Mr joseph vempeny Posted on : 04/02/2008 07:04:43

World Religions

World Religions

Joseph Vempeny

As a deer longs for a stream of cool water, so I long for you, O God.” Psalm 42:1

In Paleoanthropology Scientists reconstruct the physiological or anatomical features of early humans by studying part of a skull or a few pieces of bones. From available fossils we can tell what they looked like. But the fossils will not tell us what they thought. So we do not exactly know when our ancestors began to think of God. Hence we look for other clues as records of human thought. Customs and traditions leave telltale clues. And we make our conclusions based on these clues.

In the World Book Encyclopaedia we read that the earliest evidence of religious activity dates from about 60 000 B.C. In other words, since the very early days of existence as humans, we knew about, thought about and learned about God. This does not mean that our ancestors saw or heard or felt God through their physical senses. Even as a child recognizes its mother or father, the human soul, created in the image and likeness of God recognized and felt the presence of God, the soul heard the voice of God and knew God. This knowledge was accompanied by some ideas of the immortality of the spirit. This must have been what prompted elaborate burial rituals and practices.

This was the genesis of religious practices, common to all primitive cultures. One must assume that even as God created the first couple as humans, He gave them this firm belief that they are different from the other animals and that they are special to Him. As He gave them the rights and privileges of the princes of the kingdom, He wrote in their hearts the laws or rules that must guide their life. Religion began with the acceptance of free will, with the capacity to distinguish between good and evil. Thus it would be right if we assume that religion is as old as humanity itself. Here we take the term religion in the broad sense of all practices, customs, rituals and ceremonies associated with the belief in God or in certain deities or in the immortality of the soul.

God meant different things to different people. This was so in those early millennia of prehistoric and protohistoric times in different parts of the world; it has been so throughout history and it is so even today. From the earliest times there were monotheistic cultures where people worshipped one God as creator and ruler. There were also polytheistic and animistic cultures where people worshipped or paid homage and offered sacrifices to a number of deities and considered the various elements of nature like wind, sun, certain animals, even grain and sand as personal deities. But most people strongly believed in one supreme God, whatever name or attributes they gave Him / Her / It.

Why did I refer to God as He / She / It? With my Christian background I often refer to God as He or the father. Once during a scripture session an active member of my group challenged my language. “ Are you sure that God is a he”, she asked, “why not a she, a mother?” I conceded her point and said that millions of people in India still call upon God as a mother and that the earliest concept of God was probably as a mother, source of all life. In India at least, from time immemorial to the present, God was and still is a ‘She’ for a sizable section of the people. The Jewish people are often referred to as monotheistic and patriarchal, meaning that they worship one God considered as a male personal God. But when you read the old testament it is clear that they were polytheistic in nature and from Moses onwards all prophets had a hard time to bring the people back to the monotheistic culture. Even in Jeremiah’s time the Jewish people, against all strictures of prophets and the laws, worshipped and made offerings to a mother Goddess referred to In Jeremiah as the Queen of Heaven. (Jer: chapters 7 and 44).

On another occasion a Muslim friend asked me, “Why do you refer to God as father? He is not your father. He is your king.” On another occasion a philosophically minded friend also questioned my language. According to him God is not male or female, father or mother, king or queen but a spiritual being to whom human attributes cannot be applied. Here again I conceded to his view of the impersonal God and said that common man and woman cannot be expected to have such sublime ideas. Then I added, “He is all this – father, mother, king, judge, creator and destroyer and much more.” As He is infinite and almighty, there is nothing that He cannot be. He is everything to everybody. In certain books of the Bible as well as in the Bhakthi literature of India, God is the ‘lover” of the soul that is yearning for a reunion with the lover. I also referred him to a verse from the Vedas that could be translated something like this. “People call me by different names and to all these I respond.” These words may also help those who wonder whether to call Him / Her God, Jehovah, Allah, Iswar, Siva, Devi, or Durga or any one of the many other names. There could be as many names as there are languages, not considering the synonyms – God in English, Allah in Arabic, Devi in Malayalam, Durga in Bengali and so on and so forth.

