VARṆA ORDINARILY
Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia is now 14 years old
Our Encyclopedia recently received a wonderful opportunity for a major renewal on its 14th birthday . After many years of growing our Encyclopedia had become bit slow and sometimes even decided not to answer when people knocked on the door.
A very big thank you and blessings to Dmytro Rudiy (rudiy.nl) for his great work in upgrading the server, website and all of the infrastructure and helping make TBE fast and reliable again for everyone!
We kindly ask our readers to help us cover the cost of this important upgrade and also help with the ongoing costs of keeping the Encyclopedia alive and freely available.
or card
Every little donation helps and every one is deeply appreciated. 🙏🙏🙏
OM AH HUM VAJRA GURU PADMA SIDDHI HUM 🙏🙏🙏
May blessings shower down on all of yous 🙏🙏🙏
there are four chief divisions or castes (varṇ a) of Hindu society—viz.: Brāhmaṇ a (priesthood; teaching); Kṣ attriya (warrior); Vaiśya (merchant); Śūdra (servile) said to have sprung respectively from the mouth, arm, thigh, and foot of Brahma. A man of the first three classes becomes on investiture, during the upanayana ceremony of the sacred thread, twice-born (dvija). It is said that by birth one is sūdra, by ̣ samskāra (upanayana) dvija (twice born); by study of the Vedas one attains the state of a vipra; and that he who has knowledge of the Brahman is a Brāhmaṇ a.1 The present Tantra, however, speaks of a fifth or hybrid class (sāmānya), resulting from intermixture between the others. It is a peculiarity of Tantra that its worship is largely free of Vaidik exclusiveness, whether based on caste, sex or otherwise. As the Gautamiya-Tantra says, “The Tantra is for all men, of whatever caste, and for all ̣ women” (Sarvavarṇ ādhikāraśca nāriṇ ām yogya eva ca).
1 Janmanā jāyate Śūdrah ̣ Samskārād dvija ucyate Veda-pāthat bhavet viprah Brahma jṇ ānāti brāhmaṇ āh.