The Gender of the Gods

The Gender of the Gods

It starts before the beginning with a denial of entry to females into the womb by using an enterprising Godman’s  Divya Putrajeevak Beej medication which claims to install a divine gatekeeper at the womb keeping out prospective life which has XX chromosomes. If the gatekeeper has been careless the error is corrected with a murderous termination of the female foetus after a prenatal determination of its sex.

It is not only into some temples that one half of humanity is being denied entry.  They face a denial of entry into life itself.

The Semitic religions have male gods, Jehovah, the Lord Almighty and Allah but the polytheist Indic religions have been devised as gender equitable with space for both gods and goddesses.  So their places of worship have either a god or a goddess as the principal deity. And in the notable Sabarimala even the miraculous offspring from a transgender Mohini has been installed as a deity.

It makes one question the gender of the gods.

Whatever be the origin of this bias against women entering some temples and worshiping alongside with men we as a society must realise that the times have changed.  Old arguments of ‘centuries old traditions’ or of ‘the restriction ... ...prevailing in Sabarimala from time immemorial’  do sound ludicrous when mouthed by agents of a modern, elected  democratic government.  Kerala with its high literacy, higher than average Quality of Life index and a relatively high participation of women in public life finds its government anachronistically debating for the ban.

Political activity represents the aspiration of a people.  We are well past the age of monarchs and feudal chieftains who in earlier times claimed centuries old traditions and practices from time immemorial. We are striving to be modern and have welcomed women in the work place, in various professions (including soldiering) and in the conduct of public affairs. In keeping with this #gender justice diffusing in all other orders of society religion too must assign an equal place to women in all places of worship. 

The representatives of the people have a major role in doing this. 

After the Kerala government's stated position in the Supreme Court we now have the parties to the dispute in the Shani Shignapur temple pass the onus for a decision saying "now the ball is in the chief minister’s court.”