In relation to ashoka's dharma and its feautures,
explain
purity in family and domestic life
Answers
Answer:
Explanation:The word Dhamma is the Prakrit form of the Sanskrit word Dharma. There have been attempts to define and find equivalent English words for it, such as "piety", "moral life" and "righteousness" or "duty" but scholars could not translate it into English because it was coined and used in a specific context. The word Dharma has multiple meanings in the literature and thought of ancient India. The best way to understand what Ashoka means by Dharma is to read his edicts, which were written to explain the principles of Dharma to the people of that time throughout the empire.
Dharma was not a particular religious faith or practice, or an arbitrary formulated royal policy. Dharma related to generalized norms of social behavior and activities; Ashoka tried to synthesize various social norms which were current in his time. It cannot be understood by assuming it is one of the various religions that existed at that time. To understand why and how Ashoka formulated Dharma and its meaning, one must understand the characteristics of the time in which he lived and to refer to Buddhist, Brahmanical and other texts where norms of social behavior are explained.
Some historians link Ashoka’s policy of Dhamma with Buddhism. According to V.A. Smith, Ashoka actually became a Buddhist monk for a short span of his life. V.A Smith believes that he was both a monk and a monarch at the same time. D.R. Bhandarkar claims that Ashoka was a Buddhist and his policy of dhamma was actually original Buddhism as preached by the Budhha.
The Mahajanapada of sixth century B.C. marked the beginning of the state system in many parts of India. Only a small section of society came to have a monopoly of power, which they exercised over the rest of the society. There were gana-samghas in which the rulers were a group of hereditary Kshatriya or members of a clan. By the time Ashoka ascended the throne, the state system had grown very elaborate. It was characterized by:
The political supremacy of one region (Magadha) over a vast territory which comprised many previous kingdoms, gana-samghas, and areas where no organised states had previously existed;
Existence within this vast territory of geographical regions, cultural areas, and of different faiths, beliefs and practices;
Monopoly of force by a ruling class of which the emperor was the supreme head.
Appropriation of a very substantial quantity of surpluses from agriculture, commerce and other sources.
The complexity of the state system demanded an imaginative policy from the emperor which required minimal use of force in such a large empire having diverse forms of economy and religions. It could not have been controlled by an army alone. A more feasible alternative was the propagation of a policy that would work at an ideological level and reach out to all sections of the society. The policy of Dharma was such an endeavor