by “progressives” as the source of all India’s social evils i.e. the caste system. But Manu contains a lot of positive statements as well - it is actually anti-dowry, has many verses which praise women, good advice on polity - good advice on personal development etc. Vivek Arya has given some outstanding examples.
The interesting thing is that most of the haters of Manu have never read the text! Sudras hate it because it legislates their disabilities, progressive secularists hate it because it promotes inequality, hierarchy and patriarchy …………… and guess what? The Brahmins hate it as well because it also disenfranchises their privilege and rescinds their moral authority!! WOW! Everyone hates poor Manu!
Manu clearly states that the only basis for Brahminical privilege and moral authority is the study of the Vedas, and thus any so-called Brahmin who does not study the Vedas is like a “wooden elephant” (to use his expression) and equal in every respect, and should be treated as a Sudra! He also says that any member of the 3 castes who doesn’t perform Sandhya daily also loses caste and becomes a Sudra …… so according to Manu the Brahmins, Kshatriyas and Vaishyas and in fact virtually ALL Hindus are Sudras, except those who are living and practicing as Vedic priests - how many would they be? A couple of thousand?
So to all those Social Justice Warriors — Manu is passe — no cares about Manu, no one bases any of their decisions on Manu, I don’t know a single Hindu priest who has even read Manu! And most Hindus never listen to their priests anyway - they do exactly as they please - so even if a priest did quote from Manu, people would disregard him anyway. This, by the way, is how we know that Manu’s laws couldn’t ever have been imposed on the general populace!
So let the book lie undisturbed on the library shelves so that those who are interested in ancient Indian literature can study it in peace. Don’t burn copies as book-burning is a fascist venture!!