Purity, Pollution and the Body

Three lessons have described a ranking: four varṇas from a hymn, thousands of jātis by descent, and an English word standing in for both. None of them has said what the ranking runs on. This one does.

Śuci, the word for pure, is glossed first as shining, glowing, gleaming, radiant, bright, cited from the Ṛgveda onward. Then brilliantly white. Then clear, clean, pure — literally and figuratively — holy, unsullied, undefiled, innocent, honest, virtuous. Then, separately marked, pure in a ceremonial sense, cited to the Chāndogya, Manu and the Gītā. And then a sense that will matter in a moment: one who has acquitted himself of, or discharged, a duty.