“The Antics of Drunkards” – ascetics and Indian Satire
As an aside from my series on armed yogis, I thought I’d take a look at some examples of Indian satirical plays that feature ascetics – particularly the so-called heterodox religions, such as the Jainas and Buddhists, but also some tantric (or at least proto-tantric) practitioners.
These plays are useful as they not only provide us with a window into how these formations were regarded – at least by their sophisticated audiences – but also give us a “picture” of sorts, of how some of these traditions behaved. For example, no texts of the pre-tantric ascetics known as the Kāpālikas (or Somasiddhāntins) are known, so the general scholarly picture of them is drawn, for the most part, from secondary sources. But they often turn up as stock characters in plays. One such is the Mattavilāsaprahasana (“The Antics of Drunkards”) written in the early 7th century and attributed to the Pallava king Mahendravarman. King Mahendravarman, apart from his literary accomplishments, is also renowned for his conversion from Jaina to Śaivism. This conversion was affected by the Śaiva saint Appar. Mahendravarman, according to popular tradition, had agreed to put Appar to death, but each time it was tried, the saint emerged unscathed due to his devotion to Śiva. Mahendravarman was so moved that he converted to Śaivism, destroyed the pagodas of the Jains, and erected a temple to Śiva.
Despite its brevity, Mattavilāsaprahasana is an interesting play. Not only does it give us a picture of the dubious Kāpālikas, but it also provides some insight into what its sophisticated, courtly audience thought of heterodox movements such as Buddhists, Jains, and Pāśupatas.
Mattavilāsaprahasana is a one-act farce. Apart from the stage manager and actress who appear in the prologue, the main characters are Satyasoma and his partner, Devasomā (both Kāpālikas), the Buddhist Nāgasena; Babhrukalpa (a Pāśupata) and an unnamed “madman”.
The plot is simple enough. The Kāpālika Satyasoma loses his begging bowl, made from a human skull. He and his ritual consort Devasomā leave the liquor shop where they have been drinking and walk through the streets of the city (Kāñcīpura). They meet the Buddhist monk Nāgasena and accuse him of hiding the skull bowl under his robe. They engage in a parody of debate and argue, almost coming to blows. The Pāśupata Babhrukalpa enters the scene and joins the debate. He suggests they settle the matter at the courts of law. On the way to the courts, they meet the “madman” (possibly another ascetic) and it transpires that he has found the skull-bowl. The madman and the Pāśupata depart, and Satyasoma asks the Buddhist monk for forgiveness.
In the play, the religious precepts of the Buddhists, Jains, Kāpālikas, and Pāśupatas are all mocked to various degrees. All these movements were considered (by the orthoprax at least) to be contrary to the teachings of the Vedas. The 7th-century Mīmāṁsā philosopher Kumārila Bhaṭṭa for example, in his Tantravārttika says:
“The texts that may not be drawn on, because they contradict the Veda and because we can detect their [base] motives, are, we are taught, [the following. Firstly they are] these well-known works of religion-cum-irreligion rejected by Vaidikas and accepted [as scriptures] by the Sāṃkhyas, the followers of the Yoga school, the Pāñcarātrika Vaiṣṇavas, the Pāśupatas, the Buddhists, and the Jainas. These hide in the shadow cast by a screen of pious observance containing some elements of the Veda’s teaching; but their real purpose is to win social approval, wealth, veneration and fame. They are contrary to the Veda and incoherent. The greed and other [vices of their authors] are manifest. They have been composed on the basis of arguments framed within the limits of [the means of non-transcendental knowledge, namely] sense-perception, inference, analogy, and presumption. … And [secondly they are] the works even more remote from the Veda that prescribe [observances] that are contaminated by [culturally alien] practices proper to barbarians (mlecchācāramiśra-), such as eating from a skull-bowl (kabhojana-) and wandering naked (nagnacaraṇa-).” 1
For example, In the liquor shop, Satyasoma compares the activity around him to a Vedic sacrifice:
“My love just look. This liquor shop (surāpaṇa) equals the majesty of the sacrificial enclosure. Here the flag pole equals the sacrificial post; the liquor equals the soma; the drinkers, the priests; the liquor glasses, the soma cups; the snacks such as meat kabobs, the various oblations; the drunken chatter, the sacrificial formulas; the songs, the sacrificial hymns; the liquor vats, the sacrificial ladles; the thirst of the drinkers, the sacrificial fire; and the owner of the shop, the sponsor of the sacrifice.” 2
He also scorns the teaching of the Jainas:
"The Jains argue that each effect Resembles the cause from which it came. But against this they also expect That the bliss of our eternal salvation Comes from penance and its pain. These fools defeat this curious claim With their own logical argumentation." 3
The Buddhist monk Nāgasena, looking about the city muses on the rules for the behavior of Buddhist monks that “instruct them to live in mansions, to sleep on well-constructed beds, to eat in the morning, to take well-flavored drinks in the afternoon, to chew betel leaves mixed with five perfumes and to wear comfortable clothes.”
