Shloka 17
Ethics of Action — Chanakya Niti
शुद्धं भूमिगतं तोयं शुद्धा नारी पतिव्रता ।
शुचिः क्षेमकरो राजा सन्तोषो ब्राह्मणः शुचिः ॥
śuddhaṃ bhūmigitaṃ toyaṃ śuddhā nārī pativratā |
śuciḥ kṣemakaro rājā santoṣo brāhmaṇaḥ śuciḥ ||
Pure is the water found within the earth; pure is the wife devoted to her husband. Pure is the king who is clean and brings security; pure is the Brahmin who is clean and content.
FAQs
In the broader Nītiśāstra milieu, such verses often function as mnemonic lists that reflect elite social ideals: purity associated with natural resources (water), domestic order (the pativratā ideal), political legitimacy (a welfare-producing king), and Brahmanical norms (cleanliness and contentment). The categories mirror the social and political structure of early classical South Asia, where kingship, Brahminical authority, and household ethics were frequently linked in didactic literature.
Purity is framed as a composite of physical cleanliness (śuciḥ/śuddha), social-role conformity (pativratā as a normative marital ideal), and political function (kṣemakara, “welfare-producing,” as a quality of kingship). The verse treats these as culturally salient markers rather than providing a procedural definition.
The shloka uses parallelism and repetition of śuddha/śuciḥ to create an enumerative taxonomy of valued states. “Bhūmigitaṃ toyaṃ” reflects a common premodern association of subterranean water with freshness and freedom from surface contamination, while “kṣemakaro rājā” ties moral/ritual purity to governance through the notion of kṣema (security, welfare). The term “pativratā” is a culturally loaded compound indicating a gendered ideal of marital devotion in Brahmanical discourse.