Heirarchy of 21st century Brāhmanas

[ozone]

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A few years before,I read a news item that a lady from an European country visited the Shiva temple in Rameshwaram and witnessed the
'Pradosha Pooja'.She was very much pleased.On returning to her country,she remitted money(equivalent to Rs.1 crore)and requested the
temple authorities that her donation to the temple may be utilised exclusively for 'Pradosha Pooja'

As usual,her donation was not even acknowledged by the temple authorities.A lady from Ramanathapuram Maharaja family who is a Trustee of the Temple happened to see the letter from the European lady felt sad that the donation has been accepted but not acknowledged. She immediately arranged to get in touch with that lady
and wanted to give that Lady a Grand Welcome when she visited the temple next time.
I want to know from the enlightened members of this Forum to which 'VARNA' or 'CASTE' or'HIERARCHY' this noble lady should be assigned.

Sri BK,
You have provided some information and a question at the end. Are you asking us to derive the answer from the information you supplied along with? How and more particulary why?
I notice you have already assigned her a 'noble' class. Do you need more?

 

[sangom]

Brahman is as we know .....Supreme Self.

One who realizes Brahman is a Braahmana.

Just like a worshipper of Vishnu is a Vaishnava,
a worshipper of Shiva is a Shaiva.
Son of Vasudeva is Vaasudeva,Son of Raghu is Raaghava etc.

Its called Taddhita,Its a grammar rule here where its denotes sense of belonging.

taddhita is ok but there is another derivation for brāhmaṇaḥ also, as —

ब्रह्मं वॆदं अधीयते इति ब्राह्मणः brahmaṃ vedaṃ adhīyate iti brāhmaṇaḥ (he who learns brahmaṃ i.e., vedaṃ)

 

[prasad1]

A few years before,I read a news item that a lady from an European country visited the Shiva temple in Rameshwaram and witnessed the
'Pradosha Pooja'.She was very much pleased.On returning to her country,she remitted money(equivalent to Rs.1 crore)and requested the
temple authorities that her donation to the temple may be utilised exclusively for 'Pradosha Pooja'

As usual,her donation was not even acknowledged by the temple authorities.A lady from Ramanathapuram Maharaja family who is a Trustee of the Temple happened to see the letter from the European lady felt sad that the donation has been accepted but not acknowledged. She immediately arranged to get in touch with that lady
and wanted to give that Lady a Grand Welcome when she visited the temple next time.
I want to know from the enlightened members of this Forum to which 'VARNA' or 'CASTE' or'HIERARCHY' this noble lady should be assigned.

I get the idea, money has its own hierarchy.

But there must be factual error. The temple very clearly states that temple is only for Hindus. The administrator even boasted to us that they stopped Dr. Kalam from entering the temple. He is native son and was instrumental in getting broad gauge train to Rameswaram.

 

[biswa]

Is it only 'those who crossed the ocean to LIVE overseas are already shudras' or 'those who crossed the ocean (to live or visited and came back to India) are already shudras'?!

I think both those categories are shudras!

I think we will all agree that this losing caste by going overseas is all BS (pardon my french!). In fact I may go so far to say that this caste thing itself is utter BS.

That said however, let us not foist the follies of a vocal minority (I mean even a minority of Brahmins) on the full community. Yes there may have been some who advocated these strictures. There may have been some who practised untouchability, or even those who advocated the sati-daha practice (burning of Brahmin widows on the cremation pyre of the husband).

However I would really like to think that the majority did not (and currently is not) going with these practices. If there was any widespread crime, it was that of passivity.

 

[biswa]

Biswa, am sure you very well know social scientists are not the creators of the classification, so wonder why you say "they" have the "right" to classify. Those poor social scientists are merely using terms which they did not create, in order to study/explain social models.

Once upon a time i too fell for the idea that everything gets classified, so classifying humans based on varna is fine. After reading what various religious texts say, i realise what an utter fool i was.