He complains though, that he hasn’t seen the rules for “taking a wife or drinking liquor” and speculates that Buddhist elders removed these rules out of jealousy of the young. He hopes to do a service to the Buddhist community by finding a complete text which allows the pleasures of wives and alcohol. 4 His musings are clearly parodies of the Buddhist rules for the behavior of ascetics. The monk’s focus on pleasure is at odds with the life of an ascetic. His hypocrisy is shown up when Satyasoma offers him some liquor. It’s obvious (his mouth is described as watering) that he wants it, but he’s worried that “a big merchant might see me”. 5 The implication is that his asceticism is feigned.
Satyasoma says of the Buddha:
"The ideas he stole, that thieving Tathagata, From the Upanisads and Mahabharata, He brazenly claimed as original thinking, While foolish brahmans stood there blinking." 6
The Pāśupata Babhrukalpa appears to be respectable, but whilst he suggests that Satyasoma and Nāgasena take their dispute to a court of law, he secretly has his eye on Devasomā:
"This barber's wench who I quite fancy This Buddhist rogue has lured his way Offering her coins from beneath his robe, As if tempting a cow with a fist of hay." 7
To some extent, these rascally ascetics are all stock literary characters of the period. Daṇḍin’s Daśakumāracarita, written at the end of the 7th century also has its share of fraudulent ascetics too – evil Kāpālikas, Buddhist nuns acting as go-betweens for adulterous women; ascetics who are spies in disguise (a practice advocated in Kauṭilya’s Arthaśāstra – see this post)
‘Much Ado about Religion’
Even those who were generally in favor of Śaivism and accepting of the validity of the tantras balked at some of the more extreme practices of the Kaulas. A case in point is the Kashmiri Nyāya philosopher, Jayanta Bhaṭṭa (circa 820-900 c.e.). Jayanta’s most famous work is his philosophical discourse, Nyāyamañjarī (‘A Cluster of Flowers of the Nyaya tree’) which he wrote in order to protect the authority of the Vedas. As we might expect, he sees the Buddhists as being against the Vedas, but he accepts both the Śaiva and Vaiṣṇava Pāñcarātra revelations as valid. A theist (unlike Mīmāṁsās such as Kumārila), Jayanta accepts the concept of other revelations from a divine source and uses well-defined criteria with which to judge their validity. For example, a scripture must have been accepted by an assembly of great persons; they should not appear unprecedented – even if they are recently composed; and they should not be motivated by greed. 8
As both the Śaiva and Vaiṣṇava tantric scriptures do not seek to overturn Vedic ordinances (as the Buddhists do) and because they clearly show the stamp of the teaching of the Upaniṣads regarding liberation, they are valid. Yes, he admits, the methods they teach are different from that of the Vedas, but this in itself is not an invalidation of them. After all, Vaidika, Śaiva, and Pāñcarātrika, are all options that one is free to choose between. There are limits, however, to Jayanta’s inclusivity:
“As for those others, who practice various impermissible forms of post-initiatory observance that [claim to] transcend inhibiting duality through such means as eating the impure and having sexual intercourse with forbidden partners, [they evidently lack the strength of their professed conviction, because] they do not do these things openly but act in secret, shying away from the majority that abides by the rules that govern the four caste-classes and life-disciplines. For if their faith in their scriptures is so free of doubt why do they put their teachings into practice like thieves [avoiding detection].” 9
As Alexis Sanderson points out, Jayanta is clearly aiming this criticism at the Kaula-style practitioners, as opposed to the rather more staid Śaiva Siddhāntas.
Jayanta’s play Āgamaḍambara (‘Much ado about Religion’) concerns the tensions between co-existing religious traditions and the power plays between them. The orthoprax Vaidikas hope that the king – Śaṅkaravarman-will banish all heterodox movements from the state – Buddhists, Jains, Śaivas, Pāñcarātrikas, etc. Their champion is Saṃkarṣaṇa, a young and ardent Mīmāṁsā scholar, eager to flex his argumentative rhetoric against the enemies of the Vedas.
The first act begins with the arrival of a Buddhist monk and his disciple. The monk discourses on Buddhist teachings for the benefit of his pupil. They depart. Then Saṃkarṣaṇa arrives with his servant boy. They enter a luxurious Buddhist monastery. Saṃkarṣaṇa observes that it is more like a royal garden than an establishment for ascetics. Seeing the Buddhists assembling for their meal, Saṃkarṣaṇa and his servant watch them covertly, noticing that the monks do not bathe before eating, that they are attended by beautiful servant women, and that the monks eat meat and drink wine (as with the Mattavilāsaprahasana, it is implied that the Buddhists would behave differently if they knew they were being watched by outsiders). The Buddhist monk from the previous scene then reappears, and Saṃkarṣaṇa engages him in scholarly debate, defeating him and reducing him to silence. Saṃkarṣaṇa’s servant and one of the Buddhist’s disciples nearly come to blows during the debate.
