By Brahma prabhu – http://www.swami.org/sanga

Question:      What is the role of women in Krishna consciousness?

I subscribe to a service that distributes Srila Prabhpada's lectures, and the most recent one greatly disturbed me. The article said, "According to the directions of sastras, women are never to be given freedom. When a child, a woman must be strictly controlled by her father. When she is young, she must be strictly controlled by her husband, and when she is old, she must be controlled by her elderly sons."

Srila Prabhupada went on to say, "So (women) become, because. Just like children. They are innocent, and if they are given freedom they will be spoiled." (>>> Ref. VedaBase => Srimad-Bhagavatam 5.6.4 -- Vrndavana, November 26, 1976) The lecture makes it sound like women are literally second-class citizens, predisposed towards evil and stupidity. Is this really God's plan?

Answer:      Dear ********,

In this lecture Srila Prabhupada talks about the position of women as mentioned in the shastras (scriptures). This is a controversial issue throughout the religious world as not only Hindu but Christian, Moslem, Buddhist and most other scriptures of the world present a paternalistic view of women in relation to society. Paternalism means the care or control of a community in a manner suggestive of a father caring for his children. The scripture represents God as a caring Patriarch speaking to those in power-namely fathers and elder sons-about the need to protect their daughters and sisters. This is clear in the lecture you cited where men-first the father, then the husband, then the eldest son-are ordered by scripture (God) to protect the most vulnerable and innocent members of the family-'the women'. The question that arises next is who are these vulnerable innocent women supposed to be protected from. The answer of course is 'the men', not religious men but men who do not follow the dictates of scripture. In other words irreligious exploitative men. Why are these women considered so vulnerable? The answer: because men are physically stronger and men were in total control of that society.

In modern western culture paternalistic statements like these seem ridiculous because the power structure of society has radically changed from what it was in ancient Hindu or Biblical times when these scriptures were written. Now women are powerful and independent, so much so that parents today are just as likely to warn their sons about the dangers of aggressive powerful women as they are likely to warn their daughters about the dangers of uncaring exploitative men. Still in certain cultures of the world women are not as emancipated as they are in the west and Srila Prabhupada was brought up and educated in one of these cultures. Also this lecture was spoken some 28 years ago when the role of women in the west was still much defined by traditional Christian paternalistic values. Thus these type of statements today seem extremely backward and (as you said) disturbing.

Therefore a word on scripture may be in order. Scripture is the realization of saints presented to society through the cultural filter of the times in which they lived. To make spiritual advancement we are to be concerned with the essence of scripture rather than the cultural rules and norms through which its essential message is expressed. The essence of scripture has nothing to do with outdated rules that might seem sexist, racist, or homophobic today. Indeed, Srila Prabhupada was a very practical person and had he spoken that lecture today he likely would have taken into consideration the social norms of the time and presented his main point in another way. And what was his main point?

The main point of every lecture that Srila Prabhupada ever gave was that we (as souls) are eternal servants of Krsna and to realize this truth we should associate with devotees and chant Hare Krsna. This is the timeless message of Godhead.

I hope this is helpful, sangaeditor

Please refer to these Sangas from Swami Tripurari:

'Women, degradation and trust'
http://swami.org/sanga/archives/pages/volume_two/m94.html

'Women and the reality of our times'
http://swami.org/sanga/archives/pages/volume_three/Archive013101.html

'Women, intelligence, and interpretation'
http://swami.org/sanga/archives/pages/volume_three/m149.html