Śampāka
Śampāka
Śampāka is a brāhmaṇa tapasvin (one who lives by tapas, austerity). He appears in the Mahābhārata, in the Mokshadharma Parva of the Śānti Parva. He lives in complete dāridrya (poverty). A king asks him whether poverty is a hardship. Śampāka answers with a teaching known as the Śampāka-Gīta. He says that dāridrya is better than wealth because it brings vairāgya (freedom from attachment). He also says that only tyāga (giving up all desire) leads to paramam (the highest good) and in the end to moksha (liberation).
His teaching
- Poverty and freedom. The poor man has nothing to grieve over, no wealth to guard and no property to lose. His poverty makes vairāgya grow naturally. The rich man is always anxious about guarding and increasing his wealth. He is more deeply bound than the poor man.
- Tyāga is the only path. Śampāka says: “Without tyāga there is neither sukha (happiness) nor moksha. Without tyāga the paramam cannot be reached.” Here tyāga means more than giving up outer things. It means giving up all desire and every feeling of “mine”.
- Dāridrya-sukha. The contentment of the person who has nothing to lose is called Śampāka’s dāridrya-sukha, the happiness of the truly poor. It is not the suffering of poverty. It is the freedom that comes when a person has let go of all attachment.
Place in the Mokshadharma Parva
Śampāka is one of the brāhmaṇa tapasvin teachers who show their teaching through their own lives. The Mokshadharma Parva argues again and again that outer poverty is a help on the spiritual path and not a loss. The Śampāka-Gīta is one of a series of gītas in the part of the Parva that deals with vairāgya. The Maṅkī-Gīta and the Bodhya-Gīta are others in this series.
Sources
- Mahābhārata, Śānti Parva, Mokshadharma Parva, Chapter 176