{"id":388,"date":"2013-07-13T01:27:42","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=388"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:27:42","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:42","slug":"094-the-unhindu-spirit-of-caste-rigidity-vol-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/01-bande-mataram-volume-01\/094-the-unhindu-spirit-of-caste-rigidity-vol-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","title":{"rendered":"-094_The Unhindu Spirit of Caste Rigidity.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\nThe Unhindu Spirit of Caste Rigidity<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n          
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>T<\/font><\/b>HE<\/b>
\nBengalee <\/i>reports Srijut Bal Gangadhar Tilak to have made a definite
\npronouncement on the caste system. The prevailing idea of social inequality is
\nworking immense evil, says the Nationalist leader of the
\nDeccan. This pronouncement is only natural from an earnest Hindu and a sincere
\nnationalist like Srijut Tilak. The baser ideas underlying the degenerate
\nperversions of the original caste system, the mental attitude which bases them
\non a false foundation of caste, pride and arrogance, of a divinely ordained
\nsuperiority depending on the accident of birth, of a fixed and intolerant
\ninequality, are inconsistent with the supreme teaching, the basic spirit of
\nHinduism which sees the one invariable and indivisible divinity in every
\nindividual being. Nationalism is simply the passionate aspiration for the
\nrealisation of that Divine Unity in the nation, a unity in which all the
\ncomponent individuals, however various and apparently unequal their functions as
\npolitical, social or economic factors, are yet really and fundamentally one and
\nequal. In the ideal of Nationalism which <\/p>\n

India<\/p>\n

will set before the world, there will be an essential equality between man and
\nman, between caste and caste, between class and class, all being as Mr. Tilak
\nhas pointed out different but equal and united parts of the Virat Purusha as
\nrealised in the nation. The insistent preaching of our religion and the work of
\nthe Indian Nationalist is to bring home to everyone of his countrymen this ideal
\nof their country’s religion and philosophy. We are intolerant of autocracy
\nbecause it is the denial in politics of this essential equality, we object to
\nthe modern distortion of the caste system because it is the denial in society of
\nthe same essential equality. While we insist on reorganising the nation into a
\ndemocratic unity politically, we recognise that the same principle of
\nreorganisation ought to and inevitably will assert itself socially; even if, as
\nour opponents choose to imagine, we are desirous of confining its working to
\npolitics, our attempts will be<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-533<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nfruitless,
\nfor the principle once realised in politics must inevitably assert itself in
\nsociety. No monopoly, racial or hereditary, can form part of the Nationalist’s
\nscheme of the future, his dream of the day for the advent of which he is
\nstriving and struggling.<\/font><\/p>\n


\n           
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>The caste system was once productive of good, and as a fact has been a
\nnecessary phase of human progress through which all the civilisations of the
\nworld have had to pass. The autocratic form of Government has similarly had its
\nuse in the development of the world’s polity, for there was certainly a time
\nwhen it was the only kind of political organisation that made the preservation
\nof society possible. The Nationalist does not quarrel with the past, but he
\ninsists on its transformation, the transformation of individual or class
\nautocracy into the autocracy, self-rule or Swaraj, of the nation and of the
\nfixed, hereditary, anti-democratic caste-organisation into the pliable
\nself-adapting, democratic distribution of function at which socialism aims. In
\nthe present absolutism in politics and the present narrow caste-organisation in
\nsociety he finds a negation of that equality which his religion enjoins. Both
\nmust be transformed. The historic problem that the present attitude of Indian
\nNationalism at once brings to the mind, as to how a caste-governed society could
\nco-exist with a democratic religion and philosophy, we do not propose to
\nconsider here today. We only point out that Indian Nationalism must by its
\ninherent tendencies move towards the removal of unreasoning and arbitrary
\ndistinctions and inequalities. Ah! he will say, this is exactly what we
\nEnglishmen have been telling you all these years. You must get rid of your caste
\nbefore you can have democracy. There is just a little flaw in this advice of the
\nAnglo-Indian monitors, it puts the cart before the horse, and that is the
\nreason why we have always refused to act upon it.<\/font><\/p>\n


\n           
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>It does not require much expenditure of thought to find out that
\nthe only way to rid the human mind of abuses and superstitions is through a
\ntransformation of spirit and not merely of machinery. We must educate every
\nIndian, man, woman and child, in the ideals of our religion and philosophy
\nbefore we can rationally expect our society to reshape itself in the full and
\nperfect spirit of the Vedantic gospel of equality. We dwell on this common sense
\nidea here at the risk of being guilty of repetition.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-534<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nEducation
\non a national scale is an indispensable precondition of our social amelioration.
\nAnd because such education is impossible except through the aid of
\nstate-finance, therefore, even if there were no other reason, the Nationalist
\nmust emphasise the immediate need of political freedom without which Indians
\ncannot obtain the necessary control over their money. So long as we are under an
\nalien bureaucracy, we cannot have the funds needed for the purpose of an
\nadequate national education, and what little education we are given falls far
\nshort of the nationalist ideal, being mainly concerned with the fostering of a
\nspirit of sordid contentment with things that be. Apart from the question of the
\ncultivation of those virtues which only come in the wake of liberty, apart from
\nthe question of reorganisation of the country, if we were to look into the
\nproblem in its purely social aspect, even then we are confronted with the
\nprimary need of political emancipation as the condition precedent of further
\nfruitful activity.<\/font><\/p>\n


\n           
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>The Nationalist has been putting the main stress on the necessity of
\npolitical freedom almost to the exclusion of the other needs of the nation, not
\nbecause he is not alive to the vital importance of those needs of economic
\nrenovation, of education, of social transformation, but because he knows that in
\norder that his ideal of equality may be brought to its fullest fruition, he must
\nfirst bring about the political freedom and federation of his country.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nBande Mataram<\/i>,
\n<\/i> <\/font>
\nSeptember 20, 1907<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n

Page-535<\/font><\/p>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Unhindu Spirit of Caste Rigidity              THE Bengalee reports Srijut Bal Gangadhar Tilak to have made a definite pronouncement on the caste system….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","wpcat-8-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}