Elephant: An Indian Tale
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The reason every one of you is telling it differently because each one of you touched the different part of the elephant. So, actually the elephant has all those features what you all said. There was no more fight. They felt happy that they were all right. The moral of the story is that there may be some truth to what someone says. Sometimes we can see that truth and sometimes not because they may have different perspective which we may not agree too. So, rather than arguing like the blind men, we should say, "Maybe you have your reasons.
In Jainism, it is explained that truth can be stated in seven different ways. So, you can see how broad our religion is. It teaches us to be tolerant towards others for their viewpoints. This allows us to live in harmony with the people of different thinking.
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Griffiths, this premise is the foundation of universalist perspective behind the parable of the blind men and an elephant. The hymn asserts that the same reality is subject to interpretations and described in various ways by the wise. In this version, they do not fight with each other, but conclude that they each must have perceived a different beast although they experienced the same elephant. Many scholars refer to it as a Hindu parable. The parable or references appear in bhasya commentaries, secondary literature in the Hindu traditions.
Story 6 Blind Men And Also The Elephant (An Indian Tale) |
For example, Adi Shankara mentions it in his bhasya on verse 5. Mallisena uses the parable to argue that immature people deny various aspects of truth; deluded by the aspects they do understand, they deny the aspects they don't understand. This is the maxim of the blind men and the elephant. The Buddha twice uses the simile of blind men led astray. The earliest known version occurs in the text Udana 6.
In the Canki Sutta he describes a row of blind men holding on to each other as an example of those who follow an old text that has passed down from generation to generation. A king has the blind men of the capital brought to the palace, where an elephant is brought in and they are asked to describe it. When the blind men had each felt a part of the elephant, the king went to each of them and said to each: Tell me, what sort of thing is an elephant? The men assert the elephant is either like a pot the blind man who felt the elephant's head , a winnowing basket ear , a plowshare tusk , a plow trunk , a granary body , a pillar foot , a mortar back , a pestle tail or a brush tip of the tail.
The men cannot agree with one another and come to blows over the question of what it is like and their dispute delights the king. The Buddha ends the story by comparing the blind men to preachers and scholars who are blind and ignorant and hold to their own views: In their ignorance they are by nature quarrelsome, wrangling, and disputatious, each maintaining reality is thus and thus. O how they cling and wrangle, some who claim For preacher and monk the honored name!
For, quarreling, each to his view they cling.
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Such folk see only one side of a thing. Rumi , the 13th Century Persian poet and teacher of Sufism, included it in his Masnavi. In his retelling, "The Elephant in the Dark", some Hindus bring an elephant to be exhibited in a dark room.
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A number of men touch and feel the elephant in the dark and, depending upon where they touch it, they believe the elephant to be like a water spout trunk , a fan ear , a pillar leg and a throne back. Rumi uses this story as an example of the limits of individual perception:. The sensual eye is just like the palm of the hand. The palm has not the means of covering the whole of the beast.
The eye of the Sea is one thing and the foam another. Let the foam go, and gaze with the eye of the Sea. Day and night foam-flecks are flung from the sea: You behold the foam but not the Sea. We are like boats dashing together; our eyes are darkened, yet we are in clear water.
The parable of the blind men and an elephant originated in the ancient Indian subcontinent, from where it has been widely diffused. However the meaning of the popular proverb differs in other countries. It is a story of a group of blind men, who have never come across an elephant. A folk tale from India that teaches intercultural awareness by illustrating how different "An elephant must be a powerful giant," claimed the first blind man.
Rumi ends his poem by stating "If each had a candle and they went in together the differences would disappear. Each in his own opinion concludes that the elephant is like a wall, snake, spear, tree, fan or rope, depending upon where they had touched. Their heated debate comes short of physical violence, but the conflict is never resolved.
In Japan, the proverb is used as a simile of circumstance that ordinary men often fail to understand a great man or his great work. The story is seen as a metaphor in many disciplines, being pressed into service as an analogy in fields well beyond the traditional. In physics , it has been seen as an analogy for the wave—particle duality.
The fable is one of a number of tales that cast light on the response of hearers or readers to the story itself.
Idries Shah has commented on this element of self-reference in the many interpretations of the story, and its function as a teaching story:. They then accept or reject them. Now they can feel happy; they have arrived at an opinion about the matter. According to their conditioning they produce the answer. Now look at their answers. Some will say that this is a fascinating and touching allegory of the presence of God.
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Others will say that it is showing people how stupid mankind can be. Some say it is anti-scholastic. Others that it is just a tale copied by Rumi from Sanai — and so on.
The Elephant’s Friend and Other Tales from Ancient India
Shah adapted the tale in his book The Dermis Probe. This version begins with a conference of scientists, from different fields of expertise, presenting their conflicting conclusions on the material upon which a camera is focused. As the camera slowly zooms out it gradually becomes clear that the material under examination is the hide of an African elephant. This retelling formed the script for a short four-minute film by the animator Richard Williams.
The story enjoys a continuing appeal, as shown by the number of illustrated children's books of the fable; there is one for instance by Paul Galdone and another, Seven Blind Mice , by Ed Young In the title cartoon of one of his books, cartoonist Sam Gross postulated that one of the blind men, encountering a pile of the elephant feces, concluded that "An elephant is soft and mushy. An elephant joke inverts the story in the following way:. Six blind elephants were discussing what men were like. After arguing they decided to find one and determine what it was like by direct experience.
The first blind elephant felt the man and declared, 'Men are flat. We have to remember that what we observe is not nature in itself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning. Touching the Elephant was a BBC Radio 4 documentary in which four people of varying ages, all blind from birth, were brought to London Zoo to touch an elephant and describe their response. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Let the foam go, and gaze with the eye of the Sea. We are experiencing technical difficulties. In the title cartoon of one of his books, cartoonist Sam Gross postulated that one of the blind men, encountering a pile of the elephant feces, concluded that "An elephant is soft and mushy. The parable or references appear in bhasya commentaries, secondary literature in the Hindu traditions. The moral of the parable is that humans have a tendency to claim absolute truth based on their limited, subjective experience as they ignore other people's limited, subjective experiences which may be equally true. His mother tells fantastic tales of the wild, before humans captured her and turned her into a domestic animal, but neither she nor the rest of Mr. The reason every one of you is telling it differently because each one of you touched the different part of the elephant.
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