How can one make a representation of the philosophers’ concept of an impersonal God? I think that the ancient Indians who thought up this concept had found an answer to that as well. All over India you see people worshipping a black stone, not representing any living being, male or female but just a cylindrical black stone with a rounded top. I personally have a hunch that the ancient sages had conceived this as a representation of the impersonal God, neither male nor female, neither human, bird or animal, having no organs like head, trunk or limbs. If this is not a representation of the Impersonal God what is? But somehow today this representation is called Lingam (phallus), or more specifically the Siva Lingam, the creative force. But I still believe that originally this must have been the representation of the impersonal God.

What I am trying to convey here is the idea that no one can claim that he or she or a certain system knows all about God and that any different view is wrong. In our attempts to comprehend the incomprehensible, we attribute to God different qualities that could be comprehended by human intelligence. The limitation of the human intellect to comprehend the infinite nature of God is brought about in a story about Augustine of Hippo, the great Christian theologian. Walking on a beach, pondering the mystery of the Holy Trinity, he came across a boy pouring water from the sea into a hole in the sand. Asked what he was up to, the boy said he wanted to empty the water of the ocean into the hole. When Augustine pointed out the futility of the attempt, the boy said that what Augustine was trying - to understand the nature of the infinite God by the finite human intellect - was more futile than trying to empty the ocean into the small hole. Then the boy disappeared, indicating that he was a messenger from beyond. The mystic Indian counterpart to the above western story gives another dimension to man’s search for God. Here the person or the sage who ventures out to find out all about God is compared to a doll, made of salt, going down to measure the depth of the ocean. Even as the doll dissolves completely in the ocean and ceases to exist as a doll, the best way to know God is to lose oneself completely in Him and become one with Him.

Revelation

Christianity, Islam and Judaism are the three major religions of the West. All these three had their origins in West Asia and North Africa (Egypt) and can be traced to a single source, the Patriarch Abraham or Ibrahim. He lived about 3700 years ago, in Mesopotamia. He had spent some years in Egypt as well. According to the traditions of the holy Bible and the holy Quran this patriarch had two sons, Ismail and Isaac. The descendents of Isaac, the Jews, spoke Aramaic and Hebrew. They were basically monotheistic. But some of them must have worshipped some idols or minor deities. Hence the strict rule of Moses against idolatry. In their language, the name for God was Eli or Alaha. The descendants of Ismail, the Arabs, spoke Arabic. They worshipped Allah, the creator along with many minor deities.

Isaac’s son Jacob and his children came to Egypt during a famine and settled there. Eventually they were enslaved there for a few centuries. About 3200 years ago Moses, born and brought up in Egypt redeemed them from slavery, took them out of Egypt and led them to the promised land of Canaan. Moses also organized the Jewish religion in very great detail and gave his people the ‘Laws’ including the Ten Commandments. The first five books of the bible are attributed to him. While stamping out idolatry Moses taught about one God who created heaven and earth and everything in it including Adam and Eve, the first humans. Moses also pictured this God as the lawgiver and judge to whom you will have to account at the end of the day. As these five books form the foundation on which these three religious edifices are constructed, it is right to speak of the Egyptian or African origins of these three religions.

Isaac’s son Jacob and his children came to Egypt during a famine and settled there. Eventually they were enslaved there for a few centuries. About 3200 years ago Moses, born and brought up in Egypt redeemed them from slavery, took them out of Egypt and led them to the promised land of Canaan. Moses also organized the Jewish religion in very great detail and gave his people the ‘Laws’ including the Ten Commandments. The first five books of the bible are attributed to him. While stamping out idolatry Moses taught about one God who created heaven and earth and everything in it including Adam and Eve, the first humans. Moses also pictured this God as the lawgiver and judge to whom you will have to account at the end of the day. As these five books form the foundation on which these three religious edifices are constructed, it is right to speak of the Egyptian or African origins of these three religions.

