Caste in India: The Facts and the System c6.s8.55

c6.s8.55

This aspect of the ‘ gods of the earth ’ is not bound up solely with their religious character.⁴ It extends to those representatives of the class whose occupations and ordinary life would of themselves afford no title to it. Respect which is properly religious is lavished on all kinds of ascetics and teachers, of whom a very large number are not Brahmans. Conversely, sects whose heterodox belief should easily detach them from the Brahmans and the prejudices of caste, like the Jainas,¹ and even some Muslims, continue to show a most abject deference to them, and to desire them as priests of their cult. Still less does the Brahmanic prerogative descend to the level of the sectarian conflicts between Viṣṇuites and Śivaites. The Brahmans are generally pleased to affect an attitude of disdain towards these divisions.