Sexual Life in Ancient India: A Study in the Comparative History of Indian Culture v1.c6.24

v1.c6.24

WHEN now the woman is married, how does her life in marriage go on? What is expected of her? What is granted her? The first purpose of woman is the bearing of offspring. In a quite wholesome, if often exaggerated stressing of this great task in life of the woman, the Epic agrees with the rest of the literature.¹ In addition to the well-known reasons more or less active almost all over the world, which set such extraordinary importance on offspring, and that usually male offspring, there are especially in India religious ones, too: the son must make the sacrifices for the dead to his fathers which are absolutely necessary for their welfare in the other world. He saves them from an existence in hell or among ghosts, and leads them to heaven. Thus marriage is necessary for both sexes.²