The word SATI has no other esoteric meaning. Sati does not mean a woman whose eyes do not fall on another man; sati means a woman who no longer has the female priciple left within her to look at another man.
If a woman becomes so completely surrendered in love to even an ordinary man,all her four bodies will combine and stand at the doorstep of the fifth. Therefore, it was the women who had been through this experience who said, “The husband is God.” This does not mean that they actually thought that the husband was God; it means that the doors of the fifth opened for them through the medium of the husband. There was no mistake in what they said, it was absolutely correct. What another meditator gains through great effort she obtains easily, through her love. The love for one person alone takes her to that state.
Take the case of Sita in the Ramayana: she belongs to the category of women whom we call sati, meaning a woman of truth and purity. Now Sita’s devotion is unique. From the point of view of surrender she is perfect; her devotion to Rama, her husband, is total. Ravana, who kidnapped Sita, is an incomplete man whereas Sita is a complete woman. The radiance of a complete woman is such that an incomplete man cannot dare to touch her. He cannot even set eyes on her. Only an incomplete woman can be looked at in a sexual way by him.When a man approaches a woman sexually he is not entirely responsible. The incompleteness of the woman is also inevitably responsible. When a man touches a woman sexually in a crowd he is only half responsible. The woman invites it and is equally responsible. She provokes it, invites it, and because she is passive her role in it goes unnoticed. Since the man is active it is very evident that he touched her. But we cannot see the invitation from the other side.
Ravana could not even raise his eyes toward Sita, and Ravana held no meaning for Sita. Yet after the war with Ravana and after rescuing Sita from his captivity, Rama insisted on the fire test for Sita to confirm her purity. Sita did not resist. Had she refused to go through the test she would have lost her position as a sati. She could have insisted that they both pass through the fire test, because although she was alone with another man Rama too was roaming the woods alone – and who knows what women he may have met?
But this question never arose in Sita’s mind. She readily went through the fire test. Had she questioned Rama’s authority even once she would have fallen from her position as a sati, because then the surrender would not have been total; there would have been something slightly lacking in it. And had she raised the question even once and then passed through the fire, she would have been burned.
~ OSHO – In Search of Miraculous