Review of the contributions of a Major Thinker.
This issue of Samyukta highlights the contribution of Swami Vivekananda.

SWAMI VIVEKANANDA
ON THE WOMEN QUESTION
K.B.USHA

Swami Vivekananda ( Narendra Nath Datta, 1863- 1902), the leading spokesman for modern Hinduism in the late 19th century is known globally for his enchanting vision, spiritual wisdom of universalisation of Hinduism, a comprehensive understanding of all significant aspects of human life, societal and gender concern and national life in India. Among the modern Indian reformers and leaders, who stood for complete equality of men and women, the most outstanding was Swami Vivekananda. He was highly sympathetic towards the oppressed position of Indian women and insisted on their regeneration, and argued for gender equality. His theory towards that equality was of gender interdependence so that both genders can live peacefully in the society. This was based on the Vedic notion of spiritual sex equality, in the highest reality of Parabrahman. His attitude towards femininity was markedly condescending. Since post-independent India still has problems of women which are to be solved in a meaningful way, in the Indian feminist literature, his position has much scope for using to a feminist deconstruction towards a paradigm shift in the Indian society. To this end, the following is an attempt to analyze and examine his concept of womanhood, the ideas he stood for on women’s equality and education.

Background
It is the Hindu culture and the Vedanta philosophy on which Vivekananda’s position on women is based. The “Hindu ideal of woman’ is the very ideal of woman he evolved for India. According to Vedanta philosophy, men and women and all beings are divine in their essential nature. Men and women have been endowed by nature with the organic capacity to enquire into and realize this great truth. Men and women have equal access to education. Hindu culture views all social evolutions as the process of truth into the texture of human relationships. This view of Hindu culture provides the values of freedom, equality and the dignity and the sacredness of the human personality. As per the Vedic philosophy, men and women are essentially the ever pure, ever free, ever illumined Atman, the sexless Self. Associated with body and mind, this Atman becomes conditioned as male and female. In the realization 1 of manhood of man by man and the womanhood of woman by woman,in the context of the equality of the marriage relationship, Hindu culture recognizes a significant experience of spiritual education. It points out that there is no real independence in this sphere for either man or woman: here interdependence is the law; it alone leads to happiness and fulfillment for both. But true interdependence cannot come if man is free and woman unfree. To elaborate this in the words of Gandhi, “woman has as much right to shape her own destiny as man has to shape his and rules of social conduct must be framed by mutual co-operation and consultation” (Sharma, 1981: 49) towards realizing true interdependence.

In the modern times, the history of women shows that they have come across many changing statuses. The Vedic period is said to be of complete equality for women . Then came the feudal period, foreign invasions which took away women’s freedom, and the national movement against foreign domination, which also took women’s rights and sexual equality as important along with other issues. But now gone are those days and women of postindependent India encounter many new problems which urge them to rise to the highest level of self-development, self-expression and self-esteem. In this millennium, equal access to education for both men and women is an important step towards greater gender equality and empowerment of women. In postindependent India, even though there has been perceptible rise in the activities directed towards women’s emancipation for social, economic and political justice, most of the women in the rural areas are illiterate and trapped in a vicious circle of poverty and deprivation. It is, therefore realized that the women have to be provided with the vital educational inputs, if they are to become a powerful force in the society, and participate in the developmental and decision making process. Through education, the gender inequality, created through the erotization of dominance and submission, as feminists argue (MacKinnon,1993:201) is to be rectified. Since the man-woman difference and dominance/ submission define each other it is necessary to identify the socio-cultural factors that influence the formation of female identity. Contemporary feminists argue that gender roles are culturally determined and inequality between the sexes results from socially constructed power relationships. ( Haralambos & Heald, 2002: 369). Even though women have gained many rights, their gains have not eradicated sexism or revolutionized the gender relations. Therefore, post-modern feminists argue for identifying the fundamental difference between men and women for the purpose of emancipation and equality. For thinkers like Irigaray sexual difference as the difference that women make has to be constructed. This means woman does not yet exist and that she will be unable to come into being without women’s collective efforts, which empower and symbolize her specific sexuality, political vision, etc. (Braidotti, 1994: 64).That is, women must seek an identity of their own and not just “disappear” into the mirror image of men as happened in the past. This aims to construct women’s specific, unique subjectivity and not to allow them enter the dominant patriarchal world on terms under which women’s subjectivity would remain hidden.( Barnett, 1998: 150). Swamiji’s ideals on womanhood premised upon Vedanta can be suggested as the guiding principles for women to identify themselves regarding their status--ethical, ontological, religious and social. In today’s context, his ideas have vital strength to be used for a critique of modern thinking or a change in perspective. It is for helping such a necessity that the visions and views of Vivekananda are important in the modern or post-modern context.

Concept of Womanhood
Vivekananda concentrates and believes in the ideals that Vedanta says on women’s position. He glorifies the ideals contained in the rich Indian heritage and Vedic scriptures. It is in the background of Vivekananda’s understanding of the causes of the degeneration of women in the modern age that he evolved his ideal of “Indian womanhood”.

