What is the difference between kula dharma and jati dharma?
Answer Podcast
Transcript
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Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. Hare Krishna.
Question. In the first chapter of the Bhagavad Gita, the two terms are mentioned, jati dharma and kula dharma. Utsad yante jati dharma, kula dharma shishashvata, Arjuna says.
So that both these dharmas will be destroyed. So what is the difference between kula dharma and jati dharma? Answer. The two words kula basically refers to one’s dynasty.
So it is basically one’s lineage, one’s father, grandfather, that is kula. And jati is a bigger category. So if we normally talk about Varna.
Varna we could consider as a nation. Within that jati is a state. And within that kula is like a district.
So Krishna is telling Arjuna over here that, or Arjuna is telling Krishna rather, that by fighting in this war, he will be destroyed. Utsad yante jati dharma, kula dharma shishashvata. So because it’s a fight between the members of the dynasty, so their cousins were fighting and many other relatives were also there on both sides.
So because of that, there will be destruction of the dynasty. And the kula dharma, the duty of a kula is to protect one’s own members. And similarly jati, now the word jati is frequently translated in English as caste.
And often it is associated with discrimination. There is caste discrimination in India. But primarily the purpose of jati was to give a sense of belonging to an extended family.
The Brahman Varna itself was like a very big family. It’s a meta family. But in between the Varna and the kula, there was a jati.
So for example now, roughly speaking, within, we say, Saradhana Goswami and Rupa Goswami, they were Saraswat Brahmanas. So that is, they are Brahmanas, but within that, the jati was Saraswat Brahmanas. So Krishna, Arjuna is telling over here that it is not just a destruction of the dynasty that will happen, but even the destruction of the jati, of the Kshatriyas, of the particular group that they belong to, that will also happen.
And then he says that this sort of, it’s not just I am killing a few people or I am ready to die myself. We are causing a big direct destruction of a big group. And that’s why there are severe reactions for that.
Thank you.