Question regarding Chanting of Vedas by women

[Guest guest]

Respected All,

Adiyen is not knowledgable enough(in anything), but

when it comes to vedas i have heard from several

people that women should not be chanting the vedas.

Adiyen does not intend to discriminate women or hurt

anybody's feeling , so i request the learned

bhagavatas to throw some light on this issue.

 

Dasan Anand

 

 

 

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[Guest guest]

Namaskaaram Anand avargale

 

Only a woman who is interested in chanting the vedas

needs to know if she is entitled to do so ,and ,

moreover

If aeons ago ,women were not allowed to chant

mantrams , we possibly wouldnt have had a Andal

Tiruppavai now

 

Regards

Sowmya

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[Guest guest]

Respected Sowmya,

I do respect your interest in chanting the vedas, but

i just wanted to understand what was the exact reason

as to why women were not allowed to chant them.

 

The thought just came to me as a result of my

curiosity , hence i requested the learned bhagavatas

to give me some insight into the underlying thought.

 

I am extremly sorry if adiyen has hurt the feelings of

any bhagavatas.

 

Once again adiyen re-iterates that "I do not mean to

hurt the feelings or intimidate any bhagavatas". I

just wanted to know the reason behind it if any.

 

Dasan,

 

Anand

--- Sowmya N V <sowmya_nv wrote:

> Namaskaaram Anand avargale

>

> Only a woman who is interested in chanting the vedas

> needs to know if she is entitled to do so ,and ,

> moreover

> If aeons ago ,women were not allowed to chant

> mantrams , we possibly wouldnt have had a Andal

> Tiruppavai now

>

> Regards

> Sowmya

>

>

 

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[Guest guest]

Dear Bhagavatas,

Sri Anand has raised an often asked question. AdiEn heard that Because of

Bramha dosham, women cannot chant vedas. Is it true? I request learned

Bhagavats in this list to throw some light on this.

dasan

sridhar ranganatha

[Guest guest]

Namaskaram Ms. Sowmya.

I dont know the what made you to write this mail. But I dont find any

relationship between Andal's Tiruppavai.

The point that in those days ladies were restricted from learning and chating

vedas cannot be denied.

Infact, that could have been one of the reasons for Andal to compose the

Prabandam verses(which are called Dravida Vedam). But we cannot say that Andal

used to chant vedas and mantras. And chating of vedas has nothing to do with

Prabandams. If we go by your argument, then we would have not got the prabandams

of many Alwars since most of them are not Brahmins and in those days only

Brahmins were allowed to learn Vedas.

Regards

Chakravarthy

Sowmya N V <sowmya_nv wrote:Namaskaaram Anand avargale

 

Only a woman who is interested in chanting the vedas

needs to know if she is entitled to do so ,and ,

moreover

If aeons ago ,women were not allowed to chant

mantrams , we possibly wouldnt have had a Andal

Tiruppavai now

 

Regards

Sowmya

[Guest guest]

Dear Members,

 

It is quite true that stree-s are not allowed to chant vedam. There is a

reason for this. As you know the veda mantara-s are made up of bIja, and

other parts. They have to be chanted within the strict rules of phonetics

(siksha). They have strict prosodies.

 

The mantara-s of the veda-s evolve from the nAda-brahman. Dr V Varadachari

has written about the nAda brahman in his book "Agamas and South Indian

Vaishnavism". As you would know, there are six chakras through which the

power of the brahman (sakti) is invoked through yogic practices.

 

The anatomy of a women is much different from that of a man. This is

scientifically true. I wrote about the chakra-s a few days back. You might

want to read about them here:

 

bhakti-list/message/17140

 

Given this fact, the Siksha or phonetics of a mantra cannot be invoked by a

stree. The chanting of the mantras is not a mere process of utterances from

the mouth. It involves much more than that.

 

However, as you would know there are exceptions to that. We had vedic women

seers like Maitreyi, Gargi et al. Please note that these sages are not just

mere humans like us, who now live in the dark age of the Kali Yuga.

 

Indeed, everyone can chant the stotra-s. Sriman Sadagopan Iyengar of

Coimbatore had written an excellent article about that sometime back. It is

in the archives.

 

Present conditions are something completely different. We would be better

off by understanding the rationale behind the practices of those times

instead of understanding the mud wallow that present day society is in now.

This is of course the case when are thoughts are within the parameters of

vedantic thinking.

 

There is a good article in this following website which seems to cover some

contemporary issues within the background of hinduism.

 

http://www.atributetohinduism.com/Women_in_Hinduism.htm

 

Just a thought: We would be better of discussing this topic in the

sv-general group.

 

Regards,

 

Malolan Cadambi

[Guest guest]

Looking at this discussion going on back and forth in this issue, I

have approached a swamin at kanchipuram and heard the following.

If anything found to be an error it is due to my lack of knowledge

and nothing else. I also apologise in advance if this mail hurts

somebody.

