What Sends a Man to Heaven or Hell

The grandsire was still on the arrows at Kurukshetra, waiting for the sun to turn north, and the king who had won the war was still asking him questions. They had just finished with Ashtavakra and the woman in the north, and Yudhishthira came back from that old tale to a plain matter of household practice.

"Whom do the eternal Brahmanas strictly observing religious rites call a proper object of gifts?" he said. "Is a Brahmana that bears the symbols of the order of life he follows to be regarded as such, or one who does not bear such indications?"

"Gifts should be made unto a Brahmana that adheres to the duties of his own order," Bhishma said, "whether he bears the indications of a Brahmachari or not. Both are faultless, he that bears such indications and he that is divested of them."

"And what fault does an uncleansed person incur," Yudhishthira asked, "if he makes gifts of sacrificial butter or food with great devotion unto persons of the regenerate order?"

"Even one that is most destitute of self-restraint becomes, without doubt, cleansed by devotion. Such a man becomes cleansed in respect of every act, and not with reference to gift alone."

Then the king raised the distinction the learned draw. A Brahmana employed in an act touching the deities is never to be examined; a Brahmana employed in an act touching the Pitris is to be examined in both conduct and competence. Why should the two differ?

"As regards acts that have reference to the deities," Bhishma said, "these fructify not in consequence of the Brahmana that is employed in doing the rites, but through the grace of the deities themselves. Those persons that perform sacrifice obtain the merit of those acts through the grace of the deities. The Brahmanas are always devoted to Brahman. The Rishi Markandeya, one of the greatest Rishis endued with intelligence in all the worlds, said this in days of yore."

Markandeya is the sage who outlived the flood and came back to describe it, and when a name like that is produced in support of a rule, the rule is meant to be taken as settled.

Yudhishthira had heard that five kinds of men are counted proper persons: the stranger, the man endued with learning, the man connected by marriage, the man endued with penances, and the man who adheres to the performance of sacrifices. He wanted to know why those five.

"The first three," Bhishma said, "strangers, relatives, and ascetics, are regarded as proper persons when they possess these attributes: purity of birth, devotion to religious acts, learning, compassion, modesty, sincerity, and truthfulness. The other two, men of learning and those devoted to sacrifices, are regarded as proper persons when endued with five of these, that is, purity of birth, compassion, modesty, sincerity, truthfulness."

Then he said that four persons of mighty energy had once given their opinions on this, and he recited them one after another as they had been spoken. There is no debate in the passage and no frame around it. Four beings speak, one line each, and go.

The Earth said: "As a clod of mud, when thrown into the great ocean, quickly dissolves away, even so every kind of sin disappears in the three high attributes, officiation at sacrifices, teaching, and the receiving of gifts."

Kasyapa said: "The Vedas with their six branches, the Sankhya philosophy, the Puranas, and high birth, these fail to rescue a regenerate person if he falls away from good conduct."

Agni said: "That Brahmana who, engaged in study and regarding himself learned, seeks with the aid of his learning to destroy the reputation of others, falls away from righteousness, and comes to be regarded as dissociated from truth. Verily, regions of felicity hereafter are never attained to by such a person of destructive genius."

Markandeya said: "If a thousand Horse-sacrifices and Truth were weighed in the balance, I do not know whether the former would weigh even half as heavy as the latter."

"Having spoken these words," Bhishma said, "those four, each of whom is endued with immeasurable energy, the goddess Earth, Kasyapa, Agni, and Bhrigu's son armed with weapons, quickly went away."

They did not stay to be questioned. The Earth had said that ritual dissolves sin, and Kasyapa had answered that learning saves nobody whose conduct has gone, and Agni had put the scholar who uses his books to ruin other men outside the gate of heaven, and Markandeya had set one thousand of the costliest rites in the world against truth and declined to say that the rites came halfway.

"If Brahmanas observant of the vow of Brahmacharyya solicit the offerings one makes unto one's deceased ancestors in Sraddhas," Yudhishthira said, "can the Sraddha be regarded as well performed if the performer actually makes those offerings over to them?"

