Hindu Sexism and Male Perception of Female Dharma, or What is the Meaning of Her Life?
Hindu Sexism and Male Perception of Female Dharma, or
What is the Meaning of Her Life?
In every era of history, in every walk of life, people have their own opinions of what the meanings of their lives. Their decisions are made based on how they perceive their own lives, and the things they have to do. In Hinduism, this is known as their dharma. People make decisions based on what their dharma is – what they need to do to lead a fulfilling life. People also make judgments of others based on how they perceive their dharma. They form opinions about the rest of the world based on how they see their own dharma, and how they see other people's dharma, specifically how they see the dharma of people of the opposite gender. Is that woman taking care of her husband? Is that man providing for his family? Is that daughter respecting her elders? Is that son studying hard in school? Perceptions of the duty of another can be very different from perceptions that person might have of their own duty, and lead to conflict or misunderstanding. The purpose of this paper is to understand and explain how men in Hindu traditions perceive and have perceived female dharma in general.
The key issue seems to be a patriarchic system in which the idea of dharma developed, which lead to female dharma being predominantly defined by men, and therefore defined in a way that was self serving. Women's dharma, or strīdharma, is centered around housework and family life. A women's duty is concern for her family, "service to her husband" (Flood 66), and doing rituals for the wellbeing of the family; as Flood so aptly puts it, "love [is] a woman's svadharma, or more correctly her strīdharma, 'woman's duty'" (Flood 65). The ideal woman has "modesty, patience, and above all, a strong sense of duty towards her family, the community, and the nation" (Hurst 28). Women are to be revered and kept happy by their husbands, but if the family is having hard times, it is perceived as the fault of the woman, as she must have been doing something wrong for bad things to happen to the family, and she must perform a ritual to fix the mistake. She will be instructed to fast, or perform rituals, or pray to various deities, in order to protect her family and more specifically her husband. Strīdharma is about a life of seva, or service to others, especially men. In some brahmanical tradition a 'good woman' could be defined as one who "dies on her husband's funeral pyre if he predeceases her" (Flood 66). Though this is now illegal, it emphasizes the idea that women exist mostly to serve men, a rather sexist perception of gender roles.
Female dharma probably is the way it is because of the gender roles in India, and the idea that all women are subordinate to men and weaker than them, and "feminist scholars have shown that Hindu gender ideologies bolster male power and subjugate women" (Derne 16). One of the primary writers on the subject of dharma, Manu, writes about male and female roles in the context of caste. He believes that "a Bhraman who sleeps with a Śūdra woman goes to hell and loses brahmanical status upon the birth of a son" (Flood 60) and has different punishments for men and women who commit adultery, "the woman being 'eaten by dogs in a place frequented by many' and the man 'burnt on a red hot iron bed'" (Flood 60). This separate treatment of men and women shows the belief that they are fundamentally different, which leads easily to the belief that their dharma is fundamentally different. Cross-caste marriages are condemned in Manu, but if they are to occur he states that 'with the grain' marriages are better than 'against the grain.' This means that if a man and a woman of different castes are to marry, the man should always be of higher caste than the woman (Flood 60-61). This again shows a common belief that men are or should be superior to their wives, which is reflected in women's strīdharma, to serve their husbands, or be subordinate to them. According to Manu, women are "to be subject to male control throughout their lives" (Flood 66) which is probably derived from the belief that women are fundamentally subordinate to men. Another example of this in modern society is clear in the words of Deevender Mishra, "a 37-year-old heading a household that includes his wife, aged mother, and unmarried siblings…if a wife 'complains against someone, the husband should not take too much notice of it even if she is telling the truth. If everything of the wife is accepted, there is only trouble in that'" (Derne 23). Clearly, sexism is alive and well in India today, enforced by male concepts of strīdharma as service to the men in the family.
