From: bhattach@quip.eecs.umich.edu (sayan bhattacharyya)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Re: Hinduism and women
Date: 9 Sep 1992 21:47:57 GMT
Organization: University of Michigan EECS Dept., Ann Arbor, MI
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: remarque.berkeley.edu
Originator: muffy@remarque.berkeley.edu

In article <18ids0INNdtf@agate.berkeley.edu> raju@chekov.usc.edu (Raju Narayanan) writes:
>In article 4947 Diane writes,
>>In discussing this problem people should realise that the people
>>are usually Hindu, a religion which maintains that to be a woman
>			^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>>is a cursed state 
>^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>
>Although, what Diane says about Hinduism is true, there
>is of course, the other side of the coin.
>
>	1) There are many goddesses in Hinduism.
>	2) The supreme of all gods is believed to be Shakti ( a goddess)
>	3) Lord Shiva( one of the two most popular gods in Hinduism) gave
>	one half of his body to Shakti (probably symbolizing equality)


I think it is important to note that abuses against women in India are
not confined only to the Hindu community but to minority religious
communities as well. It is rather simplistic to ascribe , as the author
quoted by Diane Bailey did, the cause of such abuse to the influence 
of one single religion.

Religion is a pliant tool and has always been manipulated by the 
elite ( the social elite, the economic elite as well as the sexual
elite ) to perpetuate their hegemony. This has happened at all 
places and at all times and Hinduism is no exceptional to this rule.

So I think that both Raju and the author quoted by Diane are being 
naive about the role of religion in this issue. It
is social practice disguised as religion which is responsible here,
not religion *as*  religion. Such social practice, as usual , is
born of economic factors, as I have maintained in my postings on this
thread. Philosophical interpretations of Hindu goddess cults or
the cult of Shakti , however interesting, is therefore totally 
irrelevant to the discussion.


>Another point to be noted is that Hinduism is no one religion; it is a 
>collection  different relegions that have different philosophies, different 
>gods and different sets of rituals, the only commonality being the willingness 
>of the people to accept other gods. 

Following up on this very good observation by Raju, let me point
out something that might be interesting to readers of this newsgroup.
As Raju says, Hinduism is an accumulative religion . As it spread 
over India after the Aryan invasion , Hinduism encompassed within 
its fold the local deities of the various indigenous ethnic groups. 
Archaeological evidence suggests that these original inhabitants 
were matriarchal people with significantly high status for women.
Their deities also tended to be goddess figures , usually variations
on the Mother Goddess theme. On the other hand the religion that
the Aryan invadors brought with them was markedly patriarchal. The
upshot of this cultural encounter was that the local female deities 
were internalised within  Hinduism, but with significant loss
of their former status.  Also , the Aryans entered India through
the western borders , and the patriarchal Aryanising influence 
grows significantly weaker as one moves further and further east. 
Thus the male figure of Rama is the most popular deity in the 
strongly Aryanised North India and North-West India, while the
mother-goddess figure of Durga , probably a remnant of a pre-Aryan
culture, continues to be popular in East India (e.g. Bengal). The
southern tip of India similarly retained something of the matriarchal
heritage (note the custom of tracing lineage through matrilineal
ancestry in parts of South India).

>
>Raju
>

-Sayan Bhattacharyya
 
~~~~~~~~~~


Sayan Bhattacharyya
Artificial Intelligence Lab     bhattach@quip.eecs.umich.edu
The University of Michigan      bhattach@caen.engin.umich.edu


>
>
>-- 
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