Ashoka

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Akosha was the grandson of Chandragupta and the son of Chandragupta II. He expanded the Mauryan Empire to include much of India. After a gruesome war with the kingdom of Kalinga, in which 100,000 people were killed, 100,000 people were deported, and 100,000 people were left homeless, Ashoka realized that war was wrong. He decided to rule by the idea of Ahimsa, or nonviolence, and he attempted to conquer other kingdoms by right conduct alone. He had his ideas inscribed all over his kingdom describing the ideas of morality and Dharma, all in the name of rightness based on the eight-fold path. The inscriptions renounce meat-eating, protecting a wide range of animals, and they are called the rock edicts and the pillar edicts. Ashoka was one of the first politicians to to shy away from the authority of religion and instead base his ideas on morality.

Sources: Manual pages 163-164; [[1]]; [[2]]

Alden Arnold