The Forgotten Rishikas Restoring The Balance of Shiva And Shakti In Practice

Creation in Sanatana Dharma was never a solo act. It is a relationship: Shiva and Shakti, Purusha and Prakriti, stillness that only means something once movement enters it. Anyone raised around temples and evening aartis already knows this. In the glow of a diya, the sound of bells, a grandmother’s bedtime stories, the feminine was never meant to stand off to the side. She is the force everything else moves through.

Saraswati is called on for clarity and learning. Lakshmi for a stable home and everyday abundance. Durga for courage in difficult times. Kali appears at the edge of endings, when something inside wants to be free of fear. Lalita Tripura Sundari holds another place altogether, that fullness which comes from awakened consciousness. Shakti literally means energy, the charge that makes anything move at all. Scripture is clear: without her, Shiva becomes Shava, a still form with no breath left.

Emotion Was Never The Problem

There is an old argument that women are too emotional to lead as spiritual teachers. It does not stand up next to what Hindu spirituality actually values. Bhakti is emotion refined into devotion. Karuna is emotion turned into compassion. Viraha bhakti, that ache of longing for the Divine, is counted among the highest spiritual states.

Mirabai’s love for Krishna was emotional. Andal’s surrender was emotional. Akka Mahadevi’s longing dissolved her sense of self entirely. None of them are remembered as weak for it; that intensity is why we still say their names. The real question was never whether women feel deeply. It is whether society learned to respect only one narrow style of spirituality, dry, formal, mostly male, while forgetting the devotional intelligence women carried for generations.

The Rishikas Remembered By The Vedas

The Vedas hold mantras, philosophy and direct spiritual experience. Among them are hymns tied to women seers we have all heard of. Yes, Lopamudra, Ghosha, Apala, Vishvavara and Vak Ambhrini. Lopamudra appears in the dialogue with Sage Agastya. Apala’s hymn calls directly on Indra. Vak Ambhrini’s Devi Sukta is one of the boldest declarations of feminine spiritual authority in sacred literature, where the feminine voice speaks as cosmic power itself, holding the universe together.

Later memory honours Gargi and Maitreyi as seekers of the highest knowledge of Brahman. Gargi pressed Yajnavalkya on the nature of reality in King Janaka’s assembly. Maitreyi, offered wealth, chose knowledge instead, asking whether riches could buy immortality. These were not passing appearances, they were women engaging the biggest questions existence offers.

The Unwritten Path to Liberation

No mainstream text gathers a woman’s path to liberation as its own subject. This is not proof that women were seen as incapable of moksha; the lives of the rishikas already argue otherwise. It shows that their stories were left scattered, rather than drawn together. In Vedanta, Atman has no gender. Society, though, rarely remained that neutral. The famous debate between Adi Shankaracharya and Mandana Mishra is remembered with Ubhaya Bharati as judge, believed by many to embody Saraswati herself. Both sides accepted her authority to decide the winner. For that story to survive generations, people had to accept that a woman’s knowledge could judge two of the era’s greatest scholars.

History, Change And Distortion

It is inaccurate to say women always had equal spiritual access. It is equally inaccurate to say Hindu tradition shut them out from the beginning. What happened was more complex. Centuries of invasion, political upheaval and colonial rule reshaped Hindu society. Communities tightened restrictions on women in the name of protecting them. None of this calls for guilt. It calls for clarity, so that what was genuinely sacred can be honoured and what became distorted can be gently set right.

Opening Priesthood And Practice

Even in progressive households, hesitation persists: she may know the shastras, but will the elders accept the ceremony? That hesitation reflects conditioning, not scripture. Ritual work demands training and familiarity with shastra, and none of that belongs to men by default. Today, women trained in different parts of India perform marriages and griha pravesh with full mantra and procedure. There are women-led priest groups that conduct ceremonies while explaining Sanskrit directly to couples.

Women have kept dharma alive for generations through vrata kathas, prasada, and guiding a child’s first prayers. Recognising this as genuine spiritual labour matters. The goal is not competition between Shiva and Shakti, or between men and women. It is balance.

Remembering the Inner Life of Dharma

Gargi, Maitreyi, Lopamudra, Vak Ambhrini, Ubhaya Bharati, Andal and Mirabai were never outside Sanatana Dharma looking in. They were, and still are, part of its interior life. As Bharat rediscovers its civilisational confidence, the work ahead is remembering that inner truth, one that recognises tapas, bhakti and learning wherever they genuinely show up, without regard for gender. In a tradition where Shakti is worshipped as the heart of creation, real spiritual participation for women is not a modern concession but a return to something Sanatana Dharma has always known.

(Acharya Poonam Dutta (Satyamshakti) is a Vedic astrologer, certified hypnotherapist, psychotherapist, and spiritual counsellor with over 25 years of practice. She is the Founder and Chief Astrologer of Annant Drishti Aadhyatam Peetham, Mumbai. The facts and opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer and do not reflect the views of ETV Bharat.)

Note: Spiritual and religious beliefs are personal. This information has been published as per the information provided by the writer.

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