About1400 years ago Prophet Mohammed founded among Arabs the religion of Islam, which means “submission” to the divine will. Like Moses, Mohammed advocated monotheism and taught that polytheism is the deadliest of sins. His teachings are contained in the holy Quran. A follower of Islam is called Muslim, which means “one who submits to the divine laws”. In terms of the number of followers Islam is the second largest religion of the world, the first being Christianity.

Abraham was specially ‘chosen’ by God who promised that his children would be as numerous as the grains of sand on the shore. His children are the Hebrews and the Arabs. Moses and Mohammed were specially ‘called’ by God to be His messengers or prophets and they taught or wrote what was ‘revealed’ to them by God. Judaism, Islam as well as Christianity are considered revealed religions and their authority is based on the revealed scriptures.

The founder of Christianity, Jesus Christ, can be considered among other things as a reformer in the Jewish community. He pointed out how the religious leaders of Israel were going away from the essence of the Law of Moses. He preached about the ‘Kingdom of Heaven’ and exhorted people to change their ways to attain this goal of salvation. His teachings contained revolutionary ideas. He pointed out the need to shift the emphasis of religion, from a God-centred one to a man-centred one. He wanted His followers to love every one, even their enemies. According to him, when you serve the hungry and needy fellow beings you are serving God. According to Christian faith Jesus, the son of God came to the earth to atone for the evils that humanity has done in disobeying God’s laws and to bring salvation for the human race, by the supreme sacrifice of his death on the cross. Jesus is thus to be considered primarily as a saviour and a teacher.

Belief and Knowledge

At a time when atheism in the scientific community was at its highest there was in England a scientist who was a regular churchgoer, a practicing Christian. He was invited to address a conference of Bishops in London, to talk about ‘Science and Religion’. He began his address with the words, “I do not believe that God exists.” Watching the shocked expressions on the faces of the assembled prelates he continued, “I do not believe that there is a God. I know that there is a God.” He was trying to bring out the element of doubt that underlies the word, belief. The words, ‘I believe’ implies blind faith whereas ‘I know’ implies conviction. These represent two levels of faith.

“To believe in God” is a higher rung in the ladder of faith than “to believe that there is a God” The former involves an element of trust in the Providence while the latter is purely academic acceptance of His existence that implies no relationship. It is better to say that “I know that there is a God” than to say that “I believe that there is a God”. Faith of an even much higher level is the ability to say, “I know God” implying an element of acquaintance. This becomes intimate when we realise that the acquaintance is mutual. I know the president of the country but he does not know me. This is not like that. I can say with conviction that God knows me also. In fact he knows me much better than I know him.

Living in the presence of God is the next phase of faith, that of spiritual life. This also has several levels. The academic acceptance of the omnipresence of God that provides you with the realisation that He is around is the first level. The second is the realisation that God is watching you. Here God is seen as a judge or a detective. The resulting ‘fear’ of God is the basis of morality and ethics for some people. The next level is the feeling that God is watching over you. Here he is the loving and caring Father or Mother in whom you can put your absolute trust. You are a child of God and all those you come across, are also His children and as such your brothers and sisters. Such faith becomes ‘alive’ when this knowledge is supported by actions. Your life, the way you treat others, should show this conviction, this faith.

The Son of God

Many educated people, even some Christians, find it hard to accept that Jesus is the Son of God. They consider him a prophet or reformer. Not only the Gospels in the Bible but even the Quran accept the fact of Virgin Birth. In the eyes of the rationalist the concept of virgin birth may be an impossibility. But then they do not know the meaning of the word almighty. Nothing is impossible to the Almighty. Mary the mother of Jesus was a virgin and she conceived by the power of God. Hence Joseph or any other man is not his father. It follows then that God is his father and so Jesus is the Son of God.

