René Guénon
Chapter 9

THE DEPENDENCE OF ROYALTY ON PRIESTHOOD

LET US NOW DIRECT OUR ATTENTION TO the relationship between the Brahmins and the Kshatriyas in the social organization of India. To the Kshatriyas normally belongs outward power since the field of action, which concerns them directly, is the external and perceptible world; but this power is nothing without an interior principle, a purely spiritual one, that incarnates the authority of the Brahmins and in which it finds its only real guarantee. We see here that the relationship between the two powers could still be represented by that between the 'interior' and the 'exterior', a relationship that in fact symbolizes well that between knowledge and action or, to put it differently, between the 'mover' and the 'moved', taking up again the idea we explained above in reference to Aristotelean theory as well as Hindu doctrine.[1] It is from the harmony between this 'interior' and 'exterior'—a harmony moreover that must not be conceived as a kind of 'parallelism', which would imply an ignorance of the essential differences of the two domains—that there results the normal life of what can be called the social entity. By the use of such an expression, we do not mean to suggest any sort of comparison of the collectivity to a living being, especially as certain people have abused this notion in the strangest way in recent times, mistaking what is mere analogy and correspondence for a true identity.[2]

In exchange for the guarantee of their power by the spiritual authority, the Kshatriyas must use this power to ensure that the Brahmins will have the means to peacefully accomplish their proper function of knowledge and teaching, sheltered from trouble and agitation. This is what is represented in Hindu symbolism by the image of Skanda, lord of war, protecting the meditation of Ganesha, lord of knowledge.[3] It should be noted that the same thing was taught, even outwardly, in the Western Middle Ages; indeed, Saint Thomas Aquinas expressly declares that all human functions are subordinate to contemplation as their superior end, 'so that, when considered properly, they all seem to be in the service of those who contemplate the truth,' the true _raison d'être_ of the entire government of civil life fundamentally lying in the assurance of the peace necessary for this contemplation.

One sees how far this is from the modern point of view, and also how the predominance of a tendency to action, as it incontestably exists among Westerners, does not necessarily bring about the disparagement of contemplation, that is of knowledge, at least so long as a people possesses a civilization of a traditional character, whatever form that tradition may take—which in the context cited was religious, whence the theological nuance that Saint Thomas always attached to contemplation, whereas in the East the latter has always been envisaged in the order of pure metaphysics.

On the other hand, in Hindu doctrine and in the social organization that is its direct application—and therefore among a people where a contemplative aptitude understood in the sense of pure intellectuality is manifestly preponderant and even generally developed to a degree found perhaps nowhere else—the place accorded to the Kshatriyas and consequently to action, while subordinate (as it should normally be), is nevertheless very far from negligible, since it comprises all that can be called the visible power. Besides, as we have already noted on another occasion, [4] those who, under the influence of the false interpretations fashionable in the West, might doubt this very real though relative importance accorded to action by Hindu doctrine, as well as by all the other traditional doctrines, need only refer to the _Bhagavad Gītā_ to be convinced otherwise, for we must not forget that this work can only be rightly understood if we recall that it is one of those especially destined for the use of Kshatriyas.[5] The Brahmins have only to exercise an as it were invisible authority which as such may be unknown to the vulgar but which is nonetheless the immediate principle of all visible power, being like the pivot around which all contingent things turn, the fixed axis around which the world accomplishes its revolution, the pole or the immutable center that directs and regulates the cosmic movement without participating therein.[6] The dependence of the temporal power on the spiritual authority has its visible sign in the anointing of kings, who are not truly 'legitimized' until they have received investiture and consecration from the hands of the priesthood, implying the transmission of a 'spiritual influence' necessary for the regular exercise of their functions.[7] This influence has at times manifested itself outwardly with distinctly perceptible effects, and we can cite as an example of this the healing power of the kings of France, which was indeed directly connected to their anointing, for the influence in question was not transmitted to the king by his predecessor but received only by virtue of this anointing, which shows clearly that this influence does not belong properly to the king but is conferred on him by a kind of delegation of the spiritual authority, in which, as we indicated above, the 'divine right' truly consists. The king, then, is merely a depository of this influence and consequently can lose it in certain circumstances, which explains why in the Christendom of the Middle Ages the pope could release subjects from their oath of allegiance to their sovereign.[8] Moreover, in the Catholic tradition Saint Peter is depicted holding in his hands not only the golden key of sacerdotal power but also the silver key of royal power. For the ancient Romans these two keys were an attribute of Janus, signifying the keys to the 'greater mysteries' and the 'lesser mysteries' which, as we have explained, also correspond respectively to 'sacerdotal' and 'royal' initiation.[9] Here it should be noted that Janus represents the common source of the two powers, whereas Saint Peter is properly the incarnation of the sacerdotal power, the two keys being transferred to him because it is through his intermediation that the royal power is transmitted, whereas the sacerdotal power is itself received directly from the source.[10]

What has just been said defines the normal relationships between spiritual authority and temporal power, and if these relationships were everywhere and always observed, no conflict would ever arise between them, for each would occupy its own proper place in the hierarchy of functions and beings, a hierarchy that, we stress again, conforms strictly to the very nature of things. Unfortunately this is far from always being the case, and this normal relationship is only too often misunderstood and even inverted. Here it is first of all important to note that it is already a grave error simply to consider the spiritual and the temporal as two correlative or complementary terms, and to lose sight of the fact that the latter finds its principle in the former. This error can arise all the more easily since from a certain point of view, as we have already said, this consideration of their complementarism also has its _raison d'être_, at least when the two powers are considered in their state of division, where one is no longer the supreme and ultimate principle of the other, but only its immediate principle, which as such is still relative.

