Gṛhasthāśrama

Gṛhasthāśrama · gṛha-stha-āśrama, “the householder’s stage of life”

Gṛhasthāśrama is the householder stage of life, the second of the four āśramas. Chapter 26 of the Mārkaṇḍeya Purāṇa teaches the dharma of the householder (gṛhastha) as Mādālasā taught it to Alarka. The teaching centres on the pañca-yajñas (five daily yajñas), the treatment of guests, serving others before oneself, and the truth that the householder holds up all four āśramas. Chapter 152 of the Agni Purāṇa adds the means of livelihood of the householder.

The Bhāgavata Purāṇa tells that gārhasthya came forth from the waist of the Virāṭ Purusha, gives the four vṛttis by which the gṛhastha lives, and through Nārada Maharshi‘s teaching to Yudhishṭhira and Śrī Kṛshṇa‘s teaching to Uddhava sets out how the householder lives: offering every karma to Bhagavān Vāsudeva, performing the five yajñas, taking no more wealth than he needs, seeing all beings as his own and dwelling in his house like a guest. Such a gṛhastha, it says, is a jīvanmukta and reaches Īśvara while still at home; but the one bound by the home, like the pigeon caught in the hunter’s net, falls again into saṃsāra.

The gṛhastha as the kāmadhenu

The Mārkaṇḍeya Purāṇa calls the gṛhastha the kāmadhenu (the wish-fulfilling cow) of the four āśramas. The kāmadhenu feeds all who come to her. In the same way the householder feeds the brahmacārī, the vānaprasthī and the sannyāsī through the fruits of his yajñas, his dāna and his hospitality. Without the householder’s work in the world, the other three āśramas cannot be kept up. Mādālasā presents this as an honour and not a burden: to be the āśrama that sustains the others is to be the most central.

Ṛtu-kāla-dharma

The first particular duty named for the householder is ṛtu-kāla-dharma. This is the keeping of the right time for union with his wife, which is only in the set period after her monthly ṛtu. It is the base of the householder’s life of dharma. It keeps his share in kāma (desire) within the bounds of dharma.

The five yajñas

The five daily yajñas (pañca-yajñas) of the householder are:

  1. Deva-yajña: offerings to the devas through the sacred fire (homa)
  2. Pitṛ-yajña: offerings to the ancestors through tarpaṇa and piṇḍa
  3. Manushya-yajña: care of guests (atithi-sevā)
  4. Bhūta-yajña: offerings to all living creatures, including animals and insects, by scattering food
  5. Brahma-yajña (also called Veda-yajña): daily recitation of the Vedas

These five are to be done every day, as far as one is able. They are the least that the householder must do. They keep him joined to all five kinds of beings to whom he owes a debt.

The order of feeding

The householder must feed others before himself, in this order:

  1. The pitṛ-gaṇas (ancestors), through piṇḍa and tarpaṇa
  2. The devatā-gaṇas (the devas), through homa and pūjā
  3. The atithis (guests who come without being invited), before any member of the family eats
  4. The jñātis (kinsmen and relatives)
  5. The bhṛtyas (servants and dependants)

Only when all these have been fed may the householder and his family eat from the food that is left. This rule is called bhukta-śesha (eating from what remains after serving others). It is the mark of gṛhastha-dharma.

Care of the guest

The treatment of the atithi (the guest who comes to the door without being invited) is given special stress. The word atithi (a + tithi) means one who comes without a fixed day, that is, at any time. Such a guest must be received with honour and fed without delay. Failing to honour an atithi is a grave adharma, and it directly harms the puṇya (merit) the householder has gathered.

The results

Mādālasā states that a householder who does not perform the pañca-yajñas will go to naraka (hell). A householder who performs them faithfully gains moksha-lābha, the power to reach moksha. The householder is not told to give up the world but to take part in it fully within the framework of dharma. In doing so he sustains both the world and his own path to moksha.

Gṛhastha dharma in the Agni Purāṇa

In Chapter 152 of the Agni Purāṇa, Pushkara teaches Paraśurāma about the livelihood and conduct of the householder.

Livelihood of the brāhmaṇa. The brāhmaṇa must live by his own work in dharma (svakīya-karma). If he cannot support himself by it, he may in āpat-kāla (a time of emergency) turn to the livelihood of a kshatriya or a vaiśya. He may never turn to the work of the saṃkara-jātis (the mixed groups). In hard need the dvija (twice-born) may farm, trade, keep cows (go-rakshaṇa) or lend money. But he must never trade in cow’s milk, sugar, salt, strong drink or meat.