An example of a story about gender roles and dharma is the Rāmāyaṇā. The two main characters, Rāma and Sītā, "are ideal examples of dharmic gender roles for Hindu couples" (Flood 109), and Sītā fulfills her strīdharma to the letter. "Sītā, the long-suffering and faithful consort of Rāma may not need much introduction. Her name is often the first mentioned in discussions of epic role models and there is no doubt that she functions prominently in the psychology of Hindu women" (Hurst 119). When Rāma is banished to the forest, she accompanies him, and at the when "Rāma banishes Sītā to [a] hermitage" (Flood 108) for being suspected of being unfaithful to him, she continues to raise their children, thus completing her strīdharma despite being separated from her husband, even though she already went through a fire ordeal "to prove her faithfulness to her husband during the time she spent with her abductor" (Hurst 119). This is a powerful scene, contested within the tradition itself. "The image of Sītā engulfed in flames is imbued with meaning and remains relevant to the life of many contemporary Hindu women" (Hurst 119). Much of Sītā's dialogue in the Rāmāyaṇā emphasizes her subservience to her husband, demonstrating what an ideal woman should do, in the eyes of a male author. She defines strīdharma when she says to her husband, "to a woman, neither father nor son nor mother nor friends but the husband alone is her sole refuge here in this world and in other worlds, too. Hence I shall accompany you. Life with the husband is incomparably superior to life in a palace, or an aerial mansion, or a trip to heaven" ("The Ramayana of Valmiki" 901). Sītā then willingly follows her husband into the forest, threatening suicide if she is not allowed to follow him and complete her strīdharma. This is arguably a moment of great significance for the rest of the story, as it portrays a women's decision making, and implies that the "right" choice is to follow her husband into the forest (Hurst 120). A common theme throughout Hindu literature is "the frequent backsliding of powerful patriarchs, which brings untold suffering upon themselves and their families, relieved only by the steadfast virtue and devotion of their womenfolk" (Hurst 102). These tales provide female "role models" like Sītā for the Hindu woman to revere, someone who protects her husband and family by performing rituals and being "virtuous" in a dharmic sense of the word. This "[commits] women to a life of self-sacrificing nurturing" (Hurst 103) and defines women's place in the world and their dharma, though most of these stories are written by men, not women.
Who is to say that men do not perceive female dharma correctly? Perhaps women's dharma is correctly defined as serving their husband. However, men and women have different interpretations of what is important in a women's life, and even which rituals she has to complete. For example, the texts say "votive rights are the best way of achieving the world [beyond] as well as of attaining enjoyment [in this world]. It is through vratas that one attains success" (McGee 72) where as a Hindu woman would say that the votive rights are not just for attaining success, but for "preserving the institution of the family" (McGee 73). This difference in opinions means that a woman would believe that the votive rights are necessarily for her dharma, whereas a man might see a woman who performs these rights all the time as trying to achieve success, as desiring success, and therefore not performing her dharma correctly (McGee 76). Clearly these two opposite views could cause conflict if taken to the extreme.
Though many men are not intentionally sexist when they talk about the dharma of women, the society in which this dharma was defined is sexist. The ideas that men and women have about women's dharma are different, and this can lead to conflicts and misunderstandings. In every society, every culture, every era, there is a constant shifting and changing of the definition of the meaning of life for each individual person, and opinions can vary wildly between genders, races, or classes, and even within groups most people have their own opinions that could be very different from their peers. It is important to understand the differences in perceptions and how they impact people's lives.
Derne, Steve. Culture in Action: Family Life, Emotion, and Male Dominance in Banaras, India. Albany: State University of New York, 1995. Print.
Flood, Gavin. An Introduction to Hinduism. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1996. Print.
Hurst, Jacqueline Suthren, and Lynn Thomas, eds. Playing for Real: Hindu Role Models, Religion, and Gender. New Delhi; New York: Oxford UP, 2004. Print.
McGee, Mary. "Desired Fruits: Motive and Intention in the Votive Rights of Hindu Women." Roles and Rituals For Hindu Women. Ed. Julia Leslie. Rutherford; Madison; Teaneck: Farleigh Dickenson UP, 1991. 71-88. Print.
"The Ramayana of Valmiki." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Sara Lawall and Maynard Mack. 2nd ed. Vol. A. New York: W W Norton & Company, 2002. 890-953. Print.