Vivekananda saw that there is no distinction of sex in the highest reality of Parabrahman. He observes, “ The more the mind becomes introspective, the more the idea of difference vanishes. Ultimately when the mind is wholly merged in the homogeneous and undifferentiated Brahman, such ideas as this is a man or that a woman do not remain at all….Therefore,… though outwardly there may be difference between men and women, in their nature there is none. Hence, if a man can be a knower of Brahman, why cannot a woman attain the same knowledge? Therefore… if even one amongst the women became a knower of Brahman, then by the radiance of her personality thousands of women would be inspired and awakened to truth, and great well-being of the country and society would ensure”. ( Complete Works of Vivekananda, Vol.7: 219).Swamiji pointed out that any idea of privilege and superiority, either mental, physical, or spiritual, for anyone was inadmissible to a true Vedantist. He said, “The idea that one… is born superior to another has no meaning in the Vedanta; that between two nations, one is superior and the other inferior has no meaning whatsoever. Put them in the same circumstances and see whether same intelligence comes out or not.”( Bose, 1998: 285-86). According to this position if men and women are also given same opportunity, it is possible to attain same level of development. He said, “We should not think that we are men and women. But only that we are human beings born to cherish and help one another”. He warned that until the women learn to ignore the question of sex and to meet on a ground of common humanity they will not really develop and remain merely as playthings in the hands of men. (Ranade, 1963: 108). There were times when Vivekananda’s mind was dwelling in a transcendental realm and those times gave rise to expressions like these: “There is neither man or woman (in Vedanta) for the soul is sexless… It is a lie to say that I am a man or a woman or I belong to this country or that. All the world is my country, because I have clothed myself with as my body.” Such was his sense of identity at that moment. He never tried brushing off the well meaning concerns of men who would ask him about “women’s problems”, “Hands off”, he exclaimed “women will solve their own problems”. “Men had no business attempting to solve them for them”. Always Swamiji’s call had been that women have to develop their own personality and try to know themselves and their problems.

In the Vedic and Upanishadic age, Maitreyi, Gargi and other ladies of revered memory had taken the places of Rishis through their skill in discussing about Brahman. When such women were entitled to spiritual knowledge, Swamiji asks, then why shall not the women have the same privilege now? What has happened once can certainly happen again. History repeats itself. (CW.,Vol. 7: 215). Swamiji pointed out another example for female eminence that when Yajnavalkya was questioned at the court of Janaka, his principal examiner was Vachaknavi, the maiden orator– Brahmavadini, as the word of the day was. Due to her skill in questioning, her sex was not even commented upon. The Vedas proposed feminine modesty in the qualities such as their character, skill, courage, spirit of service, affection, compassion, contentment and reverence. He felt that it was much against the ancient ideal of India that women were not given enough opportunities for self development. It is the spiritual ideal of Sita or Savitri that Indian women have been following through the ages. Faith in god, self abnegation and service also marked their character. Chastity has been the guiding motive of their life. It is necessary to intensify the ideal of womanhood in the Indian woman so that they may feel the necessity of coming up along with men. Indian women should try to attain greatness and strength that Sita had shown.

On Indian womanhood he said, “The highest of all feminine types in India is mother, higher than wife. Wife and children may desert a man, but his mother never. Mother is the same or loves her child perhaps a little more. Mother represents colourless love that knows no barter, love that never dies. Who can have such love? – only mother, not son, nor daughter, nor wife”.(CW, Vol.6: 149). He saw their love as eternal. By worship of women Ramakrishna had meant, he assured us, that to him every woman’s face was that of the Blissful Mother and nothing else. The ideal of womanhood in the East is an ideal for which “Motherhood is the beginning. Motherhood is the end of Indian womanhood”. (Maithilyananda, 1959). To him women were living images of Shakti--the Divine Mother. He said, “Mother is the first manifestation of power and is considered a higher idea than father. With the name of Mother comes the idea of Shakti, Divine energy and omnipotence, just as the baby believes its mother to be all powerful, able to do anything. The Divine Mother is the Kundalini (“ coiled up” power) sleeping in us; without worshipping Her we can never know ourselves. All-merciful, all-powerful, omnipresent are attributes of Divine Mother. She is the sum total of the energy in the universe. Every manifestation of power in universe is “Mother”. She is life, She is intelligence, She is love. … Established in the idea of Mother we can do anything. … The worship of even one spark of Mother in our earthly mother leads to greatness.”(CW, Vol.7: 26-27). Mother deserved worship because she was “a saint in bringing …(her child) into the world” by keeping “ her body pure, her mind pure, her food pure, her clothes pure, her imagination pure, for years” in expectation of becoming a mother. (CW, Vol.8: 61). He pointed out the universality of Hindu worship of motherhood in other religions also. He asserted that “In the religion, Jehovah, Jesus and Trinity are secondary; there the worship for the Mother –She the Mother with child Jesus on her arms. The emperor cries –Mother, the field marshal cries-- Mother, the fisherman in his rags cries Mother, the beggar in the streets cries Mother! A million voices in a million ways, from a million places-- from the palace, from the cottage, from the church cry Mother, Mother, Mother! Everywhere is the cry Ave Maria, day and night-- Ave Maria, Ave Maria”.( CW, Vol.5: 506).

