THE STORY OF CASTE
Far back in the early days four kinds of people sprang from Brahma the
creator, to form the castes of India. The first, the Brahman caste,
sprang from his mouth, to rule all the others. The second sprang from
his arms to be the warriors of the land. The third sprang from his
loins to be the business men and the land-owners, and from his feet
came the fourth to serve the others.
The Brahmans are still the powerful caste. From amongst them priests
are taken, and they rule all others. But the other three castes have
been broken up into many smaller divisions, till one can scarcely trace
the lines that mark the difference between the four that were spoken of
long ago. And besides all the castes there are thousands of those who
are outside. They are called pariahs, and all the caste men look down
on them and scorn them.
In some parts of India those who belong to different castes are as far
apart from each other as if the lower caste men were not human beings
at all, and a high caste man will not touch a low caste one even to
save his life. The Brahmans are treated almost as if they were gods.
Many of them live by the gifts of the people, so they do everything
they can to strengthen the old customs and beliefs that make the other
Hindus worship them. They have strange ways of keeping their power.
If a Brahman is angry with anyone he will go and sit on his enemy’s
doorstep day and night without tasting food or drinking water. Even
if the villager does not give in at once, he soon does, because he
knows that the Brahman will rather starve to death than leave his
door, unless he gets his way, and the poor man thinks of all that may
happen to him after death if he allows a priest to die of hunger on his
doorstep. He thinks he may go to one of the places of punishment beyond
the world, and after hundreds of years come back to earth as a worm
or a fly, and so he does what the priest bids him, however hard it is.
[Illustration: FAKIRS]
It is caste law that tells Hindu children what sin is, and many of its
rules are about eating and bathing. No one may eat food with anyone of
a lower caste. No one may marry anyone of a different caste. No one may
change his religion. There are many rules about what the people of each
caste may eat, and how their food must be cooked.
Many of the laws of caste speak of the honour that must be paid to
Brahmans, and of the punishments anyone who does not reverence them
may suffer. Some of these punishments are so cruel that the government
would interfere if anyone tried to enforce them now, but the fear of
the pain that may come after death is strong enough to keep very many
Hindus still in constant fear of the Brahmans, even though they cannot
be punished so brutally in this life as they once might have been. Here
are some sentences from the laws about caste.
“The Brahman is by right the lord of all this creation.”
“What being is there superior to him by whose mouth the gods eat
oblations?”
“When the Brahman is born he is born above the world, the chief of all
creatures, to guard the treasures of religion.”
“Thus whatever exists in the universe is all the property of the
Brahman.”
“No greater wrong is found on earth than killing a Brahman.”
“Certainly the king should not slay a Brahman, even if he be occupied
in crime of every sort.”
“A Brahman may take possession of the goods of the Sudra[1] with
perfect ease of mind, for, since nothing at all belongs to this Sudra,
as his own, he is one whose property may be taken away by his master.
The leavings of food should be given to him, and the old clothes.”
“If a man of low birth assault one of the twice-born castes with
violent words he ought to have his tongue cut out.”
“If he lift up his hand or his staff against him he ought to have his
head cut off.”
“The dwelling of Chandals[2] and Swapacas[2] should be outside the
village; their clothes should be the garments of the dead, and their
food should be in broken dishes.”
These are only a few out of many, and some of the laws are too cruel to
quote here. Yet though all that is written in the old law of India, men
have often risen there, who tried to break through the rules of caste,
and there are other ancient writings that show that all Hindus have not
believed in these differences between man and man.
“Small souls inquire, ‘Belongs this man
To our own race, or class, or clan?’
But larger-hearted men embrace
As brothers all the human race.”
But those who have held that caste law is not binding have never been
able to break the power the priests held over the great masses of the
people, and so caste law and not the brotherhood of man still rules.
In many parts of India a boy cannot choose what trade he will follow.
If his father belongs to the carpenter caste, he must be a carpenter;
if his father is a sweeper, he must be a sweeper; if his father is a
robber, he will be a robber. In one place in the far north, when a
little boy is born his mother swings him backwards and forwards over a
hole in the wall and says to him:--
“Be a thief! be a thief!”
There are castes of robbers and murderers still in India. The caste
of the Thugs was the most famous one of them all, but now the British
Government has taken under its control all those who still belong to
it. They are kept in ground set apart for them, and none of them are
allowed to go out to kill or to steal.
Yet pilgrims still crowd to the beautiful marble tomb of the man who
founded the caste of the Thugs two hundred and fifty years ago. He is
one of the saints of India, and the priests who guard his shrine cover
the tomb with beautiful cashmere shawls, and lay fresh flowers on it
morning by morning.