As we have explained elsewhere regarding knowledge and action,[11] this complementarity is not false but only insufficient, for

Dante's texts; but it would perhaps not be opportune, at least for the present, to give certain precise 'technical' details on the 'power of the keys', nor to explain various other things connected more or less directly with them. If we bring up this subject here it is only so that those who have some knowledge of these things may see that our reserve is deliberate and not due to any obligation.

it corresponds to a still exterior point of view, as indeed does the very division of these two powers, made necessary by a state of the world in which the unique and supreme power is no longer within the reach of ordinary humanity. One could even say that when they are differentiated the two powers inevitably first appear in their normal relationship of subordination, and that they are seen as correlatives only in a later historical phase of the cycle's descent. It is to this new phase that certain symbolic expressions particularly emphasizing the aspect of complementarity correspond, although a correct interpretation could show that they also indicate the relationship of subordination. Such is the case of the well-known (but in the West little understood) parable of the blind man and the lame man, which in one of its principal meanings actually represents the relationship between the active life and the contemplative life: action left to itself is blind, and the essential immutability of knowledge is expressed outwardly by an immobility comparable to that of the lame man. The point of view of complementarity is represented by the mutual aid of the two men, each compensating by his own faculties for what is lacking in the other; and if the origin of this parable, or at least this particular application of it, [12] is to be related to Confucianism, it is easy to see that the latter must confine itself to this point of view by the very fact that it is itself confined exclusively to the human and social order. We must note apropos of this that in China the distinction between Taoism, which is a purely metaphysical doctrine, and Confucianism, which is a social doctrine (both proceeding moreover from the same integral tradition, which represents their common principle) corresponds very exactly to the distinction between the spiritual and the temporal.[13] And we should add that the importance of 'non-action' from the Taoist point of view particularly justifies the symbolism employed in the fable in question for whomever looks at it from the outside.[14] We should, however, carefully note that it is the lame man who plays the leading role in the association of the two men, and that his very position—mounted on the blind man's shoulders—symbolizes the superiority of contemplation over action, a superiority that Confucius himself was far from disputing in principle, as is shown in an account of his meeting with Lao Tzu preserved by the historian Ssu-Ma-Chi'en, in which he admitted that he was not 'born to knowledge', that is that he had not attained knowledge par excellence, which is knowledge of the purely metaphysical order, and which, as we said above, by its very nature belongs exclusively to those who possess true spiritual authority.[15] If then it is an error to envisage the spiritual and the temporal merely as correlatives, there is an even graver error which consists in claiming to subordinate the spiritual to the temporal, that is to say, knowledge to action. This error, which completely reverses the normal relationship, corresponds to the tendency that generally characterizes the modern West, and it can obviously occur only in a period of very advanced intellectual decadence. In our time, moreover, some go yet further in this direction, even as far as to deny the very value of knowledge as such, and also, proceeding quite logically—for the two things are closely linked—to the negation pure and simple of all spiritual authority. This last degree of degeneration, which implies domination by the lowest castes, is one of the characteristics of the final phase of the _Kali-Yuga_. If we consider religion in particular, since this is the special form that the spiritual takes in the Western world, this reversal of relations can be expressed in the following way: instead of regarding the entire social order as deriving from religion, as being suspended from it so to speak and finding its principle therein (as was the case in medieval Christendom, and as it was equally in Islam, which is quite similar to it in this respect), today people see religion at most only as one element of the social order, one element among others of equal value. This is the enslavement of the spiritual to the temporal, even its absorption by it, pending the inevitable complete negation. To consider things in this way amounts perforce to 'humanizing' religion, that is, to treating religion as a purely human fact of the social order, or better still, of the 'sociological' or psychological order, depending on one's preference. In truth, this is no longer religion, for religion essentially includes something 'supra-human' lacking which we are no longer in the spiritual domain, for the temporal and the human are essentially identical, as we explained earlier. Thus we have here a veritable implicit negation of religion and the spiritual, whatever the appearances may be, a negation such that the explicit and avowed negation will amount less to the establishment of a new order than simply to the recognition of a fait accompli. In this way the reversal of relations prepares directly for the suppression of the superior term—something it already implies, at least virtually—just as the revolt of the Kshatriyas against the authority of the Brahmins prepares for and summons as it were the ascendancy of the lowest castes, as we shall see. And those who have followed us this far will easily understand that there is something more in this parallel than a simple comparison.

