Caste in India: The Facts and the System c7.s2.17

c7.s2.17

Regular marriage should only be contracted between members of the same caste. The rules, however, concerning certain marriage ceremonies and matters of inheritance, and the permission to marry, at any rate as second wives, women of lower castes—in fact, the whole theory of mixed castes—proves that the rule was not applied with such uniform severity as the general formula would lead us to suppose. The prohibition against marrying a Śūdra, which in the case of Brahmans and Kshatriyas is repeated with insistence, obviously admits of a great many accommodations. Still more so is this true of the precepts which govern food. Lastly, except for certain reservations, the use of meat itself is tolerated. Abstinence from spirits, which is strongly enjoined elsewhere, appears in certain passages as nothing but a mere counsel of perfection.