The Untouchables - 2

...There are some people who argue that untouchability is not a part of Hindu religion, if it is so then one must be reminded that neither Varna nor Santana dharma were part of Rig Vedic society. And even before that there was no Rig Veda itself. Hindu dharma was born with Varna dharma in later Vedic times and with its emphasis on purity of human beings it gave birth to dharmic practice of untouchability. A great dharmic tradition emerged to keep the society purer by keeping the polluted people outside the society.

When one tries to understand untouchability one has to understand the notion of purity and notion of pollution as separate from hygiene and cleanliness. Additionally one has to consider the notion of degrading jobs as separate from inferior jobs. One more thing has to be taken into account is the provision of ostracization to keep the recalcitrant elements in check.

The notion of purity itself comes from the divinity itself. The need to purify oneself comes straight from Rig Veda where water is considered as great purifier. All the religious things and activities are sacred in nature which is a level above pure. The source of purity in Hindu society is in the sacredness of Vedas. The Word of God has to be pure and sacred. The Vedas are the most sacred elements of Hindu religion. Even the temples and idol of gods are of later origin. The temples are manmade but not the Vedas. To handle the sacred and most pure Vedas one has to be pure. Impure people cannot handle Vedas. And in addition those who are preserving Vedas also have to be pure indeed the purest of them all. The presence of notion of purity is not sufficient for untouchability to exist; the notion of pollution and a process of purification is also required.

The notion of pollution comes from the notion of degrading jobs as separate from inferior jobs. The degrading jobs are the inferior jobs which degrade the persons engaged in them. The impure jobs make their performers impure. Then the children of such people get the impurity in inheritance. The notion of degrading jobs came into existence with the introduction of agriculture in Vedic society. The agriculture was known the occupation of defeated people. The Aryans, mixed or unmixed, were the ultimate winners in the struggle between native societies and Vedic societies for the political supremacy in upper north India. It created a mixed society of winners and losers, the superiors and inferiors, the higher and lower, the pure and degraded. The agriculture being the occupation of defeated people was degrading in nature. The impure nature of agriculture is evident in the impure origin of Vaisyas in Purusha sukta of Rig Veda. The Vaisyas were born from thighs which is an impure origin being below the naval. The impure people doing impure jobs were assigned the impure origin. Thus agriculture was a degrading job and this notion developed further with the spread of Vedic culture. Many more jobs were to be classified as degrading or impure. When the main activity was declared impure then how could the minor activities be left behind? They also had to follow the course. Thus all the activities involving manual labor became impure. And some were downgraded to still lower level of untouchable or polluting. Over a period of time even the Vaisya level activities of agriculture and cattle rearing in Vedic times were degrade to Shudra level. The pure Brahmans cannot take food from the impure Shudras. The impurity of Shudra is evident from their impure origin of being born from feet and lacking eligibility for thread ceremony...