Podcast Summary

Overview

Episode: Wendy Doniger, "The Dharma of Unfaithful Wives and Faithful Jackals: Some Moral Tales From The Mahabharata"
Podcast: New Books Network (New Books in South Asian Studies)
Host: Shruti Jain
Date: October 25, 2025
Guest: Wendy Doniger

This engaging conversation between host Shruti Jain and renowned Indologist Wendy Doniger delves into Doniger’s 2024 book, “The Dharma of Unfaithful Wives and Faithful Jackals: Some Moral Tales from the Mahabharata.” The episode explores how lesser-known stories from the Mahabharata complicate and challenge conventional ideas of dharma (righteousness or duty) by focusing on narratives of moral ambiguity, inversion, and contradiction—particularly through tales of women, animals, and kingship.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Book's Title and Its Significance

[02:36–04:19]

• Dharma is often depicted as a clear set of rules in Sanskrit epics, especially regarding kings and men, but Doniger highlights stories about adharma (violation or subversion of dharma).
• Unfaithful Wives & Faithful Jackals: The title provokes curiosity about categories we assume are fixed: "We expect wives to be faithful, but what about their dharma when they aren't? Jackals are seen as untrustworthy, so what does it mean to find a faithful jackal?" (Doniger, [03:43])
• Purpose: Get readers thinking, “Dharma is more complicated than I thought. I think I’ll read this book.” (Doniger, [04:16])

2. Why Focus on Lesser-known Tales

[04:19–06:26]

• Most scholarly focus is on the straightforward, didactic sections (esp. Books 12 & 13) of the Mahabharata; Doniger sought instead the “tricky bits”—stories of people and animals who work around, subvert, or challenge the standard laws.
• She sees another, subversive discourse running parallel to the canonical one: "Another tale is also being told which challenges the conventional idea…" ([04:58])

3. Dharma, Contradiction, and Adharma

[06:26–11:25]

• Multiplicity & Impossibility: Dharma is “impossible”; it demands things few, if any, can live up to, so stories reflect humanity’s strategies for “getting around it, violating, making up for it, changing it, making it flexible.” (Doniger, [06:06])
• Many Dharmas: Dharma is not singular, even theoretically—different classes (varnas), different genders, and different situations all have their own, sometimes contradictory, dharmas.
  • "There’s no such thing as one dharma... Dharma is complex. Dharma is subtle." (Doniger, [10:18])
• Practical Approach: Sometimes violating dharma is itself necessary for good ("There are times when you need to break the rules in order to do the right thing." [10:18])

4. Misogyny, Anxiety, and the Good/Bad Woman Dichotomy

[11:25–21:18]

• Many tales feature deep anxieties about women’s sexuality and autonomy (“If you don’t keep an eye on them, they’re going to behave very badly.”—Doniger, [12:04]).
  • The verb raksha (to protect, guard, control): layered with benevolent and controlling intentions.
• The "bad woman" is often the unfaithful wife; the "good woman" is obedient, especially as mother more than wife: “The real defining good woman is the good mother. And there are lots of good mothers in these stories.” (Doniger, [20:40])
• Passive goodness vs. active agency: While most good women are passive, yoginis—ascetic, unmarried women—hold unusual power and agency: “...they do what they want to do... These female yoginis... are more powerful than any Brahmin, any king.” ([35:33])

5. Fluidity of Identity: Bhangaswana and Beyond

[21:18–26:17]

• The Bhangaswana Story: A male king becomes a woman, chooses to remain female because her love for her children as a mother is greater than as a father.
• Indian vs. Greek versions: In India, maternity is central; in Greece (cf. Tiresias), female pleasure is emphasized.
• Does this represent fluid sexual identity? Doniger says no: “[Sexual identity]...was not a socially viable third nature... It's about the difference between the feeling for children that men and women have.” ([21:52–25:45])

6. Mixing of Varna and Gender: Satyavati, Jamdagini, and Others

[28:20–34:51]

• Stories highlight the risks of “mixing” class or gender boundaries, conveying the imperative for purity in both domains.
• Doniger links some tales to Brahmin anxiety about maintaining power over kings (and vice versa), suggesting that these stories often mask a deeper class or political struggle.

7. Women’s Agency: Is There a ‘Good Woman’?

[35:06–39:44]

• Married women’s virtue is generally defined by compliance; but in exceptional stories, women defy husbands for higher moral reasons.
• Ascetic women/yoginis provide an alternative: “These women do present a very attractive alternative, and there are many of them.” (Doniger, [37:48])
• The book finds nuanced ways women attain goodness, through both compliance and (sometimes supernatural) agency.

