by Radha devi dasi
I recently read an online post by a woman who was born and raised in India that covered the topic of “How should a woman behave in the brahmana culture?” I’ll refer to her as Krishna dasi in this essay, although that is not her name. In the post she describes her experience in a physically abusive marriage and how her diksha guru advised her to stay in her marriage. She offered her experience as a model for other women to follow.
I don’t intend to criticize this woman for the choices she has made in her married life. However, having worked with survivors of serious domestic violence, I have learned that an abusive relationship can seriously threaten a woman (and most survivors of domestic violence are women) and her children. A “one size fits all” approach to abusive relationships literally puts lives at risk.
We tend to assume that what works in an ideal situation is going to work even when the situation is less than ideal. Srila Prabhupada instructed Vaishnavis to be humble and submissive to their husbands so that their marriages would be peaceful. Some take this instruction to an extreme, opining that a woman may never disagree with her husband. While there is give and take in any healthy relationship, many Vaishnavis will choose more feminine communication styles in their marriages. These less confrontational communication styles can be part of strong marriages.
On the other hand, a chronic domestic abuser does not, as many think, become abusive due to his wife’s behavior or other factors such as stress or financial worries. Stress and financial difficulties, including addiction of any kind, are not the cause of domestic abuse, but rather they can act to exacerbate a domestic violence situation. Domestic violence is used by the abuser to exercise power and control over the vulnerable partner and is a systematic course of behavior employed to achieve these ends. This is the dysfunctional pattern the abuser has developed to manage his own painful emotions. This pattern gives rise to the classic “cycle of violence” in which an abuser first courts his wife, then becomes more and more angry as his stress builds, explodes with violence, returning to the courting stage with remorse and promises of change. His violence is independent of anyone else’s behavior, including his wife’s.
Krishna dasi’s post makes it clear that her husband’s behavior was beyond her control. Although she was a model wife, she was frequently beaten and describes her husband as “cruel” (somewhat of an understatement!). Her guru advised her to go to her brother’s house when her husband beat her and then return when her husband calmed down but not to divorce her husband for any reason. Krishna dasi is an ardent defender of “stri-dharma” and believes a woman should never “leave your husband.” She was uncomplaining and submissive in the face of horrific abuse. No one will argue that she caused her husband’s violence.
It’s important to acknowledge this violence as aberrant behavior. Beating one’s wife is not normal, not a healthy response to life’s challenges, and a serious form of Vaishnava aparadha. It can also harm children who become anxious and distressed when witnessing such violence or who may be on the receiving end of such violence. Children who witness domestic violence are more prone to mental illness, drug abuse and more likely to be violent with their families as adults. Marital violence can also undermine a family’s faith in Krishna.
An often overlooked point is the fact that abusers actually kill their wives. Sometimes they go so far as to kill their children, family members, neighbors, co-workers, or law enforcement along with their spouses. Would we encourage a woman to stay in a marriage knowing that it could end in her death and the death of her children? No. We need to recognize that some women are in life-threatening situations. All devotees should be able to live in peace and safety.
And despite her claims and her advice to others, Krishna dasi did in fact leave her husband. When the violence was at its height, she would typically leave her home and stay with her brother. This kind of safety planning is essential to surviving domestic violence. What Krishna dasi means is that she did not divorce her husband or refuse to live with him after his beatings.
Why is it acceptable to leave the home temporarily to protect oneself but not permanently? The truth is, Krishna dasi found a safety plan that worked for her and balanced her social and cultural considerations with her safety. Kudos to her. Where she goes off track is in assuming that her compromise should be adopted by any woman in a violent marriage.
Krishna dasi was fortunate in having a brother who offered her a safe haven. Many Vaishnavis lack that resource. Getting out of the house while her husband was violent was, by her own admission, key to Krishna dasi’s safety. For those who lack a welcoming relative, that choice is not available.