Swamiji was critical of Radha prema-- the divine love which Radha had towards Shri Krishna. He opined, through the preaching of that love broadcast, the whole nation has become effeminate- a race of women! The whole of Orissa has been turned into a land of cowards; and Bengal running after the Radha prema, these past four hundred years, has almost lost all sense of manliness! The people are good only at crying and weeping; that has become their national trait. Look at their literature, the sure index of a nation’s thoughts and ideas. Why, the refrain of the Bengali literature for these four hundred years is strung to that same tune of moaning and crying. It has failed to give birth to any poetry which breathes a true heroic spirit. (CW, Vol. 5: 345). In his opinion the sex love can never be the property of the masses. But the preaching of Vaishnava Gurus about sex love rather than renunciation was beyond the comprehension of the common people. Failure to grasp and assimilate that high ideal of divine love, naturally made of it the worst form of love between man and woman. These notions suggest that Vivekananda identified two concepts of women: (1) woman, the mother- de-crotised (maternal) and (2) woman, the fallen, the sexual being (carnal). The former is pure, nurturant and spiritual and the latter is the sexual female with negative qualities of effeminacy such as lethargy, cowardice, immaturity, etc. Robert Goldman observes, “ in many texts women are idealized as pure, spiritual, and nurturant when they are de-erotized and placed in clearly defined and sexually tabooed blood relationships such as those of mother, sister, or daughter. In other words when emphasis is placed on their sexuality, they are often vilified for this aspect of their nature and condemned as temptress, seductress, or whore”. (Goldman, 1993: 375-76).

Vivekananda studied about the history of the Indian women and women of other places and compared those with that of the Vedic concept of women of the Aryan race. “Aryan and Semitic ideals of woman” he said, “have always been diametrically opposed. Among the Semites the presence of woman is considered dangerous to devotion, and she may not perform any religious function, even such as the killing of a bird for food: according to the Aryan a man cannot perform a religious action without a wife”. (CW, Vol.5, 1997:229). To him, “the ideal womanhood centers in the Aryan race of India, the most ancient in the world’s history. In that race men and women were priests, “sapatimini (saha-dharmini)” or co-religionists as the Vedas call them… There man and wife together offered their sacrifices, and this idea was carried so far that a man could not even pray alone, because it was held that he was only half a being, for that reason no unmarried man could become a priest. The same held true in ancient Rome and Greece”. (Burke, 1966:541-42). Then he shows how the position of women degenerated, i.e., in the feminist point of view the origin of the patriarchal ordering of society.

Swamiji found the advent of various priest class, change in the system of marriage, rise of the Vedic idea of personal purity, development of monasticism, etc, as the reasons responsible for the degeneration of women in the later periods. He said, “ with the advent of a distinct and separate priest class, the co-priesthood of women in all these nations steps back. First it was the Assyrian race, coming of Semitic blood, which proclaimed that girls have no voice, and no right, even when married. The Persians drank deep of this Babylonian idea, and by them it was carried to Rome and Greece, and everywhere women degenerated.”(Burke, 1966: 542).

Swamiji observed that in the primitive stage there was no marriage. Later emerged the matrimonial marriage system; that is one in which the mother was the center, and in which the girls acceded to her position. Here the women have advantageous position, but this led to a system of Polianders (polyandry), where five and six brothers often married one woman. “There was not much fixity about the father, the children were named after the mother; all the wealth were in the hands of women, for they were to bring up the children. In the course of time, wealth, the women included, passed into the hands of male members. As in the case of wealth the male said on women, “all these women are exclusively mine; if anyone encroaches upon my right in them, I will fight him”. Women became as much the property of man as his slaves and chattels. (CW, Vol.5: 522). This is how men traditionally assumed supremacy and maintained it in society. Here Swamiji sees the origin of the modern marriage system, which subordinated the position of women. In the ancient times he found many places like Tibet, Malabar and Southern India where females led in everything. In Malabar he noticed that exceptional cleanliness was apparent wherever there was the greatest impetus to learning. There he found women spoke good Sanskrit, while in the rest of India not one woman in a million could speak it. The Dravidians of Southern India, according to him were the most civilized and women with them stood higher than men. Later he sees mastery elevates and servitude debases (CW, Vol.5 :50). Therefore he felt that if one is not allowed to become a lion he/she will become a fox. “Women are a power, only now it is for evil because man oppresses woman; she is the fox, but when she is no longer oppressed, she will become the lion.” (CW., Vol.5: 22). Swamiji very clearly demonstrates here that women are deliberately deprived of their opportunities for development. And this match the feminist view that gender is “constructed as a socially relevant differentiatio in order to keep (gender) inequality in place”.