8. Moral Inversion: Faithful Jackals and Court Politics

[41:40–46:13]

• Tales invert conventional moral associations (jackals as evil; mothers as subservient; kings as wise) to show that virtue or vice isn't inherent in social roles or castes.
  • “Just as you wouldn’t judge a Dalit, saying, well he’s a Dalit, he can’t have any sense, so too, sometimes you have to listen to your mama, even though she’s a girl.” (Doniger, [44:53])
• Memorable moment: “Mother knows best, as we say in English.” (Doniger, [45:52])

9. Challenging Social and Caste Boundaries

[46:13–54:33]

• Animal fables and other stories challenge the idea that a person’s dharma is entirely fixed by caste, class, or role: “These stories show you jackals and Kshatriyas who don’t behave the way they’re supposed to.” ([46:34])
• Yet reactionary stories exist too, reaffirming the impossibility of transcending the dharma of one’s birth (e.g., story of the ever-constrained dog, [52:21–54:33]).

10. Kingship, Evil, and Power

[54:40–58:16]

• Kingship and moral order are intertwined. Bad kingship brings chaos; good kingship (often linked to Vishnu) restores dharma.
  • “The establishment of dharma is the establishment of kings. Without kings, there was no dharma.” (Doniger, [54:51])
• Stories reflect both ideal and failed kings.

11. Divine Models: Indra, Vishnu, Shiva

[58:16–69:26]

• Indra (king of gods) is shown as unrighteous—a relic of Indo-European mythologies focused on might, not morals. "He is no longer God with a capital G." (Doniger, [58:53])
• Vishnu emerges in the Mahabharata as the model of righteous kingship, embodying the new ideal.
• Shiva appears as a powerful, dark, ascetic god, offering a cultic and moral alternative to the Vishnu model, but not replacing it: “Shiva is the god of magical power, the god of death, the god of night...In the Mahabharata, he doesn’t have the general status of Vishnu...” (Doniger, [68:26])

12. Dharma’s Ultimate Complexity and Subtlety

[69:26–70:29]

• Dharma is “multiple,” “subtle,” and ultimately elusive.
  • “You never really know it. Whenever you think you know it, there’s a story that shows you really didn’t quite get it.” (Doniger, [69:48])
  • Listeners are reminded there’s always “a much larger fabric by which other people live very different lives.” (Doniger, [70:13])

13. Doniger’s Personal Note & Upcoming Work

[70:43–71:47]

• She is working on a memoir about her life as a woman scholar in male-dominated fields of Indology and Sanskrit studies.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Complicated Dharma:
  "Dharma really requires us to do things that nobody can do except in a storybook epic. And that the way humans, human beings really live with Dharma is getting around it, violating, making up for it, changing it, making it flexible."
  — Wendy Doniger [06:04]

• On Multiple Dharmas:
  "Dharma is complex. Subtle. Dharma is subtle is the expression. So you can say, well, never tell a lie. But there are times when you can save your life and maybe somebody else's life by telling a lie..."
  — Wendy Doniger [10:18]

• On Mother's Wisdom and Role Inversion:
  "Just as you wouldn't judge a Dalit, saying, well, he's a Dalit, he can't have any sense. So too, sometimes you have to listen to your mama, even though she's a girl. So I think it's a really interesting story that reverses two standard ethical categories simultaneously in a very useful way."
  — Wendy Doniger [44:53]

• On Indra’s Shift in Mythology:
  "He is no longer God with a capital G, right? He's just a king... Indra remains a kind of comic, second rate character who runs around seducing women... but he has no moral status."
  — Wendy Doniger [58:53]

• On the Elusive Nature of Dharma:
  "You never really know it. Whenever you think you know it, there's a story that shows you really didn't quite get it."
  — Wendy Doniger [69:48]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Introduction and Title Explanation: [01:37–04:19]
• Significance of Lesser-known Tales: [04:19–06:26]
• Adharma, Multiplicity, and Contradiction: [06:26–11:25]
• Misogyny and The Good/Bad Woman Dichotomy: [11:25–21:18]
• Gender Transformation and Bhangaswana: [21:18–26:17]
• Class and Gender Mixing (Satyavati et al.): [28:20–34:51]
• Women’s Agency and Questioning Goodness: [35:06–39:44]
• Animal Stories: Jackals and Role Inversion: [41:40–46:34]
• Caste, Class, and Moral Stereotypes Challenged: [46:13–54:33]
• Kingship and The Origin of Evil: [54:40–58:16]
• Divine Models: [58:16–69:26]
• Final Reflections on Dharma: [69:26–70:29]
• Upcoming Work and Goodbye: [70:43–71:47]

Overall Tone and Language

The conversation is lively, nuanced, and rich with both scholarly depth and engaging anecdotes. Doniger’s style remains conversational, witty, and insightful throughout, and Shruti Jain’s questions prompt careful, often playful exploration of complex philosophical ideas.

In Summary: This episode invites listeners to reconsider the nature of dharma as something endlessly complex—full of contradictions, inversions, and challenges, echoed in the Mahabharata's lesser-known tales. Doniger’s interpretations reveal folk, women’s, and lower-caste oral traditions intersecting and subverting elite moral codes, all while demonstrating the text’s fierce, ongoing interrogation of what it means to live morally.