Have you ever attended an Indian wedding ? If not you should. Personally I believe that Indian weddings are the best cultural experience. These weddings are no less than a festival, lots of colors, decorations, music, dance and tasty food. In India people take this occasion as an opportunity to meet each other they haven’t met from so long, basically it brings families closer. Marriage is an alliance that binds not just two people, but two souls for lifetime and also binds their families. This could also be defined as a mutual contract of lifetime togetherness, and every contract is a promise.
These marriages in is a long process they consist of many rituals, customs. One of which is ‘Saptapadi’ i.e. seven vows or seven steps. These seven vows is an important part of the procedure.
As we all know there are seven days in a week, seven colors in a rainbow also chariot of son’s god is drawn by seven horses.
Saptapadi means seven vows taken by the couple around the holy fire these seven vows are the seven promises made to each other at the time of marriage. Bride asks for seven promises from groom and only after groom accepts them all she sits on left side of groom and marriage proceeds.
During first vow bride demands that her husband won’t make a pilgrimage without her also in every religious and spiritual activity such as fast or visit to religious ceremonies she will be equally participating with his husband. This symbolizes equal participation and equal status of husband and wife.
The second promise she demands equal respect for her parents as her in laws. She wants her husband to treat her parents with same love and respect as he treats his own parents. This symbolizes equal respect, care and love for both the familes.
The third promise she demands is equal care, love and respect in all stages of her life. She wants her husband to support her in every stage of life whether oldage or middle age.
The forth promise is to take responsibility of family’s economic stability.
The fifth promise is to consult her in financial matters of family.
In sixth promise she demands to stay away from bad habits such as gambling and other evils. This symbolizes a healthy for her husband and respect in society. Also she make him promise that he will never insult her in front of others.
In last promise she demands that her husband should consider any other women as her mother or sister and will not engage in any extra marital affair. This symbolizes loyalty and love for his wife.
These promises are made while doing parikrama around a holy fire. This holy fire acts as evidence for their marriage. These promises are made for seven janam that is why it is marriage is known as sath janam ka sath.
Marriage is binding of two souls and not two bodies. Thats the reason it requires a lot of matras and procedures. This energy comes from within the soul couple accept each other from heart and soul, thats the reason marriage is called sath janam ka sath. Souls are eternal but bodies are not.
