![](\"http:\/\/hinduismnow.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/H_H_Risley.png\")
Risley \u2013 The McCaulay of the Caste System<\/p><\/div> It is extremely critical for all Hindus to understand this conspiracy and know the truth about the caste system., because this is the biggest stick with which both other religions and Hindus themselves beat themselves with. There is no word for caste in Sanskrit. Varna describes a mental setup. Jaati is a professional guild. Kula is a family tree. There is no word for caste. Let that sink in.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Vyasa was born to a fisherwoman and Valmiki was a hunter. Vishwamitra was a King. Dhurva a demon.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Hinduism never believed ANYTHING<\/strong> was unchangeable \u2013 your mental setup, your physical body including<\/em> the DNA and yes, even<\/em> the laws of physics. \u00a0It is the Europeans idea of superiority of their skin that made them project the idea of un-changeable and by-birth nature to the \u00a0jaatis of India. \u00a0 While it is true that parenting and community have a huge influence on individuals, we never believed that it was a final statement. \u00a0 History of Hinduism is replete with instances of this. \u00a0 Dhurva \u2013 one of the greatest devotees of Vishnu \u2013 was born to a demon. \u00a0Vyasa \u2013 who scribed\u00a0the Vedas, the Bhagavatham, Brahma Sutras and almost every major \u00a0scripture \u2013 was born to a fisher woman. \u00a0Vishwamitra, whose gave the Gayatri Mantra which every Brahmin recites daily was born a Kshatriya king. \u00a0Rama and \u00a0Krishna \u2013 the greatest incarnations of Lord Vishnu \u2013\u00a0who are worshiped by every Hindu were born as Kshatriyas and not a Brahmins. \u00a0If this idea of hierarchy of Varnas or Jaatis was true, why would the Brahmins \u2013 who preserved these texts \u2013 retain these stories? The Varna System was the greatest freedom offered to men -it recognized everyone\u2019s choice and gave them a rightful place in society. Power was equally balanced and nothing was restricted by birth \u2013 but only by intent and declaration.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Do Read this amazing article by Prof KS Kannan summarizes the main points about the origin of the caste system by the British. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The very word caste was coined by the British from the Portuguese word \u00a0Casta. In the 1800s Based on Darwin\u2019s idea of evolution of species, many Europeans started\u00a0this idea of evolution of races (though Darwin never talked about races). They said Africans were the lowest and Europeans, highest and so on. And this \u201cscience\u201d of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":""},"categories":[1952],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50811"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=50811"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50811\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=50811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=50811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalpress-new.hinduismnow.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=50811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nThe very word caste<\/strong> was coined by the British from the Portuguese word \u00a0Casta<\/strong>. In the 1800s Based on Darwin\u2019s <\/a>idea of evolution of species, many Europeans started\u00a0this idea of evolution of races (though Darwin never talked about races). They said Africans were the lowest and Europeans, highest and so on. And this \u201cscience<\/em>\u201d of race was imported into India and mapped by \u201crace scientist<\/strong>\u201d Herbert Risley who was appointed the census commissioner of India<\/em>. \u00a0He categorized and made an hierarchy of the various Jaatis<\/strong> \u2013 or professional guilds \u2013 and wrongly\u00a0mixed that up\u00a0to Four Varnas \u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>\u2013 which was a scientific way of analyzing mental setups and not a discriminatory, defined-by-birth, rigid condemnation of individuals \u2013 which is what the Europeans were doing to everyone with their idea of higher and lower races.<\/p>\n![\"valmiki\"](\"http:\/\/hinduismnow.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/valmiki-300x233.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n
\nIt is true that knowledge was kept in families and that families of a particular trade used to marry within themselves. But that is a phenomenon that is common on every part of the world and in every sub part. But nowhere was \u00a0right denied by birth and no where were a particular mental setup looked down upon. \u00a0Everyone had their role to play and power was equally distributed.
\n![\"varnas\"](\"http:\/\/hinduismnow.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/varnas-230x300.jpg\")
<\/a>The scholars who were interested in pure knowledge were called Brahmins\u00a0\u2013 but they had to live by begging only so that they will use their knowledge to serve society. The warriors or Kshatriyas were to defend the Kingdom, but they had strong rules to make sure that they never abused their powers. Vaishyas controlled the wealth and commerce and movement of goods and Shudras owned all the land. \u00a0There was no superiority or inferiority \u2013 only choice. People did what they wanted and every group held one important part of the society.
\n <\/p>\n
\nOk, lets talk about\u00a0Caste<\/a>
\n\u2026
\nCaste system in India is a direct result of multi-generational social engineering by the British as part of their divide-and-rule strategy. One of the key architects of this engineering was\u00a0 Lord Risley<\/a> who institutionalized caste by making it part of the census. Over multiple censuses caste was inherited and soon one would be rigidly assigned to a caste right at birth. Caste-by-birth is a distortion of Hindu philosophy and tradition. Caste itself is a distortion and an European import, just like secularism. The closest Hindu construct is that of varna<\/em> and jaati<\/em>. This is a big topic, but Varna may be be thought of as division of labor in society and jaati as professional associations, like the Institute of Engineers. The relevant point is that these categories were fluid and could can evolve over time and are certainly not fixed at birth. I repeat \u2013 Inheritance of caste is a distortion, and not an fundamental tenet of Hinduism. Most prominent scriptures of Hinduism, such as the Gita, completely reject the idea of \u2018caste by birth\u2019.\u00a0<\/em>By the way, Lord Risley had gone further and also assigned a hierarchy to the different castes. That was the origin of the current upper, lower, scheduled, OBC and tribal categories.
\nAnother notable Brit in this context is Sir William Jones<\/a>. He interpreted\u00a0Manusmriti<\/em> to give Hindus their laws! My guess is that our current obsession with Manusmriti<\/em> can be traced back to him.
\n\u2026
\nThe story now is more complex with multiple villains. Obvious ones are politicians like Mulayam Singh Yadav and Laloo Yadav who are using caste to play vote bank politics<\/a>.
\n\u2026 Read More<\/a>
\nPlease see this full 6 minute video by Rajiv Malhotra where he explains the origins of the caste system (6 min 24 secs)
\n <\/p>\n
\nAnd then this lucid explanation by Swami Nithyananda about\u00a0the Spiritual truths about\u00a0\u00a0the Varnashrama\u00a0System<\/p>\n