SECTION VII. THE CASTE SYSTEM.
I have said that at the end of the Golden Age and during its degeneration period, people's minds lose their tranquil equilibrium and look outwards for happiness. At this stage of the disturbance within Nature and humanity occasioned by the assertion of the Rāja attribute, the caste system comes into existence. The object of the caste system is to preserve as much order and harmony in human society as possible and prevent its disruption into individual units. In the Golden Age all the people are as one family, in the Silver Age they are divided into four families, divided according to their inclinations, habits and actions, and harmonious relations being established with one another through laws and interdependence. Those who still retain their perfected spirituality by subduing the influence of Rāja are called Brāhmans which means those who know or still dwell in Brahm—the Spirit of God. They are considered the head of the other castes because they are the embodiments of spiritual wisdom which is the chiefest requisite in the building of character and the higher development of the human soul. Some of them still retain their Golden Age habits of life, others clothe themselves with the barks of trees and live on fruits and nuts and roots in the forests, in huts made of tree-trunks and leaves. They pass their days and nights in contemplation of the Deity, the Divine Spirit and its Laws operating within Nature and inculcate these truths into the minds of the other classes of people.
Those who, being unable to subdue the influence of Rāja, are swayed by passions and become bold, spirited and filled with material desires are called Kshatriyas. They become rulers of the other two castes. These are the first Kings and Rulers of men. But they rule according to the injunctions of inspired Codes of laws, laws which are propounded with the object of the highest good of humanity in view, as well as the propagation of peace and goodwill among all classes of people.
According to these laws the King's first duty is to look to the material welfare of his subjects; the second is to protect them from injustice and aggression; the third is to help their moral and spiritual development; in short, the King's duty is to treat his subjects as his children. If any King fail to perform these duties to the satisfaction of his subjects or become aggressive towards them, he is immediately removed from his throne by the Brāhmans (Rishis), the all-powerful Brāhmans, who always have the welfare of God's creatures at heart, and whose spiritual powers are mightier than kingly weapons and might. The Brāhmans are called the "gods of earth" (Bhudevas) on account of their disinterested love of humanity and self-sacrificing devotion for its welfare and their irresistible spiritual and psychical powers to carry their objects for the good of humanity into action.
Those among the Golden Age people in whom excessive action of Rāja develops some Tama as well, and partly covers the Sattwa Attribute, form yet another distinct caste. They are called Vaishyas. While the Kshatriyas occupy themselves in taking over the control and government of countries and peoples, the Vaishyas take to the occupation of agriculture, commerce and raising of cattle, as much in their own individual material interests as in the interests of all humanity. In the Golden Age, owing to the fulness of spirituality within Nature, all kinds of grains grow wild and abundant. With the decrease of that spirituality towards its end, these natural products of the earth diminish in quality and quantity, while the growing material instincts in people bring about their larger consumption, thereby creating greater demand for them. This increased demand is supplied by cultivation by the Vaishyas.
Those, again, among the Golden Age people who, owing to the predominance of the Tama Attribute in them, are filled with envy and greed, and become untruthful and devoid of clean habits of life and take to all sorts of low means and ways for their living are classed as Sudras. The Kshatriya rulers compel these Sudras for their own good as well as the good of all other classes of people to take service under the three upper castes as domestic servants, so that by contact and association with their masters and by the examples of their purer ideas and habits of life they may be elevated in morals and conduct.
The science and wisdom which are the foundation of the caste system of the Silver Age people and which still form the backbone of the degenerate remnants of these primeval people, now known as Hindoos, are worthy of study of all civilized mankind of the present day. It is the scientific law of the caste system which has preserved the indestructible individuality of the Hindoos as a race; it is the chief source of strength which has supplied their inexhaustible vitality as a nation; the never failing force which has insured the permanency of their existence on the face of the globe. It is a system, the absence of which in the organization of all other human societies, modern and ancient, has been the cause of their decay and death. The Hindoo caste system is based upon laws of the inmost science of life, the laws which modern scientists are trying so hard and yet so hopelessly to discover and understand through wrong processes of investigation. Modern scientists are boastful of their achievements in the field of discovery of Nature's laws and imagine they have learned almost all of Nature's secrets, while in truth they know but a few of her surface-laws the mainsprings of which are to be found deep down in the mental and spiritual strata of which they even dream not of—a realm which must ever remain closed to purely objective investigation.
It is as wrong to try to study Nature from the operations of her physical laws as to govern and guide human beings by the aid of the deceptive light of those laws. The physical is the manifestation of the mental plane, as the mental is the manifestation of the spiritual plane, as I have shown in previous Sections. The phenomena of the physical plane of Nature are deceptive to the purely physical vision because they are the product of Tama—darkened Rāja. Deceptive also are the phenomena of the mental plane—though not as deceptive as those of the physical—to a mental vision the light of which is not derived from the spiritual plane—the mysterious machine room which alone supplies the life-substance and springy of action to the mental and physical planes. The student of physical and mental Nature who is not provided with the microscope of spiritual insight is apt almost invariably to read her in both these aspects incorrectly. He should not, therefore, be considered a safe guide for the healthy and harmonious development of human character, which is but a part and phase of one whole Nature called the Universe.
