Dipali

Dear Tarik
That’s very true. In many parts of India women and girls are subjected to physical and sexual abuse as punishment or as culturally justified assaults. Indian laws are as liberal as any other developed country, the Indian constitution gives women the same rights as men. 1950 when women got their rights of property, re-marriage and voting rights in India.
Although Muslim personal laws differ considerably from that of the Hindus. Despite various laws protecting women’s rights, traditional value of women can still be degrading in some parts of India. Indian social structure is very complex . Its based on religion ,caste and wealth. There is a visible vast different in socio-economic status and its evident everywhere, Women from rich and higher caste often enjoy a very liberal life style.


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Tarik Sultan

Thanks for the input. For some reason, I never considered the class issue, but it makes sense that despite the laws the caste system hasn't totally gone away. I have to say though, that I have forgotten the attitudes that I've experienced from upper class Indians regarding dance. As an example, I once had a student who was not only Upper calss, but high caste as well. She was reluctant to let her family know she was taking classes because she was raised to believe that such things were beneath her.

From your input, I think we've just added another piece to the puzzel, which is class. I don't think it is strictly religious prohibition, but a combination of several factors, class being a major one.

Aisha Azar

Dear Tarik,
In reality, has there ever been a time when religion was NOT based on caste/class, lines? Consider the Jews who were not allowed into the room with the Ark of the Covenent, or allowed to bathe in the public baths. Consider the Egyptians who were not allowed to pray in the inner sanctums of the religious institutions unless their title was Pharoah or Priest. Think about women's status in the many countries of the world where they are not allowed to lead or sometimes even participate in religious rituals. To quote Fran Lebowitz, my favorite sarcastic bitch, "Always a godmother; never a god."!!!!!
Love,
A'isha

Tarik Sultan

Organized religions no, they've always gone hand in hand. That's why Jesus's and Mohamed's teachings were so radical because they both went against the established class order. From the perspective of our time, giving women the poor, orphans and children the right to inheritance, property, the right to divorce, consent in marriage, testifying in court seem like no big deal, but back in ye olden days this was earth shattering. Just think, Jesus even went so far as to say the priesthood and temple were unneccessary, you could talk to god yourself.

This is why these and other religions were soon coopted by the ruling elites who ignored these principles and defaulted to tradition instead. I can't remember off hand now, but, there are some earth based religions where there is, if not total equality, at least more access to the sacred and input in the leadership of the community.

chryssanthi sahar

Going back to the question of Rebecca: In my opinion, Buddhism is maybe the only religion, which doesn't damn physical activities such like dancing, singing, performing etc. But then again, it depends on what kind of Buddhism. There are very big differences among the schools of Buddhism, even lot bigger than among the denominations of Christianity. I have dealt with Buddhism for the last 10 years and I used to belong to a Tibetan Buddhist community. I can confirm, that they not only didn't have any problem at all with my belly dancing, but they even were asking me to dance at different parties and celebrations of the community. I also never experienced negative reactions about my dancing among Japanese Buddhist communities, which I had got to know during my stay in Japan. But it is possible, that there are Buddhists who don't like this kind of dance.

Kiraze

It is interesting that Christianity, Judaism and Islam are all thought to be based on Zoroastrianism which was very equal and respectful religion. It was also the first religion based on dualism so everything was either bad or good, black or white and maybe this is also the reason why these "successor religions" tend to be full of strange rules which easily make the supporters of those religions both intolerant and divided into classes.

Hinduism and Buddhism are based on very different values than these dualistic religions and the philosophy of life in those is usually more complex as it was with religions of ancient Egypt, Greece, Azteks etc. - and with pagan religions: problem with "neo-pagan" religions at these days is that people following those are still mostly coming from the background of dualistic values.

I know extremely intolerant Buddhists and Wiccan and extremely open-minded Muslims and Christians and vice versa. So I believe that none of the religions is intolerant - people are

Moon

Exactly!

(wanted to give you some reputation, but I got the message to spread it around first )

Sara

I agree with Tarik! Lol.

Aisha Azar

Dear Cryssanthi,
Important to remember that the word in Tibetan to "Woman" is also the word for "Low Born"..... I did study Tietan Buddhism for a short while with Chugdad Tulku Rinpoche because in my naivete, I believed that these people were more "enlightened" than the rest of us. Turns out they are just exactly as enlightened as the rest of us, and not one bit more.
There was a woman who traveled to Tibet around the turn of the century... I forget her name right now...She found out that the Dali Lama of the time did not want to speak with her because she was a woman.
I learned a lot about Tibetan Buddhism from Rinpoche, and continue to be interested in the religion, but I also see where it is sort of like Catholicism with an epicanthic fold.
Regards,
A'isha

chryssanthi sahar

Dear Aisha.

I agree that traditional Tibetan Buddhism is quite old fashioned as about the role of women. But there are also westernized forms of Tibetan Buddhism (like the one I used to belong), which are very progressive and where men and women are absolutely equal. There are differences also among the traditional Tibetan schools of Buddhism (there exist 4 main schools in Tibetan Buddhism). Well, I still consider myself to be a Buddhist, but I don't belong to any school anymore. I feel very connected to Zen Buddhism (to it's philosophy, but not it's practice, this is too severe for me), so I rather consider myself to be a free Zen Buddhist (more or less).