[Advaita-l] Women and Vedas

[Aditya Varun Chadha]

Greetings

On 4/2/06, m w <all_discussions at yahoo.com> wrote:
>          Regarding a formal answer to the question, instead of a rebellious one as i have to be...for you try to bind truth and it can never be done so...>>women can not see truth...some caste classifications can't see truth...Ah! such an ache and such a pity.....

Exactly my point Manish ji, I am not "supporting" any arguments saying
that women or "shudras" should not have the right to recite the Vedas.
I am just pointing out that in numerous bhASyas such things have been
written.

After that, people like me and you might either say that
Shankaracharya may have been mistaken or atleast bound by the contexts
of his time when he wrote this, but there's no denying what he meant.
Whether he is right or wrong or simply contextually bound, that is a
debate that can only come AFTER acknowledging the obvious meaning of
the writings.

I don't think any consciencious modern thinker will try to prove that
women are unfit to gain knowledge directly from the Vedas. The only
thing I am saying is to take the writings on face value and then to
attempt an honest critique. Some particular person's saying something
has no bearing ultimately on the rightness or wrongness of something,
so I and you are free to say that what Shankara said is not applicable
in our times for sure. But to say that something else was meant when
he wrote "women", would be ridiculous.

All I am saying is that, we do not need scriptural sanction ultimately
to rule over our daily Acharan. The path of j~nAna yoga requires us to
question even the scriptures if they clash with the pratyakSa. So
while I agree with you that Sudras and women should have the right to
gain knowledge directly from the Vedas, I also acknowledge that
Sankara may have been of a different view, and that does not bother
me.

--
Aditya Varun Chadha
adichad AT gmail.com
http://www.adichad.com
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