Krishna dasi was also fortunate that her husband did not beat their children. However, abusers who hit their wives are also more likely to hit their children. Should we expect women to allow their children to be abused in order to comply with a traditional vision of stri-dharma? Part of a mother’s dharma is to protect her children. There are many ways in which another Vaishnavi’s situation might differ from Krishna dasi’s and we should not expect all women to make the same choices.
Krishna dasi’s choice to remain married to her abuser was also driven by her culture and social environment. Although she writes that “everybody” told her to leave her husband, she also writes that her decision to stay in the marriage protected her daughter’s social status. If Krishna dasi had left the marriage she writes “who would have married her?” If the decision to stay in an abusive marriage is based on the idea that it is a woman’s duty, then do these social considerations even matter? The truth is, Krishna dasi was predisposed by culture to make particular choices. There is no reason to expect other Vaishnavis to make similar choices.
Ultimately, we have to understand that a marriage with recurring domestic violence is a terribly dangerous environment and destructive to everyone involved (husband, wife, children, extended family, and community). Each situation is different and each Vaishnavi should be able to choose her response based on what protects her and her children on what provides an environment where their spiritual lives can flourish.
Hare Krsna! The fact that a balanced, spiritually relevant article like this needs to be written for adherents of a spiritual community where we are enjoined to be kind even to insects, to avoid stepping on ants or unnecessarily cutting a tree, is a sad reminder that we have not come to understand and appreciate some fundamental facts about life: Every living entity is a part and parcel of Krsna, the living entity is NOT his/her material body and spiritually advanced persons give protection to their dependents, not abuse them. Thank you Radha Dasi for this most important article.
Pranams, to all please. We Krishna’s ( aspiring ) devotees, unfortunately meet abusiveness everywhere around us, in our Kali Yuga degraded Godless civilization. And unfortunately often and misbehavior among Vaisnavas too. Actually, we are NOT Vaisnavas as such situations do not exist in real Vaisnava culture. WE need to be taught – and adopt proper Vaisnava Culture, Lifestyle and Etiquette. We have to be trained in this very important subject matter. Blessings thank you, Hare Krishna, All glories to real pure Vaisnava HDG Srila Prabhupada ! Hare Krishna !
Thank you for a very well written, intelligent article. I hope her guru gets a chance to read it. Srila Prabhupada said the same thing in regards to an abusive husband, the wife should leave.
When I came to the join the movement I was already a “liberated” woman, having been in an abusive relationship I had gotten enough of that and came to the realization to be alone, but joining the movement brought me to a different reality. I was not to smile at men at all, which was something natural for me since I was on the sale force and had a team of only men as salespersons, so I started to restrain myself from that kind of behavior, trying to be chase as they ask me to, at the age of 30 that was hard, but I did it, and through the years suffered so much trying to keep quiet when I saw abuse or experience it myself, even few years ago, with a so called “senior” disciple, for two years he verbally harassed me constantly and I couldn’t find a way to stop it until one day, I got the courage, and told him simple “to control his tongue”, this was done in front of other senior disciples and he was embarrased, but finally the abuse stopped. It is so ridiculous to have such a beautiful philosophy and to have such followers, :>(
I can’t believe this should be a topic of conversation and instruction for devotees: please don’t beat your women! Moreover, what kind of “guru” would give such rotten advice? Wonder if he’d like to bear such mental and physical abuse?
Hmmm, I wonder too.
“Your” women? Women are not mens’ property.
Lord, it’s just an expression! Stop reading so much into EVERY pronoun. I never said women are property.
You might want to be more careful which pronouns you use.
Hare Krishna,
It is not uncommon for senior devotees not to understand abuse in marriage, or facilitate ongoing abuse. It is not uncommon for seniors to misread mental illness, even in Godbrothers. It comes to a point where everything hits the fan, and then steps are taken… or not.
I am deeply saddened about the abuse that takes place in our movement (where people can hide behind philosophy and culture) and outside our movement where systemic abuse happens continually for the vulnerable. Please become aware! Then you can help!