To me, a Christian, Jesus is not just the Son of God; he is God. How can this be? If God was walking around on the earth as a man, who was up there in heaven? Are there three Gods, Father, Son and Holy Spirit? The three persons of the trinity must be considered as the three manifestations of the same God. As creator He is the Father. As our saviour and beloved friend He is the Son. As a teacher who inspired the prophets and still inspires us He is the Holy Spirit. These three are aspects or manifestations of one and the same one God. This is the Christian faith, as I understand it. Some may ask if each person of the trinity is infinite. According to the Hindu philosophy, God is infinite and the universe is infinite and this infinite universe has originated from the infinite God. This apparent contradiction is explained by one verse of Upanishad. It may be translated like this; “That there is infinite; this here is infinite. After this infinite is removed from that infinite what remains is still infinite.” Mathematically speaking: infinity minus infinity equals infinity. If this is in reference to God and the universe we may make the following mathematical sentence regarding the trinity: Infinity + infinity+ infinity = infinity.

Children of God

Jesus taught his disciples and through them the whole humanity, to call God as Father. Does it mean that each of us can call ourselves as the son of God or the daughter of God? I do not think that would be right. The title of ‘son of God’ is reserved for Jesus. I am not a son of God, only a child of God. The difference is in the level of maturity and dependence. Let me put it this way. The relationship between my thirty-year-old son and myself is the father-son relationship. We are both independent, now. My relationship to God is more like the relationship of my toddler grandson to his father, one of total dependence. A toddler holding on to his father’s hand will not be afraid to walk in the dark or through a busy city or through a jungle. With such absolute trust we must put our lives in the hand of our Divine Father. If we try to grow up and try to be independent of God, the burden on our shoulders may be too much to bear and we may fall prey to the common maladies of the day such as anxiety, depression, fear and worry. It is far better to be dependant on God and feel safe than otherwise. This is the meaning of faith. Faith is not just acknowledging the existence of God and worshipping Him or praying to him. True faith is accepting Him as your father or mother and putting your absolute trust in Him/Her. This is the easiest way to happiness, and peace: to salvation. This could be what Jesus meant when He said, “Unless you become like little children, you may not enter the kingdom of heaven.”

In ‘revelation’ God is coming down to man to reveal himself. Christians, Muslims and the Jews consider themselves as the chosen people of God. God has spoken to them directly, through angels or prophets, giving them the laws and taboos. Before the advent of Christianity, Greek, Roman and Egyptian civilizations had their own religions. Some other individual cultures also had some religions though not as well known as these three.

Inspiration

“East is east and west is west and the twain never meet”. So runs the adage. This is most true in the matter of religions and the way they evolved through millennia. In the west, God came down to reveal himself to man. In the east man went up to find God. This is the inspiration received as a result of meditations or deep reflections. In the west one religion replaces another as if two or more cannot coexist. In the east new religious ideas are accepted and incorporated forming coalitions or allowing peaceful coexistence. In place of the personal God of the western philosophy there is an impersonal God in the Eastern philosophy.

The major Eastern religions have no known founders, being as old as the people themselves. These are: Hinduism of India, Taoism of China and Shintoism of Japan. Buddhism that started, as a reformation of Hindu religion in India and Confucianism in China are the two major religions with founders. Buddhism has spread to most of the rest of Asia though it has lost a lot of ground in India. But Buddhism has left its mark on Hinduism and the Indian way of life. Some Hindu scholars accept Buddha as one of the incarnations of God and respect his teachings. In China it is said that it is difficult to label a person as Buddhist, Taoist or Confucian. A person can be Confucian on a socio-political level, Buddhist on an ascetic level and Taoist in a spiritual level.

