Sources

Before examining the six epic chapters in question, it is necessary to make some general observations about the textual sources. As one of the world's longest narrative poems, the Mahabharata focuses on the actions of aristocratic war­riors and kings who comprise the Ksatriya class.

As the twelfth book of the epic, the Santi Parvan contains an enormous amount of information on governance, ethics and issues of law and its enforcement. The section entitled ‘Law, Force, and War' (MBh 12.93-107) replicates the larger framing device of the Santi Parvan since it presents an ongoing conversation at the war's end on dharma between the eldest Pandava brother and newly consecrated king, Yudhisthira, and his grand- fatherly patriarch, Bhisma. Throughout the epic, and especially in its twelfth book, arguments are made for just war in contrast to unjust war under the broad heading of rajadharma. The epic also prescribes rules of chivalrous fighting for members of the warrior class under the heading of ksatriyadharma. Issues of jus ad bellum and jus in bello are directly addressed in MBh 12.93-7, yet the idealistic rules of warfare are frequently circumvented by prescriptions that allow a king to use ‘crooked' (vakra) strategies which ‘slightly squeeze the law' (MBh 12.101.1): a fact underscored by Kona's sustained advice to the Pandavas elsewhere in the epic.^[1273] In addition, while the epic accounts of violence are heavily romanticised, especially in terms of the superhuman nature of its main characters, the information in the Santi Parvan has a clear didactic purpose as the episodes communicate messages about how real kings and warriors should act, often in situations where the right course of action is unclear legally or ethically.

Prescriptions about warfare also appear in legal texts called generally Dharmasutras (‘Treatises on Law').