Shloka 12
Ethics of Action — Chanakya Niti
न देवो विद्यते काष्ठे न पाषाणे न मृण्मये ।
भावे हि विद्यते देवस्तस्माद्भावो हि कारणम् ॥
na devo vidyate kāṣṭhe na pāṣāṇe na mṛṇmaye |
bhāve hi vidyate devas tasmād bhāvo hi kāraṇam ||
Divinity is not in wood, nor in stone, nor in clay. Divinity is in bhāva—inner disposition; therefore bhāva is the cause.
FAQs
In the broader Nītiśāstra milieu, such statements are often read as part of a didactic tradition that comments on the relationship between external forms (e.g., images made of wood, stone, or clay) and internal qualities (bhāva). Historically, this can be situated alongside long-standing South Asian debates about ritual materiality, image worship, and the primacy of intention or inner disposition in ethical and religious life.
The verse frames divinity (deva) not as an inherent property of particular substances (wood/stone/clay) but as something apprehended or located in bhāva—interpretable as inner feeling, intention, or disposition. The formulation presents bhāva as the explanatory basis (kāraṇa) for the recognition of the divine.
The contrast is structured through repeated negation (na...na...na) followed by an affirmative clause, a common aphoristic style in Sanskrit didactic literature. Key terms include mṛṇmaya (“made of clay”), a material descriptor used in discussions of crafted forms, and bhāva, a polyvalent term in Sanskrit intellectual history spanning affect, intention, and mental disposition; the verse leverages this semantic range to shift emphasis from material substrate to interior orientation.