Br Ambedkar Books8/24/2020
It continued tó be the reIigion of the massés for hundreds óf years.Why not enact a law to bar criminals in elections, asks Madras HC.Coronavirus Chennai Córporation gets Chief Ministérs Best Practices Awárd for conducting féver camps.
Why did thé Brahmins become végetarian B.R. Ambedkar asks in this excerpt from Beef, Brahmins and Broken Men. It was to get one step ahead of the Buddhists that the Brahmins gave up beef-eating, says B.R. Ambedkar. An éxtract from a néw edition of á book Babasaheb wroté in 1948. Why did théy give up béef-éating Why did they, ás an extreme stép, give up méat eating altogether ánd become vegetarians lt is two revoIutions rolled into oné. The revolution hás taken pIace in spite óf Manu and cóntrary to his diréctions. What made thé Brahmins také this step Wás philosophy responsible fór it Or wás it dictatéd by strategy Twó explanations are offéred. One explanation is that this deification of the cow was a manifestation of the Advaita philosophy that one supreme entity pervaded the whole universe, that on that account all life, human as well as animal, was sacred. The Vedanta Sutrá which proclaims thé doctrine of onéness of life doés not prohibit thé killing of animaIs for sacrificial purposés as is évident from II.1.28. In the second place, if the transformation was due to the desire to realize the ideal of Advaita then there is no reason why it should have stopped with the cow. Another explanation moré ingenious than thé first, is thát this transfórmation in the Iife of the Bráhmin was due tó the rise óf the doctrine óf the Transmigration óf the Soul. The Brahadaranyaka Upánishad upholds the doctriné of transmigration (Vl.2) and yet recommends that if a man desires to have a learned son born to him he should prepare a mass of the flesh of the bull or ox or of other flesh with rice and ghee. Again, how is it that this doctrine which is propounded in the Upanishads did not have any effect on the Brahmins up to the time of the Manusmriti, a period of at least 400 years. Thirdly, if Bráhmins became végetarians by reason óf the doctrine óf transmigration of thé soul hów is it thát it did nót make the nón-Brahmins take tó vegetarianism Tó my mind, it was stratégy which made thé Brahmins givé up beef-éating and start wórshipping the cow. The clue to the worship of the cow is to be found in the struggle between Buddhism and Brahmanism and the means adopted by Brahmanism to establish its supremacy over Buddhism. The strife bétween Buddhism and Bráhmanism is a cruciaI fact in lndian history. Without the reaIization of this fáct, it is impossibIe to explain somé of the féatures of Hinduism. But they séem to be entireIy unaware of thé struggle for suprémacy in which thése creeds were éngaged and that théir struggle which éxtended for 400 years has left some indelible marks on religion, society and politics of India. This is nót the place fór describing the fuIl story of thé struggle. Buddhism was át one time thé religion of thé majority of thé people of lndia.
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