128 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
task to him. This is evident from the following admonition contained in the Bhagvat Gita. Says Krishna :—
IV. 7-8. “O! Bharata, whenever Righteousness declines and Unrighteousness becomes powerful, then I Myself come to birth. I take birth in different Yugas for protecting the Righteous and destroying the Unrighteous and for establishing Righteousness.”
It is not only a special feature of the Hindu social order. It is an extraordinary feature. An examination of consecrations will show that there are instances where society has consecrated inanimate beings and inculcated on the minds of its members the religious belief that they are sacred. There are cases where stones, rivers, trees are made Gods and Goddesses. There are instances where society has consecrated living things and inculcated on the minds of its members the religious belief that they are sacred. But there are no instances where a particular social order has been consecrated by Religion and made sacred. The primitive world had its clan order and its tribal order. But the clan or the tribal order was only a social order and was never consecrated by religion and made sacred and inviolate. The ancient world countries like Egypt, Persia, Rome, Greece, etc., each had its social order in which some were free and some were slaves, some were citizens, some were aliens, some of the race, some of another. This class order again was only a social order and was never consecrated by religion and made sacred and inviolate. The modern world has its order, in some it is Democracy, in some Facism, in some Nazism and in some Bolshevism. But here again the order is only social order. It is not consecrated by religion and made sacred and inviolate.
Nowhere his society consecrated its occupations—the ways of getting a living. Economic activity has always remained outside the sanctity of religion. Hunting society was not without a religion. But Hunting as an occupation was not consecrated by religion and made sacred. Pastoral society was not without religion. But pastorage was not consecrated by religion and made sacred. Farming as an occupation did not become consecrated by religion and made sacred. Feudalism with its gradations, with its Lords, villains and serfs was a purely social in character. There was nothing sacred about it.
The Hindus are the only people in the world whose social order—the relation of man to man is consecrated by religion and made sacred, eternal and inviolate. The Hindus are the only people in the world whose economic order—the relation of workman to workman, is consecrated by religion and made sacred, eternal and inviolate.
It is not therefore enough to say that the Hindus are a people with a sacred code of religion. So are the Zorastrians, Israelites, Christians