To investigate woman’s position among the other ancient nations of Asia
is also of interest.
The =Parsee= or =Parsis=, belonging to the great Aryan or Indo-Germanic
race, occupied two thousand years before Christ that part of Central
Asia known at present as Iran or Persia. Whether this country was the
original home of that race, is unknown. Some modern scientists are
inclined to seek it in more northern parts of Asia or even of Europe, as
the sacred songs of the Parsee contain indications, that the Aryans
originally came from countries with a temperate or frigid zone. When for
instance the Vedic singers in hot India prayed for long life, they asked
for “a hundred winters.”
In their treatment of women these Aryans or Parsee have been much more
noble than any other Asiatic race. They believed in marriage for higher
purposes than the mere begetting of children. The principal incentive to
conclude a marriage was the desire to contribute to the great renovation
hereafter, which, according to the sacred book of the Parsee, the
Zend-Avesta, is promised to humanity. This renovation cannot be carried
out in the individual self, but must be gradually worked out through a
continuous line of sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons. The motive of
marriage was therefore sacred. It was a religious purpose they had in
view, when the male and female individuals contributed by marital union
their assistance, first, in the propagation of the human race; second,
in spreading the Zoroastrian faith; and third, in giving stability to
the religious kingdom of God by contributing to the victory of the good
cause, which victory will be complete about the time of resurrection.
The objects of the marriage bond were, therefore, purely religious,
tending to the success of light, piety or virtue in this world. For this
reason the Avesta declares that married men are far above those who
remain single; that those who have a settled home are far above those
who have none; and that those who have children are of far greater value
to humanity than those who have no offspring.
While daughters were believed to be less useful than sons for the
continuation of the father’s race, they were, however, not disliked, but
also objects of love and tenderness. Marriages were not the result of
any barter or capture, but of pure selection on the part of the two
individuals. If they were still of minor age, the marriage was subject
to the confirmation of the parents or guardians.
Infanticide was strictly prohibited. There were also laws against the
destruction of the fruit of adultery. Such illegitimate offspring had to
be fed and brought up at the expense of the male sinner until they
became seven years of age.
* * * * *
Like the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, and like the
highlands of Central Asia, or Ariyana, so the mountains, plains and
forests of =India= were inhabited long before the dawn of history by
masses of men of various races and split into many hundreds of tribes.
Of these races descendants exist in almost the same conditions as their
ancestors did many thousand years ago. In Southern India the Kader are
still living in primitive tree-huts. Assam and Bhutan are regions
abounding with villages which are the exact counterparts of the
prehistorical lake-dwellings of Switzerland.
These vast regions of India were at some unknown time invaded by tribes
of =Aryan= or =Indo-Germanic= race. While among the aborigines of India
women were subjected to all the hardships and bad treatment of primeval
times, the women of the Aryans enjoyed, as stated above, a far higher
position. Like their husbands they were the “rulers of the house,” had
the entire management of household affairs, and were allowed to appear
freely in public. Husband and wife also drew near to the gods together
in prayer. That the education of the females was not neglected is proven
by the fact, that some of the most beautiful Vedas or national hymns and
lyric poems were composed by ladies and queens.—
With the decline of the Aryan race and culture in India, caused most
probably by the hot, enervating climate of the country, the position of
women also underwent a change for the worse. Especially the growing
despotism of the Brahmanic priests gradually robbed women of all their
former rights and liberty. In time they became completely subject to the
authority of man. Mothers owed obedience to their own sons, and
daughters were absolutely dependent upon the will of their fathers. The
system of conventional precepts, known as “Manu’s Code of Laws,” clearly
defined the relative position and the duties of the several castes and
sexes, and determined the penalties to be inflicted on any transgressors
of the limits assigned to each of them. But these laws are conceived
with no human or sentimental scruples on the part of their authors. On
the contrary, the offenses, committed by Brahmans against other castes,
are treated with remarkable clemency, whilst the punishments inflicted
for trespasses on the rights of the Brahmans and higher classes are the
more severe and inhuman the lower the offender stands in the social
scale.
Against the female sex Manu’s laws are full of hostile expressions:
“Women are able to lead astray in this world, not only the fools, but
even learned men, and to make them slaves of lust and anger.”—
“The cause of all dishonor is woman; the cause of hostility is woman;
the cause of our worldly existence is woman; therefore we must turn away
from woman.”—“Girls and wives must never do anything of their own will,
not even in their own homes.”—“Women are by their nature inclined to
seduce men; therefore no man shall sit even with his own relative in
lonely places.”—“The wife must be devoted to her husband during her
whole life as well as after his death. Even if he is not without blame,
even if he is unfaithful and without a good character, she must
nevertheless respect him like a god. She must do nothing that might
displease him, neither during his life nor after his death.”—“Day and
night must women be held in a state of dependence.”—
As the subjection of women was made a cardinal principle of the Brahman
priests, they did not shrink from misinterpreting the text of the Vedas
accordingly. So the sentence: “You wife, ascend into the realm of life!
Come to us! Do your duty toward your husband!” was explained to mean
that a widow must not marry again but ought to follow her husband also
in death. This led to the voluntary burning of the widows with the
corpse of the husband, a practice which assumed great dimensions and was
observed till the middle of the 19th Century. Mrs. Postans, an English
lady, who during the first part of the last century resided many years
in Cutch, one of the northern provinces of India, gave the following
account of such a ceremony: “News of the widow’s intentions having
spread, a great concourse of people of both sexes, the women clad in
their gala costumes, assembled round the pyre. In a short time after
their arrival the fated victim appeared, accompanied by the Brahmins,
her relatives, and the body of the deceased. The spectators showered
chaplets of mogree on her head, and greeted her appearance with
laudatory exclamations at her constancy and virtue. The women especially
pressed forward to touch her garments—an act which is considered
meritorious, and highly desirable for absolution and protection from the
“evil eye.””
“The widow was a remarkably handsome woman, apparently about thirty, and
most superbly attired. Her manner was marked by great apathy to all
around her, and by a complete indifference to the preparations which for
the first time met her eye. Physical pangs evidently excited no fears in
her; her singular creed, the customs of her country, and her sense of
confused duty excluded from her mind the natural emotions of personal
dread, and never did martyr to a true cause go to the stake with more
constancy and firmness, than did this delicate and gentle woman prepare
to become the victim of a deliberate sacrifice to the demoniacal tenets
of her heathen creed.”
[Illustration]
[Illustration:
A LADIES’ PARLOR IN CHINA.
]