This varna classification of humans is an unnatural system, based on a hateful ideology of segregation to support and spur feudalistic mentality. It is about keeping access to the best of resources for oneself only.

This classification system depended on useless fools (tribals) who fought against one another for conquering resources. The winners who supported 'divine feudal laws' were elevated in rank to provide resources to the system, while the rest were put down.

There is nothing natural in this system like Phylum Chordata Subphylum Vertebrata Class Mammalia and so on all the way to Homo Sapiens Sapiens.......Such an equivalance of comparison simply does not exist.

Regards.

Ms. HH,
I am quite with you on the fundamentals of the case. However let me still debate about the merits of classification. Remember, classification not segregation.

Suppose we call Soichiro Honda a Japanese person or Francois Truffaut a French person or you an Indian person would you consider than an insult?

Similarly do you think if we say that Steven Spielberg is Jewish or that Obama is America's first Black president, that they will really mind?

Also, if you classify Renuka as a doctor and myself as a computer scientist, would we get upset? I view the original caste system to be occupational. One man chants hymns in a temple and another tends to horses. Who is better than the other?

The problem starts when we say that Black people cannot use the same restroom, or a dalit cannot enter the temple.

Classification and science cannot inherently be bad. It is just human malice that is the problem.

 

[biswa]

I am not enlightened but let me give my opinion here.
Why assign her any Varna..is she asking for it?Do we need to even classify the act of donation and assign a Varna for that?
For all I know she wouldnt even desire the grand welcome.

I think that is precisely Mr. Krishnamurthy's point. Good deeds do not have a Varna!

 

[prasad1]

There was no spelling mistake as far as I know! The first line in the first item of the opening post had this clarification , admittedly cryptic.

Brahmana is Brahmin - like Thanjavur is Tanjore.

My northern upbringing tells me there is difference between BRAHMAN and BRAHMIN.

Brahman - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In Hinduism, Brahman is the one supreme, universal Spirit that is the origin and support of the phenomenal universe.[1] Brahman is sometimes referred to as the Absolute or Godhead which is the Divine Ground of all being. Brahman is conceived as personal ("with qualities"), impersonal ("without qualities") and/or supreme depending on the philosophical school.
The sages of the Upanishads teach that Brahman is the ultimate essence of material phenomena (including the original identity of the human self) that cannot be seen or heard but whose nature can be known through the doctrine of self-knowledge (atma jnana). According to Advaita, a liberated human being (jivanmukta) has realised Brahman as his or her own true self (see atman).
The Mundaka Upanishad says:
Auṃ - That supreme Brahman is infinite, and this conditioned Brahman is infinite. The infinite proceeds from infinite. If you subtract the infinite from the infinite, the infinite remains alone.

May be for Tamil spelling Brahman should be Brahmam.

Brahmin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Brahmin (also Brahman; Brāhmaṇa) is a name used to designate a member of one of the four varnas in the traditional Hindu society. The English word brahmin is an anglicised form of the Sanskrit word Brāhmana. In the Smriti view there are four "varnas", or classes: the Brahmins, the Kshatriyas, the Vaishyas, and Shudras.

 

[B.Krishnamurthy]

I refer to Post No. 78.
When Shri.Abdul Kalam was to take oath as President of INDIA,large number of People from Rameshwaram came to NewDelhi to witness the swearing in
ceremony.The prominent among those were the elder brother of Shri.Abdul Kalam and 'Kurukkal' from Rameshwaram temple with temple Prasadam.

 

[amala]

Brahmin is nothing but the English/western pronounciation/spelling for Brāhmaṇa. In Tamil its Brāhmaṇa/Brāhmaṇan. In North India this is Brāhmaṇ. Notice the stress on the "a".

Brahman or Brahm is different. No stress on the "a". This Brahman is the supreme one. Whereas Brāhmaṇ(an) is a Brahmin.