The second act begins with a comic interchange. The servant enters, having been dispatched by his master, Saṃkarṣaṇa to find the Jaina monk Jinarakṣita in the abode of the Jains. He espies a Jain monk having an exchange with a Jain nun, who storms off in anger. The servant decides to disguise himself as a nun in order to make fun of the monk. He approaches the monk, asking the whereabouts of Jinarakṣita, whereupon the monk attempts to seduce the ‘nun’ until he realizes the servant’s gender, and sees that he has been deceived. The servant demands and receives ‘hush money’ to keep quiet. The Jain nun reappears, and angrily berates the monk for his apparent lechery, hitting him with her broom. They depart. In the remainder of the act, Saṃkarṣaṇa meets the Jaina Jinarakṣita in debate and despatches his doctrine, mocking the notion that extreme forms of asceticism lead to salvation. Following the victory over the Jaina, Saṃkarṣaṇa is astonished and horrified to see a man and a woman entwined together under a blue (or black, depending on the translation) cloth. A host of these ascetics appear, singing of the delights of drinking liquor and making love in honor of a sage, nīlāmbara. Saṃkarṣaṇa worries that if this ‘modern’ doctrine takes hold, then the ordinances of the Vedas which govern social conduct will be overthrown. He resolves to tell the king about this threat.
The nīlāmbaras were a Kaula group, who would engage in ‘indecent activities’ (group sex) in public on festival occasions, wrapped only in a blue or black cloth. Very little is known about the nīlāmbaras. Jayanta does mention their banning in his Nyāyamañjarī, and Sanderson notes their appearance in a Jain text. In all the instances that they are mentioned, they appear to be reviled. 10
Act three begins with a discussion between two Śaiva adepts. They are filled with fear because Saṃkarṣaṇa has persuaded the king to expel the nīlāmbaras from the state, on the grounds that their practices are outside the Vedas. The two Śaivas are concerned that they too will be ordered to leave the kingdom, as their observances are not so different from the nīlāmbaras. They debate whether or not to leave the kingdom, and decide to steal away by night.
Enter Saṃkarṣaṇa, who by now has been given the post of Protector of Religion, with authority throughout the kingdom, and honored by the king with gifts, and a wife. Saṃkarṣaṇa notices the disappearance of the dissolute Śaivas, but is told that some of the ‘chaste’ Śaiva ascetics are fleeing too. The king himself is a devotee of Śiva, and Saṃkarṣaṇa, after hearing of the flight of the ascetics from the kingdom, visits the hermitage the Śaiva Dharmaśiva, and reassures him that he and his followers will be left alone. At this point, one Vṛddhāmbi enters the scene. He is a member of the irreligious Cārvākas (materialists) who do not believe in the gods, the afterlife, or the authority of the Vedas. He aims to dispute with Dharmaśiva, and make him a laughing stock. But Saṃkarṣaṇa makes an alliance with Dharmaśiva, and Vṛddhāmbi is defeated.
The final act begins with a discussion between two Vaidikas who are bemoaning the fact that despite their desire to rid the state of heterodox religions – the Buddhists, Jainas, Śaivas, Pāñcarātrikas, Sāṅkhyas, and Pāśupatas – are still present. They say that Saṃkarṣaṇa believes that all religions are authoritative, and curse his ‘useless erudition’. The king, after all, is a devotee of Śiva, and the queen, Sughandhā, favors the Pāñcarātrikas. They depart, saying that Saṃkarṣaṇa has gone to a great gathering of the Bhāgavatas in order to scrutinize their religion.
The scene then shifts to Saṃkarṣaṇa’s attendance at this gathering. Many learned scholars are present – followers of the different philosophical schools – logicians, grammarians, and those learned in the sciences. The issue at hand is whether or not the doctrines of the Pāñcarātrikas are valid, as well as a larger question – how can validity exist amongst so many contradictory teachings?
A great sage – Dhairyarāśi – is accepted by all present as arbitrator. He makes a long speech outlining the problem in detail – raising possible objections and answering them. His conclusion is that scripture or doctrine is valid if it conforms with the Vedas; if it is not dangerous, anti-social, has only been recently proclaimed; that it does not appear to have been proclaimed by a madman, or espouses contemptible practices (i.e. eating forbidden things, making love to women who are forbidden). All present are content with this view and agree to practice their own religions according to established custom.
Satires such as Mattavilāsaprahasana and Āgamaḍambara reveal the tensions between different religious movements co-existing in the same social space; the different doctrines were known to the courtly audiences of these plays, and how these plays reflected the arguments of philosophers as to their validity.
Sources
Csaba Dezsö, ‘Much Ado about Religion’: A Critical Edition and Annotated Translation of the Āgamaḍambara – a Satirical Play by the ninth century Kashmirian philosopher Bhaṭṭa Jayanta (D. Phil. Thesis, Balliol College, 2004).
Gavin Flood The Tantric Body: The Secret Tradition of Hindu Religion (I.B. Tauris, 2006)
David Lorenzen, “A Parody of the Kapalikas in the Mattavilasa”, in David Gordon White (ed) Tantra in Practice (Princeton University Press, 2000)
Alexis Sanderson, “Tolerance, Exclusivity, Inclusivity and Persecution in Indian Religion During the Early Mediaeval Period” in John Makinson (ed) Honoris Causa: Essays in Honour of Aveek Sarkar (Allen Lane, 2015). Available online at academia.edu
Notes:
