Sanyasi And The Householder: A Darwinian And A Dharmic Perspective

The Maha Kumbh Mela, a remarkable spectacle of human gathering, is a fascinating phenomenon from an evolutionary perspective.

Religion, as a bio-cultural force, demonstrates its power to attract millions to a specific place on Earth, determined by a unique configuration of celestial bodies. If that isn't puzzling enough, among the millions gathered by faith, a significant number are renunciates — individuals who have forsaken traditional family bonds, many of whom have taken vows of celibacy.

This raises a question central to understanding the dynamics of religion: how does renunciation, seemingly contradictory to biological imperatives, contribute to the flourishing of a religious group?

Religions, viewed through the lens of evolution, can be seen as shaping human populations into distinct groups, creating barriers — not biological, but sociocultural — that influence resource allocation and reproductive patterns. Within this framework, renunciation appears counterintuitive. 

Why would a system promoting its own expansion encourage individuals to forego reproduction?

The answer may lie in the tension between genetic success, measured in terms of its biological success — in terms of number of the religionists — and memetic success, measured in the spread of its belief systems across the brains.

Renunciation, by sacrificing genetic lineage, potentially enhances the memetic fitness of a religion. Freed from familial obligations, renunciates can dedicate themselves to propagating religious beliefs and practices, strengthening group cohesion and attracting new adherents.

This dynamic is reinforced by the elevated status accorded to renunciation in many religious traditions. By associating renunciation with spiritual merit, religions incentivise behaviour that, while seemingly detrimental at the individual genetic line, may ultimately contribute to the overall success of the pseudo-biological or meta-biological group.

With limited resources and growing population pressure, a religion aiming to secure resource access for its followers should focus on gaining new adherents rather than competing through higher birth rates. Thus, conversion can be seen as the most sustainable way of ensuring the optimal evolutionary fitness of a religion.

Hindus need to understand this perspective clearly — they must evolve into a missionary religion. To do so, they need renunciates who can lead and spread their values and teachings.

On the contrary, Hindu savants made it clear that, under normal circumstances, sanyasa or renunciation is the final phase of an individual's ideal life cycle.

This signifies that as the life cycle matures, a person becomes illumined with lived wisdom, individuation, self-realisation, and a proportional drastic decrease in resource utilisation. However, if an individual chooses to skip the householder stage and enter the renunciate phase directly, he must remember that he is materially supported by householders. Thus, the householder sustains both renunciates and students in society.  

Perhaps the most important defining approach to this problem is enshrined in the Rig Veda itself.

Being an ascetic, shunning family life, and engaging in the pursuit of truth was not unknown to Vedic Rishis. However, it was considered a fragmented approach. While many later Puranas depict women as the cause of an ascetic’s downfall, the Rig Veda presents a radically refreshing perspective.

In its verses in the first Mandala, 179th Sukta, the Rig Veda presents the dialogue initiated by Lopamudra, the wife of Agastya, to Agastya Rishi. She wants him to engage in family life rather than immersing himself in asceticism.

Agastya is hesitant. He considers asceticism superior to indulging in the pleasures of family life. Lopamudra points out that "the sages of the path, who were disseminators of Rta, who verily conversed of truths with the gods, begot (progeny)," and that it did not diminish them. Agastya is convinced.

In a conventional religious sense, the woman, in such a context, would be seen as a seductress, akin to Puranic damsels or the archetypal Biblical Eve.

However, the Sukta ultimately declares that by engaging in family life as desired by Lopamudra, Agastya did not fall but instead achieved his goal — realising the immortal truth and attaining immortality through progeny.

Sayanaacharya comments:

Thus household was not a materialistic pursuit away from a spiritual quest.

Here, the woman, by calling a Rishi into worldly pleasures, does not seduce him but guides him toward his rightful path. This reflects a fine balance and harmony between genetic and memetic phenomena, long before these terms existed.

We see this Vedic vision preserved in the later development of Sanatana Dharma as well.

• Thiruvalluvar states that it is the householder who is the virtuous support of the other three ashramas: brahmacharya, vanaprastha, and sanyasa (Kural 41).

Thus, an instance of a bishop being seen as spiritually inferior to a sincere householder is very rare in Christian tradition. Even in Buddhism and Jainism such instances are rare. Members of the Sangha or the members of the Church are always considered superior to common householders.

While Islam does not advocate celibacy, it also considers the religious elite — those who have dedicated themselves to religious education — as superior to the householders. Thus, it is very rare to find a narrative, even a fictitious incident, where a housewife would be considered spiritually superior to maulana.

Perhaps the only exception is in the early days of Christianity, where a Samaritan helping someone is portrayed as superior to a Rabbi. However, beyond that parable — where only a Jewish Rabbi is shown as inferior — there is little in Christian spirituality that suggests an ordinary housewife or peasant is spiritually superior to a bishop.

This is a remarkably important feature unique to Hinduism. Hinduism is the only religious tradition where the secular is infused with the sacred and can be regarded as higher than the institutionalised sacred.

This is the fine balance between sanyasa and householder. Hinduism needs renunciates to spread its values of inclusiveness and theo-diversity, allowing the meta-biological differences of religious systems to harmonise.

At the same time, Hinduism never considers a religious order of sanyasa or any institution superior to the virtuous householder. This is spiritual democracy at its highest and noblest form.