12-17-2005, 12:01 AM
Shaurya,
I am posting here an alternate interpretation of varna that makes it relevant to the modern world. It has been given by Swami Tapasyananda who was a great scholar of the Ramakrishna order.
This interpretation makes more sense to me than the traditional interpretation.
Gangajal
****************************************************************************************************************
GITA 4.13
According to the aptitudes resulting from the dispositions of Nature (Gunas)
and works, the social order of fourfold division (CHATURVARNYA) has been
created by Me. Though I am their originator, know Me to not an agent but the
spirit unchanging. (Gita 4.13)
Commentary by Swami Tapasyananda:
Caturvarnya or the social order of fourfold division is NOT the caste system,
which is a system of social grouping solely based on birth. Brahmana,
Ksatriya, Vaisya and Sudra, as conceived in the Vedas, is a division based
on the natural constitution of man arising from the dominance of Sattva,
Rajas, and Tamas, the constituents of Nature (Gunas), as also the duties
they are fit to perform according to aptitudes arising from their
constitution. They are mere <b>CHARACTER TYPES</b>. In this context, the reference
to chaturvarnya is meant not to single out any particular society, but to
generalize about the institution of society among men. Just as He is the
author of the order of nature, so is He the author of the order of society
among men also.
*************************************************************************************
GITA 18.41
O great hero! The duties of Brahmanas, Ksatriyas, Vaisyas, and also of
Sudras, have been divided according to the qualities born of their nature.
Commentary by Swami Tapasyananda:
A great doctrine of the social philosophy of ancient India, regarding the
foufold class system, is here propounded. There has been no doctrine so much
misapplied, misunderstood, and misrepresented as this doctrine. The four
Varnas of Brahmana, Ksatriya, Vaisya, and Sudra are today and for a long time
past understood as four hereditary castes. But the Varnas as understood by the
best Indian thinkers, are not caste based on birth in particular groups, but
character types based on the domination of the Sattvika, Rajasika and Tamasika
elements entering into the constitution of their body-mind, and this is
determined by their evolution in their past lives. At least such is the Gita
view. To have identified character types with endogamous social groups is
nothing but an aberration. It is in regard to the fourfold class based on
character that the Lord says in 4.18 Caturvarnyam maya srstam - the order of
four classes is My creation. Here also he speaks of duties pertaining to them
as born of the constituents of Nature forming their body-mind.
These four character types are universal all over the world and the prosperity
of a society will depend on the man of the right nature and character being
put to the right type of duty. For the individuals also doing the duty that
is natural to his psycho-physical constitution is the way of higher evolution.
************************************************************************
GITA 18.45
By being devoted to one's own natural duty, man attains to spiritual
competency. Now hear how devotion to one's own natural duty generates
spiritual competency.
Commentary by Swami Tapasyananda:
This great verse of the Gita links man's social duties with spiritual
discipline. By cultivating a special attitude towards work, work is turned
into worship, and the distance between the shrine room and the work-spot
disappears. This philosophy is based upon a fundamental faith that this world
and the progress of life in it are all under the guidance of Supreme
Intelligence, who is the master of it all, and whose will is expressed in all
its movements. If man has got this faith, man ceases to be self-centered. He
comes to view himself as a worker of God, and all that he does comes to be
done with a sense of dedication to Him. Such work, as accrues to one according
to one's nature and is done with a spirit of dedication, is called Svadharma,
one's natural duty. This outlook on one's work makes a man free from
corruption and negligence, and induces him to put his best effort into his
work. If an attitude of this type were accepted in a society as a whole, it
will be the best social philosophy, besides being a spiritual doctrine. It
will secure the social good as also bring about the individual's spiritual
evolution.
A natural objection to this way of understanding chaturvarnya is that all
commentators understand the four Varnas as endogamous groups called castes,
and their natural duty (svadharma) of theirs as the profession that was
traditionally and scripturally alloted to those groups under the four
distinctive names. Such interpretations of the Gita were given at a time
when these endogamous caste groups were a recognized feature of Indian
society, and thinkers considered birth in a group as tantamount to character
type. The mistake of such identification was obvious to many thinkers of the
past. So some of them have made some kinds of amends for it by admitting that
if great disparity in quality is found in the actual quality of a Ksatriya
with the traditionally ascribed qualities, he can become a Brahmana. But all
rationality seems to have been neutralised by the very strong prejudice in
favour of endogamy.
