Chapter 4: From Devotion to Dissent - Hindu Women's Sacred Agency
She slipped out before dawn, her anklets muffled by the folds of her sari. The temple courtyard was still empty, save for a few goats stirring in the shadows. Mirabai moved toward the shrine of Krishna, flute in hand, song in throat. Her voice broke the silence:
"I have found love, O my mother.
I will not stay in this house."
By day, she was a Rajput princess—a royal widow bound by the rules of caste, clan, and decorum. By night, she sang songs that made ministers bristle and priests whisper. She composed in the vernacular, not Sanskrit. She danced in public, not private. She claimed mystical union with Krishna, not submission to patriarchs. And when rebuked, she replied: *"I will not worship your stone gods. My heart belongs elsewhere."*¹
Mirabai's life, somewhere in 16th-century Rajasthan, became legend. But she was not alone. She was part of a centuries-long current of Hindu women who resisted marginalization by turning devotion into defiance. Their tools were poetry, song, and story. Their texts—sometimes preserved in oral tradition, sometimes transcribed decades later—challenge the notion that sacred transmission in Hinduism belonged solely to Brahmins or men.
In Hindu tradition, women have long occupied an ambiguous space in relation to sacred texts. On the one hand, many foundational scriptures were authored and preserved within patriarchal frameworks. The Vedas, the earliest and most authoritative corpus of Hindu literature, were transmitted orally through male priestly lineages. Women were explicitly barred from Vedic education for much of Indian history, though some exceptions survive in memory.²
Yet women appear even in the earliest strata of sacred literature. The Ṛg Veda includes hymns attributed to women such as Ghoṣā, Lopāmudrā, and Apālā—female seers (ṛṣikās) who spoke of love, illness, desire, and cosmic insight.³ Their verses, though few, offer glimpses into a time when women's voices were not entirely excluded from the sacred domain.
Over time, however, Brahmanical orthodoxy narrowed the space for female agency. The Manusmṛti and other Dharmashastra texts reinforced patriarchal norms, emphasizing women's dependence on fathers, husbands, and sons. Women's literacy declined. Scriptural access became increasingly limited to upper-caste males. And yet, in parallel, alternative traditions flourished—especially through the bhakti movement.
Bhakti (devotion) emerged in the first millennium CE as a spiritual path emphasizing love, personal relationship with the divine, and interior transformation over ritual purity. It often took form in vernacular poetry, and its loosened theological boundaries gave women a new kind of access to the sacred. Women like Āṇṭāḷ in Tamil Nadu (9th century), Akka Mahādēvī in Karnataka (12th century), and Mirabai in Rajasthan (16th century) became powerful voices in regional devotional traditions.
Āṇṭāḷ, the only female poet among the twelve Āḻvārs (Tamil poet-saints) of Tamil Vaishnavism, composed ecstatic hymns in praise of Vishnu, imagining herself as his bride. Her Tiruppāvai, still sung today during the month of Mārgaḻi, is revered as scripture in many South Indian temples.⁴
Akka Mahādēvī renounced marriage, wandered naked save for her long hair, and composed striking vachanas (short poetic aphorisms in Kannada)—about Shiva. "What can I do with a man's world?" she wrote. "My Lord, white as jasmine, is my only possession."⁵
These women's texts were not just spiritual outpourings. They were theological statements, challenging caste and gender hierarchies with bold metaphors and social critique. Yet their transmission was uneven. Much of their poetry circulated orally, and when later compiled—usually by male editors—it was sometimes sanitized or selectively preserved. Commentaries often emphasized their chastity and humility rather than their intellectual or spiritual authority.
The regional diversity of women's voices reflects the broader complexity of Hindu tradition. In North India, figures like Mirabai and Sahajo Bai (17th century) composed devotional poetry in Hindi and Rajasthani dialects. In South India, Āṇṭāḷ wrote in Tamil, while Akka Mahādēvī used Kannada. In Bengal, women like Rami (16th century) participated in the Vaishnava revival through vernacular songs. This geographical spread demonstrates that women's sacred expression was not isolated to particular regions but flourished across the subcontinent wherever bhakti movements took root.⁶
The epic heroines of Hindu scripture reflect similar tensions. Sītā, the central female figure of the Rāmāyaṇa, is often read as an icon of wifely virtue. But in some versions—especially regional or folk retellings—she challenges Rāma's decisions, refuses to undergo trials, or chooses exile on her own terms. In Valmiki's original Sanskrit version, she demonstrates considerable agency, while in some folk traditions, she is portrayed as an incarnation of the goddess Lakshmi with independent divine power.⁷
Draupadī, in the Mahābhārata, openly questions her husbands, denounces injustice, and calls upon Krishna for justice after her public humiliation. In some versions, she even vows to burn the world if vengeance is denied.⁸ These moments of resistance were often interpreted as literary flourishes rather than theological contributions. But for later women readers and performers, they offered models of sacred speech.
The colonial period added another layer of complexity. British orientalists and Indian reformers alike tended to highlight "suffering woman" tropes—recasting Sītā and Sāvitrī as passive ideals while downplaying voices like Mirabai or Akka Mahādēvī. This selective emphasis shaped how these figures were taught and remembered, often diminishing their more radical expressions. In turn, postcolonial feminist scholars such as Uma Chakravarti and Vasudha Narayanan have worked to recover the radical dimensions of these women's voices.⁹
The forms of women's religious expression evolved over time as social circumstances changed. Early Vedic women like Gārgī participated in formal philosophical debates. Medieval bhakti poets like Mirabai used devotional songs to claim spiritual authority. In the modern period, figures like Pandita Ramabai (19th century) employed memoir and social commentary to advocate for women's education and religious reform. Each generation found new ways to articulate sacred experience within the constraints of their era.¹⁰
Today, their songs are taught in classrooms and chanted in temples. Contemporary scholars like Madhu Kishwar and Kumkum Roy continue to uncover women's contributions to Hindu textual traditions, while practitioners across India and the diaspora draw inspiration from these historical voices. But the stories behind them—the risk, the defiance, the deliberate stepping beyond social bounds—are still being rediscovered.