Farming and its permitted scales. Farmers who till the earth, cut plants and kill insects and other small creatures without meaning to may cleanse those pāpas by yajña and deva-pūjā. A plough drawn by eight bullocks is fully in keeping with dharma. A plough with six bullocks is a plough for livelihood. Four bullocks are for those who are stricter. Two bullocks are for those who must keep adharma in farming as small as they can.

Five lawful means of livelihood are named for the householder:

  1. Ṛtam: gathering only the grains that have fallen at the threshing floor, and living on these alone
  2. Amṛtam: living wholly on what is offered without asking (ayācita-vṛtti)
  3. Mṛtam: living on what is left after all others have been fed (bhikshā-vṛtti)
  4. Pramṛtam: farming (vyavasāya)
  5. Satya-anṛtam: trade and commerce (vāṇijya)

The worst way, śva-vṛtti (the life of a dog), meaning servility and low service, must never be taken up by the householder.

Per Vāmana Purāṇa

In the Vāmana Purāṇa, the maharshis of the āśramas of Magadha, teaching dharma to the rākshasa king Sukeśī, name the best of every kind: as Janārdana is the best among all devatās, Himavān among mountains, the Sudarśana cakra among weapons and Gaṅgā among rivers, so the gṛhasthāśrama is the best among the āśramas. The same comparison leads them to their teaching that the kṛtaghna, the ungrateful one, is the lowest of all who do pāpa.

Per Bhāgavata Purāṇa

The Bhāgavata Purāṇa teaches the gṛhasthāśrama in many places: in the creation of the āśramas by Brahmā, in the dharma of the varṇas and āśramas that Nārada Maharshi teaches Yudhishṭhira and that Śrī Kṛshṇa teaches Uddhava, and in the words of bhaktas and maharshis on the bonds of the home. Its one teaching is that the householder should offer every karma of his āśrama to Bhagavān Vāsudeva and live in his house without the sense of “mine”; then, even while remaining a gṛhastha, he reaches Īśvara.

The origin of gārhasthya

Maitreya tells Vidura that when Brahmā created the worlds, the four āśramas, brahmacarya, gārhasthya, vānaprastha and sannyāsa, came forth from him with their dharmas, together with dharma and its four pādas (feet); and the āśramas and their vṛttis (means of life) were created in the same order. The four vṛttis of the gṛhastha āśrama are:

  1. Vārtā: a livelihood allowed by the śāstras, such as growing crops.
  2. Sañcaya: earning one’s living by serving as yājaka (officiating priest) at yajñas and other Vaidika karmas.
  3. Śālīna: living on what comes without asking.
  4. Śilāñcha: living on the grains that lie on the ground after the harvest is cut, and the grains fallen in the places where grain is sold.

Śrī Kṛshṇa tells Uddhava that, in his Virāṭ form, brahmacarya came from his heart, gārhasthya from his waist, vānaprastha from his chest and sannyāsa from his head.

Source: Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Skandha 3, Chapter 12; Skandha 11, Chapter 17

Nārada’s teaching to Yudhishṭhira

When Dharmarāja Yudhishṭhira asked Nārada Maharshi for the sanātana dharma of the varṇas and āśramas, Nārada told him the dharma he had heard from the mouth of Bhagavān Nārāyaṇa, who performs tapas at Badarikāśrama. For dvijas purified by birth and by karmas, the karmas of the four āśramas are ordained. The maharshis who see the mantras ordained dharma for every person according to his svabhāva (nature). Living by the livelihood fixed by his svabhāva and practising his svadharma, a person should slowly give up even that karma, go beyond the guṇas and become jīvanmukta. As a field that is sown too much becomes barren of itself, so the mind, the home of desires, gains vairāgya (dispassion) after enjoying desires for some time, not all at once; if it enjoys only a few small desires it does not become calm, like a fire into which a few drops of ghee are poured. That is, while practising svadharma it is good to enjoy some desires in the gṛhasthāśrama, and lasting vairāgya grows in that way.