What the Lord speaks of here as chaturvarnya should never be identified with
castes, because the Varna is said to be solely dependent on character formed
by the Gunas of Prakriti. It is only an ideal grouping based on psychological
principle and not on rigid hereditary basis.
Besides the Gita is a universal Gospel addressed to all mankind, for all
time, and not merely to the Indian society of a particular age. In no part
of the world except in India, caste system strictly based on birth seems to
have existed. Loose castes there have been but not rigid castes. So the old
commentators have done great injustice to Sri Krishna in watering down the
significance of his message as relevant only to members of the rigid Indian
social system.
The only practical way of applying the Gita teaching in this respect today is
to consider the duty to which one is called, as one's svadharma. Strictly
Svadharma is work according to one's nature. But until an ideal and efficient
social system comes into vogue, it may not be possible to give every one a
work for which he is suited by his character type. What could be done for
today, if one's duty is not according to one's nature, is to change it for
a more suitable one, considering the former as Paradharma, the duty of
another type of character. But today most men are found seeking not a duty
temperamentally suitable for them, but what will bring them maximun income.
When a duty is valued solely for the income it fetches, it ceases to be a
pursuit of a Dharma or spiritual value. Receiving remuneration for services
is unavoidable for man in the world, but what is unspiritual is to value
the work only for its remuneration, forgetting that the work he does is an
offering to God, irrespective of the remuneration he gets.
************************************************************************
GITA 18.47
One's own duty, even if without excellence (i.e. inferior in the scale of
worldy values), is more meritorious spiritually than the apparently
well-performed duty of another. For no sin is incurred by one doing works
ordained according to one's nature, (that is, in consonance with one's own
natural evolution.)
Commentary by Swami Tapasyananda:
This verse, which was easy for our ancients to understand, pose great
difficulty for us today. So long as Varna was identifies with endogamous
caste, and valid texts ascribed particular works to each caste (18.41-45),
it was easy to find one's Svadharma. But, as already pointed out, the wording
of the Gita about Caturvanya, except as interpreted by old commentators, does
not by itself mean endogamous castes, but the four psychological types. If
this is accepted, Svadharma would mean only work that springs out of one's
nature and therefore adopted to one's natural development.
*************************************************************************************************
I am posting here an alternate interpretation of varna that makes it relevant to the modern world. It has been given by Swami Tapasyananda who was a great scholar of the Ramakrishna order.
This interpretation makes more sense to me than the traditional interpretation.
Gangajal
****************************************************************************************************************
GITA 4.13
According to the aptitudes resulting from the dispositions of Nature (Gunas)
and works, the social order of fourfold division (CHATURVARNYA) has been
created by Me. Though I am their originator, know Me to not an agent but the
spirit unchanging. (Gita 4.13)
Commentary by Swami Tapasyananda:
Caturvarnya or the social order of fourfold division is NOT the caste system,
which is a system of social grouping solely based on birth. Brahmana,
Ksatriya, Vaisya and Sudra, as conceived in the Vedas, is a division based
on the natural constitution of man arising from the dominance of Sattva,
Rajas, and Tamas, the constituents of Nature (Gunas), as also the duties
they are fit to perform according to aptitudes arising from their
constitution. They are mere <b>CHARACTER TYPES</b>. In this context, the reference
to chaturvarnya is meant not to single out any particular society, but to
generalize about the institution of society among men. Just as He is the
author of the order of nature, so is He the author of the order of society
among men also.
*************************************************************************************
GITA 18.41
O great hero! The duties of Brahmanas, Ksatriyas, Vaisyas, and also of
Sudras, have been divided according to the qualities born of their nature.
Commentary by Swami Tapasyananda:
A great doctrine of the social philosophy of ancient India, regarding the
foufold class system, is here propounded. There has been no doctrine so much
misapplied, misunderstood, and misrepresented as this doctrine. The four
Varnas of Brahmana, Ksatriya, Vaisya, and Sudra are today and for a long time
past understood as four hereditary castes. But the Varnas as understood by the
best Indian thinkers, are not caste based on birth in particular groups, but
character types based on the domination of the Sattvika, Rajasika and Tamasika
elements entering into the constitution of their body-mind, and this is
determined by their evolution in their past lives. At least such is the Gita
view. To have identified character types with endogamous social groups is
nothing but an aberration. It is in regard to the fourfold class based on
character that the Lord says in 4.18 Caturvarnyam maya srstam - the order of
four classes is My creation. Here also he speaks of duties pertaining to them
as born of the constituents of Nature forming their body-mind.
