truth would be an advantage, they will not tell it.... Yet, strange to
say, some of their works and sayings represent a falsehood as almost
the unpardonable sin. Take the following for an example: 'The sin of
killing a Brahman is as great as that of killing a hundred cows; and
the sin of killing a hundred cows is as great as that of killing a
woman; the sin of killing a hundred women is as great as that of
killing a child in the womb; and the sin of killing a hundred
[children] in the womb is as great as that of telling a lie.'"

[Footnote 1: Joseph Roberts, in his _Oriental Illustrations_, p. 580.]

The Mahabharata is one of the great epics of ancient India. It
contains a history of a war between two rival families, or peoples,
and its text includes teachings with reference to "everything that it
concerned a cultivated Hindoo to know." The heroes in this recorded
war, between the Pandavas and the Kauravas, are in the habit of lying
without stint; yet there is evidence that they recognized the sin of
lying even to an enemy in time of war, and when a decisive advantage
might be gained by it. At a point in the combat when Yudhishthira, a
leader of the Pandavas, was in extremity in his battling with Drona, a
leader of the Kauravas, the divine Krishna told Yudhishthira that, if
he would tell Drona (for in these mythical contests the combatants
were usually within speaking distance of each other) that his loved
"son Aswatthanea was dead, the old warrior would immediately lay down
his arms and become an easy prey." But Yudhishthira "had never been
known to tell a falsehood," and in this instance he "utterly refused
to tell a lie, even to secure the death of so powerful an enemy." [1]
Although it came about that Drona was, as a matter of fact, defeated
by treachery, the sin of lying, even in time of war, and to an enemy,
is clearly brought out as a recognized principle of both theory and