--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
> This isn't a Buddhist thang per se. Many Dalits were
> originally consigned to the untouchable caste by Hindus
> because they considered Buddhists beneath them, but
> after that it became hereditary. The point is that the
> upper castes in this village killed these people
> because they were getting uppity and didn't want their
> property taken away from them by the upper caste Hindus
> who wanted to build a road through it, and an untouch-
> able getting uppity and wanting to be treated like a
> human being is something the "more evolved" "upper"
> castes could not allow to happen.
>
> This is an example of what the caste system is *really*
> like, not what Maharishi and you present as an idealized
> picture of it. Maharishi's portrayal of what caste is all
> about in India today is as accurate as his portrayal of
> what life was like in India in Vedic times.
>
No question that the caste system is very open to abuse and misuse.
It is based on our rememberance, or more accurately, India's
rememberance of that natural separation of society into its own
dharmas-- best characterized today in my opinion by the Japanese
craft traditions, but open to a lot of misuse and abuse in India.
Which doesn't mean that it is a bad system, only that India has a
poor memory of its possible simplicity, its perfection.