Oriental Thought

Among the Oriental philosophic circles of 1000 to 400 B.C. the idea of an impersonal God, a spiritual being transcending all human attributes is very common. Some of their views are given below. First let me cite what the Encyclopaedia Britannica has written on the Hindu view. “The uncreated, eternal, infinite, transcendent, and all-embracing principle, which comprising in itself being and non-being, is the sole reality, the ultimate cause and foundation, source and goal of all existence. This ultimate reality is called Brahman.” This could be from one of the many Upanishads – ancient texts that deals in a very philosophic manner, with the metaphysical aspects of our existence. Here is another one from Taittiriya Upanishad; “That from which all these entities are born, that in which they live, that into which they enter in the end, know that: that is Brahman”.

The Japanese view of ‘Kami’ the spirit that underlies all matter is explained in one of their ancient texts like this, “The nature of kami cannot be fully explained in words as kami transcends the cognitive faculty of man. Devotees are however able to understand kami through faith.”

Lao-tzu, a Chinese philosopher, one of the masters of Taoism, a contemporary of the Buddha, Confucius and Socrates, explains the concept of God like this: “It is something formlessly fashioned, that existed before heaven and earth. Its name we do not know. Tao is the byname we give it. Were I forced to say to what class of things it belonged I should call it immense.”

The concept of the impersonal God is not for the common man, only for the thinkers and the masters. For common man to relate to this Creator, to pray and worship the Hindu masters conceived two aspects of the Brahman. The Saguna Brahman is God with human attributes. We can conceive him as loving and merciful, as fair and just, as a father or mother, as a king or judge. Nirguna Brahman is the God of philosophy, the impersonal God with no human attributes. Atman is another term used in Hindu literature to describe the Cosmic Soul or God. Kena Upanishad has something interesting to say about the personal and impersonal aspects of God, on what God is to the thinker and the common man. “To the man of true knowledge, It is the unknown, while to the ignorant It is the known.”

Indian Synthesis of Religions

The major religion of India, Hinduism is a collection of the religious beliefs and practices of many cultures extending over six or seven millennia, if not more. The main reason for the present polytheistic nature, the presence of so many gods, goddesses and forms of worship and belief can be attributed to this way of mixing of faiths and cultures. Known as the mother of all religions, Hinduism is considered to be the oldest known religion and its origins are shrouded in the mists of distant past. Yet we can make the following observations about the earliest inhabitants of the subcontinent, which cannot be far from the truth.

Pre-Aryan Cultures

A turning point in the story of these people is the Aryan invasion or migration that happened about 4000 years ago. We can identify three separate groups of people who migrated here before the Aryans. We may list these as : pre-Aryan, Dravidian, and pre-dravidian. During the course of the past millennia there could have been several migrations to the subcontinent. The fertile regions of the Indo-Gangetic plain had always been a magnet that attracted people from the earliest humans.

Pre-Dravidian or Aadivasis

The earliest of these, were there for tens of thousands of years. Today we call them Aadivasis and they are found in various parts of India as hill-tribes. Certain groups of the so-called untouchables also belong to this early people. Even these Aadivasis seem to be of two separate groups in origin, if not more. The most ancient and most effective form of herbal medical treatment for certain ailments is practiced by some of these even today.

To the Aadivasis God was a mother, the source of life. 7000-year-old terra cotta figurines of female deities attest to this assumption. Kaali (as in poly) is the name they give to their God the Mother. These people were monotheistic from time immemorial. Even today, in spite of the galaxy of Indian gods and goddesses being worshipped all round them and in spite of the fact that they do not deny or disclaim any of these, to the Aadivasis still there is only one God, Kaali, the mother.Kaali or Bhadra Kaali is often pictured as an incarnation of terror, a murderess, and one who delights in blood sacrifices. How can such a being be associated with divine nature? Wouldn’t the terms beastly or devilish suit her more, one may wonder? True, Kaali is pictured as destroying some one. That someone is the demon, the personification of evil. In other words, what Kaali represents is the victory of good over evil.

