"Gestational Surrogacy and Hindu Bioethics: The Karma of Genetics and the Genetics of Karma" by Deepak Sarma

Gestational Surrogacy and Hindu Bioethics: The Karma of Genetics and the Genetics of Karma

Deepak Sarma

Image by Mariya Popovich from P ixabay

This article is part of our “Religious Perspectives on Assisted Reproduction and Surrogacy” series. If you’d like to explore other articles in this series, click here.

While a great deal has already been written about cross-racial surrogacy and surrogacy in India, there are, however, no significant or credible studies concerning gestational surrogacy from a Hindu perspective. What happens in cases where the surrogate is an Indian Hindu and the “intended” parents are, and identify as, “white”? How will the women who acted as gestational surrogates prior to the passing of the 2018 law or their resulting children be viewed from a Hindu perspective? At the level of bioethics and Hindu doctrine, what are Hindu views on the sharing of minerals, nutrients, and cells with an embryo whose intended parents are outsiders to the caste system? And, perhaps most significantly, what are the Hindu views about the transference, sharing, and intersection of karma between the gestational surrogate and the fetus or microchimeric cells? What, then, is the karma of genetics and the genetics of karma? After offering an overview of Hindu bioethics related to surrogacy, I intend to address gestational surrogacy from one Hindu perspective (among many), answer some of these questions, and provoke new ones.

Doing Hindu Bioethics: Doctrinal Considerations and Pluralistic Practices

The very idea of doing Hindu bioethics, as I have argued elsewhere, is deeply problematic, given the wide range of practices, beliefs, and doctrines that are considered “Hindu.” Under this context, picking one view and calling it “Hindu” is misleading. Selecting several views across the various Hindu traditions within India and characterizing them altogether as “Hinduism” would be misleading. One should thus be specific about which tradition is being examined in the pursuit of transparency.To this end, I will offer a view from a particular, privileged, and problematic perspective — namely the view of Hinduism through and by means of the texts and practices upheld by the Brahmins, the “priestly” class. A great deal of social injustice has been propagated and perpetuated by the Brahminical tradition and hegemony. However, the Brahminical system does offer a structured doctrinal and textual system, making it exceptionally useful as a sieve through which to push bioethical issues by providing insight into a “slice” of a particular and privileged kind of Hinduism. It has served as both a foil and a paradigm for non-Brahmincal, “lived religion” perspectives.

Shuddha, ashuddha, and the exchange of bodily fluids

The chief concern regarding surrogacy that would arise in Brahminical Hinduism is the dynamic relationship between the gestational surrogate and the fetus, the sorts of fluids and substances that are exchanged between them, and how this affects their respective purity.The worlds envisioned and governed by Brahminical Hinduism are thus centered upon issues of shuddha (purity) and ashuddha (impurity). The Dharmasastras, a genre of texts concerned with proper behavior and social interaction, offer a detailed account of how to act in almost every imaginable situation and, simultaneously, to maintain one’s purity. The Dharmasastras describe when and how one should eat, bathe, have intercourse, get married, be an ideal wife, and give birth, among numerous other things.

Purity issues were preeminently embodied in the varna (class) and jati (caste) system, as well as in gender protocols. Purity issues, moreover, were manifested in terms of permissible and forbidden exchanges.¹ Brahmins, who regard themselves at the top of the hierarchy and, therefore, the purest, had to be very careful when it came to exchanging fluids, or coming into any sort of contact with those of lower classes. Even accidental and non-intentional contact or fluid exchanges incurred impurity. Though believing themselves to be naturally pure, Brahmins still had to follow practices that ensured, maintained, and enhanced their purity. Purity issues are recognized across class and caste and are not merely Brahminical concerns. They play an inescapable and inevitable part of “lived” Hinduism. They play less of a role in thinking about surrogacy and IVF for most Hindus.