The rules for guarding one’s śīla (conduct) that bind the brahmacārī are ordained also for the gṛhastha and the sannyāsī; for the gṛhastha who lives with his wife, service of the guru and the like are optional, done if he can. When the brahmacārī has finished his study of the Vedas, their Upanishads and their aṅgas, he offers the guru the gift the guru asks, and with his permission he may enter the gṛhasthāśrama, go to the forest for tapas, take sannyāsa, or stay on in the gurukula. The brahmacārī, gṛhastha, vānaprastha and sannyāsī who live thus by rule all come to know the ātma-tattva and attain Parabrahma as the ātmā.

Source: Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Skandha 7, Chapters 11–12

How the householder lives

Then Dharmarāja asked how a householder like himself, whose mind is bound to the home, could easily attain the direct realisation of the ātmā, and Nārada gave him the dharmas of householders.

  • The householder should do the karmas of his āśrama as if offering them directly to Vāsudeva, and should serve the mahātmās.
  • Whenever his daily duties leave him time, he should listen with śraddhā, again and again, to the nectar of the accounts of the avatāras of Bhagavān Vishṇu, among people free from attachment.
  • Body, wife and children will one day leave of themselves; as a man who wakes lets go of a dream, he should slowly give up his attachment to them by the power of the company of the good.
  • He should use the body and the home only as far as there is need of them; free from attachment within, he should behave outwardly like an ordinary man, and accept, without the sense of “mine”, whatever his relatives, parents, children, brothers and friends do and desire.
  • All wealth, whether from the rains and the crops, from the earth as gold, or coming suddenly, is brought by Acyuta himself. A man has a right only to as much as fills his belly; the one who claims more is a thief and deserves punishment.
  • He should regard deer and wild beasts, camels, donkeys, monkeys, mice, creeping creatures, birds and flies as his own children.
  • He should not strain after dharma, artha and kāma, but take them only as far as daiva (the divine dispensation) has made them available, according to place and time; and he should share his enjoyments, each as is fitting, even with dogs, with those of pāpa and with the fallen, and serve all beings.
  • The man who gives up attachment to woman brings even Bhagavān Vāsudeva, the unconquered, under his control.
  • With the wealth gained by the grace of daiva he should perform the pañca-yajñas, to the devas, the pitṛs, the ṛshis, men and beings, and live on what remains; giving up the sense of “mine” in all that remains, he attains the ātma-sākshātkāra that the mahātmās attain.
  • With the wealth of his own livelihood he should worship Parameśvara, who is present as the devatās, the ṛshis, men, beasts and birds and the ātmā; when he has the means, by agnihotra and the other karmas by the method of the Kalpa-sūtras. Yet Bhagavān Vishṇu, the enjoyer of every share of yajña, is not so pleased by homa in the fire as by food offered to a knower of the Veda.

Nārada closes the teaching: whatever thing is not forbidden to a person at his place and time, with that alone he should carry on his work, and except in times of calamity he should not go near forbidden things. The man who worships Bhagavān Vishṇu with bhakti, doing these karmas and the others the Veda enjoins on him, reaches the svarūpa of Īśvara, moksha, even while remaining in the gṛhasthāśrama.

Source: Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Skandha 7, Chapters 14–15

Śrī Kṛshṇa’s teaching to Uddhava

Śrī Kṛshṇa, teaching Uddhava the dharmas of the varṇas and āśramas, says:

