NCJ Number
134095
Date Published
1988
Length
123 pages
Annotation
This second in an 8-volume work by the author explores the organization and regulation of society in traditional India in relation to prevailing beliefs about reality, knowing, and desiring.
Abstract
The author's central concept of jurisculture is that human societies are organized and regulated by cultural processes that reflect shared meanings, values, purposes, and principles, all of which derive from fundamental beliefs. The roots of jurisculture in India come from the fundamental beliefs that arise from the Vedas, Jainism, Buddhism, Carvakian materialism, the great epic poems (the Ramayana and the Mahabharata), and the six orthodox systems of Hindu philosophy. The book traces the influence of these beliefs in the direction and control of the cooperative activities of society as well as in individual actions during 3 millenia from 1500 B.C. to 1500 A.D., with some remnants of this period identified in the modern period. The book explains why India, unlike Greece or Rome, did not undergo a social revolution when the basis of fundamental beliefs changed from speculative faith to rational knowledge. In India, ultimate reality came to be viewed as being instead of activity; the highest good was viewed as withdrawal from society into communion with the inner self. This "good" could be attained through individual action that did not require societal institutions. Society, therefore, was not as important in India as in the West. Indians experienced reality in two realms of existence: soul development and moral cause and effect. Neither tends to lead to a commitment to the reform of societal structures. Chapter notes, a 41-item bibliography, and a subject index