What is the Meaning of Her Life?
In every era of history, in every walk of life, people have their own opinions of what the meanings of their lives. Their decisions are made based on how they perceive their own lives, and the things they have to do. In Hinduism, this is known as their dharma. People make decisions based on what their dharma is – what they need to do to lead a fulfilling life. People also make judgments of others based on how they perceive their dharma. They form opinions about the rest of the world based on how they see their own dharma, and how they see other people's dharma, specifically how they see the dharma of people of the opposite gender. Is that woman taking care of her husband? Is that man providing for his family? Is that daughter respecting her elders? Is that son studying hard in school? Perceptions of the duty of another can be very different from perceptions that person might have of their own duty, and lead to conflict or misunderstanding. The purpose of this paper is to understand and explain how men in Hindu traditions perceive and have perceived female dharma in general.
The key issue seems to be a patriarchic system in which the idea of dharma developed, which lead to female dharma being predominantly defined by men, and therefore defined in a way that was self serving. Women's dharma, or strīdharma, is centered around housework and family life. A women's duty is concern for her family, "service to her husband" (Flood 66), and doing rituals for the wellbeing of the family; as Flood so aptly puts it, "love [is] a woman's svadharma, or more correctly her strīdharma, 'woman's duty'" (Flood 65). The ideal woman has "modesty, patience, and above all, a strong sense of duty towards her family, the community, and the nation" (Hurst 28). Women are to be revered and kept happy by their husbands, but if the family is having hard times, it is perceived as the fault of the woman, as she must have been doing something wrong for bad things to happen to the family, and she must perform a ritual to fix the mistake. She will be instructed to fast, or perform rituals, or pray to various deities, in order to protect her family and more specifically her husband. Strīdharma is about a life of seva, or service to others, especially men. In some brahmanical tradition a 'good woman' could be defined as one who "dies on her husband's funeral pyre if he predeceases her" (Flood 66). Though this is now illegal, it emphasizes the idea that women exist mostly to serve men, a rather sexist perception of gender roles.
Female dharma probably is the way it is because of the gender roles in India, and the idea that all women are subordinate to men and weaker than them, and "feminist scholars have shown that Hindu gender ideologies bolster male power and subjugate women" (Derne 16). One of the primary writers on the subject of dharma, Manu, writes about male and female roles in the context of caste. He believes that "a Bhraman who sleeps with a Śūdra woman goes to hell and loses brahmanical status upon the birth of a son" (Flood 60) and has different punishments for men and women who commit adultery, "the woman being 'eaten by dogs in a place frequented by many' and the man 'burnt on a red hot iron bed'" (Flood 60). This separate treatment of men and women shows the belief that they are fundamentally different, which leads easily to the belief that their dharma is fundamentally different. Cross-caste marriages are condemned in Manu, but if they are to occur he states that 'with the grain' marriages are better than 'against the grain.' This means that if a man and a woman of different castes are to marry, the man should always be of higher caste than the woman (Flood 60-61). This again shows a common belief that men are or should be superior to their wives, which is reflected in women's strīdharma, to serve their husbands, or be subordinate to them. According to Manu, women are "to be subject to male control throughout their lives" (Flood 66) which is probably derived from the belief that women are fundamentally subordinate to men. Another example of this in modern society is clear in the words of Deevender Mishra, "a 37-year-old heading a household that includes his wife, aged mother, and unmarried siblings…if a wife 'complains against someone, the husband should not take too much notice of it even if she is telling the truth. If everything of the wife is accepted, there is only trouble in that'" (Derne 23). Clearly, sexism is alive and well in India today, enforced by male concepts of strīdharma as service to the men in the family.