Dravidians

The next major migrant group is the Dravidians who now occupy most of south India especially the Tamilnadu. Tamil is considered by many scholars as the oldest of all the world languages spoken today. Many scholars point out that there are two distinct groups among the Dravidians – those with Negroid features and those with Mediterranean features. Both these groups were present in India before the Aryans but I do not think that we can classify these two into one group – the Dravidians. I would rather consider them as two distinct groups.

The Dravidians were also monotheistic. They had only one God Siva, also known today by a host of other names such as, Rudra, Sankara, Mahesa (the great ruler), Parameswara (the supreme God). Later mythology assigned to him a consort, Parvathy and two sons, Ganesa of the elephant face and Subrahmanya with the spear (Vel Murugan). The Dravidians of today try to distance themselves from the Aryan gods and their religion is devoted to the worship of Siva or his sons. Temples for worship of Ganesa and Muruga can be found all over Tamilnadu but the worship of Siva is not limited to that region. Siva’s temples are found all over India. In spite of the numerous gods and deities brought by the Aryans, Siva still holds in India the position of the Supreme God.

Pre-Aryans (Mediterranian)

Then we have the people from the Mediterranean region, those previously thought to be a subgroup of the Dravidians. These could be considered as the authors of the Indus Valley Civilization that flourished almost 5000 years ago. In my opinion, the Rishis who spent long periods of time in caves and grass huts to meditate on the mysteries of life should have belonged to this group. It was at the feet of these masters that seekers after truth among the Aryans learned the precious lessons that later became the texts of Upanishads. They also had only one God. Like the Aadivasis, their God was also a mother, a loving, caring personal God who always listens to the call of the children. Their descendants today call this mother Durga or Devi. 6000-year-old terra- cota figurines of a female deity were found in the Mediterranean region. These are similar to those found in India. The influx of Aryans pushed these people to the south and the east. The descendants of these people, though they lost much of their identity through a liberal mixing of their genes as well as faith with the Aryans and Dravidians, can still be found in these regions of the east and the south especially Bengal and Kerala where Durga or Devi temples are abundant. Today in many parts of the country the place of mother goddess is taken by Parvathy, the consort of Siva, or Saraswthy, the goddess of education and fine arts or Laksmi, the goddess of prosperity. The title ‘Aadi parasakthi’ meaning the original supreme force or the force of creation is also used for the consort of Siva. To me it seems that this also is one of the ways by which ancient Indians used mythology to create harmony between differing views. By marrying the mother goddess, Parasakthi of the earliest inhabitants to the supreme god, Parameswaran, of the Dravidians they were helping the amalgamation of the two faiths into one. Here we have a very good example of using the faith of the people to unite them and not to cause division among them. This also teaches us that what we call our creator is not what is important but how we relate to Him/Her/It.

There are three distinct sects in Hinduism today, the Sivites – those who worship Siva, Muruga or Ganesa -, the Vaishnavites – those who worship Vishnu or his incarnations chiefly Krishna – and the Sakthi sect who worship the mother Goddess – as Durga, Devi or Kali. The Sakthi movement is comparatively new as a formal sect. This does not mean, as some people infer, that the worship of God as a mother is new to Indians. As mentioned earlier the earliest inhabitants had no other God than the mother. Millennia back the name given to her might have been different, other than Durga, Devi or Kaali, yet the prehistoric ancestors of the people of Kerala and Bengal as well as the Aadivasis worshipped a mother Goddess without doubt. Nor was the worship of a mother Goddess limited to India. The prophet Jeremiah had to warn the Israelites against worshipping and offering sacrifices to ‘The Queen of Heaven”.

