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Do women fit into this (four classes) social structure? You keep referring to man

Expressions researched:
"Do women fit into this social structure? You keep referring to man"

Conversations and Morning Walks

1975 Conversations and Morning Walks

Woman is not equally intelligent as a man.
Press Conference -- July 9, 1975, Chicago:

Reporter (5): What do... You said there are four classes and the first-class is to rule?

Prabhupāda: Hmm?

Reporter (5): The first-class should rule?

Jagadīśa: What do the first-class men do?

Jayatīrtha: Is their position to rule?

Prabhupāda: No. First-class man means... I have already explained. He is the brain. Everyone should take advice from him. That is first-class man. And he will give perfect advice. That is first-class man.

Reporter (5): What does he do?

Prabhupāda: He does give you advice. If you take his advice, then you get perfect advice.

Reporter (5): What do the other classes do?

Prabhupāda: Other classes... The second-class, they are supposed to be administrator. They are very... They are also very strong. They do not go away when there is fighting. They have got a ruling capacity, and they are charitable. They have got seven qualifications. So... But he rules according to the advice of the first-class men.

Reporter (5): Then... Well, how about the third and fourth-classes?

Prabhupāda: Third-class means they should engage themselves, how to produce food and give protection to the cow. It is said...

Reporter (5): The cow?

Prabhupāda: Cow, yes.

Reporter (2): The cow?

Prabhupāda: Yes, cow, from where you get milk, that cow. So the exact word is used in Sanskrit, kṛṣi-go-rakṣya-vāṇijyaṁ vaiśya-karma svabhāva-jam (BG 18.44). Vaiśya, the third-class man, is called vaiśya. So his duty is how to produce food, food grains, for both for the animals and the man. And he gives protection to the cows. As the second-class man, the administrator, he gives protection to the human being from danger, similarly, the third-class man is entrusted to give protection to the cows. Cow is very important animal in the society because it is supplying milk, the most nutritious food. And... Find out. This is the third-class man's duty. And the fourth-class man means general worker. He has no brain, he simply helps the other three classes: first-class, second-class, and the third-class. And below the fourth-class men, they are called fifth-class, sixth-class. So they are called lower class, less than the fourth-class. So the society should be generally divided into four classes. As I have given example, there is head, arm, belly, and leg.

Reporter (3): (a woman) Where... Do women fit into this social structure? You keep referring to man.

Prabhupāda: Woman is not equally intelligent as a man.

Reporter (3): Equal in intelligence?

Prabhupāda: Not equal intelligence. In the psychology, practical psychology, they have found that the man's brain has been found up to sixty-four ounce, woman... Sixty-four ounce, man's brain. And woman's brain has been found, thirty-six ounce. So therefore woman is not equally intelligent like man.

Reporter (3): So where does she fit?

Prabhupāda: You will find in practical psychology.

Reporter: Pardon?

Prabhupāda: Practical psychology.

Brahmānanda: She's asking where does woman fit into this structure?

Prabhupāda: Now, woman is supposed to be assistant of man. If woman is faithful wife of the first-class man, then she also becomes first-class. If she is assistant of the second-class man then he is also second-class. If she is assistant of the third-class man, then she is also third-class. Because she is assistant, so, according to her husband, or protector, she becomes first, second, third, fourth.

Reporter (3): But she doesn't have any structure at all until marriage?

Prabhupāda: No, she has got structure—she has got brain. I have already told. But not as good as man's brain.

Reporter (3): You means she's not qualified as first, second, or third-class until she marries?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Woman requires to be protected—in childhood by the father, in youthhood by the husband, and in old age by the elderly sons.

Reporter (2): What is your feeling in regard to Mrs. Gandhi's actions in India at the present time, particularly in relation to what you're saying about women? Is what's happening there because she has a thirty-six ounce brain and is incapable of ruling?

Prabhupāda: Well, what is scientific proof, that is equally applicable to Mrs. Gandhi or to any ordinary woman.

Reporter: Is she having problems because she is a woman, though? If a man were in her position...

Prabhupāda: (laughs) Why you are trying to put me in the emergency law? (laughter)

Reporter (2): In the what?

Devotee: In the emergency rule.

Reporter (2): Did you say emergency room or emergency law?

Brahmānanda: Emergency rule that is going on in India.

Jayatīrtha: He will be arrested if he says like that.

Reporter (2): Oh.

Prabhupāda: But one thing I can say, generally. There was a great politician, Cāṇakya Paṇḍita, under whose name in New Delhi there is a quarter called Canakya Purī. All the foreign embassies are situated there. He said, viśvāso naiva kartavyaṁ strīṣu rāja-kuleṣu ca: "Never trust a woman and a politician." That is his remark, of course, I do not say anything. (Devotees laugh)

Reporter (3): Are these books all... Have you written all of these books or are they by other philosophers of...

Prabhupāda: Yes, I have written all these books.

Reporter (3): Who has published them?

Prabhupāda: We have got our own publishing house, Bhaktivedanta Trust. But we are selling our books very nice.

Reporter (3): Is that part of your income, to run a...

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes, that is our only income, by selling books.

Reporter (2): You commented that, you gave the words "Never trust," if I understood you right, "never trust an old man and a politician?"

Jayatīrtha: A woman or a politician.

Prabhupāda: That is Cāṇakya Paṇḍita's remark.

Reporter (3): Jonathan who?

Brahmānanda: Cāṇakya Paṇḍita.

Prabhupāda: You perhaps know. There is a embassy quarter in New Delhi which is called Cāṇakya Purī under his name. He was a great politician. About three thousand years ago when there was the reign of Candragupta, he was the prime minister. (break)

Page Title:Do women fit into this (four classes) social structure? You keep referring to man
Compiler:Marc, Rishab
Created:18 of Jul, 2011
Totals by Section:BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=0, Con=1, Let=0
No. of Quotes:1