MiraBai on Gender

MiraBai is a Hindu Saint/poet who it is said that when she was very young and was pestering her mother about who she would marry, her mother handed her an idol of Krishna and told her, “Krishna.  You will marry Krishna.”  From that day on she was completely devoted to Krishna.  She later was forced to marry a prince who died and after harassment from her in-laws, left the royal home and became a wandering sadhu.  Once, when wanting to enter a gathering of men who were singing devotional bhajans she was stopped at the entrance way and told that she couldn't enter because she was female.  Her response was, “are not all souls female before God?”

They let her enter. 

Re: MiraBai on Gender

Hi Metta,

Thanks for sharing that. I haven't read that sory of MiraBai before.

I wonder why souls were considered female before God?

Is it because they considered God as male and so to unite with God the soul is female?

There is a poem of Mirabai's that I like.. which makes me think this might be so.

The night is painted red 

”.. and I am ready,

dressed to get undressed.

This is my night

with the king.

…

He has put on his beautiful

dark face.

I am happy because now my wedding night

is eternity.”

( an extract)

Re: MiraBai on Gender

Okay, this may seem like a completely random association, but reading of MiraBai being refused entrance and her reply made me think of a fragment of a speech given by Newberry Award award winner Robin McKinley about Tolkien's seemingly ONLY acknowledgment of the existence of the female gender:

“Tolkien has received much criticism for his inability to portray women - or perhaps better to say his unwillingness to deal with women at all, except as tersely and tangentially as possible, and with teeth visibly clenched.  When I was first reading LOTR, it never occurred to me to protest - beyond a mild wistfulness - that there were no girls in it.   Even in the makeup of the Fellowship of the Ring, the Nine Walkers, so carefully chosen to represent the races of Elves, Dwarves, and Men - and one Wizard, who is also called “he” - no thought is given to, uh, female persons of each persuasion, creed, or national origin.  That’s just the way the best books usually are.
“But wait.  In the middle of all this unmitigated male bonding there’s a surprising and highly uncharacteristic scene in The Return of the King… before the gates of Gondor, where the forces of Mordor have besieged it.  The Riders of Rohan have swept down and engaged the enemy in battle, and the defenders are briefly hopeful, but the Nazgul, the Black Riders, Sauron’s deadliest servants, return, and neither horse nor man can stand against the terror of their coming.  The Rohan king, Theoden, falls beneath his maddened horse, and his Riders are scattered.  Or all his Riders but one: Dernhelm, the mysterious, solitary young man who befriended the hobbit Merry, remains at Theoden’s side, even when the Lord of the Nazgul threatens him.  The rest of this scene is in Tolkien’s own words:

'[Dernhelm’s] sword rang as it was drawn. “Do what you will; but I will hinder it, if I may.”
“Hinder me?  Thou fool.  No living man may hinder me!”
Then Merry heard of all sounds in that hour the strangest.  It seemed that Dernhelm laughed, and the clear voice was like the ring of steel.  “But no living man am I!  You look upon a woman.  Eowyn I am, Eomund’s daughter.  You stand between me and my lord and kin.  Begone, if you be not deathless!  For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him.”

The winged creature screamed at her, but the Ringwraith made no answer, and was silent, as if in sudden doubt.  Very amazement for a moment conquered Merry’s fear.  He opened his eyes and the blackness was lifted from them.  There some paces from him sat the great beast, and all seemed dark about it, and above it loomed the Nazgul Lord like a shadow of despair.  A little to the left facing them stood she whom he had called Dernhelm.  But the helm of her secrecy had fallen from her, and her bright hair, released from its bonds, gleamed with pale gold upon her shoulders.  Her eyes grey as the sea were hard and fell, and yet tears were on her cheek.  A sword was in her hand, and she raised her shield against the horror of her enemy’s eyes.' ”

What's interesting about this to me is that even from a writer with zero cognizance of the  existence of women, much less any intrinsic worth they might bear, comes this passage acknowledging some mysterious power that comes merely from being a woman.  Culturally, if not biologically, male is the default sex.  Merely being a woman in a 'man's world,' therefore, confers some quality of surprise, of unexpectedness, something unforeseen, and even more so, unforeseeable.

