Ishwa helper Reged: 03/03/02 Posts: 553

Re: HOMOSEXUALITY [Re: chetangandhi] #14703 - 04/12/02 07:39 AM Edit Reply Quote

Dear Chetangandhi, The person you are talking about is Il�. She was born as a woman, then became a man Ila-Sudyumna to ge a share in the property of Manu and then again Il� as mother of Pururavas Aila of the Lunar Dynasty. The way it is depicted in the Puranas is very confusing. Of course Il� and Ila were two different persons. Il� and Budha Sauma were the parents of Pururavas, king of Pratishth�na. But Ila-Sudyumna was the father (nothing said about his wife) of three sons named Vinata, Gaya and Utkala, who ruled over those areas in the east and somewhere in the west. (Vinata being a country somewhere in northwestern India). The Puranic tradition didn't know what to do with those two persons in an attempt to link every king or queen with the same Manu tradition. Shikhandin was the name of two persons, one was king Shikhandin Y�jnasena, who lived in the initial period of Kuru power and the second was Shikhandini Y�jnasenii, daughter of Drupada Y�jnasena far later in the end of the Kuru period. We'll find many instances of persons being a male or female in one birth and becoming a male or female again or of the opposite gender for some kind of morality. Or if no one is born a shr�pa or curse is given which has an effect in the same or afterlife. This is just afterwork to explain certain (otherwise for next generations after the incidents inexplicable) narrative aspects.