These four character types are universal all over the world and the prosperity
of a society will depend on the man of the right nature and character being
put to the right type of duty. For the individuals also doing the duty that
is natural to his psycho-physical constitution is the way of higher evolution.
************************************************************************
GITA 18.45
By being devoted to one's own natural duty, man attains to spiritual
competency. Now hear how devotion to one's own natural duty generates
spiritual competency.
Commentary by Swami Tapasyananda:
This great verse of the Gita links man's social duties with spiritual
discipline. By cultivating a special attitude towards work, work is turned
into worship, and the distance between the shrine room and the work-spot
disappears. This philosophy is based upon a fundamental faith that this world
and the progress of life in it are all under the guidance of Supreme
Intelligence, who is the master of it all, and whose will is expressed in all
its movements. If man has got this faith, man ceases to be self-centered. He
comes to view himself as a worker of God, and all that he does comes to be
done with a sense of dedication to Him. Such work, as accrues to one according
to one's nature and is done with a spirit of dedication, is called Svadharma,
one's natural duty. This outlook on one's work makes a man free from
corruption and negligence, and induces him to put his best effort into his
work. If an attitude of this type were accepted in a society as a whole, it
will be the best social philosophy, besides being a spiritual doctrine. It
will secure the social good as also bring about the individual's spiritual
evolution.
A natural objection to this way of understanding chaturvarnya is that all
commentators understand the four Varnas as endogamous groups called castes,
and their natural duty (svadharma) of theirs as the profession that was
traditionally and scripturally alloted to those groups under the four
distinctive names. Such interpretations of the Gita were given at a time
when these endogamous caste groups were a recognized feature of Indian
society, and thinkers considered birth in a group as tantamount to character
type. The mistake of such identification was obvious to many thinkers of the
past. So some of them have made some kinds of amends for it by admitting that
if great disparity in quality is found in the actual quality of a Ksatriya
with the traditionally ascribed qualities, he can become a Brahmana. But all
rationality seems to have been neutralised by the very strong prejudice in
favour of endogamy.
What the Lord speaks of here as chaturvarnya should never be identified with
castes, because the Varna is said to be solely dependent on character formed
by the Gunas of Prakriti. It is only an ideal grouping based on psychological
principle and not on rigid hereditary basis.
Besides the Gita is a universal Gospel addressed to all mankind, for all
time, and not merely to the Indian society of a particular age. In no part
of the world except in India, caste system strictly based on birth seems to
have existed. Loose castes there have been but not rigid castes. So the old
commentators have done great injustice to Sri Krishna in watering down the
significance of his message as relevant only to members of the rigid Indian
social system.
The only practical way of applying the Gita teaching in this respect today is
to consider the duty to which one is called, as one's svadharma. Strictly
Svadharma is work according to one's nature. But until an ideal and efficient
social system comes into vogue, it may not be possible to give every one a
work for which he is suited by his character type. What could be done for
today, if one's duty is not according to one's nature, is to change it for
a more suitable one, considering the former as Paradharma, the duty of
another type of character. But today most men are found seeking not a duty
temperamentally suitable for them, but what will bring them maximun income.
When a duty is valued solely for the income it fetches, it ceases to be a
pursuit of a Dharma or spiritual value. Receiving remuneration for services
is unavoidable for man in the world, but what is unspiritual is to value
the work only for its remuneration, forgetting that the work he does is an
offering to God, irrespective of the remuneration he gets.
************************************************************************
GITA 18.47
One's own duty, even if without excellence (i.e. inferior in the scale of
worldy values), is more meritorious spiritually than the apparently
well-performed duty of another. For no sin is incurred by one doing works
ordained according to one's nature, (that is, in consonance with one's own
natural evolution.)
Commentary by Swami Tapasyananda:
This verse, which was easy for our ancients to understand, pose great
difficulty for us today. So long as Varna was identifies with endogamous
caste, and valid texts ascribed particular works to each caste (18.41-45),
it was easy to find one's Svadharma. But, as already pointed out, the wording
of the Gita about Caturvanya, except as interpreted by old commentators, does
not by itself mean endogamous castes, but the four psychological types. If
this is accepted, Svadharma would mean only work that springs out of one's
nature and therefore adopted to one's natural development.
*************************************************************************************************