The laws operating in the deepest depth of Nature can only be seen and studied by the illumination of the soul, the Radiance of Krishna's Body. These the Brāhmans, the portion of the Golden Age people who still retain their high state of spirituality, study and learn and utilize in codifying principles and rules for regulating the daily life of the rest of the people. The conception of the caste system betrays their intimate knowledge of these inner natural laws upon which it is based and the profound wisdom with which its organization to the minutest details is arranged. The organization of the caste system is, in fact, devised after the organization of the human body—after the inner and the outer human body. The entire caste system is like a huge living human body—living with its organs and senses in harmonious working order and its mind contributing to and enjoying the effect of that harmony and feeling the higher planes to which the effect of that harmony elevates.
What is the most needed essential for the healthy, harmonious and useful conduct of human life? Love, Intelligence and Wisdom. I had almost said Love or Wisdom, for Intelligence and Wisdom are but manifestations of Love. Intelligence is the light of Love, and wisdom is but its reflection on its own enlightened shadow—the mind. Wisdom likewise embodies both Love and its light. Without wisdom a human being is like a wayward, mischievous animal. Our wisdom (intelligence and thought) inspire and guide our actions. Good thoughts lead us to good actions, bad thoughts lead us to bad actions. We are nothing but our mind and our mind is nothing but our thoughts—commingled effects of the reflections upon the mind of external objects and internal impressions of previous reflections of objects, called Ideas. Thoughts that lead us to bad actions, that is to say, actions which hurt others and us too, which bring inharmony to others and finally to our own mind, are neither beneficial nor useful to our life; they are injurious to its best interests. Wisdom (harmonious, useful thoughts) is therefore the most essential requisite of human life. Without it power and wealthy are apt always to be misused and misdirected, resulting in loss of harmony. And harmony is happiness, happiness which is the goal of all our quests and efforts in life.
Thus the Brāhmans, who devote themselves absolutely to acquiring wisdom by communing with the Soul of Nature and its finest and purest attributes, and to supplying them to those who do not any more enjoy that advantage and privilege, naturally form the head —the seat of wisdom and intelligence—of the social organization, called the four-castes. The lower three castes are indebted to the Brāhmans for wisdom which they receive from them in the form of lessons and codified laws of life which guide their daily existence, just as every one of us is indebted to our intelligence and wisdom for performing the functions of life to our own and our neighbors' benefit. Hence the Brāhmans, who supply the most important essential of life, are protected, provided for and paid utmost homage to, by all the other castes.
Next to wisdom comes strength, physical and mental, another greatly needed requisite of human life. A man needs mind-force to rule his own mind and body as well as those of others to whom he is related, in order to maintain harmony within and without. He needs also physical strength to defend himself and others against attacks and aggressions and prevent encroachments by others upon his property and interests. The Kshatriyas (Kings) form and supply this requisite to the four-caste organism. They form the arms of the Caste-Body, arms being symbolical of strength and ruling power. Without a powerful, noble ruler, all communities of men are liable to find themselves in disorder and inharmony and to suffer from lawlessness and injustice, just as a man who has no strength to defend himself from aggression is liable to be robbed of his possessions and be miserable.
More important than the duty of protecting the life and property of his subjects is the King's duty to help their moral and spiritual well-being. And this the king does by enforcing the performance of the religious duties appertaining to each of the three castes as enjoined in the Vedic laws, discovered and enunciated by the holy ones. Those who do not perform these duties and practices are punished by temporary excommunication and, if still persistent in disobeying the injunctions, by absolute banishment from all societies. These early sages have always held that prevention is better and easier than cure of diseases, physical, mental or spiritual. Regular spiritual practices, performed daily, form habits, and spiritual habits cleanse the impurities of the mind which then becomes fit to reflect the highest spiritual truths by the light of which man witnesses the unity of all Nature, feels the ecstasy of the One Essence which pervades it and stands face to face with his Maker.
The next essential of harmonious human life is food. Most people of our day will say that food is rather the first essential of life. We, in this degenerate age, have indeed come to think so. But the Silver Age people, as well as all really thoughtful people amongst us, do not think so. Food does sustain life, no doubt, but that life, if void of wisdom and force of mind, is not worth living. It is the life of an animal or a vegetable. Food is essential to life; so are wisdom and mental force. Is our life sustained by food alone? I should think not, unless it be the life of a man who is but a little removed from a beast. Happy thoughts furnish the chief support of our life. Our life depends more upon happy and harmonious thoughts than food. If our thoughts are sad and gloomy, we do not enjoy life at all or feel that we are living, although we may eat the daintiest food, be surrounded by luxuries and have plenty of the world's goods. Many of us destroy this food-sustained life suffering from the pangs of miserable thoughts, many die of broken heart and other diseases brought on by the continued pressure of sad thoughts, although well fed and well clothed and well supplied with money and other material comforts of life.
