Sama vyAyAmikam - Philosophy of tranquility and activity

This post covers the second chapter of maNDala yOniH called Sama vyAyAmikam that deals with the philosophical basis behind the peace and war.

There are two things that drive all the activity. 1. yOga is about acquiring something new; while 2. kshema is about protecting and enjoying what is already acquired. So, Sama i.e., peace and vyAyAma exerting effort combined in right proportions is the basis of yOga and kshEma says cANakya.

shADguNyam the six-fold policy is the basis for Sama and vyAyAma which results in three outcomes: 1. Loss or Decline, 2. stability or holding, 3. Growth or advancement. These three or consequences of the policy.

The activity of people  is of two types: nayam - good of lawful; and apanayam - bad or unlawful.

The activity of daivam (that of God) is of two types: ayam - fortune and anayam - fateful.

Only the above two types of activities run all that in this world. The activity of people is called mAnusham which is visible and the activity of god which is called daivam that works invisibly. Both these activities when end in a favorable result it is called ayam, otherwise it is anayam.

The king/leader possessing Atma sampat and the other excellence described earlier and who is wishing "ayam" is vijigIshu the center of circle i.e., rAja maNDalam.

As shown above, ten types of kings/leaders are naturally form based on the way they control the territories around the vijigIshu. Putting the vijigIshu and his friend circles there are 18 elements and the opponents and their friends make up 18 elements.

Friends are of two types, 1. natural and 2. artificial. Even the opponents can be grouped in to natural and artificial. There are neutral kings that can turn friend or opponent; they make another 18 + 18 elements. Hence a total of 12 types of kings and 60 types of other constituent elements making a total of 72 elements that form the rAja maNDalam.

Having understood the elements, now about sakti and siddhi

Sakti is the possession of power and siddhi is about happiness (or success!) Sakti is three types 1. that of strategy, knowledge, counsel (mantra-Sakti) 2. that of treasury and army (prabhu-Sakti) and 3. that of valour (utsAha-Sakti)

The siddhi is also of three types: that which is gained by mantra-Sakti is mantra siddhi; that is gained by prabhu-Sakti is prabhu siddhi and that is gained by utsAha-Sakti is utsAha-siddhi.

Thriving with these Saktis and siddhis the king becomes superior. otherwise inferior. If these are equal then equal. 

A king/leader should improve the sakit and siddhi of his own and friends constituent elements. Diminish the sakti and siddhi of the opponents.

There are some special situations, the king should desire the sakti and siddhi in the opponent. One example is if the opponent is going to injure his own subjects due to his excessive power (Sakti) then the constituent elements will oppose that leader; or if the opponent will, when endowed with success (siddhi) become negligent and become addicted to bad habits like hunting, wine and women etc., in that case, a king should desire the opponent to have power and success!!

A king desiring victory should keep himself in the middle like the hub putting the opponents as spokes and the friends as the external rim of the wheel. 

Thus we reached the end of second chapter, and of sixth book of artha SAstra called manDala yOniH i.e., about the basis of foreign policy.