"If a Brahmana who has practised the vow of Brahmacharyya for the prescribed period of twelve years, and acquired proficiency in the Vedas and their branches, himself solicits the offering made in Sraddhas and eats the same, he is regarded to fall away from his vow. The Sraddha, however, is not regarded as stained in any way."

The loss is the beggar's, not the giver's. But the giver has his own way of going wrong, and Yudhishthira asked next what the settled conclusions are about righteousness, since it is said to have many ends and numerous doors.

"Abstention from injury to others, truthfulness, the absence of wrath, compassion, self-restraint, and sincerity or candour," Bhishma said. "These are the indications of Righteousness. There are persons who wander over the earth praising righteousness without practising what they preach, and engaged all the while in sin. He who gives unto such persons gold or gems or steeds has to sink in hell and to subsist there for ten years, eating the while the faeces of such persons as live upon the flesh of dead kine and buffalos, of men called Pukkasas, of others that live in the outskirts of cities and villages, and of men who publish, under the influence of wrath and folly, the acts and omissions of others."

That is the price of a careless gift to a fraud, stated without softening. Then the king asked what is superior to Brahmacharyya, what is the highest indication of virtue, what is the highest purity.

"Abstention from honey and meat is even superior to Brahmacharyya. Righteousness consists in keeping within boundaries, that is, in self-restraint. The best indication of Righteousness is Renunciation, which is also the highest kind of purity."

And when to do what: "One should earn wealth in the first part of one's life. Then should one earn Righteousness, and then enjoy pleasure. One should not, however, attach oneself to any of these."

Then he set out the equivalences. To utter falsehood in a court of justice, to behave deceitfully towards the king, to act falsely towards preceptors and seniors, are equal in heinousness to Brahmanicide. To do an act of violence to the king's person, or to strike a cow, is equal to the sin of foeticide. To abandon one's homa fire, to cast off the study of the Vedas, to assail a Brahmana by word or act, are all equivalent to Brahmanicide.

Yudhishthira asked for the ordinances touching the deities and the departed ancestors at Sraddhas, and Bhishma began with the clock.

"Having purified oneself by baths and the other purificatory acts, and then going through the well-known auspicious rites, one should carefully do all acts relating to the deities in the forenoon, and all acts relating to the Pitris in the afternoon. What is given to men should be given at midday, with affection and regard. That gift which is made untimely is appropriated by Rakshasas."

That last word governs everything that follows. Nothing offered wrongly simply fails. It goes somewhere, and something eats it, and the list of what the Rakshasas are fed is long and exact.

Gifts of articles that have been leapt over by anyone, or licked or sucked, that are not given peacefully, or that have been seen by women who are impure because their season has come, produce no merit. They are the portion of the Rakshasas. So are gifts proclaimed loudly before many people, and gifts from which a portion has been eaten by a Sudra, or which have been seen or licked by a dog.

Food mixed with hair, or in which there are worms, or stained with spittle or saliva, or gazed at by a dog, or into which tear-drops have fallen, or which has been trodden upon, is the portion of a Rakshasa. Food eaten by a person incompetent to utter the syllable Om, or eaten by a person bearing arms, or eaten by a wicked person, is the portion of Rakshasas.

Food from which a portion has already been eaten by another, or which is eaten without a part having first been offered to the deities and to guests and to children, is appropriated by them. Such stained food, if offered to the deities and the Pitris, is never accepted by them but is taken by the Rakshasas.

The food offered in Sraddhas by the three regenerate classes, in which mantras are either not uttered or uttered incorrectly, and in which the ordinances are not complied with, goes the same way even when it is distributed to guests. So does food given to guests without having first been dedicated to the deities or the Pitris with a libation on the sacred fire, and food a part of which has been eaten by a person who is wicked or irreligious.

A man may perform the whole rite, feed the whole village, and discover that he has been catering for something else.

"I have told thee what the portions are of the Rakshasas," Bhishma said. "Listen now as I lay down the rules for ascertaining who the Brahmana is that is deserving of gift."

