Edicts of Ashoka: Session 1

The Edicts of Asoka are a series of 3rd century BCE inscriptions from the Indian subcontinent. The “major rock edicts,” some of which we are reading for this week, survive in ten locations with similar (near identical?) texts. Most are written in Prakit, a descendant of Sanskrit, but there is one monolingual Greek inscription and one bilingual Greek-Aramaic inscription from Kandahar, in modern Afghanistan. The content of the inscriptions primarily concern “King Priyadarsi,” his interest in “Dharma,” and his efforts to “increase the practice of Dharma.”

To my layman’s eyes, they pose a number of immediate questions (not all answerable by this group or at all)

• Who was the audience of these inscriptions? Why were they carved in the locations where they were carved, and under what conditions would the original audience(s) interact with them?

• Are these inscriptions genuinely intended for Asoka’s descendants (13 and 4)?
• Are they intended for ascetics? Ordinary people (apparently the audience for the festivals mentioned at the beginning of 4)?
• How are the inscriptions adapted to their particular circumstances (as 14 claims)?

• What are the teachings of these inscriptions?

• What does dharma consist of? Obedience to superiors & courtesy to peers?
• What does a proper king do? Is it different from an ascetic or from a layperson?
• What is the “other world” (13) and why do actions there matter more than actions here?

• Are the edicts consistent with one another? If cruelty to animals is absent in 13, does the picture of “dharma” in 4 fully line up with the “dharma” in 13?
• Why does Asoka care so much about ascetics? Why is their suffering valued more than the ample suffering of ordinary people (13)?
• What is the historical and intellectual context for these inscriptions? E.g.
• What is the timeline of the life of the king? Is it plausible that he conquered the Kalingas in year 8 of his reign and inscribed edict 4 in year 12?
• What is the vision of history that the inscriptions are working under? What has happened in the past? Is the past merely “hundreds of years” of sinful behavior (as represented in 4)? What about the hopes for the future?
• What connection do these inscriptions have with Buddhism? This is the era when the great stupas are first being built (e.g. at Amaravati and Sanchi), and those stupas in particular are sometimes associated with Asoka. Are these inscriptions Buddhist, or an effort to spread ideas similar to Buddhism? Is “Dharma” a Buddhist idea? What about the Brahmanas (hinduism?) and the Sramanas? The rejection of animal sacrifice (4)?
• What connection do these inscriptions have with the Mediterranean? They clearly have some connection: some are written in Greek (text and translation here), Hellenistic monarchs are mentioned in edict 13, and perhaps the whole epigraphic habit is an import from the Mediterranean.

• Edict 13’s “... even a person who wrongs him must be forgiven for wrongs that can be forgiven” ~ Matthew 6:14 “For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.”
• Other possible connections: remorse & conversion narrative, rejection of animal sacrifice, ευσεβεια as translation for dharma (cf. Plut. 171f)

I don’t have any answers to any of these questions, but I hope to consider them with you all.