Is this reverse sexism?  Or a deeper cultural archetype, as evinced by the many stories of unexpected female heroines?  Is there some meaning of the veil of secrecy under which these women (from Charlotte Bronte to MuLan) succeed, only to unmask themselves?

I know this is a bit of a departure, and I am also curious about why are 'all souls female before God?' 

It seems like with a male deity, whatever the religion, whatever the priest caste, there are always women devotees referred to as 'brides.'  Is this a pagan remnant?  The fragment sass cited seemed remarkably similar both to the Inanna/Dumuzi sacred marriage ritual I've read of, and to relatively modern Christian women mystic saints.  Or of course, the Song of Songs.

And what was that you were saying elsewhere Metta, about all love poetry might be read as spiritual?  Maybe it goes both ways…

Re: MiraBai on Gender

I love your whole post Tsuya, random association or not.  I had never thought of the lack of women within the Lord of the Rings before… very interesting.

Yes, all love poetry can be read as spiritual - and I think the converse could be true… because when you are in love, that person, most times, becomes as some kind of mythological god in your eyes, holding a very large power over you.  Especially if you have bhaktic (is that a word) tendencies.

Metta 

Re: MiraBai on Gender

MiraBai lived at the beginning of the Bhakti (yoga of devotion/love) movement and she thought of Krishna, her form of the Diety, as Beloved, Lover and God.  There are some male Bhaktas in India who worship Krishna and acutally live their lives dressed as and behaving as a woman, not because they are gay, but to be able to approach the Diety as a woman.  It is also thought that this love relationship (lover and Beloved) moves you toward God much quicker than any other path.  Because when you are in love with someone, that someone becomes part of your every thought (but this works for Goddess worship as well, of course)

Why is God thought of as male?  Well, I have many ideas - as a devotee you want God to fill you as and when a man makes love to a woman, he enters her - also, in the culture of India during MiraBai's time, the woman's life was built around men.  They lived in their father's house, they lived in their husband's house and when the husband died, they lived in their son's home.  They were always the dependent of the man.  Not only that, but when they married, they were to look upon their husbands as God, as a form of the Diety on earth - and, in some cultures, when their husband died they were to climb atop the burial pyre and die themselves as the pyre was set on fire.

I much prefer to see it in the symbolic manner of the bride and the bridegroom, the lover and the Beloved.  It is very beautiful.  You see it in the writings of Catholic mystics such as St Teresa of Avila and St Catherine of Siena

I have this image of the relationship with God that goes like this - that the soul and God are making love… God can be a tease and sometimes moves so slow as to be imperceptible, but he is still inside, slowly moving deep inside the soul, sometimes moving quickly - which I suppose could be equated with the ecstasies that some lovers of God experience… when He finally is entirely within the soul, it is the big O - enlightenment, oneness with God… 

those are my ponderings… 

Re: MiraBai on Gender

The poet who was the subject of my master's thesis, William Everson (also known as Brother Antoninus) often wrote during his Dominican period of his love for God from his feminine self. The Church was very tolerant of his poems because they fell within a tradition of mystical writing. And of course, Saint Teresa wrote highly erotic poems about her union with God (please note that erotic is relative to the period in which one lives). 

So while Mirabai is the best known of the Hindu Bhakti poets, and many men dressed as women in their devotion to Krisha, the practice transcends religious lines.

There is even evidence that Rumi had a romantic relationship with Shams, a friend and teacher who appears to have opened Rumi to certain elements of divine love that were new to him. Many love poems directed to the Beloved are meant for Shams or even signed with his name (written after Shams disappeared, or was murdered), with the implication that through his love of this man he was embracing the God that lives in each of us.

