Chathurashram for a New Age – 1

Blooming Stars - Swami (Dr) Snehanand Jyoti 

The Chathurashram (the four stages of life of an individual in traditional India) Parampara (tradition) is modified, reinterpreted, and adapted for the needs of the modern person. In the present scheme, sathyashram (training in and living truth) more appropriately takes the place of brahmacharyashram (moving in God); grihasthashram (family life) is more aptly replaced by sevashram (life of service to family and society); vanaprasthashram (retreat from worldly pursuits and desires) is substituted by paramarthashram (the pursuit of the ultimate good); sanyasashram (the life of renunciation) is replaced by siddhashram (place for realization). What is the need for change?  Brahmacharyashram, which is very broad and general, and should be applied to all the ashrams. Everyone should be living and moving and having being in the ultimate reality, Brahman. Brahmacharya is wrongly reserved to celibate life with some kind of prestige attached to it. Brahmacharya is not anyone’s monopoly; all should practice it. Grihasthashram is also given a broader meaning in sevashram which should be uniquely characterized by service to others including one’s family. Sevashram culminates in paramarthashram (retired life) that focuses on the ultimate good as well as a preparation for siddhashram (a place for complete renunciation and realization. The modified ashrams are also more in tune with current needs and aspirations. Besides that there was a wide-spread living of these ashrams in practical day-to-day life is very seriously doubted. Women were excluded from these ashrams.

The old Vedic tradition did well in the past, and partly or wholly influenced the life of the Indian people. It was more theoretical, conceptual, and ideal than real and practical. Currently it can provide a much-needed frame-work for a new model that preserves the good elements of the old tradition. It is only fair that everything old as well as new is thoroughly scrutinized and adapted for our times. I strongly feel that is what the seers of old did in their life time. As they passed on what is worthwhile, i. e., tradition, it is imperative that we pass on what we find useful and valuable to later generations. After all the very Latin word tradere from which the word tradition comes means to hand over or to pass on. We are not mere static vehicles that uncritically just hands over our past. We are dynamic conveyors who dare to modify and adapt the useful past, and pass it on with our own findings culled from our lived experience. We alone are the authority of our experience. To give undue importance to any other epoch or time neglecting our own does justice to no one. Therefore we thoroughly scrutinize and evaluate the past, take what is relevant and good, and add our own findings before passing on. It would have been utterly foolish, for instance, to pass on the evil practices of caste system as they were handed down to us. We have a right and an obligation to make the necessary corrections of any tradition, rituals, and customs.

It is important to give a few pivotal concepts to place the four ashrams in their proper context. Brahma sathyam (God is absolute, real, and unchanging truth); jagan mithya (the world is unreal, changing, and illusory). There is Nirguna Brahma: the absolutely unreachable, undefinable, and static, Brahman who cannot at all be predicated with any attributes, and there is Saguna Brahman:  the Brahman that is dynamic and heaped on with anthropomorphic forms and attributes. There are three kinds of truth: parmarthika sathyam (the absolute and unchanging truth), vyavaharika sathyam (the truth related to everyday life in the world that is constantly changing), and prathibhasika sathyam (the truth that is illusory and confusing). All material objects and persons are composed of three gunas (qualities): satva (being, order, purity), rajas (atmosphere, change, movement), and tamas (darkness, inertia, ignorance). All persons will have these qualities. The level of consciousness will depend on the proportion of these qualities in each person. The more the satva tendency in a person the higher the consciousness. The four purusharthas (the aims or objectives of human life) – dharma (righteousness, duty), artha (wealth), kama (pleasure, desire), moksha (liberation) complete the list of the key ingredients that make the life of a person rich and purposeful. The varnashrams that resulted in the ugly, destructive caste system did enough damage to humanity, and is better confined to the garbage can of history, and is not included in the key concepts. (To be continued).


For more articles from Blooming stars, kindly click here.