The Aryans

Then came the Aryans. They were polytheistic. The chief of their legion of gods was Indra. They worshipped the sun and another major god Vishnu. They came riding on horses, brandishing their swords, ready to go to war with who ever they were to meet. But war was not in the programme of the peaceful people of the Indus valley. Their interests lay elsewhere. This onslaught from the northwest displaced many to the south or the east. Others were subjugated or dominated. If the San people (Bushmen) of Southern Africa in the nineteenth century considered the Europeans who came in their flying machines as gods, no wonder some people of India considered the Aryans on their horses as gods 4000 years ago. And the shrewd Aryans capitalised on this. In the legends and epics to follow the Aryans described themselves as gods coming from the land of gods (devaloka), and the Dravidians as demons (Asuras or Rakshasas). The Aryan warlords who successfully defeated the resistance from the kings in the south - in Kerala, Karnataka or Sri Lanka, namely, Vamana, Narasimha and Sree Rama, became the incarnations of their god Vishnu. The Aadivasis who helped Rama to defeat Ravana the king of Lanka were called monkeys. In return for this help, their leader Hanuman was elevated to the position of a god.

It is said that the Aryans were terrified of the powers of the Dravidian God known to them as Rudra. This may be partly due to the mystical powers possessed by some Dravidians through Manthravada, some special Indian black-art similar to Voodoo, which they ascribed to their faith in Siva or Rudra. This made the Aryans accept Rudra as one of their holy trinity, the other two being Brahma and Vishnu. Krishna, an incarnation of Vishnu has, among the Hindus, a place somewhat similar to that of Christ among Christians. The Tamilians may be an exception in this regard as they refuse to worship any of the Aryan gods these days. In place of Krishna, the Dravidians have Muruga and Ganesha.

The most important contribution of the Aryans to the Indian religious scene is the Sanskrit literature with its Vedas, Upanishads, and epics like Ramayana and Mahabharatha along with many other ancient books of fiction, mythology and philosophy. Ramayana, the story of Rama, is the most revered book in Indian homes and a very edifying one, with its emphasis on the duties of each state of a person, on family values and human relationship in general. Geetha, a small part of the great epic Mahabharatha, is a holy scripture in its own right.

The Caste System

An all time world record for human right violations, something that far surpassed feudalism, serfdom, slavery, apartheid, holocausts, or all these combined, as well as a Nobel price for ingenuity and craftiness should go to the Aryan leaders who conceived, introduced and established the caste system and weaved it so neatly into the social structure of the population and justified and even sanctified it on religious grounds as the will of the gods and the result of the deeds in the past birth. Caste system was the strong foundation on which the concept of rebirth was built into the philosophical systems of Hinduism. Even as heaven was promised to the serfs of Europe for their passive submission to the atrocities of the feudal lords, the reward of good deeds, of doing the duties assigned to your cast was rebirth into a higher caste. The Brahmin was called the twice born and was closer to the final goal of Moksha, final union with God.

Over the last two and a half millennia many reformers have attempted at eradicating this scourge. Sri Buddha almost succeeded in getting rid of the caste system when Buddhism spread through the length and breadth of the subcontinent. But after Buddha’s time the Aryan leaders or Brahmins managed in re-establishing Hinduism as Brahmanism. A last stand against this was taken by the Buddhists in Kerala. This brought another incarnation of Vishnu - Parasuraman - to the rescue of the ‘gods’ and reclaimed the land for the gods. Even after the havoc done by this incarnation, the second in Kerala, the proud people of Kerala refused to accept Aryan priests. That is when they put the holy thread of Brahmins on a particular guild of the population and formed the Malayalee Brahmins known as Namboothiris. There are also those that hold the view hat the Namboothiris are Brahmins who in the past migrated to Kerala from Mangalore area. It could be that Parasuraman brought these from Mangalore or thereabouts to establish their domination.

Gandhi spent much of his time and energy to fight for the rights of the untouchables during and after his struggle for India’s independence from British colonialism. The constitution of India acknowledged the principle of equal rights for every caste and made special reservations in the fields of education and employment for the low caste people so as to alleviate the injustices of the past. This had very positive effects especially in the southern states but the caste system is still prevalent in India and the low caste people are ill treated, especially in the Aryan dominated north.