The Hindu scriptures say that the wife must be very obedient and that the husband is God to her. Some ignorant persons take advantage of this and exercise undue authority over their wives and keep them under extreme subordination. This is a sad mistake. Woman is in no way inferior to man. The home is a co-operative organisation. It flourishes on the principle of division of labour. The husband should not think that he is superior to his wife, simply because he is the earning member of the family. Women have a definite field of their own. They are mothers of the house.
The extraordinary abilities and intellectual attainments, and the magnetic personality of the modern women are a standing monument to their undoubted equality with men. The personal influence of women at home is essential to unify the various interests of the family. It is women alone who can rear and nurse children. Hindu wives are queens in their own homes. The husbands should treat their wives with intense love and respect. They should be regarded as equals in all respects and be held in the light of partners in life.
Manu Smrithi says, “The householder should first serve his relatives and dependents with food and then take the remaining food along with his wife,” hinting thereby at the position of equal footing on which she is to be treated. If a man earns and the wife stays at home, it does not mean that the woman is a parasite and a slave. She is indeed the builder of the nation. Verily, women exercise an authority over their husbands through their love, tenderness, affection, grace, beauty, selfless service and fidelity, purity and self-abnegation. In the west the woman is wife. In India the woman is the mother. Mother is worshiped.
Mother is considered as the Goddess Lakshmi of the house. The Srutis emphatically declare, “Let thy mother be thy God.” In the West the wife governs the home. In an Indian home the mother rules. In the West the mother has to be subordinate to the wife. In India the wife has to be subordinate to the mother. If woman be pure she can save and purify man. Woman can purify the race. Woman can make a home a sacred temple. The Hindu women have been the custodians of the Hindu race. The Hindu religion, the Hindu culture and civilization still survive in spite of the many foreign invasions, when other civilizations have come and gone, on account of the purity of the Hindu women.
The women are taught to regard chastity as their most priceless possession, and the loss of it as equal to the eternal damnation of their souls. Religion is ingrained in the Hindu women from their very childhood. Hindu women illumine and enliven the house through the glory of their purity. This is the secret of the endurance of the Hindu religion, civilization and culture.
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