These women spoke. And they were remembered. But not always as they truly were.
"I shall not marry a mortal man,
Even if he is wise or great.
I will offer myself to the Lord,
The one who holds the conch and discus."
—Āṇṭāḷ, Tiruppāvai 6
The women of Hindu tradition did more than pray. They argued, sang, refused, wandered, and insisted. Their sacred agency was often cloaked in devotion, but beneath it lay critique—of caste, gender, and power. Their verses still echo in temples and on tongues, but their stories remain half-told. To remember them is not just to hear their songs; it is to recognize their courage, and to restore their place in the sacred symphony.
Also Remembered
Gārgī Vāchaknavī (c. 8th century BCE): Vedic philosopher who debated sages in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad, one of the earliest records of women in formal philosophical discourse. Her questions about the nature of reality pushed the boundaries of theological inquiry.
Ghoṣā (Ṛg Vedic period): Female seer who composed hymns to the Ashvins, expressing both philosophical insight and personal longing. Her verses demonstrate that women's voices were part of the earliest Vedic tradition.
Āṇṭāḷ (9th century CE, Tamil Nadu): Only female Āḻvār poet-saint in the Sri Vaishnava tradition. Composed the Tiruppāvai, still sung in South Indian temples and considered canonical scripture by many communities.
Akka Mahādēvī (12th century CE, Karnataka): Mystic poet and Lingayat saint. Composed vachanas expressing radical detachment and divine love, challenging social conventions through her wandering lifestyle.
Sahajo Bai (17th century CE, Rajasthan): Poet-saint of the Dadu Panth who composed verses on meditation and inner realization, representing the continuation of women's devotional poetry into the early modern period.
Sītā (epic era, various retellings): Heroine of the Rāmāyaṇa whose agency varies significantly across versions. In some, she asserts her own divinity and rejects patriarchal judgments, while folk traditions often emphasize her independence and power.
Notes
- This opening scene represents a plausible reconstruction based on traditional accounts of Mirabai's devotional practices and the documented social tensions surrounding her behavior. While specific incidents are not historically verified, her practice of dawn devotions and conflict with royal expectations are consistent with hagiographic sources. See John Stratton Hawley, Three Bhakti Voices: Mirabai, Surdas, and Kabir in Their Time and Ours(Oxford University Press, 2005), 45–67.
- Stephanie W. Jamison, Sacrificed Wife, Sacrificer's Wife: Women, Ritual, and Hospitality in Ancient India (Oxford University Press, 1996), 72–74.
- Laurie L. Patton, ed., Jewels of Authority: Women and Textual Tradition in Hindu India (Oxford University Press, 2002), 25–30.
- Vasudha Narayanan, "Women and the Sacred in South India," in The Graceful Guru: Hindu Female Gurus in India and the United States, ed. Karen Pechilis (Oxford University Press, 2004), 25–37.
- A. K. Ramanujan, trans., Speaking of Śiva (Penguin Classics, 1973), 111–123.
- Hawley, Three Bhakti Voices, 89–112; Vidya Dehejia, Slaves of the Lord: The Path of the Tamil Saints (Munshiram Manoharlal, 1988), 67–89.
- Paula Richman, ed., Many Rāmāyaṇas: The Diversity of a Narrative Tradition in South Asia (University of California Press, 1991), 134–156.
- Alf Hiltebeitel, The Cult of Draupadi (University of Chicago Press, 1988), 101–110.
- Uma Chakravarti, Gendering Caste: Through a Feminist Lens (Stree, 2003), 134–139; Vasudha Narayanan, "Brimming with Bhakti, Embodiments of Shakti: Devotees, Deities, Performers, Reformers, and Other Women of Power in the Hindu Tradition," in Feminism and World Religions, ed. Arvind Sharma and Katherine K. Young (SUNY Press, 1999), 25–77.
- Uma Chakravarti, Rewriting History: The Life and Times of Pandita Ramabai (Kali for Women, 1998), 89–123.
Further Reading
Laurie L. Patton, ed., Jewels of Authority: Women and Textual Tradition in Hindu India (Oxford University Press, 2002). Comprehensive analysis of women's roles in creating and transmitting Hindu sacred literature.
John Stratton Hawley, Three Bhakti Voices: Mirabai, Surdas, and Kabir in Their Time and Ours (Oxford University Press, 2005). Contextual study of devotional poetry including detailed analysis of Mirabai's life and works.
Paula Richman, ed., Many Rāmāyaṇas: The Diversity of a Narrative Tradition in South Asia (University of California Press, 1991). Examination of how regional traditions have portrayed Sītā with varying degrees of agency.
Uma Chakravarti, Gendering Caste: Through a Feminist Lens (Stree, 2003). Postcolonial feminist analysis of how caste and gender intersected in Hindu tradition.
A. K. Ramanujan, trans., Speaking of Śiva (Penguin Classics, 1973). Classic translation of vachana poetry including works by Akka Mahādēvī.
Vasudha Narayanan, "Brimming with Bhakti, Embodiments of Shakti," in Feminism and World Religions, ed. Arvind Sharma and Katherine K. Young (SUNY Press, 1999). Survey of women's spiritual authority across Hindu history.