The Hindoos as They Are: A Description of the Manners, Customs and the Inner Life of Hindoo Society in BengalSivachandra Vasu
Religion
The Hindoos as They Are: A Description of the Manners, Customs and the Inner Life of Hindoo Society in Bengal
Sivachandra Vasu
Hindus; India -- Social life and customs; Women -- India
Ward has omitted
to say anything about the nocturnal revelry with which the festival is
in most instances accompanied. I have witnessed scenes on such
occasions, which are too disgusting to be described. Not only the
officiating priest and the spiritual guide, but all the members of the
family and not a few of the guests partake of the spirituous liquors
offered to the goddess, and in a state of intoxication sing _Ramprasadi_
songs befitting the occasion. The festival closes with orgies such as
are observed in the worship of Bacchus. There are, however, a few
honorable exceptions to the rule, who, though they perform the worship
of this goddess, yet altogether abstain from drinking. The goddess,
Kali, is their guardian deity, they worship her daily, but are known
never to touch a drop of wine. They attribute to her all the worldly
prosperity they enjoy and look to her for everlasting blessedness. Such
men have no faith in the common drunken motto, "_Bharey ma Bhobaney_,"
mother _Bhobaney_ (another name of Kali) is in the cup. But the grand
characteristic of this and similar festivals which are annually
recurring is, as I have already mentioned, "the wine, the fruit and the
lady fair."
"Even _bacchanalian_ madness has its charms."
But to return to the priests of Kali Ghat.--As time rolled on, their
descendants multiplied so rapidly that it soon became necessary to allot
a few days only in the year to each of the families, and on grand
occasions, which are not a few, the offertories are proportionately
divided among the whole set of the sacerdotal class. Thus it has now
become a case of what a Hindoo proverb so aptly expresses: "The flesh of
a sparrow divided into a hundred parts," or infinitesimal quantities.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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