Jignasa Journal Of History Of Ideas And Culture Part 01

Author(s): Vibha Upadhyaya and Others
Publisher: University of Rajasthan

Page 72

34 / Jijñāsā
had to either renounce marital life or go through intense agony and suffering. Invariably, all women saints like Akka, Mahadevi, Karaikalammaiyar, Meerabai etc., had to go through profound conflict in choosing between their devotion to supreme deity and their husband. Most often, this anguish ultimately resulted in renunciation of family life. Rajendra Yadav, while referring to women who pursued the path of bhakti has quoted Camu while defining the recourse to spiritualism as 'metaphysical suicide as it involved not only renunciation of family life but also liberation from her existence as a woman, more precisely from her body' and 'sex'.
Meera stands out as the most pervasive ideal in the ascetic and devotional category. She has had high inspirational value for women when they choose to transcend the traditionally accepted ideals of a wife and a mother to aspire for spiritual roles. Meera's emergence in the realm of bhakti, her subsequent acceptance by the people, accompanied by her widespread popularity and more surprisingly, her long-lasting survival in the cultural ethos, goes to prove that an alternative non-traditional image of women as bhaktas was also highly acclaimed. Nevertheless her spiritual journey was not effortless and she had to confront and resolve various patriarchal dilemmas, as the ascetic option was considered a male domain. Therefore, in the course of her unswerving devotion to Krishna, Meera disowned, defied and subverted the normative pattern of values associated with powerful and entrenched institutions-family, marriage, caste, clan, royalty and even the realm of bhakti. In fact, a perusal of Meera's life shows that there was a continuous conflict and confrontation between Meera's fiercely independent and single-minded devotion to Krishna and the code of behaviour cherished by the society and polity in the erstwhile Rajput State. Due to her rejection of traditional boundaries Meera has been often called a 'rebel'.
Over the period, various legends have been woven around Meera Bai which have, to some extent, obscured true facts concerning her life history. Meera, born in 1498 A.D., was the daughter of Ratan Singh of the Medtiya Rathore clan. Tradition has it that as a young child Meera had considered herself wedded to Lord Krishna. Her attachment to this particular deity of the Hindu pantheon, an incarnation of Lord Vishnu, was partly due to the fact that her natal family was Vaishnavite. She was married into the royal family of the Sisodiya Rajputs of Mewar who had become legendary as upholders and defenders of Rajput system of values and traditions. After her husband Bhojraj's death, her brother-in-law Vikramaditya, who succeeded to the title of Maharana, resented her lifestyle and, particularly, her unwillingness to conform to the norms of the royalty. It is popularly believed that he even plotted to kill her many times. To escape the inhibiting lifestyle of the palace, Meera left Chittor, intermingled with male ascetics and danced and sang bhajans (devotional songs) for Lord Krishna in the temples, forests and on the streets. She spent the rest of her life in the temple at Dwarka where she attended to and worshipped Krishna. There are many fables about her death, the most popular being her final absorption in Krishna's idol and immersion in water.
As a Bhakta, Meera's spiritual experience distinguished her from the Bhaktas of her genre. In the Indian bhakti tradition, there have been various forms in which God is visualized, worshipped and approached by devotees. These bhāvas and rasas of bhakti are: Madhuryabhāva which posits God as lover and husband; Dasyabhava, where the devotee assumes the role of a servitor to the God implying complete surrender, humility, service and a sense of belonging; Shantabhāva wherein the devotee contemplates the incarnate form of God; in Sakhyabhāva God is approached as a friend and companion; in Vätsalyabhāva, the devotee envisions God as a child and while identifying with the