Varna system should be seen as the greatest promoter of diversity and plurality.: "===========================================It assigns task to people according to their inner constitution, for its supporting cosmology believes that it is oppressive and unspiritual to subject people to tasks and vocations that are in contradiction to their natural proclivities. I think it should be quite clear to educators that it is really oppressive to subject people who are interested"
Some Thoughts on Varna, Jati, etc.
From our postcolonial perspective, I think as we interrogate our Indian socio-political existence, it is important to extend the same to the mainstream and dominant western modern and postmodern perspectives. The following comes up for me as I extend the inquiry:
When renaissance happened in Europe, Europe was coming out of dark ages. There were certain socio-political-historical circumstances in which the values of modernity and the modern world emerged. One of them was to jettison the tradition completely: Modernity has a huge distaste for traditions. In contrast, India was moving towards the dark ages around the same time, particularly from the perspective of the Hindus and Hindu civilization. It was able to resist its downfall till the time the Vijayanagara empire was in existence but after its collapse, it was practically the end of the story till the next stage of revival began. Since the socio-political-historical context of the Hindu civilization was different from that of European world, we do not need to be jettisoning our traditions. We do not need to re-enact the European gripe against tradition. We therefore need to examine our traditions on our own terms—from the perspective of the cosmology that supports our traditions and history. If the priesthood in Europe had become the guardians and brokers of power, it does not automatically mean that the Brahimins were doing the same in India.
Eurocentric history cannot be transposed in understanding traditions of the rest of the world. Equality, which is the corner stone of modernity, has an important assumption behind it—that of John Locke’s “Tabula Rasa.” That we are born with a mind that is a blank slate and that our personality is shaped by experiences that we gain through sense perceptions is just a mere assumption. It wears the cloak of science but it is the Christian understanding that we live our lives only once, unlike the Indian understanding that we are reborn and keep getting reborn till we attain our moksha, which informs this theory. Since the theory of rebirth has been validated by sages for centuries in India, even when they have been unorthodox with respect to the Vedas, there is no reason for us to swallow the theory of “tabula rasa” and hence equality hook, line, and sinker. Besides, as long as the scientific truth of “tabula rasa” is in question, there is additionally no reason to accept it as a gospel of truth. A critique of equality does not mean an automatic support of a fascist hierarchy.
A critique of equality does not mean supporting oppression, for the same principles that inform the varna system based on guna and karma, are quite emphatic in stating that any kind of oppression is non-dharmic and unspiritual. Varna system should be seen as the greatest promoter of diversity and plurality. It assigns task to people according to their inner constitution, for its supporting cosmology believes that it is oppressive and unspiritual to subject people to tasks and vocations that are in contradiction to their natural proclivities. I think it should be quite clear to educators that it is really oppressive to subject people who are interested in knowledge and finding out the ultimate secrets of reality and Truth (the natural Brahmans) to the work of governance or production of wealth. Similarly it is oppressive to make a natural businessman pursue spiritual knowledge. The gunas are arranged in hierarchy only in terms of the attainment of moksha and spiritual knowledge. Brahmans (not based on their house of birth but based on the predominance of satvic guna that they have) have the best shot to attain spiritual knowledge, but it must also be remembered that in order to become a yogi or jnani one has to go past all the gunas and consequently the varnas—one needs to become “trigunatita” to attain spiritual knowledge.
A Brahman is not superior to a shudra. Their status is relative to the predominant guna that they have. As long as people are performing their actions in tune with their predominant guna, they are all equal. If a person driven by sattva is pursuing dispassionate knowledge, and if a person driven by rajas and sattva is involved in governance and statesmanship, they both are equal—none is inferior or superior to the other. The notion of inferiority or superiority comes when one is not following one’s dharma according to one’s predominant guna (thus varna in the original sense). The critics of Hinduism forget that the Vedantic traditions are the biggest exponent of equality by stating that it is the same divine which is in everybody and in everything, and it is the one and the same divine that has become the lowest matter to the highest godhead. Besides in yogic pursuit, nurturing, fostering, and pursuing the quality of “samata” is extremely important. Though samata definitely does mean practicing equanimity, it also means seeing the divine equally in all beings and non-beings. If an hierarchical system creates problematic societal issues, a social system based on equality does that too. It is not that the west has created a heaven on earth based on the system of equality. There are many societal problems in the west that I think can be attributed to equality alone. Humility, for once I think takes the biggest hit, and we all know how important humility is for spiritual pursuits and for keeping family together. Equality also breeds arrogance, and I wonder if it has been greatly responsible for the breakdown of social fabric of the western world. It is not that hierarchy has completely disappeared from the western world.
Their class system is very much like the “caste” system. It is just that it is not acknowledged as it is. On the contrary, it has hidden itself in the western world as what we call in the psychological parlance “shadow.” It manifests in much insidious and hideous ways as opposed to when it is acknowledged and on the table. My understanding is that the Vedic system had a good balance of equality and hierarchy.
Whenever it was upset, sages appeared to set the record right. Even as they critiqued the existing social practices, they never critiqued or jettisoned the spiritual understanding or the cosmology of the varna system (the one that is exclusively based on gunas and not on the family of birth) including the Buddha. Both hierarchy and equality have value for creating a robust social system. In India, I think we need to create an ideal mix of hierarchy and equality. However, for integration and reconciliation of both, we need to first transcend the dichotomous divide of hierarchy and equality. By taking inspiration from the dharmic spiritual traditions (Vedanta and Mahayana Buddhism are big on this), we need to understand that both hierarchy and equality are determined by each other—one cannot exist without the other, just like right cannot exist without wrong, day cannot exist without night, mountain cannot be conceived without valley. Once the dichotomous divide has been transcended, we can integrate it following Sri Aurobindo’s principle of “transcend and integrate.”