The Dharmashastras include an elaborate list of the different items and activities that result in impurity, including restrictions on contact with the menstrual blood and bodily fluids of others (“Body oil, semen, blood, marrows, urine, faeces, ear-wax, nails, phlegm, tears, discharge of the eyes, and sweat — these are the twelve impurities of Man” V, 135), and further restrictions regarding the flesh of an animal, one’s own bodily fluids, and fluids or foods offered that were touched by another person:

“He must also never eat the following: food given by someone who is drunk, angry, or sick; food contaminated with hair or insects or touched deliberately with the foot; food looked at by a murderer of a Brahmin, touched by a menstruating woman, pecked by a bird, or touched by a dog; food smelled by a cow; in a special way, food given after a public announcement; food given by a group or by a prostitute; food that is despised by learned men; food given by a thief, a musician, a carpenter, a usurer, a man consecrated for a sacrifice, a miser, a prisoner, a shackled man, heinous sinner, a eunuch, a promiscuous woman, or a hypocrite; food that has turned sour or is stale; food of a Sudra; leftovers;; food given by a physician, a hunter, a cruel man, someone who eats leftovers, or an Ugra; food of a woman impure by reason of childbirth;” IV, 207-212

Some transactions were prohibited. Ironically, the touch of a physician was explicitly forbidden. There are even texts in the Dharmashastras which warn that the shadows of a lower-class Hindu upon an upper-class Hindu cause impurity. Of course these were and are prescriptive and not descriptive: there are some Brahmins, specifically from Kashmir and Bengal, who eat meat and fish, respectively. There are also Brahmins who do not follow these ancient dictates, just as there are liberal Jews who occasionally eat pork. Nevertheless, according to these prescriptive texts, all Brahmins are, in fact, required to be vegetarian.

What happens when one applies the shuddha paradigm to gestational surrogacy? For purity to be maintained, both the gestational surrogate and the fetus must be of the same class and caste. A lower-class woman acting as a gestational surrogate for any fetus that is in a higher class or caste will make the fetus impure. An upper-class woman becomes impure if they act as a gestational surrogate for a lower class fetus. And, for fetuses that are not even considered part of the Hindu class system (like a white fetus whose biological parents are Christians), would cause the gestational surrogate to be impure, no matter her class. Ironically, there are versions of this issue cast in a slightly different light — when Caucasian couples seek surrogacy from women in India and issues about the potential corruption of a white Caucasian fetus.

Of course, one may argue that the substances that are exchanged between a surrogate and a fetus (like nutrients, oxygen, and carbon dioxide), are merely molecules and are not affected or altered in any way by the social classification of the producer or the recipient. But in the Brahminical worldview, the very ontology of a substance is affected by its immediate surroundings. The mere contact of the fetus with the surrogate mother via the placenta is enough to incur impurity. From the perspective of a secular medical institution or bioethicist, this might all seem to be nonsense. But, if one were to take the Brahminical (or any religious) position seriously, one would have to grapple with positions like this. These views are not held widely by Hindus beyond the Brahminical tradition. And even within the Brahminical tradition, they are relevant only to those well-versed in the textual tradition who are usually the most orthodox.

Karma of Genetics and the Genetics of Karma

While the diversity of Hinduism makes it problematic to claim that it has one unifying doctrine, it is feasible to claim that all Hindu traditions and practices presuppose the mechanism of karma, the idea that one’s actions in earlier lives affected both one’s rebirth and the events that are to occur in one’s future lives. One accumulates some combination of puṇya (meritorious karma) and pāpa (demeritorious karma) — popularly rendered in the West as “good” and “bad” karma, respectively — and is born again in saṃsāra (the cycle of worldly existence). Jains and Buddhists follow the same system of cause and effect.

One manifests their latent karma over time. That is, an individual’s accumulated karma, both good and bad, manifests itself until it is depleted or until more is accrued. This manifestation can occur in a single lifetime or future ones when one is reborn via saṃsāra.Incidentally, Hindus seek to end this seemingly endless cycle and to attain mokṣa, the state that sentient beings enter after being liberated from saṃsāra and one that is without suffering. For Hindus, suffering is thus inextricably linked to the consequences of action. Saṃsāra is unavoidably pervaded by some degree of suffering, resulting in significant bioethical implications. Within the confines of this framework, the infertile couple is infertile because of their collective karma. Their choice to move forward with surrogacy will delay their karma and will have its own karmic consequences.

