MANUSMRITI AND THE CONTROVERSY

The time frame in the ancient Vedic times was divided into four yugas comprising of Krita, Treta, Dvapara and Kali.  The least number of years is in Kaliyuga and the number of years is expected to be around 10% of the total years i.e. 4,320,000 years in all the four yugas.  These yugas are cyclical.  The cycle of the yugas for one thousand times is called Kalpa - Day for the Brahma - God of creation. In the night of Brahma, a pralayam, Tsunami or dissolving all that is created by Brahma including himself takes place.  In the next morning Brahma is reborn and starts his creation work again. Brahma, at the start of each cycle of the chaturyuga (meaning four yugas) designates a person as a Manu for that chaturyuga. Each cycle of chathuryuga had its own manu starting from Svayambuva - the one who self manifested. The manu formulates the rules and regulations for the humans to follow to live in harmony with nature and other living beings.  In the present chaturyuga, the Sun is designated as the Manu and he is known by his name Vivasvan and the period of his, is known as Vaivasvatha Manvanthara (Times of the particular Manu). The writings of these manus are called Manusmritis (Smriti is the one that is written). From the sankalpa mantras that are chanted before any worship or homam is performed, it is derived that the present manvanthara is the one in the twenty-eighth cycle of yugas.  

It is generally believed that the present Kaliyuga started about 3100 BCE that is about 5120 years earlier to-date. What was the living conditions or the standards of the people those times, the present day humans may never be able to decipher.  But a general inference can be made from various literature that are being taught in Sanskrit in various disciplines from time immemorial.   

Apart from Veda there are many literature in  Sanskrit on various subjects.  Drama, songs, grammar, logic, law, economy, astronomy, rules of living etc.  Each literature had been authored by different authors in different periods of times. In some cases like Kalidasa, he himself had authored some of the best known drama - Shakunthalam, Meghadhootam, etc. The renowned Chanakya alias Kautilya wrote the Artha Shastra.  Panini wrote his wonderful Ashtadhyayi, the concise book on Sanskrit Grammar.  Sage Kanad wrote his treatises on trigonometry (The word Trigonometry itself is derived from Sanskrit). Sushruta wrote on medicine and surgery.  Some of his works are valid even today. There are many who had contributed to astronomy the best known being the Varahamihira.  Likewise, the person who was designated as the Manu for that particular chathuryuga wrote in detail about how the humans have to live in harmony with the nature and other living beings and laid down rules, regulations and guidelines.  

The Europeans, when they came to India in the middle of the 17th century, they were dumbfounded to see that the people were prosperous and at the same time highly contended with no one desiring for more.  Every person they came across was aspiring to be better than the other in terms of spiritual emancipation.  They found that the foundation for such a way of life was the general rules governing their day-to-day lives which were codified in the books of manusmritis from various yugas that were handed down to them by word of mouth and later written down in palm leaf manuscripts.  Some of the Europeans like Max Mueller and William Jones took the trouble of learning the language in which these manuscripts were written. (Devanagari was not in vogue in the early part of the CE and mostly only prakritham and grantham were used to write Sanskrit).  Like in many language one word need not necessarily have one meaning only, in Sanskrit also the words have different meaning.  The words are derived from the root words and are context oriented.  A person who is an excellent scholar in Sanskrit with a good grip over the grammar alone will be able to lucidly explain the meaning of the many slokas and writings in Sanskrit.  In that background, the efforts of people like Max Mueller, Williams Jones etc. are only half hearted attempt at translation without understanding the context. 

As such expecting the present day politicians in TN who have been brought up on the anti Hindi and anti Sanskrit lobby's preaching, to have any idea about the writings in Sanskrit is like expecting a LKG student to write a critical essay on Shakespeare's works.  When that be the case, it would be highly advisable for the TN politicians to keep their mouth shut regarding what is there in Sanskrit literature instead of showing off their ignorance.  To quote from William Jones' half hearted attempts in translating the Manusmriti into English and deregatorily refer to the women in Hindu religion is nothing short of a gimmick playing to pander to the vote banks in the form of block votes from particular religious sections.  It is highly unfortunate that the said politician went out of the way to justify his statement quoting extensively from Jones' translated works the portions that are suitable to him and stopping short of the portions that are highly praise worthy of the women.  This is nothing but selling oneself for the price of a few hundred rupees in the streets of Kamathipura in Mumbai or the Sonagachi in Kolkata.