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Across religions, include women in the clergy
There is potential in women priests from all religions becoming game-changers in gender inclusion. They must have a greater role in the rituals that govern all our lives from birth to death.
When Tamil Nadu Hindu religious and charitable endowments department minister, P K Sekar Babu, announced recently that women could also be appointed as priests in temples following stipulated training, it caused consternation.
The importance of women priests in all religions cannot be overstated. The government and civil society should encourage more women to take up this profession and facilitate this. The clergy plays an important part in lessening social prejudices, an example being the Sikh clergy coming out strongly against female foeticide.
There is huge potential in women priests from all religions becoming game-changers in gender inclusion in contemporary times. They could play a vital role in erasing vaccine hesitancy, tackling the upsurge in domestic violence during the pandemic, and addressing issues which affect women. In a deeply religious society, advice from the clergy carries significant weight.
While there is no data on practising Hindu women priests, there are about a dozen formal institutions which train women for priesthood. The Jnana Prabodhini in Pune is among the oldest, and its Sanskrit Sanskruti Sangshodhika department, established in 1975, has a department to train men and women for priesthood, regardless of caste, unusual in a profession traditionally dominated by Brahmins.
Manisha Shete, 51, who works as a priest and is the coordinator at the institute mentioned in an interview to a newspaper that when she began her training at Jnana Prabodhini in 2006, around 50% of the students were women. The institute encourages single women, divorcees, widows and women who are unable to have children to study there, most of whom are usually not accepted as equals in a traditional society. Excluding women from worship and carrying out religious rituals on the basis of biological functions, according to Shete, is a misinterpretation of the scriptures.
The blurring of gender divisions in the clergy has also been seen among Muslims. A decade ago, the All India Muslim Women’s Board appointed two women, Hena Zaheer and Maria Fazal, as qazis in Uttar Pradesh. The progress since then has been heartening and steady. In 2016, the Bhartiya Mahila Muslim Andolan (BMMA) began training women to be qazis; today there are six in Mumbai who run sharia courts, solemnise marriages, try and resolve marital and inheritance issues, and counsel women facing domestic violence.
In an interview with TV channel Al Jazeera, Noorjehan Safia Niaz, the founder of BMMA, said that the syllabus for studies of female qazis is carefully curated so as to not cater to the misogynistic rituals and principles that usually dominate religious studies. These women study the Koran from a female perspective, alongside the Constitution, to make better decisions that are gender-sensitive and in sync with the law.
This means that the women are likely to be far more open and gender-inclusive when conducting rituals. According to several wedding planning portals, women priests are much more in demand today than ever. Google searches which were once limited to 10 for female priests a month in 2016 registered at least 200 per month in 2020, usually from brides who do not want to be subjected to patriarchal rituals such as vidaai and kanyadaan. Women priests are also seen as not being as judgmental as men when it comes of interfaith and multicultural couples.
Women must have a greater role in the rituals that govern all our lives from birth to death.
lalita.panicker@hindustantimes.com
The views expressed are personal
