Vivekananda on the Vedas (part 140)

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SWAMI VIVEKANANDA ON THE VEDAS AND UPANISHADS

By Sister Gayatriprana

part 140

PART III, SECTION 7: THE FRAGMENTATION OF THE VEDIC MESSAGE IN INDIA

Chapter 18: Reaction to Foreign Invasion

a) When the Kings Supported Priestly Tyranny, India Became a Cheap and Ready Prey to the Muslim Invaders

In the Vedic and adjoining periods the royal power could not manifest itself on account of the grinding pressure of the priestly power. We have seen how, during the Buddhistic revolution, resulting in the fall of the brahminical supremacy, the royal power in India reached its culminating point. [Chapter 7, e 1] In the interval between the fall of the Buddhistic and the establishment of the Muslim empire, we have seen how the royal power was trying to raise its head through the Rajputs in India and how it failed in its attempt. At the root of this failure, too, could be traced the same old endeavors of the Vedic priestly class to bring back and revive with a new life their original (ritualistic) days.(1)

[The priests and the kings]… now friendly to each other… and engaged in the satisfaction of mutual self-interest…, being steeped in all the vices consequent upon such a union, e.g. the sucking of the blood of the masses, taking revenge on the enemy, spoliation of others’ property, etc., they in vain tried to imitate the rajasuya and other Vedic sacrifices of the ancient kings, and only made a ridiculous farce of them. The result was that they were bound hand and foot by a formidable train of sycophantic attendance and its obsequious flatteries; and, being entangled in an interminable net of rites and ceremonies with flourishes of mantras and the like, they soon became a cheap and ready prey to the Muslim invaders from the West.(2)

The kshatriyas had always been the backbone of India; so also had they been the supporters of science and liberty, and their voices had rung out again and again to clear the land from superstitions; and throughout the history of India they ever formed the invulnerable barrier to aggressive priestly tyranny.

When the greater part of their number sank into ignorance and another portion mixed their blood with savages from Central Asia and lent their swords to establish the rule of priests in India, her cup became full to the brim and down sank the land of Bharata [india], not to rise again until the kshatriyas rouse themselves and, making themselves free, strike the chains from the feet of the rest. Priestcraft is the bane of India. Can people degrade their brothers and sisters and themselves escape degradation? (3)