The word Varna which is a Sanskrit word denoting 4 categories namely Brahmana, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra is very popular both in the serious academic literature and popular semi-academic gossip about Indian social system.
The English word caste is quite often used as a translation for the Sanskrit word Varna. As a result, at many places we find statements such as ‘there are 4 castes in Indian/Hindu society’ and so on. But, in reality even as per the government records enlisting scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, other backward classes/castes or any other such record there are 100s of castes on the ground. As per the Anthropological survey of India’s, survey of India also there are 1000s of castes identified and studied. Even, as per British ethnographic reports and early anthropological studies such as Edgar Thurston’s Castes and Tribes of Southern India also, there are 1000s of castes.
Is there a similarity between the 2 systems that lead to this confusion? Just like caste system, Varna system too has the features of Membership by birth, Hereditary occupations and endogamy as features.
How do those who conflate/translate Varna as caste reconcile with this reality of Varnas being only 4 and castes being numerous? They find 2 ways to come out of this problem. They try to categorize these 100s or 1000s of castes into the 4 boxes of 4 Varnas. The 2nd way out for them is to theorize that in the beginning, there were only 4 Varnas and no castes. But later, each of the 4 Varnas split into sub-groups and further sub-groups and further sub-groups and so on and the result is the 100s or 1000s of castes.
But this method does not make sense. For example, as per the texts describing/prescribing the activities of each Varna the Vaishyas of the Varna system, are agriculturalists cum traders whereas those of the caste system who are calling themselves as Vaishyas are traders only and do not have any participation in agriculture; agricultural castes of the caste system are not traders and none of them call themselves as Vaishya. There are many trading communities (Balija, Perika, Tenugu etc. in the Telugu speaking areas) all over India which do not call themselves Vaishyas. There are many warrior and ruling communities (Boya/Bedara = Hunters) in India who do not call themselves Kshatriyas. Many ruling dynasties belong to agricultural castes like Reddy, Kamma, Velamas etc. Example, the Kakatiya dynasty was founded by agriculturalists. Many contemporarily, politically, dominant castes in India are agricultural castes. Most of the big land lords in India hail from these communities, while varna describing texts designate agrictulturists as Vaishyas, none of these agricultural communities call themselves as Vaishyas. As per the Varna describing texts, people of the first 3 varnas, Brahmana, Kshatriya and Vaishya undergo a ritual of second-birth called upanayana and wear a sacred thread across their shoulder. As per the Varna system this ritual and the sacred thread are the identities of the first 3 Varnas and the absence of such a ritual and the sacred thread is the identity of the 4th Varna called shudras. As per this logic, the politically dominant agricultural castes fall under Shudras. Shudras as per the stereotyped hierarchy in the Varna system are at the bottom of the social stratification of that system. But, in reality these politically dominant agricultural castes never received, accept or claim any such bottom status in the social strata. We can go on like this showing a whopping number of incompatibilities between the 2 systems.
One of the consequences of mistranslation of Varna into caste has been creation of a modern word or neologism called ‘outcast.’ This is a mistranslation, again, of a an artificial Sanskrit word called ‘Varna Bahya.’ This word has been used in reference to the castes that are under government categorization, called scheduled castes. Since, these castes were considered to be outside the fold of even the 4th Varna called the Shudras, people started using words like panchama, the 5th, anthyaja, the last born, etc in reference to these castes. We don’t find these words in any ancient Sanskrit source such as the Vedas, Upanishads, Smritis, Puranas, etc. The translation outcast in reference to these castes is wrong because all the castes under the category of scheduled castes are in fact castes only. None of these social groups is a non-caste or outside the caste system. From the point of view of caste system, they are just like any other caste and as such are part of the caste fold. From the point of view of Varna system, at least there is a possibility of construing that they are not part of the Varna system because they do not come under any of the 4 Varnas (because they have not been referred to in the books that deal with the Varna system). This itself is another evidence of incompatibility between the caste system and the Varna system. Castes which are at least imaginably outside the Varna system are not outside the caste system. As such, the word outcast itself is a misnomer.
Another consequence of the conflation between caste and Varna is the wrong view of caste system as essentially hierarchical has been extended to the Varna system being essentially hierarchical and vice-versa. For inferring that Varna system has been a hierarchical system from it’s ‘creation’ / ‘origins’ these theorizers quote Purusha Sukta, a hymn from the 10th mandala of Rig Veda they translate a portion of this hymn as
Brahmins came from the mouth, Kshatriyas from the shoulders, Vaishyas from the thighs and the Shudras from the feet of the Cosmic person
In fact, the Mantra goes as
Brahmanosya mukhamaseet, bahu rajanyah^kritah
Ooru tadasya yadvaishyaha, padabhyam shudro ajaayataa.
The first line does not have any word/preposition/case-marker that means from. The first line translates as “Brahmin became the face.” Even the next 2 lines translate as the “Kshatriya became the shoulders, the Vaishya became the thighs.” Only in the 4th line which talks about the Shudras, a “padbhyam” is used. This word can be translated as, “from the legs/feet” or “for the legs/feet.” For the sake of coherence with the earlier 3 lines only the meaning “for the legs/feet” should be accepted. Then only, it can get translated as “Shudra was born to become the legs/feet.” Taking the meaning “from the legs/feet” makes the 4th line mismatching/incoherent with the first 3 lines and makes it an odd man out in the whole verse.
It is not understandable how making 4 entities as 4 parts of a human body makes those entities hierarchically placed. In fact, such a description does just the opposite. It makes those 4 entities as equally important as the different parts of human body. It makes the 4 entities organically connected to each other forming into an organism, giving an organic view of the system made of the 4. It shows the 4 as inseparably inter-dependent.
Even if, for the sake of argument, it is considered that the meaning of the 4th line is “Shudra is born from the feet,” the holy river Ganga considered as the holiest of the rivers by Hindus is believed to have born from the feet of Vishnu (one of the Puranic names of the Cosmic person). Being born from the feet does not make that river get treated low or lowly.
In any case, this hymn of Rig Veda cannot be taken as the Hindu creation narrative for the creation of caste system, because this hymn does not talk about 1000s of castes, but talks about only 4 Varnas.
Another incompatibility between the caste system and the Varna system is that there are textual evidences to show that Varna system was birth based in an equal number to the textual evidences to show that, the word Varna itself is derived from the word “Var” means to choose and such Varna is a choice based system. Swami Dayananda Saraswati, the founder of Arya Samaj, the 19th century reformation movement vehemently argues for the Varna system being a choice based system and all the Arya Samajees today follow it as such accepting non-Indians across the Globe also into one of the 4 Varnas. There is no such argument or textual evidence or factual evidence for the caste system to prove that it is not birth-based and is choice based. Words like, Jaath, Jaati in reference to castes themselves mean birth-based, natural, etc.
In the next articles in this series that I am writing about caste, I would be bringing out many more such incompatibilities, as well as would be discussing topics such as Occupational Shift within the caste system, Pre-modern and Modern Social Mobility among Castes, Did Europeans introduce caste system in India? etc.
For now, that’s it folks! See you soon!
– Sadyogi
In a series of articles you have very clearly busted many myths around caste. Many thanks