[For Rumi's life and work see Annemarie Schimmel, I Am Wind, You Are Fire: The Life and Work of Rumi (Boston: Shambhala, 1992); idem, The Triumphal Sun: A Study of the Works of Jalaloddin Rumi (London: East-West publications, 1978)]

Peace,

Bill 

Re: MiraBai on Gender

I'm wondering who has suggested that Rumi was romantically involved with Shams in any other way than in words, and then mystical words speaking of the internal rather than the external.  I haven't read that yet and I'm curious.

You know, I read a few years back that some believed that Saint John of the Cross was gay because of his poem, The Dark Night, suggesting that the poem was about him meeting with another man, a lover, and not his experience of oneness with God:

With my carnal man's view I can see how this could be understood, but  I cannot see as a spiritual man who has experienced a touch of this lover/Beloved love relationship with God how it can be understood in that manner.

Seems that it would be the eyes that one looks with that would determine how they view these two amazing beings and their own experiences that would color that view.

Re: MiraBai on Gender

In many schools of Tantric metaphysics it is common to consider all manifested existence (thus humans included) as supported by Shakti or the female divine, thus God (whether Krishna or Siva, etc…) was the empty void that manifestation exists within. Perhaps this metaphysic is what leads to everyone being female before God. I also remember quiet a bit of Indo European mythology and it wasn't until IE cultures really began to develop distinctly that we get too many Goddess or female stories that are anything more then creation myths. In Vedic paleopaganism the Goddesses that would later evolve into the more commonly known Hindu Goddesses where primarily river or lake Goddesses, and served little other roles then to animate nature. A poem from one of the Vedas (the latest one I can't remember the name now) praises the mother and is pretty much a laundry list of wealth and riches that the singer hopes to be rewarded with. Tolkien who very clearly stated that he wished to create a British mythology and was a professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford stuck very closely with Celtic and Germanic mythology in finding roles for women, especially the romantic poetry which was a redressing of old Welsh mythological tradition and medieval French ideals. In these traditions the Women is always an inspirer of great deeds (however not usually the doer of them). There's a smattering of free associated thoughts that may have absolutely nothing to do with each other, but create an interesting polemic none the less.

Namaste

Re: MiraBai on Gender

Tsuya -

the point you bring up about Tolkein is very interesting. I also always thought it was a strange dynamic in Lord of the Rings- that all of the central core characters driving the action are male, but at the climactic moment of the novel is it a woman, Eowyn (who, shut out of the action, dresses as a male to participate) who unmasks herself and commits the key decisive act.  In mythology there is a general split between the agency of male heroes and the passive / supportive role of heroines (waiting, being rescued, abducted) - and in that context your question about the role of the heroine (woman) unmasked is very interesting one!

Bill & Metta -

I read just this week a reference in a french philosophy text of  a physical relationship between Rumi and Shams.  The interesting thing seems though to me , not the actualy physicality of the relationship (or not) but the blurring of lines between human beloeved and spiritual.. the manner in which the human beloved provides a vehicle, a conduit for that spiritual relationship.

Re: MiraBai on Gender

Hi Sass,

You said:  The interesting thing seems though to me , not the actualy physicality of the relationship (or not) but the blurring of lines between human beloeved and spiritual.. the manner in which the human beloved provides a vehicle, a conduit for that spiritual relationship.

I think that is exactly the interesting part. When I first learned about Rumi and Shams, the teacher who was talking about their relationship presented it not as two men hooking up, but as a Sufi form of Tantra. The discussion focused on how we can experience the Divine through physical love of another. In fact, the poetry suggests that for Rumi (assuming this is all true, and I think there is enough evidence to say it is) Shams embodied the archetype of the Divine and through loving him he was loving God.

The cool part of this is that it provides a template for spiritual homosexuality within a monotheistic tradition. This is exactly what is needed.

Peace,

Bill 

Re: MiraBai on Gender

Bill,

I think I was really just trying to avoid a “did they or didn't they” debate on the sexual nature of Rumi & Shams relationship :)

But your point is an excellent one.  I absolutely agree with you on the importance of having a template that acknowledges the spiritual dimensions of homosexual love.  Alongside the dearth of well acknowledged female spiritual role models, homosexual models of spirituality are virtually unknown in the everyday cultural landscape. 