  • The brahmacārī who wishes to become a gṛhastha should marry a girl fit for him, without faults, of the same varṇa and younger in age.
  • All who have had the upanayana are entitled to yajña, study of the Veda and dāna; only the brāhmaṇa may receive dāna, teach the Veda and conduct yajña for others.
  • The brāhmaṇa who lives with a contented mind on grains fallen in the fields and the market follows a great and spotless dharma; offering his mind to Śrī Kṛshṇa, without much attachment to saṃsāra, he gains moksha while living at home. Whoever lifts up a knower of the Veda who suffers in poverty and has ekānta-bhakti to Śrī Kṛshṇa, him Śrī Kṛshṇa lifts out of dangers as a boat lifts one out of the sea.
  • The gṛhastha performs the pañca-yajñas: brahma-yajña, study of the Veda; deva-yajña, honouring the devatās with homa; pitṛ-yajña, honouring the pitṛ-devatās with piṇḍa-dāna; bhūta-yajña, giving food to beings; and manushya-yajña, the gift of food to men. The devatās, pitṛs, beings and men are all forms of Śrī Kṛshṇa, so he worships them every day according to his means.
  • The meeting of the jīva with children, wife, friends and relatives is like the meeting of travellers in a rest-house, or the relations in a dream; separation from them all comes with the body. Reflecting so, he should live in his house like a guest. The gṛhastha without ahaṅkāra (I-ness) and mamakāra (my-ness), not attached to the house, is a jīvanmukta.
  • Having had children and worshipping Śrī Kṛshṇa with bhakti through the karmas of his āśrama, the gṛhastha may remain a gṛhastha, or become a vānaprastha or a sannyāsī. One may go from a lower āśrama to a higher, but not from a higher to a lower.
  • Even for the gṛhastha who lives with his wife the dharmas are brahmacarya (here, looking at no woman but his wife), tapas, śauca (purity), santosha (contentment) and maitrī (friendliness) to all beings; and the ārādhana of Śrī Kṛshṇa as Īśvara is the dharma of every āśrama. Whoever performs his svadharma without desire and serves Śrī Kṛshṇa sees Śrī Kṛshṇa alone in all beings and soon gains firm bhakti to him.
  • The vānaprastha too performs, as the gṛhastha does, the agnihotra, the darśa-pūrṇamāsa and the cāturmāsya.
  • But the attached gṛhastha, his heart scattered by the vāsanās of saṃsāra, never satisfied with enjoyments and thinking only of wife and sons, dies and is born as an animal or bird, without viveka.

Source: Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Skandha 11, Chapters 17–18

The fort and the bonds of the home

When Śuka told of Priyavrata, Parīkshit asked how so great a bhakta could fit into the gṛhasthāśrama, for people sunk in household life forget their own svarūpa and are caught in the bondage of karma. Śuka told him the words of Brahmā to Priyavrata: what fault can touch a jñānī who has conquered the senses and delights in the ātmā, even in the gṛhasthāśrama? As a king who takes shelter in a fort can conquer even strong enemies, so the wise sādhaka should first practise his sādhana in the gṛhasthāśrama and conquer the six inner enemies; then, whether he stays a gṛhastha or goes to the forest, there is no difference. Yet the household āśrama, the home of sense-enjoyments, is like a reservoir mixed with poison, and the desire for enjoyment is hard to overcome; Manu, having installed Priyavrata, gave up that desire.

In the forest of saṃsāra that Śuka explains to Parīkshit, the gṛhāśrama is a field for karmas: though a field is ploughed every year, if the seeds in it are not burnt it is overgrown by sowing time, and so karmas are never wholly removed in the house, for the house is the birthplace of desires. To undertake all the karmas prescribed for a gṛhastha is like climbing a great mountain over thorns and sharp stones.

In the city of Purañjana that Nārada describes to King Barhishat, the queen Purañjanī praises the gṛhastha life: in the gṛhasthāśrama there are dharma, artha and kāma, the joy of sons and fame, and through it one gains pure puṇya-lokas free of sorrow; the elders say it is a refuge of welfare for the pitṛ-devatās, the devas, the ṛshis, men, all beings and oneself. And Nārada teaches the king that the gṛhastha who takes his children, wife and wealth to be the aims of life, and performs kāmya karmas for them, goes round and round in saṃsāra.

Prahlāda, praising Bhagavān Narasiṃha, says that the pleasure of union in the gṛhāśrama is to be censured: it is like scratching an itch with both hands, a little pleasure at first and unbroken sorrow after. And in the Dattātreya Gītā that Śrī Kṛshṇa tells Uddhava, the pigeon, one of the gurus, teaches the same: when his wife and chicks were caught in the hunter’s net, the male pigeon lamented that his gṛhāśrama, the means to dharma, artha and kāma, was destroyed, and fell into the net himself. So the householder who delights in the pairs of joy and sorrow perishes with wife and sons; and the one who, born a human, which is the door to moksha, is attached to saṃsāra like that pigeon, is called by the mahātmās ārūḍhacyuta, “one who climbed up and slipped and fell”.

Source: Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Skandha 4, Chapter 25; Skandha 5, Chapters 1, 14; Skandha 7, Chapter 9; Skandha 11, Chapter 7

Sources

  • Mārkaṇḍeya Purāṇa, Chapter 26
  • Agni Purāṇa, Chapter 152
  • Vāmana Purāṇa, Chapter 12
  • Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Skandha 3, Chapter 12; Skandha 4, Chapter 25; Skandha 5, Chapters 1, 14; Skandha 7, Chapters 9, 11–12, 14–15; Skandha 11, Chapters 7, 17–18