Footnotes

[1]Here one could again apply the image of the center and the circumference of the 'wheel of things'.
[2]The living being bears within itself the principle of its unity, which is superior to the multiplicity of the elements that enter into its constitution, and since there is nothing similar in the collectivity, which is strictly speaking only the sum of the individuals that compose it, a word such as 'organization' when applied to either cannot be taken in strictly the same sense. One can say however that the presence of a spiritual authority introduces into the social collectivity a principle superior to its constituent individuals, since this authority by its nature and origin is itself 'supra-individual'. But this presupposes that society be not envisaged merely under its temporal aspect, and this consideration—the only one that can make of it something more than a simple collectivity in the sense just indicated—is precisely one of those that escapes most completely the contemporary sociologists who claim to identify society with a living being.
[3]Ganesha and Skanda are moreover represented as brothers, both being sons of Shiva, which is another way of saying that both the spiritual and the temporal powers proceed from a common principle.
[4]_The Crisis of the Modern World_, chap. 2.
[5]The _Bhagavad Gītā_ is strictly speaking only an episode in the _Mahābhārata_, itself one of the two _Itihāsas_, the other being the _Rāmāyana_. This character of the _Bhagavad Gītā_ explains the use it makes of a martial symbolism, comparable in certain respects to that of the 'holy war' among the Muslims. There is moreover an 'inner' way of reading this book, which gives it its profound meaning, and it is then called the _Atma-Gītā_.
[6]The axis and the pole are above all symbols of the one principle of the two powers, as we have explained in _The King of the World_; but they can also be applied to spiritual authority in relation to temporal power, as we are doing here, because, by reason of its essential attribute of knowledge, this authority is effectively part of the immutability of the supreme principle, which is what these symbols fundamentally express, and also because, as we said above, it represents this principle directly in relation to the external world.
[7]We have been translating as 'spiritual influence' the Hebrew and Arabic word barakah. The rite of 'laying on of hands' is one of the most customary modes of transmitting the barakah, in particular of bringing about through it certain kinds of healing.
[8]The Islamic tradition also teaches that the barakah can be lost, while in the tradition of the Far East the 'mandate of Heaven' is likewise revocable when the sovereign fails to carry out his functions in a regular way, that is in harmony with the cosmic order itself.
[9]According to another symbolism they are also the keys to the gates of the 'Celestial Paradise' and the 'Terrestrial Paradise', as we shall later see in one of
[10]As for the transmission of royal power there are however exceptional cases where for special reasons it is conferred directly by representatives of the supreme power, the source of the other two: thus kings Saul and David were not anointed by the high priest but by the prophet Samuel. This can be compared with what we said elsewhere (_The King of the World_, chap. 4) on the threefold character of Christ as prophet, priest, and king in connection with the respective functions of the three Magi-Kings, who themselves correspond to the 'three worlds', as we recalled in a previous note, the 'prophetic' function here implying a direct inspiration and corresponding properly to the 'celestial world'.
[11]_The Crisis of the Modern World_, chap. 2.
[12]There is another application of the same parable, no longer social but cosmological, to be found in the doctrines of India, specifically in the _Sankhya_. The lame man is _Purusha_ insofar as he is immutable or 'non-acting', and the blind man is _Prakriti_, the undifferentiated potentiality of which is likened to the darkness of chaos. These are in effect two complementary principles considered as poles of universal manifestation, both proceeding moreover from a single superior principle, which is pure Being, that is, _Ishvara_, consideration of which exceeds the limits of the special point of view of the _Sankhya_. In relating this interpretation to the one given above, it should be noted that an analogical correspondence can be established between contemplation or knowledge and _Purusha_, and between action and _Prakriti_; but we cannot enter into an explanation of these two principles here; instead we refer the interested reader to what we have written on this subject in _Man and His Becoming according to the Vedanta_.
[13]This division of the Far-Eastern tradition into two distinct branches was accomplished in the sixth century before the Christian era, an epoch the special character of which we have previously drawn attention to (The Crisis of the Modern World, chap. 1), and to which we shall return later on.
[14]We say 'from the outside' because, from the inner point of view, 'non-action' is in reality supreme activity in all its plenitude; but, precisely because of its total and absolute character, this activity does not appear outwardly like activities that are particular, determined, and relative.
[15]It is clear from this that there is no opposition in principle between Taoism and Confucianism, which are not and cannot be rival schools, since each has its own sharply distinct domain. If there have nevertheless been disputes, at times even violent ones (as we noted above), these were due above all to the misunderstandings and the exclusivism of the Confucianists, who were forgetful of the example given by their own master.
PreviousCh. 8: BRAHMINS AND KSHATRIYAS: THEIR RESPECTIVE NATURES
NextCh. 10: 6 THE REVOLT OF THE KSHATRIYAS