Does anyone know of other examples they can share?

Re: MiraBai on Gender

The poets Rimbaud and Verlaine had a secular version of this. Unfortunately, it was corrupted by drug and alcohol abuse by both men. I'll think about this – I'm sure there are other, healthier examples.

Re: MiraBai on Gender

re: Rumi and Shams…

again, I think this all goes back to the eyes you read it with…  If you are looking to find a physical relationship, you will… if you are looking beyond the physical into the spiritual realms, it is something altogether different.  I don't want to get into the he did or he didn't argument, either… but, I think Rumi was way beyond the physical. 

Rumi & Shams

But Metta doesn't that create a false separation between the immanent and the transcendent? Isnt it only through the very physicality of our bodies - whether dancing (like the sufis) or yoga or meditation or sexuality -  that the spiritual realm is brought alive for us?

Re: Rumi & Shams

I am just going to post a quote of something it is recorded that Shams said from the recently released “Rumi and Me - The Autobiography of Shams-i Tabrizi” by William Chittick:

By God, I am incapable of knowing Mawlana.  There's no hypocrisy in these words, no standing on ceremony or interpretation, because I am incapable of knowing him.  Every day I come to know something about hist state and acts that was not there yesterday.

You need to grasp Mawlana a bit better than this, so that afterwards you won't be astounded.  That is the day of mutual defrauding [64:9].  He has this beautiful form and speaks beautiful words, but don't be satisfied with those.  Beyond them is something else.  Seek that from him.

He has two sorts of words - one hypocrisy, the other truthfulness.  As for his hypocrisy – all souls and spirits of the saints are yearning to meet him and sit with him.  And as for his truth and lack of hypocrisy, the spirits of the prophets are yearning for that: “Oh, would that we had come in his time so that we could have been his companions and listened to his words.”  Now that you have that companionship, don't waste it.  Don't look at him like that.  Look at him with the gaze with which the spirits of the prophets look – that of sighing and longing.

Harun ar-Rashid said, ” Bring Layla for me so that I can see why Majnun's love for her has thrown such fervor in the world and why from East to West the lovers have made the story of his love their own mirror.”  They spent a great deal of money and used many tricks, and they brought Layla.  The caliph entered into her private chamber at night, the candles all lit.  He gazed upon her for a time, and then for a time he looked down.  He said to himself, “I'll get her to talk.  Maybe whatever it is will become more apparent in her face when she talks.”  He looked at Layla and said, “Are you Layla?”

She said, “Yes, I'm Layla, but you're not Majnun.  The eye in Majnun's head is not in your head.

     How will you see Layla with an eye that sees others and has never been purified by tears?

“Look upon me with the gaze of Majnun.”

You should look at the beloved with the eyes of the lover, for He loves them [5:54]  The flaw is that people don't look at God with the gaze of love.  They look at Him with the gaze of knowledge, the gaze of gnosis, and the gaze of philosophy.  The gaze of love is something else.

Re: Rumi & Shams

an example of what was written and what was read:

[b]Upanishad[/b]

We dream that busy dream
of worlds turned under our beds;
with toes tucked beneath blankets;
with fear of boogey men.

We wake in that slow awakening
with smell of baking bread;
the sweet song of sun rise;
with taste of what is come.

We sing that silent sound
that reaches far within.
With no coverings left to bind,
beautifully naked we merge.

I wrote this poem after a discussion about the Upanishads in a class that I was in. It was written about the soul and God - the process of awakening - and the ultimate merging, becoming one with God… Yet, a number of people in reading the poem discerned that after a night, perhaps dealing with the kids, I got up made bread, watched the sunrise, took off my clothes and made love to my lover… but that it is not what I am writing about…

I’m writing about the soul emeshed in maya and illusion, I’m writing about those things that happen that gently rouse the soul and bring it into a new reality… I’m talking about the dissollution of the veils seperating one from God being removed - until we are naked - bare of any coverings and find final union with God…

Now, I am no Rumi - and I have yet to find final complete union with God… But I hope you see what I’m trying to say…