Thank you for this article. I joined the Movement as a married person. My husband was beating me regularly before we even knew of Krishna. After joining, the abuse increased to every other day. I almost lost my life at the hands of this maniacal monster. I kept hearing how if I chanted all my rounds, followed the principles, attended the temple programs, and rendered service in spreading Krsna Consciousness, that I would make advancement and become more and more blissful. I followed all of this strictly and yet, I found myself trying to go underground to find safety. I was not feeling the bliss. How could anyone feel bliss in this situation? Marital partners in Krsna Consciousness should treat each other with kindness and respect, to work together for the benefit of the conditioned souls, and to help each other make spiritual progress. This is just common sense. If this Movement continues to view women as “less than” mentality, with all certainty, I can tell you that women will not be joining and those who have, will be leaving. This is not what Srila Prabhupada wants. He was kind and encouraging to his women devotees. The abusive men in ISKCON should try following in his footsteps, lest they face their own fate of mistreatment and abuse.
I’ve begun thinking the question should be turned in the other direction to create a real conversation
‘What would the treatment be of a brahmachari in an ashrama who even once raised a hand towards an authority?’
‘What would be the advice given to a brahmachari by diksha guru if their immediate authorities regularly abused them physically and verbally?’
I read the original article by “Krsna Dasi” and a lot of alarms went off.
First thing is that we only know one side of the story, we never hear from the husband. To make herself look like a heroine she paints him as black as possible. Was he actually that way? We don’t know.
And then to make herself look as good as possible she paints herself to be a saint. Why? So as to get sympathy and prestige so that she is better than her god-sisters. “Just see how difficult my life was but I still stuck to my dharma.” This kind of boasting can be done by anyone male or female who artificially paints their life circumstance as badly as possible but then says “but I still did my duty.” Like the kind of person who tells us that they had to walk 10 miles barefoot through the snow every day to go to school but they still graduated from Harvard Law school. So I was very suspicious in the way she was painting her life story so that she comes out as a saint.
And the final alarm was that I know her guru and that he would never give such instructions and has instructed other female disciples in such situations to go back to her paternal family and stay there until the situation improved and if not to stay with the paternal family.
Her whole story wreaked on self-glorification.
This response is shocking! If the husband is an abuser, we don’t need to know his side of the story. Why would this woman lie about her situation? That was total speculation on your part that Krishna dasi could have made this whole thing up for her own self glorification. What a stretch!. In order to extend compassion, we need to hear without judgment or mental speculation. THERE IS NO GOOD REASON FOR SOMEONE TO ABUSE ANOTHER PERSON!!
And maybe you don’t know her guru as well as you think you do!
This is rape culture. This is misogyny and it is patriarchal power over. This is not Krishna consciousness. No one should have to be physically or emotionally or verbally abused by anyone else. End of story. As someone else pointed out if indeed the abuse was going on we don’t need to hear his side of the story. But rather someone perhaps another man should maybe reach out to him and help him because clearly he needs help too in a different way. Most perpetrators and abusers were once abused themselves. And of course as we know in many cultures around the world I heard somebody pointing out Muslims well it so happens that Hinduism is also interpreted and presented in a very patriarchal manner both inside and out of iskcon. Abusing a devotee is vaishnava aparharad and it is offensive to Krishna because they are His devotee and he lives in their heart. treating our fellow humans with respect and gaining consent for any kind of physical contact are basic sandbox rules. you know like what we teach kids when they’re 4 years old.
Wow, this response written brings many alarms off the hook for me. Does not matter if she had intentions of boasting or not…NO ONE HAS THE RIGHT TO EVER…REPEAT EVER STRIKE ANYONE…EVER!
I am curious how your inner workings filter… I only pray that you will never be in an abusive situation be it mentally, physically, sexually, excetera. I believe your inner tone would best be changed and altered forever. Many blessings to you
But of course. A woman who complains of abuse is lying. And such thing as sexism in ISKCON. Right. Unfortunately, we have thousands of people who would attest otherwise. And yes, I have heard certain Guru’s advise abused women to stay in a marriage, because it is a womans responsibility to do so.
