to recreate in microcosm the macrocosmic geography of the divine
realm, with the palace at the centre representing the abode of the gods
on Mount Meru, the world axis. The impressive rituals at which they
officiated only added to their aura of cosmic power.
Belief in karma and reincarnation provided further legitimisa-
tion. Karma as an inexorable natural law of moral cause and effect
provided an explanation for both individual fortune and social status.
The king ruled as king because through previous lifetimes he had accu-
mulated the necessary karma to do so. In this way karma powerfully
reinforced social hierarchy, for everyone was born into the social situ-
ation they deserved.
Kings sought to maximise their sources of social power: military,
economic, political, and ideological. Ultimately the goal of a powerful
king was to become a universal ruler, or chakravartin. As no ruler could
know how far his karma might permit him to go in realising this ideal,
the potential was always there. A more powerful ruler would have
superior karma, but this was recognised only as a temporary phenome-
non, for who knew what a ruler’s karma had in store, or that of his
successor? This was a worldview that accounted for and reinforced
hierarchies of power; and did so without discredit, for all such hier-
archies were always open to change.
The temporary nature of political power is even more evident
in Buddhism than in Hinduism, for in Buddhism impermanence
(anicca) is one of the three ‘signs of being’, along with the inevitabil-
ity of suffering (dukkha) and the non-existence of a permanent self or
soul (anatta). As all earthly phenomena are impermanent, so are all
configurations of power. One can therefore accept the greater power of
another kingdom, in the knowledge that this will change in time. The
mighty will be laid low, and new powers will arise. The fluidity of this
conception of the world as process contrasted markedly with the order
and stability of the Chinese worldview.
These very differences in worldview allowed Southeast Asian
rulers to accommodate the pretensions even of the emperor of China.
A Short History of China and Southeast Asia