This was the result of his labors: the Rig
Veda orders the Brahman to place the widow side by side with the
corpse, and then, after the performance of certain rites, to lead
her down from the funeral pyre and to sing the following verse
from Grhya Sutra:
Arise, O woman! return to the world of the living!
Having gone to sleep by the dead, awake again!
Long enough thou hast been a faithful wife
To the one who made thee mother of his children.
Then those present at the burning were to rub their eyes with
collyrium, and the Brahman to address to them the following verse:
Approach, you married women, not widows,
With your husbands bring ghi and butter.
Let the mothers go up to the womb first,
Dressed in festive garments and costly adornments.
The line before the last was misinterpreted by the Brahmans in
the most skillful way. In Sanskrit it reads as follows:
Arohantu janayo yonim agre.....
Yonina agre literally means to the womb first. Having changed
only one letter of the last word agre, "first," in Sanskrit [script],
the Brahmans wrote instead agneh, "fire's," in Sanskrit [script],
and so acquired the right to send the wretched widows yonina agneh -
to the womb of fire. It is difficult to find on the face of the
world another such fiendish deception.
The Vedas never permitted the burning of the widows, and there
is a place in Taittiriya-Aranyaka, of the Yajur Veda, where the
brother of the deceased, or his disciple, or even a trusted friend,
is recommended to say to the widow, whilst the pyre is set on fire:
"Arise, O woman! do not lie down any more beside the lifeless corpse;
return to the world of the living, and become the wife of the one
who holds you by the hand, and is willing to be your husband." This
verse shows that during the Vedic period the remarriage of widows
was allowed. Besides, in several places in the ancient books,
pointed out to us by Swami Dayanand, we found orders to the widows
"to keep the ashes of the husband for several months after his
death and to perform over them certain final rituals."
However, in spite of the scandal created by Professor Wilson's
discovery, and of the fact that the Brahmans were put to shame
before the double authority of the Vedas and of Manu, the custom
of centuries proved so strong that some pious Hindu women still
burn themselves whenever they can. Not more than two years ago
the four widows of Yung-Bahadur, the chief minister of Nepal,
insisted upon being burned. Nepal is not under the British rule,
and so the Anglo-Indian Government had no right to interfere.
The Caves Of Bagh
At four o'clock in the morning we crossed the Vagrey and Girna,
or rather, comme coloris local, Shiva and Parvati. Probably,
following the bad example of the average mortal husband and wife,
this divine couple were engaged in a quarrel, even at this early
hour of the day. They were frightfully rough, and our ferry,
striking on something at the bottom, nearly upset us into the cold
embrace of the god and his irate better half.
Like all the cave temples of India, the Bagh caverns are dug out
in the middle of a vertical rock - with the intention, as it seems
to me, of testing the limits of human patience. Taking into
consideration that such a height does not prevent either glamour
or tigers reaching the caves, I cannot help thinking that the sole
aim of the ascetic builders was to tempt weak mortals into the
sin of irritation by the inaccessibility of their airy abodes.
Seventy-two steps, cut out in the rock, and covered with thorny
weeds and moss, are the beginning of the ascent to the Bagh caves.
Footmarks worn in the stone through centuries spoke of the
numberless pilgrims who had come here before us. The roughness
of the steps, with deep holes here and there, and thorns, added
attractions to this ascent; join to this a number of mountain
springs exuding through the pores of the stone, and no one will
be astonished if I say that we simply felt faint under the weight
of life and our archeological difficulties. The Babu, who, taking
off his slippers, scampered over the thorns as unconcernedly as
if he had hoofs instead of vulnerable human heels, laughed at the
"helplessness of Europeans," and only made us feel worse.
But on reaching the top of the mountain we stopped grumbling,
realizing at the first glance that we should receive our reward.
We saw a whole enfilade of dark caves, through regular square
openings, six feet wide. We felt awestruck with the gloomy majesty
of this deserted temple. There was a curious ceiling over the
square platform that once served as a verandah; there was also
a portico with broken pillars hanging over our heads; and two
rooms on each side, one with a broken image of some flat-nosed
goddess, the other containing a Ganesha; but we did not stop to
examine all this in detail. Ordering the torches to be lit, we
stepped into the first hall.
A damp breath as of the tomb met us. At our first word we all
shivered: a hollow, prolonged echoing howl, dying away in the
distance, shook the ancient vaults and made us all lower our voices
to a whisper. The torch-bearers shrieked "Devi!... Devi!... " and,
kneeling in the dust, performed a fervent puja in honor of the
voice of the invisible goddess of the caves, in spite of the angry
protestations of Narayan and of the "God's warrior."
The only light of the temple came from the entrance, and so two-thirds
of it looked still gloomier by contrast.
