Vivekananda on the Vedas (part 167)

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Parts 1 to 166 were posted earlier. This is part 167. Your comments are welcome... Vivekananda Centre London

Earlier postings can be seen at http://www.vivekananda.btinternet.co.uk/veda.htm

 

SWAMI VIVEKANANDA ON THE VEDAS AND UPANISHADS

By Sister Gayatriprana

part 167

 

3. Under Buddhism and Foreign Invasion Women Were Deprived of Their Vedic Rights

It is very difficult to understand why in [india] so much difference is made between men and women when the Vedas declare that one and the same conscious Self is present in all beings.(42)

Q: Are you… entirely satisfied with the position of women [in India]?

Swami Vivekananda: By no means; but our right of interference is limited entirely to giving education. Women must be put in a position to solve their own problems in their own way. No one can or ought to do this for them. Our Indian women are as capable of doing it as any in the world.

Q: How do you account for the evil influence which you attribute to Buddhism?

Swami Vivekananda: It came only with the decay of the faith. Every movement triumphs by dint of some unusual characteristic and, when it falls, that point of pride becomes its chief element of weakness. The Lord Buddha - the greatest of men - was a marvelous organizer and carried the world by this means. But his religion was the religion of a monastic order. It had, therefore, the evil effect of making the very robe of the monk honored. He also introduced for the first time the community life of religious houses and thereby necessarily made women inferior to men, since the great abbesses could take no important step without the advice of certain abbots. In ensured its immediate object - the solidarity of the faith. You see, only its far-reaching effects are to be deplored.

Q: But sannyasa is recognized in the Vedas!

Swami Vivekananda: Of course it is, but without making any distinction between men and women (43)

The vaishya and the shudra [when writing letters] should sign themselves as dasa and dasi [servant, male or female]; but the brahmin and kshatriya should write deva and devi. [god and goddess]. Moreover, these distinctions of case and the like have been the invention of our modern, sapient brahmins. Who is a servant, and to whom? Everyone is a servant of the Lord Hari. Hence a woman should use her patronymic, that is, the surname of her husband. This is the ancient Vedic custom.(44)

In what scriptures do you find statements that women are not competent for knowledge and devotion? In the period of degradation, when the priests made the other castes incompetent for the study of the Vedas, they deprived women also of their rights.(45)

There is a passage in the later law books that a women shall not read the Vedas. So it is prohibited to a weak brahmin, even; if a brahmin boy is not strong-minded, the law applies to him also. But that does not show that education is prohibited to them, for the Vedas are not all that the Hindus have. Every other book a woman can read, all the mass of Sanskrit literature, that whole ocean of literature, science, drama, poetry is all for them; they can go there and read that, except the scriptures. In later days the idea was that a woman was not intended to be a priest; what is the use of her studying the Vedas?(46)

[The barbarous custom of ] child-marriage was resorted to in northern India to protect the girls from falling into the hands of the ruthless [Muslim] invaders who would carry them off to their harems. (47)

[Guest guest]

Dear Charles

 

I will share your message on the list as I am sure you will get interesting

feedback.

 

regards

jay Vivekananda Centre London

 

====================message from Charles==============

-

" shinkai_birx " <crbirx

" Vivekananda Centre " <vivekananda

Wednesday, August 06, 2003 04:26

 

Re: Vivekananda on the Vedas (part 167)

 

 

 

Greetings,

 

Reading the question and answer writings below I would like to ask if

the Ramakrishna Mission has women learders? All the photos I see of

centers here in the USA and other countries picture men as the

leaders. Pictures of conferences show only men on the stage. It

seems that the statement, " ...the community life of religious houses

and thereby necessarily made women inferior to men... " may also

apply to Ramakrishna Mission. Do women give mantra diksha in the

Ramakrishna lineage? I do not know how the Ramakrishna Mission is

organized. Perhaps I have a wrong picture of the structure.

 

Many thanks,

charles