What came next was an exclusion list, and it is worth hearing in its own order, because the categories are not all of one kind.

Brahmanas who have been outcasted for heinous sins, and Brahmanas who are idiots or out of their minds, are not to be invited to Sraddhas in which offerings are made to the deities or the Pitris. Nor is the man afflicted with leucoderma, nor he who is destitute of virility, nor he who has leprosy, nor he who has phthisis, nor he who labours under epilepsy, nor he who is blind.

Then the callings. Those who practise as physicians. Those who receive regular pay for worshipping the images of deities established by the rich, or who live upon the service of the deities. Those observant of vows from pride or other false motives. Those who sell Soma. Those who are by profession vocalists or dancers or players or instrumental musicians or reciters of sacred books, or warriors and athletes.

Those who pour libations on the sacred fire for Sudras, or who are preceptors of Sudras, or who serve Sudra masters. The Brahmana who is paid for his services as a preceptor, and the pupil who attends a preceptor's lectures because of an allowance granted to him, for both of them are regarded as sellers of Vedic lore.

He who has once been induced to accept the gift of food in a Sraddha at the very outset. He who has married a Sudra wife, even if possessed of every kind of knowledge. Those destitute of their domestic fire. Those who attend upon corpses. Thieves, and those who have otherwise fallen away.

Those whose antecedents are unknown or vile, and those who are Putrika-putras, the sons of daughters given in marriage on the condition that their offspring shall belong to the mother's father.

He who gives loans of money, or subsists upon the interest of loans, or lives by the sale of living creatures. Those who have been subjugated by their wives. Those who live by becoming the paramours of unchaste women. Those who abstain from their morning and evening prayers.

None of these, said the grandsire, deserve to be invited.

"Listen now as I mention who the Brahmana is that has been ordained for acts done in honour of the deities and the Pitris," Bhishma said. "Indeed, I shall tell thee what those merits are in consequence of which one may become a giver or a recipient of gifts in Sraddhas notwithstanding the faults mentioned above."

The second list is a set of pardons, and it pardons a great deal.

Those who are observant of the rites laid down in the scriptures, or possessed of merit, or conversant with the Gayatri, or observant of the ordinary duties of Brahmanas, may be invited even if they have betaken themselves to agriculture for a living. If a Brahmana happens to be well born, he deserves to be invited even though he follows the profession of arms and fights the battles of others. The one who takes up trade, however, is to be discarded, even if possessed of merit.

The Brahmana who pours libations every day on the sacred fire, who resides in a fixed habitation, who is not a thief, and who does the duties of hospitality to guests arrived at his house, may be invited. So may he who recites the Savitri morning, noon, and night, or who subsists upon charity while observing the rites laid down for his order.

He who having earned wealth in the morning becomes poor in the afternoon, or who poor in the morning becomes wealthy by evening, or who is destitute of malice, or is stained by only a minor fault, may be invited. So may he who is destitute of pride or sin, who is not given to dry disputation, and who subsists upon alms obtained in his rounds from house to house.

Even the man who is not observant of vows, or is addicted to falsehood, or is a thief, or subsists by the sale of living creatures or by trade in general, becomes worthy of invitation if he offers all to the deities first and afterwards drinks Soma. Even the man who has acquired wealth by foul or cruel means becomes worthy, if he spends it in adoring the deities and discharging the duties of hospitality.

But the wealth acquired by the sale of Vedic lore, or earned by a woman, or gained by meanness such as giving false evidence in a court of law, should never be given to Brahmanas or spent in offerings to the Pitris.

A Brahmana becomes guilty of a dereliction of duty by uttering a falsehood. A Kshatriya incurs four times, and a Vaisya eight times, the sin that a Brahmana incurs by the same lie.

There were smaller rules still, and Bhishma laid them down without hurry.

