Jain Journal 1974 01

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 36

120
The impetus given by Rsabhadeva, the first tribal king to prevent marriage between co-uterine brothers and sisters drove nails to the system of pairing family during the Age of civilization. At this stage one man lived with one woman yet in such a manner that polygamy and infidelity remained the privileges of men for economic reasons, at the same time the strictest fidelity was demanded of the woman1.
JAIN JOURNAL
The pairing family was itself too weal and unstable to make an independent household necessary or even desirable as expected during the Age of civilization among the people of the stage of the infancy of the human race and the Age of Kulakarism than they did during the period of civilization. The division of labour between two sexes determined the status of women in society in that stage of civilization. The social status of the lady of civilization, surrounded by sham homage and estranged from all real work in civilization was infinitely lower than that of hard working woman5 of the Age of Kulakarism.
With the undermining of primitive free life and the growth of population the more degrading and oppressive became the position of the women, the more fervently must they have desired for the right to chastity, to temporary or permanent with one man only as deliverence or to no-marriage and to joining Jaina Sangha as nun.
This advance during the Age of civilization had originated from the women, but not from the men for the reason that they had never dreamed of renouncing the pleasures of actual group marriage with so many girls.
The pairing family arose on the border line between Kulakarism and civilization in which monogamy became the family characteristic at a later stage.
Until the upper stage of Kulakarism fixed wealth consisted of the house, clothing, household utensils of the simplest kind, crude implements of procuring and preparing food, boats, weapons, etc. Food had to be procured anew every day. At the stage of civilization all
• King Bharata kept his 64000 queens (a fabulous figure) in a separate mahal (apartment) with strict vigilance for their fidelity. It is strange how the maintenance of such a large troupe of ladies could be made at the expense of the public exchequer for the sake of luxury and pleasure of a single monarch. It shows clearly the degraded position of women.
5 Even to-day the hard working woman of the Santal tribe of India has better status in the social life than the ladies of the Indian feudal and capitalist classes.