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Bhagavad-gitā  As It is
[Ch. 2]
tion). The  kṣatriyas  are trained for killing in the forest. A  kṣatriya  would go into the forest and challenge a tiger face to face and fight with the tiger with his sword. When the tiger was killed, it would be offered the royal order of cremation. This system is being followed even up to the present day by the  kṣatriya  kings of Jaipur state. The  kṣatriyas  are specially trained for challenging and killing because religious violence is sometimes a necessary factor. Therefore,  kṣatriyas  are never meant for accepting directly the order of  sannyāsa  or renunciation. Nonviolence in politics may be a diplomacy, but it is never a factor or principle. In the religious law books it is stated:
āhaveşu mitho ’nyonyam jighāmsanto mahīkṣitaḥ yuddhamānāḥ paraṁ śaktyā svargaṁ yānty aparāṅmukhāḥ yajñeṣu paśavo brahman hanyante satataṁ dvijaiḥ saṁskṛtāḥ kila mantraiś ca te ’pi svargam avāpnuvan.
“In the battlefield, a king or  kṣatriya , while fighting another king envious of him, is eligible for achieving heavenly planets after death, as the  brāhmaṇas  also attain the heavenly planets by sacrificing animals in the sacrificial fire.” Therefore, killing on the battle on the religious principle and the killing of animals in the sacrificial fire are not at all considered to be acts of violence, because everyone is benefitted by the religious principles involved. The animal sacrificed gets a human life immediately without undergoing the gradual evolutionary process from one form to another, and the  kṣatriyas  killed in the battlefield also attain the heavenly planets as do the  brāhmaṇas  who attain them by offering sacrifice.
There are two kinds of  svadharmas , specific duties. As long as one is not liberated, one has to perform the duties of that particular body in accordance with religious principles in order to achieve liberation. When one is liberated, one's  svadharma —specific duty—becomes spiritual and is not in the material bodily concept. In the bodily conception of life there are specific duties for the  brāhmaṇas  and  kṣatriyas  respectively, and such duties are unavoidable.  Svadharma  is ordained by the Lord, and this will be clarified in the Fourth Chapter. On the bodily plane  svadharma  is called  varṇāśrama-dharma , or man's steppingstone for spiritual understanding. Human civilization begins from the stage of  varṇāśrama-dharma , or specific duties in terms of the specific modes of nature of the body obtained. Discharging one's specific duty in any field of action in accordance with  varṇāśrama-dharma  serves to elevate one to a higher status of life.