[Advaita-l] Eligibility of Shudras & Outcastes to learn Hinduism

[Sunil Bhattacharjya]

Namaste,

The Shudras were to assist the Dvijas and that means the Brahmanas, Kshatriyas and the Vaishyas. That is more a theoretical statement because in the past  it was the Kshatriyas and the Vaishyas, who needed assistants more than the Brahmanas needed. The Brahmanas generally had their students to help them. For example Adi Sankaracharya did not have a shudra servant to attend to his needs.


During the colonial times the Britishers wanted to apply their strategy of  "Divide and rule" and the census was the first varna-based census and the term "Caste was coined at that time. Megasthenes reported that there was no slave in India.


Secondly the work of the Shudras was more like paryutthanatmaka, where physical help was needed, say if a Kshatriya wanted to make a vehicle or a Vaishya wanted to lift a bag of grains he could have a Shudra to help him as the Shudras were not having any specialised education and trainin g like the Dvijas to do specialised work themselves.

Regards,
Sunil KB



________________________________
 From: Venkata sriram P <venkatasriramp at yahoo.in>
To: advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org 
Sent: Wednesday, July 18, 2012 9:56 PM
Subject: [Advaita-l] Eligibility of Shudras & Outcastes to learn Hinduism
 
There is an apavAda on the statement that shUdrAs are required to 
serve the brAhmaNAs.  Straight away this is lifted as it is and 
was thrust on shUdrAs saying that *you must serve a brAhmaNa*.
 
At the same time, one must also see that what sort of brAhmaNa
was he asked to serve.  He should be sadAchAri, shrOtriya who 
should perform all the shaTkarmAs.  And above all, devoid of 
superiority complex that he belongs to brAhmaNa varNa.  
 
If one serves such a brAhmaNa, naturally, he would be blessed with
kalyANa only because such a brAhmaNa only performs his 
anuSTAna for lOka kalyANa by offering his tapObala. 
 
People tend to forget this *extra responsibility* having taking birth in
brahmin families.   They should perform sandhyavandana, devatarchana,
brahma yajna, aupasana etc.  The thread they are wearing on the left shoulder
should remind them of their kartavya that they are born for anuSTAna only
not for *eat, drink and be merry*.  
 
Hope the philosophy behind chAturvarNa is clear now.
 
regs,
sriram
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