Sounds like you are using this as a pretext to attack Vedic culture.
I don’t believe Vedic culture includes wife beating. When we’re dealing with family violence, we’re already outside the norms of Vedic culture. The question is how we deal with aberrations in Vedic culture. There are no “one size fits all” answers here.
Agreed. this is the problem. The misconception that these are normal things to be doing as a devotee or somebody in Vedic culture because of the patriarchal presentation.
“ Part of a mother’s dharma is to protect her children”. – one of the main members of Vaishnavi ministry became a drug addict when her daighter was small and she was already an initianed devotee, so the daughter lived in a nightmare. So how come such abusers are a prt of a team that is meant to protect women and girls???
By the way, one of the reasons NR mataji stayed with her husband is TOPROTECT HER DAUGHTER and she says about it in the interview, cause the relatives tol good care of her daughter and they found her a good husband. If she chise to leave with the child, then her daughter would just become a prostitute. So that was protection.
Absolutely untrue. Let’s have a respectful discussion that rises above ad hominem attacks.
I’m not judging Krishna dasi for her choices. She did what she thought was right for her family. But what worked for her won’t work for every woman who is being abused
Such violence against any person is a felonious CRIME and should be treated as-such.by everyone involved.
Thank you, very important article! I would like to add a point, if I may. Just as it’s easy to see how absurd it is to advice a woman to stay in such an abusive situation, it is also important to know that it’s not always easy to leave and even when leaving, the biggest danger sometimes comes at that point, as the abuser gives up hope of keeping her and THEN kills her. There is such a pattern. So when we offer support and advice to a woman in an abusive relationship, accept her intuition about the situation. Offer help, don’t think you know her situation better than she does herself
Labangalatika prabhu, thank you for your insightful comment!
Thank you for this very important article, and the balanced view it provides. I survived an abusive marriage before I came to the movement, and then found myself in an abusive “devotee” marriage. I was advised several times not to leave my husband, but things got to a point where I had to do what I felt best to protect myself and my daughter. Some time later, after many of the details became public, some of those who had advised me not to leave came to me and apologized for their earlier advice and said that had they known the full facts they would have never advised me to stay in the marriage. Every situation is different, but anyone giving advice should be sure they have the full facts rather than just basing their opinion of “you should never leave your marriage” on a theoretical platform.
Cintamani devi, a disciple of Srila Prabhupada’s told me this story in person when we met in India. The below was originally published by her:
http://www.harekrsna.com/sun/editorials/05-17/editorials14929.htm
Did Srila Prabhupada Sanction Wife Beating?
BY: CHINTAMANI DASI
May 15, 2017 — USA (SUN) —
After reading the stories of child beating in ISKCON, I am remembering something Srila Prabhupada said. I feel it is my duty to relay this incident.
Sometimes in the old days you would hear a devotee jokingly say, “You can beat a drum, a mridunga and your wife.” Unfortunately, a few men thought it was alright.
Srila Prabhupada sent myself and two other devotees to Japan to open the first temple there. When he made his first visit, a few devotees also visited, among them a couple that were having marital difficulties. The wife confided in the temple president, Sudama, that her husband was beating her. He went directly to Srila Prabhupada and explained the situation. Srila Prabhupada told him, “Any man who beats his wife is a dog and she should leave him.”
I have told this before, and senior devotees have told me they would use it (for instance in a Prabhupada Memories video), yet no one ever has! Anyway, she left him. But like certain other child beaters, the husband also did a lot of service.
I swear this to be true. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.
A real devotee of Krishna is a gentle soul. Nuff said. Haribol
Very well described and this movement will get good results if we share with more and more souls
Who is her guru? This should be made public because his actions are criminal, resulting in continued violence towards his disciple. Since she feels she has to abide by his order, he is responsible for the violence as well. He should encourage her not only to leave her SO-CALLED husband, but report him to the police, as he is a criminal.
Wife abusers should be killed.