A Brahmana already invited by a Brahmana should not eat elsewhere. If he eats at the house of the person whose invitation came later, he becomes inferior and incurs the sin that attaches to the slaughter of an animal on an occasion other than a sacrifice; if he does it after an invitation from a Kshatriya or a Vaisya, he incurs half of that. He who eats at these rites without having performed his ablutions, or while impure because of a birth or a death among his kinsmen, knowing himself impure, incurs the sin of uttering an untruth for a cow.

At the completion of a Sraddha the closing word differs by the order of the performer. For a Brahmana, the word Swadha should be uttered. For a Kshatriya, the words are, Let thy Pitris be gratified. For a Vaisya, Let everything become inexhaustible. For a Sudra, Swasti. The Brahmana who, at the end of a Sraddha performed with his aid, refuses to say the words astu swadha, incurs the sin of swearing falsely in a suit for land.

The girdles too are named. That of a Brahmana should be made of Munja grass, that of one belonging to the royal order should be a bowstring, and that of a Vaisya should be made of Valwaji grass.

Then Yudhishthira asked the question that had been under all the others. By giving unto whom does a man earn the amplest reward?

"Feed those Brahmanas," Bhishma said, "whose spouses reverently wait for the remnants of the dishes of their husbands like tillers of the soil waiting in reverence for timely showers of rain."

He went on naming them. Those emaciated by abstaining from luxuries and even from full meals, who keep the vows that waste the body, and who approach a giver desiring a gift. Those who regard conduct as their food and their spouses and their strength and their refuge for crossing this world, and who ask for wealth only when it is needed. Those who have lost everything to thieves or oppressors. Those who beg food from a poor man of their own order who has himself just been given something. Those who have lost all in a time of universal distress and been deprived of their spouses in it. Those robbed by powerful men though perfectly innocent, who now wish only to fill their stomachs and no longer ask what the food is. And those who beg on behalf of others, and are satisfied with even a small gift.

"Thou hast now heard the declarations of the scriptures about the making of gifts," Bhishma said. "Listen now as I expound what those acts are that lead to hell or heaven."

They sink into hell who speak untruth, except when the untruth serves a preceptor's purpose or gives the assurance of safety to a man in fear of his life. They who ravish other people's spouses, or assist at such acts. They who rob others of their wealth, or destroy other people's possessions, or proclaim the faults of others.

They who destroy the water tanks that cattle drink from, who injure public meeting halls, who break down bridges and causeways, who pull down dwelling houses. They who beguile and cheat helpless women, or girls, or aged dames, or women who have been frightened.

They who destroy the means of other people's living, who exterminate the habitations of others, who sow dissension among friends, who destroy the hopes of other people, and they who are ungrateful to friends for services received. They who have no faith in the Vedas, and they who break their own vows or oblige others to break them.

They who take exorbitant rates of interest and make unduly large profits on sales. They who gamble, they who do wicked acts without scruple, they who slaughter living creatures. They who cause masters to dismiss servants that are hoping for reward, or waiting on wages, or expecting a return for services already rendered.

They who eat without offering portions to their spouses, their sacred fires, their servants, their guests, their children and the aged, and who abstain from the rites laid down for honouring the Pitris and the deities. They who sell the Vedas, they who find fault with the Vedas, and they who reduce the Vedas into writing.

They who live by selling hair, they who subsist by selling poisons, they who live by selling milk. They who put obstacles in the path of Brahmanas and kine and maidens. They who sell or forge weapons, and they who make shafts and bows.

They who abandon preceptors and servants and loyal followers who have given no offence, and they who cast off persons endued with forgiveness and self-restraint and wisdom when these are no longer of service to them.

They who set bullocks to work before the animals attain sufficient age, who bore the noses of beasts to control them better at work, who keep animals always tethered. Those kings who do not protect their subjects while forcibly taking a sixth of the produce of their fields, and they who, able and possessed of resources, abstain from making gifts.

All these, said Bhishma, have to go to hell.

"Listen now, bull of Bharata's race," he said, "as I tell thee who those men are that ascend to heaven."

He began with a warning turned inside out. The man who transgresses against a Brahmana by impeding the acts in which the deities are adored loses all his children and animals; they who do not obstruct the religious acts of Brahmanas ascend to heaven.