An example of a story about gender roles and dharma is the Rāmāyaṇā. The two main characters, Rāma and Sītā, "are ideal examples of dharmic gender roles for Hindu couples" (Flood 109), and Sītā fulfills her strīdharma to the letter. "Sītā, the long-suffering and faithful consort of Rāma may not need much introduction. Her name is often the first mentioned in discussions of epic role models and there is no doubt that she functions prominently in the psychology of Hindu women" (Hurst 119). When Rāma is banished to the forest, she accompanies him, and at the when "Rāma banishes Sītā to [a] hermitage" (Flood 108) for being suspected of being unfaithful to him, she continues to raise their children, thus completing her strīdharma despite being separated from her husband, even though she already went through a fire ordeal "to prove her faithfulness to her husband during the time she spent with her abductor" (Hurst 119). This is a powerful scene, contested within the tradition itself. "The image of Sītā engulfed in flames is imbued with meaning and remains relevant to the life of many contemporary Hindu women" (Hurst 119). Much of Sītā's dialogue in the Rāmāyaṇā emphasizes her subservience to her husband, demonstrating what an ideal woman should do, in the eyes of a male author. She defines strīdharma when she says to her husband, "to a woman, neither father nor son nor mother nor friends but the husband alone is her sole refuge here in this world and in other worlds, too. Hence I shall accompany you. Life with the husband is incomparably superior to life in a palace, or an aerial mansion, or a trip to heaven" ("The Ramayana of Valmiki" 901). Sītā then willingly follows her husband into the forest, threatening suicide if she is not allowed to follow him and complete her strīdharma. This is arguably a moment of great significance for the rest of the story, as it portrays a women's decision making, and implies that the "right" choice is to follow her husband into the forest (Hurst 120). A common theme throughout Hindu literature is "the frequent backsliding of powerful patriarchs, which brings untold suffering upon themselves and their families, relieved only by the steadfast virtue and devotion of their womenfolk" (Hurst 102). These tales provide female "role models" like Sītā for the Hindu woman to revere, someone who protects her husband and family by performing rituals and being "virtuous" in a dharmic sense of the word. This "[commits] women to a life of self-sacrificing nurturing" (Hurst 103) and defines women's place in the world and their dharma, though most of these stories are written by men, not women.
Who is to say that men do not perceive female dharma correctly? Perhaps women's dharma is correctly defined as serving their husband. However, men and women have different interpretations of what is important in a women's life, and even which rituals she has to complete. For example, the texts say "votive rights are the best way of achieving the world [beyond] as well as of attaining enjoyment [in this world]. It is through vratas that one attains success" (McGee 72) where as a Hindu woman would say that the votive rights are not just for attaining success, but for "preserving the institution of the family" (McGee 73). This difference in opinions means that a woman would believe that the votive rights are necessarily for her dharma, whereas a man might see a woman who performs these rights all the time as trying to achieve success, as desiring success, and therefore not performing her dharma correctly (McGee 76). Clearly these two opposite views could cause conflict if taken to the extreme.
Though many men are not intentionally sexist when they talk about the dharma of women, the society in which this dharma was defined is sexist. The ideas that men and women have about women's dharma are different, and this can lead to conflicts and misunderstandings. In every society, every culture, every era, there is a constant shifting and changing of the definition of the meaning of life for each individual person, and opinions can vary wildly between genders, races, or classes, and even within groups most people have their own opinions that could be very different from their peers. It is important to understand the differences in perceptions and how they impact people's lives.
Derne, Steve. Culture in Action: Family Life, Emotion, and Male Dominance in Banaras, India. Albany: State University of New York, 1995. Print.
Flood, Gavin. An Introduction to Hinduism. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1996. Print.
Hurst, Jacqueline Suthren, and Lynn Thomas, eds. Playing for Real: Hindu Role Models, Religion, and Gender. New Delhi; New York: Oxford UP, 2004. Print.
McGee, Mary. "Desired Fruits: Motive and Intention in the Votive Rights of Hindu Women." Roles and Rituals For Hindu Women. Ed. Julia Leslie. Rutherford; Madison; Teaneck: Farleigh Dickenson UP, 1991. 71-88. Print.
"The Ramayana of Valmiki." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Sara Lawall and Maynard Mack. 2nd ed. Vol. A. New York: W W Norton & Company, 2002. 890-953. Print.