Are Bengali "Kayasthas" Shudras?
From
lravi814@gmail.com@21:1/5 to
All on Wed May 27 09:58:58 2020
Swami Vivekanand:I read in the organ of the social reformers that I am called a Shudra and am challenged as to what right a Shudra has to become a Sannyasin. To which I reply: I trace my descent to one at whose feet every Brahmin lays flowers when he
utters the words — यमाय धर्मराजाय चित्रगुप्ताय वै नमः — and whose descendants are the purest of Kshatriyas. If you believe in your mythology or your Paurânika scriptures, let these so-
called reformers know that my caste, apart from other services in the past, ruled half of India for centuries. If my caste is left out of consideration, what will there be left of the present-day civilisation of India? In Bengal alone, my blood has
furnished them with their greatest philosopher, the greatest poet, the greatest historian, the greatest archaeologist, the greatest religious preacher; my blood has furnished India with the greatest of her modern scientists. These detractors ought to
have known a little of our own history, and to have studied our three castes, and learnt that the Brahmin, the Kshatriya, and the Vaishya have equal right to be Sannyasins: the Traivarnikas have equal right to the Vedas.
Shudra couldn't read and write in Vedas. Brahmin could read and write in Vedas whereas Kshatriya and Vaishya could read Vedas but not write in them.
Hence Swami Vivekananda was a Brahmin+Kshatriya or Brahma-Kshatriya.
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