They ascend who follow the duties laid down in the scriptures and practise charity and self-restraint and truthfulness. They who, having acquired knowledge by obedient service to their preceptors and by austere penances, become reluctant to accept gifts. They through whom other people are rescued from fear, from sin, from the impediments in the way of what they wish to accomplish, from poverty, and from the afflictions of disease.

They who are forgiving, patient, prompt in performing righteous acts, and of auspicious conduct. They who abstain from honey and meat, from congress with the spouses of other people, and from wines and spirituous liquors.

They who help in the establishment of retreats for ascetics, who become founders of families, who open up new countries for habitation and lay out towns and cities. They who have abstained from all injury to all creatures, who are capable of enduring everything, and who have made themselves the refuge of all creatures. They who wait with humility upon their fathers and mothers, who have subjugated their senses, and who are affectionate towards their brothers. They who subjugate their senses though they are rich and strong and in the enjoyment of youth.

They who are kind even towards those that offend against them, who are mild of disposition, and who contribute to the happiness of others by serving them in humility. They who protect thousands of people, who make gifts unto thousands, who rescue thousands from distress.

They who make gifts of gold and of kine, of conveyances and animals, of the articles needed in marriages, of serving men and maids, of cloths and robes. They who make public pleasure-houses and gardens and wells, resting houses and tanks that let cattle and men quench their thirst. They who make gifts of houses and fields and populated villages to those who ask for them.

And they who, born in families high or low, beget hundreds of children and live long lives practising compassion and keeping wrath subdued.

"I have thus expounded to thee," Bhishma said, "the rites in honour of the deities and the Pitris that are performed for the sake of the other world, the ordinances about making gifts, and the views of the Rishis of former times upon the articles of gift and the manner of giving them."

One question was left, and Yudhishthira asked it as a man asks about a thing he fears he may already have done.

"It behoveth thee to answer this question of mine truly and in detail. What are those circumstances under which a person may become guilty of Brahmanicide without actually slaying a Brahmana?"

"Formerly I had one day requested Vyasa to explain to me this very subject," Bhishma said. "I shall now narrate to thee what Vyasa told me on that occasion. Do thou listen to it with undivided attention."

He had gone to the son of Parasara, the compiler of the Vedas and the grandfather of both these armies, and had addressed him as a pupil addresses a teacher.

"Thou, O great ascetic, art the fourth in descent from Vasishtha. Do thou explain to me this. What are those circumstances under which one becomes guilty of Brahmanicide without actually slaying a Brahmana?"

Vyasa, well skilled in the science of morality, made him an answer at once excellent and fraught with certainty, and Bhishma repeated it word for word.

Know that man as guilty of Brahmanicide who, having of his own will invited a Brahmana of righteous conduct to his house for giving him alms, afterwards refuses him anything on the pretence that there is nothing in the house.

Know that man as guilty of Brahmanicide who destroys the means of living of a Brahmana learned in the Vedas and all their branches, who is freed from attachment to worldly creatures and goods.

Know that man to be guilty of Brahmanicide who causes obstructions in the way of thirsty kine while they quench their thirst.

Take that man as guilty of Brahmanicide who, without having studied the Srutis that have flowed from preceptor to pupil for ages and ages, finds fault with the Srutis, or with the scriptures composed by the Rishis.

Know that man as guilty of Brahmanicide who does not bestow upon a suitable bridegroom his daughter possessed of beauty and other excellent accomplishments.

Know that foolish and sinful person to be guilty of Brahmanicide who inflicts such grief upon Brahmanas as afflicts the very core of their hearts.

Know that man to be guilty of Brahmanicide who robs the blind, the lame, and idiots of their all.

Know that man to be guilty of Brahmanicide who sets fire to the retreats of ascetics, or to woods, or to a village, or a town.

Eight men, and not one of them has lifted a hand. That was the answer Vyasa gave, and the grandsire, who had been counting out the last of his own days on that bed, passed it on without adding anything to it.