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Oppiliappan List Archive: Message 00214 Oct 2004

 
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Dear Devotees,
Shriman ravi sukhparia wrote:
"Every one is entitled to have a dip in the Ganges. But if I want to be a doctor and practice medicine professionally, I have got to get MBBS or other degree first and then I can go for specialization course."
 
Only the modern Purohit practices the profession of performing rituals and offering prayers on behalf of others who reward him with money for 'services rendered'. In his biography of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, Swami Vivekananda observed: " The father being dead, the family was very poor; and this boy had to make his own living. He went to a place near Calcutta and became a temple priest. To become a temple priest is thought very degrading to a Brahmin." Further in the biography, he observed:
"it has been held from the most ancient times in our country, legislated upon by Manu, that it is a degenerating occupation to become a temple priest. Some of the books say it is so degrading as to make a Brahmin worthy of reproach. Just as with education, but in a far more intense sense with religion, there is the other idea behind it that the temple priests who take fees for their work are making merchandise of sacred things."  ( http://www.ramakrishnavivekananda.info/vivekananda/volume_4/lectures_and_discourses/my_master.htm )
 
The devotees are all seekers, not professionals. They need only motivation and guidance, not a license or other prescribed qualification to live their holy life of seeking. Sanatana Dharma advises all individuals to live their lives for the four Purusharthaas: Dharma, Artha, Kaama, Moksha. Learning the scriptures, which includes chanting, is the necessary equipment for one to lead life according to Dharma and proceed towards the goal of Moksha.
 
Viewed in this light, men belonging to modern times should not consider women as not fit/qualified (for any reason) to chant the Vedas. As to whether the shastras themselves have prescribed a prohibition, opinion does not appear to be unanimous.
 
Dasan
M.K. Krishnaswamy
 

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