While the complexities and conundrums concerning collective karma and karmic consequences are important to consider, it is far more important to consider the correlation between karma and microchimeric cells. Bidirectional cellular exchanges between the gestational surrogate and the fetus suggests that both organisms are changed ontologically. The karma of one merges with the karma of the other. This exchange is permissible if the fetus and the gestational surrogate are of the same varna (class) and jati (caste), maintaining what is tantamount to a type of eugenics. If not, then their intermingling of cells is tantamount to miscegenation, which is forbidden in the Dharmasastras. The first part of chapter ten of the Manava-Dharmashastra concerns the mixing of varnas via “adultery among the classes, by marrying forbidden women, and by abandoning the activities proper to them,” and the status of the resultant children.²The result would conflict with the prescription to pursue endogamous marriages and would threaten not only the purity of the women who acted as a gestational surrogate, but the overall purity of the class and caste to which she belongs. From a Brahminical Hindu perspective, gestational surrogacy amongst agents who are not in the same class and caste is forbidden. Again, this is relevant only to those who know and uphold Brahmincal texts. Beyond the Brahminical purview, the issues are dismissed as esoteric, outdated, and unnecessarily communal.

The 2018 Indian Law on Commercial Surrogacy

In 2018, a new surrogacy law was passed by the Lok Sabha (the lower house of India’s bicameral Parliament), essentially banning commercial surrogacy in India. The law was born out of an urgent need to prevent further exploitation of marginalized groups in India who were being treated unethically and denied basic human rights by European and American intended parents. Most discussions related to the controversy of commercial surrogacy in India, such as those raised by scholars like Laura Harrison, Daisy Deomampo, and Amrita Pande, concerned the exploitation of a formerly-colonized population by their former colonizers. The complexities of a marginalized Indian Hindu woman acting as the gestational surrogate for a white non-Hindu couple who may also be acting unethically is no longer a reality. The bioethical issues still persist however, though in different contexts and with different concerns.The reverse situation, where a non-Indian, non-Hindu woman acts as a gestational surrogate for an Indian Hindu couple is still possible if the surrogacy occurs outside of India. Additionally, there are still relevant bioethical issues to resolve, given how many commercial gestational surrogacies have already been completed in India.

Conclusion

In this paper I intended to offer an overview of Hindu bioethics as it pertains to gestational surrogacy. If one takes into consideration the Brahminical paradigm, any kind of gestational surrogacy, unless the fetus and the gestational surrogate are of the same varna (class) and jati (caste), would incur ashuddha (impurity), would result in a child whose class and caste are ambiguous, and would transform the nature and social classification of the surrogate. With these possible outcomes, it would be ill advised to pursue most kinds of gestational surrogacy, at least from a Brahminical perspective.

The Brahminical view is only one among many Hindu perspectives, but it is the most systematic and well-known. Most Hindus may be aware of these perspectives but do not actually follow them. In this connection and as mentioned above, the enormous plurality of Hindu views makes it impossible (and misleading) to generate a unified “Hindu” perspective. Detailing the Brahminical view may be the only way to juxtapose prescriptive doctrine and lived religion. ♦

Deepak Sarma is the Inaugural Distinguished Scholar in the Public Humanities, Case Western Reserve University. After earning a BA in religion from Reed College, Sarma attended the Divinity School at the University of Chicago where they received a PhD in the philosophy of religions, and specialized in Indian philosophy. Sarma writes and researches about “Hinduism,” contemporary Hinduism, bioethics, Madhva Vedanta, Cultural Theory, philosophy, post-colonial studies, museology, and the Grateful Dead. Verily, their job is to shed light and not to master.

Recommended Citation

Sarma, Deepak. “Gestational Surrogacy and Hindu Bioethics: The Karma of Genetics and the Genetics of Karma.” Canopy Forum, September 13, 2024. https://canopyforum.org/2024/09/12/gestational-surrogacy-and-hindu-bioethics-the-ikarma-i-of-genetics-and-the-genetics-of-ikarma/

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“Gestational Surrogacy and Hindu Bioethics: The Karma of Genetics and the Genetics of Karma” by Deepak Sarma