 

Sastra's say that anybody without sambandam of Gayathri manthram

should not chant vedam. A person get the Gayathri sambandam by way of

undergoing Upanayanam. Upanayanam is performed only for men and not

for women, and hence this restriction.

 

In olden days caste system was classified into four categories namely

Brahmna, vysya, Kshatriya and Sudra. Out of the four the former three

caste had the practice of performing Upanayanam and chant vedas.

 

Moreover only a Brahmin can learn and teach veda whereas a vysya or a

kshatriya can only learn anc chant vedam and cannot teach vedam. If a

vysya or a Kshatriya want to learn vedam he has to come to Brahmna

Acharya, that is one of the reason Lord Krishna had to been

Sandeepani Maharishi to learn vedam.

 

I refuse the point raised by Sri Chakravarthi, that only Brahmnas

were allowed to chant vedam in those days. It is definitely not true

to the best of my knowledge. Only Sudras were not allowed to chant

vedam. I don't know on what basis he has told this. Even though we

cannot find real Kshatriya or a real Vysya today, still there are

some Kshatriyas and Vysyas undergoing the upanayanam ceremony. Alwars

have born in this world with the Grace of Sriman Narayanan. Hence

definitely Alwars could have composed this 4000 Divya Prabandam at

any cost.

[Guest guest]

Dear Bhaktas,

 

In this correspondence so far, there has beeen no direct quote from Vedas itself

that lays down an injunction against ladies chanting the Vedas. What we know

definitely is only that in the past, our ancestors were following the practice

of ladies being Saha-dharmini's only, assisting their husbands in performing the

vedic rituals.

 

There could be any number of reasons for the origin of this injunction against

ladies. What we have to consider however, is whether there is any reason now to

continue this past practice without reducing the sanctity of the Vedas. Our

Dharma follows the healthy principle indicated long afterwards in the following

lines of Tennyson in Morte d'Arthur:

 

Old order changeth, yielding place to new;

And God fulfills himself in many ways -

Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.

 

Unlike other religions, Sanatana Dharma is a constantly evolving Dharma, much

like the perennial and purifying river Ganga, renewing itself constantly and

thereby continuing to remain fresh, current and pure. (It is still pure in the

upper reaches in the Himalayas, as those who undertake the yatra to Badri will

confirm!).

 

In the past, the custom might have been necessary and good, keeping in view the

living conditions which prevailed in those days. So much has changed since then

and in such radical ways too. By opting for continuing this old good custom, we

might be denying the healthy development of interest in the Vedas and the

spreading of vedic teachings in the present times. Many ladies who have

excelled in academic persuits and engaged in public service are competent to

study Vedic scriptures and contribute their profound thinking on various issues.

Why deny the Vedas that we revere the active and dynamic support of 51% of the

population and restrict it to Males only many of whom, perhaps, fulfill only the

qualification based on gender. We need many more individuals of the caliber of

Gargi, Maitreyi and Andal to propogate Vedic teachings in this

materialistic-value-centered age and times.

 

Let us thank our ancestors for not prescribing a rigid, unchangeable

constitution in the Vedas and barring the ladies for all times. For, if they

had done so, our religion could not be the unique sanatana dharma that it is

today -- with strenth and vitality that comes only through the medium of change,

enabling more of us to choose and travel on the path to the changeless One.

 

Dasan,

Krishnaswamy M.K.

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

I whole heartedly agree with Sri Krishna Swamy that our Dharma has evolved

over thousands of years and should continue to evolve with the change of

times.

He is also, correct in saying that factual evidence from our scriptures has

not been presented as to why women are or should be barred from reciting

vedas.

 

I beg to differ with him however, in that there are no rigid rules in the

Vedas which could be far from the truth. There are rigid rules and so are

many rigid what one might call prejudices hard to get rid of.

 

Adiyen Ramanuja Dasan

 

Keshava Prasad

 

 

 

 

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[Guest guest]

Namaskaram Krishnaswamy avargale

This has been by far the best mail reply i have

read in this group

In case you have a wife ,she is the luckiest in the

world , because she has by her side a man who knows

the real definition of equality ! And more importantly

lives by it

 

Regards

Sowmya

--- "M.K. Krishnaswamy" <krishnaswamy

wrote:

> Dear Bhaktas,

>

> In this correspondence so far, there has beeen no

> direct quote from Vedas itself that lays down an

> injunction against ladies chanting the Vedas. What

> we know definitely is only that in the past, our

> ancestors were following the practice of ladies

> being Saha-dharmini's only, assisting their husbands

> in performing the vedic rituals.

>

>> To Post a message, send it to:

> bhakti-list

> Group Home:

> bhakti-list

> Archives: http://ramanuja.org/sv/bhakti/archives/

>

>

> Your use of is subject to

>

>

>

 

 

 

 

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