Very interesting article. I just want to point out few things. First, when we say that there are “more feminine communication styles” which are “less confrontational”, we are saying that for we to be feminine there is only one style of communication, which I don’t think is correct, I am quite femine, but I am also quite strong and straight in my communication, even with my partner. And that makes our relationship strong, because he is intelligent enough to handle a strong woman beside him, he likes it, he feels good about that, and if I was not like that, probably our relationship wouldn’t be as strong as it is, since I point out important things to him, his mistakes etc. I unstruct him, and correct him. And he does the same for me. Because he knows my strong position, he feels we have a proper relationship. He doesn’t need a submissive and quite woman to feel he is a “real man” or something like that. So, I think that what really matters to have a strong marriage, is to get married to a man who is not weak, so that he doesn’t need to feel his wife is submissive, obedient or less than him to feel secure about himself. Regarding the communication style, according to one’s nature, the style might be more agressive or more confrontational, if the person has a brahmincal inclination or is more like a ksatriya. I don’t think it is not about being feminine. I don’t think Durga or Kali are not confrontational, and they are big feminie figures. Even Satyabhama is not “non confrontational” kind of girl… Another point is that it is nice to say that women should leave abusive marriages, but they must know what they will face in ISKCON if they do that. For example, they might not be allowed to live in places like Mayapur dhama, or they may be questioned in their rights of giving lectures, and they might suffer different kinds of prejudice. So, we also need to take steps in ISKCON so that women CAN really be accepted if they decide to leave an abusive relationship. We also need to think how we send a message that women are less than men in ISKCON, what is a fertile ground for abuse. When we don’t allow women to give lectures or sing in certain places, that is also a way of abusing them, and sending a wrong message to the society,. The last point is that I would love to know who was that guru. I think women in ISKCON have the right to know who are the supports of women abuse. Thanks so much for this article.
Kamalaksini Rupa prabhu, thank you for your well-expressed and thoughtful comment. I agree that my use of the word “feminine” was problematic. And you are absolutely right that straightforwardness, directness and strength can be feminine qualities. My own family background includes many women, however, who were expert at indirect communication styles. I was trying to acknowledge the value of both direct and indirect styles. Thank you for pointing out my error.
I also agree that ISKCON (and society, in general) can acknowledge the need for some women to leave their marriages and then support them when they do. Possibly we can learn to support all devotees in their spiritual progress rather than judging them on how we think they should have responded to a challenging circumstance! Thank you again for your comment.
May we know the guru’s name?
Bhakti Vikas Swami.
Shame on him.
I’m hard-pressed to think of a more important issue wherein knowledge of the difference between a variable detail and an invariable principle is required in order for the essence of the principle to be realized. Thank you very much for such an exemplary exposition on such an important topic.
If a karma attached and beat up a woman Devotee what would we do to that Karmi? Men who beat their wives are giving in to their rascal demonic nature and are devotees in dress only. They should be helped, but if they can’t or refuse the help they need to be separated from the society sangha of actual devotees
I do not know if it’s just me or if everybody else encountering problems with your website.
It appears like some of the text in your posts are running off the screen. Can someone
else please comment and let me know if this is happening to them as well?
This could be a issue with my web browser because I’ve had this happen previously.
Many thanks
Independent mentality women or so called feminists need some dose of domestic violence.
Sri Das, you are the kind of man who gives men a bad name. Advocating for domestic violence against women who have the audacity to claim their inalienable right to self-determination, in the matter of Krishna’s service or in any other context, is completely unacceptable. Your ignorance in this regard tells us all we need to know about your lack of spiritual advancement and clearly identifies you as precisely the kind of unscrupulous man that righteous men do their best to protect women from.
Well said, Hari-Kirtana. Sri Dasa, perhaps you’ve heard that jiva-daya is one of the Vaisnava qualities? If not, you would do well to educate yourself and rise above the animal mentality you have expressed. Advocating violence on women, presumably Vaisnavis no less, is directly antithetical to Vaisnavism.