07-03-2007, 12:41 PM
Thanks for clarifying.
"Guiding principles" for law are the principles that govern ethical behavior, I think.
The dharma-shAstra-s do provide some rationale for the laws in them, so it may be good to start with those. They are also the "schools" of legal thought if you may, and the different dharma-shastra-s show a lot of variation, and they provide arguments for justifying those variations. Dharma-sutras themselves are short texts, so it may be fruitful to also look at commentaries and other expositions.
Prescriptive parts of many texts, besides dharma-shastras would also be relevant.
Particularly the so called <b>"nIti" texts</b>, such as chANakya-nIti, vidura-nIti, bhartrihari-nIti etc.
As I said, Hindu legal thought got frozen in time, and hasn't had the opportunity to grow since then. Your posts are a welcome indication that there may be some yearning in hindu consciousness to recast, restart and reestablish the schools of hindu legal thinking.
This is healthy, since the marxist-macaulayite dominated thinking in current India wants to treat all old hindu structures as irrelevant, and fit for transplantation by "modern" western structures.
We shouldn't forget that western structures/schools have had freedom to modernize which hindu structures didn't till about the end of 19th century. Even when the "reforms" were introduced by hindus themselves, somehow the thinking has become ingrained that the reforms were introduced due to external pressures only and hinduism didn't have internal resources to effect such reforms. But that thinking is wrong.
Existence of hundreds of dharma-shastra-s and debates amongst their proponents suggests that during old times, legal theorizing was a very lively part of intellectual life in India. And if Hindu society had been free, those legal theories would have naturally evolved with the times too. Compared to their times, hindu dharma-shastra-s are exemplary, so it stands to reason that if they had been free to evolve, they would have become exemplary even in modern context.
So, this is another avenue where long stifled hindu consciousness can restart to discover and assert its genius.
"Guiding principles" for law are the principles that govern ethical behavior, I think.
The dharma-shAstra-s do provide some rationale for the laws in them, so it may be good to start with those. They are also the "schools" of legal thought if you may, and the different dharma-shastra-s show a lot of variation, and they provide arguments for justifying those variations. Dharma-sutras themselves are short texts, so it may be fruitful to also look at commentaries and other expositions.
Prescriptive parts of many texts, besides dharma-shastras would also be relevant.
Particularly the so called <b>"nIti" texts</b>, such as chANakya-nIti, vidura-nIti, bhartrihari-nIti etc.
As I said, Hindu legal thought got frozen in time, and hasn't had the opportunity to grow since then. Your posts are a welcome indication that there may be some yearning in hindu consciousness to recast, restart and reestablish the schools of hindu legal thinking.
This is healthy, since the marxist-macaulayite dominated thinking in current India wants to treat all old hindu structures as irrelevant, and fit for transplantation by "modern" western structures.
We shouldn't forget that western structures/schools have had freedom to modernize which hindu structures didn't till about the end of 19th century. Even when the "reforms" were introduced by hindus themselves, somehow the thinking has become ingrained that the reforms were introduced due to external pressures only and hinduism didn't have internal resources to effect such reforms. But that thinking is wrong.
Existence of hundreds of dharma-shastra-s and debates amongst their proponents suggests that during old times, legal theorizing was a very lively part of intellectual life in India. And if Hindu society had been free, those legal theories would have naturally evolved with the times too. Compared to their times, hindu dharma-shastra-s are exemplary, so it stands to reason that if they had been free to evolve, they would have become exemplary even in modern context.
So, this is another avenue where long stifled hindu consciousness can restart to discover and assert its genius.