The Vaishyas represent the vital vigor of the Four-Caste organism, and as, according to the Shāstras, the seat of the vital vigor is the loins, the Vaishyas form the loins of that body. The Silver Age Vaishyas take to cultivation of the soil, raising of cattle and trade more for the weal of all mankind than for their own personal aggrandizement.
The Sudras are the feet of the Four-Caste organism, very important members of the body too. They represent devotion through service. Indeed, devotion is the training which each caste passes through while fulfilling the duties of its profession. The Brāhmans are to practise meditation on God and study the Veda; the object is devotion to the Supreme Being. The Kshatriyas are to rule the other two castes with the aid of the Brāhmans, with love, justice and fatherly care according to inspired laws; the object is to acquire devotion to the Supreme Being. The Vaishyas are to till the land and raise cattle only to serve God's creatures; the object is to cultivate devotion to the Supreme Being thereby. The Sudras must serve the three pure and spiritual upper castes for the purpose of absorbing their spiritual magnetism through association and examples; the object is the same, cultivating devotion to the Supreme Being by loving service rendered to His devotees.
Thus the Caste system, though worked by human agency, is founded upon natural laws. As originally created in the Silver Age, its object is to form people into groups according to the similarity of their natural casts of mind, according to their natural instincts and dispositions, with the view of uniting them by the bonds of their common as well as mutual interests, with the view of helping them to material, moral and spiritual elevation by compelling them to discharge their respective duties according to the injunctions of inspired codes of laws furnished by illumined Sages whose very pure, unselfish, spiritual and self-sacrificing life is the best guarantee of the wisdom, efficacy and usefulness of their advices and teachings. The relation of interdependence which these caste laws consolidate is in itself one of the grandest achievements of the caste system for the good of the human family. It is the most practical means of preserving unity and a natural preventive of the disintegration of the whole mass of humanity into individual units than which no greater calamity can happen to the general as well as individual weal of human beings. Yet, alas, among non-caste races this is happening, especially in the Western countries of the world, at the present time!
Look at the state of the human society at this moment, particularly that portion of it which is governed by the ideas of what is boastfully called "civilization"! Look at the external results of the internal influence of this civilization! Material comfort and pleasure has become the very ideal of life for its average votary. All, almost all are ever rushing on the path of securing the means for that one end. And in that mad rush they are jostling, hustling, hating, abusing, cheating, killing, and destroying one another physically and morally. In that mad rush for that one goal, in that selfish fight and quarrel, out of the exhaustion brought on by the efforts of that bustling and hustling, they have no time or opportunity or inclination to think of anything which has no immediate concern with that utterly material aim of life. They have no time to think of their mind, much less of their soul, which most of them have abolished as a delusion and an obstacle in the way of material success. They have even no time to look up into the blue heavens during night or during day, to look at the beauties of the stars and the moon, much less to think of what they are and if they have any relation with them. Material interests are fast taking the place of natural love and affection. Husbands and wives are fighting with each other; sons and daughters are ignoring and disobeying their parents; masters and servants have no other regard for each other than that inspired by personal gain; they are always trying to cheat instead of helping each other. Members of communities are divided against each other and only seemingly united for the sake of selfish ends. Society exists only in name. Envy, malice, greed, selfishness, conceit having gained predominance in all, have split society into units.
This chaotic state of modern human "society" in most parts of the world, the truth of which will be generally acknowledged, ought to convince all thoughtful people as to the wisdom and vital necessity of the caste system. Even now where the four-caste system still exists, it does serve to keep the communities within its rule as one compact body to a great extent, through the influence of its laws of interdependence and mutual harmonious relations. Thanks to Caste, even the degenerating Hindoos of to-day have not yet been split into units. This remnant race, a race which has still retained some of the instincts of the original human family of the Silver Age, is being more and more divided and subdivided, no doubt, at the present day. But these divisions and subdivisions are large coherent parts, linked together into one great whole. The entire race is divided into four castes; the castes are divided into sub-castes, the sub-castes again into communities, the communities into rural societies, the rural societies into large patriarchal joint-families. The members of families are ruled by the patriarchs, the patriarchs by the headmen of caste communities, the caste communities by the spiritual (Brāhman) guides, through the enforcement of the salutary Scriptural injunctions, the infringement of which is punished, in minor cases, by expiations involving physical hardships and spiritual austerities and purifying ceremonies, and, in serious cases, by expulsion from caste, which, in India, is a greater disaster than natural or material calamities. And all these rulers and ruled are related to one another by more or less natural love and affection or respect and sense of duty born in their blood through thousands of generations of hereditary habits of thought and life; all are inspired to command and obey by the spirit of the Veda which their mind absorbs through the performance of their respective spiritual, social, physical duties as enjoined by the later Scriptures—the Shāstras, which are modified embodiments of the revealed laws of the Basic Spirit of All Life, the all-cementing Spirit of Nature—Love.